“I may need people to join the Militia and the Imperial Navy for my own goals,” Bond told Harriet, “but I will not see anyone else feel they have no choice if they are to save their children.”
“I…thank you, Your Grace,” Harriet managed to get out past the overwhelming wave of relief.
“To give credit where credit’s due, Medit! had started assembling the clinic before I arrived,” the Duchess explained. “I think she felt guilty that there was no other way to get your son that treatment.”
“Doesn’t change anything for my son or me,” the Captain pointed out. Her son would have been dead by now if she hadn’t signed on.
“No, it doesn’t” Bond agreed. “Why you joined the Navy won’t be remembered. Neither of us, Captain Tanaka, is likely to be remembered fondly by history. Our job is to make sure humanity has a future from which to look down on us.”
#
Harriet took a deep breath, bringing her emotions slowly back under control. The meeting so far had been rather more…searing than she’d expected.
Bond simply waited, allowing her to get her composure back. The courtesy one ship’s captain allowed another, always.
“Somehow, I suspect that conversation was exactly what Tan!Shallegh was expecting when he sent me to brief you,” Harriet finally told Bond with a wry smile. “The manipulative squid.”
“He is that,” the Duchess agreed. “I’d hate him for some of what he’s pulled on me, except he is so very good at being likable. He does his job, and he’s mostly on our side. But he is very sneaky.
“Now, you had a briefing for me, Captain. I’m guessing it has something with why a Kanzi attack cruiser showed up in my system and started shooting.”
“It does,” Harriet admitted. “We’ve been running scouting patrols along the border—the old border, and the new one with Terra’s Kovius Treaty Zone. Yesterday was my second encounter with Kanzi scouts, and the eighth overall.”
“That we know of,” Bond pointed out.
“We’re missing two scout ships,” Harriet said levelly. “Most likely, they also encountered Kanzi and were destroyed. There doesn’t appear to be any specific concentration, but the fact that one of their ships entered Sol suggests you’re high on their list of potential targets.”
“So, we’re looking at war,” the Duchess replied.
“The Fleet Lord doesn’t think so. Not officially, anyway.”
“Explain.” Bond looked tired. Even older than she had before, somehow.
“The Kanzi have refused to recognize the annexation of Terra,” Harriet said. “Their official position is that Sol remains independent, and therefore they can attempt to conquer it themselves.
“Tan!Shallegh doesn’t expect them to make a formal move as the Theocracy. He expects the First Priest to be enabling one of the Clans to carry out raids on a massive scale, probably by outright giving them the ships to do so.”
“We haven’t even begun refitting the destroyers we were provided,” Bond told her. “I intend for them to be fully updated with armor and active defenses, but that will take time. How large a force are we talking about?”
That was a new discussion to Harriet. The expectation, as she understood it, was that Terra would deploy the destroyers as is. No one had been expecting them to acquire compressed-matter armor or active missile defense suites.
The old destroyers the Duchy had been given would acquire a whole new level of threat if they were upgraded to anything close to Tornado’s specifications.
“We think that they’ll stick to ships they can justify the Clan having honestly acquired,” Harriet told her. “I have a briefing note from Tan!Shallegh’s intelligence team for you as well, but the key point is we expect to see a strike force of probably twenty to thirty attack cruisers and twice that in smaller ships.”
“That would be a serious problem. An attack of that scale does become the Imperium’s responsibility, I’ll note,” Bond said with admirable calm.
“Indeed. Tan!Shallegh asked me to remind you that he cannot position Imperial warships in Ducal space without an official request.”
Bond sighed, studying her hands for a long moment.
“A request which is politically unfeasible at this point in time,” she finally admitted. “Which I’m sure the Fleet Lord is entirely aware of.
“The acceptance of the Duchy government and the Uplift department on Earth is…tenuous,” she continued. “For the moment, I think we have things together and people are willing to give us a chance.
“A return of Imperial warships to the system, however, could easily undermine that chance.”
“Of course,” Harriet agreed. “The Navy will, of course, be patrolling the area. We will attempt to intercept any major violation of the Imperium’s borders before it reaches you. We will also respond to any request for help the Duchy may send.”
“A mostly academic point until the starcom is online,” Bond pointed out. “Which I understand is a long, delicate process. The last time estimate I saw was another year.”
“I don’t pretend to understand the science,” Harriet replied. She and Bond had roughly the same exposure to A!Tol science and tech, really. She didn’t understand how much of the gear she was working with worked…but then, she hadn’t when she’d commanded a spaceship for Earth, either.
It was enough to understand what it did, not how it did it—and it apparently took almost two full Terran years to assemble and calibrate a starcom transmitter.
“None of this is a surprise to Tan!Shallegh,” she continued. “He had several suggestions to help mitigate the risks, starting with…”
#
Chapter 21
They’d gone through the vast majority of Harriet’s updates and briefings on Tan!Shallegh’s suggestions, and the plans to make sure Sol was defended, when a chime rang on Bond’s communicator and the Duchess checked it quickly.
