Free Fleet Box Set 1

by Michael Chatfield

  Henry nodded as he twirled the hay.

  A dust plume rose at the end of the driveway.

  “Must be Carl,” his dad said as he nodded. “Know that I’m always here for you. Plus, it sounds like you have a few friends there for you too.”

  Henry grinned. “Oh, I’ve got a family. Have you heard about the gaming team Mecha Tail?”

  Henry talked as his two brothers Carl and Jesse arrived. Cindy was the last as normal, wearing her office apparel. Carl had his wife Lucy and his daughter Meghan; they were also expecting a second child. Jesse was seeing a girl, and Cindy was married to her job still, though no one denied Momma Terrance.

  They sat, ate, and drank as the sun went down. Henry smiled as he looked at his family smiling and joking. This is what the Free Fleet’s for. He looked at his dad, who gave him a look that said the same thing about the Marines.

  As the family lounged around the farm, Henry went to the barn. The smell of hay was comforting, even though it reminded him of when he had to stack the damned things.

  Jesse found him after some time. “Hey, Henry,” he said simply as he sat down. “I come bearing beer.” He handed Henry one, none in his own hands.

  “Not drinking tonight?” Henry asked.

  “Nope. Going to a party later. You should come, though we’re going to have to get you some shine the way you’re mowing through that beer.” He grinned.

  “Pah, weak.” Henry grinned back.

  “The invitation was real. There’s going to be people from high school there. Gotta show off my shiny new big brother in his gray and darker gray clothes,” he said.

  Henry laughed, looking at the Commando regulation battle suit he wore. “It’s for Commandos. The different color, or the stripe on the cuff, is the different areas you’re trained in.”

  “Looks pretty snappy,” he said.

  Henry shook his head and smiled. “I’ll pass. Just a bit tired.”

  “You sure? Girls love the uniform.” Jesse nudged Henry, who rolled his eyes.

  “Girls also like to know how their little brother got to be the commander of the most powerful multi-role force,” Cindy said.

  Jesse almost jumped out of his skin as Henry sipped his beer.

  “Hay’s pretty loud. Going to have to do better than that to scare me, big sis.” Henry smiled at her as he saw gears ticking in her head. His smile died in his eyes.

  “So how did you do it?” she asked, her eyes intent now.

  Henry shrugged. “Salchar picked me and I keep finding my ass in this position no matter how much I wish I wasn’t.”

  Her eyes turned calculating as she took in her brother. Cindy had been a big shot in her scouting company. She found the talent and was able to talk them into lucrative contracts and get a big return on it. Since the Recruitment, Cindy had been pulled into the military and made people from other countries join the United States instead of staying with their own country. Henry felt that she was about to try to scout him.

  “Well, I could see you living quite comfortably if you wanted to come back to the United States.” She watched for his reaction.

  He sighed and shook his head. “I have too many responsibilities.”

  “You have family and friends here, not to mention the Marines.”

  “You don’t understand, Cindy. I won’t leave them.” He looked at her.

  “How many of your friends have you seen hurt? Why would you want to keep going on like that?”

  “Cindy!” Jesse said as Henry placated him with a gesture, which she took as a lead and she continued.

  “How many have been maimed? Shot or died? How many have died so that you can come home?”

  Henry’s ire built. “Cindy,” he said in warning.

  She apparently didn’t catch on, in full pitch mode. “Why go back up there when they’ve died for you to come home? Doesn’t it make sense for someone else to take your place and die instead of you?”

  Henry heard the glass break in his hand as Cindy and Jesse looked at it in alarm. Henry was clenching the broken glass in his hand. “I have many waiting in the dark for me, Cindy. Many that you should respect instead of trying to use as some twisted ploy to get me to help your career.” He looked up at her now.

  She visibly flinched.

  “If I go into the dark for one of my people, I would gladly do so. No Commando, no person in the Free Fleet is above another. We fight together, side by side.”

  “Yet Salchar sits on his throne and—”

  “Enough,” Henry said, his voice deadly as he stood.

