Imperator

by Timothy Ellis

  The Russians had two of their three jump points very heavily defended, but traders were going in all directions unimpeded. I could see from the map the Chinese had the same arrangement. Big fleets on two jump points, but trade was flourishing. It implied there were no hostilities around here, but had been in the past.

  Nippon though had a surprise.

  Whereas on our time line they’d specialized in corvettes, now they not only had fleets of battleships at their two key jump points, but two of them at each were the largest battleships I’d seen built by humans. The two we jumped past were named Yamato and Musashi. At the other jump point were the Nagato, and the Haruna. Each was a good twenty five percent longer than anyone else’s battleships, had four turrets top and bottom instead of three, and their main guns were also bigger than ours were, although nowhere near as powerful.

  BigMother settled into orbit of Nippon, and took up a position not far from the military station. Three shuttles launched from the station as soon as we appeared, and landed on the flight deck. By the time they were down on the maintenance deck, Annabelle, Lacey, and myself were there to greet them.

  The Japanese wanted it all. Extra systems, trade with the galaxy, and most especially, they wanted their space isolated from everyone else, but allowing them to come and go. I’m not sure where they got that idea from, and while I could do it, I couldn’t think of a reason why I would, or why they’d want it.

  It made me think about how to maintain the spine for everyone else if I took a key system out of it. It was possible of course, but was it a good thing to do? Looking at the trader traffic through the system showed a good mix of everything this side of Earth, including Earth itself. So severing the spine here, unlike on the other side of Earth where the war systems effectively made civilian traffic a suicide run, would cause a lot of ships to be cut off from their home systems. And when I say a lot, it was potentially thousands.

  They’d found only five of the eleven systems available to them, which accounted for why their planets were badly overcrowded. We did at least have something to offer them.

  On Jane’s suggestion, we’d set up an embarkation room off the maintenance deck. The rift went to the Imperious station, allowing anyone to come aboard, and then walk to Haven or beyond. The Japanese promptly walked through to meet David on Haven, with a single exception.

  He was a middle aged man in a business suit, and after the others left, he bowed to me.

  “Captain Tanaka, Imperator. Please excuse my addressing you directly. I was retired by the current government for voicing opinions not popular with them. Having heard you are recruiting, I managed to use my influence to be able to get here with the first group. I apologize if I am being too forward.”

  He bowed again.

  “Not at all Captain. What did you command before retirement?”

  “I was captain of Yamato when she was launched two years ago.”

  “And you want to be a captain again?”

  “I do. No-one leaves the bridge of a ship voluntarily.”

  “Very true. What was it you voiced?”

  “Patience. Over the last ten years, while we’ve not had a war, the likelihood of one between us, the Russians, and the Chinese, has been slowly escalating. I told them to prepare for war as always, but do nothing to provoke one.”

  “How have they been provoking one?” asked Lacey.

  “Through trade policy. Since we lost contact with the Americans and British, our government has sought to dominate the markets as widely as possible. It has angered our neighbors.”

  “Jane?”

  “Telling David now.”

  Tanaka looked surprised at the voice out of nowhere, but covered it quickly.

  “Thanks for the information,” I told him. “So you’d like to join the Imperium military?”

  “Along with several dozen other ship officers. If you’ll accept us.”

  “Do you have their records available?”

  “I do.”

  “I tell you what. I have a Japanese officer already. If you’d go spend some time on his bridge, and discuss your officers with him, we’ll see how it goes. We’re after as many recruits as we can find, but this will fast track the process of placing you on ships.”

  He bowed lower this time.

  “Thank you, Imperator. What is this officer’s name?”

  “Sato.”

  He looked confused again for a moment.

  “There has been no Sato’s in the Japanese officer corps for several hundred years.”

  “We know. I’ll let him explain it to you.”

  Like the rest of us, his family had died out. In this case, suspiciously.

  “Jane?” I called.

  “Yes, Jon?” and I jumped slightly.

  She was standing behind me.

  “Would you care to escort the Captain to see Admiral Sato?”

  “I would. Captain, please come with me.”

  He bowed one more time, and walked through the rift after her.

  I opened a channel to Sceptre, and let Sato know he was coming, and to have a gig waiting at the nearest rift to him. I also let him know John Wayne needed a captain, and to see if the good Captain Tanaka would like to command her. John Wayne wasn’t going to be Yamato for him, but he’d appreciate the fact JW had a lot more firepower than the larger ship.

  Aline came up next to me at that point.

  “How’s your Russian?” she asked.

  Twenty Eight

  The Russians wanted everything as well.

  But most especially, they wanted the Japanese out of their space permanently. I could see why. There were hundreds of Japanese freighters in the Moscow system, the single largest group from any other sector. It was hardly surprising though, since they shared a jump point. But as I quickly gathered from the delegation who came aboard, customs at the jump point was a nightmare for them. Even with only half heading into the sector itself, while the rest were going up spine, or back home.

