TauR14G6-15 Blue Waters and
Gentle Mist
Captain
Hierl nodded and signed off on the latest report. So far so good, though they
had problems.
Wasn’t
it always the case she thought and then grimaced.
She
had a single platoon of troops on each planet. They’d set up a very wide
perimeter and were slowly beginning to tighten it. The navy was beginning to
make headway with identifying where Sedu and Shrapnel had gone to ground.
Ninth
Fleet was supposedly going to leave in the next six weeks. When it happened,
she was going to be on her own for a while. They were going to leave half of
the Marines with her and two squadrons of cruisers. They were going to head out
to catch up with Ninth Fleet as fresh ships came in to replace them over time.
She
had half of the Marines from Ninth Fleet but too many duties for all of them.
Six hundred Marines didn’t amount to a lot. Sure, she had half of the drop
shuttles from Ninth Fleet but that again was an issue.
She
had two squads of powered armor. Again, split between the two planets. They
were in reserve at the moment. She had a single squad of Recon troops on the
planet. She had hopes that they could identify the HQ of General Sedu and
Colonel Shrapnel so they could knock them out. So far the answer was a wait and
see.
The
problem was that the rest of her troops were infantry and most were green. They
were outfitted for security and for boarding actions, not for planetary
invasion. The navy had given her some support, but she needed a lot more than
what Ninth Fleet had provided before their departure.
Recently
they had started to deploy drones to scout and monitor the perimeter. That took
a squad of troops to monitor the feeds of twenty-four drones. They were broken
into three personnel per shift and two shifts per planet.
She
was going to have to cut another squad loose to support them soon. When she did
that, they could theoretically each watch over eight drone feeds. That would
allow her to double up on her drones.
The
industry thing was an issue though. The brass had promised her all the
industrial support that she wanted. For the moment, she had raw material and
not much else.
The
Feds had dispatched an engineering team from the cruisers to look into the
Tauren side of that equation.
While
she did that, a couple of naval spooks and the one Marine ensign who had
minored in intelligence gathering were trying to process the mountains of data
from the commercial satellites, communication logs, and so on. The ship AI were
lending their support but it was a lot of data to process. Lieutenant Adel was
the lead AI.
Supposedly,
the Tauren Admiral Ree was inbound. When he arrived, she would theoretically
hand over some of the duties to him and his troops and then could focus more on
the ground problem.
It
couldn’t come soon enough.
<<(O)>>
Ensign
Tish was assigned to work with the Tauren industry on the stations and in the
star system to build what the jarheads needed for the eventual invasion.
Up
until they’d been given the go-ahead, the naval engineers had been working
strictly in house from the replicators in Ninth Fleet. Now that Ninth Fleet was
gone, they had only the two squadrons of cruisers to draw on initially.
Captain
Hierl and the joint army-navy-marine task force that was in the process of
building up wanted more than what the ship’s replicators could handle.
This
was therefore the only fix short of getting someone to ship in what they needed,
which wasn’t possible in the time frame that they had.
She
made the rounds, met some people, and inspected their hardware. She was not
impressed. Their nanites were poorly designed, and there were few in the
replicators. Their computer support was pathetic. Their CAD and tooling paths
were horrible. In short, they needed a lot of work.
She
got them on producing generic material for the moment while she shot an urgent
request outlining the problem and her possible solution to the brass.
She
wasn’t surprised when the chief shot her an email back that it’d have to go
further up the chain and to wait.
What
she was proposing probably broke a lot of rules and would make some people
gnash their teeth, wring their hands, and probably pretend they had them around
her neck at the time. Well, so be it. If they wanted her to get the job done,
than they needed to damn well give her the tools to get it done.
They
could use the shells and support tech but the Tauren industrial replicators
needed a turnkey upgrade to get them up to Federation military standards. It
would be hard to do and once done they couldn’t easily undo it without a full
flush and reboot.
While
the powers that be debated what they wanted, she drew up a list of what needed
to be done. When she did get the authorization, she wanted to hit the ground
running.
<<(O)>>
The
Federation ships took note of the arrival of the Tauren warships from the
south. They and their crews were a welcome sight and were greeted.
Admiral
Ree was pleased by the greeting and a bit amused by it. He immediately
announced that he was there to take custody of the star system. Captain Z’n’ll
didn’t even quibble; he immediately began the transfer of authority, much to
the admiral’s relief.
He
found out as he entered the star system and his people communicated with the
newly-operational ansible station that the brass had been coordinating the
handover through the ansible. That amused him.
Admiral
Lobo, his officers, and senior enlisted were to remain in joint custody. They
were still working out how to handle that trial.
His
people would have to take over many of the duties in the star system while
working with the Feds. They also had to interview all of the former rebels. He
wasn’t looking forward to that task but it had to be done. They needed people
that they could trust to get things back to normal.
