I didn't sleep much that night, or the next. I tried to find out who had filed the accusation, but that information wasn't released until the preliminary hearing. My first thought was that Newman was trying again for my position, but then as I lay not sleeping, I thought back to the incident on the Battle of Kuzikos when I had boarded Sherman's flag ship and shot the spacer who claimed he was being held against his will.

I went about the next few days with a numb sick feeling. I found it hard to concentrate on the logistics reports and though the number of jump ships arriving had nearly grown sufficient to move the fleet, I couldn't feel excited about going home. The hearing was going to arrive even sooner.

When the day came I showed up in my best uniform with the best legal counsel I could arrange. When my name was called, a trooper led me into the courtroom. After confirming my identity I was sworn in before a panel of three judges of which Commander Ashbless was the head jurist.

"This is only an inquiry," Ashbless began in a calm almost friendly tone. "No formal charges have been made. Any spacer may make an accusation, but only the court may formally charge someone with a crime and then only if the preliminary evidence warrants a trial. The accused is not required to make a formal response to the charges at this point but may, if he so chooses, offer exculpatory evidence. The court reminds all parties they have been sworn in and that everything they say is a matter of court record and may be used in any further court actions. Are there any questions?"

Standing at attention before the court, I looked at sub-commander Jennings, my lawyer, who poked a data pad calling up files. She quickly looked up at the judge and said, "Not at this time." "Very well. Fleet-commander Kenneth Phon now stands before the court. Does anyone have an accusation to make?"

I glanced around the room. It was fairly large by shipboard standards but, packed with observers, it seemed quite small. The whole proceedings were being recorded and made publically available, so I knew many more were watching around the fleet.

"Er, we do." Two men and one woman, all wearing stained duty coveralls rose and stood at the court clerk's table.

"And what is the nature of the accusation?" Commander Ashbless asked.

"Piracy," said the first man. He was an unshaven middle-aged man with a pear-shaped body and a ring of hair around his bald head that reached nearly to his collar.

"And murder, or manslaughter," said the taller man next to him. He was a skinny guy with a ferret face and short sandy brown hair and patchy mustache of the same color.

"Criminal negligence at the least," added the woman who looked a lot like the first man, but with less hair on her face and more on her head.

"These are serious allegations," Ashbless said. "When did this happen?"

"Back on that moss planet just before we entered the territory of From the Stars."

I rose.

Ashbless acknowledged me. "Commander Phon?"

"May I ask a question?"

"You may, but I remind you that everything said here remains a matter of court record."

My lawyer paused in her prodding of her datapad and gave me a worried frown.

"Is this about the Leroy Kelso?" I asked.

The shorter man raised a defiant chin. "You know it is."

"And the murder—homicide—negligence charge, is that about the people left behind?"

"We lost some good people!" the tall one shouted.

"One was my fiancé," the woman said.

"And my brother!" the other man said.

"Ah." Relief flooded through me as I realized this wasn't about the Battle of Kuzikos. I addressed the court. "Your honor, I believe I know what this is about and can explain."

Ashbless glanced at my lawyer who had risen with wide warning eyes. "I don't think it's..."

"It's already a matter of record." I shrugged.

"Continue," Ashbless said.

"Approaching the system in question, we came across the light cruiser North Wind which had broken down. Lacking the needed parts we ordered the Leroy Kelso in orbit about the planet to go back and help them, but they refused because their commander was indisposed and their sub was down on the planet."

"Our yeast strains were dying," the pear-shaped man blurted out. "We'd had nothing to eat for days."

"And the algae," the woman said. "Our O2 levels were critically low."

I paused until they were finished with their interruptions, and continued. "Another ship was sent back to help, but when the fleet later started to leave, pirates moved in to attack the North Wind and I was forced to take my flagship back to drive them off. Once we got the North Wind moving, the pirates pursued us to the planet where I found the Leroy Kelso had remained behind. I tried to contact them, but they refused to respond. Fearing a mutiny, I send Force Commander Kouvaras over to secure the ship."

"It wasn't a mutiny," the tall one objected. "The ship's sub- commander had ordered the crew to abandon the ship."

"Once we had obtained control of the ship, we ordered the crew on the planet's surface to return and prevented others, such as these, from leaving."

"You had no authority!" the woman began.

"You weren't even in our chain of command," the tall one said.

"The crew on the planet refused to return and, with the number of pirate ships growing, we were forced to leave them behind."

"Who gave you the right?" the woman demanded. "Who gave you the power to decide whether we go or stay—who lives or dies?"

