Rachel was at her desk and Boris was at the conference table when Elizabeth announced the arrival of a man who had insisted on seeing Boris as soon as possible. The man’s name on the personnel roster did not match the name on his transponder. Rachel had monitored his passage from the airlock to the corridor outside her office. The Marines were busy herding the new colonists from Peter to their temporary quarters in the transport modules and would not be available should she need help. Peter had alerted her that the man was “flying under false colors” but did not appear to be a threat.
Boris appeared startled at the knock on the door.
“Elizabeth, please admit our guest.”
The door opened to reveal a slight built man with a shock of white hair and bushy white eyebrows.
Boris leaped to his feet, tripping over his chair in his haste to greet the man. “Anatole!” That was the name that matched the transponder and not the manifest.
“Oh My God! Anatole Dubrovnik! I thought you were dead! I, I, it is so good to see you! Wait. What brings you all the way out here? This cannot be good news. First, let me introduce you to my captain. Captain Rachel Solomon Cohen, please allow me to introduce my old friend Major General Anatole Dubrovnik Federation Colonial Service Retired. You are still retired, aren’t you?”
The man chuckled. “First things first.” He gently took Rachel’s hand and kissed it. “It is a pleasure to meet you. Your mother rescued my ship once a long time ago. I shall be forever in her debt. I understand the fruit falls not far from the tree. Captain...”
“Rachel,” Rachel corrected, “if I may call you Anatole.”
“That’s right! Your parents were Americans, and you Americans love your informality.” Rachel smiled and nodded.
“Very well,” Anatole said excitedly. He looked around, and his eyes widened. “Is this one of your sentient ships? It would have to be being this large. This is such an honor. How do you address it? May I?”
“Elizabeth, your cover is blown,” Rachel giggled.
“Well! How ungentlemanly of him!” Elizabeth responded with a chuckle of her own.
“This is so exciting!”
Rachel giggled watching this man who had to have been a battle hardened veteran judging by the scars on his face and arms fairly jumping up and down like a child with a new toy.
“Elizabeth? As in Queen Elizabeth of England?” He had picked up on the British accent.
“Yes, my loyal subject,” Elizabeth replied regally.
“One or Two?”
“That depends on how I feel. Some days one, some days the other.”
“My gracious lady I would gladly be your subject, but I have come on other business. May I request that the remainder of our conversation be held in the strictest confidence?”
“May I participate in the conversation?” Elizabeth asked.
“I suspect that we will need your assistance, if it pleases your captain, er Rachel, yes.”
“Elizabeth, we will keep this conversation classified as Top Secret until I say otherwise,” Rachel ordered.
“Aye, Captain.”
“Why does she call you Captain if everyone else calls you by your name?” Anatole asked.
“It’s an old joke. Peter called me Captain when I was a toddler.”
“Peter?” Anatole’s eyes grew wide. “The other ship? The cargo ship?”
“Yup.”
“I never had a chance did I?”
“Nope. It’s good for you that Boris greeted you the way he did.”
“Then, let’s get down to business.” He pulled a chair out from the table and sat down. “Boris, your report caused quite a stir at central office. There was a huge wrangle over who would take over governance of this colony.”
“Anatole, I am not leaving. I am staying here, and I will govern this colony.”
“That is not how Sergei Tsarevich sees it.”
“That is indeed bad news. I cannot think of anyone worse suited to govern this colony,” Boris said softly.
“Why would he be so bad?” Elizabeth asked.
“Because he would lock up the Vikings in cages and ship them back to Earth for use as test subjects,” Boris replied.
“Has he done this before?” Elizabeth asked.
“Yes, he does this every time he runs into any new species or anything out of the ordinary. He sends them back to his friends in the labs who do horrible things to them in the name of science.”
“Then he must be stopped,” Elizabeth asserted. “No doubt you have a plan.”
“No, my gracious Queen, I do not have a plan. That was always Boris’ strength, not mine. I got us into trouble, and Boris got us out. I was able to delay the departure of their convoy a little. Some of their documentation accidentally got scrambled, and they could not leave until that was resolved. At best I bought us a week. I have a data module with the convoy’s unscrambled documentation if that will help.”
Rachel held out her hand, and Anatole gently placed the data module in it. Rachel inserted the module into the reader and then examined the data for a moment on her displays. “Anatole, I need to gather the team,” she said tentatively as if he would object.
“That is the best news I have heard in weeks.”
“Elizabeth, please gather the battle group. We will meet in the large conference room. Top Secret notifications.”
“Aye, Captain!”
“Elizabeth, please have food and drink brought into the conference room. I suspect we will be there a long time.”
“Aye, Captain!”
“Is Lt. Rattigan busy?”
“Not so busy I can’t drag him to the conference room.”
“Please.”
“Aye, Captain!”
“Did my special requests arrive in this shipment?”
“Peter is marshaling them as we speak.”
“Please have the accessory kits sent to the conference room.”
