Vicky Peterwald: Survivor (Vicky Peterwald Series Book 2)

by Mike Shepherd

  In a few moments, Vicky was out of uniform and braless. In a few moments more, she was dressed, such as she was.

  She let her eyes rove the room and settled on the settee in the admiral’s conversation circle. She walked over to it barefoot and folded herself onto it, reclining in a most languid fashion.

  “You ready to record?”

  “If this is what you want to do,” Kit said, and held up her commlink.

  “Hello, Stepmother dearest. It was so good to hear from you. As you know, you continue to miss what you’re aiming at. It’s hard to believe that little old me is more than all your assassins can hit,” Vicky said, waving a hand down her side, then moving quickly to pull her dress back in place as one nipple slipped out.

  Vicky stared hard into the commlink. “Thank you for your most gracious offer of hospitality, but you know what it was like last time I visited. Dead bodies here. Explosions there. Your assassins just kept missing the mark and hitting innocent bystanders. I think I’ll keep my distance for the time being.”

  Vicky glanced away, then turned back, voice as hard as she could make it. “Don’t bother sending any more pirate junks to take a shot at me. I will have a battleship to look out for me, and I know it will do the job very well. You stay in there, making the mess you’re making of the Empire, and I’ll stay out here, trying to mitigate the pain and agony you’re causing. If you stay there, and I stay here, we are both likely to live longer. Ta-ta, until we meet again,” Vicky said, waving at the camera.

  As she did, both nipples slipped free of the dress.

  “Mademoiselle, you are too too,” Kit said.

  “She is teasing a tigress,” Kat said.

  “And enjoying every moment of it,” Vicky said as she stood. “Now, let us get me back in decent clothes.”

  CHAPTER 50

  IT took most of what was left of the afternoon, but Mr. Smith was away shortly after supper in the Spaceadler with Vicky’s message to dear young mom, her wish list, and an allotment of crystal to barter for the desired software. That done, Vicky found herself invited to the admiral’s day quarters and included in a discussion with several ship outfitters and maintainers.

  “Here’s the list you asked for, Admiral von Mittleburg, for the minimum that it would take to upgrade those two slips so they can handle heavy cruisers,” one commander said. “The list is long, but doable using St. Petersburg’s heavy-fabrication capabilities, or so they told us when we asked for information.”

  “Will it use too much of it?” Vicky asked. “Some of the bankers are scared to death of sparking inflation.”

  “Have you ever met a banker who wasn’t?” the admiral asked dryly.

  That got a laugh from the Navy officers.

  While they talked at length about whether they really needed this or that to make the docks into what they wanted, Vicky found herself with little to say and even less she could understand. She began fiddling with the comm station at her place around the admiral’s conference table.

  When she started, she had no idea where she was headed, maybe just scratching an itch that she didn’t know she had. First, she brought up the planets that Captain Spee had visited when the Doctor Zoot made its hurried round-robin. Between them they produced a wide array of raw materials essential to the lifeblood of the Empire.

  At least they had been deemed essential during the Empire’s better days.

  Vicky had her computer plug those resources into the St. Petersburg economy.

  They fit nicely. They also fit nicely into Posnan’s.

  What was missing on all the planets was the big industrial base needed to convert those resources, the heavy fabricators. It was true that given enough time, St. Petersburg could make heavier and heavier fabricators, but it would be a whole lot nicer if she could just buy what she needed at the start.

  Vicky found herself wondering if the admiral and his men weren’t settling for too little. On further review, was Mannie looking at all the options the present disaster opened up to him and St. Petersburg?

  “Admiral, if you wanted to make the generators, reactors, and capacitors for, say, the Retribution, where would you go to get the materials and fabs to make the tools you needed to make the tools?” Vicky asked, interrupting a conversation on just how little an upgrade they could make do with and still repair the Attacker.

  The looks she drew from around the admiral’s conference table were appropriate for someone who had just grown two heads. Maybe three.

  The admiral looked around at his commanders and captains. Most just gnawed their lower lips. One spoke.

  “Greenfeld and Kiel have yards with everything necessary to support the construction of battleships and other heavy warships,” he pointed out.

  “Such as the new Terror class battleships,” Vicky said. “I understand a man is being brought in to command that first ship. A man not from the Greenfeld Navy.”

  That was met by silence around the table.

  “And if we wanted to work on something the size of the Retribution, either to repair it, or maybe build a sister ship . . . ?” Vicky asked, trying to be vague about what some might call treason.

  The answer was a while coming. Several of the officers at the table silently polled each other. Finally, the one who’d offered the first answer spoke.

  “Metzburg is the closest planet with that kind of heavy industry. Her and New Brunswick.”

  The admiral muttered something to his computer, and the bulkhead across from Vicky lit up with a star map. Both Metzburg and New Brunswick were about equidistant from St. Petersburg and Greenfeld.

  “What are their recent economic circumstances?” Vicky asked.

  Her computer answered, “Both are in recession. Their economies have shrunk for the last ten quarters by two to three percent on average. As much as five percent occasionally.”

  “Why?” Vicky asked.

