The next day, six frigates and three cruisers took flight. Four mine killing probes got twenty-one mines. One of the probes swung around behind the jump and got five more before it, too, was vaporized. Still, that left another five too close to the jump to risk eliminating.
The next day, the aliens who drew the long straw took off at the highest gees they could pull. Still, there were two frigates and likely one cruiser left guarding the minefield. Ten probes, sent through at irregular intervals, took out seventy-four mines. The last one got nine.
The Tenacious, Persistent, Steadfast, and Relentless were hitched together and sent through with the Steadfast’s bow pointed at the cruiser and the other three bows pointed at the frigates. Many of their 6-inch secondary lasers were charged to full capacity and loaded with targeting data for the nearest mine data taken from the periscope.
Two seconds after the division crossed the jump at dead slow, the alien ships were under fire. Four seconds later, they were just rapidly dissipating gas. The secondary batteries had also nailed fifteen of the atomic bombs.
Admiral Miyoshi has assumed the alien mines were using an active proximity fuse. Certainly, the periscope was showing evidence of very attenuated radar signals. However, there may also have been a dead man’s switch. Two seconds after the last alien ship vanished in a ball of exploding gasses, all the atomics in the area blew up.
While the area directly around the jump had been swept, that was an awful lot of what the cats called ‘mega tonnage’ going off. The helmsman on the division’s flagship, Tenacious, earned everyone thanks by slapping down hard on the reverse jets and zipping the four battlecruisers back through the jump.
While the standard radiation protection in the ship held the level of radiation down, no one wanted to test how long it could have continued, considering all that was headed their way with all the bombs going off.
This was a good choice, because as it turned out, the mines didn’t explode as one gigantic boom. Rather, they exploded in a wave sweeping out wider and wider, over the next thirty minutes.
A probe sent through an hour after the last blast showed a high level of radiation. The probe had an anti-matter reactor aboard. It was allowed to self-detonate. No one really wanted to bring that highly radioactive vehicle back on board.
Admiral Miyoshi held his position for another four days, until the first two alien battle groups had jumped out of the system. He then established a pair of high quality jump buoys on either side of the jump, and began his voyage back to Sasquan and its irritating cats.
46
Grand Admiral Sandy Santiago looked out at a sea of furry faces. They were cheering, clapping, and shouting their joy.
They had sat quietly as President Almar of Columm Almar and Prime Minister Gerrot of the Bizalt Kingdom introduced Sandy. They had stayed very quiet as Sandy introduced each of her admirals and let them describe their recent battles, or, in poor Miyoshi’s case, the lack of a fight. Still, many of the admirals and generals in the room had nodded sagaciously at the Musashi admiral’s wisdom at refusing battle.
Most of the civilians, in what was billed as a news conference, were much more interested in the battles fought by Admirals Bethea, Drago and, most especially Admiral Nottingham. He’d fought his battle at the very jump into this system. With ninety alien frigates and cruisers rushing at them, and only the twenty-two battlecruisers to defend, Sandy had made the hard call not to attempt to engage them in the second system, but rather to form the blocking force at this jump.
The aliens had died like moths on a flame.
The cats had listened to each post-action report in absolute silence. Only when President Almar invited the audience to show their gratitude did a hurricane of applause and approval bombard the stage. It went on and on. Nether the President nor the Prime Minister made any effort to bring the applause to an end.
Sandy expected that the approbation was aimed as much at her officers and their crews as at the cats on the planet below. The entire back of the auditorium was lined with cameras, carrying these after-action reports to practically every business and household on the planet. Halfway through the reports, President Almar had leaned over to whisper in Sandy’s ear that the official ratings for this news conference were double those of any television show the cats had ever shown.
“And it’s still growing. More and more people are tuning in. More channels are turning to this news conference. I think before we finish today, every station on the planet will be carrying this feed. By defending us, you have united us.”
Sandy could only hope that there would be something more substantial than applause for all her crew who had fought and died.
While the other two fleets had held the butcher’s bill down, the cost to Bethea’s Third Fleet was shocking to all of them. Clearly, the aliens were learning the humans’ tricks and were doing their utmost to come up with ways to close in the most brutal of ways.
A huge number of alien warships at close quarters with a limited number of better human ships was becoming a worse and worse nightmare, and more likely.
When the applause finally began to run down, the President and the Prime Minister motioned to four other heads of state to come join them.
THOSE SIX WOMEN GOVERN OVER HALF THE POPULATION AND NEARLY TWO-THIRDS OF THE INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION OF THIS PLANET, Mimzy advised Sandy on Nelly Net.
Sandy, like everyone else, waited for what they might or might not say.
President Almar started. “These strangers from the stars have fought for us, and too many have died so that we might live.”
