The Pride of the Damned (Cochrane's Company Book 3)

by Peter Grant

  “Hard. We lost three ships at New Skyros, and almost all their crews, a total of well over two hundred dead. We only lost four killed at the Brotherhood’s base – thanks be! – and one ship.”

  “That makes it almost seven hundred people we’ve lost to the Brotherhood over the years, sir.”

  “Yes, it does, but they’ve lost thousands – in fact, they no longer exist. Frank was very downhearted for a while after he got back. He blamed himself, until I pointed out that anyone caught in that situation would have suffered just as badly. He was fighting a fanatically determined, well-equipped enemy at point-blank range, and still succeeded in killing four out of five ships with no trouble at all. If they’d all fought as hard as the destroyer, he might not have got back at all.”

  She shivered. “Yes, sir. It looks as if New Skyros was as ruthless with its prisoners as the Big Three were on Patos. All the survivors, and the anchor watch crews, and the staff of the Brotherhood’s purchasing mission on the planet, were convicted of piracy, condemned to death, and hanged within a couple of months.”

  “And whose fault is that? The Brotherhood started it. Hawkwood, and the Big Three, and New Skyros, have finished it.” Cochrane’s voice was very cold.

  He sat silent for a moment, then changed the subject. “All right. Over the next few months, you’ll set the wheels in motion on the water purification and sewage treatment plants for Bianca. They’ll go out there in containers, for robotic assembly on site. Also, look into autonomous site preparation robots. Sue McBride will give you the details. They’re expensive, but if they save as much time as their manufacturers claim in leveling and clearing building sites, digging trenches, laying pipe and cable runs and preparing roadbeds, they’ll be worth it.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  “Sue will be our project manager for Bianca. She’ll coordinate all the various disciplines involved, and make sure they’re working smoothly together. She’s been getting ready for this for a while.”

  “That’s great, sir! I’m so glad she’s back in harness.”

  “So am I. She’ll specify what we need – except for what Pal Sejdiu worked out, of course; we won’t reinvent the wheels he provided. You’ll buy it for her. You’ll also handle things like our relationship with the United Planets. You said you were worried about being bored, before you moved here. If that’s still a concern, we’re going to need a Consul at the UP, possibly growing to a full Ambassadorship in due course. Want the job?”

  Her eyes sparkled. “On Neue Helvetica? Try and stop me, sir! That’ll be fascinating, as well as working with Sue, of course – and just think of the intelligence-gathering opportunities! Can I have Henry to help me?”

  Cochrane winked at her. “A little bird tells me you and he are getting closer than just a professional relationship.”

  Caitlin blushed. “Yes, sir. We’ve worked together for several years now, and… well, he’s quite a guy.”

  “Yes, he is. If he agrees, and if you both figure you can make the relationship work, I’m willing to make him Vice-Consul and Commercial Attaché. It can be tricky to work alongside your partner, as Hui and I have learned the hard way, but it can also be very rewarding.”

  She smiled eagerly. “Thank you, sir.”

  “You’re going to Neue Helvetica next week, so you can start looking for offices for the Consulate and a nice place for you to live. Also, bring Pal Sejdiu back with you. He’s been kept incommunicado while we dealt with the Brotherhood. It’s time to consider his future now, and that of the other prisoners and survivors.”

  “With the Big Three looking for them by name, do they have a future at all, sir?”

  “Let’s get him back to his family, then I’ll discuss it with them.” He stretched. “Don’t tell anyone else about Bianca yet. Only a few of us know about it. We’ll announce it to the rest of the staff in due course.”

  The following week, Cochrane called in Lachlan MacLachlan, who wore the twin Staff Officer hats of S4, Logistics, and S8, Finance.

  “How does our balance sheet look now, after all our recent wheeling and dealing?” he asked.

