Guilty Gear fic: Chain of Command - Part 3
Finished!
Title: Chain of Command
Part: 3/3
Summary: Ky didn't become commander of the Holy Order at sixteen without leaving a story or two behind him along the way.
Genre: despite all velithya's attempts to retitle it. XD Gen
Rating: PG
Words: 3290
Previous parts: Part 1, Part 2
Notes:
(Yeah, more notes - it’s turning into that kind of fic ^^;) Most of the stuff about promotion in the Holy Order here is my attempt at incorporating what I could puzzle out of a couple of pages in the Guilty Gear Bible on the subject. Of course, this may have been a bit of wasted effort on my part given that I can’t find anything online to suggest anyone else has ever translated them before or would have any way of knowing whether I’ve gotten it right or wrong. Still, it saved me on a bit of Making Stuff Up to fill the gaps, and hopefully I’ll be able to get around to getting my notes in enough order to be worth posting myself at some stage - there’s some interesting stuff in there.
No number of investigations after the fact would ever discover whether the simultaneous Gear counter-attack on the Holy Order's light sources had been coordinated or merely coincidence. Even had they found out, it would have been no help to the men on the ground that night, plunged suddenly into a darkness filled with wave after wave of monsters which could be heard but barely seen. For the senior officers who should have been directing their men, the night became an unending struggle to get the lights relit as fast as they were taken out. And for Ky's unit, long periods passed with only the illumination of their own magical fire to see by. Any attempt to produce a longer lasting light of their own only made the caster into a target.
When the sun finally rose over the battlefield many hours later, nothing in the scene it illuminated brought any comfort.
***
The battle of Rio Mera Valley would officially go down in the records as a victory, in that the Gear force had been all but wiped out, but the toll on the Holy Order’s side had been horrific. Less than a third of the fourth battalion now remained fit for combat, and barely a third of the remainder would ever be again. Sol had been right - the Gears would fight until one side or the other had been annihilated.
Ky had too much time and too little to do with it when the surviving troops made it home. By virtue of being one of the lucky few who had come away with no worse than minor injuries, but with no command rank and no skills the medical division could make use of, he was quickly relegated to a category no-one wanted to know about. He tried going for a walk to stop himself from brooding, but the place was too quiet; even areas of the complex which he knew objectively were always empty at this time of the day felt empty for the wrong reasons. The concept of survivor’s guilt had taken on a new and personal meaning in the past hours. Reminding himself that there had been nothing else he could have done was cold comfort - it didn’t lessen the number of men who had died.
When a messenger was sent to look for him twenty-four hours after their army’s return to base, Ky was found in the garden to the south of the headquarters. He looked up guiltily at the sound of his name.
“Yes, that’s me,” he told the messenger, uncomfortably aware of exactly where he would have been expected to be at this time of day under less extraordinary circumstances.
“The commander wants to see you,” the man told him without preamble, “and he made it sound urgent.”
There was only one person in the Order who was referred to by that title, but the idea that he would personally want to speak to someone as low ranked as Ky at a time like this was so foreign that it took several moments for it to register what the man was talking about. “Comm… Sir Kliff wants… but why would he…?”
“Didn’t say, I’m just the messenger,” said the man. “But I wouldn’t keep him waiting.”
That much was beyond argument.
Ky was very nearly too distracted to remember the way. It wasn’t too far fetched to believe word of his actions during the last battle had reached the commander’s ears, and Ky was again uncomfortably aware that what he had done had involved disobedience of a direct order, but it would be unbelievable that he’d deserve an official reprimand given the surrounding circumstances - let alone one from the very top of the command chain. Even if the opposite was true, that he’d earned some commendation, it made so sense that he’d learn of it in such a way. With so many officers killed or wounded in battle, it was possible they were in a position to take reports from anyone left who could stand, but even that seemed insufficient to warrant his being personally singled out like this. Ky didn’t have any real hope of guessing what this could be about.
