Family Law

by Mackey Chandler

  Chapter 38

  Earl's wife, Faye, took Lee to get clothing in Marquette. There was one big store that had reasonable prices and took the voucher. Lee picked denim jeans and knit t-shirts. That's what she was used to since Faye told her coveralls were not worn and they wouldn't have them small enough anyway. She got a flannel shirt with a hood, because they had no wool. Wool was expensive, she found out. A pair of tennis shoes and some socks were fine, but Lee insisted on a pair of real boots. She got them, but it used up her voucher. Faye reminded her several times she wouldn't get another until the fall. The new condo had its own washer and dryer, which made everybody happy because they had used a community wash center before.

  "Oh, you'll have to be evaluated and get schooling assigned this fall too," Diana suddenly thought to tell her. "Summer schooling is optional. Earl and I both grew up having summer vacations and we chose that for our kids too."

  "Where do they go to school?" Lee asked worried.

  "Oh they take their lessons at home. Only a fancy private school can afford a central building and boarding, or the expense of busing everybody there day after day. Some on negative income don't keep after their kids to do their lessons," she said disapprovingly, "but I do. You can skate along and they won't push, but I won't have them like half the projects, who can't read their forms and fill them out without a clerk helping."

  Lee just kept her mouth shut. Gordon would have been proud.

  Her foot finally healed completely without any treatment. She started doing exercises again, but she didn't have anybody with who she could spar. Earl told her not to do it outside where people could see.

  "Earl, your wife kept reminding me I wouldn't get another clothing voucher until fall. Is it OK to tell her I have my own money? I've kept it quiet, but we can go get some cash at a machine if I need things. For that matter I'd be happy to buy anything you need and have a hard time affording. It's not any burden."

  "I'll tell her myself, but I have to do it right. I love my wife, but she isn't good at keeping secrets. I thank you, but I don't want to take from you unless it is an emergency. It doesn't feel right. We'd have to cover it up if it was something you could see. Jerri and Joey have friends in, kids aren't dumb and they talk back home. As long as we have what we need, leave be."

  * * *

  The message from Stanley repeated Lee's message about where she was and most importantly that she was safe. He then informed Gordon Blackwater would have agents in place soon watching the family. Stanley went on in some detail about the legal complexities of challenging her foster placement in court. After reading a few detailed analyses of the jurisdictional complexities and the difficulty of establishing standing, the legal side of it was beyond him. He just replied: "What are the odds we could just snatch her and have her above atmosphere before they know what the heck is happening?"

  * * *

  - Media Headlines – Shorts -

  Pravda – Americans in Secret Interstellar War - American Ships Seized.

  Daily Lunatic - Naval officers repay rescue by staging mutiny. - Attempt take-over of civilian ship carrying over 200 passengers. Two killed in 'Battle for the Bridge'.

  Shipping News – Liner captain lands at Lunar Republic – leaves system on first outbound ship.

  Washington Wow (in exile) - State Department denies receiving Declaration of War posted on their own web site. Secretary in video says War notice a joke of powerless boondockers nation can ignore.

  The Interstellar Investor - Explorers ask if North America is safe for wealthy to visit? - Ugly history of forfeiture cited.

  Sapient Rights /Web - Judge calls Derf soulless animal and furry freak - says foreign law null regardless of treaty recognition. References religious beliefs and throws Derf from courtroom.

  FarNews - Fargone disperses armed vessels with orders to defend themselves.

  Star Law Journal - Letters of Marque and Reprisal EARTH law not Derf. Hoist on our own Petard?

  Rights Watch /Web - Rights organization labels alien sapients 'New Niggers' - Safe to hate people who have fur or feathers.

  Financial Times /Web Site - Explorer stocks down on fear system will limit awards. Claims Commission denies NA has made any claim on heiress payments. Assures it is still independent.

  Commodities Analyst - Central banks limit PM transfers out-system.

  LA Times /Web - California court says placement of Claims heiress not public information.