  Their delegation walked through to Haven with little fanfare, where they also met David, who’d passed the Japanese on to a team specifically formed to deal with them. The Russians were also getting their own team. David was just doing the introductions.

  The Russians had found seven of their twelve systems, so we had five to offer them. Their military was huge, but largely untested, and, which had probably worried them about the Japanese, wasn’t up to a serious war with them. They had battleships in the shipyards, but they were not going to be out any time soon. Which I assumed was why they were jumping at the chance to not have to complete them.

  Jane did a quick appraisal of their ground forces, and found them somewhat lacking, but for what we needed, second tier troops to secure a planet and garrison it while the locals recovered, they were perfect. And given time, they’d train up to our standards. The point was, they had significantly more troops than we needed.

  The Chinese didn’t come aboard immediately.

  Instead, they inquired what time of day it was for us, and invited as many as I cared to bring to dinner. I let David know, and he walked through with the senior members of the team formed for the Chinese delegation. Instead of taking a shuttle down to Beijing’s biggest city, I opened a temporary rift down to the venue itself, and we all walked through.

  The group included the alpha team, Aline, Lacey and his three squadron leaders, and the other team leaders still on board. Hobbs was back on Stars still, and declined when I invited him, saying Chinese food wasn’t has favourite.

  Chinese food was on my list of favorites, and the banquet served certainly hit the spot, even if the venue went silent for a full minute after I asked for a fork. Given the starbursts on my dress uniform, the fork was forthcoming very quickly, but the service staff had to make an effort to not show any disdain. Not that I cared. Chopsticks and I had never gotten on, and I wasn’t going to learn them now.

  Aline made a point of feeding me tasty morsels using her chopsticks, much to the amu
sement of the rest of the team. No business was discussed until after the meal, when a senior general, and an even more senior diplomat, took David and I off to a private office while everyone else was having coffee.

  They of course wanted everything, and like everyone else, had only found half of their systems. The extra five were also badly needed. And like the Japanese and Russians, they wanted Beijing severed from the spine permanently. In their case though, it was the Indians they wanted to keep out. Not so much because of the way they traded, although they had the same problems with the Japanese the Russians did, but the Indians demanded a much higher percent of their food production than they wanted to supply.

  Unfortunately, the Indians had them by the short and curlies, since all trade from down spine went through Delhi, and the times they’d refused to fill India’s food orders, they’d found themselves with a shortage of key imports, which only came from some of the African planets, because their traders were stopped from passing through Delhi space. It had come to war several times over the past several hundred years, quick and nasty ones, but the Chinese had always given in.

  What they wanted from us was to keep the Indians out of their space, but still allow the trade with the African and Latin sectors to continue. It meant we had to sign up both those sectors as well, or find a way of continuing the trade without using freighters. There were some options, but I didn’t tell them. In the morning they’d go through to Haven as well, and I’d see what David’s people could come up with.

  One thing though, we’d heard nothing from either of the two sectors further down the spine, which probably meant they were not interested in us. I’d have to go there anyway, as they could be interested in the planets they hadn't found. But I was beginning to think those we hadn't heard from, were first making an effort to find their extra systems themselves, now they knew most of the sectors had them. Nothing we could do about that.

  When I mentioned it to Jane as we were returning to BigMother, she confirmed there were ships in locations which might indicate they were searching for jump points. And by the time I was ready for sleep, she confirmed several ships had found them, and had moved into previously unknown systems.

  I pondered some of the options after Aline dropped off to sleep, and while patting Angel.

  She dropped off before I did.

  Twenty Nine

  The Indians it turned out, wanted the same as the Chinese.

  They wanted full trade, but from an isolated sector. In other words, they wanted their cake, and to eat it too. The solution might not be what they really wanted, but one was starting to come to mind.

  David, who’d overnighted on BigMother instead of going home, welcomed the Indian contingent, and sent them through to Imperious, but stayed to talk to me. We needed to work out what was possible for the conflicting needs of the sectors. Jane joined us in my ready room.

  Isolating the sectors wasn’t an issue. It was the easiest part of it. So removing Moscow, Nippon, Beijing, and Delhi, could be done.

  The problem left behind after that was the lower spine cut into two, leaving trade at both ends cut off from the middle. This could be fixed though.

  Solving the Chinese issue of needing trade with Africa, given Africa didn’t seem interested in joining the Imperium, required some creative thinking. It was Jane who came up with the most workable solution.

  Assuming all four sectors joined, and the others didn’t, I’d connect Finland to Nepal, solving the spine issue. We still had two pirate stations available, and Jane suggested we put one of them in Last Hope, and the other in Iceland, neither system of which had been claimed yet. It meant we’d need to claim them, and fortify them. The stations would allow freighters to dock at either end of the spine, and offload cargo into our trade network.