In his short lifetime he’d met Kliff Underson only twice, both times briefly, and that was already more than many soldiers would see of him in person in their entire military careers. That first meeting when a ten year old Ky had happened upon Kliff by chance on the edge of a battlefield barely counted, however, when the prescribed five years was up and he returned to join the Order officially, he was pleasantly surprised to discover that his younger self had made enough of an impression for his name to be remembered and recognised. It had seemed presumptuous even to ask to speak with the commander directly when he’d gone to sign up, but his request had been granted and it had paid off. Kliff had expressed more surprise that the five years had passed so quickly than that Ky should have taken his words so seriously as to seek him out in person, then he’d grinned and declared aloud that he’d look forward to seeing whether Ky would live up to the determination he’d shown back then.
Ky had left with the pleasantly odd feeling he’d passed a test he hadn’t known he was taking.
It was unlikely that Kliff would get many chances to see Ky in action on the battlefield first hand though. He’d always been the sort of commander who led from the front, and even in his advancing years his skill with that giant axe was legendary. However, as the years of the crusades dragged on into decades without Kliff showing the slightest sign of slowing down or passing any of his tasks on to underlings, certain influential figures in the UN were becoming increasingly uncomfortable about someone as old and important as Kliff risking himself on the front lines more often than necessary. The Holy Order might be his army in name, but as long as he wanted to keep his men fed and supplied, there was a limit to how much ‘advice’ from higher up he could afford to ignore. These days he spent increasing portions of his time in an office at headquarters, trapped behind a much detested pile of paperwork. Reliable rumour had it that just as soon as he found a successor he was satisfied with, he’d be retiring from the position for good.
There were three assorted senior officers and secretaries between Ky and the commander’s office, all of whom waved him through quickly after hearing his name. Finally, he found himself knocking politely and nervously on the appropriate door.
“Come in,” called a familiar, gruff voice. As soon as the door opened to bring commander and soldier into each other’s view, the voice amended, “Kiske? Took your time.”
“I’m sorry sir,” said Ky automatically. It had been barely ten minutes since he’d received the message, but it didn’t seem likely that Kliff wanted excuses.
The office was not elaborately furnished, being decorated only with a few tasteful eastern-styled ornaments, richly exotic against the contrast of so much classic European architecture. To the left of a neat set of shelves holding small collection of delicate Japanese teacups, two sturdy looking hooks had been hammered into the far wall. These were designed to hold the giant battle axe Sir Kliff wielded in battle, though the weapon itself had been propped up pointedly below them where it could be more easily accessed in a hurry. The Dragonslayer was not an ornamental piece, and Kliff would make sure the world knew it. The desk was indeed covered in papers divided into piles which Ky guessed would be for documents which were urgent and important, documents which could be lost for a few days without disaster, and documents which their owner was strenuously trying to ignore. The important pile was stacked high today, the few that were visible on the top all dated within the last forty-eight hours.
Kliff reached for one of those nearest to hand. “I’ve been hearing some interesting reports on your performance at Rio Mera.”
It wasn’t that far from what Ky had been expecting. “Sir, I realise my actions were in contradictions with our orders. However, in the circumstances…”
“At ease, soldier,” Kliff growled before he could get any further. He sounded worn out and short tempered, it seemed unthinkable that he’d had even as much sleep in the last twenty four hours as the few fitful winks Ky could boast. Even being spared the scene of the battle could hardly have lightened the burden of this affair.
“I didn’t have people looking for you for an hour so I could lecture you about procedure. Following orders put more than two divisions out of action yesterday. Your unit was the only one on the front line that didn’t run for it and still came back with enough men to deserve that description. If this is where it gets me, I need men to ignore orders more often.” While Ky was still reassembling his thoughts around this new information, the commander added, “But it sounds like you had some problems with those orders from the start, hm?”
