Eternal Winter's Reign - Book 2 - Chapter 11 - Chain of Command (Patreon)

                                                              Alexander North

The guard once again seems surprised by my question, but he quickly begins leading me to somewhere. And as we walk, I can’t help but notice that the people in the base are all a little more relaxed now. Even if some of them are still eyeing me with clear unease or even fear.

I ignore those looks though as I continue following the guard till we end up at what turns out to be the clinic of the base. And when we go in, the guard immediately takes me to the doctor I spoke to earlier who apparently went back to the clinic while I was busy taking out the garbage.

“Doctor Ruthers, Second Lieutenant North is here to-” he begins only to be cut off when the woman answers without even looking at him, “Yes, I can see. Thank you. You are dismissed.”

The guard doesn’t seem surprised by her blunt words as he simply gives her a curt nod, followed by doing the same to me and then leaving the room.

Now that I’m speaking to her with the whole chairperson situation dealt with, I examine her a little closer, finding the woman to look around her thirties or so. She has long brown hair that goes over her stark white lab coat, and clear blue eyes.

The woman also has the signature of a Symbiont Host. Something I didn’t pay much attention to earlier since she was just a doctor, and my thoughts were preoccupied with my team.

“I’m sure you’re wondering, so I’ll just get it out of the way right now,” she says with a sigh before standing up from the stool she was sitting on. Then she takes off her lab coat to reveal armor underneath with the insignia of a lieutenant colonel, making my eyes widen. “You understand now?” And when she sees me nod, she continues, “Good.”

That was not expected. And from what I can tell from my senses, her symbiont isn’t even close to Tier 3 like the average lieutenant colonel’s symbiont.

Although the fact that she has one in the first place means she’s likely older than she looks.

“You took care of the chairperson?” she asks with a raised brow, then continues after I nod, “Good. What are you planning on doing now? Will you take over this base? Or leave?”

Her blunt manner of speaking is rather surprising, but then again, my doctor who’s been looking over my heart all these years is the same. Except when he’s near dad, but that’s because he’s frightened of the guy. He is the General of the Military after all.

“I’ll be staying, but I won’t take over the base,” I answer while glancing around the clinic in the hopes of seeing my team. “I don’t have as much training in what would be needed to run a base as some of you more experienced officers here, so it wouldn’t be good.”

Plus I don’t want to. It would be a pain.

She looks a little surprised by my answer, but she recovers quickly as she says, “Very well. I’ll take partial command over the base then.”

I frown and ask, “Who will take the other part?”

“Why, you and the Princess, of course,” she answers, making my frown grow deeper. “Don’t worry, the Princess and I will handle all the affairs of the base. You’ll just be in charge of the base’s strength and military might. Mostly as a show of power to the other bases, and to help deal with the nearby nests.”

Oh. That… I can work with that.

“Besides,” she adds with a raised brow, “don’t you frost infused and mutans grow stronger by killing the things and absorbing the cold energy inside of them?”

I smile at that and nod.

“Then this benefits you too,” she concludes before looking at a soldier standing at the entrance to the clinic and raising her voice, “Soldier, gather everyone up for an announcement.”

He salutes her and leaves the room.

The lieutenant colonel turns back to me and says, “I think you should go around and get to know some of the people of the base a bit now that you’re going to be a pseudo leader here. Just talk to them a little. Make them trust that you aren’t going to eat them.”

I blink at that last bit before saluting her and stating, “Yes, ma’am,” and leaving. But before I can get out, she adds, “Also, don’t call me lieutenant colonel or anything like that. Just call me Doctor and treat me like one too.”

A little surprising, but I give her another nod and leave the room.

Time to see what the people of the base are like.

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After quickly finding Alexia and bringing her with me, I start up a short and brief conversation with over a dozen different people at random around the base. And thanks to that, I manage to find out quite a few things about the base in general.

Although I doubt this was the real purpose of the doctor asking me to do this. I’m pretty sure she wanted me to socialize and calm their nerves, not gather intel. But I’m not the most social person, so it’s fine.

It probably did do some of what she wanted though.

That aside, I’m a little surprised by just how much of a scumbag that chairperson was. As soon as he believed they were gonna be left along on this planet and cut off permanently from the rest of the Republic, he started abusing his power. I even heard one story about a woman who he had apparently tried to force himself on, only to fail since the guards started following her around, protecting her from his advances after the first instance of it.

No one ever had the courage to stand up to him though since it would be a court martial or straight up lifetime imprisonment for killing him.

Me on the other hand, I can get away with kicking him out of the base without any trouble at all. Dad can see to that, along with my own rank as a second lieutenant.

Even if he dies out there. Which is likely.

So most everyone seems happy to have me here now even if some are a little wary of me.

I smile at that as I walk out of the base towards the gathering of people, finding the Doctor standing on the wall.

Time to introduce myself fully then, I guess.

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