“While some of our young fought with them,” Prime Minister Gerrot said, “there were few of us and far too many of them standing in the battle line.”
“They fought against horrible odds,” a third head of state said, taking up the speech.
“We cannot expect them to always win for us,” said a fourth.
“We must participate in our own defense,” a fifth said in an absolute voice.
“We are told that the enemy is becoming more skilled as the humans defeat them over and over. There must be more warships to protect us, as well as the other planets the humans are sworn to defend,” said a sixth.
It was now back to the President.
“We are a proud people. We do not let others defend us like helpless cubs whose eyes have not opened,” the Prime Minister said. Now the other five built upon his statement.
“We must find ways to participate in our own defense.”
“This may mean more of our young traveling with the aliens to work in their factories in the Alwan system.”
“We have already put plans in place for us to begin to build warships to the plans the humans are willing to share with us.”
“However, it will take at least a year to produce a warship, likely more before it is ready for combat.”
“So,” the President said, “what can we do to speed up our defense?”
“We certainly can’t assume the monsters who want to wipe us off the face of our beloved planet will wait upon our time table,” the Prime Minister added.
Now, the ball of this strange multi-faceted presentation was tossed to the four junior partners who continued the collective reflection.
“We know that the humans at Alwa are producing a lot of light manufactured goods out of this magical metal of theirs.”
“We know from those of our young who have returned that these goods are the glue that is holding together the different cultures on Alwa and keeps them working together for their mutual defense.”
“We, however, can make many of these things in our own factories.”
“They need agricultural machinery and equipment. We make a lot of that.”
“They need rifles and ammunition. We can make that.”
“They need lasers for their warships. We have learned from them how to make lasers.”
“We can learn to make large fighting lasers.”
“What we are proposing,�
�� the President interjected, “is that we merge our economy as much as we can with the humans and birds on Alwa.”
“We can ship to them all the things they need that we can manufacture,” the Prime Minister said. “It won’t be made of magic metal, but our products are strong and durable.”
This was tossed to the junior partners for commentary, again.
“If the humans don’t have to use the magic metal for these light industrial products, they can devote more of their production to warships.”
“We can provide the people to work their factories, as well as crew the extra ships they produce.”
“We can ask that half the ships built be detached for duty in our sky.”
“We can also ship the battle lasers to Alwa so that they can jack up their production without having to overtax their own laser production.”
“We know there will be problems,” President Almar now said. “There are no banks and there is no currency in the Alwan system.”
“The birds don’t seem to understand the concept of money,” Prime Minister Gerrot explained. “The humans, on their part, are operating a demand economy. When your main product is warships, they have only one buyer, the Navy.”
“We have talked with human economists. They know that what they are doing is both an aberration and cannot be done for long.”
“However, so long as both our planets are confronted by an alien menace that wants us all wiped from the face of our planets, we can expect matters to continue that way.”
“Exactly how we will pay for what we ship to Alwa is something we will have to look at carefully.”
“Whatever the price, there is no question that we want those warships above our head.”
“Before this attack began,” the President Almar now said, “we had entered into an agreement to both manage our interaction with the humans and birds as well as control the export of human technology to our world.”
“Those agreements have already passed the legislature in all six of our nations,” the Prime Minister said.
“Now, we six heads of state propose to present to all our legislatures a proposal to transfer goods to the Alwan system in exchange for this technology.”
“Goods that will result in more warships being built.”
“Warships being built and orbiting above our sky.”
“We will need a lot of thought to go into the final product.”
Here the four of them took a step back, leaving the President and the Prime Minister at the podium.
“While we will be presenting the same proposal to each of our legislatures, we do not expect that every nation will approve it with a rubber stamp.”
“We want everyone’s input,” the Prime Minister said. “We know this has been hastily put together on the pounce. We expect that many of you will have many better ideas.”
“We also expect that different nations will have different ways of handling this exchange,” the President said. “We need to keep this agreement both the same where we need to speak with one voice, and different where our differences will strengthen us.”
“But we must understand one thing,” the Prime Minister said. “The days for doing the same old thing, doing things the way we always have, they are gone.”
“We, today,” the President said, “faces a challenge the likes of which no generation before us even considered. The arrival of one set of space aliens to help at the very moment that a vicious and murderous group of space aliens launched attacks on us is like nothing our foremothers ever faced.”
“We, the six of us,” the Prime Minister said, presenting the six of them with a wave of her paw, “are committed to finding solutions to this challenge together. Just as we have presented this report to all of you together, the time for petty differences is gone. We will either all live together, or we all will surely burn together in one great cataclysm.”
“Our children and their children will look back on us with pride at how we weathered this storm,” the President said. “That, or there will be no children to remember our names.”