  “Pretty good, sir.” Lachlan called up a spreadsheet on the Commodore’s desk terminal. “Right now we have just over thirty billion in our asteroid reserve account, mostly from the Mycenae system, although the first fruits of our Larcuna contract are beginning to arrive. They’re looking good. Thanks to Caitlin’s haggling at Neue Helvetica, we still have four billion uncommitted in the account of Compagnia Bianca GmbH. We recovered six and a third billion francs worth of gold at the Brotherhood base, of which we’ll retain about five billion after bonuses or death benefits for everyone who took part in both operations to deal with the Brotherhood’s ships. Finally, there’s eight and a half billion in our operating account, and eight billion in our capital expenditure reserve, earmarked for the ships we have on order.”

  “So, a total available, uncommitted balance of about forty-seven billion? That’s better than I’d realized.”

  “We’ve been working the asteroid field in Mycenae pretty hard, sir. I’m afraid the New Orkney Enterprise may smell a rat there in due course, despite our cover story, and demand that we stop. Also, don’t forget that our operating costs are well over a billion a month, and getting higher as more of our ships are delivered and enter service. That balance isn’t nearly as much as it sounds.”

  “You’re right. Also, don’t forget that NOE is gearing up to expand their own security force. Within about two years, they’ll have their new ships in service, and our contract with them will come to an end. We’ll take as much as we can out of Mycenae until then, of course, under cover of the presumed threat from the Brotherhood; we just won’t tell NOE that they’re now defunct. I’ll speed that up as much as possible by allocating more ships and resources to it. If I can stockpile a few hundred asteroids from that system over the next two years, I will, against future need. We have a planet to settle, don’t forget. That’s not going to be cheap.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’ll inform the staff about this later, but right now, you’ve got more ships to buy. First off, we have another four frigates on order, right?”

  “Yes, sir, out of a total of nine – but we’ve just lost two, of course.”

  “I want you to add one more to our order. After our losses, that’ll give us a squadron of eight frigates. Qianjin is talking to Kang Industries about taking the full-size Desroches class destroyer hull, which we shortened as the basis for our frigates, and fitting three, rather than two, cruiser missile pods into it. It’ll have to be reconfigured internally, of course, and perhaps lengthened, too – maybe even enough to fit four missile pods. If they get that design right, I want to order some of them, too. They’ll form the core of our System Patrol Service at Bianca.”

  “Ah… isn’t that a very big, expensive defense for a brand-new, insignificant planet, sir?”

  “Yes, it is, but I expect Hawkwood will make more enemies in due course – although not another Brotherhood, please God! Also, we don’t want anything like what the Big Three did to Patos to happen on Bianca. We need to make our base too tough a nut for them to even think about cracking it like that. Super-destroyers, plus one or two arsenal ships, should be a good start.”

  “Yes, sir. There are two problems. First, Hawkwood can’t buy ships like that. As a private security company, we’re restricted under United Planets regulations to warships that can carry no more than two missile pods. Even our arsenal ships, which technically aren’t warships, are stretching that regulation about as far as it can go.”

  “True, but Hawkwood won’t be buying these ships – Bianca will. Our new planetary government will also issue an end-user certificate for them. That’s entirely legal.”

  “Oh! You’re right, sir. I’d forgotten about that. My second point was, they’re going to be very expensive. Can we afford them?”

  “If we get enough out of Mycenae before NOE shuts us down in that system, I think we
can. I expect them to cost about two and a half billion francs apiece, compared to a frigate at under one and a half billion. We may take our time ordering them, depending on the money situation. I’ll let you discuss that with Kang Industries. Qianjin will keep us informed on how the design is progressing.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “As for getting enough out of Mycenae, and out of asteroids in general, I think it’s time we bought ourselves a refinery ship. Now that the Brotherhood’s out of our hair, we can afford to divert some of our time, resources and attention from our fighting ships and spacers. At present, Barjah refines our asteroids, and charges us fifty per cent of what they yield. If we have our own refinery, that instantly doubles our income from that source, less the operating costs of the ship. Go ahead and order one.

  “While you’re at it, order a full metalworks ship as well, one that can produce various grades of steel, aluminum and alloys, then cast, roll and forge them into whatever we need. We’ll base them both at Bianca. Its asteroid belt will provide raw materials, the refinery ship will process them, and the metalworks ship will produce most of our infrastructure needs, both orbital and planetside. Its first job will be to produce the frames and plating for an orbital space station for Bianca.”

