Title：Michael Kotcher - Samair in Argos 01 - Pursue the Past.epub

Prologue

              Commander Tamara Samair sat in the court martial, waiting for the members to return.  She was in her Navy dress blues, as was everyone else in the courtroom.  Her lawyer was seated next to her, completely at his ease, though she had no idea why.  The prosecution team across the way was looking rather smug.  And the commander who was doing the prosecuting kept shifting eyes their way, as though challenging her lawyer to look back.  He never took the bait though, keeping his eyes on either his paperwork or on the front of the courtroom.

              Tamara seethed.  This trial had been going on for eleven months now and with each day that passed, those two had been in the court, boring holes in the back of her head.  Captain Horace Bythe and Lieutenant Oliver Islington were the two other officers (along with Tamara) in command of the Hudora System shipyards for the last six years.  In the year before her arrest, Tamara had begun to notice at first a slight, then a much more marked, decrease in supplies and funds and had begun to investigate why the sudden decrease in inventory.  Just as she was starting to get close to finding out where the resources were going, suddenly Naval Investigation Service arrested her for smuggling and theft.  And the two of them were grinning at her as the security officers slapped cuffs on her.

              Eleven months later, and it had finally come to this.  The court martial was the culmination of humiliation, a humiliation that Bythe and Islington were sure to remind her of at every available chance.  Just before her arrest, she had just received her promotion to Commander, and now, she was in danger of being thrown in a prison colony for the rest of her natural life.  The amount of funds and equipment stolen was enough to put the guilty party away.  And of course, enough was found in her bank accounts and in her personal storage to make sure that she went away.  Bythe and Islington were nothing if not thorough.

              The arrival of the six members of the court martial brought her back to the present.  Tamara stared straight ahead at the Judge’s bench, not allowing her gaze to shift even one millimeter in any other direction.  She could feel the looks that Bythe and Islington were sending her way, as well as the many other stares she was undoubtedly getting from others in the courtroom.  Tamara refused to submit to the crush of emotions.  She would hear the decision and then she would hold her head high, no matter the outcome.

              “All rise.”  With a practiced movement, Tamara Samair rose to her feet, smoothed out the edges of her jacket.  Hands at her sides, she resumed her forward-facing stare. 

              The judge turned to the members.  “Have the members reached a decision?”

              A female captain stood.  She was in her middling years, her short hair streaked with gray, but she was still youthful.  However, there was no twinkle of mirth in her eyes as she turned to the judge.  “Yes, Your Honor, we have.”

              “Would you please read that for the court?”

              The captain opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out.  The deck jerked so violently beneath them all that everyone was knocked aside, many lost their footing entirely, sprawling unceremoniously to the deck.  The lights flickered and alarms sounded.  Emergency red lights ignited and the klaxons certainly got everyone’s attention, if being tossed to the floor hadn’t already.

              “Battle stations!  Battle stations, all hands, battle stations!” a voice came over the public address system.  “The station is under attack.  All hands, report to battle stations!”

              “Court is adjourned,” the Judge declared loudly, picking himself up off the deck.  “All of you, report to your posts!  MPs, detain Commander Samair and return her to the brig.”

              Two very large MPs immediately appeared at her sides.  Her face still a ceramic mask, she held out her hands, and a pair of cuffs were attached to her wrists.  “After you, Commander,” one of the men said, gesturing.

              Without a word, Samair turned and marched toward the door, aware that both Islington and Bythe were still in the courtroom, pretending to assist others out before they would leave themselves.  They glanced at her as the MPs led her past them, but didn’t say anything, didn’t betray their feelings in this case. 

              The attack had saved her, but it wouldn’t forever.  Federation forces were attacking the station but the Republic Navy would drive them off.  And when they did, the court martial would resume and the members’ decision would come down.  This was simply a stay of sentencing, not a commutation of sentence.  They knew it.  She knew it.  There was no reason to get angry, not yet.

              The cell was familiar; she’d spent the last eleven months here.  Except for a very