  Cindy’s eyes went wide and Jesse looked unsure of what he should do.

  “Salchar is my brother. He has fought with me many times. I would follow him into the darkest realm of hell if he asked me to.” Henry let out a breath of air as he opened his hand. Blood poured from it but he barely felt it. The pain implants had taught him how to ignore pain. “Do not ask me again to leave my people,” Henry said softly as he walked past her and out the barn.

  “You can be a real bitch sometimes, Cindy.” Jesse hurried after Henry, saying nothing as they walked back to the house. “How’s the hand?” Jesse finally asked.

  “It’ll be fine.” Henry pulled a salve from his pants pocket, which he applied to his cuts. They pulled together.

  “Cool!” Jesse grinned, having watched it.

  Henry shook his head as he put the salve back in his pocket and felt a familiar tube. “Oh, this’ll be cool,” he said as Jesse followed him to find his dad.

  “Dad, you know...about that leg,” Henry said with a grin on his face. “Well, I might have something.” He held up a needle labeled HELLFIRE.

  “I take back what I said earlier. Let’s go to that party,” Henry said out the side of his mouth.

  “Why?” Jesse said out the side of his mouth too.

  “’Cause otherwise Dad’s going to chase me down and kick my ass.”

  Jesse looked to his brother in question as his dad shrugged from his seat.

  “I’ll give it a go,” he said as he finished off his beer.

  ***

  Rick smiled as Marleen hugged his mom and then dad, both of them beaming as she followed him into the shuttle.

  Did I just see them hold hands? Rick shook his head, shrugging as he took a seat.

  Marleen’s grin was completely at odds with the hand-wringing nervousness she’d had when she’d landed at Rick’s mom’s house in California. His dad, who lived in the Nevada desert, had flown down to see his boy as well. Plus, it seemed as if his whole family wanted to meet his wife.

  Everyone had been there, and so had the food and, of course, the booze. His family drank like sailors and swore worse than them too, but they loved meeting new people and Marleen was an instant hit. Being from New York and from a family who never wanted to see one another, she had been quite nervous for a big family gathering.

  Yet his mom, aunts, and multitude of cousins had added her in as if she’d always been a part of it. Rick was thankful as they’d got caught up on everything, as if Rick and Marleen had just been away for a while, instead of in space. It was relaxing and happy.

  He sighed as he pulled out his data pad. His mother hadn’t allowed him to take it out. Lord knew what awaited him when he got to the fleet.

  “Another day at the office,” he muttered as Marleen put her head on his shoulder.

  “I like your parents,” she said and he beamed.

  No amount of work could make him feel down now. He kissed her head. “Good. They liked you too.” Marleen smiled into his shoulder as he did work, for once, with a smile on his face.

  He got off the shuttle, still smiling, as Henry was coming off his shuttle, bag slung over his shoulder.

  “Have a good few days?” Rick asked.

  “Sarah Palmer, my friend, Sarah Palmer.” Henry grinned.

  Rick shook his head. “The poor girl.” He and Henry laughed.

  Marleen rolled her eyes. “I’m off to the gun deck; you two don’t g
et into trouble!”

  Rick touched the data pad to his head. “Yes, ma’am.”

  She walked away, shaking her head.

  “Good to see you walking away, ma’am!” Rick continued as she over-exaggerated her walk, leaving Henry and Rick laughing.

  “That’s my girl!” Rick yelled as the people walking around the shuttle bay looked up, a few grinning while a few looked confused.

  “How about you?” Henry asked as they meandered through the ship.

  “Family gave the big thumbs-up.” Rick grinned as Henry smiled appreciatively. “Talking about family, how was yours?” Rick asked.

  “Good, other than the part where I gave my dad Hellfire and he chased my ass through two acres of corn fields before my brother saved me with a truck.” A grin crossed Henry’s face.

  “Then Sarah Palmer?”

  “Something like that.” He grinned wider. “My dad gave me this.” Henry opened his bag and revealed four bottles of moonshine.

