Eric Flint's Blog, page 203

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 10

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 10

In short, the perfect right-hand man for him. David could hire Heinz as his own employee and call him a sub-contractor for the army. No one would squawk since his salary wasn’t coming out of the military’s budget but David’s own pocket.

Which was now deep, deep, deep. David took a great deal of pride in the uniform he wore and the contribution he was making to the war effort. The actual salary he got as a major he contributed to the soldiers’ widows and orphans fund, since he hardly needed it himself. He’d already made a fortune in the stock market and expected to continue doing so indefinitely.

And after the war… If Heinz worked out as his quartermaster’s assistant, he’d surely have a place for him in one or another of his civilian enterprises.

David finished his beer, paid for it, and left the tavern. By the time he got out on the street, Böcler was no longer in sight, but David wasn’t concerned. He started walking in the direction Böcler had been going when last he saw him, listening for the sound of an earnest voice engaged in bargaining.

He’d find him soon enough. If Johann Heinrich’s parents had been Puritans instead of Lutherans, they have named him something like Reliable in the Eyes of the Lord Böcler. Or Prudence or Patience, if he’d been a girl.

****

Late that day, Bonnie Weaver dropped by Rita and Tom’s apartment.

“Have you seen Heinz?” she asked. “I’ve been looking for him all afternoon.”

Without waiting for an invitation, she pulled out a chair and sat down at the kitchen table. There was just enough room for her because Tom had left a couple of hours ago to deal with an issue involving the artillery train. He and his men would be marching out of Regensburg themselves the next day to join the campaign against the Bavarians.

Rita occupied her usual seat by the window — the very tiny window with a very distorted glass pane, which didn’t do much except let in some sunlight and not much of that — and Julie was sitting across from her trying to keep Alexi from fidgeting, as thankless a task as it ever was with energetic three-year-olds.

Bonnie immediately relieved her of that burden. “Here, let her play with this,” she said. She dug into her purse and came out with a top in her hand. The toy was made of wood and was larger than most up-time versions would have been. But the biggest difference was the carving — it almost looked like a work of art.

Alexi’s attention was immediately riveted and her hands stretched out as if driven by instinct. She already knew how to use a top so no instruction was necessary. Five seconds later she was happily contemplating the joys and delights of the laws of motion.

“Bless you, Bonnie,” said Julie. “I was at the point where I was either going to have to take her home or — or –”

“Don’t say it! Strangulation is really not an option, as tempting as it might sometimes be.”

“Would you like some coffee?” Rita asked. “I can make some.”

Bonnie gave her a look full of doubt and suspicion. “Are we talking actual coffee?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Didn’t think so. No, thanks.” She turned toward Julie. “I’m curious, though — you’ve been living in Grantville ever since you got back from Scotland, Julie. What’s the coffee situation back home, these days?”

“Sucky. You can get it, usually, but it’s always expensive as hell and the quality’s pretty unpredictable.”

“Where’s it coming from? Turkey?”

“Most of it’s brought in by Italian merchants. I think they buy it from somewhere in the Ottoman Empire, but someone told me most of the coffee is actually grown further south. Yemen and I think Ethiopia, too.” Julie’s expression darkened. “God knows what it gets cut with along the way, though. I’ve had some so-called ‘coffee’ that I don’t want to think where it actually came from or what was really in it.”

“How long are you planning to stay here in Regensburg?”

Julie shrugged. “As long as Alex is campaigning in Bavaria, I figure. He’ll be close enough I might get to see him from time to time. When he was off in Poland it was hopeless so I just stayed home. In Grantville, I’ve got ready-made babysitters of the best persuasion.”

Rita and Bonnie both grinned. “Grandparents,” said Rita. “And — lucky you — one of them’s a dentist so you don’t have to worry about that either.”

“The best medical care’s still in Grantville, too,” Julie said. “Even with Dr. Nichols living up in Magdeburg now. For a woman with a child in the Year 1636 in our plague-and-typhoid-fever-not-to-mention-diphtheria-infested brave new world, that’s a load off.”

“Regensburg’s not too bad that way,” Bonnie said, a bit defensively.

Rita nodded. “It’s pretty good, actually. The sanitation practices are up to Magdeburg standards, anyway. A lot of that’s the army’s influence.”

“Yeah, I know. That’s part of the reason I decided to move down here.”

Bonnie cocked her head slightly. “Did you bring your rifle?”

“Yeah, sure. I don’t go much of anywhere without it. But I doubt very much if it’ll ever come out of the case unless I go hunting.” Julie got a pious look on her face. “My days imitating Annie Oakley are over, dammit.”

The expression got a bit haunted. “Scotland was… enough.”

The sounds of someone entering the apartment filtered into the kitchen.

“We’re back here!” Rita half-shouted.

Böcler came into the room.

“There you are!” said Bonnie. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

Heinz had a peculiar expression on his face. “I was meeting with David Bartley. For a while. Then I decided it would be most appropriate to do this the up-time way — I asked David how it was done — and I’ve spent the past two hours negotiating with Herr Sommer.”

“The jeweler?” asked Bonnie, frowning. “Why does the army need a jeweler?”

Heinz shook his head. “Not the army. Me.” He took a slow, deep breath. “I have a new employer. Herr Bartley. The offer came with a large — very large — increase in remuneration. So…”

He looked around, leaned over, and gently nudged Alexi to the side. The girl was so intent on her spinning top that she didn’t even seem to notice.

“Herr Bartley tells me one knee is correct. If he is not right, blame him, not me — but not to his face. I do not want to lose the job.”

He got down on one knee, reached into a pocket of his coat, and drew out an ornate little wooden box. Then, got a look of consternation on his face.

“I forgot to ask. I am not certain which one of us is supposed to open it.”

He offered the box to Bonnie.

She stared at it. “Holy shit.” Then, smiled very widely. “If that’s what I think it is, Heinz, the answer’s yes.”

“And boy are you in a world of hurt, if it’s not,” said Rita, smiling widely herself.

When Bonnie opened the box, her smile widened still further. It threatened to split her face, in fact.

“I recommend leaving the ‘holy shit’ part out of your report to your dad, though,” cautioned Rita. “I don’t think that’s technically blasphemy, but still…”

 

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 54

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 54

Chapter 30

“Director,” Fleet Command Dannet said, “you may want to look at the main view screen.”

When Caitlin did, she saw the familiar schematic of the Khûr system. It took a moment for her to see the additional clouds of symbols spreading out from the various planets and headed toward the elements of her fleet.

“Is that what I think it is?”

“If you think those are fleets of ships launched by the natives of the system and heading toward us, then yes.” Dannet’s angles were at dealing-with-the-moment. “And some of those launched from the outer planets are of respectable size.”

Caitlin turned to Pyr. “Have we had any response at all to our messages?”

Pyr folded his hands together. “No,” he said with a trace of sadness.

Caitlin looked back at the view screen. “How many?”

“Fifty-nine total from the home world,” Lieutenant Vaughan said, “all heading toward us. Sixty-five from the inner world, all headed for our main fleet. Seventy-five from the third planet, and one hundred and nine from the gas giant, all headed inward but no definite target yet.”

Caitlin snorted. “We know who the target is.”

“Well,” Vaughan acknowledged, “it’s too early to tell if they’re aiming for our little group or our main fleet or both.”

“They have ships the size of Harriers,” Dannet added to the conversation.

“They won’t be as good as Harriers,” Caitlin countered.

“But they won’t be as easy to kill as those small ships we just encountered, either.”

“You assume we’re going to be fighting them,” Caitlin said with a frown.

Dannet said nothing, simply moved to a neutral posture, which for her at this moment was almost provocatory.

Caitlin thought for a moment, then looked to Vaughan. “Get me a line to Gabe Tully, please.”

Vaughan touched a series of controls on his workstation.

“Tully here,” came the response over his speakers in a few seconds.

“Gabe,” Caitlin said, “have you got anything at all out of your guests yet?”

“Nope. We just got the surviving officer to start talking to us. Haven’t got past the name, rank, and serial number stage yet.”

“Damn,” Caitlin responded. “Okay, number one thing we need to know is if we leave the system, how far will they pursue us? Number two thing we need to know is we know they have much bigger ships than we’ve seen, but do they have heavier weapons?”

“You got it,” Tully said. “Tully out.”

