Defender

6

As soon as the Wasp made orbit around Alwa, the six observers demanded to be returned to the Association of Associations by the first shuttle. Granny Rita was expressly not invited to join them.

Kris invited Granny Rita to the now-restored Forward Lounge, where the old gal could enjoy some well-aged Scotch, a luxury that had disappeared on Alwa too many years ago to count.

“So, what’s up with the Alwans?” Kris asked, when they were both served. Kris was back to tonic water with a twist of lime.

“I have no idea. They haven’t said a word to me since you refused to ‘crow’ to the lone survivor. Something about how we’ve strutted our stuff and flashed our feathers. ‘They can see you are superior. Now, they must bow their heads.’”

“That’s what they wanted me to send?” Kris asked, incredulously.

“That’s the way they do things, young lady. Be glad of it. It saved me and my crew from a lot of bloody fighting when we dropped in. Fortunately, they had some dry land that wasn’t much used, and it wasn’t too bad for farming.”

“You were lucky in too many ways to count,” Kris said.

Granny raised her glass in a silent toast to those like them but no longer present. “I’ve had more luck than any human being has a right to claim since I led the remnants of BatCruRon 16 into that jump at three gees and battle revolutions.”

Kris nodded. Eighty years ago, that was a death sentence for the Furious, Enterprise, Audacious, and Resolute.

Granny Rita’s eyes grew distant, and her words came low. “The Iteeche were implacable after my squadron blew up their invasion fleet. Any hope of taking our base had gone up in exploding gas, as well as an awful lot of their troopers, so when I took off, they came hot and straight after me. We went through the next three jumps at higher and higher speeds, adding on more revolutions to our spin in the hope of saving some of our armor from the hammering the Iteeche were giving us.”

The old war fighter shook her head. “We fled, but they would not give up the chase. We were long past any planets claimed by the Iteeche Empire, and still the chase went on. First the Resolute faltered, fell behind, and died fighting a dozen Death Balls. They got her, but she got half of them. Then it was the Audacious’s turn. When finally Furious and Enterprise made a jump and discovered to our great joy that no Iteeche ship had followed us through, we were hopelessly lost.

“And while I and the Enterprise’s young skipper were trying to figure out what to do next, our two ships shot through a jump point that wasn’t even showing on our sensors. We jumped three, four times farther than I ever thought a ship could go and found ourselves even farther from any help. That happened to us twice before we managed to change course real fast and dodge whatever it was that was doing this to us.”

“We call them fuzzy jump points,” Kris said. “That was Nelly’s name for them, and it’s stuck. Our best guess is that the Three who built the jump points built the fuzzy ones last as some kind of expressway. They’re closer together, and they take you a whole lot farther. With fifty or so baby monster ships chasing the Wasp after this fight, the only way we managed to break contact and get back to human space were those jumps. You need special navigational gear to spot them.”

“Well, they got us into this neighborhood. We took axes to the surviving armor on our two ships. The Furious was less damaged, so we piled everyone in her, fed anything we thought might work into the plasma chambers, and started trying to slow down.”

Again, Granny Rita raised her now-half-empty glass. “We were down to fumes and hard tack when we stumbled into a system with that beautiful blue-green orb. It could have gotten messy, but the Light People took us in. That, my dear, is why we’re here to say howdy to you.”

“But will the Alwans be talking to us tomorrow?” Jack asked as he joined them. “The Captain’s Gig is back. The crew report the Alwans didn’t say a word on the drop down. Not even a thank-you as they disembarked. It was made clear to the bosun flying the gig that they wanted him gone soonest.”

Jack flagged a server down, one of his Marines supplementing his pay, and ordered a beer. It arrived very quickly.

Granny Rita just shook her head. “The Alwans are not stupid. I know they have this blind side about fighting. They seem to have evolved into their present system of conflict resolution. I benefited from it. It will be a tough fight against hereditary impulses, but I can’t help but think when they see they were the target of an attack, and now have seen your ship attacked, that they’ll do what has to be done.”

“Kris, there is a call coming in for you,” Nelly said.

“From whom?”

“One of the media services.” Nelly did her best to do something with clicks, coos, and warbles.

