In Chaleel while food and farms were king, Nelly, the dock separated from Nancy was undoubtedly second, and growing as fast as Parnmal.
The Yard was doing booming trade with the merchants and the contractors that were trying to make their own ships. The AIH-Chaleel partnership was made for the purpose of increasing their trading abilities, one of the factors keeping them back was the number of ships they could get their hands on. There was a number that the FMF rented out, but as the merchant's ranks increased, the ships available for rent were getting small.
There was plans to build a civilian yard in Parnmal, but for now military needs had to come first.
Though in some situations both sides could be satisfied.
The yard was happier than anything else to give the partnership re-serviced non-military parts in exchange for raw materials to fill the yard's appetite.
The Fleet barely slowed as it went through Chaleel, picking up ammunition from the factories that were now in close orbit to the yard. The two corvette's that had patrolled the system were now doubled to four and had a Destroyer on station, that wasn't including the sixteen or so ships going through the yard.
A message beeped on Carsickle's screen, a childhood friend that he had one day hoped to make something more, but had never been introduced to his mother, requested to talk to him.
He grinned, thinking of the times they'd gone to the meetings of youth in the fields, or their escapades with his closest friends in school. He was becoming old.
He accepted her transmission, unable to hide his joy at seeing her.
***
AIH was doing me proud, Ursht had made alliances with all the other clan leaders and started combining the leaders and the people’s efforts with his own. He had also worked out a way for those sworn to other leaders to fight in the Free Fleet. They were to be viewed as attached honour guard to myself and Yasu. It was rather tricky, but it worked and got me more trained people. Avarians weren’t just trying to join the Commandos to call themselves Ninja’s, I don’t think I would ever live that comment down, but were coming in as engineers, gun techs, environmental specialists, miners, refinery crew members. They were populating every branch of the free fleet.
Most of them were also on the fast track like the children of the free fleet, due to their use of new technology, and sleep training.
“There seems to be some kind of commotion in the shuttle bay,” Walf said.
“Put it on my personal screen Walf,” I said.
I looked to the internal cams, watching as Commandos moved out of the way as a group wearing the skin of a Quarvar, the deadliest creature on AIH. Something that the Avarians killed with nothing but swords and spears while a Commando would have a problem with a plasmid blade.
They moved, projecting an air of calm while moving as one.
“Awakened priests,” Krom said from beside me.
“It looks like it,” I said, rising and looking at my own Avarian-human skin blend. “I guess we should go meet them. In Sook you have the bridge!” I raised my voice.
“Understood,” she said, populating her screens with information pertinent to Resilient.
It didn’t take long to find the priests, I waited by the elevator to the Bridge. The head priest of AIH looked to me.
“We meet again Salchar,” his deep voice reminding me of Krom’s.
“What can I do for you high priest?” I asked.
“The Awakening priests of AIH wish to be teachers of the stars. We wish to learn your ways in order to pass them on to our people. There has been debate to bring back the creators. Now that we know more, we can make them useful once more and begin the propagation of Avarians into space.”
“Why do you want to become teachers of this all?”
“We are teachers anyway, we have taught the Avarians much. They now crave for new lessons that we wish to supply. We hope to assist AIH in becoming one of the more advanced peoples. Living on the ground has taught us of our fragility. When the shields went, the Syndicate could have taken our people, we were on the path of destruction. We were becoming like the Kalu. There is much that our people need to learn,” The high priest said.
“Very well. I can’t argue with your desire to educate your people. Give me the numbers of those that wish to learn how to teach others. I’ll pass it to my Chief of Staff and he will figure it out for you.”
“Certainly,” a data pad came out from the Avarian’s cloak as they pressed a few buttons and turned it to me.
“These are the names and what they wish to study,” The High priest said.
“This will also take money, I will provide half of the tuition, and the other half will be on you,” I said, I had found that through Ursht, Krom's brother and my appointed leader of the city Asul that I had amassed quite a bit of wealth. I had gained Asul by saving the planet by providing the shield generator on the planet with the helium three it needed to stop the planet's massive volcano from erupting. Ursht had been the leader before, and I put him in charge as Yasu and I were off fighting in the Free Fleet. He had made Asul a prosperous city, and had gained three freighters which were doing a brisk trade down the corridor.
“Thank you, we have the money for these people,” the high priest assured me.
“Good,” I said, my mind on other things as I pulled my data pad and transferred his list to mine.
“There are also rumors that you do health treatments on the aged to make them of fighting ability?” The high priest turned the statement into a question.
“Yes we do, if one signs up for a fleet contract all health costs are taken on by us,” I said, slightly unsure what he was asking.