Caitlin crossed her arms and stared at the floor. We can’t make friends if they won’t talk to us. And even if we continue here and just keep blowing their missiles up, sooner or later something’s going to go wrong and we’re going to be even worse off in trying to make connections. I don’t really want to do this, but I don’t think we have any choice. Time to get out of Dodge before we burn a bridge we’ll really want later on.

She looked up. “Fleet Commander, all ships to return to main fleet as soon as possible, then head for galactic north at best speed until we pass the boundary of the system. We will defend if attacked, but not return fire unless I order it.”

Dannet shifted to compliance-to-oudh. “As you direct.” She turned to issue orders to the fleet.

Wrot stepped up beside Caitlin. “Remove the possibility of confrontation until we understand this system. A good idea.”

“No,” Caitlin muttered. “Not a good idea. It’s just the least-bad idea at the moment.”

****

Boyes looked at Lim, the Khûrûsh-an momentarily forgotten. “He’s my what?”

The alien–Kamozh–chattered again. Lim listened, then held a hand up and turned to Boyes. “He says that he is your slave by right of conquest and surrender.” She shrugged. “Or at least that’s as close as I can come to it. There are additional strands of meaning that do not work well in English.”

Boyes looked at Kamozh still lying on the floor, and holstered his pistol. He gave a wild-eyed look for a moment at the mirror that was the observation window.

The sergeant walked over to the small table that had been pushed to one side of the room and sat down on it. He gestured at a chair for Lim. She took a seat, holding her staff in one hand. “Honestly? A slave? I thought only the Ekhat went in for that stuff.”

Lim shook her head. “There are no exact parallels between the Khûrûsh and you humans, but if you think of Shogunate Japan blended with equal measures of Homeric Greece and the British Raj, you’re approaching a concept. Except that their emperors are very smart, and very perceptive, and very capable. Also not given to allowing second chances for failure.”

“But I can’t keep a slave! I mean, even if Colonel Tully let me, what would I do with him?”

“Leave that for the Colonel and Director Kralik,” Lim said.

Boyes took a deep breath. “Okay, try talking back to him. Tell him I said he’s got to talk to you to talk to me, and I will take it very badly if he gives you any problems. And tell him to sit up.”

****

“I have changed your directive slightly, Director.” Dannet approached Caitlin.

Caitlin just looked at the big Jao, and crossed her arms, not going to a Jao posture.

“I have ordered the main fleet to head for the system limits now rather than wait for the return of our group. We will join them on a converging course.”

Caitlin looked at the main view screen, where the Khûrûsh fleets were moving toward them. It wasn’t hard to understand the fleet commander’s reasoning. The sooner they were out of the way, the sooner there would be no risk of contact.

“Very well.”

The fleet commander turned away, and Caitlin looked back at Wrot. “Does anything about this whole experience seem fishy to you?”

“In what way?” Wrot asked.

“Everything that’s happened since we came into this system.” She walked away a few steps, then turned and walked back. “I mean, nothing has seemed right since we got here. This is a high-technology civilization. Not as high as the Jao, but definitely at least a little ahead of where Earth was when you Jao first arrived.

“When your first fleet moved in, as soon as we understood you were from the stars, even as you made your assault landings, we started sending you all kinds of communications, trying to get some kind of understanding of who you were and what you wanted.”

Caitlin repeated the walk away and return steps. “Here, nothing. Nada. Zilch. We know they know we’re here, because of the radar. But they never offered anything.”

Walk away, return. “I could almost accept that as a manifestation of extreme caution. Or pathological isolationism. Maybe even cowardice. Except that once we began the approach, once we initiated a communication contact using their frequencies and their language, the only response we got was an attack. No warning, no cautions, no wave-offs; just a full-bore attack.”

She stood by Vaughan’s workstation. She knew he was listening, as well as Wrot and the Lleix at the next workstation.

“We’ve been reacting,” she said, “not analyzing. My fault. I wanted the contact to work so badly that I didn’t consider that these folks are not us, and their universe view is apparently very different from ours. But it’s not too late to think about that.”

Caitlin looked around at those close by: Wrot, Vaughan, Lim and Garhet, Caewithe and Tamt.

“Maybe they’re crazy. Maybe they’re insane, like the Ekhat. But I have trouble believing that that could be a successful survival strategy for more than one race. And I refuse to believe that there are only three sane races in this corner of the universe.”

Human, Jao, and Lleix heads all nodded. They were tracking with her so far.

“So why would a whole race and civilization respond this way? Why would their reaction be ‘Destroy the invader’, at first contact, without even a single attempt to talk?”

There was a long moment of silence, broken by Pyr. “There has to have been a resounding traumatic event in their history that changed their cultural outlook.”

Caitlin considered that thought, then nodded. “I can buy that. So what would have caused this kind of mindset?”

 

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 09

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 09

Bonnie nodded. “So they are. Just shy of fifty pounds. I’d prefer lighter bombs myself. But the problem is that we’ve run out of the smaller jugs that we originally used. And this isn’t the time and place I came from where you could just pick up the phone and order a new batch of jugs from some factory off in Philadelphia or Kansas City or wherever and have them delivered by UPS in a few days. Until we get some more of those smaller jugs, we’ve got no choice but to use the pots at hand. And if those pots make for incendiary bombs that are too big and heavy for a Size 4 girl like Mary to handle easily, so be it. We can train someone else to be the Pelican‘s co-pilot.”

She paused for a moment and contemplated Ursula. The German woman was somewhere in her late twenties, looked to be in pretty good health — and, unlike Mary Tanner Barancek, didn’t have the usual American female obsession with her weight. She was attractive but on the heavy side, as was Bonnie herself.

(Well, on the heavy side, anyway. Bonnie didn’t think she was as good-looking as Ursula, but she didn’t care much because one Johann Heinrich Böcler didn’t seem to.)

“How about you?” she asked. “You could be a bombardier, if you wanted to.”

For a moment, Ursula got a look on her face that was almost longing. For whatever reason — perhaps because she’d been rescued by an airship — Ursula adored flying. She went up in one of the airships any chance she got and whenever an airplane passed overhead she wouldn’t stop looking at it until it was out of sight.

She shook her head. “No, it wouldn’t be right. If I were up in the air all the time I couldn’t conduct my missionary work properly.”

Bonnie tightened her lips in order to keep herself from saying something impolitic. Like, oh… Who the hell ever heard of an Episcopalian missionary?

But, sure enough, Ursula Gerisch was one — and surprisingly effective at it. In the short time since she’d returned from Grantville she’d already made seven or eight converts.

What was it about down-time Germans that made them so receptive to new up-time creeds? Bonnie had heard that the Mormons were growing by leaps and bounds over in Franconia, especially in and around Bamberg. Apparently, up-time Episcopalians were different enough from down-time Anglicans that nobody — at least, no Germans — thought of them as an English church.

Bonnie herself was a Baptist, formally speaking. But although she considered herself a Christian she was not deeply committed to any particular denomination or creed. If things continued to unfold well between her and Johann — familiarly known as “Heinz” — she’d probably eventually become a Lutheran. Just to keep peace in the family, so to speak. His father was a Lutheran pastor, and while Heinz himself shared Bonnie’s indifference to theology, he had a strong attachment to respectability. Bonnie sometimes found that trait annoying, but most of the time she didn’t. There had been aspects of West Virginia hillbilly culture that she’d never cared for at all, starting with the carousing and not-infrequent brawls at the bar located on US Route 250, not all that far from the house where she’d grown up.

She giggled, for a moment.

“What’s so funny?” asked Ursula.

“Oh… I just had a flash image of Heinz in the middle of a tavern brawl.”

Ursula’s laugh was an outright caw. “Not likely!” Smiling, she shook her head. “He is a nice man, Heinz is. Even if he won’t listen to me about the true church.”

****

At that very moment, elsewhere in Regensburg, the nice man in question was feeling quite exasperated — and several times over.

First, he was exasperated because the wainwright he was negotiating with to supply the Third Division with wagons was being pointlessly stubborn. Böcler was operating within the tight budget constraints given to him by the Third Division’s quartermaster, Major David Bartley. The offer he was making to Herr Fuhrmann was a take-it-or-leave-it proposition and the man knew it perfectly well.

