The Blunt End of the Service Read online

  THE BLUNT END OF

  THE SERVICE

  L. J. Simpson

  Text Copyright © 2016 L. J. Simpson

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover Design © 2016 Go On Write

  www.goonwrite.com

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 1

  Chuck always knew he was destined for a career in space. Like many youngsters he spent a good part of his childhood reading comic books whose pages were filled with men in silver space suits, all of them zooming across the galaxy in silver space ships; vast armadas of silver battleships, silver cruisers and silver destroyers. Everything was silver, except of course for the evil aliens who were generally green, and their equally dastardly space ships which were, for some unknown reason, usually some shade of orange. Day after day he thumbed his way through the pages, dreaming of wearing the silver suit and dashing around the galaxy in a sleek, silver starship, casting aside alien hoards and saving civilization from slavery and oppression.

  All young boys need a hero; Chuck found plenty within the covers of his books but his first real life hero was Granddad Burt, his maternal grandfather. Granddad Burt had been the helmsman of a corvette during the last honest-to-goodness shooting war. Chuck wasn’t sure which was more exciting, the fact that Granddad Burt had been a real life pilot or that he’d actually been shot at and lived to tell the tale. To a six year old, either made you at least some kind of relation to Superman. Chuck often asked Granddad Burt about the war but to his disappointment he didn’t seem to want to talk about it very much. Chuck persisted but Granddad Burt just smiled and said to ask again when he was older.

  “How much older?”

  “When your head reaches about here,” replied Granddad Burt, tapping his shoulder. “Which might not be too long, the rate you keep growing. What are they feeding you on, anyway?”

  Put like that, it sounded like a good enough deal, but the fact was that Granddad Burt was a veritable giant of a man, and had to stoop a little just to ruffle Chuck’s hair. Chuck couldn’t see himself reaching his shoulder anytime soon, if at all. Whenever Granddad Burt came to visit, Chuck would sidle up alongside to see how much further he had to go but it seemed like he was fighting a losing battle. He’d read somewhere that really, really old people sometimes shrank a little. Perhaps Granddad Burt wasn’t yet old enough for that but maybe in another few years… and in the meantime Chuck would go on eating all his vegetables. He occasionally tried to catch his granddad out and slip in some question about his wartime exploits when they were talking about something else, but Granddad Burt would just laugh and tap himself on the shoulder.

  Chuck’s second real life hero was his elder brother Greg who, with two sisters in between, was some nine years older. By the time Chuck had reached Granddad Burt’s elbow, Greg had graduated from comic book space ships to a shot at the real thing, winning a place at the space academy on Marian 5, twenty light years from their home on the planet Atlas. In the days leading up to his departure Chuck hung around his brother’s room like a vulture, hoping for a few cast offs. Perhaps the poster of the SS Iron Duke, maybe even Greg’s radio controlled Thunderwing or if he was really lucky, his complete set of ‘The Chronicles of Zarog’.

  To Chuck’s chagrin, the only thing that came his way was a very dog eared copy of ‘The Wonderful World of Paper Airplanes’. As for the rest, Greg was pretty explicit in his instructions.

  “Don’t touch my stuff.”

  Chuck faithfully promised that he wouldn’t, and retreated to his room where he immediately promised himself that he would, just as soon as Greg was no longer living on the same planet, in just a few days hence.

  Chuck wasn’t particularly surprised to find that Greg didn’t take him at his word, all the best stuff being sealed in cardboard boxes and stuffed in the closet. Greg wasn’t so daft as to leave his most prized possessions lying around for Chuck to loot. An unfortunate turn of events, but Chuck was no fool either, already having noted that some left over boxes and tape were at this very minute lying in the corner of the basement. Once Greg was out of the way it should be simple enough to plunder what he wanted and if needs be, seal it all up again before Greg came home on leave. Job done.