“That is indeed interesting,” a smile crept across his face. “We will meet again Salchar,” he turned and left, his cadre following.
“Does he do that yoda, half sense, and half vague-as-hell all the time?” I asked Krom.
“Pretty much,” he said, a half-grin on his face.
“Avarians,” I sighed, turning to my data pad.
I added the names to a message template, adding my own words.
Hey Rick,
Maybe look at having programs that will train people to teach others? The more half-trained people that apply, the faster we can turn them into free fleet personnel, instead of having them as trainees.
See you soon,
Salchar
I looked at the message, it was kind of weird how I found my first name odd to my own ears.
No need to sweat the small stuff when you’re running the Free Fleet. Well other than the fact that your wife will kill you if you miss dinner... shit, that was fifteen minutes ago. I started running, sending the message as I heard Krom laughing behind me.
“You could’ve warned me!” I yelled.
“Must have slipped my mind!” he said back, his footsteps making the deck shudder.
“Damned bodyguards, protect me from plasma, rail guns, beads, and psychopaths, then forget the most important threat of all!” I said as I skidded to my door, missing it a little bit as I grabbed a rung to stop myself. I hit the button for the door, hiding my elevating breathing.
“Hey beautiful,” I said with a smile.
“You’re late!” She fired back.
“Good luck sir,” Krom whispered, I gave him the dirtiest look I was capable of with my peripherals.
“The Awakened priests came aboard, I had to meet them and talk about an education system,” I walked into the room, throwing the biggest line I had in my arsenal.
“What did they want?” She asked, sitting at the table that I rarely used for meals.
“To teach AIH, I passed it on to Rick and I’m going to have him look and see if we can’t improve the education systems of those under our protection,” I said, taking a seat across from her, I could already smell the delights on the table.
“Interesting,” she said looking away, thoughtful. She was a model Commando Commander, she lived with her people as much as possible, trusted them with her li
fe as they trusted her. She was a savant in fighting with anything at hand.
“Ever wish that this just never happened and that we were still on Earth?” I asked out loud.
“No,” she replied, looking a little surprised.
“Me either,” I said, I knew that people had died in the thousands, that Earth was still trying to understand what was going on and there was a hell of a lot resting on my shoulders. Yet I wouldn’t leave these people for anything. If I hadn’t been ‘recruited’ then I wouldn’t have seen space and all its deadly glory. And I wouldn’t have married Yasu, the other deadly beauty in my life.
We shared a look across the table, she got up and sat down on top of me.
“That’s better,” she said with a mischievous smile.
“Now how am I going to eat?”
“Sounds like a personal issue,” she said, grabbing some food with chopsticks.
“If it’s my problem it’s yours too!” I complained, in a wheedling tone, probably something that no one would expect from their commander.
She just smiled, putting more food in her mouth so she couldn’t talk.
I let out a grunt as I made sure she didn’t fall and awkwardly ate my food around her with chopsticks.
“The one thing I wish we could do, is have a real date. Go out for dinner, watch a movie, drive home and sleep together. Instead we snatch what time we can, live on separate ships and even then we see each other little,” she said.
“After we defeat the Kalu then we will,” I said, giving her a smile.
“After we defeat the Kalu,” she said softly. “Will it end though? Lady Fairgate is still out there, so is the Syndicate and Kalu space is nearly as big as Union.”
“I don’t know,” I said with a sigh.
She put her food down and hugged me. I did the same.
“I don’t want you to die,” she said, her voice full of emotion,”
“Listen to your own advice, you’re the one charging into ships. I’ve been firmly told to keep my ass in a command chair,” I raised an eyebrow, indicating that it was her that had told me to do so.
“You’re all that I’ve got left other than the Sato sisters and Takahashi,” she buried her face in my shoulder.
“Saying I’m the same as Takahashi?” I said, trying to bring levity to the situation. I was not good with people if they started crying.
“No, baka!” She said hitting my shoulder playfully, moving away enough to give me a smile.
“I will do my best to train the Fleet to work without me,” I said, those words paining me, but also bringing their own sense of relief. Relief at knowing that I would be looking out for the future of the fleet even if I wasn't leading it. But how can I trust anyone with that kind of responsibility? You're going to have to take a leap. Another part of my brain seemed to respond.
I wouldn't be around forever, so many had died, and there was no knowing if I would or wouldn't be one of those that went into the light.
“Thank you,” she said, pulling herself into me again, banishing my sombre thoughts.
***
In the morning I put a call in to Ursht, Tik and Tak. All three of them were on within minutes.
“Alright, Ursht, would you be interested in joining the Free Fleet?” I asked, looking to the man. I knew he longed for battle and to prove himself, he was a damned good leader. Considering Asul and its assets working as well as they did, but I knew he didn't want to be Asul's leader forever. He was still young, he still yearned for battle, to blood himself again.
