Chapter 27

The alien scout probed what remained on the battlefield, though there was scant indication of what had happened to the harvesting fleet, other than that they had been destroyed in place. Though how, who and how many of the destroyers remained a mystery.

‘Begin scanning the planetary wavelengths to see if they can reveal anything,’ the intelligence in charge of the scout ordered.

‘Scanning,’ the monitoring intelligence replied.

‘Anything in their primitive records?’

‘They detected the battle, but were too far away to scan much, nor did the fighting prey contact them.’

‘Log the results. We shall return to report to the masters,’ the intelligence in charge decided.

Envoy Kubbe sighed in frustration. His efforts to try and gain information on this Empire had produced little or no results in a lot of areas. The AI system installed on the station was simply too efficient in dealing with any attempts to get any information the Empire didn’t want them to have. He had learned a great deal on their politics, trade and social mores; but almost nothing on their actual location, technology or alliances. His job wasn’t being made easy by his staff’s seeming inability to behave themselves on the station and their arrogance in trying to provoke both the Imperials and the Florveni, only to end up getting, without fail, a neural pulse for attempting to do so.

At the moment though he and his staff were staring somewhat in awe as the second re-supply fleet emerged from XD space and were counting the number of warships as relayed to them by the AIs on the station.

“They would appear to outnumber the combined fleets of the Kingdom,” Viscount Ruun, his senior aide. commented.

“As well as outgun us if the reports of what they did to Prince Royal Vislan’s fleet are as reported,” Kubbe replied.

“One wonders what wise King Rentap plans.”

“Hopefully a stable peace treaty. I will be recommending that we do not cross this Empire at any stage in the immediate or distant future.”

“Will he listen?” Ruun asked in a comment that bordered on treason.

“I would like to think he would,” Kubbe answered blandly, his demeanour suggesting he actually thought the opposite.

“Invite time again!” Flinn rejoiced.

“Yep. Aunt Taisha wants us there for the reception to greet the various dignitaries from the re-supply fleet.”

“Nice of her,” Torun replied with a grin. “Er ... will Kleevas be there?”

“Yes, he’ll be attending with Minno,” I laughed as Torun’s face lit up.

“Anyone else important?” Flinn asked also grinning.

“Voice of Truth Aramissa, Admirals Hark and Densoss of the 12^th and 13^th Fleets, Navarchs Huila and Untiriol of the Melanoqi Regialis and Amazona Fleets, also Admiral Ramantillavion of the Gershonian 2^nd Royal Fleet, along with Dukes Tremaina and Bassilus representing the Ducal Fleets. Plus assorted others.” the AI replied.

“Hell of a guest list,” I chuckled.

“You’re telling me,” Flinn smiled. “So glad you’re under my command. I’d never have met any of these people if you weren’t.”

“Most of them I haven’t met either,” I chuckled. “Though I have met Admiral Hark at one of Aunt Manny’s functions before.”

“I thought she didn’t go in for the social scene?” Torun asked.

“Normally she doesn’t, though she hosts a reception on the day before Empire Day for various worthies where she hands out a few awards for services to the Empire, mostly Lamidosti titles.”

“Ah, instant upper level status,” Torun giggled.

“Yep, just a meaningless title with that added little bonus.”

“Couldn’t afford to live there anyway.”

“Means your kids will get neural learning,” I pointed out.

“That’s true, assuming I get noticed,” she grinned, her bubbly personality coming to the fore.

“Wonder if those good-for-nothing Ilmainians will be invited?” Flinn commented with a slight scowl as the Ilmainians were a minor nuisance, if amusing in their lack of comprehension of Imperial behavioural mores.

“They are, Healer Flinn,” the AI confirmed.

“Hope they behave.”

“They have been warned.”

Once again we donned our still somewhat drab dress uniforms and waited in line to greet Taisha as well as the various guests of honour.

Taisha, as ever, was pleased to see me and congratulated us all effusively for our work in the first successful and complete defeat of an alien fleet as well as our part in the capture of what was thought to be the ship’s captain.

The big surprise for me was meeting Navarch Untiriol of the Melanoqi who, it appeared, knew my Dad from his work.

“I’m glad to see his daughter is doing well,” she finished the greetings.

“Yes, Ma’am, thank you,” I replied, a little lost for words as I’d never met a living patient of his outside the immediate family grouping I was part of (that I knew of).

“Please relax, Kiria. I know we Melanoqi have a ‘reputation’ for being punctilious, but I and Huila here are not like that.”

“I kind of guessed, what with Navarch Huila having a male Ploiarch at her side,” I replied, relaxing somewhat.

“Yes, Ploiarch Wenistos is definitely a rising star of the Autarchy Naval Force,” Untiriol nodded. “A shame he has to work twice as hard as a female to get ahead.”

