(Continuing the snippets. Usual disclaimers apply. Enjoy!)
Basilone Military Academy
New Kilrain, Fuercon
Brigadier General Ashlyn Shaw stood at the window that lined most of the wall behind her desk, her gaze fixed on the parade ground below. The sun slowly rose above the horizon, painting the sky in shades of bronze, orange, and yellow. The buildings surrounding the parade ground cast long shadows across the well-manicured grass. In another minute or two, the color guard would appear to raise the flag, something that never failed to move her. Memories of every battle she fought in, every brother and sister-at-arms she lost fighting to protect that flag and all it represented washed over her. Their deaths still hurt, some more than others. But seeing the cadets marching onto the parade ground reminded her it had been worth it to keep Fuercon and its allies free.
All activity on the parade ground came to a halt as the color guard appeared. Without conscious thought, Ashlyn braced to attention, holding the position as the flag was raised. A slight smile touched her lips as the squad saluted the colors before leaving the field. A moment later, the remaining cadets returned to their activities under the watchful eyes of cadet officers and Academy staff members.
Twelve months.
That’s how long Ashlyn had served as commandant of the Basilone Military Academy. Twelve months of being responsible for overseeing the training of the young cadets who would one day become leaders in their own right. Twelve months of redesigning the curriculum and training for those cadets. Twelve months of doing everything possible to prepare them for their military careers. Hopefully, it was enough to keep most of them alive. Much as she wished all of them would come home alive and well throughout the course of their military careers, she knew the odds. Even without Fuercon being at war, those in the military, especially the Navy and Marines, faced danger every day. Some would be injured. Others would die. No matter how hard she worked to prepare them, there was nothing she could do to prevent it.
But, by all that was holy, she’d do everything she could to make sure no more died than absolutely necessary.
As she watched the cadets drilling, a pang of sadness filled her. Her posting would soon end. When she agreed to take over as commandant, she’d signed on for a year. That had become the norm, giving the new commandant time to settle in—or not. If they settled in and the Academy ran smoothly, the posting was extended. If not—well the last thing FleetCom wanted was to have the Academy helmed by someone either not suited for the position or who didn’t want to be there.
It hadn’t taken long for Ash to realize a year wasn’t enough time to do what she wanted to update the cadets’ training. Now she faced a difficult decision, one she needed to make sooner rather than later. She could ask to have the appointment extended. General Okafor already told her she’d not hesitate to approve the request once made.
If only the decision was that easy. Much as she enjoyed the challenges of running the Academy, Ashlyn felt torn. Over the last few months, she found herself considering a return to active duty. Doing so presented a new set of challenges, starting with convincing not only General Okafor but also FleetCom’s senior medical staff that she was physically and mentally able to return to active duty. The war had taken a heavy toll on her physically. Like most Marines, she’d suffered her fair share of injuries over the course of the war. When the Callusians invaded Fuercon near the end of the war, she’d been trapped in the rubble after a mortar hit a building not far from the FOB. Her right leg had been badly damaged, requiring multiple surgeries so she could walk again. The next several years saw additional surgeries and extensive therapy to rebuild the muscles and nerves of the leg. It took time but a little more than three years after being wounded, she ran her first mile. She didn’t come close to making the time needed to return as a Reservist, but it was a step closer.
Worse than the leg, she also lost her left eye in the battle to drive the Callusians off-planet. The cybernetic replacement she first received gave her more problems than it solved. The doctors never figured out why her body kept trying to reject the implant. None of the other implants she received over the course of her military career showed signs of rejection. Only the eye. Since the end of the war, the doctors tried four other cybernetic eyes. The last one, replaced less than a year ago, saw the doctors implanting the latest generation of cybernetic eyes, one her body didn’t do try to reject.
Thank all that was holy.
Her body might be scarred, but it was once again whole, which was more than so many others could say. There was no reason she physically couldn’t return to active duty, as long as the powers that be signed off on it.
But she knew FleetCom’s medical staff. She knew there were those who still doubted she was emotionally ready to return to duty. They’d had concerns about her taking the leadership of the Academy. She’d spent hours with various shrinks and counsellors, answering their questions and taking their tests. Some couldn’t understand why she wanted to take the position. She’d been on Reserve status for years.
The question was if she really wanted to return to active duty?
The answer was simple: she did. But she needed to be sure Okafor agreed to it—if she did—because she was physically and mentally ready and not because the powers that be felt they owed it to her.
“You can worry about that later. Right now, you have more important things to deal with,” Ash muttered.
With a resolute nod, she turned away from the window and glanced at her schedule currently displayed on one of the holo screens across the room. As she did, she grimaced slightly. With graduation less than a week away, there was still a great deal to do.
