Vicky Peterwald: Survivor (Vicky Peterwald Series Book 2)

by Mike Shepherd

  “But for us to raise an army is treason against your father,” the woman snapped.

  Vicky shrugged. “So you don’t raise an army. The black-hearted Empress has raised herself an army by another name, and she seems to have successfully skirted that treason. Why don’t you do the same?”

  The woman turned her gaze from the distant hills to fix Vicky with a hard stare, but she said nothing.

  Vicky raised a hand and ticked off her fingers one by one. “You have out-of-work young men and women. Left on their own, they are just the tinder that provocateurs need to start riots guaranteed to bring the black-hearted Empress’s Security Consultants down on you sooner or later. Then you do have an army loose on your lovely planet to wreak havoc and nothing to stop them. Nothing at all.”

  Vicky let those words sink in, then raised another finger. “But what if those out-of-work young people were put to work? What if they were out of the cities and busy from sunup to sundown?”

  “How?” the woman shot at Vicky.

  Vicky turned away to the view. “Your planet has many lovely vistas like this one, but much of it is still in need of terraforming. There are whole mountain ranges begging to have trees planted on them, rolling hills just ready for grass.”

  “There’s never enough money to make this planet what we want,” the woman admitted.

  “But now you have out-of-work youths who you must get working, even if it’s only backbreaking labor. I had my computer do a search last night for historical situations like this. In one of them back on Earth, they raised a Civilian Conservation Corp. Don’t those words just drip of peace and harmony as they roll off your tongue? A corps of civilians working to conserve the planet. Almost as innocent-sounding as Security Consultants, don’t you think?”

  “Don’t armies have corps?” the woman didn’t really ask.

  “Yes. Yes they do,” Vicky answered, holding tight to the grin on her face. “In this particular case, the young civilians working hard out in the woods were supervised by officers and NCOs from their nation’s army. Some were active duty and detached for this work. Others were recently retired.

  “Now,” Vicky went on, “I just happen to know where we have a supply of recently retired officers and NCOs. Even more, a lot of officers and noncoms are being RIFed out of the fleet as the Navy and Marines find themselves forced to trim their budgets, retire ships, and disband Marine battalions. I think we could get our hands on quite a few competent leaders for your civilian conservationists.”

  “Civilian terraformers,” the woman corrected. “About this drawdown, I haven’t heard of it. How’s it going?”

  Vicky suppressed a smile. If the woman was renaming the corps, Vicky had her headed in the right direction. Still, Vicky stepped away from that and followed the woman to the RIF. “The Reduction in Force is not going well. The Navy gets smaller. Strange thing, some of those retired ships sold for scrap are showing up as pirates. Some are even crewed by officers and Sailors who got their pink slips just recently.”

  “So the Navy is being split,” the woman said, “as the officers and crews are dumped on the beach. Those who can stomach working for that damn woman end up under the pirate flag, and those who can’t are stuck seeing how long they can survive on unemployment.”

  “That’s what we’re looking at.”

  “And you want me to hire your laid-off Navy types to teach my young men and women to plant trees and what?”

  “Am I correct that you are allowed hunting rifles?” Vicky said, knowing very well the answer.

  “In our outback and gone, there are some really nasty critters that don’t much care for us humans, except as dinner,” the woman admitted. “Anyone who goes there better carry a rifle.”

  “So, if we’re sending young folks out to terraform your outback,” Vicky said, “it might be a good idea to teach them how to shoot. Shoot a rifle and hit what they aim for.”

  “Unlike the State Security boys who just sprayed everything and let the coroner sort them out.”

  “And, no doubt, like the Security Consultants do.”

  “So,” the woman said, “our Civilian Terraforming Jobs Companions will plant trees Monday and Tuesday and spend Wednesday at the rifle range. What do they do the rest of the week?” There was a fey smile on the older woman’s lips.

  Vicky brushed a speck of dirt from the balustrade. “They might well go back to the mountain they planted on Thursday and figure out a way to dig in and defend it? Maybe spend Friday learning how to storm that defense?” Vicky said.