Second, he was exasperated because once again he’d had to fend off Ursula Gerisch’s continuing effort to convert him to her newly-adopted Episcopal church. There was no chance at all that Heinz would abandon the Lutheran faith he’d been brought up in. Not because he was so devoted to that creed as a matter of theological conviction, but simply because it would cause undue and unneeded stress upon his relations with his family.

Which — point of exasperation Number Three — were already under some stress because somehow his father had discovered that he had formed an attachment of sorts with Bonnie Weaver and said father, being a conscientious pastor, was making a blasted nuisance of himself by peppering his son with letters inquiring as to the young woman’s character, faith, demeanor, parentage, education, financial prospects — you name the issue and Pastor Böcler was sure to include it in his queries.

As if he wasn’t busy enough already!

Which — fourth — brought him to the major, never-ending and ongoing source of his exasperation, which was the simplest of them all.

He didn’t make enough money. Not to support a wife and family, at any rate. He knew from various remarks she’d made that Bonnie herself wasn’t particularly concerned about the matter. She had the common — quite startling — American attitude on the issue, which Heinz thought was a perfect illustration of Aesop’s fable about the ant and the grasshopper.

The up-timers didn’t even have the excuse of not being familiar with the fable. They knew Aesop’s fables quite well, as a matter of fact. Yet they would approvingly refer to the fable in one breath and in the very next make it clear that they considered the grasshopper to be the model for their own conduct.

The one time he’d tried to address the issue directly with Bonnie, her insouciant answer had been “the Lord will provide.”

Baptists, they called themselves. Amazingly, it was quite a prominent creed among the Americans.

How had they managed to survive?

“Never mind,” he finally told Herr Fuhrmann, having come to the end of his patience. “The wheelwright, Herr Becker, is willing to accept the terms I offered. I’m sure he won’t object to the extra business of having to do a lot of wagon repair because you won’t provide me with sufficient new ones.”

And off he went, ignoring the protests coming from behind him.

****

Watching the scene through the window in a tavern across the street, David Bartley came to his decision. He’d been pondering it for days, much longer than he would have weighed a decision involving the stock market.

In the end, that disparity was the decisive factor for him. David simply couldn’t transfer the dispassionate, even cold-blooded way he worked the stock market over to his commercial dealings with people in the flesh. He didn’t think Johann Heinrich Böcler was particularly cold-blooded either, but what the young man exemplified was the best sort of German junior official. He was hard-working and conscientious almost to a fault. Best of all — David had never had any use for so-called “hard sell” artists — while Böcler would take “no” for an answer he’d keep looking until he found someone who’d say “yes.” People didn’t discourage him the way they could so often discourage Bartley himself.

 

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 08

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 08

Chapter 4

Regensburg, Bavaria

“I’m telling you, Tom, we’ve created a monster.” Rita Simpson set down her cup and made a face. “What I wouldn’t do for a cup of real coffee.”

Across the table in their small kitchen, her husband leaned back in his chair and regarded his wife with a calm, level gaze. “I’m trying to figure out how ‘we’ comes into this. I’m not the one who took Ursula Gerisch under his wing — and I’m certainly not the one who sent her up to Grantville to discuss religion with Veleda Riddle.”

He took a sip from his own cup. “I agree the coffee sucks. Which is not surprising since it’s not exactly coffee to begin with.”

Rita glared at him from beneath lowered brows. “It’s your fucking church, that’s why it’s ‘we.'”

Tom nodded. “Indeed, I am a member of the Episcopal Church — but I remind you that its official name is the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America. United States of America, please note. Not Europe. As churches in the here and now go, it’s something of a waif. There were never very many Episcopalians in Grantville to begin with and my father and I only added two more to the number.”

He took another sip from the cup. “Technically, my mother’s a Unitarian, not an Episcopalian, although back up-time she probably spent more time at Dad’s church than her own — and now that’s she’s down-time she won’t go near anything that might even vaguely resemble a Unitarian congregation on account of. Well. You know. Best case scenario, she’d wind up associated with Polish Socinians — to whom she’s actually rather partial but given the current war with Poland and the fact that she’s an admiral’s wife it’s a tricky political situation. Worst case scenario she gets burned at the stake somewhere, which happened pretty often to the founders of Unitarianism in this the not-altogether-enlightened Early Modern Era.”

Rita frowned. “Really? Unitarians got burned at the stake? For Chrissake, they’re about as milk toast as any religion gets.”

“True — by the standards of the late twentieth century. But not today’s.” He shook his head. “History was never your strong suit, love.”

“That’s ’cause it’s boring.”

“How unfortunate for you, then, that you wound up living in a history book.” That came accompanied by a big grin.

Her returning smile was sour, sour. “Very funny. What’s your point?”

“Theologically speaking, Unitarianism can be traced all the way back to the apostolic age right after Jesus’ death. Arius was one of the founders — depending on how you look at it — and Arianism was probably the first of the great heresies. There’ve been oodles of people burned at the stake ever since if they get associated with it. The burning parties are pretty ecumenical, too. So far as I know, Luther never set a torch to a pile of kindling himself with a Unitarian perched on it, but he denounced Unitarian ideas as being responsible for the rise of Islam — ”

“Huh?”

“Oh, yeah. There’s a reason — bunch of ’em, actually — that I’m not a Lutheran. But moving right along, Calvin — that would be the Calvin, the one they named Calvinism after — had Michael Servetus burned at the stake in Geneva back in the middle of the last century. Not to be outdone, the Catholics had him burned in effigy a short time afterward.”

He drained the cup, made a face, and set it down on the table. “Stuff really is crappy. Anyway, to get back to where we started, the long and the short of it is that being an American Episcopalian these days means having to deal with the Anglican Church — and given the awkward relations the USE has with England, that means in practice dickering with Archbishop Laud since he’s now in exile and is at least willing to talk to us.”

“Like I said!” Rita’s tone was triumphant. “It’s your church.”

“Formally speaking, yes. But I’m what you might call my father’s brand of Episcopalian. Sophisticated, progressive — at least on social issues; you don’t want to get my dad started on economics — and, most of all, relaxed on the subject of religion in general. Veleda Riddle, on the other hand — that would be the woman that you told Ursula she ought to talk to — is what my mother calls a Samurai Episcopalian.”

Rita frowned. “Isn’t that a contradiction in terms?”

“I think so — but Veleda Riddle does not. And therein lies the source of your current unease. Because Ursula — who is your protégé, I remind you, not mine — has returned from Grantville filled with the fanatical zeal of the convert.”

“Who ever heard of a fanatic Episcopalian? And what would you call that, anyway? High church holy rolling?”

They heard the door to their apartment opening. They kept it unlocked because, first, the door had no lock; second, because Tom kept procrastinating about getting a workman to install one; and, finally, because the story of what had happened to the Bavarian soldiers who got slaughtered while breaking into Tom and Rita’s apartment in Ingolstadt was by now very widespread. The odds that anyone would try to steal anything from them were so low that they didn’t really need a lock anyway.

Julie Sims came into the kitchen, with her daughter Alexi in tow. “You wouldn’t believe what Ursula’s up to now,” she said. Her expression was a peculiar mix of amusement and something very close to horror.

“Don’t tell me,” said Rita.

“Of course I’m going to tell you. It’s your fault in the first place.”

“Told ya,” said Tom.

****

Elsewhere in Regensburg, the same Ursula Gerisch that Tom, Rita and Julie had been discussing was creating a different sort of ruckus. This one, of what might be called a technical-military nature, not a theological one.

“Stefano doesn’t like the new bomb pots. He says they’re too heavy.”

Bonnie Weaver squinted at Ursula, her expression one of unalloyed suspicion. “You can’t be that naïve, Ursula.” A spiteful part of Bonnie’s soul was tempted to add given your own history but that would just be cruel. Unfair, too. Whether the stories that Ursula had been not much better than a prostitute when Rita rescued her were true or not, it was indubitably true that since that rescue Ursula had led a life that was completely untainted by carnal excess. Religious excess, yes; whoring, no.

Ursula frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, come on! What Stefano really cares about is that he wants Mary Tanner Barancek to stay on as his so-called ‘co-pilot’ –”

“She is capable of piloting their airship. Pretty well. I’ve seen her myself.”

