Conflict!

by Dale Moorhouse

  The silence following was deafening until one Weasel stood and started clapping. She was quickly followed by the rest of the Weasel representatives and then the Warms and Colds and finally the Mmrrreeowwn. When the noise died down, the Mmrrreeowwn representative moved that the Confederation continue supporting me and our current plans and actions. The motion was quickly seconded by a Weasel, and the vote was almost unanimous amongst the non-Squid members with a handful of the representatives abstaining.

  The Weasel representative made a motion to limit the crewing of vessels to allowing Squids only on ships under their direct control and their presence in each of the shipyards was no longer allowed. The motion also called for a review of the Squids continued membership in the Confederation after the Plague war ended. The motion was seconded by one of the Squids, to my surprise, it was Livid. When the voting was over the motion passed with all members voting in favour except for the Squids, Livid voted for then headed for an exit before the rest of the Squids could berate it.

  When the big screen went, dark Elder Three turned to me and said, “For better or worse we will stand with you. I believe the Weasels and their clients will as well.”

  The words were still ringing in the air when there was a chime, and the hatch opened to let Ishmael, his Emperor and several Warms and Colds in their climate suits enter. The Emperor strode across the room to stand in front of me, flanked by a couple of his clients. He was close to my height and was able to look directly in my eyes. He said, “Warlord, you have but to order it and it will be done. Let all here witness my entire species and our client species as well have chosen to follow Warlord Jason until we are all free or all dead. May the Spirit of All take note of this oath.”

  Each of the two clients came to me and bowed then offered their hands. When I extended mine, they clasped my wrist and I theirs. Through their helmets, I could see their eyes and could sense they were in this to the end, whatever that might be. When each of the remaining clients had made their vow, Ishmael came up and clasped me in a hug before he too gripped my wrist and we shook. “Jacky asked me to convey she sees you and all of us victorious in the cycles to come. She has never been wrong, I will do my utmost to make sure this time is no exception.”

  It was late when we started back to HQ. Ishmael invited the four of us to his home for a bite of dessert and a drink. Elaine nodded yes while Tuxedo and Ginger said they would be delighted. It was a short walk to the complex where Ishmael and Jacky lived, our escorts knew the way, so we headed off in good spirits.

  Jacky was waiting for us and opened the door and greeted us warmly while guiding us into the living room. She said, “I’ve prepared a small treat for us, which I will dish up while Ishmael sets out the drinks.”

  Elaine jumped up with Ginger, and both said, “We’ll help!” and followed Jacky to the kitchen.

  I could tell from the conversation I could overhear they were hugging and chatting excitedly while dishing up the food. When they returned a few centas later, Ishmael had poured drinks all around, and we all stood when the ladies entered the room. I could tell Jacky was pleased at the manners and respect they were being shown and Ishmael commed privately saying, “Jacky is not actually a stickler for good manners but always appreciates a little gallantry. She will talk of this with her friends, soon everyone will know of the Warlord and his sweet mate and good manners. It will play well in the royal court, you can expect many invitations to visit when you come to Mother of Peril to confer with the Emperor.”

  “Thanks, Ishmael, it just seemed like the right courtesy to pay.”

  When the ladies handed out the plates, we sat, and some low music came on from the corners of the room, while alien, it was pleasant to hear and quite relaxing.

  The next half deca or so was spent in peaceful company, the conversation remained light and mostly was about various customs the Weasels, Terrans and Mmrrreeowwn had in common and how they had come about over the years. It was clear the Weasels had done their research on both our species and had focused on the enjoyable and positive. When our foursome was ready to head for home, we took our leave and not a word of business had been spoken the entire time.

  Elaine and I both slept well and deeply for the first time since we had been apart. I always slept better when she was there, and I knew when I headed back to the fleet, she would be with me.