Beginning with a demanding, self-important Army general who had yet to understand he didn’t get to tell her how to run the Academy or this year’s graduation ceremony. Somehow, she needed to find a way to tell him to pull his head out of his ass, remember the Army isn’t Fuercon’s only military branch, and that she had no plans to change the order of things for graduation and the commissioning ceremony just to stroke his all too fragile ego. As tempting as it was to take the direct approach, she learned long before accepting this post that the old adage about discretion being the better part of valor was all too true just about everywhere except on the battlefield.
Worse, no matter how tempting it was, she couldn’t hand the matter off to anyone else. She needed to handle the general and do so in a way that didn’t see him filing an official grievance against her.
Hell, no matter how carefully she dealt with him, he would still complain.
Shaking off her thoughts, Ash turned back to the window and the parade ground below. Sgt. Major Edita Anisimova, the Academy’s senior NCO, stood at the head of a formation of cadets. Ashlyn reached over and touched a stud, so small it was almost unnoticeable, next to the window. A moment later, Anisimova’s voice, sharp and commanding as she barked out orders, filled the office. The blonde, who many underestimated because of her small stature despite her years in the Corps, moved with a natural authority that commanded respect from those around her. As Ash continued to watch, Anisimova suddenly stopped moving down the line of the front rank. Her head snapped to the far side of the formation. A moment later, she spun and broke into a run, her stride eating up the ground as she sprinted the length of the field in less time than most of the much younger cadets could manage.
Ash couldn’t hear what the Sgt. Major said as she stopped abruptly in front of a first-year cadet and got in their face, but she didn’t need to. From the young man’s suddenly very stiff spine to the way Anisimova leaned in, it was clear that she was reading the cadet the proverbial riot act. Then, as suddenly as she spun and ran in his direction, Anisimova turned on her heel and returned to the front of the formation. She pivoted sharply and addressed the assembled cadets, her voice carrying through the speaker into Ashlyn’s office.
“Listen up, cadets. I am going to say this one time and one time only. Saturday’s ceremony will not be marred by any pranks, any jokes, or any attempts, intentional or not, to break protocol. I do not care what the reasoning for such actions might be. I do not care if the person these pranks are aimed at is your best friend, your brother, or your sister. If I get so much as a hint of something about to go down, I promise you will be cleaning latrines for the rest of your time at the Academy and, trust me on this, that time will be very brief no matter what your class standing happens to be.
“Once I’m done with you, Captain Hernandez will have a go at you. Trust me, she and I will only be the warmup acts for what General Shaw will do. There will be no graduation from the Academy for anyone foolish enough to violate the regs. There will be no commissioning ceremony for that person either and, if I have my way, there will be no military service, not even as a civilian consultant, for anyone involved for the rest of their lives. Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes, Sergeant Major!” the cadets answered in unison.
“Good. Now, company commanders, on my order, your cadets are to fall out to the staging area. We are going to repeat the entrance until we get it right. I don’t care if you have finals scheduled for first period. Let the possibility of being late be motivation to quit jacking around and actually follow orders for a change. Understood?”
“Yes, Sergeant Major!”
Ashlyn watched as Anisimova gave the gathered cadets one last hard look before giving the command to return to their original positions. Satisfied she had things well in hand, Ash returned to her desk and took a seat, her fingers drumming absently on the polished wood. She could leave this phase of the preparations to Anisimova and the others. They would make sure everything was ready for her review the next day. That was good, because she already had more than enough on her plate and not enough hours in the day to get it all done between now and graduation.
The sudden chirp of her comm a short time later interrupted her musings.
“Shaw.”
“Good morning, Ash. I figured I’d find you in your office already.”
Ashlyn smiled and leaned back in her chair, welcoming the sound of the warm, soothing voice. “Hey, Mom. You’re up early.”
“Isn’t that a bit like the pot calling the kettle black?” Lt. General Elizabeth Shaw, commanding officer of the Seventh Marine Corps Division, asked.
“Where do you think I learned it from?” When Elizabeth laughed in response, Ash chuckled softly. “Where are you?” From the background of the image on her comm, she couldn’t be certain.
“On my way to the office. I have a number of meetings this morning and wanted to get an early start.”
That didn’t surprise Ashlyn. Her mother was nothing if not dedicated. For as long as she could remember, Elizabeth set the example by doing her best for the family, for the Corps, and for Fuercon. It really hit home for Ash after she and members of her command had been falsely convicted and sentenced to the penal colony on Tarsus. After President Harper pardoned them, Ash learned her mother had been beached for not only being vocal in support of her daughter but in working to do all she could to clear Ashlyn’s name. Since then, Elizabeth had once again dedicated herself to the Corps and keeping Fuercon safe.
