Vicky Peterwald: Target

by Mike Shepherd

  On the ninth or fifteenth repeat, she turned to Gerrit. “When did you program that?”

  “When you hit the head just before I started yawning.”

  “You malicious, devious . . .”

  “Guy who plans ahead.”

  “Yes. That, too.”

  “Well, get yourself into whatever you intend to wear. I intend for you to watch me like a hawk on my shoulder as I go through this jump. The next one is yours.”

  “One jump I watch you, then I have to do it myself?”

  “They’re easy. The computer does all the work.”

  “Yeah, right,” Vicky said, pulling on her bra and slipping into panties that were more of a distraction than nothing would have been. She followed Gerrit up to the cockpit and settled into her seat. Immediately, she checked her own board. “We still have this system all to ourselves. Not a ship anywhere. How can a planet survive with no commerce?”

  “Would you like my analysis of the situation?” her computer asked.

  Vicky found Gerrit eyeing her like she had two heads.

  “Why yes, Computer, I would like to hear your analysis of the situation on Poznan. How did you come by this analysis?”

  “As I told you before, the net on the station was easy to hack into. I also tracked most of the communications while we have been in system. Almost none of it is encrypted. From all I captured, I was able to construct an analysis of the situation there that is ninety-eight point six-four percent probable.”

  “Very good, Computer. I approve of your initiative. However, in the future, please ask my permission before you do such an analysis. In some places, the communications tracking that you did would land me in jail.”

  “Oh, I would not wish such an outcome for you, ma’am. Yes, I will be more careful in the future and ask your approval before I do such a thing.”

  “Good. Now, Computer, what is your analysis?”

  “All major industries on Poznan have closed down for lack of spare parts or critical feedstock that can only come from off planet. The planet managed to pay its taxes for last year only by being stripped of its gold reserve. With no further hard currency to support trade, it collapsed. Some small, cottage-type industry is still working. There are a few small machine shops, and some tiny foundries that are only using local raw materials. These local enterprises are keeping some locally manufactured equipment up and running, such as farm rolling stock and the like. However, most of what is needed for a modern economy is either closed down or falling apart.”

  As the computer paused in its analysis, Vicky and Gerrit traded raised eyebrows. He spoke next.

  “Computer, what impact is this having on the local population?”

  “May I answer his question, ma’am?”

  “Yes. Always, please.”

  “The farms have become less productive. Their production is down below fifty percent of five years ago. Many people have and are fleeing from the cities to the countryside. The first wave of flight was able to find jobs on the farms. With equipment failing, many farmers were falling back on human labor. However, the farms could only support so many workers. The later waves were met with armed guards telling them to move on and threatening to shoot anyone who raided the farms for food.”

  “I guess that’s understandable,” Vicky said, and did not like the taste of the words in her mouth.

  “A church is now arranging for passage of people through the farm belts and into the hinterlands beyond. They will collect refugees and convoy them out.”

  “Convoy?” Vicky said. “Do they have trucks to carry them?”

  “No, ma’am. They all have to walk: men, women, children, and the elderly. I do not have a word for a large group of walking people accompanied by good-hearted people who arrange for their passage. Are you aware of such a word?”

  “I’d say pilgrimage,” Gerrit said, “but the word’s inadequate to cover this tragedy.”

  Vicky nodded. Then found she had a question. “How are the people managing when they are dropped off outside the farmlands?”

  “There are few reports from there. The people are falling back on gathering what food they can find. Some of the farm seeds have been carried on the wind into the unseeded area. Other land has been converted into forest, and there is some gathering of nuts and berries. It appears that some of the indigenous seeds and fruits are edible if prepared properly. However, the land is being stripped of food close in, and people have to walk farther and farther to find anything edible. There are rumors of lawlessness breaking out among the vagrants, as they are being called.”

  “The population is crashing,” Gerrit said. “It’s only a matter of time before those that have any strength or access to guns decide that they will not leave the cities. Then they’ll demand that the farmers turn over their food at gunpoint.”

  “And what happens after that?”

  “Anarchy, murder, total collapse,” the Navy commander said through tight lips.

  “We can’t let that happen,” Vicky said.

  “How are we going to stop it?” came hard from the Navy man.

  “Maybe the money we paid the station with will start something?” Vicky thought out loud.

  “Assuming there isn’t a tax farmer who sucks it up and uses it to get off planet.”

  “I would have thought any tax farmer would already have left,” Vicky said, “what with food being so scarce.”

  “No matter how bad the famine, there are always the few who manage to stay fat,” Gerrit growled.

  That left Vicky with little to say.

  They were coming up on the jump, so both of them concentrated on the instruments. Gerrit was right, the computers and sensors did most of the work. Gerrit did have to adjust at the last minute for some wandering by the jump point. Still, he only had to goose the engine for a small bit to push them through the jump.

  He did warn Vicky, standing behind him holding on to his seat, not to move so much as a muscle. He had the ship steady and wanted to keep it that way.

  Vicky held her breath for the last few seconds and didn’t even wiggle her toes.

  They found themselves in a new system.