<<(O)>>
Admiral
Hunter smiled as he shook hands with Admiral Ree. The Tauren was a bit reserved
but that was fine.
"Thank
you for coming," Admiral Hunter stated.
"Thank
you for taking back our star system," the Tauren replied, putting slight
emphasis on the posessive pronoun.
"As
soon as you can get your people on board, the better we'll feel, Admiral,"
Rick said with a nod.
Admiral
Ree nodded back. "Let's look into that, shall we?"
"Yes,
lets," Admiral Hunter stated.
<<(O)>>
Luna
talked to her brother at the usual time. She had five minutes instead of two;
she appreciated that.
He
told her a tissue of lies about the farm and harvest season wrapping up.
She
mentioned the arrival of Admiral Ree. “I don’t know if you saw it on the news,
but he’s here and taking over.”
“Ah.
I had heard something. I think it was on last night's news or on the net. Huh.
Ree, huh?”
“Yeah,
the Feds are handing over everything to him.”
“And
here people thought that they were here to stay,” he scoffed.
“No
way,” she shook her head and then realized he couldn’t see her. “They have a
deal with the Confederation. They just want their people.”
“Ah.”
He paused for a few seconds. “Huh. Well, they sure don’t act like it.”
“Really?”
she asked in disbelief. They are handing everything back over to the
Confederation. Their fleet has left.”
“Yeah,
but didn’t they leave a bunch of ships in orbit? And take over the stations?”
“And
the yard and the ships, yeah. And they stuffed everyone in transit stations
until the Confederation got here. Now they are handing everything off to
Admiral’s Ree’s herd.”
“Huh.”
“Bro,
you haven’t heard about any illegal acts, right?” she reminded him.
“Well,
we’re in the back of beyond. We’d probably be the last to know.”
“Oh.
True.”
“And
they control the media.”
“No,
actually they’ve been hands-off there. They just don’t tell them everything
that is going on.”
“Huh.”
He didn’t quite sound like he believed her.
“Believe
it, bro. They have gone out of their way to not antagonize anyone. I’ve met a
few of the aliens; I never thought they’d be just normal people.”
“Huh.”
“I
mean, not all uppity and judgy.”
“Huh.”
“You
say that a lot. That is your default. Oh wait, no, the default is duhh …,” she
mocked.
“Funny,
sis. You are so lucky you aren’t in arm’s reach at the moment,” he mock
growled.
She
couldn’t help herself, she giggled. It came out naturally.
He
snorted.
“So,
when do we expect the carpet baggers to arrive?” he asked.
“Carpet
what’s?” she asked in confusion as her brows knit.
“A
term I heard in the pub.”
“What
does it even mean?”
“I’m
not sure. Something about Feds moving in to take over our businesses and then
government.”
“Bro,
I just told you that they aren’t doing that,” she said patiently. “They’ve got
some navy people here on the station and a bunch of those Marine types. I think
there are like, six or seven hundred all told of the ones in camo, but don’t
quote me on that. Hardly what you’d send as an invasion force, right?”
“True,”
he said thoughtfully.
She
felt a thrill of fear but took the plunge. “At the moment, there is I think a
hundred or so on each planet. I could be wrong.”
“We
haven’t seen any,” he said doubtfully.
“Well,
it is a big planet,” she responded with a characteristic exasperated response.
She felt a little nettled over that reply. He was drawing attention to
something she had rehearsed to give to him casually.
“True.”
“And
you are on the farm, bro,” she teased she said as she felt more natural about
the responses she was giving.
“Also
true.”
“So,
what are they doing?”
“Waiting
for more of the Confederation to show up at a guess. I haven’t heard anything.”
“Well,
mom always said you went up there to make friends. Maybe you should.”
“I’m
still getting used to seeing aliens every day,” she temporized. “I’m not all
chummy and all that. I’m supposed to work with a few starting next week.”
“Well,
make friends. You’ve got some right? Girlfriends I mean. Boy friends are not
allowed. sis,” he growled.
She
chuckled and smiled. “Wouldn’t you like to know,” she teased.
“Me,
mom, dad, and the whole herd,” he growled.
“Well,
it’s for me to know and you not to find out,” she said wickedly.
“You’ve
got to come down for a holiday sometime, sis. Mom will guilt trip you into it,
wait and see. And when you do …," his voice turned mock menacing,
"I’ll get it out of you.”
She
grinned. “As if. I’m faster and smarter than you. You are just a big farm clod.
Big and yeah, strong, but I can run circles around you.”
“You’d
be surprised,” he growled back.
“Funny.”
she saw the countdown switch to red. “My timer is about up. Stay safe. Don’t
drink and drive,” she scolded.
“Yes,
mom,” he mocked.
She
made a kissing sound and then cut the circuit.
After
the conversation, she sat back thoughtfully. Friends? Okay, she could look into
that …
<<(O)>>