  “Yes, sir. For a pair of new-construction, state-of-the-art ships like that, you’re talking five to six billion francs. They’ll take two to three years to build, because they’re very specialized and very big – four to five million tons displacement apiece. The industrial production lines and equipment aboard each of them cost many times more than the ships themselves.”

  Cochrane shrugged. “Spend it. As I said, we’re losing half our asteroid revenue through not having our own refinery. We’ll more than cover their cost from the first two precious metal asteroid shipments we refine. I’ll stockpile most of the asteroids we get out of Mycenae in orbit around one of Bianca’s moons, and wait to refine them until we can keep all the profit for ourselves.”

  “Yes, sir. What about crews for the refinery and metalworks ships? Those are specialized occupations.”

  “Yes, they are, but we can afford to pay for the best. Some of our people might want to retrain in those specialties, and I’ll give them the opportunity. That’s not the end of our ship needs, either. I’ll re-examine our growth plans with Dave Cousins and Frank Haldane over the next couple of weeks. We’ll probably order more corvettes, to bring our total fleet of that class to twenty-four once they’ve all been delivered. That sounds like a lot, but up to a third will be rotating through maintenance and training at any one time, and there’ll be enough security work to keep the rest busy.

  “I’ll also order two extra frigate missile pods, but empty, without missiles. One will be outfitted as a marketing and presentation suite. The other will provide VIP accommodation for any of Bianca’s or Hawkwood’s senior executives and officers who need secure travel facilities. The pods will have plenty of room to install those facilities and whatever else they need. We’ll put them aboard any available frigate or destroyer whenever they’re needed. There’ll be a few more freighters, to replace Porpoise and support our migration to Bianca and our expanding operations; and probably some more communications vessels, too. We’ll also need a shipyard.”

  “A shipyard, sir?” Lachlan was clearly shaken. “At Bianca? That’s a hellish expensive item, even more than the refinery and metalworks ships. Even a small one will cost up to ten billion francs.”

  “Yes, but we’ll need one to support our vessels. It’s a longer-term project, of course. I’ve had Jock Murray researching it, with the assistance of Grigorescu Shipyards. They’ve agreed to help us build it in due course, and Matei Grigorescu will lend us one of his sons to help get it up and running. He says that when the time comes, he might even sell his shipyard as a going concern – it’s worth a lot more now, because it’s expanded to keep pace with our growth – and buy a half-share in ours. If so, he’ll move his entire family and a lot of his workforce to Bianca, to run our shipyard for us. They like us, and we like them, and we work well together, so I’m going to encourage that. He’ll also train shipyard staff for us in his establishment here.”

  Lachlan shook his head bemusedly. “Don’t you ever run out of new ideas, sir?”

  “Well, there’s no point in stagnating, is there? Besides, now that the Brotherhood’s out of the way, we’ll be much better positioned to grow our business without them interfering. Let’s stretch our wings as wide as we can, and climb as high and go as far as they’ll carry us.”

  The following month, Cochrane booked the private room of an exclusive restaurant to host a victory dinner for Hawkwood’s directors and staff officers. The atmosphere was a blend of sorrow for their losses, pleasure over their victories, sober contemplation of the Brotherhood’s fate, and consideration of their own future.

  After enjoying a sumptuous meal, they settled down to business. The waiters cleared the tables, served coffee and liqueurs, then closed the doors to give them privacy. Cochrane started the ball rolling by unveiling a large-scale model of Bianca, cast, carved and painted to represent her continents, smaller islands and oceans.

  “This is our new home,” he told them. “We’ve already bought and paid for it. I’ve ordered our satellite base at Barjah to move to Bianca at once, with all its ships. It’ll be out of the way of prying eyes there, which was the reason we put it at Barjah in the first place, and it’ll provide local security. All of our warships based here at Constanta will be transferred there over the next five to ten years, as circumstances allow, although our freighters will continue to be based here for the foreseeable future. Caitlin, tell us about Bianca.”