“Anyway, I wanted to check with you about this weekend, Ash. I know you’re up to your neck with graduation preparations.”
“I am.” There was no sense denying it, especially when her mother knew first-hand what the week before graduation was like. “But I haven’t forgotten about Sunday. Promise.” There wasn’t a chance in Hell she’d forget her parents’ anniversary and the plans she and her siblings made to help celebrate.
“I never thought you had.” Elizabeth smiled and then muted her comm for a moment as she listened to something her driver said. “Sorry, Ash. You know how it is.”
“I do. Have you talked with the others?”
“I have. Kate and the kids will be here tonight. Your brothers and their families are getting in over the next day or two.”
“And you and Dad are thrilled because the whole family is going to be together.”
Something that didn’t happen very often since her brothers were still on active duty and Sandy’s work as a planetary geologist often took her away from Fuercon.
“Of course, we are.”
“Do you know if Dad’s confirmed our dinner reservations?” The only reason she hadn’t done so herself was because her father insisted. He wanted to make special arrangements with the restaurant for her mother’s favorite dessert to be served. For some reason, he didn’t believe any of their grown children could do it.
“He has. He said to tell you everything’s all set.”
Ashlyn didn’t doubt it for a moment. Very little got past Abe Shaw, especially when it had anything to do with his family. “Tell him I’ll check in later today to see what I can do to help with the last-minute preparations.”
“I will, but you might want to give him a call yourself. I have a feeling he has something up his sleeve and I’d really prefer not being too surprised,” Elizabeth said.
Ashlyn chuckled, knowing her mother was right. “Mom, you know he’s going to do what he wants, no matter what I say.”
“I do and he’s more excited about everyone being home this weekend than I am.”
“It will be good to have everyone together for a change.”
They’d been lucky. So many families lost fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters in the war. She hadn’t been the only one of their family to be seriously injured. Fortunately, they all came home at the end of the war. Now they were returning home once again. This time bringing with them a new generation. Hopefully, one that wouldn’t face the hardships of war.
“It will.”
Elizabeth fell silent. Then, hearing her sigh, Ashlyn braced herself. She knew that sigh. Her mother wanted to talk about something she suspected Ash might not want to discuss.
“Ash, I don’t want to pressure you, but have you given any thought to what you’re going to do after graduation? Your billet at the Academy ends in eight weeks. Okafor’s going to want your decision soon.”
“I know, Mom.”
“Ash, I’m serious. I’m not going to push you on this, at least not too much.” She grinned again, her eyes shining mischievously. “But if there’s anything I can do to help, I hope you’ll let me know.”
“I know, Mom, and I promise we’ll talk about it after this weekend.” Maybe she’d even have an idea what she wanted to do by then. “Right now, I’ve got so much on my plate, it’s all I can do to keep my head above water. But I promise I’m keeping my options open.”
“Including returning to active duty?”
Ashlyn heard the note of hope in her mother’s voice and smiled slightly. Not once since the end of the war had Elizabeth or anyone else in the family or in Ash’s circle of close friends pressured her to return to duty. The few times she’d asked why, they told her she’d done more than enough already for the Corps and for Fuercon. She’d earned time to heal, to rest. . .frankly, to enjoy life. When she’d been ready both physically and mentally to accept a position in the Reserves, the powers that be ensured she did so at her rank at the end of the war. They promised she would not have to leave the planet unless she wanted to. That let her spend time with Jake, something she desperately wanted and needed. Later, they offered her current posting and she’d accepted without too much hesitation.
While she enjoyed the challenges it presented, she found herself wondering more and more frequently if it was time to find something else to do.
“Yes, Mom, I’m keeping all options, including returning to active duty, open.”
Silence seemed to draw out between them, and Ashlyn fought the urge to fidget in her chair as she waited for her mother to say something.
“Ash, I won’t lie and say I wouldn’t welcome you back with open arms. But I also don’t want to pressure you into making that, or any, decision.” Elizabeth spoke softly, gently. “Weigh all your options. Then decide what’s best for you—not what you think the rest of us want of or for you.”
“Thanks, Mom.” She checked the time and winced slightly. “I hate to say it, but I’ve got to run. Talk to you tonight?”
“Of course. Talk to you later.”
Ashlyn sat back and took a moment to gather her thoughts. Then she turned her attention to the email she received from General Marcus Gataki the night before. Now she needed to deal with him, hopefully in a way that wouldn’t end with him trying to bring her up on charges of insubordination. After all, one simply didn’t tell the Commanding General of Fuercon’s Army to go fuck himself, no matter how tempting it might be.
(chapter to be continued in the next post—ASG)