  “Imports are down. Several fabricators have closed down due to a lack of credit. Others lack critical resources. Even those still running are below capacity because they lack markets, both on planet and off.”

  “The same story we have been hearing all throughout the Empire,” Vicky concluded.

  “Apparently,” Admiral von Mittleburg said evenly if not precisely.

  “What are the critical failure points?” Vicky asked, then realized she was inviting her computer to talk through the night. “Cancel previous question. Do the critical failure points include crystal and rare-earths products?”

  “Crystal fabrication takes place mainly on Greenfeld in the facilities owned by the Smythe-Peterwald consortiums. Repairs can be done almost anywhere, but the initial units come from Greenfeld. So does the miniaturized-electronics industry as well as power-generation facilities. They are an Imperial monopoly of the Smythe-Peterwald Holding corporations,” her computer said, telling her what she’d learned at her father’s knee.

  “We hold the rest of the economy by the neck,” he’d bragged. “If you have their balls clutched in your hands, their hearts and minds will follow.” That had been Vicky’s introduction both to male anatomy and mixed metaphors.

  “Have the security firms of my dearly loved stepmum and her brothers set up shop on either planet?”

  “No. There is much civil unrest, but so far the local officials have been able to avoid large-scale riots in the streets,” her computer reported. It was as reliable a report as Vicky was likely to get in the empire.

  “So there are likely small-scale riots,” Vicky said dryly. Her smile was bitter.

  The Navy officers sitting around the conference table were staring at her, as if trying to figure out a name for this strange and unheard of beast that had been dropped in their midst.

  “What are you thinking, Your Grace?” the admiral finally asked.

  “I am thinking that you are thinking way too small, gentlem
en. I am thinking that we need to grab this bull by the horns. Rather than waiting for it to trample us and gore our guts out in the dirt, we should be grabbing its horns and twisting it around to gallop off to where we want it to take us.”

  “And that would be?” the admiral asked.

  “Look what my stepmum and her robber-baron family have been doing. They are wrecking the Empire. However, as the Empire my family built goes up in smoke, they are pulling this and that bit of wreckage out of the fire and claiming it for their own. I say we should be looking for bits of their future plunder and grabbing it before they barbecue it.”

  Vicky stood up and strode around the table to the star map. “Metzburg and New Brunswick are hurting, but they are not burning. Not yet, at least. They have what we need here on St. Petersburg. Our little trade consortium here”—she jabbed at the six planets they had involved so far—“has what they need. What they need and the Navy colonies need, I might add. Despite the best monopolistic efforts of my ancestors, St. Petersburg has managed to manufacture some of what is needed to keep the larger economies of Metzburg and New Brunswick working during these hard times. If we swap them what they need for what we want, St. Petersburg grows, they stay afloat, and the raw-resource suppliers get the business they need.”

  Vicky made a face at the planets visited by Captain Spee. “I suspect my father’s purchasing agents have been quite good at keeping down the prices of the raw feedstock they buy from them. If the value is allowed to float on a free market to what it’s truly worth, they may be surprised at what they can buy.”

  Now, several of the Navy officers were staring at Vicky with their jaws hanging half-open.

  “Gentlemen,” the admiral was quick to say, “what you hear here, no doubt, you understand, will stay here.”

  “Can we do that?” one was heard to whisper.

  “Keep our mouths shut?” his neighbor asked.

  “No, damn it, I’m a Greenfeld officer, my right hand never knows what my left hand just did. No, can we do this trade thing?”

  “Can we?” Vicky repeated the question, then answered it. “Yes.”

  “Are we permitted to?” the admiral said. “Likely, no.”

  “Will we?” an officer from the foot of the table asked.

  “Why not?” Vicky answered.

  The officers around the table looked at each other but did not gainsay her.

  “Gentlemen, let us continue this discussion tomorrow,” the admiral suggested, and, in a moment, only he and Vicky were still seated at the table.

  “That was interesting,” he said to Vicky.

  “How so?” she asked.

  “Well, for one thing, I’ve never sat at a table and had a Grand Duchess propose treason.”

  “I warned you I was close to it,” Vicky said, not suppressing a smile.

  “Yes, you warned me, but I didn’t expect it so soon.”

  Vicky shrugged. “We can let my robber-baron in-laws plunder and destroy, or we can take action. My question to you is whether or not you think this action will work,” she said, still eyeing the star map.

  “You’ve got the best analytical computer aboard this ship,” the admiral pointed out.

  “Computer, will the plan just outlined work?” Vicky asked.

  “Economically, it is very likely to succeed,” the computer said. “Practically, it is a very complex proposed action plan, and there are several complications and potential failure points, but none that should prevent it from working. However, politically, there are several laws, trade restrictions, and other constraints of trade that seem to make this entire action plan something that cannot be done.”

  “So, nothing but politics to stop us,” Vicky said, and tried to look as confident as her words sounded.

  Inside, her gut was doing fifteen hundred revolutions a minute.

  The admiral groaned. “I did want to spend a few good years retired and growing grapes, testing casks to see how the wine was maturing,” he said.

  “And I do want to see our beloved Greenfeld prosper,” Vicky said.

  The admiral met her firm gaze with level eyes. “Then let us see what we can do about both of our wishes.”