After all that had transpired, the news that Ky’s outburst during the briefing had reached Kliff’s ears was no more than a momentary surprise. “Yes, sir.”
“Well? Don’t keep me in suspense. I want to hear what you thought these big flaws in your orders might have been.”
Ky took a deep breath. “Sir, I believe it was an error to attempt to flank the gear force from both sides simultaneously. The firepower to defeat heavy class gears requires high level magic, which our men could not risk for fear of overshooting and hitting our own soldiers. In addition, in a battle against such opponents, maintaining our hold on the high ground offered very little advantage, as…”
“Alright, that’s enough,” said Kliff, cutting him off again. “I can see you know what you’re talking about, and you’ve more than proven yourself on the battlefield, and that’s good enough for me. I need a new captain and you’ll do.”
“S…sir?”
“It’s called a field promotion, Kiske, I’m sure you’ve heard of them,” Kliff answered impatiently. “Not even the regulations I’m saddled with forbid me the right to grant that in an emergency - and if that’s not what this is, I don’t want to know what ever will be.”
“Me? But sir, I’m…” There were too many obvious objections for Ky to even decide on one to voice. Promotion in the Order was a straightforward business. If you weren’t flagged as officer material the day you signed up, you might as well resign yourself to being addressed as ‘private’ forever. If you were, then you’d get officer status if and when a position opened up above, if and when half a dozen clerks were done reviewing the very brief performance records provided to them for yourself and whoever else was eligible. Up until that day it didn’t matter how you behaved, no-one above had the time to care. Heroics in the right context were encouraged in a general sort of way, but nothing ever went beyond that. Even a civilian would know that promoting a teenager with barely a few months of military experience all the way to captain was absurd.
“Did you have someone better in mind?” asked Kliff, the exhaustion in his voice nearly overriding even the impatience. “The best thing I can say for Captain Stavell’s idea of a plan is that he stayed to see his own insanity through, and he won’t be coming back unless someone finds the pieces. I don’t have so much as lieutenant in your division who’ll be fit for active duty within two months. The only man to show any leadership in this mess was a recruit who stands up in briefings, questions orders and gives his own when he doesn’t like the ones he’s got, so I’m promoting him as high as I can get away with before he shows up any more of his superiors.” He raised an eyebrow in Ky’s direction. “Any objections?”
In short, Ky realised hotly, he was being given exactly what he had been asking for. “No, sir.”
“Good!” Kliff barked, returning to his papers to stamp something in a final sort of way. “Just don’t expect to be doing too much captaining any time soon. Your battalion will be grounded until we find you enough men to make putting that airship back in the sky worth the effort. May as well make the most of the chance to get used to your new office.” He paused, looked up again at Ky in a significant sort of way. “That will be all, Captain Kiske. You’re dismissed.”
Ky was starting to find that wandering around the complex in a daze was becoming a familiar sensation.
***
The issue of breaking the news to the men that the best replacement captain who could be found was a fifteen year old boy turned out to be a non-issue, reason being that news of Ky’s performance in that fateful battle had got around. The Holy Order’s high command were not in the habit of offering public excuses for unlikely appointments, but they didn’t need to, the story spread with a life of its own. By the time it had completed its rounds, it had been retold and exaggerated to the point that one could have been forgiven for believing that the fact any sort of victory had been possible was thanks to the actions of one newly recruited soldier. A ‘hero’ to men in a war as long and desperate as this one was just about anyone they could latch on to, and popular opinion latched on to their new prodigy of a captain fast. Ky’s first appearances in his new uniform drew cheers from men who would not have recognised him hours before. The stories which made the full round back to Ky’s ears again grew so wild that he seriously considered making an official announcement just to set the record straight, but (in what would never be recorded as the first really good leadership decision he’d ever make) he thought better of it. It didn’t seem like captainly behaviour.
