Shelby 9 Snippet 3

 

 

TauR14G6-15 BlueWaters and Gentle Mist

 

AdmiralLobo tried to gently rub his brow. He was tired; his body was a bit crabby fromsitting for prolonged periods of time. He had a headache from reading, mostlikely eye strain and low blood sugar. And he needed food. Better food thantake out, which seemed to consume his world for the moment. His steward wasprobably getting tired of forcing sandwiches and soup on him.

Hewas starting to regret getting into a rebellion with the Confederation and intowhat was turning into a nasty situation with the Federation. He felt like hewas in a vice, and outside forces were turning the screws ever so slightly andcarefully … but relentlessly.

Eventuallysomething was bound to pop.

Hewanted to blame General Sedu and others, but he was a bit too self-honest withhimself. Sure, the deaths of the civilians in their stasis pods he could lay atstupidity and an accident. But … he made a puttering sound.

No,it was still on his watch. He should have had people paying more attention tosuch things.

Heglanced at the empty glass nearby and pushed it away with a flick of hisfingertip. The glass had weight on the bottom so it didn’t tip easily. Heturned away to look out the view screen to the star system.

Normallyhe loved the view; it helped to calm him. It reminded him of a night sky andstaring up at it in wonder as a calf. At the moment, it barely registered.

GeneralSedu had engineered the rebellion, insurrection, whatever you wanted to callit. He had to admit, he’d gone along with it when he had resented theConfederation surrendering to the Federation.

Ifthey’d only tried harder, gotten their timing right …

Hecut those errant thoughts off harshly. Coulda, woulda, shoulda wouldn’t changea damn thing. What happened was what happened. They needed to move forward.

Forthe moment, things were progressing. The New Tauren Confederation made up of sixinhabited and one empty star system was progressing. A fresh constitutionalconvention was in the works. They had their own Ansible network, which wasgrowing. Its bandwidth was limited, but it worked and best of all, it wasn’tcontrolled by the Confederation.

Heturned slightly to look at the status board. The locked-down Confederation Ansibleblinked a lurid red at him mockingly.

Hehated that. It meant that the Confederation knew that they were in revolt andwere doing something. He had no way of knowing what. Nothing good obviously.

Heglanced at the sector map. Their newly-minted capital was a binary star systemwith two agro worlds and a mixed population. They had orbital fortresses and asmall task force under his command. General Sedu controlled the ground forceswith an iron glove.

Theyhad the single shipyard in the star system. There were small repair yards hereand there, and some on their borders he was hoping to grab. At the moment, hewasn’t certain they were worth the risk.

Hehad too many fronts. The capital was wide open on their flanks and thatbothered him and kept him up at nights, especially with the Feds.

Hewinced slightly. Oh, how he regretted taking out that ship! If they’d onlysurrendered as planned …

Heflicked his head in a negative gesture. Again, it was over and done with. Hewas going to have to find a way to deal with an angry Federation at some point.

Thatwas a bleak thought he thought and then got up to visit the head. He needed toget some rest or he wasn’t going to be good for anything anymore.

>>>~<<<

CommanderBlack Tip flicked his black-tipped ears as he checked on the status of theprisoners and ships. So far so good, though he worried about any moreaccidents.

Hewas also concerned about the rebellion. Obviously talks with Admiral White Faceand Admiral Yen, not to mention the insurrection hadn’t gone over well. AdmiralLobo hadn’t said much but the lack of positive reports was enough to infer thatthey hadn’t gone well. And it was becoming something of an open secret that theAnsible was locked down and that the Confederation knew something was going on.

Heshook his head and then grunted. He noted that the admiral was going to bed andnodded in relief and agreement. Good. Now, he planned an unscheduled check onthe prisoners for later in the week and then he too would hand off his dutiesto the next in line and get some shut eye as well.

>>>~<<<

PlanetaryGovernor Dash of Gentle Mist nodded to his counterpart, Max, the planetarygovernor of Blue Waters. They waited outside the office of Governor Hard Tossor “interim president” as some were calling him these days.

Dashfelt an urge to check his watch but sat on it firmly. He didn’t need or want tolook impatient. He knew the game; hell, he’d used it often enough. Hard Tosswas playing a dominance game by having them wait in order to assert himself asthe dominant bull. They were the supplicants; he was the alpha.

Ofcourse they knew that already. They were also all busy and had full schedules.Besides, he had summoned them to the station, they could have held aconversation … well, no the damn distances between planets in the binary starsystem would have prevented a proper conversation. Still, this shit was gettingold.

“Comeon already,” Max muttered.

Dashfelt a bit of amusement and thrill of triumph at not being the one to break andshow annoyance first. He glanced at his partner and flicked his ears. Maxrolled his brown eyes in return and rubbed his hands on his knees.

“Stupidgames we play,” Max finally said impatient. “I have a schedule to keep.” He gotup and looked at his chief of staff and then over to the aide near the door.“When Governor Hard Toss is ready to reschedule, let me know,” he said flatly.

Dashblinked and then got up as well. He glanced uncertainly to the staff and guardsand then headed behind Max to the door.

Theaide immediately touched his ear and then cleared his throat.

Max’schief of staff paused in front of him and turned. The bulls turned one by oneback to the aide.

“Thegovernor’s call has ended, and he is ready to speak with you now.” The aidemade a show of turning a sweeping hand to the door and triggering the opening.

“Abouttime,” Max muttered as he changed course. The other bulls followed.

>>>~<<<