  Tests showed they’d jumped fifteen light-years. This system held a small colony on the fifth planet, Presov. Vicky had her computer gain access to its net. The story was sadly the same, only in this case, the colony had a shorter distance to crash since it was just getting started.

  The crystal mines that had been the main reason for its colonization were still working, and a ship did come by every three months for its produce, but it was not bringing products for the colony, just taking, claiming that they owed too much on their debt to pay for any imports.

  This was strangling the colony, and mining production was dropping as people spent more and more time in the search for food.

  “My estimate is that there will not be enough crystal production to pay for the ship’s stop next time,” Vicky’s computer concluded.

  “So they will abandon those workers to survive as best they can,” Vicky said.

  “Assuming they can survive at all,” Gerrit pointed out.

  “Yes,” Vicky said, and sighed. “Isn’t there anything we can do about all this?”

  “Computer,” Gerrit asked, “is there any mention of the situation on these two planets in the records back on Greenfeld?”

  “The only reference I can find in the data I accessed on Greenfeld about these two planets is that they are in arrears on their taxes, Poznan four quarters, Presov six.”

  “They are behind on their taxes, and that’s all the Empire cares about,” Gerrit growled.

  Vicky found herself shaking her head. “A Marine general dies under questioning, and the Imperial Guard tries to goad the Marines into a fight over his still-warm body. Two planets are only months, if not weeks away from anarchy, murder, and maybe even cannibalism, but all the palace notices is that they are behind in their taxes. This has got to stop.”

  “And who’s goin
g to make them?” Gerrit asked.

  “Nobody,” Vicky admitted bleakly, and the breath left her body. “Nobody.”

  “Or maybe you, huh?”

  Vicky felt herself fill with impotent rage.

  Rage she was used to. Impotence, not so much.

  “Gerrit, what can I do?” she snapped. “I’m running for my life. I don’t know if I’m going to find a place to hide or if I’m going to be one of those refugees, hopefully somewhere in the backcountry of St. Petersburg, but still grubbing in the dirt for my next meal.”

  “Is that the way a Grand Duchess ends?”

  Vicky’s next breath escaped her in a bitter laugh. “Those were just words my dad spoke when he had no one but me to pin his hope on for the next generation. Now he’s got a son coming along and a witch for a wife who’s only too happy to rule over the wreckage she and her family are making of everything my ancestors tried to make of Greenfeld.”

  “Maybe when those monstrous aliens you and Kris Longknife discovered show up, they’ll ignore planets with only a few naked savages on them. Who knows, it might work to save humanity,” Gerrit muttered.

  Vicky glanced at her board. “We have this system to ourselves. No ships. I need a shower.” And she headed below.

  Gerrit joined her as soon as he got the ship headed for the next jump at 1.3 gees. Vicky took him, still wet from the shower. She took him with barbaric lust, as if she was already dirty and starving and hoped that if she slacked his needs, he might share the raw, still-bleeding results of his hunt.

  And Vicky hated herself for what she did. For who she was. And for what she could never do for the people that looked to her for, just possibly, their only salvation.

  CHAPTER 45

  THEY argued and made love, and argued and screwed, and argued and just sat in their chairs in a huff.

  Vicky could see in Gerrit’s eyes the Grand Duchess that he saw in her, the one woman of the Empire who could make a stand against the wicked Empress.

  Vicky knew herself for what she was. A spoiled brat raised to needlepoint and the Kama Sutra, both for business and pleasure. Maybe she was good enough to stand a communications watch on a battleship where nothing much was happening and there were a half dozen eyes backing her up.

  But she had no real skills. If she had to scratch in the dirt for her next meal, she might very likely starve if someone didn’t give her food.

  Well, maybe she could cook a meal if pulling it from the freezer and warming it was all that was required. Gerrit took to insisting that she cook for them.

  He didn’t do it nicely.

  “If a bed warmer is all you’re good for, you can at least learn to cook.”

  Vicky didn’t quite throw his first supper at him. He managed to catch it on the fly and refused to notice that it had been tossed high and wide.

  So she cooked their meals and found that there were more options in the ship’s kitchen than just warming precooked packages. Their last meal before the jump into the St. Petersburg system, Vicky put together something special.

  Not for Gerrit. He was just a pain in the neck.

  No, she did it for herself, to show herself that she could do it.

  The steaks were from the freezer. The mixed vegetables she did herself. There were a dozen baking potatoes preserved some way she didn’t understand, but that didn’t keep her from popping two in the oven to bake.

  And there was bread. She made it herself, from a recipe glued to the kitchen wall next to a bread cooker. She found the starter dough in the freezer and took it from there.

  That got Gerrit’s attention. He came down from the cockpit.

  “What are you doing to make the whole ship smell wonderful?”

  “I’m baking bread.”

  “From scratch?”

  “Yep.”

  “Yeast and all?”

  “Yep.”

  “And steaks! Are those real potatoes?”

  “The very same. Now shoo, this is my kitchen, and you will just have to wait for dinner.”

  “Please don’t make it too long. My mouth is watering, and I’m a whole lot more hungry than I realized.”

  “Begone, you, from my domain. Don’t you know, too many cooks spoil the stew.”