The whole promotion affair had been too easy, if anything, Ky mused, watching from the upper balcony over the airship’s main hold as a new shipment of supplies was unloaded and carried away. That, or their continuing inactive status had given him too much time to think about it over the last couple of days.
Either way, hearing some honest disagreement was actually more refreshing than he would ever have expected.
“So now I’m in an army made out of kids and lead by kids? Well, fuck.”
Ky had not seen Sol coming up the stairs, but even if he hadn’t recognised the voice he couldn’t have mistaken the sentiment. He looked up in time to see the Order’s least obedient recruit coming to lean on the balcony a few feet away from him.
In many ways, dealing with Sol was a part of his job which Ky would get worse at rather than better over the years that followed. The man grated on him so badly it could only have been a deliberate effort to rile him, so much so that they would eventually reach the point that any communication between them that didn’t dissolve into some kind of argument would be a very rare thing. But now, Ky had yet to become accustomed enough to his newly granted authority to expect to be given respect, however grudging, and had not yet stopped expecting to have to answer for his success. “Certainly, I was surprised by the commander’s decision. But if he believes I am the best man for the position, all I can do is trust his judgement and see that I don’t disappoint him.”
“Hah,” Sol muttered, unmoved as usual. “’Least you coulda learnt from that mess was when not to go blindly trusting the guys upstairs.”
“This was a command that came directly from the founder of the Order,” Ky reminded him. Sol’s unapologetic disrespect for that position was already starting to irritate him. “Even our leaders will occasionally make mistakes, but if we can’t put our trust in Commander Undersn, then what good is the Order at all? Who else under God am I to put my faith in?”
Sol rolled his eyes. “Another religious nut. It gets better and better.” Ignoring Ky’s glare, he went on, “And to hear some of the stories going around, this lot already think you’re the next Messiah.”
Ky had heard some of those stories, enough to have no desire to hear any more that might be emerging and was starting to regret his decision not to publicly deny them.
“Much the same seems to be true of you,” he countered. “The stories I’ve heard claim you were the only man from your unit to make it back alive, and yet reports say the enemy still lost troops faster from your quarter than any other location on the battlefield.”
“Oh? That the story?” said Sol, sounding amused, though he showed no interest in setting the record straight, whatever the reality might have been.
“It seems strange you’ve never been promoted,” said Ky, feeling bold again. “I’ve heard nothing but praise for your skills, and you seem to understand the mechanics of combat better than many men here do.”
Sol coughed out a laugh. “Hell will freeze over before any of this lot dream of promoting me.”
Ky experienced a momentary impulse to recommend Sol for promotion himself, just to be contrary. He had that authority, as the new captain, and they were in need of new officers, but he had to admit his motives for doing so seemed questionable, even to himself. As a first act after receiving his new rank, it did not seem especially wise.
“I have to admit, I have difficulty understanding why a man like yourself joined the Order in the first place. You have little enough respect for it.”
“Good question. Why indeed.” Sol frowned, and Ky guessed that Sol was in truth not certain himself what had made him agree. “The old man was pretty determined to get me to sign up. And if I’m going to be hunting Gears anyway, might as well do it somewhere the meals and transport are free.”
This was war. An organisation like the Order hardly had the luxury to be picky about the attitudes of men who had the skills to fight it. Ky supposed that men like Sol would be one of those things he’d have to learn to deal with, which only went to show how little idea he had.
The moment of quiet reflection was broken by Sol looking over the balcony and saying, “So this is captaining for you? Standing around watching everyone else do the work?”
“It’s hardly a task they need direction for,” Ky pointed out. “Until we have enough men fit for battle to fill more than half the ship’s capacity, I won’t have much more than the most routine duties. I’ve had more time than I have anything to do with.” Even training sessions were barely beginning to start up again, though Ky recognised those would work rather differently for officers than for ordinary soldiers. His body was starting to itch from the lack of exercise.
He gave Sol a long, thoughtful look, a new possibility occurring to him. “Can I interest you in a sparring match?”
