Chapter 37

It's hard to get away when you're President. Especially when you have a detail that's pissed because you already did it once. It had to be done though. A message had been sent by Joan two months after the vacation stating she had to see me and that it was urgent.

The campaign stops made it possible, if barely. We detoured for a "rest stop" in Kentucky and she met us in Hazard. At her insistance, we met alone. As soon as the door closed she wasted no time before launching into a tirade.

"I thought you were shootin' blanks on the cay! Why did you lie to me?" was the first thing she yelled.

I was confused, I replied that I hadn't been using live ammo. I was more confused when she continued with "then why, in the name of the Gods, am I fuckin' pregnant!

I tried to calm her down by holding her but that just caused her to start crying. Over the sobs, I heard "dammit! I wanted this, but not yet! I can't travel and perform the way we do without putting too much stress on the baby. How did this happen?"

I had an idea, and voiced it. "The Gods, Joan. Someone wants us to have children. It must be pretty important to at least one of them. Remember the first time we made love on the Cay? It was as if we couldn't stop until you conceived.

That caught her attention while diverting some of her frustration and anger in another direction. She snarled "Loki! Get your hunky, Godlike ass down here right now!"

Evidently he liked the "hunky" comment because he was himself and smiling when he appeared. He actually hugged Joan as he explained. "I am sorry that having Matthias's children displeases you so. It would be a great help if you would though. They are important to us. Bragi (God of music, muse, and Poetry) has assured us of this.

Joan leaned back and looked up (waaay up) at him. "I'm not mad that I'm pregnant with Matt's child. I'm angry because we didn't get to choose when they would be born. Why does it have to be now?"

Loki explained "Earth needs Bards as much as it needs anything the rest of you can accomplish. It is hoped they will spread your message and help to bring peace and tranquility."

Joan interrupted with "you used the plural there. Is someone else pregnant?

Loki smiled and said "there only the ones you will bear for now, but Bryan and Alannah may provide more, we hope" before fading away.

Joan wasn't angry anymore. In fact, she was just the opposite. "Twin Bards! Wow! Do you have any idea how long it's been since the world had a true Bard? Hel, I don't know if there ever has been one! This is so cool!

Her enthusiasm was dampened when I reminded her that Loki hadn't said there would be only two. That lasted only a moment before another emotion surfaced. Being pregnant with musicians who would be even better than her seemed to turn Joan on. Since she was quite enough to do the same to me at any time she wished, that wasn't a problem.

We were in my office and there was no bed. There was, however, a desk and a sofa. She ripped the clothes off both of us and before I knew what hit me she was bent over the desk begging to be fucked. I always tried to give my mates what they wanted. I had never found it tedious and cerainly didn't now.

Once wasn't enough though. Joan's mouth could do other things almost as well as it could emit music. She had me hard again moments after the first time ended explosively. The second time was on the sofa with her on top. The view was lovely from either side. I preferred this one though. Kissing without straining was much easier.

The rest of our mates were ecstatic at the news. They were beginning to wonder if Joan and I were going to ever be "productive". Hel, they were already suggesting names! It took over an hour to get them back on the subject of the campaign.

No major problems were anticipated in the 2004 election, but we campaigned hard anyway. I liked the "Town Hall" meeting format and held them wherever we stopped on the day after a rally. I always had our party's candidate at my side. One unpleasant side effect of our success was that the Republican party had been hurt the worst. It was true that many (if not most) moderate democrats had been convinced by now but conservatives flocked to us in droves.

Troubles in the Middle East were still there, as always. For some reason, the world still expected America to come to the rescue. Those days were over, as far as we were concerned. I attempted once more to get the point across when asked at a Town Hall meeting in Brooklyn "what are your plans for bringing peace to the Middle East?"

I tried not to let my anger show, and answered "I have no plans. There isn't a scheme that could possibly bring peace to that area. They've been killing each other since the weapon of choice was a rock. If you took their guns and bombs away from them they'd revert to that. There is only one way there will ever be peace between the Arab world and the rest of us, or even among themselves."

I continued when they settled down. "The solution was voiced by Golda Meir at the National Press Club in 1957 and still holds true today. She said "Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us." She was correct. As long as there are people who hate more than they love, there will be no solution. We will continue to support our Israeli allies but I will not waste our resources or my energy in a lost cause. There is no logical reason for the unrest there. Food is plentiful, the desert is changing to farmland, livestock is thriving, and business is booming. You can not cure fanaticism, folks. It simply can not be done. Perhaps they'll come to their senses eventually. I doubt it, but won't rule it out. After all 'Nothing is impossible, just improbable."