“Fine.” Bonnie waved a rather plump hand. “Doesn’t matter how good she is as a co-pilot. The Powers-That-Be have decreed that any member of an airship crew has to be able to double in every capacity. That means bomb-handlers have to be able to fly the ship, in a pinch — and pilots and co-pilots have to be able to heave bombs overboard. However much those bombs weigh.”

Ursula looked a bit sulky. “Those new bombs are heavy.”

 

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 53

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 53

“At least the docs got his arm reattached.” Tully shook his head. “And we got two of these things?”

“Yes, sir. The guy I shot and the guy who surrendered both had one. I still don’t know why he surrendered. All the others went down fighting.”

Tully shrugged. “Not important at the moment. Lim and the Lleix will get it out of them if anybody can. XO,” he said, turning to Major Liang. “Send one of these to Lexington for the science types over there, and keep one of them here and turn it over to the armorers. Suggest strongly to Lexington that they proceed with great caution. Give our guys orders to be very careful in how they inspect it. I have a hunch these folks may have things to teach us about batteries and capacitors.”

Tully’s com pad pinged. He touched a control. “Yes?”

“Colonel Tully, I need Sergeant Boyes to join me in the interrogation room, please.”

“What’s up, Lim?”

“The surviving officer will not speak to me. I wish to see if he will speak to the one who conquered him.”

“Conquered? What does she mean, conquered?” Boyes muttered. Tully waved a hand at him, and he shut up.

“Officer?” Tully queried. “You’ve identified their ranks?”

“Colonel,” Lim sounded annoyed, if that was possible for a Lleix, “we can read their script, we’ve been watching their videos for days now, and they love to talk about their space service. Yes, I know their ranks. Now please have Sergeant Boyes join me.”

“On our way.”

Tully stood up. “Top, Boyes, you’re with me. X.O.,” he turned to the executive officer, “I want an inventory and initial assessment of everything that was pulled off that wreck chop-chop. Boatright,” he looked to the Charlie Company commander, “I need an after-action report ASAP to forward to Director Kralik. The rest of you,” with a glance at the other commanders, “clean-up and start the next drill cycle.”

****

For the next several cycles, as she dealt with tasks Ninth-Minor-Sustained had given her, Third-Mordent considered the implications–all the implications–of what her ancestress had said, and perhaps even more importantly, what she had not said. Her understanding of “Never give anything away” was now advanced.

****

Lim turned from the one-way mirror in mingled frustration and relief as Colonel Tully entered the viewing room, followed by First Sergeant Luff and Sergeant Boyes. “I only needed him,” she said with a nod at Boyes.

“Maybeso,” Tully responded, moving to the mirror to view the interrogation room, “but I need to be in on this. Boyes, come look at this.”

Lim stepped to one side to allow Boyes room to step up to the glass. Luff moved up and stood behind the shorter sergeant, well able to see over the top of his head.

For several moments, they all watched as the Khûrûsh-an paced back and forth, mostly walking on the middle and hind limbs, but twice raising up to walk on hind limbs only for a few steps.

“I wouldn’t swear to it,” Boyes finally said, “but I think that’s the one who surrendered.”

“It is,” Lim responded.

Boyes winced. “Jeez, that’s not going to make me his favorite person, is it?”

Lim shrugged, frustration resurfacing. “He won’t talk to me. Let us see if he will talk to you.”

She led the way to a door next to the viewing window, and placed her hand on the door handle. Boyes looked to Colonel Tully, who nodded. Boyes squared his shoulders, and said, “Let’s get it over with, then.”

Lim nodded, opened the door, and motioned Boyes through with her staff. She followed, closing the door behind them.

The Khûrûsh-an spun at the sound of the door closing, and his fur bristled up to the point he seemed almost twice as large. He backed into a corner and rose up on his hind legs. Boyes realized he was almost looking the creature in the eye.

Unlike when they faced each other across the command deck of the wrecked spacecraft, the Khûrûsh-an was not holding all four arms stretched out with spread-out hands. No, here the arms were curved forward, with the hands curled like claws–which they might well be, Boyes realized after a look at the fingers.

The Khûrûsh-an hissed at him, if something that sounded like a baritone steam-kettle could be called a hiss. Boyes reached out and grabbed Lim with his left hand and pulled her behind him as he drew his sidearm with the other.

“Noh-rah-zhoh!” Boyes shouted the surrender command, and jabbed his left hand down at the deck just as he had done when he had faced this same Khûrûsh-an just hours before.

****

Sergeant Luff put his hand on the doorknob, ready to intervene in what was happening in the interrogation room.

“Wait,” Tully said. “Let’s see how our boy does. But stay ready.”

****

“They did what?” Caitlin decided that she couldn’t be shocked any more. Even this latest weirdness didn’t rattle her.

“The Khûrûsh destroyed the disabled craft after Ban Chao and Pool Buntyam left it behind,” Vaughan replied. “Both parts of it.”

“Destroyed it how? Lasers, self-destruct mechanism, took it apart with wrenches?” Okay, she was still capable of sarcasm and frustration.

“They launched four missiles at it, and blew it into scrap.”

“But they had no idea if any of their people were still on board!” That idea did bother Caitlin. “Why would they do that?”

“That might be why they call them aliens,” Vaughan said with that quirky smile he’d been flashing at Caewithe for some time.

Caewithe laughed at that.

“Funny man,” Caitlin turned away. Behind her, she heard Caewithe giggle again.

****

“I said, Noh-rah-zhoh, you SOB!” Boyes snarled at the Khûrûsh-an again, aiming the pistol directly between his eyes while again jabbing at the floor forcefully.

There was a very tense moment, before the steel seemed to evaporate out of the alien. His outstretched arms drooped first, then he settled to first four limbs on the deck, then all six. Finally he lay prostrate, and began chanting something in a soft voice with his nose pointed at the floor.

Boyes kept his pistol aimed at the alien’s head, dropping his aim as he moved. But after a minute or more of the chanting, he stepped back a step and said to Lim, “What’s he saying?”

Lim lifted a hand, but didn’t respond for another minute or more. Finally she said, “It’s a lament, in what passes for a classical form. The officer you shot was his father.”

“Ho, boy,” Boyes muttered, focusing his attention back on the Khûrûsh-an again. “Why isn’t he jumping all over me?”

Lim continued as if he hadn’t said anything. “In addition, his father was his clan-lord. His chief, if you will. He was second in command under his father.”

After another long moment, Boyes said, “So what else is he saying?”

“He’s lamenting the death of his father, and the ending of his clan. His surrender has ended his clan line, as he has no living brothers or sisters, and his mother is also dead. He surrendered because with the clan-lord dead that was the only way he could spare the lives of their retainers on the ship.”

“You mean the crew were . . .”

“Literally servants of his father in his position as clan-lord, yes.” Lim paused and listened for a moment more. “Now he’s asking forgiveness of his ancestors for having been taken alive by the monsters from the dark. He’s very confused as to how we could have come out of the sun when we are clearly monsters. But he’s promising to watch over the retainers as best he can, and to maintain what honor he can until he comes to them–which he hopes will happen soon, but it’s up to the monsters.”

The alien ceased his muttering, then looked up at Boyes and rattled something off quickly.

“He says his name is Kamozh ar Mnûresh, and he is your slave.”

****

Third-Mordent summoned her chosen choirs to return to the hall. She would see to their completion herself. Her understanding of “Never reveal all your skill to anyone” was now crystal clear.

 

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 52

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 52

Chapter 28

Thoomp!

As designed, the shaped charge had directed almost all of its energy downward against the hull. Boyes felt the equivalent of a hard push against his back from the spillover. He spun in place, to see Clark and Laroche placing their door-openers in the cracks formed by the charge and triggering their operation. A few seconds later they discarded the metal plate and stepped back.

Nolan and Kemal already had the flash-bang grenades in motion through the opening, one-two-three-four.

As soon as the grenades had exploded, Singh and Gomez pulled themselves through the opening, back to back, Super-Tazers leading the way. “Damn!” Boyes heard one of them call out as he pulled himself through on their heels. His external audio sensor began picking up sounds of conflict. As his helmet rose above the interior edge of the opening, he could see Singh and Gomez both facing to his left, firing their weapons as quickly as they could.