ETA: On to the Epilogue
Title: Chain of Command
Part: 3/3
Summary: Ky didn't become commander of the Holy Order at sixteen without leaving a story or two behind him along the way.
Genre: despite all velithya's attempts to retitle it. XD Gen
Rating: PG
Words: 3290
Previous parts: Part 1, Part 2
Notes:
(Yeah, more notes - it’s turning into that kind of fic ^^;) Most of the stuff about promotion in the Holy Order here is my attempt at incorporating what I could puzzle out of a couple of pages in the Guilty Gear Bible on the subject. Of course, this may have been a bit of wasted effort on my part given that I can’t find anything online to suggest anyone else has ever translated them before or would have any way of knowing whether I’ve gotten it right or wrong. Still, it saved me on a bit of Making Stuff Up to fill the gaps, and hopefully I’ll be able to get around to getting my notes in enough order to be worth posting myself at some stage - there’s some interesting stuff in there.
No number of investigations after the fact would ever discover whether the simultaneous Gear counter-attack on the Holy Order's light sources had been coordinated or merely coincidence. Even had they found out, it would have been no help to the men on the ground that night, plunged suddenly into a darkness filled with wave after wave of monsters which could be heard but barely seen. For the senior officers who should have been directing their men, the night became an unending struggle to get the lights relit as fast as they were taken out. And for Ky's unit, long periods passed with only the illumination of their own magical fire to see by. Any attempt to produce a longer lasting light of their own only made the caster into a target.
When the sun finally rose over the battlefield many hours later, nothing in the scene it illuminated brought any comfort.
***
The battle of Rio Mera Valley would officially go down in the records as a victory, in that the Gear force had been all but wiped out, but the toll on the Holy Order’s side had been horrific. Less than a third of the fourth battalion now remained fit for combat, and barely a third of the remainder would ever be again. Sol had been right - the Gears would fight until one side or the other had been annihilated.
Ky had too much time and too little to do with it when the surviving troops made it home. By virtue of being one of the lucky few who had come away with no worse than minor injuries, but with no command rank and no skills the medical division could make use of, he was quickly relegated to a category no-one wanted to know about. He tried going for a walk to stop himself from brooding, but the place was too quiet; even areas of the complex which he knew objectively were always empty at this time of the day felt empty for the wrong reasons. The concept of survivor’s guilt had taken on a new and personal meaning in the past hours. Reminding himself that there had been nothing else he could have done was cold comfort - it didn’t lessen the number of men who had died.
When a messenger was sent to look for him twenty-four hours after their army’s return to base, Ky was found in the garden to the south of the headquarters. He looked up guiltily at the sound of his name.
“Yes, that’s me,” he told the messenger, uncomfortably aware of exactly where he would have been expected to be at this time of day under less extraordinary circumstances.
“The commander wants to see you,” the man told him without preamble, “and he made it sound urgent.”
There was only one person in the Order who was referred to by that title, but the idea that he would personally want to speak to someone as low ranked as Ky at a time like this was so foreign that it took several moments for it to register what the man was talking about. “Comm… Sir Kliff wants… but why would he…?”
“Didn’t say, I’m just the messenger,” said the man. “But I wouldn’t keep him waiting.”
That much was beyond argument.
Ky was very nearly too distracted to remember the way. It wasn’t too far fetched to believe word of his actions during the last battle had reached the commander’s ears, and Ky was again uncomfortably aware that what he had done had involved disobedience of a direct order, but it would be unbelievable that he’d deserve an official reprimand given the surrounding circumstances - let alone one from the very top of the command chain. Even if the opposite was true, that he’d earned some commendation, it made so sense that he’d learn of it in such a way. With so many officers killed or wounded in battle, it was possible they were in a position to take reports from anyone left who could stand, but even that seemed insufficient to warrant his being personally singled out like this. Ky didn’t have any real hope of guessing what this could be about.