“Rachel,” Boris interrupted, “why are there two P I ships in this shipment? I did not request them.”
Elizabeth’s short snort of laughter was unmistakable.
Rachel grinned at her image of what that laugh would look like if Elizabeth were human. “I did. I figured I would feel naked and unprotected once the convoy escorts left, so I pulled a few strings. These two ships were sitting in marshaling orbit at the Eretz shipyard. They had a few extra features the Federation did not want to pay for. The whole thing turned into a political shouting match, and the ships were parked. I arranged to borrow them although I doubt I will ever return them.”
“What’s so special about them?”
“Mostly it’s what’s in the accessory kits that makes them special. There a few enhancements to the ships that could prove interesting. You’ll see later,” Rachel grinned.
“Boris, please take Anatole to the conference room. I will meet you there.” The two men left the room catching up on each others lives since they had last seen each other.
“Elizabeth, are the ships fully equipped?”
“Yes, they have everything you requested, and they appear to have some new toys I have not seen on a P I before.”
“What is their flight status?”
“Cold. The seals have not been broken on the reactors. They are brand spanking new.”
“Fueled?”
“Ready for start up procedures.”
“Excellent. Where are Buddy and Daisy?”
“On patrol.”
“Once we get the new ships operational we will want them to come back in for updates.”
“Very good.”
Rachel allowed enough time for her to be the last to enter the conference room.
Once Boris, Anatole and Elizabeth finished briefing the battle group, Rachel turned to David. “Is there any legal way we can stop Sergei Tsarevich from taking over the colony?”
David answered slowly. “We cannot legally use force to prevent him from taking over the colony. He outranks Boris by two pay grades,” David
replied thoughtfully. “While I would not advocate doing anything illegal, there are things we can do that might perhaps be slightly deceptive while not illegal might be considered suspect. We need to keep in mind the concept of plausible deniability. Can we deny plotting against this man while in fact plotting against this man?”
“Hold on a second!” Faye Anne interrupted. “Here we go again acting on incomplete intelligence. How many times have we been burned by bad information? I am not saying Anatole is not being truthful with us, but with our track record we need to be careful. We have not been particularly good at finding out the whole truth of a situation before we act. I say we draw him out first.”
“How do you propose to do that?” Wendy challenged.
“Invite him and his top staff to a Captain’s Dinner. We can chat him up, get him drunk and see what he says,” Faye Anne replied.
“Kind of like waiting for targeting radar,” David said.
“Exactly,” Faye Anne agreed.
“I’m good with the dinner,” Rachel said. “The convoy that came with Anatole is only six ships, and two of those are the escorts. What is the chance the escort pilots are the ones who were here before?”
“According to the manifests Anatole brought, they are strangers,” Elizabeth offered.
“So they don’t know the condition of the ships we have in the corral,” Rachel said.
“Unless they chatted with the escort pilots who were here,” Alina said.
“Reuben, how many of those ships can we park around the system access point and make them look like they are alive?”
“I don’t know.”
“Resurrect as many as you can.” She turned to Anatole. “I don’t mean to imply we don’t trust you.”
“I understand,” he replied. “Your intelligence officer is correct. You should challenge your assumptions and act only on data you know is good. I am confident that if you do as she suggests, you will find that I have understated the case. What will you do if you discover I am correct?”
“That is what we are about to discuss.” Rachel turned back to Reuben. “Please assemble your engineers. Take Rashi’s munitions people and see what you can do with those ships. Whatever we decide to do we will need as many ships as possible combat ready. Before you do that, get the two new ships started up. We will need them fully functional as quickly as possible.”
“Do you have pilots for them?” Reuben asked looking at Alina.
“Not yet,” Alina huffed. “I found out about them when you did at the start of this meeting!”
Reuben looked across the table at Rashi. “Just like old times, brother?”
Rashi laughed, “And you expected maybe something different?”
They left discussing their plan for resurrecting the ships.
The planning took several hours. When it was over, Rachel had dismissed everyone to attend to their portion of the plan except Alina and Wendy. She motioned them to help her open the small shipping container that had been sitting in a corner of the conference room. They opened the container. Both Alina and Wendy stepped back in shock. “How did you get these?”
“Sarah Abrams sent them. One more reason to be glad she and Abraham stayed at Eretz.”
Wendy lifted the helmet she had once used as her interface to a sentient P I ship now long dead. She stood speechless. Tears spotted in her eyes.
Alina lifted another helmet and read the name lovingly lettered in fine Hebrew script. “Aida?”
“There is one already programmed for each of your P I pilots,” Rachel said as she pulled another helmet from the container. “Including yourselves we currently have six potential pilots and four ships. There are two spares with programming instructions for Reuben. You can either set the crews up as solos or pairs if you recruit two new back seats. I know Aida can handle this. Delilah should adapt well. Whitney’s reports look good, how do you think she will do?”
“She has been getting lots of front seat time lately. She should be fine,” Alina said.
“And Brad?”