  “I think our gun makers could well benefit from a contract for several thousand, maybe tens of thousands of hunting rifles,” the woman said.

  “And I think I know just the people to train your tree planters?” Vicky said.

  The woman leaned on the stone balustrade. She eyed Vicky, then eyed the drop-off from the terrace. It was a long way down to the tumbling river below.

  “It would be nice to be able to protect Metzburg, to stop the Security Consultants from landing and making a mess even as they die,” the woman said to the drop-off.

  Vicky nodded.

  “Could the Navy protect us the same as they protected St. Petersburg?”

  Vicky shook her head. “Sorry, did I mention the fleet was getting smaller?”

  “I think you did.”

  “But,” Vicky said, and let that word hang over the gorge and the shadowed white water below, “if you are raising an army, by some other name, there is no reason you can’t raise a Navy to defend this verdant land you call home.” Vicky noted the curl of a smile her words brought to the woman beside her. “I have been told that Metzburg makes some very effective defensive lasers for merchant ships, 4- or 5-inchers.”

  “I believe that we do,” the woman admitted.

  “I’ve been told you might well be able to scale up your lasers to 6- or 8-inch.”

  “I expect that we have people who would love to try.”

  “I have an expert who can give you some advice on that. I couldn’t help but notice that you’ve got a lot of laid-up merchant ships trailing your station.”

  “You don’t miss much, do you?”

  “What I miss, some smart people tell me.”

  “And you listen?” was dripping with skepticism.

  “Not all Peterwalds have mud in their ears.”

  “I think you would be the first,” the older woman answered.

  “So I’ve been told by folks who were surprised by what I’m doing,” Vicky replied.

  The woman’s eyes turned to the far horizon. “Our space yards on the station have had little business of late. They and their workers could be put to work arming those ships. And if we are asked, what would we call them, we nice, loyal, subjects who are not revolting.”

  “We have a long tradition of arming merchant ships against pirates. I’m told that the pirates are rather heavily armed these days. I don’t think a 6- or 8-inch gun would be too much for self-defense,” Vicky said with an air of innocence.

  “I’m told by one of my designers that we could put a half dozen 15-inch lasers on an unused liner.”

  Vicky raised an eyebrow. “That might be harder to explain.”

  “We will need to keep very quiet about that,” the woman said, a tiny smile dancing around the edges of her mouth.

  “Shall we very quietly go talk with those who can make all of this peaceful, civilian work happen?” Vicky said.

  “Yes, let us.”

  Vicky eyed the old woman. She was smiling now, and her eyes sparkled.

  “Before you came into the room this afternoon,” the woman said, “I doubted there was any hope for us. When you left the first time, I feared all hope was gone. When you stormed back in, madder than a wet hen, I thought I saw possibilities. Now, I see hope. Hope for me and my family. Hope for all the men who work f
or us. Hope for their wives and children.”

  Vicky tried to accept the words the woman spoke, but she could not. “Ma’am, I am just a survivor. If I hope for anything, it is to help others survive as well.”

  “Oh, no, young lady, you are hope. Hope for a future that will not be as good as our past but so much better.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  MIKE SHEPHERD grew up Navy. It taught him early about change and the chain of command. He’s worked as a bartender and cabdriver, personnel advisor and labor negotiator. Now retired from building databases about the endangered critters of the Pacific Northwest, he’s enjoying some fun reading and writing.

  Mike lives in Vancouver, Washington, with his wife, Ellen, and close to his daughter and grandchildren. He enjoys reading, writing, dreaming, watching grandchildren for story ideas, and upgrading his computer—all are never ending. He’s hard at work on Kris’s next story, Kris Longknife: Unrelenting, coming from Ace in November 2015, and Vicky Peterwald: Rebel, coming in June 2016, as well as other exciting tales in Kris’s universe.

  You can learn more about Mike and all his books at his website mikeshepherd.org; you can e-mail him at Mike_Shepherd@comcast.net or follow Kris Longknife on Facebook.

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