Rodney Smith - First Command

Now, whom did he know that could get him what he needed?

H’Topa took off his heavy merchant robe and hung it on a hook. He supposed it was the type of robe a merchant would wear. The K’Rang had no merchant class or political class. There were the nobles and there were warriors. The nobles ran the Empire, electing the three Elders that ran the day-to-day affairs. There was no longer an emperor. Years of internal palace intrigue left the K’Rang weakened and disjointed. The K’Rang Empire was heading to ruin when the dukes and barons revolted against the Emperor. The Emperor was put to the sword, as were all his palace minions. The three main blocs of nobles each voted an Elder to run the Empire. The blocs shifted and changed over the years and only one of the original three blocs still provided an Elder, but the Empire prospered under their rule.

The rest of the K’Rang were warriors. K’Rang females traditionally were warrior mothers. They gave birth to warriors and administered the creches, but of late, had started to become warriors. There was initial resistance to this, but experience showed that while they were not the same as male warriors, they brought unique skills and aptitudes that males sometimes never develop. Kittens were warriors in training for the day they were ready to serve the Empire.

Warriors comprised two classes: warriors and shadow warriors. Shadow warriors were the best of the warrior class, as determined through rigorous testing from kittenhood through adult. Those judged best at providing skills the Shadow Force required became shadow warriors.

Shadow Force was the K’Rang Imperial Guard. A regiment always guarded Imperial Hall. A Shadow Force Task Force always orbited G’Durin. Shadow Force always had the first line equipment and ships.

Regular warriors’ weapons and ships were always a touch inferior to their Shadow equivalent, and also older on average. Shadow Force ships were upgraded in the yards every five years. The warriors’ ships were modernized every ten years. Although the warrior fleet outnumbers the Shadow Fleet, they were kept stationed on the outer reaches of the Empire. The Shadow Fleet patrolled the Empire’s inner main worlds.

Technically there was no merchant class. There were warriors that were in charge of production and supply for the warrior class and the women and kittens directly. Some even were in charge of providing luxuries and necessities to the nobility. Warriors supporting other warriors ran factories, shipyards, farms, mines, and lumber mills. The K’Rang just considered it logistics.

While only royalty and their relations were allowed to live permanently on G’Durin, a small number of military and bureaucrats lived on the home world during their assignments, such as the Chief of the Regular Fleet and his staff. H’Topa and J’Kraul’s duties as Shadow Warriors in the Intel HQ also gave them authority to live on G’Durin. Provided Mr. Shepler was able to acquire what was needed, they would continue to stay on G’Durin and above ground. The main military cemetery so close to the city center was a constant reminder that there was more than one way to be granted permanent residence on G’Durin.

H’Topa thought, “Mr. Shepler was helpful before in getting us long-range communications design information. Let us see if he can get what we need this time.” H’Topa had seen Shepler’s eyes light up at the thought of a reestablished supply of flamestones. “Perhaps he will be motivated to do what we ask if we ask him the right way.”

“Captain M’Toth, set course for Shepard. It seems our friend is not on Fomalhaut after all.”

Alistair Bennett noticed the highly encrypted data stream pass through the network. It drew his computer’s attention because it followed the same data path as a posting to a suspect forum. He would never know the contents, but he suspected something was being put in place.

He ran his trace routine to see if he could pinpoint the terminal that received the stream. Not only was the stream encrypted, but the data packets comprising the stream were de-multiplexed and sent though multiple links to be multiplexed back together at the receiving terminal. He let the computer work on it, but did not hold out hope.

Turning his attention to other matters, he set the computer to work on correlating suspected espionage activity and ship arrivals and departures. He was looking for patterns that would lead to K’Rang courier ships bringing in instructions and leaving with reports and/or equipment. The computer broke out a number of ships that were in the area during periods of high espionage activity. He had the computer look for any information on these suspect ships that related to registry and ownership. The K’Rang had the same problem he would have if he wanted to task an agent in the K’Rang Empire. There were no direct communications or data links between the two adversaries. All message traffic had to be carried in and input into the communications stream once the courier ship came in range of a network node. There were K’Rang ships in Human space doing the same thing. Alistair took another nap while the tireless computer trudged through the network, looking for those ships.

Kelly took a tour around his ship and liked what he saw. He sat down for coffee with Chiefs Austin and Pennypacker, thanking them for their service to the ship and saying how much they were going to be missed. He kidded Cookie about not being able to teach him to cook. He then asked them, even though their transfers were months away, if they had any recommendations for their replacements. Both Chiefs recommended people on other Scout Force ships.

Kelly was unsure if that could be made to happen. He told them both that he was considered sort of a favorite with the Admiral, but not so much that he could raid from other captain’s rosters.

Chief Austin replied, ”Culinary Specialist First Class Donna Robinson is first cook on the Virtuous. I trained her. She’s good. She just came out on the Chiefs’ list. She’s low on the list, but she’ll be looking for a job when she makes Chief. The Virtuous won’t have a billet for her then. That should be right about the time I’m out-processing. Let Yeoman Benitez ask personnel for who is coming up for promotion about the time I leave. They’ll do the research for you and take the hit with the captain of the Vigorous for stripping away his first cook.”

Chief Pennypacker said, “Gunners Mate First Class Tom Hendrickson, on the Vengeance, must be in the same boat as Robinson. He won’t have a billet either, once he makes Chief. He’s one of my wife’s cousins, but he’s a good gunner. The Chief he works for is lazy and makes him do all the work. He’s ready for his own section, where he gets the credit for what goes right and not just the blame when things go wrong. I suggest you have Benitez ask about filling both our positions as Cookie suggested. Personnel will make the transfers to keep their books straight. Let them take the heat from the other captains.”

Kelly liked their suggestions, but wanted to see both personnel files first. He made a note for Benitez to pull the files.

H’Topa’s next action was to contact the agent that acquired the one-third copy of the design segment. He contacted the agent’s dead drop servicer and arranged a transfer of twice the normal payment. He knew this agent had a family problem and always needed credits. Double pay would reward him for this coup and encourage him to be more aggressive in the future.

An idea started forming in H’Topa’s head, a way to get all three segments of the design plan. He called up data on the plant’s work force. He was so thankful Humans had a compulsion to set up publically available line and block charts of who worked for whom and who was in charge. It made his job so much easier, especially as the charts so often wound up in the trash. He would have to find a way to get the other two plant foremen to review their copies of the design at the same time. H’Topa began to put a plan together.