In his short lifetime he’d met Kliff Underson only twice, both times briefly, and that was already more than many soldiers would see of him in person in their entire military careers. That first meeting when a ten year old Ky had happened upon Kliff by chance on the edge of a battlefield barely counted, however, when the prescribed five years was up and he returned to join the Order officially, he was pleasantly surprised to discover that his younger self had made enough of an impression for his name to be remembered and recognised. It had seemed presumptuous even to ask to speak with the commander directly when he’d gone to sign up, but his request had been granted and it had paid off. Kliff had expressed more surprise that the five years had passed so quickly than that Ky should have taken his words so seriously as to seek him out in person, then he’d grinned and declared aloud that he’d look forward to seeing whether Ky would live up to the determination he’d shown back then.
Ky had left with the pleasantly odd feeling he’d passed a test he hadn’t known he was taking.
It was unlikely that Kliff would get many chances to see Ky in action on the battlefield first hand though. He’d always been the sort of commander who led from the front, and even in his advancing years his skill with that giant axe was legendary. However, as the years of the crusades dragged on into decades without Kliff showing the slightest sign of slowing down or passing any of his tasks on to underlings, certain influential figures in the UN were becoming increasingly uncomfortable about someone as old and important as Kliff risking himself on the front lines more often than necessary. The Holy Order might be his army in name, but as long as he wanted to keep his men fed and supplied, there was a limit to how much ‘advice’ from higher up he could afford to ignore. These days he spent increasing portions of his time in an office at headquarters, trapped behind a much detested pile of paperwork. Reliable rumour had it that just as soon as he found a successor he was satisfied with, he’d be retiring from the position for good.
There were three assorted senior officers and secretaries between Ky and the commander’s office, all of whom waved him through quickly after hearing his name. Finally, he found himself knocking politely and nervously on the appropriate door.
“Come in,” called a familiar, gruff voice. As soon as the door opened to bring commander and soldier into each other’s view, the voice amended, “Kiske? Took your time.”
“I’m sorry sir,” said Ky automatically. It had been barely ten minutes since he’d received the message, but it didn’t seem likely that Kliff wanted excuses.
The office was not elaborately furnished, being decorated only with a few tasteful eastern-styled ornaments, richly exotic against the contrast of so much classic European architecture. To the left of a neat set of shelves holding small collection of delicate Japanese teacups, two sturdy looking hooks had been hammered into the far wall. These were designed to hold the giant battle axe Sir Kliff wielded in battle, though the weapon itself had been propped up pointedly below them where it could be more easily accessed in a hurry. The Dragonslayer was not an ornamental piece, and Kliff would make sure the world knew it. The desk was indeed covered in papers divided into piles which Ky guessed would be for documents which were urgent and important, documents which could be lost for a few days without disaster, and documents which their owner was strenuously trying to ignore. The important pile was stacked high today, the few that were visible on the top all dated within the last forty-eight hours.
Kliff reached for one of those nearest to hand. “I’ve been hearing some interesting reports on your performance at Rio Mera.”
It wasn’t that far from what Ky had been expecting. “Sir, I realise my actions were in contradictions with our orders. However, in the circumstances…”
“At ease, soldier,” Kliff growled before he could get any further. He sounded worn out and short tempered, it seemed unthinkable that he’d had even as much sleep in the last twenty four hours as the few fitful winks Ky could boast. Even being spared the scene of the battle could hardly have lightened the burden of this affair.
“I didn’t have people looking for you for an hour so I could lecture you about procedure. Following orders put more than two divisions out of action yesterday. Your unit was the only one on the front line that didn’t run for it and still came back with enough men to deserve that description. If this is where it gets me, I need men to ignore orders more often.” While Ky was still reassembling his thoughts around this new information, the commander added, “But it sounds like you had some problems with those orders from the start, hm?”
After all that had transpired, the news that Ky’s outburst during the briefing had reached Kliff’s ears was no more than a momentary surprise. “Yes, sir.”