  Caitlin spoke for almost fifteen minutes, showing vid and images of the planet. Sue joined her to describe the next stages in the settlement process. Those who hadn’t been aware of the project grew enthusiastic, as they realized the flexibility that owning their own planet would provide.

  “That brings me to future expansion,” Cochrane said as he took over once more. “I’m going to be doing a lot more corporate work, including initial planetary governance, and less on the security side. I’m promoting Dave Cousins and Frank Haldane to Commodore with immediate effect. Dave will look after Hawkwood’s infrastructure and administration, while Frank handles operations. I daresay they’ll swap jobs every couple of years, to keep each other fresh. They’ll work hand in glove, of course. For the sake of the chain of command, I’ll promote myself to Rear-Admiral and referee any conflicts, but I don’t think there’ll be many. They get on too well together for that.”

  Congratulations and good wishes were showered on the newly promoted flag officers. They accepted them, grinning.

  “Hawkwood has grown far and fast since we began,” Cochrane continued. “When we began, I promised all of you who first joined me that you’d receive a guaranteed profit share, in cash, of at least five million francs, payable after five years. You all rolled that over, and the amount kept going up as we did better and better. Right now, there’s two hundred and fifty million francs in a Neue Helvetica bank account for each of you.”

  There were gasps as the eight original directors realized they were now independently wealthy, to the point that they need never work again, if they so chose.

  “I’m going to pay you out right away, whether or not you stay with Hawkwood. You have a choice. You can take the cash: or, if you prefer, and if you’re going to stay with us, I’ll give each of you a five per cent shareholding in Hawkwood instead of the money. You won’t be able to sell it to anyone but me, to prevent dilution of ownership outside our circle, but I’ll guarantee a fair, market-related price if you want to do that. It’ll earn you twenty-five to thirty million every year in dividends and profit share, if we go on doing as well as we have been. Personally, I think we’ll do even better, now that the Brotherhood’s out of our hair. There’s the risk we may have some bad years, of course, but there’s also the potential to double your money over time, or even
better. Cash or shares, the choice is yours – or some of each: a one per cent share equates to fifty million francs, so if you took that in cash, the balance of your money would buy you a four per cent share in Hawkwood. Let me know over the next few days what you’d prefer, and in what proportions.”

  Cochrane turned to Frank Haldane. “Frank, you weren’t part of our original board of directors, but you helped us with a couple of very important jobs right at the start, and you’ve been a big part of our success since you joined us. For that reason, I’m offering you a special deal, second only to the eight original directors. You can have two hundred million francs, or a four per cent shareholding in Hawkwood, or a proportion of each. I’m also appointing you a director with immediate effect.”

  Frank Haldane looked stunned. “Ah… um… thank you, sir! That’s the last thing I expected to hear tonight!” The others applauded, their faces lighting up with pleasure and approval.

  “You’ve earned it the hard way. Let me know which option you’d prefer.”

  He went on to tell them about the refinery and metalworks ships, and the planned dockyard. “We’ll need crews for them, of course. They’re all specialized occupations, so we’ll probably have to hire contract personnel at first, but we’ll try to grow our own people into their jobs.

  “There’s another potential source of recruits I hadn’t thought about. You’ll recall we’ve had several spacers from Keda as our prisoners for a couple of years. The Brotherhood shanghaied them from their planet, and paid most of their salaries to Keda officials as a bribe for their services. They’ve actually preferred being our prisoners to working for the Brotherhood!” Laughter from the staff, some of whom had met the Keda prisoners and come to like them.

  “We captured another two hundred and thirty-seven Kedans aboard the Brotherhood refinery ship. I asked our earlier prisoners to reassure them that we’d send them all home safely; but that had an unexpected result. When they heard about how well we’d treated their people, about two-thirds of the Kedans asked to join us. They don’t want to go back to their planet. They’ve also offered to recruit more spacers for us, people they know personally and are willing to recommend.”