  CHAPTER 51

  BY midmorning, Vicky was back in Mannie’s office. Only this time, she came as the full Grand Duchess. Well, the full Navy officer who was the Grand Duchess.

  That morning, Kit and Kat had dressed her carefully in dress whites. It turned out that Vicky was officially attached to the admiral’s staff, so a gold aiguillette was added to the left shoulder of her uniform. Her medals were few, but the golden starburst of the Order of St. Christopher, Star Leaper, made up for any lack with its weight. The few stripes of a lieutenant commander might be light, but it showed she worked for a living.

  A ballroom gown had been laid out, but Vicky had sent it back to the closet. “These people remember when the Navy saved them from my loving stepmom’s Security Consultants. I need all the good memories I can snatch.”

  Still, her appearance stopped Mannie in his tracks.

  “Oh my Grand Duchess,” he said. “Is this what you really look like?”

  “Yesterday, I was underdressed. Today, I came prepared.”

  “I’m grateful for the vision, Your Grace, but you really needn’t have. I have quite a deal for you,” he crowed.

  “I come with a better one to lay on the table,” Vicky said.

  With a puzzled frown, Mannie ushered Vicky to his couch and took his place in his usual chair. Two minutes later, Vicky was off the couch and showing him around a star chart. Five minutes later, he was out of the chair and pacing.

  “Good God, woman, don’t you ever think small?”

  “I’ve thought small most of my life,” Vicky admitted. “Small isn’t going to cut it in the mess we’re in. You can’t cross a ten-foot-wide, thousand-foot-deep chasm in two five-foot hops.”

  “Not unless the last leap is a doozy,” the mayor muttered. “But this. It’s not a ten-foot hop you’re asking for. It’s a thousand-foot hurdle!”

  “But it gets you what you want,” Vicky said, pointing to the star chart. “Out here, there are dozens of inhabitable planets just waiting for Greenfeld to expand into. Where is the logical base for that expansion?” Vicky asked. “Here, on St. Petersburg. You could be the next Wardhaven, the mother of colonies, the supplier of goods and services that this whole new sector of Imperial colonies need.”

  She eyed Mannie. He was eyeing the star chart as if he’d never seen it before.

  “You already had the initial market needed for your first growth spurt. The Navy needs everything for Port Royal. The five closest planets need just about anything you can fabricate and get to them as well as what you, in return, need to make it.”

  Vicky had her computer cascade the list of raw materials that each of the five planets provided, then opened a new window that cascaded their needs alongside that original list. Then she did the same for St. Petersburg.

  Mannie nodded along as the matches became clear.

  Then Vicky punched one more button and added Metzburg and New Brunswick.

  Mannie whistled.

  “You get much sleep last night?” he asked.

  “My computer did all the work after I asked it the right questions.”

  “Do you always ask the right questions?”

  “I rarely did until last night. I got bored during a meeting about upgrading the space docks to work on heavy cruisers. I scratched an itch I didn’t know I had, and this is what came of it.”

  “Well, I can vouch that long talks about upgrading the yard and docks on High St. Petersburg can be boring,” Mannie said, casting Vicky a whole new look.

  Vicky found she kind of liked that different look in Mannie’s eyes. It tasted of a job well done, and proud of it. She could really get used to it.

&nb
sp; “You’re right. We are thinking small, but small is the way we’ve been trained to think. Small and legal.”

  Rubbing his chin, he walked over to one of his office’s large windows. Vicky joined him. Her eye was drawn to the larger tower, the one where they had met with the titans of banking and industry last night.

  “Are they still in town?” she asked.

  “Likely sleeping. We were up into the wee hours last night. No, this morning.”

  “You think you can wake them up?”

  “Damned if I’m not going to give it a try. And any that blow me off, roll over, and go back to sleep will deserve what they don’t get,” he said with a boyish laugh. “Oh, Vicky. I had no idea what I was getting into the morning I ambushed Kris Longknife’s truck. I figured I’d get her to get you down here to sign off on the greatest brainchild of my life.”

  “You did.”

  “No, Your Grace. I used a princess to hook a Grand Duchess, and now I’m riding a tigress who seems to know no bounds.”

  “We could all end up being hanged?” Vicky decided she should point that out. Mannie was being most manic.

  “Yes, I imagine we could. Or we could save your Empire.”

  “I like to think of it as our Empire. To the Navy folks I talk to, it’s theirs as much as mine.”

  “You keep this up, Duchess, and a whole lot of people will be thinking of it the same way.”

  Again, Vicky found herself feeling warmed by Mannie’s words in a way that she’d never quite felt before. “We will have to talk about this more,” she said, feeling almost shy before his approval.

  “But first, we need to talk to some very important people who have no idea just how important they are about to become.”

  “Or very dead,” Vicky added.

  “The less we say about that, the better, Your Grace.”

  “Are you suggesting that I am wrong to think so?”

  “No, Vicky,” he said, using her given name for the second time. “I am suggesting that you are right. Oh so very right. These people will know how so very right just as soon as the words are out of your mouth. However, there is no need for us to belabor the obvious. Not when the obvious is what we intend to avoid.”