“Well? Don’t keep me in suspense. I want to hear what you thought these big flaws in your orders might have been.”
Ky took a deep breath. “Sir, I believe it was an error to attempt to flank the gear force from both sides simultaneously. The firepower to defeat heavy class gears requires high level magic, which our men could not risk for fear of overshooting and hitting our own soldiers. In addition, in a battle against such opponents, maintaining our hold on the high ground offered very little advantage, as…”
“Alright, that’s enough,” said Kliff, cutting him off again. “I can see you know what you’re talking about, and you’ve more than proven yourself on the battlefield, and that’s good enough for me. I need a new captain and you’ll do.”
“S…sir?”
“It’s called a field promotion, Kiske, I’m sure you’ve heard of them,” Kliff answered impatiently. “Not even the regulations I’m saddled with forbid me the right to grant that in an emergency - and if that’s not what this is, I don’t want to know what ever will be.”
“Me? But sir, I’m…” There were too many obvious objections for Ky to even decide on one to voice. Promotion in the Order was a straightforward business. If you weren’t flagged as officer material the day you signed up, you might as well resign yourself to being addressed as ‘private’ forever. If you were, then you’d get officer status if and when a position opened up above, if and when half a dozen clerks were done reviewing the very brief performance records provided to them for yourself and whoever else was eligible. Up until that day it didn’t matter how you behaved, no-one above had the time to care. Heroics in the right context were encouraged in a general sort of way, but nothing ever went beyond that. Even a civilian would know that promoting a teenager with barely a few months of military experience all the way to captain was absurd.
“Did you have someone better in mind?” asked Kliff, the exhaustion in his voice nearly overriding even the impatience. “The best thing I can say for Captain Stavell’s idea of a plan is that he stayed to see his own insanity through, and he won’t be coming back unless someone finds the pieces. I don’t have so much as lieutenant in your division who’ll be fit for active duty within two months. The only man to show any leadership in this mess was a recruit who stands up in briefings, questions orders and gives his own when he doesn’t like the ones he’s got, so I’m promoting him as high as I can get away with before he shows up any more of his superiors.” He raised an eyebrow in Ky’s direction. “Any objections?”
In short, Ky realised hotly, he was being given exactly what he had been asking for. “No, sir.”
“Good!” Kliff barked, returning to his papers to stamp something in a final sort of way. “Just don’t expect to be doing too much captaining any time soon. Your battalion will be grounded until we find you enough men to make putting that airship back in the sky worth the effort. May as well make the most of the chance to get used to your new office.” He paused, looked up again at Ky in a significant sort of way. “That will be all, Captain Kiske. You’re dismissed.”
Ky was starting to find that wandering around the complex in a daze was becoming a familiar sensation.
***
The issue of breaking the news to the men that the best replacement captain who could be found was a fifteen year old boy turned out to be a non-issue, reason being that news of Ky’s performance in that fateful battle had got around. The Holy Order’s high command were not in the habit of offering public excuses for unlikely appointments, but they didn’t need to, the story spread with a life of its own. By the time it had completed its rounds, it had been retold and exaggerated to the point that one could have been forgiven for believing that the fact any sort of victory had been possible was thanks to the actions of one newly recruited soldier. A ‘hero’ to men in a war as long and desperate as this one was just about anyone they could latch on to, and popular opinion latched on to their new prodigy of a captain fast. Ky’s first appearances in his new uniform drew cheers from men who would not have recognised him hours before. The stories which made the full round back to Ky’s ears again grew so wild that he seriously considered making an official announcement just to set the record straight, but (in what would never be recorded as the first really good leadership decision he’d ever make) he thought better of it. It didn’t seem like captainly behaviour.
The whole promotion affair had been too easy, if anything, Ky mused, watching from the upper balcony over the airship’s main hold as a new shipment of supplies was unloaded and carried away. That, or their continuing inactive status had given him too much time to think about it over the last couple of days.