“Duck to water.”
“Excellent. I will leave you to work out who flies with which ship.”
“Ah, that will take some thought.”
“We need to be ready when our guests arrive.”
COLONY SERVICE - CHAPTER FIVE
“HELLO BUDDY,” ALINA SAID as she settled into the pilot’s seat and fastened her helmet.
“Hello, Alina, what have we planned for today?”
“We have a little training exercise planned.”
“Good. Patrol is so boring. Are we training with the new ships?”
“Yes.”
“Who is flying them?”
“Aida and Delilah are with Alexander and Whitney and Brad are with Valerie.”
“You’ve named them. Are the new ships sentient?”
“Yes. Have they not contacted you to introduce themselves?”
“No.”
“We will do that today. We will train them on etiquette and manners.”
“Alina? Why did you not assign Aida to me? Why did you not take the new ship?”
“There are aspects of the new ships’ programming I do not understand. Aida does. These new ships are capable of actions that go beyond what you and I can do. Aida is the best to get the most out of the new ships. We need her fresh viewpoint in control of that ship. Some day our lives may depend on her skills.”
“I would still have preferred you assigned her to me.”
“Do you not love me any more?” Alina teased.
Buddy paused. “What we had was great. I guess I should be happy with that.”
“That would be wise.”
“Did Wendy choose to fly with Daisy?”
“Yes. There was never a question. She pulled rank. Wendy wanted to be where she was most comfortable, and that was with Daisy.”
“What about back seats for Daisy and me?”
“We recruited two of Rashi’s munitions people. Elaine will be flying with us and Casey will be with Wendy. I trust you will be gentle.”
“Of course.”
“They are so very young. They had the best scores in the simulations which is why we chose them, but they are so naïve. Reuben is making the final adjustments to their flight suits. They should be along shortly.”
The four ships spent the entire time until the convoy arrived taking turns being aggressors and defenders. As the resurrected Viking ships became space worthy, they were pressed into the exercises. The med ship pilots were assigned to the larger Viking ships but even with all the med pilots flying one to a ship they still lacked pilots. They recruited munitions specialists, most of whom were pilot trainees who had washed out of flight school. So many were recruited to pilot the Viking ships that had Elizabeth been called on to defend herself the only people left who could operate the weapons suites were the Solomon and Abrams children.
The colony service convoy dropped out of hyperspace with precision and discipline. Holding position strictly in accordance with regulations, they called for permission to approach the colony. In what was intended to be a show of force and skill, Rachel’s four P I ships dropped out of hyperspace around them. The remainder of the rag-tag fleet appeared in formation to support the show of force individually and in pairs as the convoy approached the moon to which they had been directed.
When the convoy had reached the point where they were less than a light minute away from the moon, Rachel hailed them and invited their senior officers and such spouses or significant others that the officers might wish to bring for a formal dinner aboard Elizabeth. Refusing such an invitation was considered a breach of protocol and her invitation was quickly followed with a list of who would be attending. When Rachel received the list she called back to say that since the list was so small, they should bring junior officers who might enjoy a social evening with her junior officers. The second list was more to her liking. She arranged for the kids to handle the dance music and entertainment.
At the appointed time, shuttle craft popped out of the docking bay and approached Elizabeth parked on the moon. The galley in passenger liner had been prepared for the party. The kids had done an excellent job and were thrilled that the decorations had been left entirely up to them. In strict observance of protocol, Lieutenant General Sergei Tsarevich stepped into the airlock first. Resplendent in brass and braid of the Colonial Service with a chest full of combat ribbons, he reminded Rachel of an officer of one of the small European monarchies that spent more money on their uniforms than on their weapons. He gracefully removed his ceremonial hat and formally bowed to Rachel. Rachel was dressed in formal whites without ornamentation or battle ribbons save only the Stellar Interstellar insignia on her cap, her captain’s bars on her epaulets and her name badge on her breast.
“Captain, I am Lieutenant General Sergei Tsarevich of the Federation Colonial Service. Request permission to come aboard with invited guests.”
“Permission granted. General, Welcome aboard the Stellar Interstellar Enterprises colony ship Queen Elizabeth.”
Tsarevich’s eyebrows shot up with the identification of the ship being something other than Federation. While technically Stellar Interstellar was part of the Federation, it was not a government, and when its personnel were not in specifically designated Federation space, they may or may not be bound by the Federation’s rules. In one sentence, Rachel had alerted Tsarevich that this ship was not his to command and neither were any of the other ships or personnel over whom she had authority.
“General, please walk with me to the galley so the festivities may begin.”
“I would be honored to follow your lead.”
Rachel motioned for him to start along a wide corridor where they could walk shoulder to shoulder.
“I noticed that you do not wear your campaign ribbons,” Tsarevich said. “If I had as impressive combat record as yours, I would wear them proudly.”
“You’re only as good as your last battle.” She tapped the Captain’s bars on her shoulder. “These are all that matter.”
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