  Chuck had mixed feelings about Greg’s leaving. Being nine years apart they had never shared many interests, Chuck always being too young to join in his brother’s games, much as he’d wanted to. On the other hand, Greg had always been convenient for helping Chuck with his homework, and even handier for ensuring that he never got picked on at school. From here on in though, Chuck would have to manage by himself. Big brothers did occasionally have their uses, unlike big sisters, who, as females, Chuck regarded as virtually useless in almost all situations, an opinion that wouldn’t change until he got himself some brand new hormones a few years down the road.

  On the day of Greg’s departure Granddad Burt made an unexpected appearance, galloping through the crowded spaceport lobby to join them. Even more unexpectedly he was in the company of Granddad Frank, who spent so much time working off planet that his visits were few and far between. Their arrival changed the whole tone of the occasion and Greg’s final farewell was to a smiling chorus of goodbyes and waves. If Greg was pleased to see both granddads, Chuck was absolutely delighted. One granddad was great, but two together were at least four times as good – a kind of square function.

  Later that evening Chuck found himself sitting out on the back porch watching his grandfathers steadily work their way down a bottle of whisky. For the life of him, Chuck couldn’t understand what they saw in the stuff. A while before he had, for a dare, attempted to drink a little but the mere smell had turned his stomach and made his eyes water. Neither Granddad Frank nor Granddad Burt seemed similarly afflicted, in fact they seemed to be relishing the experience. Chuck listened while they talked about the state of the government, the state of the economy, the state of the health service (in general) and the state of Granddad Frank’s kidney stones (in particular).

  “Bloody purgatory,” he said.

  Granddad Burt nodded sympathetically. “Not getting any younger, Frank, that’s for certain. The years are catching up. Just think of it, there’s young Greg off to space school already.” Then turning towards Chuck, he said, “Your turn next, young fella.” Chuck didn’t doubt it. Granddad Frank gazed at his whisky as he swirled it around the bottom of his glass.

  “You can’t help feeling a little envious, can you? Mind you, I expect it’s all changed since our day.”

  “Shorter hours.”

  “Better pay.”

  “Safer.”

  “Less chance of getting your ass shot off, that’s for sure.” Chuck’s ears immediately pricked up.

  “Well there was never that much chance, even in our day,” said Granddad Frank.

  “You speak for yourself,” said Granddad Burt.

  “Here we go again, Chuck,” said Granddad Frank with a wide grin. “The great Battle of the Borders. Expect you know it off by heart by now.”

  Chuck just shook his head.

  “You don’t seriously mean to tell me that you’ve never heard all this before – like about a hundred times?”

  “No, not even once. He wouldn’t tell me. Said I have to wait ‘til I’m older.”

  “Is that so? W
ell, with Greg gone, I think Chuck is old enough now,” said Granddad Frank.

  “Well, maybe…”

  “I could tell it for you, if you like, Burt.”

  “No, no… I’ll manage,” said Granddad Burt, somewhat aggrieved. He composed himself and then turned to look Chuck in the eye. “It’s like this… It was near the end of the Corporate Wars. You know about the Corporate Wars, right?”

  “Yes, kind of,” Chuck nodded.

  “I was aboard the Manxman – a corvette. Do you know what a corvette is, Chuck?”

  “Yes, granddad. A warship, but just a little one.”

  “That’s right! Well, the Corporate fleet was in retreat and we finally cornered them among the moons of Ormo 6. They were outnumbered, outgunned and had nowhere to run, so we did the decent thing and offered them terms. Stand down and surrender their fleet, or face complete annihilation.

  “Well,” said Granddad Burt, getting into the swing of things, “They agreed to surrender but just as we were moving in, the treacherous swine shot off a volley of Scepter missiles. Nasty things, those Scepters. Not very big but fast as a blur and almost impossible to intercept, especially at close range like that.”

  Chuck was so enthralled that he never noticed the inscrutable look on Granddad Frank’s face.