  29

  THE MORNING AFTER MY MEETING with the Elders and the Confederation Council, I went to my office in the command centre on level five. I’d been with the fleet for over thirty-five cycles and walked in to find my desk clean with just a short stack of items that needed my attention queued up on my workstation. Before I sat to jump into that, I decided to walk around the bullpen and say hello to everyone. As I circled through the room, I sensed a level of purpose that was more direct and stronger than when I left. Showing the Confederation that we stood a better than even chance of eliminating the Plague seemed to have energized my staff more than I would have ever expected.

  As I got back to my workstation, I was surprised to see Jacky sitting at the workstation immediately in front of mine. She smiled and greeted me, “Good morning, Warlord, I trust you slept well?”

  “Yes, I did, Jacky. Finishing up the evening with good food, good drinks and good friends can do that for a Terran, and please, call me Jase.”

  She excused herself and disappeared into the small galley to return a centa later with a pot of tea, a cup and a plate of scones which she set on my desk near my monitor. She gave me a sly grin and said, “I commed Elaine before I came in and she said you were coming directly here instead of having breakfast. I told her I would take care of that—so here is tea and some scones I made after you two left last night. You can enjoy them while you catch up on your messages. When you have finished both, I will brief you on what has transpired since you went to battle.”

  Jacky is one of the sweetest people I know but has a backbone of pure hull metal. I knew that if I didn’t follow her wishes, I would pay for it later, so I quickly sat and poured a cup of tea and put a little honey on my first scone then opened up my message queue. Someone, probably Jacky, had sorted my messages in the order they believed they should be read.

  The first was from Pete Sandusky and was more than thirty cycles old. He’d resigned as governor of California and fled to Canada where he stayed with Steve McLeod for a couple of days while he went to a Mmrrreeowwn immigration and evaluation centre and was accepted. His family, who he had sent to a small town in Saskatchewan some time back were still there, and some of his younger siblings and cousins wanted to come up too.

  The next paragraph made me sit up and take notice—he was on Mother of Glory training with the latest crop of bomber pilots and was hoping to get together with me after he had won his star. I knew he had made it to Canada and had holed up with Steve but had no idea he’d made it up to Mother of Glory. I quickly commed Mordechai, who was now commanding all of the fleet’s pilot training at the Warrior Training Complex. “Hello, Mordechai, could you tell me when the current class of pilots graduates?”

  “Yes, Warlord, the ceremony will be in twenty-six cycles here at the WTC.”

  “Good, I was afraid I might have missed it. I have a good friend coming through, and I would like to attend the ceremony.”

  “What is his name, Warlord?”

  “Peter Sandusky, he is a former pilot in the US Navy and Mo, please just call me Jase like you used to. This Warlord crap just doesn’t sit well with me when it’s people I know.”

  “Sorry, Jase, we have been instructed to use your title in anything but private and informal settings. I just looked up your friend and hope you have dozens more like him, he has broken just about every record we have and is leading his class by a good 20 per cent over his closest rival.

  “I was planning on doing the graduation address, but since you are back from a recent battle, perhaps I can talk you into giving the speech. Would you have time for that plus pinning the stars on the new pilo
t’s uniforms?”

  “Mo, I’d be honoured to do that. Do you have a speech prepared, or should I write one?”

  “The words should come from you, Jase. I have written a new speech for every class that has graduated since I took this post and I’m running out of new material. Something inspired by what you saw in your last battles might be just what this bunch needs to hear.”

  “Ok, Mo, I’ll put something together. How many in this class?”

  “Six hundred and ten out of one-thousand, Jase.”

  “Wow, the washout rate is that bad?”

  “Yes, Ser. We are getting close to the bottom of the barrel. We start a new class every ten cycles, and we have three in the pipeline, that is it. If we don’t get new blood from somewhere soon, we will have to start calling up our reservists, many of whom are already performing needed tasks for the war effort.”

  “Mo, let me look into this and touch base with Terra and see if we can get some more candidates. Also, have you considered recruiting from within the Fleet and Warriors? There should be some there who will qualify. Also, what are you doing with the washouts?”