From her reaction, it was something she’d been waiting for. Harriet wasn’t certain, but she thought she spotted a very immature grin flash across the face of her homeworld’s ruler.
“All right, Captain,” Bond said. “We’ve gone over most of the important things, and it turns out we have a guest waiting for you.”
A guest? There wasn’t anyone on Earth that Harriet was expecting to even want to see her.
“I need to go over much of what we’ve discussed with my Council,” Bond continued, “so I’d appreciate it if you stuck around until the morning local time. That’ll give me a chance to review your data and come to some conclusions.”
“I can do that,” Harriet admitted, still confused. “A guest?”
“I wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise,” the Duchess of Earth told her with a smile that was edging into wicked.
This was not promising.
“Colonel Wellesley will escort you downstairs,” Bond continued, the words a clear dismissal even as Harriet suddenly found herself lost and confused.
The door swung open and the Ducal Guard’s commander stepped in. Something in his face left Harriet feeling more concerned, but she followed him out to the hallway.
“What’s going on, Colonel?” she demanded.
“Duchess gave strict orders,” Wellesley told her. “No warnings. Come on.”
“Colonel,” Harriet said warningly. “I don’t report to the Duchess.”
“I do,” he said. “But no one here is your enemy, Captain Tanaka. Trust us, please.”
“Fine.”
She allowed herself to be led into the elevator, which whisked them down to the lobby of the Lucky Dragon hotel. The building wasn’t seeing much in terms of ordinary guests at this point, she understood. It probably wouldn’t until the planet’s government finally managed to move out.
That meant the lobby was almost empty as she stepped out into its surprisingly unostentatious imitation of a Buddhist temple. There were only a few staff scattered around—including her four Tosumi bodyguards, she noted. They’d apparently been convince
d to come down there and wait for her, which made no sense…
Then she spotted the man standing alone in the middle of the lobby, a uniformed woman with red hair standing just behind him. The officer was pointing at Harriet, and her heart stopped as she met the Japanese man’s gaze.
The last person she’d expected to see upon her return to Earth was Kenji Tanaka.
Her now ex-husband.
#
Fortunately, Kenji seemed about as dumbfounded as Harriet did. Her Tosumi bodyguards, clearly co-opted into this plan at some point after she’d left them outside Bond’s office, helped guide the two of them into a side meeting room.
Then, in a clearly planned movement, Colonel Wellesley and the Imperial Marines stepped outside the room and closed the door behind Harriet and the ex-husband she’d never expected to see again.
“Kenji, I…” She trailed off. She wasn’t even sure what to say.
“Duchess Bond’s office called me earlier today,” he said slowly and precisely, his gaze locked to her face. “As far as anyone knows, I’m attending an unexpected work meeting. Nakano-san will cover for me if needed.”
Nakano was the vice president of the software developer Kenji worked for. If he was in on this conspiracy…
“What about your family?”
“They are the reason for the deception. And your family, as well,” Kenji admitted. “They are all quite upset at your ‘betrayal.’”
“And Hiro?” she asked.
“With my sister,” he replied. “He is too young to understand yet. Aoi does, for which we owe her deeply.”
“There is no ‘we’ anymore, Kenji,” Harriet said quietly. “We both signed the divorce papers.”
“You left me little choice,” Kenji agreed. “I wish…” He paused, struggling.
All of the guilt that Harriet had felt for the position she’d left him in came crashing down. She hadn’t told Kenji she was enlisting. The first he had known of any of it would have been when he received her letter…and the accompanying pre-signed divorce papers.
She had brought dishonor on their family. There was no other way their parents would see her swearing fealty to Earth’s conquerors so quickly, regardless of whether or not it had saved Hiro’s life.
“There was no other way,” she said harshly. “Neither of our families would have accepted it. Including you would only have spread my failure. Would only have made it harder.”
“You made the right decision,” Kenji Tanaka told her. “I never doubted you for a moment, Harriet. I would have backed you all the way.”
Harriet winced.
“I know,” she whispered. “I wasn’t sure then, but I know. It was still better this way. It protected you and Hiro in the eyes of our families.”
“It may shock you to realize this, my love, but I am perfectly willing to lie to our families for their own good,” Kenji told her. “I wish you had asked me. That we could have talked about it—and that you could have gone off to the stars knowing that I had your back and that nothing you did could ever make me love you less.”
“Oh.”
It was a good thing the meeting room they’d been hustled into had chairs, as she sat down very suddenly. Her husband was not a physically demonstrative man, but he was suddenly there, holding her as the energy drained from her.
“I understand,” he said simply. “Aoi understands. When the time is right for us to explain everything, Hiro will understand. I swear this to you.”
She leaned against him and realized they were both crying.
“Kimi wo aishiteru,” he whispered. “Itsumo aishiteru.”
I love you. I will always love you.
“I have a room here for the night,” she finally whispered back. “Kimi wo aishiteru. We don’t have long—but the Duchess has arranged for us to have tonight.”
#
Chapter 22
Annette watched from the outdoor stage that had been set up in the Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Garden as the shuttle took off for Hunter’s Horn. Captain Tanaka had been in much better cheer for their morning meeting, even if its topics had been no cheerier than the previous one.