  “Well, the outer screen of frigates and destroyers took a bunch of hits and it threw the whole line into confusion. Complete mess. Of course, it was entirely the fleet commander’s fault. The fool kept our units too close together – no room to maneuver, you see Chuck. Death to any battle fleet is that,” he said gravely. “Do you know what the key to victory is, young Chuck?”

  “No, granddad.”

  “Fire and maneuver, Chuck. Fire and maneuver, that’s the key,” he said, waving his hand with a flourish. “So there we were, the escort ships were going every which way to avoid the Scepters – not to mention each other, and the battle-wagons following up couldn’t fire for fear of hitting their own destroyer screen. Then before we knew what was happening, the enemy went to full power and made a run straight at our right flank.”

  “Towards you, Granddad Burt?” asked a wide eyed Chuck.

  “That’s right, and a daunting sight it was. And then, just as we were about to engage, we received a message from the fleet commander, ‘Stand fast and hold the line! Allow none to pass, not a single ship!’

  “Well, all hell broke loose and without any heavies in support they began to push us back. We soon found ourselves trading shots with a Corporate frigate that came charging across our bows. He had heavier weapons but we were more maneuverable. We pulled up above him, did a half roll off the top and loosed off a couple of well aimed salvoes before we took any hits. The enemy veered away but as he turned we fired another volley right into his midsection and next thing we knew he just blew up in a huge fireball, leaving a great cloud of gas and debris right across our path.”

  “Wow!” said Chuck.

  “Of course, the second we entered the debris cloud our visibility dropped to zero. Couldn’t see a darned thing, so we just kept going straight ahead until we emerged from the cloud… only to find the enemy flagship, the battle-cruiser Voltan looming dead ahead, heading straight for a gaping hole in our lines.”

  Chuck could only sit and gawp. Here was incontrovertible evidence that Granddad Burt was a hero of Herculean proportions, a veritable giant among lesser mortals.

  “We formed up with a pair of friendly frigates and went into the maelstrom together, guns blazing, determined to plug the gap. The frigate to starboard was first to fall, spinning crazily out of control after she took a broadside in the engines. Then before we knew it the frigate on our portside was sliced in two by a particle beam. Just like that, clean as a whistle.”

  “So that just left you?”

  “That’s right, Chuck. Just us, one tiny corvette against a monster battle-cruiser. Daunting odds, but we jinked up and down, left and right, dodging everything they could throw at us – missiles, torpedoes particle beams, the lot. And all the time we closed in on the Voltan until they were finally in range… and then we hit them with everything we’d got.”

  “Did you get them, Granddad?” said an excited Chuck.

  “No, Chuck. Oh, we did some damage but a battle-cruiser can take a lot of punishment. They just shrugged off our attack and kept on coming. And then they started to get in some hits of their own. They took out our front guns and then we lost our dorsal turrets. With all our missiles already gone there was nothing more that we could do. Except…”

  “What was that?” said Chuck breathlessly.

  “Ram them! We set all power to the front shields and prepared for ramming speed, but before the captain could give the word a missile exploded off our starboard beam, throwing him unconscious from his chair. Being the only other officer on the bridge I took command. I checked that the shields were at maximum, laid in the course and opened the throttles. Full speed ahead!”

  “And then?”

  “And then… and then… well… I don’t know. The alarm clock went off and I woke up in my bunk at sector HQ.”

  “The alarm clock? Sector HQ?” said Chuck in bewilderment.

  “Well, yes. That’s where I was stationed.”

  “It was a dream?” squawked Chuck.

  “I’m afraid so,” chuckled Granddad Burt.

  “You… rotter!” said Chuck in a hurt voice as both granddads guffawed loudly. “Was… was none of it true?”

  “Well, some of it. I was a helmsman on the Manxman…”

  “A corvette.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you were in a battle?”

  “Not sure if you could call it a battle, Chuck, but I did get shot at.”

  “Who shot at you, granddad?”

