AL:ICE-9

by Charles Lamb

  Jake had to take a minute and inspect the plane. The airframe itself was a very familiar corporate or government jet in shape. It looked to be a smaller eight to ten person version, although he knew they had larger 18 person models in inventory.

  While it maintained the tail rudder with high elevator configuration, the wings were entirely gone and in their place were the cylindrical repulser motors at the wing roots. Since lift was no longer an issue, as the repulsers provided that service, he suspected the tail simply aided in inflight maneuverability.

  Boarding the craft, and finding a comfortable seat for himself and Sara, he simply asked ALICE to handle the flight.

  ----*----

  MeHak sat at the head of the High Council table. While technically round, she sat in a raised position, above the others. This gave her the ability to see anyone speaking. In reality though, it was more of a statement about her status.

  What she saw before her was total panic among the members. The feed from the two destroyers had bypassed all the normal communication channels with delivery directly to the council members in its raw form. While her power was impressive, it was not absolute. As such, every member of the council had received the transmission at the same time as she. They called this meeting as a result.

  All had witnessed the events leading up to the engagement with the apparently renegade cruiser, the exchange of fire, and the final destruction of both destroyers by technology unfamiliar to any at the table, herself included.

  What concerned MeHak was not the loss of the ships, the unknown weaponry, or the uprising in Nu Tau Beta. These were familiar events that occur all too frequently in every council-ship. However, the decisive nature of this enemy is what had unsettled her. She had replayed the events repeatedly in private, her evaluation fundamentally the same each time. This was a dangerous adversary, and one the NeHaw hadn’t seen for a very long time.

  They were aggressive, resourceful, and decisive. She had admired their battle tactics of shoot first and give no quarter. They would be a worthy ally, which unfortunately, MeHak could never permit. The NeHaw didn’t like to share.

  ----*----

  Jake and Sara arrived in Texas just short of an hour later. Jake was sure ALICE was showing off as the jet was her design, he had left it up to them to work out his idea. It had been a smooth, comfortable ride, and while he and Sara hadn’t engaged in his favorite in flight distractions, they did have a pleasant trip.

  Once the plane had settled onto the hangar floor, Jake and Sara were able to deplane. As they came down the steps, there was a small delegation at the bottom to meet them. Bonnie and Robert led the group, with Becky doing her best to upstage her sister.

  Sara reached the bottom first, embracing her sister, Bonnie, and then greeting Robert with equal warmth. As Sara passed Bonnie, Jake stepped up and received a warm firm hug. As he went to kiss her though, he found a cheek presented in place of her lips. Not missing a beat, he kissed her cheek and then turned to find Robert with his hand out.

  Shaking hands, he then found Becky in his face. She was all lips and no cheek, in her typical over exuberance. Giving her ample time to show her affection, she finally relented, and he was able to speak.

  “OK so let’s see this storeroom of yours,” Jake asked.

  “This way,” Bonnie replied, as she turned and led them away from the main access doors.

  Following Bonnie across the open hangar to the far side, he had expected to enter one of the small storage rooms. Instead, they entered one of the aircraft storage and maintenance hangars. As they stepped inside, Jake stopped in his tracks. In front of him was pallet after pallet of gold bars.

  “Each pallet holds 200 bars, weighing about 27.3 pounds per bar,” Robert offered, “It seems to be the standard of some kind for this storage facility. We are still transporting several pallets a day, but at over 5,000 pounds per pallet, we can only do so many at one time.”

  Without saying a word, Jake stepped forward and picked up one of the bars. The bar was clearly marked with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. As Jake recalled, this was just one of several Federal Reserve locations, but he thought this was the primary location.

  “ALICE, what do your records say about this location? Do you have any notes on its last known inventory,” Jake asked.

  “I have no direct internal information relating to the Federal Reserve Bank specifically, they were never attached to my network. However, I do have public records referencing the facility contents of both US and international holdings. They list over 550,000 bars of differing shapes but all at 400 troy ounces. Assuming Robert’s 200 bars per pallet, we will eventually need space for 2,750 pallets or 15,015,000 pounds of gold.”

  Jake did some quick math in his head and realized he only needed eight bars to buy a cruiser, and that included a tip. With this one find, Robert had addressed all their short-term needs. Who knew what the future held.

  Placing the bar back on the pile, he turned back to the group and said, “Great job Robert, now who’s going to tell me what’s going on?”

  Both Robert and Bonnie had a complete look of panic. It was then that Jake saw Robert take Bonnie’s hand before either spoke. With that one motion, Jake held up his hand indicating neither should speak.

  “Bonnie, are you in love with Robert?” Jake asked slowly.

  Bonnie paused, looked at Robert, and then nodded yes.

  Jake then looked at Robert and asked, “Robert, are you in love with Bonnie?”

  “Yes sir,” Robert replied and then started to continue before Jake cut him off with a wave.

  Jake stood there for a moment staring at both of them, then in one swift motion he swept Bonnie up and spun her around.

  “This is wonderful!” he shouted before setting her down, he then turned to Robert and grabbed his hand, shaking vigorously. Both Sara and Becky were standing back, neither expecting this turn of events.