“I do but my responsibilities,” he said hesitantly, he wasn't about to walk away from the tasks I'd given him. I waved them away.
“I'm not telling you to drop them, I'm seeing if you would want to be part of the Free Fleet based on Parnmal, and the leader of Asul,” I couldn't help but grin at the anxiety and understanding that he was going to have even more work to do. “If you want to join the Free Fleet, open the message I am sending you and press your hand to it,” he looked out of the viewer and I heard a beep, my desk telling me I now had a new member of the Free Fleet.
“Good, now I am promoting you to the Commander of AIH, though only if you are able to pass through all Commando training. Do me proud,” I said looking at the Avarian that sat straighter.
“I will Battle Master,” he said. Those words could have been cut into stone, with the surety in Ursht's voice.
“Now with that done it frees up you two,” I looked to Tik and Tak, both of them now sitting higher in their seats. “Chaleel now has a much larger fleet presence, I want you to look to the yard and the other infrastructure there. I know that you will do what is best for the fleet as you have done for AIH.”
Their manipulators signalled that while they were sad to leave AIH, they were also excited at their new adventure.
“Silly will be taking over the operations of Sol system, with LaRe as his assistant. He's going to need help from all of you to start off,” I looked at them all.
Understanding resonated through their visages.
“Now let's get through a systems briefing and you can meet your counterparts,” I said, opening the conference room door as Rick joined me and the Commanders of every system we now were charged to protect. My command staff appeared on screens and in holographic form.
Chapter Parnmal at last
We transited into Parnmal, its traffic like a hurricane compared to the sedate wind we'd seen in Earth, AIH and Chaleel. Patrols moved through the system as the main body went to the military docks of Parnmal. The rest went to the docks, taking with them the ships still loaded on their hulls.
Resilient glided into its docking position, hard sealing to the station.
“In Sook, you know the drill,” I said with a smile.
“It’ll be good to give Rick back his old job,” she said with an exasperated look.
“What don’t like being in control of Resilient?”
“I like it just fine, managing the ship and anything else that crops up in combined arms is just not the kind of fun that I’m looking for,” she smiled. She had the skills to be a ship commander, but she didn’t want the responsibility. There was something that had happened in her training that had gotten two people killed. She had time to get back on her feet, but she still disliked long periods of being in total command.
If she wasn’t able to adapt to being a ship commander and didn’t have the confidence for it, then I wasn’t going to do that to her. She was a great combined operations commander, something that I relied on completely in battle.
“Alright, I’ll go pick him up,” I said, turning to Marleen. “Coming?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” she smiled in thanks.
We got to the airlock which was already open as supplies were being funneled through lines and by cargo drones. In other militaries I would have been the first person off of the ship. We were usually working on a tight schedule, we didn’t have time for all of that.
We got to the doorway, Rick and Monk were waiting for us. Marleen picked up the pace, her and Rick wrapping one another in their arms and kissing.
“Get a room,” I said, getting an amused smile from Monk.
Rick pulled away slightly.
“Already got one!” He winked, Marleen hitting him playfully.
“Ahh how I have missed it, shall we give it a visit?” Rick said, pulling Marleen into Resilient.
“Nice to see you too Rick!” I said to his receding backside, laughing slightly as I turned to Monk. We embraced.
“It is good to see you brother,” I said to him, waving into Parnmal.
“Bok Soo says he’ll meet us at the bars,” Monk said.
“Sounds like him. He probably owes the Commandos a lot of drinks,” I said, sharing a smile.
“Have you eaten?”
“Not yet, shall we get something before we meet him. You know we’ll get stuck drinking somehow.”
“I know a great place with burritos,” Monk said, leading the way.
“Thank the universe for people with actual taste buds,” Monk agreed.
“Oh my,” I said as I smelt the food sector of the market, exotic and strange smells interacted, wafting over to me. My stomach let me know that it agreed with the smells.
Even over the sounds of the market place doing quick business, I could swear I heard Bok Soo across the market.
A cacophony of voices yelled in sounds of agreeance.
Monk and I gave one another a look, rolling our eyes. Monk led the way to the burrito place.
I put my hand out to pay for the burrito that I desperately wanted in my stomach.
“It’s on the house commander,” the owner said with a smile.
“Umm, thanks!” I said reaching a hand over the counter and shaking theirs.
Monk and I retreated to a bench, opening our packaged delights. Flavours swarmed out at me.
“Dis is soo gud,” I said over a mouthful, quickly going for another.
“You always were a messy eater,” Monk chided.
Free Fleet Box Set 2 Page 38
