Renegade Read Free

right shoulder to left. Then the next command, ‘eyes right!’, and all heads turned across as one. As the first rank drew level with the platform, ‘salute!’, and right arms snapped up, as the old vets saluted back, ranks and ranks of them atop their scaffold, and all proud and grey and happy.
    “ Boys and girls, this is your Captain, ” came the uplink message from up ahead, as they resumed normal marching. “ You’ve earned this day, all of you. This day belongs to you, and it belongs to all our brothers and sisters whom we’ve lost along the way. March with your heads high, but please note — you are allowed to smile. That means you, Erik .”
    Though they did not break formation, Erik saw the shoulders of crew ahead of him shaking as they laughed. And then he was grinning, against all his better judgement.
    “ Just one more thing, ” their Captain continued. “ Know that on all the ships in all the wars gone by, there has never been a captain more proud of his crew than I am today. ”
    And then it felt like a load had lifted from Erik’s shoulders. No longer was this parade something to be dreaded. It was a spectacle, no doubt one of the greatest in all human history. He was home, and though many of his friends would never return, there were many more who had. It was all over, the fighting, the dying. Final victory, for a species that had just a thousand years before been reduced to a meagre hundred million individuals, struggling to survive in the dark systems about their home star after their homeworld had been destroyed by unprovoked invaders.
    It all culminated here, on this new homeworld, on this day, and he was somehow fortunate enough to be at the centre of it all, third-in-command behind perhaps the greatest warrior of the latest and hopefully last ever war. Now he marched proudly, and allowed himself to take in the roaring crowds, the great banners hanging from the towersides proclaiming thanks, the heartfelt memorials, the patriotic songs. A little girl in a red dress jumped a barrier and ran to him with a flower. He gave her a smile and a kiss, took the flower and pinned it in his lapel with a wave to the girl’s beaming parents as she scampered back to them.
    And just when he thought he was having fun, he thought again of all his friends who would have loved to be here and see this, but would never be seen by anyone again. And suddenly he was in tears.

2
    A fter five kilometres of marching , the parade took a left exit and ended up in Victory Park. There MPs with loudspeakers urged everyone to disperse and head elsewhere, as the park couldn’t handle more than fifty thousand people, and several hundred thousand would be marching today.
    Rifles were collected, and goodbyes were said, as some folks wouldn’t be seeing each other for weeks — Phoenix was now headed for perma-dock and half the crew had ground leave starting from now, while the other half would have to go up in a few days to prep the ship for long term stand-down. Erik had been expecting that he and third-shift would get the bridge duty, and was surprised that it went to Huang instead. Officers clustered beneath a huge fig tree, with handshakes and embraces, and Captain Pantillo went to Erik with a fatherly hug.
    “Erik, good job these last few days. It all went well. I’m pleased.” And that was worth more than all the medals that Fleet Command was rumoured to be about to pin on them.
    “Thank you Captain.” Pantillo was not a big man, tanned with Asian features that he claimed went back to someplace called the Philippines. His hair was greying, and he’d been alive for much of the war — one hundred and twenty seven standard Earth years, a very advanced age considering the reflexes required of a warship captain. “How does it feel, now that it’s all over?”
    “Over,” Pantillo repeated, with a shrewd look. “Hmm. Well you know, something ends, something else begins. Give my best wishes to your parents, I suppose