Our short honeymoon with the environmentalists was over now. The infrastructure bill we had pushed through included massive redesign and improvements in many areas. One of these was New Orleans. All of us knew what would happen to the city if this didn't get accomplished and weren't about to back down.

We met with them in Baton Rouge the day after a rally there to address the issue. We had our own experts in environmental impact as well as in climate and Engineering. After they went over the implications of not doing something to rectify the problem I addressed the detractors and reinforced the facts. After they left I was scratching my head and wondering what the heck happened.

Everyone else was just as surprised. They had caved much too easily. Environmental nuts are not well known for their common sense and these had signed on to everything we proposed. It may have been weird but we weren't going to waste time complaining.

The design was already complete and the project funded, so the corps of engineers was given the OK and told to proceed as swiftly as possible. In less than a year, the levees in New Orleans would stand up to a category five hurricane without any problem at all.

Unbelievably, we had accomplished a significant amount of our goals in the first term. The next election was less than six months away now and with little competition for the presidency on the horizon we continued to concentrate on getting a larger majority in both houses.

A side trip was made in the middle of the tour. It was an honor and privelage to introduce Rhonda Kaye as the first female member of the Baseball Hall of Fame. The speech was easy to write, and might have embarassed her as much as my dad's had me.

"I have known Rhonda Kaye for most of my life. She was instrumental in introducing me to reality, so it is only fitting that I introduce her to you. I was a cocky little fool who thought nobody could hit the fancy new slider I had learned. She was kind enough to show me the error in my thought process. I was not the first recipient of this demonstration, and most certainly not the last. Her induction to the hall is both long overdue and very well deserved. I refuse to go all "long winded" up here today, for this day belongs to her. May I present to you not only one of the best lead-off hitters baseball has ever known, but, without a doubt, the most beautiful! Rhonda Kaye!"

Hopefully her whispered "you are so going to pay for that!" was not interpreted correctly by the listeners. I hadn't been kidding about the long overdue part. Rhonda played four more years than I had and made the 30-30 club (30 homeruns, 30 stolen bases) five times. She ended up with 310 homers, 588 stolen bases, and her hitting streak of 67 games was second only to mine. She was wearing two World Series rings and had been the MVP of both.

After that stop, a tour was made to every state where we thought we could gain seats. All of us were getting a little worried in a short amount of time. Angel finally voiced what we were thinking at the hotel in Cleveland. We had just returned to the room and she blurted "what the Hel is going on? Every time you say a word it's like the whole place is falling all over each other to be the first to agree with you! I think they'd walk off a cliff if you said it was a good idea."

Tina quickly agreed. "Every since those environmental people it's like the world thinks your shit doesn't stink! It wouldn't surprise me if the women stated throwing their panties at you!" I had a sneaking suspicion and voiced it. "How about the rest of you, since the last time we were visited have you noticed people who weren't with us then have been more agreeable?" After a moment comprehension took hold and there was a chorus of "Loki and Freyja!"

We heard a laugh and turned to see the culprits sitting on the sofa. Freyja must have thought it was hilarious from the way she acted but Loki was only smiling. I suppose he was used to pulling stunts like this. Eventually, the lady composed herself enough to say she was sorry they hadn't mentioned what they had done.

She blamed it on Loki and we believed her. She went on to explain that it was the next logical step in our evolution but wouldn't explain what that meant. They had given us the gift of charisma to make our job easier. "You are well on your way to accomplishing all of the tasks set for you" Loki explained "but what remains may be the most difficult yet. A significant portion of this world is still filled with hate and envy. They will not be easily persuaded even with this gift and without it we fear it would be impossible. It is but another weapon in your arsenal. Use it well." With that said, they were gone in an instant.

We discussed the problem through the night and by morning it was decided that we'd have to mend some fences. We would do it on our terms, however. The UN would have to become what it was intended to be for this to work.

Three months before the election Rhonda called the Secretary General and set up a date for me to give an address. They had been even more ineffective since most of their teeth had been pulled and he was very receptive. He tried in vain to pry any information out of her but Rhonda was a lot smarter than he was.

A few more calls were made and it was arranged for Alex, Chen, Wilhelm, Hogo (now the Prime Minister of Japan) and Nigel (the same in Great Britain) to be there. All of them except Chen were given the whole story and agreed with our plan.

What we planned was one last attempt to get those nations with dictators who still clung tenaciously to power at the expense of the general population. There were quite a few holdouts of this type who needed to be dealt with both in Africa and the Middle East.

During the address, we offered to help any country who met our criteria become self-sufficient.