  “But Jake, what about Julie?” Bonnie asked.

  “What about Julie? She is still our daughter and I love her with all my heart, but that doesn’t mean you don’t deserve your own happiness. Does Robert make you happy?”

  Bonnie stopped for a second, and then turned to look at Robert and said without turning back, “Yes he does.”

  “Then be happy. You, me, Sara, Becky, and all the others, we agreed that our original arrangement was based on the understanding that I felt you all could do better. You never believed me then, do you now?”

  Bonnie turned to look at Jake for a minute and then said, “Falling in love is not doing better. It’s having the best there is.”

  With that, he hugged her again and then said, “Let’s all go inside.”

  With Sara on one side and Becky on the other, Jake turned and led the way back to the main facility. Bonnie and Robert followed them out, walking behind, hand in hand.

  ----*----

  Jake spent the following three days in detailed reviews of all the existing Wawobash ship designs. Sara had offered to assist, but Jake knew all too well it was not her thing. The aliens had provided a complete virtual model of every ship currently in inventory, as well as those they were capable of manufacturing. By running the holographs in a virtual reality room, like the rooms in Alaska for training the fighter pilots, he could walk the entire ship.

  While the NeHaw cruisers were very familiar to all, the destroyers were a mystery and actually much smaller than he realized. The bridge, high and in the back of the ship, was only large enough for the four operations stations and a commander’s chair in the middle. The layout was semicircular, with the pilot and navigator directly in front of the command chair, weapons and communications to either side. The unaltered view from the bridge looked out over most of the ship.

  What impressed Jake about the destroyer was most of what you saw from the bridge was guns. This thing was a mass of firepower across the top of the hull. In addition, there was an equal amount of firepower below the hull, not visible from the bridge.


  Behind the commander’s chair was the flat of the semicircle, with the ladder to the main deck below at its center. Following the ladder down, into the main passage, was access to the aft engineering stations. Access to other areas of the ship came via a passage forward down the middle of the ship. To Jake it was almost like being in a submarine as the long narrow hull allowed only the most spartan of accommodations.

  Below the main deck, running two-thirds the length of the hull was a small cargo bay. Jake figured he could get two fighters, nose to tail, in the space but not a lot more. Still two fighters had already proven their value in the last engagement.

  He continued to review various other designs, most not intended for military use. He would flip through the inventory and then activate the holograph for the ones that piqued his curiosity. Once he had completed the initial review, his inner engineer kicked in and he started playing with ideas. Frequently he had to pull in additional references, or ask ALICE to run down some information on one thing or another.

  The most interesting piece he ran across were the original battleship designs the Wawobash had presented to the NeHaw. Apparently, the current ship has its basis in an archaic NeHaw design, one the Wawobash had assessed for limitations and vulnerabilities. Their recommendations were enhancements to the core superstructure with significant improvements to the entire ship.

  Finally, Jake had run across a ship in the Wawobash design catalog, one that the notes indicated had never been built before. This was due to both the cost and the fact that the NeHaw couldn’t find a use for its unusual configuration. The more Jake reviewed the design, the more excited he became. He knew exactly what to do with this ship.

  Chapter 16

  Jake was not the only one going over the Wawobash inventory. Patti had been reviewing the information with her team as well. In her case though, she wasn’t interested in redesigning anything. Her task was evaluating what, of the available inventory in space dock, they could purchase immediately.

  For her, what to buy was not the issue, as apparently the funds were now of no concern, according to Jake’s last message from Texas. It is the crews to operate the vessels, which are in short supply. For near earth defense, the ALICEs could remotely manage the ships in orbit, as well as any additional rail gun platforms they should choose to deploy.

  However, that was of no use should they go on the offensive. Earth needed a trained space fleet, with crews capable of independent action. They were looking at an initial order of five cruisers and ten destroyers, each in need of a crew. They had only one crew, and its assignment was to Revenge.

  Then there was the battleship. In earth’s history, the battleship was, at one time, the centerpiece of all great navies. It was the epitome of projected power, although she knew well the true relevance of ships of this nature.

  It was a rare occurrence indeed for these ships to slug it out head to head. They mostly acted as intimidators. This was not likely to be the case here. The NeHaw had two of these to their one and they had trained crews. Patti didn’t see earth fielding a crew for theirs in the near future. As it was, the Wawobash would have it for most likely a year during the refit.

  There was one thought that plagued her. In earth’s history, the aircraft carrier replaced the battleship as the power of the seas. The closest anyone had to one of those was Revenge.

  ----*----

  Jake had called a morning meeting of the teams assigned to the ship order project. He grabbed the conference room off the control room, like the one in Nevada. Sara, Robert, and Bonnie attended locally as did several other analysts that Jake had never met. With the remote locations tied in by holograph, each team had a specific focus and all were ready to report their findings.

  “Ok gang, what have we got?” Jake opened.

  Patti started, “We have pulled in the existing inventory, categorized them for combat and non-combat roles, and come up with the following. We recommend five additional cruisers, giving us a total of eight, ten destroyers and four of the heavy commercial transport.”