Boyes looked to his left. “Crap! Clark, I see six, seven, eight hostiles. Two down, four with what looks like clubs or pipes, and two hanging back.” As soon as he moved clear of the opening he brought his net gun to bear on the closest Khûrûsh-an and fired.

****

“Shit!” Tully heard Sergeant Boyes exclaim. The video feed from the sergeant’s helmet was really bobbing around. “They’re faster than snakes, and tell the video folks they’re not that much smaller than we are.”

Tully could see the Khûrûsh crewmen dodging and bouncing from wall to wall, swinging lengths of whatever they were holding in each hand. One of them looked for all the world like a four-armed Bruce Lee, his arms were moving so fast. Only the fact that he was having to duck net shots kept him from really laying out one of the boarding team.

Damn, but he should have ignored Liang and Luff. He belonged in that fight!

Just as Tully was about to call out an order, he saw one of the Khûrûsh-an fold up around his midsection, and he realized that the shotgunners had now entered the fray. Even a low charge rubber bullet could take a man down if it hit right. Looks like the same was true of the Khûrûsh as well.

****

“Yeah!” Boyes heard one of his team yell as the Khûrûsh began to go down before the rubber slugs fired by Nolan and Kemal. He and McClanahan made sure they stayed down by firing nets at them to keep them tangled up and stuck to the deck for now.

“Lieutenant Boatright,” he said over the company frequency as the action started slowing a little.

“Boatright. Go.”

“Their suits are tougher than ours. The Tazer darts are just bouncing off. You have to hit them with the rubber slugs to slow them down enough to net them.”

“Understood.”

The last of the four club-armed Khûrûsh, the one whose arms were moving like radial saw blades, went down after being hit three times by the rubber slugs. Just as McClanahan fired a net over him, Boyes saw the larger of the two remaining Khûrûsh-an raise what looked like a pistol. His shout of “Gun!” coincided with the weapon firing. There was a bit of a flash, and he heard Kemal grunt. He looked to see the young Turk’s left forearm floating in front of him, cleanly severed just below the elbow, with blood spurting from his arm.

Things seemed to go into slow motion at that point. Boyes felt himself release his net gun and move for his pistol. His hand seemed to almost be moving in water, it felt so slow. He could see the Khûrûsh-an moving his weapon to target on Nolan. He was pulling the 10 mm from his holster, but it still seemed so slow–too slow. It came up, up, up, and he squeezed the trigger.

Just as the pistol fired, the Khûrûsh-an moved slightly, and what was supposed to be a shot to the shoulder hit him in the throat instead. Everyone, human and Khûrûsh-an, froze for a moment.

“Ah, Lieutenant Boatright?”

“Talk to me, Sergeant.”

“Their suits aren’t tougher than a 10 mil, sir.”

“Damn.”

****

“Eanne!” Tully shouted.

“Colonel?”

“Get me connected with the Lleix on Lexington who are talking to the Khûrûsh!”

Eanne said nothing, but in a few seconds Tully heard, “This is Pyr,” in his ear bud.

“Pyr, this is Gabe Tully. What is the Khûrûsh command to surrender?”

Pyr didn’t ask any questions. “Noh-rah-zhoh.”

“Great! Stay connected.” Tully connected to the Charlie Company frequency. “Sergeant Boyes, you’re about to hear the Khûrûsh command to surrender. Pyr, say again.”

“Noh-rah-zhoh.”

****

There were now four 10 mm pistols aimed at the last Khûrûsh-an standing, who was also holding one of the gun-like weapons. Boyes flipped his external audio on, and shouted “Noh-rah-zhoh! Noh-rah-zhoh!”

He jabbed at the Khûrûsh-an with his pistol, and forcefully pointed to the deck with his other hand. After a moment, the last Khûrûsh-an bent and placed his weapon on the deck, then stood and held all four arms straight out.

Nobody took their attention off of the Khûrûsh-an, but Boyes’ tension ratcheted down a little. “Carter?”

“Go.” That was Carter’s voice, but Boyes knew the lieutenant was listening.

“We’re ready for the backup and the intelligence team to board. Need a bunch of restraints. These dudes have four arms, remember. Looks like we may need a couple of litters or back boards for their wounded.” He looked to where Gomez was dealing with Kemal’s wound. “Add a medic and a litter for Kemal.” He paused for a moment. “And a body bag, I guess, unless command wants to leave the dead one here.”

Chapter 29

“Ban Chao reports that the target crew has been taken aboard, as well as whatever intelligence information could be readily retrieved,” Lexington’s communication officer announced. “Hulk has been abandoned, they are withdrawing to the million-kilometer rally point.”

“Order a withdrawal by all ships to the rally point at cruising speed,” Fleet Commander Dannet ordered. “Cover Ban Chao’s withdrawal.”

Caitlin moved to Lieutenant Vaughan’s work station. “Well?”

He held up a hand. “Initial reports coming in. The Khûrûshil ship had a crew of eight. Two were seriously injured by the disabling attack or the forced entry, unclear yet which it was. They have been retrieved. The commander was killed during the boarding action.”

“What?” Caitlin was aghast. “They were supposed to take them alive!”

“According to the preliminary reports,” Vaughan repeated, “he was firing a deadly weapon at the boarding team in the constrained space of their command deck, and had already seriously wounded one of the boarding team. The team lead was trying for a disabling shot, but the Khûrûsh commander zigged when he should have zagged.” He looked up with a quirk to his mouth. “That’s a direct quote from Colonel Tully, by the way. He also said, ‘No blame for Sergeant Boyes. I’d have done the same thing.'” Vaughan concluded with, “Boyes is the team lead.”

Caitlin took a deep breath, but before she could let it out, Wrot moved into her field of vision. His eyes locked with hers, and she remembered their earlier conversation. She let the breath out in a rush, and said, “Fine. I guess we should be glad the price wasn’t any higher than that. Keep me posted, please, and let me know when they’re ready to send the crew to Lexington.”

****

“That’s it?” Tully asked. “That dinky little thing took off Kemal’s arm?”

There are only so many basic configurations a portable hand-carried weapon can assume once a culture rises above the axe-and-sword and pike-and-bow levels. The weapon that Sergeant Boyes was dandling in a clear plastic bag wasn’t too much different in size and shape than a Beretta pistol.

“That’s it,” Boyes said.

“And it’s not some kind of laser?”

“No, sir. One shot, one brief flash, and Kemal’s arm was floating in the air and he was bleeding like a, pardon the expression, stuck pig.”

“So there was no cauterization effect?”

“Nope. His arm looked more like it had met up with a meat saw and lost. No burns, no blisters, no hint of heat at all.”

 

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 07

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 07

She nodded toward Piazza. “The most conservative American in our world — someone like Tino Nobili, for instance –”

That brought a sarcastic bark from Ed and a little titter of laughter from a number of other people. Even among down-timers in Magdeburg, the cranky up-time pharmacist in Grantville was notorious. He’s to the right of Attila the Hun was a common up-time depiction of the man.

“Even someone like Nobili,” Rebecca continued, “is more progressive than most people — yes, even most commoners — in the Europe of our time. He does not, for instance, object to women being able to vote or hold office, whether electoral or hereditary. Nor — unlike almost all apothecary guilds in the here and now — does he have a problem with the idea of a woman someday running his own pharmacy.”

She let that sink in, for a moment. “In politics, things are always relative. I can remember a time — so can many of you in this room — when John Chandler Simpson seemed to be a bastion of reaction. Today… not so much, does he? At least, I’ve never heard anyone in this room suggest that he should be removed from his position as the leading admiral of our navy. And my husband Michael thinks quite highly of the man. Now. Not a few years ago, however.”

She shrugged and leaned back in her chair. “The essence of conservatism is not a political philosophy of any kind. It is a general attitude.” Again, she nodded toward Ed Piazza. “His folk have a plethora of saws expressing that attitude. So does every folk. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. That’s my personal favorite — and, by the way, a piece of wisdom I subscribe to myself. Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t. That’s another. A third — I’m quite fond of this one also — is be careful what you wish for because you might get it. And finally, of course, there is the famous Murphy’s Law, which perhaps encapsulates the heart of conservatism: if something can go wrong, it will.”