  “Finally, something with a bit of flavor!” Rick grinned. Alcohol in their new bodies burned up pretty darned quick, so moonshine was like beer now, and the metal peeler was like homemade Russian vodka.

  “You bet, brother. We’ll crack it when Salchar’s done wrangling politicians,” Henry said.

  Rick grimaced. “Better him than me!”

  “Amen,” Henry said and they both grinned.

  ***

  I took my seat as normal. Why they felt the need to label these seats, I’ll never know. At least they could’ve said CFF instead of just “Salchar.” Sounds kinda pompous. I looked around the room. There were military members among the aides the leaders brought; apparently they were not done with trying to convince me to leave. The day began with the topic of mining and got little traction throughout the day.

  The breaks, however, were a mad scram. I talked with the military members, more times than not. Often I found myself in a group of them and preferred their company over the politicians, as I believed most of the officers did. They realized I was not interested in having them replace me; they talked to me candidly about what had been going on.

  I listened with half an ear. I knew if any of these people gained my position, they’d pull their government to power.

  I sat down at my seat, reflecting on these meetings. Just mere months ago, I had wished for someone to take power from me and believed that others would take it from me in a moment. Yet here I was, seen as an officer, not someone who was faking it—at least by military officers—and told that I was the only feasible leader of the Free Fleet. Now I would have to fight to stay in control of the very fleet I had hoped and thought someone else would pull away from me with ease. With my oaths to the dead, and to the living to keep them safe, I had to make the Free Fleet a thing to be proud of. I needed to stay in command to do that.

  Again, the governments of the world tried to gain more power from me, and again I ignored them. My intelligence department already had a list of most of the leaders in the room who had plans in place to kill me. Radicals of all shades wanted to do the same. In a friggin’ room of vipers, I thought sourly as I plowed on with my major tasks.

  We did make some progress with the countries that were willing to move out into the Sol system, but it was minimal with the greedy countries and politicians.

  My first job for them was to find an arrangement where they would work together and create a government that functioned for everyone, not just the nations. It was a tall order, and many were unhappy with it. The second was that they had a plan to get not only out of Earth’s atmosphere but into the Sol system and traveling to other systems.

  I’d let them stew over it but until they found a system that would work, I wouldn’t release technology to them to get them into space.

  The talks continued like that for a while and we made little headway as we went. Many of the leaders were asking for tours of my ships with their staff, no doubt trying to glean some kind of information. I would have granted it to them if the ships that we had weren’t half pulled apart, getting put back together with their guts and weaponry open for all to see.

  A rota was set up with Free Fleet personnel training, working on fixing up the ships or station, or enjoying the first real free time they’d had since we took Parnmal. Recreational areas were set up in Hachiro and they were made frequent use of by off-duty personnel.

  After the first week, Rick had had a quiet conversation with me about the increased sexual activities of the human personnel. Rick instituted birds and the bees classes. Much to his awkwardness, he became the teacher for it. Something Marleen and I had great fun talking about—much to his embarrassment.

  Another project of mine was getting the FTL communications system up. There was a series of relays that had to be put in place and Parnmal was the only place yet making them. Chaleel was connected so far, but the relays were highly technical and took a long time to make, calibrate, and then put into position.

  We had a system of ships jumping from system to system, carrying information to make up for breaks in the FTL relay.

  We set into a routine and worked to improve the fleet, all while I dealt with the nearly daily talks with the world leaders as Earth slowly changed.

  Slackers!

  Eddie had finally allowed Shrift to come back to his position as engineer, but as the engineer in charge of overseeing the repairs to Hachiro and all of the other ships.

  Can’t have him becoming idle now that he’s some use, Eddie thought as he saw a Kuruvian playing games on his data pad instead of watching the gauges in front of him. A boot sailed through the air, making the Kuruvian stumble as it hit its hard shell.

  “Get to work!” Eddie said.

  The Kuruvian’s eyes went wide. It practically dropped its pad and glued its eyes to the gauges.