  Oh, my. Lee read the headlines in shock. She'd better show Earl.

  * * *

  "Allowing a small tribal government, not even a world, to dictate to us would make us look like fools," the Secretary of Defense insisted.

  "We already look foolish," the President growled. "Have you looked at the news headlines? State was denying they had been notified of a formal state of war, while the document was posted on their own site. It was a classic example of the right hand not knowing what the left was doing. Oy vey!"

  "Foolish like big complex organizations can be by accident," the Secretary insisted, "people understand that, but not weak. If you fumble - be a fumbling giant. I say we have a war – prosecute it. Establish who is in charge and then be gracious to them, but from a position of mastery, not weakness. No nation can afford to look weak. Send a punitive expedition and then quietly get our warship back and give them their brat."

  "What do you have to send and what would they do? What would be their objective?"

  "We have a platoon of Space Marines, Special Forces trained to fight in any imaginable environment, that can be dropped from the DSC St. Louis. They were just ready to do a show the flag cruise to Dustin's World and Lucky Strike. They have two combat shuttles that can either of them land a platoon in one drop and seize the Red Tree's only city, village really. They have no orbital capacity or air force and if they have any air defenses it would be man portable."

  "Could you send two platoons if it has two shuttles?" the President asked.

  "I could send four platoons, a short company and grapple the shuttles externally," the Secretary said, "but it would be massive overkill and a waste of resources."

  "Good, I like massive overkill and certainty, do it," he ordered, "and get Federal custody of this girl the old fool snatched, so we can return her if we that's what we decide."

  "Mr. President, I respectfully submit my resignation," the Secretary of Interstellar Affairs said. He pushed the memo pad forward, on which he had scribbled the one line resignation.

  "Why, Allen?

  "You rushed to a decision without consulting me, or any of your other space agencies, rendering my purpose irrelevant. I no longer have confidence in your judgment," he said bluntly. "Too big to admit an error and correct it gracefully is a stupid and dangerous policy. You have not balanced the risks of modern warfare against your ego. North America has continually played at war for the second half of its existence. Two hundred years of fighting only enemies who can't seriously hurt it. Wars that mean as much in the end, as a high school football game." He took a deep breath and looked at them.

  "Red Tree has not waged a war for twelve hundred years. They have existed three times as long as that and don't dabble at war like a hobby. Do you know what happened to the last clan with who they went to war? It doesn't exist. They took their land, killed every male of breeding age, tore down their castle and destroyed their banners and symbols."

  "Yes, with bronze axes and bows and arrows," the Secretary of Defense mocked.

  "They hold the Heavy Deep Space Cruiser Cincinnati," Allen pointed out. "Any starship full of rocks and boosted from beyond the system edge would be a relativistic bomb impossible to intercept and capable of taking out a quarter of the North American continent with one strike. It is only by the grace of God and the wisdom we found to let our colonies go before they demand their freedom, that we have avoided such a strike. As a species we have yet to invent a weapon we have not used. I had hoped when it inevitably does happen, the Chinese or Indians would be
the fools to invite it down on their heads. But when I leave here I am taking my family and going to Luna or beyond. I won't sit here while you make them a target," he said nodding at the angry Secretary of Defense. He walked out on the meeting and President early, breaking all protocol.

  * * *

  "Earl, I want to go somewhere I can get some cash and buy some things. I'm scared and I don't know what is happening and I want to be able to run if it looks like the smart thing to do. Who do you know, who can take me to a couple different teller machines without leaving a trail?"

  "Tell me the truth, are you coming back? I'll help you anyway, but I have to plan different if you intend to disappear. If you are running now I have to report you gone the next day or it will be hell to pay for my family. If you are really coming back I can cover you being gone a couple days, OK?"

  "I really will come back, unless something unplanned happens to me. I wouldn't lie to you."

  "No, I don't think you would. OK, I know a man who has a car. Not too old and not too new. The sort that doesn't attract attention. He drives people down to the city and back, who don't want to advertise. Them as can't have their luggage sniffed and looked at too closely for the bus."