Piazza now chimed in. “I agree with Rebecca. The point she’s making is that we will always have a strong conservative faction to deal with. Folks, I can even remember myself voting Republican up-time once in a while.” Seeing the lack of comprehension on some faces, he waved his hand. “Republicans were our variety of Crown Loyalists — well, sort of — back in up-time America. The point is –”

He leaned forward to give emphasis to his next words. “Since we’re going to have a conservative political party to deal with here in the USE, it’s entirely in our interest to have it be one that’s reasonable and responsible — and, yes, Gunther, that’s quite possible. We had plenty of conservative politicians like that where I came from.”

Rebecca picked up the thread. “We can deal with Amelie Elisabeth, without any threat or risk of violence. The same is true with Wettin himself, now that he’s broken from the outright reactionaries. No, that’s not really putting it the right way, is it? He didn’t ‘break’ from them — they ousted him from office and placed him in prison because he objected to their treasonous behavior. And we all know from Gretchen’s letters that Ernst Wettin conducted himself most honorably during Báner’s siege of Dresden.”

Smooth as silk, Charlotte Kienitz inserted herself back into the discussion. “So what you’re saying is that we should do whatever we can to encourage a rupture between outright reactionaries and those conservatives who are following the principles which Alessandro Scaglia lays out in his recent book Political Methods and the Laws of Nations.”

Scaglia was a former Savoyard diplomat who’d become one of the chief advisers to King Fernando and his very shrewd wife Maria Anna, a former archduchess of Austria. In fact, the newly reunited Netherlands could be called the best current state practitioner of those principles. Rebecca had devoted two full chapters of her book to an analysis of Scaglia’s theses — an analysis which was sometimes in agreement and never harshly critical.

“Yes, exactly,” Rebecca said. She then bestowed a benign gaze upon the glowering face of Gunther Achterhof. “I realize that this course of action will not always be met with favor by the conservatives in our own movement. I speak of those folk who are generally set in their ways and dislike flexibility as a matter of course.”

A big round of laughter erupted in the room. After a moment, Gunther allowed a crooked smile to come to his face. The man had virtues as well as faults, one of them being a good if usually acerbic sense of humor.

****

After the meeting ended and the gathering dissolved into pleasant conversation and chitchat, Charlotte sidled up to Rebecca.

“I notice you didn’t bring up the issue of your retirement in Ed’s favor,” she said.

“No, Ed and I decided that we’d do better to keep it to one controversy at a time. We’ll be holding another full meeting in a few days. I’ll bring it up then.”

They’d already agreed that Rebecca would resign from her seat in the House of Commons, thereby creating a slot for Piazza so he could run in the special by-election that would be called to choose her successor. She represented a district of the city of Magdeburg that was so overwhelmingly pro-Fourth of July Party that the Crown Loyalists hadn’t even bothered to run a candidate. It was perhaps the safest seat in the entire parliament and there was no doubt that Piazza would win the election.

Ed needed to be a member of Parliament if he were to serve as the USE’s next prime minister. He could not do so as the president of the State of Thuringia-Franconia. That position placed him in the House of Lords and disqualified him from the nation’s top executive position.

As for Rebecca, she would concentrate on the election campaign itself. Although the term wasn’t being used, she would be what up-time Americans would have called Piazza’s campaign manager.

And after the election, assuming Piazza won — which most people thought he would — there were at least two possibilities. Rebecca was by nature inclined toward working in the background. She was an organizer by temperament and had a positive dread of public speaking. So her own preference would be to serve Piazza as his chief of staff. That was a position that had not existed in her husband’s administration, because Michael Stearns had a very hands-on approach to governing. But Piazza was a more traditional sort of executive, and he definitely preferred to work through a staff.

But there was another possibility, which she knew Piazza himself preferred. That was to appoint Rebecca as his secretary of state. She was quite adept at diplomacy — extraordinarily adept, in fact — as she’d proved in her past dealings with Cardinal Richelieu, Don Fernando both before and after he became the King in the Netherlands, and the Prince of Orange, Fredrik Hendrik.

Such a position would give her more public exposure than she really cared for, but at least she wouldn’t have to be giving a lot of public speeches. She could hope, anyway.

And there was this, too, which she had to admit. Among the many things she had learned from Michael Stearns was that the best way to negotiate was to make sure that the person you were dickering with saw a clear alternative to you — which was a lot worse than you were. Michael had been particularly adept at using Gretchen Richter and the Committees of Correspondence for that purpose.

As the USE’s secretary of state, Rebecca could go him one better. Would you rather negotiate with me or with my husband? That would be the one they call the Prince of Germany, who crushed the reactionaries in Saxony and —

Hopefully, hopefully. Michael would sometimes lead from the front and he might get killed in the doing, which would crush her heart.

Still, soon enough, she thought she’d be able to add:  — and crushed the duke of Bavaria as well.

 

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 51

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 51

Chapter 27

“Atmosphere evacuated,” the Jao crewman in the assault bay control room said.

At that moment, yellow lights flashed on in the bay and on the control room workstations. “Brace yourselves,” Sergeant Marasco said. “This is liable to rattle our teeth.”

Lim pushed back against the seat, and made sure that the bottom end of the staff rested on the deck between her feet and was held firmly between her knees in addition to being gripped by her hands.

The lights flashed to red.

“Here we go!” Marasco yelled.

Whangggggg!

****

The red light went off after the vibrations of the contact had damped down, and the blue light flashed on. None of the jinau moved because the shock frames hadn’t released, but Tully knew that ship crewmen were now moving to attach tethers to the broken Khûrûshil ship for the purpose of tying it to Ban Chao. With the atmosphere evacuated, he couldn’t hear anything from his external audio pickups, but he could feel vibrations through his feet that told him the armored ram was being opened to allow the assault team to exit. He watched his helmet display, seeing the icons of maintenance craft exiting to attach lines to the very slowly twisting target. They stayed in the shadow of the craft as much as possible, as the other Khûrûshil ships were still firing missiles in the direction of Pool Buntyam and Ban Chao. The bigger ships’ lasers were picking them off, but there was still debris flying around.

The cables got attached in what seemed relatively short order, and winches in Ban Chao began pulling them in. It didn’t take long until the wrecked craft was floating in front of Ban Chao, with most of its movement damped.

The light flashed green, the shock frames released, and Charlie Company moved forward. Tully wanted a better view of the operation than his helmet display would give, so he moved to a wall panel.

“Eanne, give me a split feed of the operation display on panel . . .” he peered at it through his helmet screen, “AB9A.”

The tech said nothing, but in a couple of seconds the screen flickered to life showing four views in its quadrants. Tully watched as a couple of human jinau fired a canister round of sensors at the target. There was a brief sparkle of lights as the sensors, each tipped with something called Space Glue by the humans, stuck and adhered to their various locations, flashed a light and sent a signal back to their control unit to lock in their feedback.

Nothing was visible in the next step, but Tully knew that each of the sensors was sending out sonar pings across a wide frequency range. All of them collected the results, fed the data back to their control unit, and the result was . . . Bingo, a map of the interior of the Khûrûshil ship. Ollnat again, combining off-the-shelf technology from the petroleum seismic industry and the medical scan companies.

“Colonel Tully, do you see the map?” That was Lieutenant Boatright.

“Yes, Lieutenant. I see it. And I see that you have one large open space relatively forward in the hull. Is that your target?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Go for it.”

“Will do, sir.”

****

Caitlin was getting the same feed as Tully by way of Lieutenant Vaughan’s workstation. “I thought they were going to bring it into one of Ban Chao’s shuttle bays, or the assault bay. What’s left of the ship is not all that big.”

Vaughan shook his head. “Not while there’s a risk that there still might be something on that ship that could go boom. None of the ships could take that chance, not even Ban Chao.”

“Oh. Right. Got it.” Caitlin thought about that for a moment. “Now I see why Tully’s had the jinau drilling in zero gravity.”

“Boarding through the assault bay ramp only works when the target ship is big enough for the ram to penetrate,” Caewithe Miller offered from her bodyguard position behind Caitlin. “Otherwise, you swim through space.”

“Hmm,” Caitlin mused. “So Tully’s been thinking about this kind of thing already.”

“That’s why General Kralik made him the colonel,” Miller replied, “or at least one reason. Gabe’s got more out of atmosphere and out of ship experience than any other officer.”

“Any other human officer,” Tamt inserted into the conversation. “There are many Jao officers with more experience.”