Either way, hearing some honest disagreement was actually more refreshing than he would ever have expected.
“So now I’m in an army made out of kids and lead by kids? Well, fuck.”
Ky had not seen Sol coming up the stairs, but even if he hadn’t recognised the voice he couldn’t have mistaken the sentiment. He looked up in time to see the Order’s least obedient recruit coming to lean on the balcony a few feet away from him.
In many ways, dealing with Sol was a part of his job which Ky would get worse at rather than better over the years that followed. The man grated on him so badly it could only have been a deliberate effort to rile him, so much so that they would eventually reach the point that any communication between them that didn’t dissolve into some kind of argument would be a very rare thing. But now, Ky had yet to become accustomed enough to his newly granted authority to expect to be given respect, however grudging, and had not yet stopped expecting to have to answer for his success. “Certainly, I was surprised by the commander’s decision. But if he believes I am the best man for the position, all I can do is trust his judgement and see that I don’t disappoint him.”
“Hah,” Sol muttered, unmoved as usual. “’Least you coulda learnt from that mess was when not to go blindly trusting the guys upstairs.”
“This was a command that came directly from the founder of the Order,” Ky reminded him. Sol’s unapologetic disrespect for that position was already starting to irritate him. “Even our leaders will occasionally make mistakes, but if we can’t put our trust in Commander Undersn, then what good is the Order at all? Who else under God am I to put my faith in?”
Sol rolled his eyes. “Another religious nut. It gets better and better.” Ignoring Ky’s glare, he went on, “And to hear some of the stories going around, this lot already think you’re the next Messiah.”
Ky had heard some of those stories, enough to have no desire to hear any more that might be emerging and was starting to regret his decision not to publicly deny them.
“Much the same seems to be true of you,” he countered. “The stories I’ve heard claim you were the only man from your unit to make it back alive, and yet reports say the enemy still lost troops faster from your quarter than any other location on the battlefield.”
“Oh? That the story?” said Sol, sounding amused, though he showed no interest in setting the record straight, whatever the reality might have been.
“It seems strange you’ve never been promoted,” said Ky, feeling bold again. “I’ve heard nothing but praise for your skills, and you seem to understand the mechanics of combat better than many men here do.”
Sol coughed out a laugh. “Hell will freeze over before any of this lot dream of promoting me.”
Ky experienced a momentary impulse to recommend Sol for promotion himself, just to be contrary. He had that authority, as the new captain, and they were in need of new officers, but he had to admit his motives for doing so seemed questionable, even to himself. As a first act after receiving his new rank, it did not seem especially wise.
“I have to admit, I have difficulty understanding why a man like yourself joined the Order in the first place. You have little enough respect for it.”
“Good question. Why indeed.” Sol frowned, and Ky guessed that Sol was in truth not certain himself what had made him agree. “The old man was pretty determined to get me to sign up. And if I’m going to be hunting Gears anyway, might as well do it somewhere the meals and transport are free.”
This was war. An organisation like the Order hardly had the luxury to be picky about the attitudes of men who had the skills to fight it. Ky supposed that men like Sol would be one of those things he’d have to learn to deal with, which only went to show how little idea he had.
The moment of quiet reflection was broken by Sol looking over the balcony and saying, “So this is captaining for you? Standing around watching everyone else do the work?”
“It’s hardly a task they need direction for,” Ky pointed out. “Until we have enough men fit for battle to fill more than half the ship’s capacity, I won’t have much more than the most routine duties. I’ve had more time than I have anything to do with.” Even training sessions were barely beginning to start up again, though Ky recognised those would work rather differently for officers than for ordinary soldiers. His body was starting to itch from the lack of exercise.
He gave Sol a long, thoughtful look, a new possibility occurring to him. “Can I interest you in a sparring match?”
ETA: On to the Epilogue