These conditions were as follows:

1. Each citizen was to have equal rights. No country that discriminated in any way against women or minorities would be assisted.

2. A country must have a legitimate government in order to qualify. No dictators or usurpers would receive aid.

3. Any corruption or graft would cause assistance to cease immediately.

4. War without a just cause would disqualify any participating member.

5. Any nation sponsoring terrorism would be excluded automatically.

I thought the place would never settle down but finally, it did. I explained that this aid was not free. The conditions we had listed were payment and the UN would oversee implementation.

We had phrased the second condition carefully in order to include hereditary rulers but exclude those who had seized power from the rightful leaders. Officials were invited from nations who were interested to see the results first-hand.

If many of them hadn't been so corrupt, it would have went much smoother. That was not the case. Most of the countries controlled by tyrants refused to come because of our conditions. We couldn't allow aid to them since it would only permit them to become wealthier. The people would still starve.

We were at a loss as to what to do about it. After struggling with every idea under the sun for a month the solutions to the dilemma presented themselves at our door.

The opposition to several of the dictators of the nations in Africa had heard about our offer and sent representatives of their own. They had managed to infiltrate governments to obtain information but had been unable to attempt a takeover because the dictators controlled all weapons and the military.

Funds weren't available to buy what they needed on the black market so they were at a standstill. Frustrated while people died as the corrupt rulers increased their wealth on the aid that never made it to the population who needed it, they practically begged for whatever help we could provide.

As far as we could tell, it wasn't enough. If they managed to topple the dictator in power another general who controlled the military would simply step in and it would be more of the same.

Angel had the only practical idea and it was a long shot. We would help them stockpile weapons (both offensive and defensive) in the desert along with provisions and the capability to produce fresh water. What forces they had would trickle in to the area and construct defensive positions. They would then wait for the dictator to attack them.

By forcing the confrontation they could get the forces into the open and spring a trap. The weapons we had developed could accomplish this much. They were also warned that if it worked and things didn't change, we would make them cease to function.

The same thing would happen if they attacked their neighbors. If it did work we promised to provide agriculture and technology assistance that could make the continent self-sustaining within ten years.

No problem such as that was anticipated, however. Twelve of the leaders were "Retreads". They had been damn good at hiding. They had to be because if they weren't they would have died. All were leaders in the resistance movement.

We started smuggling untraceable weapons and creating the caches as stealthily as possible in hopes of delaying any confrontation until after the election. It worked in every case except Myanmar.

I guess Chen was a bit overzealous. He first smuggled Suu Kyi and her closest friends out of the country before issuing an ultimatum to the military government to abdicate or face invasion. They didn't choose the easy way but it was a mistake.

The population wasn't on their side and at first sight of Chinese troops almost every member of the Myanmar armed forces laid down their arms and surrendered. The war lasted less than a week and solved one nagging problem.

The election went pretty much as we had hoped and we even picked up some seats that we hadn't thought we could. A week later all Hel broke loose on the African continent. Most of the warlords there did not need, nor did they have, a well equipped army.

In most cases it consisted of a ragtag bunch of undisciplined slobs carrying AK 47's and RPG's. The rare helicopter or tank was taken care of at a distance by us. There were a few heated battles but in most cases the army was stunned when they were surrounded and facing superior weaponry.

Most of them surrendered on the spot. I wouldn't have wanted to be in the warlords shoes. Years of abuse and forced starvation had built up a lot of anger. Justice wasn't pretty but the results of the effort were. In less than a year, the whole of Africa was comprised of newly elected democratic governments who were very grateful to America. The one glaring exception was Sudan.

A large percentage of the male population had already been eliminated in the Darfur region either by government or militia troops and the remaining men were either too scared or stubborn to move. Luckily, we were prepared for this occurrence.

The day after we took office after the 2000 election our promise to the military had been put into action. Units were recalled from Europe and Japan and joined existing forces at bases built in the southwest for re-equipment and training.

The new structure called for companies of thirty people (women could now volunteer for combat assignment) divided into squads of five members. Each was equipped with the new lightweight ceramic body armor. This protection was like something out of a sci-fi movie though. It completely enclosed the wearer and was climate controlled. They looked more like the old "transformer" toys come to life than they did soldiers.

Weapons had changed as well. The standard issue armament was now lasers, both rifle and sidearm. Each needed a new power source after 1500 hours of use. The power pack was roughly the size of a "C" battery and weighed even less. Tanks, APC's and the "MUTT'S" all had the new armor and were fusion powered as well. All could go 5,000 miles or more without changing the power cell.