“But how many of them are in Terra taif?” Miller asked.

Tamt gave a human shrug, but didn’t say anything.

Wrot picked up the conversation. “None, that I know of. Most officers with that kind of experience either died in the conquest phase or left after Oppuk became governor. That should have been a warning to the Naukra . . .” the Jao council of kochans, “. . . of what was to come, but none would see it then, not even Pluthrak. And so,” he circled back to the original topic, “we have Colonel Tully being of use at the moment. He is good, you know, for a youngling. If he survives long enough to learn subtlety, he could be . . . formidable.”

Caitlin started to laugh at the idea of Tully being subtle. Then she had second thoughts, and even third ones, especially considering whose opinion she was hearing. Wrot was not the least-subtle of Jao; for all that he cultivated a rough and brusque manner. His service to Preceptor Ronz of the Bond of Ebezon was evidence of that. “Gabe Tully being subtle,” she said, “could be a scary thought.”

It didn’t surprise her at all to see Caewithe Miller nod in response, with a sober expression on her face.

****

“Boyes,” came through Sergeant Boyes’ ear bud. “Carter here. Come on over.”

“Roger that,” Boyes replied to the boarding team sergeant. He switched to the team frequency. “Okay, you apes. Our turn. Head for the shack.”

One by one his fire-team jumped for the Khûrûshil ship, himself last; and one by one they made landings of one degree or another on the broken hull. The sergeant was the first to make it to the boarding shack, a plastic tent where the walls were filled with air and made rigid by applying electrical charges. The bases of said walls were bonded to the hull with more Space Glue and electrical charges. A much weaker version of the technology allowed the jinau teams’ feet to stick to the hull.

Boyes stood by the door, naming his troops as they entered. “Nolan, McClanahan, Singh, Gomez, Kemal, and me,” as he stepped into the airlock and moved through into the main chamber.

“That all of you?” came from the figure with the Carter name patch on his suit standing opposite the inner airlock door.

“Yep,” Boyes said as another jinau followed him in and closed the inner airlock door behind them.

The shack was roughly four meters wide and seven meters long, and tall enough that even First Sergeant Luff could have stood unbowed within it. There was plenty of headroom for Boyes and his team.

“Okay, three of you on one side and three on the other,” Carter said. “Laroche, there, is going to lay out a door for you. Stay out of her way and don’t step on it.”

The other jinau began applying long lines of sticky cord to the hull metal, laying it out with care and making sure that one particular side of it always was in contact with the hull. After outlining a rectangle maybe one and a half meters by three meters, she inserted a short rod and stepped back. Carter checked a gauge on his wrist.

“Okay, boys and girls, we have the equivalent of about three thousand meters altitude atmosphere in here now, which is about as good as it’s going to get. Laroche just laid a shaped charge. Stand well back, and when I tell you to, face the walls. That should blow a hole through the hull and open the door for you. If it doesn’t, then we’ll apply the handy dandy door openers.” Here Carter held up a device that was obviously a distant descendant of what used to be called the Jaws of Life. “I’ve seen your plan, but tell it to me again.”

“After the door opens . . .” Boyes began.

“We throw the flash-bangs and step back,” Nolan and Kemal said in unison.

“We take entry lead,” said Singh and Gomez.

“Mac and I follow,” Boyes said.

“We take the rear and guard their six,” Nolan and Kemal finished.

“Weapons?” Carter asked.

“Super-Tazers.” Singh and Gomez held them up.

“Net guns.” Boyes lifted his, echoed by McClanahan.

“Shotguns with rubber slugs,” Nolan said. Kemal just grinned.

“Backups?” Carter asked.

Boyes and the rest of his team all slapped the holsters where they each carried a high-capacity 10 mm pistol, sized for the combat suits. Those were weapons of last resort on this mission, but no one, from Colonel Tully on down, denied that last resorts could be exercised. Boyes also reached up and touched the knife that was sheathed hilt down to the left of his sternum.

“The rest of my team is in the airlock, and as soon as you finish entry they’ll come in and be backup,” Carter concluded.

“Outstanding,” Boyes said. He was pumped on adrenaline. “Let’s do this thing.”

“Right,” Carter said. “Face the walls.”

 

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 06

1636: The Ottoman Onslaught – Snippet 06

The other teenager was a girl and therefore wasn’t in line of succession. The Palatinate wasn’t governed by the Salic law of France and some other principalities. There were any number of female rulers in the Germanies. The neighboring realm of Hesse-Kassel, for instance, was currently ruled by Amelie Elisabeth, the widow of Landgravine Wilhelm V, serving as regent for her oldest son. Each dynasty had its own rules when it came to the line of succession — what were called “house laws” — and those of the Palatinate excluded females.

It probably wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Even if she had been eligible to rule, Elisabeth wouldn’t be interested. Her life had also been changed by the Ring of Fire — in her case, by the influence of the American nurse in Amsterdam, Anne Jefferson. Elisabeth had developed a passionate interest in medicine. Her ambition was to become a doctor following up-time principles, not to get involved in the wrangles of royalty and aristocracy, which she now viewed as hopelessly medieval.

That left the youngest sons who’d survived infancy: Edward, Philip Frederick, and Gustav. But the oldest of them, Edward, was only ten. It would be some years before he was in any position to advance his claim to the Palatinate, assuming he chose to do so at all.

And in the meantime, Emperor Gustav II Adolf had Committees of Correspondence aroused by his former chancellor Axel Oxenstierna’s attempted counter-revolution to deal with — not to mention the so-called “Prince of Germany,” Mike Stearns, who’d just won a decisive victory over a Swedish army outside of Dresden. The emperor had come to the conclusion that a peace settlement in the hand was worth two future crises in a bush, and granted the now-very-popular demand of the Upper Palatinate’s population to get rid of the be-damned electors altogether and replace them with a republic.

“Two weeks,” von Dalberg repeated. “The elections should be held over two weeks, not ten days. They should run till the end of the month.”

Piazza shrugged. “I don’t disagree, Werner. But is it really something worth fighting with Wettin over?”

“Not in the least,” chimed in Ableidinger, “I think a shorter election period actually works to our advantage. We’re a lot better organized than our opponents.”

A woman seated next to Piazza spoke up. “Speaking of which, does anyone know yet what our opposition is going to consist of? Are the Crown Loyalists still a single party or are they going to splinter?”

The questions came from Helene Gundelfinger. Officially, she was the vice-president of the State of Thuringia-Franconia, the most populous province in the USE. In practice, she’d been functioning for months as the actual president since Ed Piazza had moved to Magdeburg — although again, not officially. He still maintained his legal residence in Bamberg, the capital of the SoTF.

Piazza and Rebecca exchanged glances. Depending on the issue involved, one or the other of them usually had better intelligence on issues of this nature than any of the other leaders of the party.

“Judging from my recent correspondence with Amelie Elisabeth,” said Rebecca, “I think what she is aiming for is to break away — or force the reactionaries to break away, so she can keep the name ‘Crown Loyalist’ — and form a new party. In all likelihood, if she succeeds in this effort Wettin will join with her. So would Duke George of Brunswick Province.”

By the time she finished, Gunther Achterhof had a frown on his face. She had no trouble seeing the expression because he was seated directly across from her at the other end of the long conference table — which was actually six tables pushed together to form one very big one. And she had no trouble interpreting the expression because she knew from long experience that Achterhof was never happy to be reminded that political affairs sometimes required regular communication with — one of his favored phrases — “the exploiters and oppressors of the common classes.”

On this occasion, though, he didn’t make any open criticism. Gunther could be extraordinarily stubborn but he was not stupid. If nothing else, he’d lost enough quarrels with Rebecca over this issue to know that his was a hopeless cause. All the more hopeless now that Gretchen Richter had made it clear in her own correspondence to the CoC activists in Magdeburg that she herself engaged in regular discussions and negotiations with Ernst Wettin, who was simultaneously the imperial administrator of Saxony and a younger brother of the current prime minister.

“What should be our attitude on the subject?” asked another participant in the meeting, seated elsewhere at the table. That was Charlotte Kienitz, the FoJP’s central leader in the province of Mecklenburg. “Or should we have one at all?”

A naïve and unsuspecting person — almost anyone, actually — would be quite taken in by Kienitz’s innocent tone. The questions she asked seemed to derive from nothing more than simple curiosity.