  “I’m not joggling your elbow. Just your time line.”

  “Go!” she said, pointing at the stairwell.

  He went.

  She found real butter in the bottom of the freezer and took it out to slowly thaw. Dinner might not be by candlelight, but it was good. She served it at the table and even dressed for it. Of course, all she had that looked good was the outfit she’d worn on Poznan.

  He seemed to like it, and the meal.

  “You can cook!”

  “I can follow instructions,” she said modestly.

  He gave her a sad look at her rejection of his praise.

  “Okay, I can cook as good as the next girl.”

  “I’d say better than most girls I’ve had the honor of sharing a home-cooked meal with.”

  So they enjoyed the steak and the small talk. Afterwards, he made love to her the way Vicky dreamed that a man might make love to a woman who’d sated his alimentary needs before inviting her to his bed.

  She felt very warm and approved of as she fell asleep in his arms later.

  Gerrit did let her take the ship through the final jump to the St. Petersburg system.

  It wasn’t as easy as it looked, either.

  The jump did a bit of a wiggle just as she was about to juice the ship through. She had to apply lateral jets to chase the jump, then dampen down all movement to get the ship rock steady again.

  That was the way it was with the jump points that united the galaxy. They orbited not just the two points they safely connected, but four, five, or more systems, depending on your acceleration, speed, and rotation when you hit them. Do it rock steady and at slow speed, and you jumped ten, fifteen, maybe thirty light-years.

  Always.

  That was what insurance companies and national command authorities liked and what most merchant and warships did.

  What Kris Longknife had done, jetting around the galaxy was crazy and not to be attempted by anyone at home.

  What Vicky did was slow, steady, and by the approved book.

  Through it all, Gerrit stood behind her, his hands holding on to the chair to keep him steady in microgee. If he had any doubts about what Vicky did, he said not a word.

  Once through the jump, Vicky studied her board and had her sensors do a check.

  “There’s St. Petersburg waiting for us,” Vicky crowed.

  “I told you that you could do it,” Gerrit said, a proud-as-a-papa grin on his face.

  “Yes, you did. Now, tell me, kind sir, who always plans ahead, what am I going to wear to meet our new allies? Not this,” she said, glancing down at the scant covering she had for her all-too-bare skin.

  He was in a skimpy thong, and looking better than he had in a while.

  He’d actually shaved.

  “Come below, and I’ll show you.”

  He actually did show her, rather than entice her to bed.

  He had a blue shipsuit, complete with lieutenant commander’s boards waiting for her. Of course, he also had a blue shipsuit for himself with the three full stripes of a commander.

  They needed a shower before they put on their new uniforms, and that led from one thing to another. Then they needed a second shower before they did get dressed.

  They were back on the tiny bridge when a call came in from High St. Petersburg station. Before going through the jump, Gerrit had done another reprogramming job on the squawker. They were now the Lucky Strike Jubilee out of Port Royal.

  “LSJ, this is St. Petersburg station. We have you on approach. Be advised, your papers are not in order. Dock and stay locked down until a Marine detachment arrives to check your papers.”

  Vicky turned to Gerrit. “What’s wrong with our papers?”

  “Nothing,” had a lot more wor
ry in it than Vicky wanted to hear. “At least nothing when we left Greenfeld. They were first-class forgeries, done by the folks who do the legal ones.”

  “Well, something’s gone wrong. Should we bug out?”

  “And go where? Besides, until we refuel, we really can’t go anywhere.”

  “Good point,” Vicky said, and settled down in her chair to worry a bit.

  Had dear, loving Stepmomma managed to reach all the way out here? Or was it a case of Stepmom casting a wide and very expensive net of bribes from a comfortable distance so that no matter where Vicky went, she’d have this kind of welcome waiting for her?

  There was no way to tell what it was until they were docked, locked down, and pretty much left to ride out whatever was intended for them.

  Vicky hated the idea of being helpless again.

  She must have said that out loud, because Gerrit had something to say on that thought.

  “All of us normal folks have to get used to being helpless now and again. I think even your old man must feel like this every once in a while.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to say that aloud.”

  “I’m glad you shared it with me. If you don’t share with anyone, how are we going to help you?”

  “I usually don’t get much help,” Vicky admitted.

  “That was the spoiled brat. You’re Her Imperial Grace, the Grand Duchess Lieutenant Commander Victoria Peterwald, Vicky to her friends. That person has a right to all the help the rest of us mere humans can offer. Because, she just might come up with a way for all of us to save ourselves.”

  “All of us to save ourselves,” Vicky echoed. “You mean I don’t have to do it all on my own?”

  “And when it’s done, it’s not just your Empire, but an Empire for all of us.”

  “Dad would never see it that way.”

  “And look at what that has gotten him.”

  That left Vicky with a lot to think about.

  Gerrit made sure she had the time to think. He cooked lunch for them. Vicky didn’t say anything about the blackened crust on his ham and cheese sandwich. She just smiled.

  She was deep in thought about what he said.

  “Have you read anything about how Kris Longknife fought off six rogue battleships that attacked Wardhaven?” she said, slow and thoughtful to Gerrit as they munched their sandwiches.