“Are you with us?” all six national leaders shouted, punching the air with their right paws, claws extended.
The roaring reply of “Yes!” in unison was loud enough to get the walls vibrating.
47
Sandy was only hours away from sailing back to Alwa. She’d be taking two divisions of battlecruisers with her. Admiral Taussig on the Hornet would be taking his old squadron as well as the iron ships from Birmingham. All the battlecruisers were at an expanded Condition Able to allow barracks for a lot of young cats, both female and males this time.
Sleeping quarters would be changed into classrooms during the day. These cats were very eager to learn.
The fast attack transports would be trailing the battlecruisers. They were also made as big as they could be. The cats had stoked them full of everything Amanda and Jacques said the Alwans wanted, then they’d added a few items of their own. They also had cats on board, including manufacturing representatives, intent on setting up dealerships and maintenance facilities.
“These cats know very well what they’re doing,” Amanda said through a thin-lipped grin. Once they get people familiar with their equipment, they’ll want more. That means more sales and a growing market.”
“But they don’t have any money,” Sandy pointed out.
“Not yet,” Jacques said. “These cats know very well what money is good for. When they get to work, they intend to demand pay. Pay that they can save, then decide what they want to buy. Maybe they’ll buy it on Alwa. Maybe back with their cat folks. Once they start walking around with money, spending it at the better restaurants that don’t take company script, things are going to change.”
“Most of the birds don’t wear any clothes, and beyond their feathers, they aren’t into any adornment. You want to bet me how long it will take the birds to get into glitz after they see some cats decked out in jewelry and jackets?”
“No way I’ll take the bet,” Sandy said. “I’m more worried about how we absorb all these cats into our force. I’m not at all sure I want a cat on guns or in engineering, much less in command of a ship.”
“They’ll either learn or they’ll die,” Jacques said with an expressive shrug.
“I’ve already had to deal with one Earth-born admiral who wouldn’t follow orders and lost way too many ships with his insubordination. What will I get with cats?”
“Pardon me for changing the topic,” Amanda said, “but before you get too worried about how the cats will fit in, have you heard anything about Granny Rita and who owns the fabs on Alwa?”
“You are a wicked person and you should be very glad you are a civilian,” Sandy said through a glower.
Amanda just laughed, a musical affair that made it impossible for Sandy to stay bothered. “But I’m not so wicked that you’d want to activate my reserve commission so you could throw the UCMJ at me.”
“Too much paper work,” Sandy grumped.
“Ma’am, I hate to interrupt this love-fest,” Sandy’s chief of staff said, leaning against the open door into Sandy’s day quarters, “but we have a fleet ready to sail. Do you have an order for me?”
“Make it so, Captain,” Sandy said, “and may God help all who sail with us.
About the Author
Mike Shepherd is the National best-selling author of the Kris Longknife saga. Mike Moscoe is the award-nominated short story writer who has also written several novels, most of which were, until recently, out of print. Though the two have never been seen in the same room at the same time, they are reported to be good friends.
Mike Shepherd grew up Navy. It taught him early about change and the chain of command. He's worked as a bartender and cab driver, personnel advisor, and labor negotiator. Now retired from building databases about the endangered critters of the Northwest, he looks forward to some fun reading and writing.
Mike lives in Vancouver, Washington, with his wife Ellen, and not too
far from his daughter and grandkids. He enjoys reading, writing, dreaming, watching grandchildren for story ideas and upgrading his computer – all are never ending.
For more information:
www.krislongknife.com
[email protected]
2017 Releases
In 2016, I amicably ended my twenty-year publishing relationship with Ace, part of Penguin Random House.
In 2017, I began publishing through my own independent press, KL & MM Books. We produced six e-books and a short story collection. We also brought the books out in paperback and audio.
In 2018, I intend to keep the novels coming.
We will begin the year with Kris Longknife’s Successor. Grand Admiral Santiago still has problems. Granny Rita is on the rampage again, and the cats have gone on strike, refusing to send workers to support the human effort on Alwa. Solving that problem will be tough. The last thing Sandy needs is trouble with the murderess alien space raiders. So, of course, that is what she gets.
May 1 will see Kris Longknife: Commanding. Kris has won her first battle, but the way the Iteeche celebrate victory can be hard on the stomach. The rebellion won’t quit and now Kris needs to raise a fleet, not only to defend the Iteeche Imperial Capitol, but also take the war to the rebels.
In the second half of 2018, you can look forward to the next Vicky Peterwald novel on July 1, another Iteeche war novel on September 1, and Kris Longknife Implacable on November 1.
Stay in touch to follow developments by friending Kris Longknife and follow Mike Shepherd on Facebook or check in at my website www.krislongknife.com
Kris Longknife's Successor Page 23