In reality, the questions had been pre-arranged by Rebecca and Ed Piazza. Over time, Charlotte had become one of their closest confidants and political allies in the never-ending political disputes in the party. Compared to the Crown Loyalists, with their fierce — at times, violent — factional conflicts, the Fourth of July Party was a veritable model of unity. Still, albeit not to the extent of the Crown Loyalists, it was a coalition of differing and sometimes competing interests. The leadership provided by Rebecca Abrabanel and Ed Piazza was generally accepted by most activists in the party — sometimes grudgingly — but that was at least in part due to their light-handed way of running things. They both preferred persuasion to strong-arm tactics. And if Rebecca had the ultimate strong arm available to her if she really needed it — that would be her husband Mike Stearns, the man who more than any other had created the United States of Europe in the first place, had served as its first prime minister, was now one of its most celebrated military figures and carried the unofficial title of the Prince of Germany — she preferred not to use it at all.

Which was just fine with Stearns himself. He had more than enough to deal with as a general in time of war, and he had complete confidence in his wife’s political abilities and acumen.

Rebecca had asked Charlotte to pose those questions if the opportunity arose, because she’d just spent the past few weeks writing the chapters in her book on political affairs that addressed the issue. So, she responded immediately and easily.

“I think we should view ourselves as tacitly — not openly, since that would do more harm than good — allied with Amelie Elisabeth, when it comes to this question.”

She forestalled the gathering protest she could see on several faces — Gunther’s being one of them, but by no means the only one — by pressing on.

“Be realistic, everyone!” She said that in a sharper tone than she normally used. “If there is one absolute iron law in politics, which has applied, does apply, and will apply in any political system created by the human race, it is this.”

She paused, briefly, for effect. “There will always be a conservative faction — and it will always be powerful. In fact, except in times of revolution and great upheaval, it will usually tend to be dominant.”

The protests that followed were fierce but not particularly coherent, which was what Rebecca had expected. She was making a pronouncement that was bound to irritate revolutionaries — “rub them the wrong way,” in the up-time idiom — who hadn’t thought these matters through. She waited patiently until the voices of opposition died down a bit before speaking again.

And, again, used a harsher tone than she normally did — much harsher, in fact. “Grow up, as my sometimes-blunt husband would say.”

That reminder of her closest associate brought quiet to the room. “When I say ‘conservative,’ I am not referring to any particular political philosophy. I am using the term in lower case, so to speak. I am referring to the basic attitude of most people that unless conditions are intolerable it is usually better to err on the side of caution.”

 

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 50

The Span Of Empire – Snippet 50

Lim had seen Caitlin in operation; how the Director would seek information, would seek opinions, would upon occasion–much to the contrary of Lleix methods–seek recommendations from those who were younger or lesser in rank. Yet in the end, the final decision would be made by Caitlin–whether it aligned with the lesser ranks’ offerings or stood against them–and by her alone.

So in a very real way, by acting upon her orders, the jinau would be the hands of Caitlin Kralik. They would carry out her order at her direction, without being consulted as to whether it was the right thing to do, without establishing consensus. She ordered; they acted.

It was at that moment that Lim gained an insight that had been eluding her ever since she joined the exploration task force–all members of the task force, even Fleet Commander Dannet, were in the task force for the purpose of being Caitlin Kralik’s hands. Or put it another way, they existed to extend her reach.

That thought intrigued her.

****

Tully started toward the front of the shock-frames, only to find his way blocked by two large figures. His display told him it was Major Liang and First Sergeant Luff. The major held up three fingers, and Tully switched to the alternate command frequency.

“Colonel, where are you going?” Liang asked.

“I’m going to lock in behind the boarding team.”

“Uh-huh,” Liang replied, as Sergeant Luff crossed his arms. “You’re planning on following the boarding team, aren’t you?”

“The thought had crossed my mind. You have a problem with that, Major?” Tully stressed the rank to underline his own.

“Actually, Colonel, I do. I know you’re a damn good leader, and I know that most of the men would follow you to hell and back. But I also know you jumped a bunch of grades in a short period of time.”

Tully couldn’t believe his ears. He’d always thought Liang liked him, or at least found him acceptable as a commander. “Yes, I did. And you also know I didn’t ask for that. General Kralik put me here. You got a problem with that?”

“Only when the lack of the experience you missed in those rank jumps means you’re about to do something, ah, ill-advised.”

Tully was willing to bet that the final word in that sentence was a last split-second substitution for “stupid.”

“Colonel, you’re almost a brigade commander, for God’s sake,” Liang continued. “At that rank, you just don’t lead from the front anymore. You can’t. You’re too damned important to the operation, any operation, to be in the front rank and get picked off by a lucky hit. You especially don’t lead a simple fire-team-level evolution. That’s what you have sergeants and lieutenants, and yes, even captains for.”

“I don’t ask my men to do anything I won’t do!” Tully bit the words off. One corner of his mind was surprised at the fury he was feeling.

“The men know that, sir,” Luff finally said something. “Everyone knows that you will do whatever has to be done. And that’s important, both for them and for their opinion of you. But at the same time, if you start taking risks like this for no critical reason, they’ll start wondering if you’ve lost it. You’re smart, and you’re lucky. So they want you to be smart and not push your luck.”

Tully snorted, but before he could say anything else, the major spoke again.

“Colonel, if nothing else, remember why you’re in this position. I’m sure that General Kralik gave you the same speech about there being a lack of field-grade officers that he gave me. Well, that’s true enough, but for this assignment he’d have found somebody, even if it was only me. There are enough competent field-grades in the ranks that he would have been able to put someone good in your position. But it’s obvious to anyone who stops to think about it for a minute, the general needed something more than a jinau officer for this job. He needed someone who could move in the highest circles, and someone that Director Kralik would listen to. Other than the general himself, that description fits you more than any other jinau officer. You have an obligation to Director Kralik, to the general, and to your troops to not take stupid chances.” This time the major didn’t seem to have any trouble using the s-word.

Now Major Liang crossed his arms, standing side by side with the sergeant. Tully looked at the two large men, and from the feeling in his gut he ought to have steam blowing out of a pressure relief valve at the top of his suit. But he also knew, coldly, objectively, that they were right. Oh, he didn’t want to admit that. His jaws clenched so hard he felt the pressure behind his eyes. It absolutely went against his grain to have to admit that his safety had that kind of priority on it that he couldn’t share all the risks of his men in the regular course of operations.

It took a long moment, but finally Tully’s jaw relaxed. “You’re a couple of bastards, the two of you. You know that, don’t you?”

Luff chuckled in his deep voice. “Colonel, that’s part of our job descriptions. Didn’t you read the fine print?”

“Fine,” Tully said, waving a hand. “I’ll just stay back here in the back rank. Is that far enough away from trouble to suit you?” He knew his voice sounded surly. At the moment, he didn’t really care. It was enough that he was doing the right thing.

“Thank you, sir,” the major said. “If you’re staying with Baker Company, I’ll post with Alpha.” Tully waved a hand again, and Liang headed toward the front of the shock-frame assembly.

Tully felt a change in his environment. It took him a moment to realize that the atmosphere was being pumped out of the assault bay.

He looked at Luff, who hadn’t moved. “You baby-sitting me, Top?” There was an edge to his voice, and again, he didn’t care.

“No, sir,” Luff replied. “The company officers suggested I slot in back here, and Major Liang agreed.”

“I’ll just bet he did,” Tully muttered. The pumps quit. “Well, let’s get locked in, Top. Things are about to get interesting.

****

Sergeant Boyes heard a ping and saw First Sergeant Luff had tapped him via the unofficial sergeants’ frequency. “Tell me you have good news for me, Top,” he responded.

“The colonel is slotting in with Baker Company, Boyes.”

A flood of relief washed through Boyes. He’d been very nervous that the colonel might try to ride shotgun on his team, and that was the very last thing in the world he wanted right then.

“Thanks, Top. Good to know. I owe you one.”

“Too right you do. First three rounds are on you next liberty,” Luff replied.

Boyes grinned in response to the humor in the first sergeant’s voice. “You got it.” The yellow light flashed on. “Gotta go.”

Luff’s light went dark. Boyes switched to the team frequency. “Heads up, boys and girls. It’s show time.”