  "Can you trust him? Am I going to be safe with him?"

  "My family and his family all know each other. He's not going to dirty his own well. Besides, I didn't just fall off the turnip truck. I'll tell him he is being asked to work for just you – no other passengers or packages this trip. And I'll ask him to take his wife and his little girl along as cover. He's not going to pull anything funny with them along. How much do you want to pay though? He's going to charge more for special service."

  "What does he usually carry? Is he a smuggler? Does he carry drugs or weapons?

  "Oh my, no," Earl looked shocked. "Do you think I'd send you off with somebody like that? People fish and hunt," he hesitated, "and poach a bit too. They pack it in dry ice, send it down to the City to relatives who can't afford meat. Some folks do sell a bit of it, though that part is illegal. He carries down cheese that people make the old fashioned way. It actually tastes like cheese. Not the crap they sell in the stores. And there are folks who keep honey bees."

  "He brings back stuff like cigarettes. There are people who still smoke, them as aren't on the negative and have to pass drug tests. People give him shopping lists too. A can of vegetables in Ishpeming runs about four dollars. Down in the City you can get them for half that. Sometimes he buys a case on speculation and sells them out on the quiet. Sometimes people do ride with him who don't want to be tracked. Why is their business."

  That sort of took the wind out of Lee's sails. She thought she was going to have a risky adventure with shifty characters. Cheese?

  "Whatever you negotiate with him then. Don't make us look like marks willing to pay anything. We need to keep some respect. I don't mind if he carries freight though. Just not people who can figure out who I am and maybe get greedy."

  "You're getting smarter about this sort of thing," he said smiling.

  * * *

  The man sized hatches up the center of the Cincinnati were ripped out and Derf rated welded in. They didn't try to make it pretty. The raw welds were not even ground smooth or painted over. The corridor was offset to one side now, so only one compartment on each level had to have its bulkhead moved in, to widen the corridor. The shift of center of mass was corrected by one counter weight, in the form of a formed plate welded to the hull outside an amidships cabin. It was a minimum mass solution, to add a neutralizing moment arm. The ship had its original balance restored at the cost of a bit more than three hundred kilograms of dead weight, including the heavier Derf size hatches.

  The airlocks were entirely adequate. They were simply one or two Derf in a squeeze, instead for four man locks. The flight deck had eight control consoles. Two on each side were ripped out and replaced with a single Derf seat and controls.

  The pressure cabin and hatch around each weapon mount was simply cut away and the Derf or men crewing it would wear pressure suits. That offset the weight added by the hatches and balancing mass. Many of the controls and stations being inaccessible to Derf wasn't a problem. In engineering spaces and environmental in particular, because Derfhome humans as well as a few Fargone mercenaries, were happy to man the controls and work the systems.

  They jumped the Cincinnati to a system that had no regular human presence. The mining that had occurred there ended at least temporarily when cheaper sources were discovered. They found a few small asteroids, chunks of floating rock and tried the ship's beam weapons. It was impressive. They left one iron nickel asteroid a molten oscillating blob, glowing yellow hot. Their astrogator calculated it would need three years to cool to where it was not detectable anywhere in the system. They hoped nobody would chance on it and figure out what they had been doing here.

  The magazine carried three-hundred-forty small short range defensive missiles, twelve anti-ship hyper-velocity missiles with x-ray laser warheads, maneuvering and electronic counter measure capable and forty-eight general purpose long range nuclear missiles with heat shields.

  They decided they would fire one of the forty-eight to test their understanding and to train the crew. Once they were shot they were irreplaceable. Fargone would probably pay big money for a sample to reverse engineer, but reproducing them in any quantity would be hugely expensive.

  "It has a variable warhead," the number one missile launch port chief informed Gordon. "Do you want ten megatons, two-hundred megatons, or something in-between?"

  "Crank it up and give us a full demo. I'll have us stand off twenty thousand kilometers. We're going to pass by that gas giant and we'll plant it on one of the small moons head on, against its orbital motion."