  “The truth is this, Chuck. At the end of the Corporate Wars a ceasefire was agreed and I was ferrying a team of negotiators to an outpost on Gavelin, one of the moons of Ormo 6. Only trouble was, the guys on the outpost hadn’t heard about the ceasefire – either that or they ignored it – and as we dropped out of orbit the opened up on us with a load of anti-air artillery. So… we did the sensible thing and made a tactical withdrawal.”

  “They ran away,” said Granddad Frank helpfully.

  “An appropriate response in the face of superior enemy fire.”

  “They ran away quickly.”

  “Sure did, and lived to fight another day,” he said with a very satisfied grin.

  “Amen to that, Burt.”

  Chuck was seriously confused. Granddad Burt didn’t seem the slightest bit embarrassed by the fact that he had, well… run away. Granddad Frank even found it amusing. This was not the work of heroes. Certainly not a deed worthy of those men in silver space suits. How could this be?

  With the passage of time Chuck came to realize that even in the most righteous of wars it was by no means compulsory to die a hero’s death. In fact, given the choice, it appeared – strangely enough – that most people preferred not to die at all. Either way, he reasoned that whatever happened at the so called ‘Battle of the Borders’ it was far better to have Granddad Burt alive and well – with or without the tall stories – than be told that the handsome young man in those old photos was his deceased grandfather, a fact made more poignant by the realization that the battle had taken place before Granddad Burt had met Granma Jane. Chuck could just about imagine a world without Granddad Burt, but couldn’t quite get his head around a world that didn’t include his parents, brother, sisters and most of all, himself.

  According to Mr. Dean, his history teacher, the Corporate Wars had been one of those unfortunate, messy little conflicts that littered human history. Granddad Burt was more forthright. “It was a damned silly war, fought because of a few idiots who were either too proud or too darned stubborn to get around a table and sort out their differences in a sensible way. The saddest part being that however pointless the causes, real people fought in it and real people died.”

  By the
time Chuck graduated elementary school his previously confused vision of life, the universe and everything reached a level of clarity rare for one of such tender years. He decided that he no longer wanted to be a hero. Someone else could have the medals, banners and flags. The poster of the SS Iron Duke disappeared from his bedroom wall and he deliberately crashed Greg’s Thunderwing into the eaves of old Mr. Brewster’s house next door. Funny thing was that Greg never asked about either when he came back on leave.

  “I don’t think Greg’s all that bothered about his stuff anymore,” said Granddad Frank when Chuck related the story. “He’s nearly finished space school and looks all set for a career in the Fleet. I hear he’s been accepted into flight school.”

  “That’s right,” said Chuck.

  “Military pilot still not for you?”

  “No,” said Chuck with a shake of his head.

  “Well, can’t really say as I blame you,” said Granddad Burt. “It’s great that Greg is training as a pilot and all, but to be honest I can’t see the fun in flying up and down the spiral arm every day for the rest of your life. Ask Granddad Frank, he knows.”

  Chuck looked over at his other grandfather who had joined them on the back porch.

  “Got a point,” said Granddad Frank. “Thing is, your average pilot doesn’t actually do any piloting these days – not in the real sense of the word. You just program in where you want to go and the flight computer does the rest. The pilot’s just button pusher, and even if you get that bit wrong the computer puts it right for you. I had thirty years of it. Two periods of intense button punching separated by ten hours of intense boredom, just watching the stars go by.

  “Listen,” he said lowering his voice. “If you want my advice, get yourself into systems engineering, computers, stuff like that. Loads more opportunities in that line of work – shipyards, space stations, liners… you can even find work planet-side if it suits you. But don’t tell Greg I said so.”

  Now that sounded more interesting. Chuck already had a knack with computers. Strange really, as it was the one thing that Greg didn’t have any aptitude for, though he excelled at just about everything else. Conversely, it was ‘everything else’ that Chuck struggled with.