“Jack, do you really think that’s the number one item on my to-do list?”
“No, but it’s going to have to be up there sooner or later. Maybe after we get back from the hunt for the Hornet’s fate.”
“Yes. That will give the skippers and leading chiefs time to handle it on their own. Meanwhile, how am I going to survive going into the lions’ cage this evening?”
“You think it’ll be that bad?”
“We told Grampa Al not to send a fleet of delectable merchant ships full of goodies out to hunt for the bastards and shot the engines out of them when they tried. Now, Ray, legend and all, drops them off here and bugs out. Jack, somehow I’ve got to get them to devote their full efforts to building up a defense here, and I don’t have a penny to pay them with.”
“Put it on someone’s charge card?” Jack suggested.
“Jack, what charge card is good this side of the galaxy? The colonists did what they had to do because the only alternative was starving to death.”
“By the way, where is this fleet of yours getting its chow?”
That brought Kris up short. “Nelly, get me Amanda Kutter.”
“Amanda here,” came a second later. “I’m busy at the moment.”
KRIS, I THINK SHE’S IN BED FROM THE SOUNDS OF IT, AND NOT ALONE.
NELLY, YOU ARE DEVELOPING A DIRTY MIND.
“Amanda, I have a very big problem. At nine, I’m meeting with a lot of business and mining types to talk about how they are or are not going to make a mint here in the Alwa system.”
“There’s no way they’re going to make a mint,” Amanda said.
“That’s what I was afraid you’d say. Would you mind heading up here, oh and bring that young man, Jacques la Duke with you. We may need some help explaining the sociology and psychology of both the birds and the colonials.”
“Ah, Your Highness, you could not have picked a worse time.”
“Oh, if so, I’m sorry, but I really need you.”
“Kris, Jacques and I just got married, and we’re on our honeymoon. Surely, you understand the problem.”
“It must be catching,” Jack whispered.
“I’m sorry, Amanda, believe me, I am so sorry, and I wouldn’t say this if I didn’t mean it, but I need to get these people working for our mutual survival, and I really need your help.”
“I think she really does,” came from Jacques.
“Yes. It’s worse than anyone could have guessed,” said Amanda back to her new husband. “Okay, we will be there before your nine o’clock meeting. You’d better hear what we’ve found out. It’ll be hard to believe.”
“Want to send us a report?” Kris asked.
“No, Your Highness. Truth like this is best delivered face-to-face.”
“Then Longknife out,” Kris said, and eyed Jack. “What do you think that’s all about?”
“Kris, there are a dozen horror stories chasing themselves around in my head. If there’s anything Gunny has taught me, a good Marine does not take counsel with his fears. What’s our next topic?”
Once again, Jack had the right idea. Still, Kris’s pigeonhole for “run in circles, scream and shout about it later” was getting awfully full.
“How do we get the next bastard’s mother ship close enough to the Hellburners for us to demolish it?”
“Oh, an easy one,” Jack said. “For someone, I hope. Because I have no idea.”
“Boy do I miss my screens. Nelly, project a holo of this system.” Nelly did, and filled the wall across from Kris with a full view of the system.
“Now, narrow it down to just the jump that the aliens would have come through, and the space between it and Alwa.”
There was a lot of empty space, but off a bit to one side was a gas giant. “Does that beauty have any solid moons?”
Nelly highlighted three of them, almost evenly spaced around the giant. For half a minute they orbited the giant in fast motion. As you’d expect, they raced around at different speeds. At one point all were close to the jump, a moment later, they all managed to be on the opposite side of their primary.
“Draw a course, half-gee acceleration, from the jump to Alwa. Assume a flip to deceleration at one-half gee at midpoint.”
Nelly did. “The base ship will never be closer than a million kilometers to any of the moons, at best,” the computer said.
“So, sneaking up is going to be a bit of a problem this time,” Kris mused.
“Anything on the surface of those moons is going to be lazed to dust,” Jack said.
“So we create battle stations deep underground that can survive the blasting.”
“And if they turn the surface to glass?”
“We drill out before we launch the Hellburners.”
“Then those mad monster ships are going to laser them again.”
“Not if we keep them busy. Keep them concentrated on a mobile strike force.”
“All four of your frigates?”
“Reinforcements are coming. Grampa Ray promised me reinforcements.”
“You trust a Longknife? No, excuse me, I love and trust a Longknife. Do you trust that particular Longknife?”
Kris sent a kiss Jack’s way but stayed in her chair. He stayed perched on her bed.
“We’ve got twelve Hellburners and four frigates, a total of eight frigates when they finished spinning the Prosperity and Enterprise into warships.”
“And there will be two hundred or more alien monster ships.”
“Can’t I plan for the future, when maybe we’ve got twenty or thirty frigates?”
“And the odds are down to only seven or ten to one.”
“We beat three to one.”
“Yes, you did. Okay, let’s say we can dig deep into these three moons and plant missile bases. Who mans them?”
“Colonials. Alwans. There are bound to be a few fighters among them.”
“And a few officers and good chiefs willing to lead them,” Jack muttered.
Penny walked in on them, her ever-present shadow and fellow intelligence officer, Lieutenant Iizuka Masao right behind her. “You two busy?”
“Only planning our next battle.”
“It look any better than the last few?”
“Not at the moment. What can we do for you?”
“Actually, we thought we should bring you up to date on some stuff we’ve been culling from the reports coming in.” Penny glanced around the room. “I know we can’t drop down to the Forward Lounge for a drink, but didn’t they give you a Tac Center or an office when you transferred your flag?”
“It’s next door. Nelly, open a door to it.”
Nelly did, just at the foot of Kris’s bed, and they walked into Kris’s office.
“That’s neat,” Penny said. “Who’d have thought you could use the Smart Metal to just open a door.” Penny actually did sound surprised. Apparently, the woman who could order the whole ship around wasn’t aware of the app that worried Amber.
“Hey! Nifty office you got here.”
“There’s supposed to be an actual carved wooden desk there”—Kris pointed at a vacant place on the deck—“and over there will be some sofas and chairs for when we just want to chat, you know, like when I make my social calls on the king.”
“That bad?” Penny said.
Her poor Imperial Navy officer seemed none the more informed but didn’t look all that interested in an explanation. Maybe Penny had warned him some questions were best left unasked around the Longknifes.
“We were trying to figure out how to get the Hellburners close enough to the bastard’s base ship to survive long enough to make a hit,” Kris said, as Nelly shrank the table down to be a perfect fit for the four of them. “Nelly, show Penny and Masao the moons we found and the problems with them.”
Nelly quickly brought them up to speed as all four settled into comfortable chairs that allowed them to rock back and forth as Kris tended to do, lean back as Jack did, sway from side to side as Penny was doing, or sit perfectly still as Masao did.