Kris had Nelly fill the forward screen with the view of the alien mother ship huge and looming just after it had jumped into the next system. The view stayed as the Hellburners blew it apart. Then switched to the dead, twisting, and rolling hulk.
With hardly a flicker, three huge alien ships appeared. One of them lazed a small rock.
“We surprised them once. That won’t happen again. I’m open from the floor for a new suggestion as to how we sneak up on them and smash them with Hellburners. By the way, Your Majesty, did you bring out more Hellburners?”
“Each frigate has two,” the king said. “When the Monarch and its escort take me back, we’ll leave our four behind. Use them as you see fit.”
“Gladly, sir. By the way, I’m still open for suggestions from the floor on how we sneak up on a monstrous alien mother ship with two hundred huge escorts.”
The floor had nothing to say. It lay there, very quietly.
“Mr. Benson,” Kris said, “I’d like to off-load all the Hellburners from the frigates to the station. I see no prospects for a frigate surviving long enough to slip a Hellburner up the rear of a bastard’s base ship. We’ll need to think of some other way of doing the same.”
“Hellburners aboard my station?” The former admiral looked pained at the thought. “I guess I could store them along the centerline, where there’s no gravity.”
“And under guard. You do have a Marine detachment?” Kris asked.
“Most definitely under guard. Do you have a plan for using those things?” Benson asked.
“I’m working on something,” Kris said, and went on. “I’d like to say that our examination of the wreck has shown us their Achilles’ heel, but instead, we’ve drawn a lot of blanks. All the reactors have been stripped from the wreck. From the size of the cable leads coming off the reactors, the ones inside the ship were big enough to run a medium-size city. Of the lasers, nothing. The undamaged ones were salvaged. Even the ones we hit, most of the wreckage has been policed up and carted off. From the small scraps we did get, we think they’re at least 16-inch. Power and range are still unknown.”
“It doesn’t sound like you know much,” Sampson muttered lowly.
“Commander,” the king said, “stow it. You just got here. When you’ve been here six weeks, if you’ve survived, we’ll talk. For now, you’re bothering me.”
“Yes, sir,” Sampson said, bracing in her chair. She almost wiped the smirk off her face.
Kris sighed. She’d met a lot of leadership challenges in the last five years. Lieutenant Commander Sampson looked only too eager to offer her a new one.
“Sir, one question if I may,” Commander Sampson said.
“Make it a good one,” the king said.
“Yes sir. The old Furious is still in orbit. Could we salvage her reactors and put them to use powering the moon base? That might save enough reactors for another mineral exploring and extraction ship.”
“Good idea,” the king said.
“Bad idea,” Kris said.
“Oh?” said the king.
“The colonials on Alwa were trying to off-load those reactors. The Alwans don’t much care for burning forests for fuel or damming rivers. It’s bad for fishing. That space launch we caught back when was part of a major colonial and Alwan effort to get back to the Furious and bring down some new, low-impact power sources.” Kris paused.
“I’ve already promised the use of the Wasp’s longboats to help.”
“I thought from the report by the Sakura that the Alwans were preindustrial and happy to stay that way,” Admiral Crossenshield said.
“The answer to that, sir, is yes, no, and maybe. The Alwans never speak with a single voice,” Kris said.
“Sounds almost human,” the king rumbled.
“Exactly, sir. Most of the old elders are against change. Some of the new, younger elders are more open to change. Many Alwans show up at the colony, ask for an education, and start working right alongside the colonists.”
“No central government, huh?” the king said.
“The survivors of the battlecruisers”—Granny Rita to be precise—“thought they had made contact with something like a central government. The Association of Associations. However, you have to realize two things. The Furious made orbit shot up pretty bad and on her last leg. Commodore Rita had to get the crew of the Furious and the Enterprise somewhere they could breathe and maybe find something to eat. Haven looked like a good target, and they went for it.”
Kris took a deep breath. “The Wasp is now doing the first methodical mapping of the planet, and we’ve spotted what look like six different major civilizations plus several minor ones. I can’t even swear that they’re all from the same gene pool. Some around the equator look very different from those in the temperate zones, and the polar regions are different again.”
“But they’re all confined to the planet,” Commander Sampson put in, “even the colonials, so what we do out here in the system is none of their business.”
This was supposed to be a Navy meeting. However, Kris noticed several tables filled with civilians, some in business suits, some in more hardworking gear. At the commander’s question, every head focused on her.
So much for a private briefing for the king and her officers.
Kris dropped the bomb. “As it turns out, that is not quite true. The Alwans have developed a taste for human technology. I was just recently interviewed by an Alwan TV medium. The camera needed a tripod to hold it and the mike they gave me weighed over a kilo and was about the size of a banana, but a lot of Alwans are watching TV. Modern transportation is catching on. Most involve animal-pulled wagons, but electric carts and trucks are gaining in popularity. They need to get the old Furious’s thermonuclear reactors dirtside and soon.”
Kris had everyone in the room hanging on her words, and everyone at the business tables were scowling her way. Enough lead-in.
“The Alwans have required royalties from the colonists to remove minerals. They want forty percent of the finished manufactured products.”
“That’s highway robbery,” Sampson exploded, climbing half-out of her seat.
The business types said much worse though in lower tones. Mother MacCreedy headed over to demand the tables comply with her rules or be cut off. Some of those not in suits were stomping around. Several gave Kris the universal hand signal of approbation.
Kris tried not to smile. Maybe she succeeded.
King Raymond stood up, and at last Commander Sampson sat down and shut up. “I can see we have a lot to discuss with the natives and the colonials. I think I’m about as fully briefed as I can stand. Commodore, do you have experienced bosuns for making the approach to, what are they calling it, Haven?”
“Yes, sir. Our bosuns have been flying the route two or three times a day.”
“We can skip the gig. I think we’ll need your biggest longboat. I’ve got a platoon of Marines traveling with me. I’m sure your staff will want to come along.” He glanced at Crossie. “If my staff gets too large, send the juniors along in the next boat.”
“Yes, sir,” Crossie said.
Kris nodded at Jack and Penny. NELLY, TELL ABBY TO COME ALONG IN THE NEXT BOAT. SEE THAT SERGEANT BRUCE AND A COUPLE OF SQUADS OF OUR MARINES ARE WITH HER.
I’LL MAKE IT SO, COMMODORE.
Kris hardly felt like she’d gotten comfortable in the frying pan. Now it was time to dive into the fire.
18
The ride down had its own surprise. Grampa Ray arranged to have the aisle seat with Kris seated inboard of him. Crossie and Jack were across the aisle from them. Kris would have preferred to have these two dangerous old guys together and Jack next to her.