  “We are sending them to aircrew school to become gunners or finding them other positions within Fleet. Some of them transferred to the Warriors to fly Elsies.”

  “Good, at least we aren’t losing the flying talent. Perhaps some just need a little ageing and could pass your flight school then.”

  “All of them have been informed they can reapply in two-hundred cycles if they can bring their marks up, but some of them are simply too immature acting which is what got them washed out. We will just have to see if they grow up and reapply.”

  “Thanks, Mo, I’ll be in touch and have a good speech prepared.”

  I quickly made some notes for the speech while the thoughts were fresh then began reading the next message. It was from Livid and was only five cycles old and appended to it was another from only last night. I decided to read the newest first, and I was glad I did.

  Livid had disagreed and gone against the Squid president of the Confederation and was now a pariah amongst his kind. He and his two buddies along with Escargot had narrowly escaped being spaced by some of the Squid president’s goons and had stolen a small shuttle. They were currently holed up at Saturn Station but would have to leave within the next cycle if they couldn’t find refuge with someone.

  Missy answered my comm immediately, and I filled her in on the situation. I asked if she would take a small detachment to the station to pick up the Squid refugees. I could tell she wasn’t happy about it but agreed to do it. Then I commed Rusty and asked if he had time for a quick trip to the moon. When he replied yes I commed Missy back and asked her to stop and pick Rusty and me up before flying to the moon to drop off the three Squids and Escargot. She chuckled when I told her I’d make it up to her. She had been planning on a quick scoot to the moon to pick up Amos, her mate, and drop off a relief crew for the ship and the researchers there.

  When I’d finished up with my messages, Jacky gave me a summary of where we were with production. The gist of it was we were looking better than I thought in the weaponry department and the Warms and Colds were producing Dopey Joe Mark IIIs and Cracker-3s at a rate nearly double what we had seen before we went after the mega-swarm. We also reviewing the performance of all of our ordinance and had some ideas that would increase the yield of our two primary missiles by nearly 40 per cent. They would be testing them next cycle and should be able to evaluate and report on performance the cycle after that.

  If the modifications worked, they would begin building warheads to the new specs right away and would set up a new production line to update the existing warheads. They were estimating completion of the updates around one-hundred and fifty cycles after starting the new line. This was fitting in with my timetable pretty well since I wanted to get back to the mega-swarm survivors in less than two hundred cycles.

  I got a comm from Missy telling me she was about ten centas out from the hangar and wanted to head for the moon as quickly as possible. I let Johnny and Jacky know and headed for Righteous Claws’ hangar with my security detail led by Ewan McFarrel today. I commed Elaine to let her know I was going to the moon and she told me she knew and she, Rusty and the cats were already at the hangar and to stop diddyhoeing around and get down there.

  When I got to the hangar, I saw she had on her armour and had mine with her. Rusty was in his ship-suit, and Silky and Edgar were in their satchels. I quickly armoured up and asked why the extra precautions. She said, “I don’t know, something was nagging at the back of my mind, and I had the armour on before I even realized it. Serena was in hers too. She’s around here somewhere, I saw her just before you showed up, she was talking with Winston, one of Silent’s operatives.

  “We need to get some for Rusty, he’s around us too much, and we get into situations too often for him not to have the extra protection. I commed Bebe about it on the way here, and she said she would have some ready for him by the time we get back.”

  As we were talking, several of the research team usually aboard Lab Rat showed up along with a platoon of warriors that would be relieving the squads on Rat. It was going to be a full flight but it was only total trip time of a deca from Saturn to the moon with the jump drive, most of that is the time to get to and from the jump limits.

  The hangar doors opened, and Claws made her entry. As soon as she was on the hangar deck, her ventral hatch opened, and we moved aboard. The warriors locked themselves in their suit racks while the rest of us sat in jump seats spread around the aft cabin or in the galley. We sat in the galley with Rusty and the cats. In less than five centas, we were back in space, heading for the jump limit.