The injustice of these coward accusations became too much. "You did!" I snapped. "When the fleet voted to treat everyone who tried to desert as traitors. And before that, when Sherman and the others were murdered, you followed me eagerly enough then! Who was it that prevented the fleet from surrendering? Who did you look to when we fought our way through The Swords territory? Who had to get you past the blockades and out of the traps? Did any of you complain then?" I glanced up at the cameras recording the trial. These weren't the only spacer who had been complaining.

"But now that you imagine yourselves safe, suddenly nothing I do is good enough! And, I've noticed, the most cowardly in battle then are the most aggressive with the accusations now. I swear I have never seen such an ungrateful group of people. By all rights I should be back on Mars in a nice cushy job. I wasn't even officially a part of this expedition when it started. I came as an observer, as a favor to a friend. I could have just left when Shines Like the Sun was killed. I would have been home months ago. But I stayed to rescue you. I'm wishing, now that I hadn't, or that I'd left you on that planet. Then you wouldn't be here to accuse me, though I'm sure you'd have complained to the pirates that I hadn't come back to save you."

Their eyes slowly dropped to the floor during my tirade or turned away. As I stopped and stared at the tops of their heads or the sides of their faces, Commander Ashbless cleared his throat.

"Are there any other accusations to be made?"

Only the whisper of the air handlers could be heard.

"In that case the court finds insufficient evidence to charge Commander Phon with a crime. At this point we'll take a fifteen minute recess before we hear any more complainants."

The room filled with the bustle of people standing up and moving about. I turned to Sub-Commander Jennings. She smiled. "Congratulations."

I didn't feel like celebrating.

* * *

"You're a popular guy," Chris said a few days later as the last of the jumpships came in and I made final preparations for moving the fleet.

"Why do you say that?"

"The whole fleet watched your performance in court. They agree those three accusers were idiots."

"And that makes me popular?"

"Not by itself." Chris chuckled. "But it did get people thinking and talking about how you saved the fleet. They all agree that you are the one commander everyone can count on to know what to do and to see it done."

"Great. That and two terra will get me a cup of coffee."

Chris laughed. "Some of your most ardent supporters have started debates in the converse about whether or not you're a better commander than Sherman."

This time I had to laugh. "With my luck I'll probably get exiled as well."

Finally the day came when the ships were all slotted into their carriages. Most of the crews traveled in their respective ships, but the command staff, along with an honor guard of one or two troopers each, all carrying side arms, traveled in the cabin with the jumpship pilots. No overt threats were ever made, but it was understood that if the pilots were under orders to split up the fleet by jumping them to different locations, they would die most unpleasantly.

How these jumpships worked, I'm not sure anyone but the crawdads knew. The pilot said something about beginning the jump sequence and nothing happened for a really long time. I sat staring out of the complex carbon windows of the cabin for what seemed like an hour when suddenly the whole universe flew away in all directions. The stars shifted to red then black as they raced away into the darkness. Then, just as quickly, a new set of stars faded in from a dim dark blue to a normal bright spectrum. A new star burned below us and somewhere nearby Red Rock orbited.

Red Rock welcomed us nearly as enthusiastically as Black Mesa had. Monetary grants, free use of shipyards, endorsement deals and easy contracts covered our operating and refit costs, but we weren't getting rich and as our home worlds seemed suddenly within reach the realization that despite all our time and trouble we'd be arriving home with broken ships and empty pockets began to weigh on everyone's mind. People from the lowest spacer first class to my fellow fleet commanders asked me if I thought there might be any alien system within reach that we could raid or any lucrative escort jobs that might earn them some money to take home.

We'd been in system a little over a week when mil-net nearly exploded with the news of Commander Smith's return. A spartan military transport jumpship arrived with a shiny new state-of-the-art battlecruiser—but only the one. The local nodes of the converse buzzed with speculation about when the rest would arrive to take us home, but when I saw the one, I knew that was all we were going to get.

Smith had only returned to his command a few hours, just long enough to get a quick brief on the state of affairs from Newman, his sub, before sending me a request for a secure communications link. I had to return to my quarters and secure it in order to connect.

His face popped up on my screen looking healthy, though his gaze wasn't as sharp as I had remembered. "I see you couldn't wait for me."

"Well, you know how it is with this crew. They run up some mighty big bar tabs. We can't afford to stay in any one place very long.

He gave me a wan smile. "I'm sorry about not coming sooner. You know how bureaucracy is. Spartan command is divided about their future course of action. I just wanted to let you know, before I said anything publicly, that the jumpships are not coming—and I wanted to talk about some things."

"I figured the ships weren't coming when I saw your battlecruiser. What did you want to talk about?"

"The subject of the military's disagreement."

"And what would that be?"

Smith paused and looked at the lower corner of the screen as if verifying we had a secure connection. "Whether or not Sparta is willing to sacrifice the Earth."