  David was fine with the mechanics, but not happy giving sectors not wanting to join us the ability to trade with us for nothing. Jane pointed out we’d just charge them more to do it. Docking fees, container rental, and higher transport fees, could be structured so we made a profit off the stations and their security. But David insisted the stations be Imperium, not mine, and I received the same portion of the network fees as stations belonging to other members paid. I didn’t have a problem with that.

  The main problem was with the security of both the stations and the planets in the systems. We’d need to put at least one battlestation on the jump point for each, and station fighters there. Jane pointed out we now had a considerable number of Brawler fighters, which on their own were superior to anything any of the sectors had, and could be flown by AI’s instead of pilots. At least until we had sufficient pilots up to speed. And it did provide us with duty stations for any pilots who tested out on the Brawler, but were unable to cope with the Excalibur. They could be formed into station defense squadrons instead of being used for the war. Or they could be formed into police units. Or we could recruit for police units.

  Jane suddenly went still.

  “Jon?”

  “What?”

  She paused.

  “Too late.”

  “What was?”

  A screen popped up, showing a sizable debris field, most of which was in motion.

  “What am I looking at?”

  “The Nazi side of their jump point with the Americans.”

  “Oh hell,” muttered David, as the implications sank in.

  “What did they do?” I asked.

  “Precisely what I told them not to.”

  “Which was?”

  “They moved all their ships as close as possible to the jump point, with clear lines of fire at it, and then fired every gun and missile they had into it.”

  I flinched. David went white.

  “Ouch,” I said, after a short pause for reflection. “And you told them not to do it?”

  “Not in so many words. After you closed the jump point, I sent their admiral a message telling them the Imperium had closed the jump point, and anything attempting to go through it from either side would simply come back out the same side. When the Americans agreed to join the Imperium, I sent them a second message saying this was now permanent, and they never needed to blockade the point again.”

  “I guess they didn’t believe you,” said David.

  “Should have seen that coming,” I said.

  And I should have.

  “Who’d have known they’d try a stunt like that?” asked David.

  “I should have,” said Jane. “But I wasn’t paying attention.”

  “If that’s our only oops moment while we’re here,” I said, “I’ll be happy.”

  “What if they blame us?” asked David. “We could be at war with them now, but no-one’s aware of it yet.”

  I didn’t answer immediately, and they both waited for me.

  “In all likelihood we were the moment I closed the jump point, and it could be why they fired at us. We’ll have to wait and see. In any case, I’m not all that worried about them. If need be, we can seal the whole sector away, and forget about them.”

  Of course, David couldn’t just let that go.

  “What about any systems taken by force?”

  “What about them?”

  “Do we have any obligation to free them?”

  “Do I look like an American?”

  They both chuckled, but I didn’t join them. It was a flippant reply to a serious question, and for now, I didn’t have an answer. But also at the moment, it wasn’t our problem. The Americans might make it our problem, but for now, I didn’t know enough about why they were at war in the first place, to speculate on if they’d want it continued or not.

  David and I had an early lunch, after which I rifted BigMother back to Terminus. The teams walked through to Haven to start working with potential marine team members, already settling into the military space scraper. But David and I had a civilian gig to go to.

  I spent a boring afternoon at the round table, as we formally signed the Americans, British, Canadian, and Australi
ans into the Imperium. The table was a ring larger, and the humanoid members were interspersed with big cats, and one dragon. The dragon was in humanoid form, and a wyvern co-representative was also present, again in humanoid form. There was no point in scaring the shit out of everyone, and as it happened, the ceiling wasn’t high enough for the dragon form. Mind you, it might have alleviated my boredom.

  It was an important event, and I was desperate to escape by the time it ended. Aline had been there as well, in her capacity as my aide, along with Hobbes and Roo, who were observers not officially observing, since they had no standing with their own people. All the same, they reminded everyone we had allies.

  The first business before the new council was the applications for membership of the Japanese, Russians, Chinese, and Indians. I outlined how we could meet their expectations, emphasizing we needed to claim two systems they didn’t yet know about, and do it immediately before anyone found them. While I could have done it on my own, it did set a precedent, and I wanted the council to take the heat for it. It took some explaining before some of the council members understood the implications.

  Effectively, it gave the Imperium, and me in particular, the power to claim any unclaimed system, anywhere. Which could be in any given member’s own space. The Imperium as a whole was actually appropriating for all, a system falling into the space of a member. And while that wasn’t happening here, since Iceland was not in the space of an application under consideration, and Last Hope was next to two sectors not interested in joining, it still had implications if they chose to give me the go ahead.

  Which they did.

  With the meeting over, I took BigMother through the rift to Haven, and picked up the alpha team. During the meeting I’d received an email asking us to join the owner of the Chinese Restaurant for dinner again. And it was a good enough time for another good meal.

  The owner welcomed us back when I rifted us down, and joined us for another banquet. Good food, great company, and a hint of sadness.