  We got to the moon in well under a deca. Missy was in a hurry to get to Amos and didn’t spare the horses, when we got to the jump limit we were approaching .1 C and just before she activated the jump drive Missy swung Claws around so she could do her braking burn the instant we were in back normal space.

  When we landed in the crater we used as a landing field there were a couple of moon sleds waiting for us. I’d heard about them but had never ridden one. They resembled large cargo litters but were equipped with manoeuvring jets and propulsion nozzles using tanks of helium, a byproduct of mining the moon’s regolith for HE3.

  The warriors stationed on Lab Rat got bored with not much to do so they cobbled the first moon sled together from four damaged anti-gravity litters. When they were visited by a few of the HE3 miners, the miners looked at what the warriors were trying to do and suggested using what to them was waste gases for propulsion. The next cycle a shuttle showed up and unloaded a few hundred small fuel spheres charged with HE4, and the rest was history.

  We climbed on the sleds while they rested on the surface and as soon as everyone was strapped in we lifted and made the run to Lab Rat in less than five centas. It was the most fun Elaine, and I had since we went white-water rafting the year we left Terra.

  We cycled through Rat’s airlocks, and there was a squealing reunion between Amos and Missy as soon as she cleared the lock. Amos came over to me, and we clasped wrists. He said, “Thank you for bringing my mate back to me, Jase. It is lonely here and even worse, knowing she is so far away and in danger.”

  “She flies courier duty for me, so she doesn’t get close to the action, but there is always the chance some Plague will sneak through and hit our carriers or freighters. Thermopylae stays with the freighters, Righteous Claws is part of our ship contingent. The danger is less, but there is always the risk. If I could keep her farther away, I would, but war is war, and she and I must be where we are needed.”

  “I understand, Jase and look forward to the day we can be rid of the Plague. I treasure every tick I have with her. Thank you for letting her have so much downtime. We have looked forward to it, and we are going to take advantage of it while it lasts.”

  “Good for you both,” I said with a smile, “as soon as Rusty and I have had a chance to catch up on
the research here we will be heading back to MoG and you two will make yourselves scarce for at least a few cycles. That is an order, Amos.”

  He grinned and nodded his “Yes, Sir” then he grabbed Missy by the hand and headed for the ladder to the personnel deck.

  Rusty, Elaine and I met with the small staff of robotics experts who had come to study the drones after we completed our research on their “brains”. What we had found was not much more advanced as what the Mmrrreeowwn had accomplished, even Terra was able to produce similar brains as far as functionality was concerned, they just required a pickup truck to haul them around. We had eventually dissected all of the brains to learn how to miniaturize and reproduce them.

  The current crew was interested in the artificial “muscles” the Plague used and had finally cracked that nut. In the future, our drones wouldn’t require gears and pulleys or cogs and belts to be able to move. We saw some prototypes the boffins had created using the Plague drones as templates, and they had been able to make a series of improvements that were so simple and so linear in terms of development I was astounded the Plague hadn’t figured it out. When I mentioned this to Rusty, he smiled and shook his head, “They didn’t make the leap because they couldn’t. Their drones, even the leader class, lack some of the basic building blocks of intelligence, imagination and creativity. What seems simple to you and me is our gift to ask one simple question: what if? They simply carry out their programming to a limited degree. They are very effective within their limitations, but they are still limited.

  “You made mention of this in your report to the Confederation council when you stated you didn’t believe the drones to be truly intelligent and I believe you are right. They can only respond to what they or their creators have experience and stored in their memory banks. I have a sickening feeling when we board the last of those globe ships we are going to find hundreds if not thousands of biologicals who have been coerced into helping the drones. I believe this may be why we have started seeing new tactics used against us. The biologicals have been revived and are providing the drones with the innovation they need to develop new methods of fighting us.