  The launch was unmistakable. The whole ship lurched from the ejected mass. "Good burn. Dropping booster. No maneuvering."

  They watched the tiny spark race away. Everyone in the ship who could, was watching a screen intently. "Terminal evasive maneuvers and dropped three decoys just like it was set."

  Suddenly the screen blacked out in overload. It took almost five seconds for the fireball to cool enough the camera could show it again. The moon was shattered, thousands of glowing fragments scattering.

  About two thirds of it was to the gas giant side, still fragmenting and trailing pieces after it as it eased away. The other third had oddly acquired a spin and was expanding throwing pieces everywhere. Everyone was stunned. It had been an egg shape almost six kilometers long.

  "I guess it was mostly a bunch of loose rocks just barely stuck together," Gordon surmised. "Damn I hope it wasn't anything useful, somebody would have mined or anything. I feel bad for just smashing it now."

  "Good to see what we're shooting though," his human XO said quietly. "I hope we don't have to use any of them on people."

  * * *

  They eased the Cincinnati down on Derfhome's larger moon. A fracture in a crater ringwall gave them a view of the entire planet hemisphere facing them, but sheltered them from over twenty degrees of observation above the horizontal to each side. A shuttle was sent with a crew of two, to sit on the smaller moon to give them better coverage and a detail went outside and shoveled regolith on top of the hull for whatever small camouflage that afforded. And they waited.

  Chapter 39

  "No challenge?" Commander Atkins asked, as they assumed orbit over Derfhome. Harris at the com board looked up to make sure he was being addressed. Did Atkins really think he'd withhold a communication, if someone was objecting to their presence? Perhaps he wanted a chatty response. Harris wasn't going to paint himself a fool to suck up to the idiot.

  This was Harris' second mission with Atkins and he missed his previous commander. That fellow hadn't distracted the bridge crew with casual conversation while they worked. The old fellow had been all business, following the book strictly on no idle chatter at duty stations. As long as he performed his job he'd gotten good reviews.

  Nothing he s
aid in response to these inane invitations to banter had pleased Atkins. He invited response and then belittled you. He was starting to wonder why they carried a political officer, with their present commander acting more like one than the party man. He stifled a giggle at the thought of the captain purging the commissioner for laxity.

  "No traffic at all, sir. I've been in this system before. They generally don't have a great deal. The station won't hail us unless we ask to dock, or are on a vector for them. I pinged the Cincinnati. If she is in system they figured out how to mute her 'friend or foe' transponder."

  "Given we are in a declared state of war with Red Tree Clan you'd think someone would express interest in our intentions." Commander Atkins didn't like being ignored. It afforded no opportunity to browbeat anyone.

  "The Cincinnati was built with man-sized spaces and corridors," Atkins noted. "I doubt a Derf could squeeze through to the flight deck. If they could it is all man-sized controls and the crew informed us they dumped all the critical control and navigation files, as well as intelligence and diplomatic information. They would have to strip it to a shell and rebuild it to use. A two or three year job I'd say."

  "Yes, sir." Agreeing with him was always safe. "I'm passive scanning as well as covering the normal com channels. If Red Tree doesn't have regular ship com and tries to call on satellite phone or commercial radio we will still hear it."

  "Very good Mr. Harris, our auto-defense is active, please set the normal warning broadcast about approach."

  "English only, sir?"

  "That is standard," Atkins agreed. The tone of it just made Harris feel he'd stuck his foot in it again.

  "Scan, highlight the Red Tree territory as we come over. I'd like infrared and electronic emissions overlay. Do a deep sweep with penetrating radar, for tunnels and bunkers. Mark vehicles and significant machinery." That kind of deep active scan would be regarded as hostile by most folks.

  "Yes, sir," Tyndale responded from the board next to Harris. A smaller ship would have had the boards combined, but the Deep Space Cruiser St. Louis could act as a task force command vessel and sat six officers at the bridge even in single mode.