  Eddie tapped a control on his belt as the boot’s built-in winch whirred, collecting the wire until it was next to his foot. He put it on, checking the cowboy boot before tipping his cowboy hat and continued his rounds.

  Winch was a damned smart idea, Eddie assured himself as past Kuruvians had taken his precious boots from him more than once or jammed his magnetic couplers. The last time some aspiring Kuruvian had taken his boots, it took him four days to find them in a fuel station.

  The little whelp who took his boots had. It was one of the reasons Eddie had him running all the repairs.

  Eddie grinned wickedly as people moved out of his way. Ever since the Free Fleet had come into existence, a man could get some room. Eddie got a few nods, but mostly harried looks. “Good to see them moving with a purpose,” he said proudly.

  “Indeed. I just wish we had more hands to do the work with,” Resilient said.

  Should’ve thought about Ms. Nosy here.

  “At least we were able to spring some of those drones from Parnmal, and the Syndicate here were still using theirs instead of feeding them into a dismantler.” Eddie’s tone became hard as he reflected darkly on the kinds of idiots who would destroy perfectly good and useful drones.

  It’s a wonder the Syndicate is still standing with that kind of idiocy.

  “So, how are you liking serving in the Free Fleet?” Resilient asked.

  Eddie pondered the question. As soon as Resilient talked to him, he knew he’d be her engineer. His changes from Syndicate to Free Fleet hadn’t been that much, as no one messed with the guy who controlled everything around you. Even the personal crew, when they saw Eddie, made sure to give him a bit of a berth.

  Yet, there was a completely different mood. People were motivated, driven even, to get things done.

  Kuruvians, who would spend their days looking at the stars or reading their data pads without much care to their actual duties, were pitching in and getting their jobs done. Their seemingly unending search for new information only occurred after they’d completed their tasks.

  Many people were cross-trained, meaning that they could act as a Commando, and electrical technician, and a shuttle pilot, o
r a variety of more or less positions within the Free Fleet.

  “I like it,” Eddie surmised. He found himself nodding as he looked at coolant piping and he stopped, in his own world. “That Salchar knows how to motivate people. Plus, he tries to put ships back together instead of ripping them apart. That man always has a plan. Mark my words, he’s fifteen or so steps ahead of everyone. We picked well. What do you think of him?”

  “I’m surprised by him,” Resilient mused.

  “Oh?”

  “Well, I thought that he would be more self-centered after all he’s been through in his life, but instead he’s putting his life into the fleet and the people in it. He truly cares, and I’m not sure what that will mean.”

  “What do you mean?” Eddie said. He could swear Resilient was playing mind games with him.

  “Well, the galaxy isn’t the most forgiving place, and I don’t know if he’ll be tough enough for what it throws at him,” Resilient said.

  Eddie thought on that. “Well, I guess we’ll just have to see. Now, I need to go and check on those new weapon installs. Apparently Chief Zor is raising hell over it all.”

  “Oh yes, it is quite spectacular.” Resilient sounded rather amused.

  Eddie snorted as he thought of Zor’s famed, colorfully filled sentences, one might say. It was rather at odds with Chief Brusk who, although not being any quieter, was never heard saying a colorful comment. Yet, their competitive friendship was legendary.

  Should be their ability to drink plasma, Eddie thought, thinking of the times the three of them had met up before finding a local brewery or a still in a secluded corner. The still drink usually tasted as if it could peel metal, though people still drank it.

  Eddie grinned as he shifted his weight to one hip and tucked his thumbs in his belt. Maybe we should give that one another go. Though this time we should see if Earth sells anything more palatable. Eddie hadn’t felt his tongue for two days and then regretted when he did.

  ***

  “Verlu, I swear you must eat helium instead of food,” Henry grumbled as he caught his breath again.

  Verlu grinned as he took a seat on the unfinished decking. The other officers came in, similarly panting as they drank from the fountain that had been installed for the purpose of Henry’s now infamous leadership meetings.