“I thought such issues were in the past?”

“By law yes, by custom, no. It may take a good few of your years to rid us of that,” she grinned.

“Ah yes, tradition and custom,” I nodded with a smile.

“Indeed so,” she nodded. “Now I have to do my duty and mingle, but please remember me to your Father.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

I caught up with Flinn who was chatting to Minno, Torun and Kleevas having found somewhere to chat privately ... I presumed.

“Kiria,” Minno greeted me with a hug.

“Aunty,” I greeted her back. “How did your battle go?”

“Bit anti-climactic compared to yours. We just held the aliens off. 6^th Fleet wiped the floor with them,” she chuckled.

“We had the Hegemony Flotilla, it made all the difference,” I nodded.

“Yes, though apparently the re-supply fleet has brought along a complete assembly plant that will be able to replace all our primary weapons, not just the ones they brought with them.”

“I’m assuming some of the fleets will retain hyperbeams?” Flinn asked.

“I believe so, though what need we have of them will be covered by the Melanoqi and Gershonians, who will be more than enough to deal with anything this Ilmainian Kingdom can come up with,” Minno commented whilst observing the ‘clannish’ behaviour of the Ilmainian delegates.

“Yes, they do appear to have issues behaving themselves,” Flinn agreed.

“Despite the numerous zaps they’ve accumulated,” I added with a grin.

“Yes, I’ve viewed the reports,” Minno laughed as Voice of Truth Aramissa approached flanked by what had to be a bodyguard.

“Greetings. You are Kiria, Cure David’s daughter?” she questioned.

“I am indeed, Voice of Truth Aramissa,” I replied politely.

“We have met, though only briefly, so I doubt you’d remember. Oh, and please call me Aramissa,” she smiled.

“We have?”

“Yes, at the Hegemony/Imperial peace talks.”

“Oh gosh, you’re right. I don’t recall much of that at all.”

“You appeared to spend much of it chasing your brother,” Aramissa laughed.

“That I do remember,” I grinned.

“You appeared to be having a lot more fun than the adults,” she laughed.

“We did,” I laughed as well.

“Yes, though those talks turned the Hegemony on its ear ... for the better,” she noted.

“So I was told, via the AIs in Imperial history.”

“Ah yes, your famous neural learning,” Aramissa nodded.

“Yes, we get taught how to access it properly, not just facts,” Minno chimed in.

“Yes, my brother purchased the equipment from the Empire to do this for his son and daughter.”

“Just for them?” I asked frowning a little at the sheer cost of it.

“No, also the children of his loyal advisors ... plus various adults who need to know something quickly.”

“Ah, right. It’s not that widespread in the Empire either.”

“That’s mostly to do with encouraging level upgrades,” Minno explained.

“Yep, pointless having a superbly educated underclass with nothing for them to do with the education they have,” Flinn chuckled.

“Yes, seen how that works with a few upper level drones,” I nodded.

“Not met many myself, but you hear tales,” Flinn laughed.

“Mmm, brilliant education, but all the common sense of a small rock,” I grinned.

“Unless they luck into money, they don’t tend to remain upper level,” Minno noted.

“That’s true,” I nodded. “Costs too much to live there unless you have access to funds, usually by way of work of some kind.”

“I knew it was a good idea to become a Healer,” Flinn giggled, making us all laugh.

“How are your Father and Mother doing?” Aramissa asked.

“They are both doing well. They even adopted the kids of a friend who died during an alien incursion.” I replied.

“That was very nice of them,” Aramissa nodded.

“They’re lovely kids, a boy and two girls,” I added.

“I’d love to visit, but my time is somewhat constrained,” Aramissa chuckled ruefully.

“I can imagine,” Flinn nodded as Torun approached after being checked by Aramissa’s bodyguard.

“Yep, too many things to keep an eye on, which is why I jumped at the chance to come out here and observe, leaving the ‘paperwork’ to my already overworked office.”

“You have people you trust?” I asked, knowing a little about how the Hegemony went about things.

“Took a while, but yes.”

“Friends and family, I’d guess,” Torun opined.

“Sadly, yes. They’re all too rich to be greedy ... plus they all know what will happen if I catch them taking ‘encouragement money’ or getting favours,” Aramissa explained.

“Fired?” I asked, though suspected not.

“No, long terms as a slave, or execution if it’s really bad.”

“Oh yes, I’d heard that you now permit slavery for criminals,” Flinn nodded.

“Yes, saves on prison costs,” Aramissa explained. “We saw how the Empire did it and again, bought the technology.”

“Can your AIs cope?” Torun asked.

“Yes, Nild has been covertly upgrading them to the point where he can deal with abuses of power, something that previous Hegemons have tried and failed to do.”

“Must leave him worrying at night, as I suspect that your ruling classes will not be amused,” I said thoughtfully.