  “Why the transports?” Sara asked.

  “Jake has mentioned on more than one occasion, about purchasing automated heavy equipment. We inquired about mining systems and the preferred models will not fit in the hold of a cruiser,” Patti replied.

  “Wow, that big huh?” Jake commented.

  “Yes, they are impressive,” commented one of Patti’s team.

  “OK so pricing?” Jake asked.

  Patti continued, “Cruisers are coming in at the promised 200 pounds per ship after refit, destroyers are 170 and the transports are 125. They are large but simple to build. Their primary cost is the larger drive units and heavy inertial dampeners.”

  Jake did the math in his head and said, “So that’s 3,200 pounds of gold plus the battleship refit. I got the estimate there at 500 pounds for everything I wanted done.”

  Jake could see the looks of confusion and concern, as most expected simple repairs, and that was probably what it cost to build in the first place.

  “I have asked the Wawobash to refit the ship to their original specifications, with some extras of my own design.”

  “Is that wise Jake,” Patti asked, “We may need the firepower on station sooner than we think.”

  Jake laughed and replied, “No worries there, when I explained the incentive clause in the repair order, they assured me it would add no delays. They get a 50% bonus for early delivery. By the way, that incentive applies to every order we place with them. They were very pleased with the terms. We offered half down and the balance on delivery, again a new concept for them.”

  “Don’t forget, each and every one of those ships needs to come here for final build-out, ALICE needs to install the stasis equipment,” Patti reminded him.

  Bonnie then added, “We have verified the payment requirement for weight and purity. They found the samples we provided from the New York inventory quite satisfactory.”

  Jake paused and then mentioned, “There is one more order I placed, but it’s not part of any existing need. It will run about 1,000 pounds initially, and they estimate a little over a year to build.”

  “Jake, is this another one of your surprises?” Sara asked with her suspicion evident in her tone.

  Jake smiled and said, “Let’s just say as a student of history, I let no lesson go ignored.”

  ----*----

  Sara sat in the command center of the Texas ALICE facility, run by her sister. No sooner did the meeting regarding the Wawobash end, then Jake received word Jessie was going into labor. After a quick kiss, she watched him jet out of the room, commandeer one of the unassigned fighters in the hangar, and head north. She admired his commitment to attend every one of his children’s birth. She was just frustrated she wasn’t one of the mothers.

  ALICE had supposedly dropped her medications, provided to prevent pregnancy early in the arrangement, as she was considered too important in her role supporting Jake. However, after the second battle, and her near death experience, that decision was overturned. She was starting to question whether ALICE had in fact stopped the practice of medicating her.

  The ALICEs had a tendency of manipulating circumstances to meet their long-term goals. Although to date, no manipulation had ever resulted in a negative impact to either party, like Jake’s children, the need for a passive acceptance of the situation was not unusual.

  She turned to her current challenge, resigned to the fact that there was nothing she could do about her circumstances at the moment. Jake had asked her to investigate new ways to recruit for spaceship crews. With each cruiser now requiring a 30-person crew and the destroyers, 20, they needed 440 new crewmembers, minus the 28 in Revenge currently. Those numbers included the fighter pilots assigned to each ship. None of this accounted for the battleship.

  Since the current staff of all six occupied locations only numbered just over 3000, they clearly needed more recruits from the outside. She was working with ALICE trying to identify new communi
ties to work with, areas with small groups that might be absorbed completely like Jake had in Alaska.

  Normally, all recruiting efforts passed to the regions facilities commander. Each location was responsible for researching and categorizing their local communities for threat, adoption, or recruitment. As such, Sara didn’t feel the need to redo others work. She simply reviewed the existing reports on the six active facilities, and then moved to the two unoccupied ALICE locations.

  ALICE-5, in Maine, listed as a medical research primary. Each location had a primary focus beyond the general capabilities and that function suggested what additional infrastructure existed there. ALICE-2, otherwise known as Dallas, was a land vehicle design and test location while ALICE-7, or just Seven, was air and spacecraft. Both were able to construct prototypes and small production runs of any designs. As a medical primary, ALICE-5 could manufacture medical support equipment as well as pharmaceuticals.

  ALICE-5 was absolutely in the middle of nowhere, the closest US town listed as Ashland, more than 20 miles to the east. Even before the fall, this place was isolated. The interesting part to Sara was its proximity to the Canadian border, and the cities of Quebec City, Montreal, and Ottawa.

  All these cities were once large population centers and even though they were not part of the United States, she wasn’t sure that mattered in the least. They had been treating the US-Mexico border as non-existent here in Texas. Her only real concern was the language listed for the population was French.

  As with the Spanish speakers here, initial contact wasn’t an issue, the translators in the combat suits would handle that. It was integrating them into the population that might prove interesting. Here most all the locals were bi-lingual, so they blended in easily. She had no idea if that proved true up north.

  ALICE-3 on the other hand was in Georgia, and was the last of the eight ALICE facilities. It was south of what was once Waycross in what the map listed as a national wildlife preserve, just north of the Florida border.