“Oh, them,” Granny Rita said, “they’ve been the best when it came to reporting on the things where we Heavy People and the People got it right. One of the calls the Alwans made the first month we arrived was that they didn’t want any sudden influx of human technology. We agreed to hold things back. We didn’t bring stuff down from the Furious we really wanted, like a reactor. It’s worked pretty good. We still schooled our kids that there’s a lot more to the world than they can work with. That launch to the Furious that you observed. We finally got permission to bring down the gear for a thermonuclear reactor.”

“They were going to let you bring a reactor online?” Kris said.

“Oh yes. They know we use a lot of electrical gear, and it’s catching on among their young. We showed them how to dam rivers and set up electrical power plants, but they noticed how it shot the hell out of the fishing upstream. They asked us if we had anything better, and we suggested the reactor. I’m hoping you have landers that can help get the containment coils down. Anyway, that media service was first and strongest in supporting us on the reactor.”

“But why would they want to talk to me?”

“Maybe they think a pretty young face will get more viewers.”

“Do they think we Heavy People are pretty?” Jack asked.

“Not likely, considering how they avoided looking at Penny and me while we were loosening up their water tanks,” Kris said.

“They think of us about the way we think of a hippopotamus,” Granny said with a grin, and finished her drink.

“So I don’t need to powder my nose,” Kris said.

“You could take a bath,” her great-grandmother said. “I don’t care what you say about those eggs of yours, a lot of sweat went into that fight.”

Properly chastised, Kris set a time around noon according to the time at the Association of Associations meridian, then paused to look at Granny Rita. “What will my talking have to do with anything? They won’t understand a word I say.”

“Still, you have the video of the attack. Both of them. There are a few reporters who have gotten pretty good at translating for us. At least I think so.”

“But you don’t know so,” Kris said.

“Different brains. Different vocal cords. Different feathers flocking together. At least we’ve made do.”

“But they weren’t facing annihilation like they are now.”

“What are you getting at, hon?”

“Nelly thinks she can translate a lot of human into Alwan,” Kris said.

“Not everything,” Nelly was quick to put in. “Their idioms and references to history or myth are still way over my head, but to the extent that one word means one thing, I can get what they’re saying and say something back.”

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, has humanity come that far since we dropped out? Kris, I kept hearing you talk to Nelly and Nelly talk back, but I had no idea she was that kind of girl.”

“Nelly is special all by herself,” Kris said.

“Me and my kids. I’ll have to introduce you to them. You’ve already met Mimzy; she works with Penny. Sal works with Jack. Speak up for yourself, son.”

“I am glad to meet you, Granny Rita,” Sal said from Jack’s neck.

“Sal doesn’t sass people back like his mom,” Jack said. “He’s a good Marine.”

“Yes, sir, Skipper,” Sal answered.

“Each computer is different?” Granny asked, incredulous.

“I developed my unique personality working with your great-granddaughter,” Nelly said. “Each of my kids has a kernel from me but is free to program their own self-organizing matrix as they, and their human, see fit. I’m rather picky who I let have one of my kids.”

“Boy is she,” Sal said.

“Is there any chance that I could get one of your computers?” Granny asked. “Not one like Nelly, but your ship store must have some decent ones for sale. Even the simplest one you got would be so much beyond what we have.”

“Nelly, tell Abby to drop down to the ship store and get Granny a top-of-the-line with a full set of apps.”

“Abby says she’s not your slave, only your maid,” Nelly said, “but for Granny Rita, she’ll be glad to hit the store and put it on your tab.”

“Tell Abby thank you very much,” Granny said.

“You’re welcome,” Nelly answered.

“What I put up with,” Kris grumbled.

“Abby also says you need a bath and hair wash if you’re going on what passes for media on Alwa. She’s got Cara getting the computer. She knows more about those things than anyone else on board, so you should get your sweaty ass back up to your room and give your maid some time to make you presentable.”

“Who’s Cara?” Granny asked.

“Abby’s thirteen- almost fourteen-year-old niece,” Jack said.

“Ship’s mascot,” Nelly added.

“And general teenage pain in my neck,” Kris said as she stood and prepared to obey her maid’s orders.

“Is this bath big enough for two?” Granny asked. “I intend to stand just offstage and watch. And, yes, honey, if you blow what I’ve worked eighty years to put together, I will step on camera and go into damage control mode.”

“We Longknifes are so trusting,” Kris said, and led the way to her quarters.