“You enjoyed that whole setup far too much,” Zhao told her, the Chinese Party leader standing at her right hand as they waited for the arrival of the Weber Network’s Alpha Cell.
Hidden in the bushes around them was every member of the Ducal Guard, several hundred HKPD officers, and enough firepower to fight a small war. Annette wanted the Weber Network’s surrender to be open, public, and seen by the entire world.
She also realized that made this affair a massive target for the rogues Commodore Joseph Anderson had secreted away.
“I did,” she answered Zhao’s question. “Someone should get a happy ending out of this goddamn mess, and Captain Tanaka has been tarred with an unfair brush.”
“And because she’s borne it, the poor bastards we have to send to the Navy with our purchased capital ships don’t have to,” Zhao said. “We owe her, I agree. I still think you enjoyed it. Living vicariously, Duchess Bond?”
“Like I said,” Annette told him, “someone has to get a happy ending.”
“There’s a few of those on the block,” the big man replied. “Mine’s easy: all I need is a good chef and a challenge.”
“Well then, you’re sorted,” she laughed. “I don’t know if the rest of us are so easy.”
“You lot have sex drives,” Zhao told her. “Used to think not having one was a pain in the ass, but then I spent a lifetime using everyone else’s against them.”
“Look professional,” Annette ordered as Robin joined them on the stage. “If Jess is here, the cameras are following.”
“Yep,” the gorgeous young woman agreed. “Everything you say and do is going live to the entire world as of about thirty seconds from now. If you need to scratch an itch, get it over with now.”
Annette stretched her neck to clear her head, then pasted on a professional smile as she saw the press corps coalesce through the security. A crowd was gathering beyond the cordon of uniformed HKPD officers but not pressing hard enough for anyone to need to send in power armor.
So far, everything was looking peaceful. She’d leave keeping it that way to Wellesley—her job today involved the motorcade that came rolling up the hill as the cameras turned to watch.
Two HKPD vehicles led the way, followed by six of the standard black sedans that had changed motors and designs over the centuries but still served the world’s governments well, then two more HKPD vehicles.
Adrian Salvatore stepped out of the lead car, dressed in the uniform of the Special Space Service for one last duty. He’d accepted her offer of employment in the Guard…effective tomorrow. Today, he had one last job for the organization that no longer existed.
More SSS uniformed troopers stepped out. All of them had been vetted by both her people and Alpha Cell. They were men and women Wellesley trusted—and they were hard, competent men and women.
They took their job seriously, sweeping the zone around the motorcade and interfacing with the Ducal Guard and HKPD before they let their charges leave the safety of the armored cars.
Finally, three men and two women in full white United Earth Space Force dress uniform emerged. They were a small ocean of gold braid, each with a little half-cape that Annette thought was utterly silly. Between the six of them, there were ten stars, marking two Vice and three Rear Admirals of the UESF.
They followed the open path through security up toward Annette with level tread, James Mandela leading the way. At the base of the stage, they met Admiral Villeneuve.
Villeneuve had designed the dress uniform of the Duchy of Terra Militia himself—and Annette suspected it had been born of daydreams back when he had been a UESF Admiral. It was the same shade of brilliant white but with gold piping instead of braid, a lower collar, a more comfortable cut…and not a cape in sight.
All five members of Alpha Cell saluted their old commanding officer and fe
ll in behind him as they parade-marched up to the stage.
“Ladies, gentlemen,” Annette greeted them, well aware her words were being carried across the world. She would find out later how many people were watching. She did not want to know right now.
“Thank you,” she said simply. “Suffice to say I know how difficult it is to stand where you are today. I appreciate the trust and honor you have shown on behalf of the Weber Network and the United Earth Space Force.”
“You would know, wouldn’t you?” Mandela asked rhetorically. “It isn’t easy.”
“If it was easy, it wouldn’t have taken this long or this much heartache,” Annette reminded him. “Shall we, Admiral Mandela?”
There were documents and plans, but most of those had been sorted. There’d been almost a week of discussion of exactly what form today’s ceremony would take, and the decision had been to be very public and very simple.
“The United Earth Space Force placed in our hands”—Mandela gestured at the admirals around him—“the sacred trust of preparing Earth for a resistance in the case of an alien invasion. We created the Weber Protocols, which, when activated, created the Weber Network.
“We understood that the Network would face a long, difficult fight. But we also knew that there would be a point when we would have to decide whether or not that fight was worth it.”
They could hear the murmuring of the crowd across the security cordon. It wasn’t hostile yet, but it could easily swing either way.
“When you returned to Earth, having bought us a portion of independence, the Network was faced with a harsh choice: which was more important? The appearance of liberty or the truth of liberty?
“Was it better for the Network to accept a partial victory, self-governance inside a structure that would help defend and uplift Earth, or to fight a scorched-earth campaign to hold to a perfect ideal of a free Earth? A free Earth that we now understood would be cripplingly vulnerable in the face of a hostile galaxy?”
Duchess of Terra (Duchy of Terra Book 2) Page 15
