Chapter 7: Butternuttery

Sandy ran a hand down her grey concubine shift, trying to smooth out nonexistent wrinkles. The large window to her left showed part of the massive transport fleet readying for their trip to Thule, silhouetted by a crescent Earth. At her former home, which she could just make out on the horizon, it was mid-morning. She took another second to review the speech she was about to give, and then nodded to Lyn. The camerawoman, staring through the viewfinder, gave Sandy the thumbs up and settled herself to keep the view steady.

"Three. Two. One." Sandy planted a big, earnest, friendly smile and began her report. "This is Sandy Hause aboard the Confederacy Systems Ship Barnegat, one of the newest ships in the Fleet. And with me is the captain of the Barnegat, Confederacy Navy Major Matt Schlemmer. Captain, I'm told this is a very new ship?"

"Yes, Sandy. This is a new class of ship, the Absecon Class, with a new role," Matt began. He tried not to drool down the neckline of Sandy's shift. "The Marines need more naval support to back up their landings, and that's our job – to dig the Sa'arm out of their tunnels from orbit using shore bombardment."

A metre-long scale model hologram of CSS Barnegat appeared at that moment, seeming to float in midair on the other side of the Captain. "The main armament is a single, long rail gun using magnetic fields to propel the warhead down the barrel at a high acceleration. The ship is designed around this weapon, with the crews' quarters, command spaces and the point defence girdled around the barrel, and the propulsion system mounted aft." He pointed to a ring just forward of the engines, just abaft amidships. "This is where the rail gun's ammunition is stored – 48 centimetre shells. The kinetic energy when they land is equivalent to the largest nuclear warhead that Earth ever built, the Tsar Bomba which had the capacity of 100 megatons of TNT, but without the radioactive fallout."

Sandy whistled. "That's huge. Those shells must be bigger than anything ever seen on Earth!"

"Not really," Matt admitted modestly. "The Yamato-class battleships of the Imperial Japanese Navy in World War II mounted a similar size gun. It's the kinetic energy released on impact that makes the blast so powerful, not the calibre."

"How many people crew this ship?"

"One hundred and five, plus each crewman is entitled to take one of their concubines with them on a cruise."

"So which of yours have you brought with you?"

"My youngest, Val." He gestured and a comely and very pregnant 14-year-old black girl shyly came waddling gently into frame. "Back when she was 12, I picked up her mother Chloe and took all of Chloe's kids. Say 'hi' to your grandma, Val." The young lady, blushing visibly despite her skin colour, gave an embarrassed wave.

Matt realized that his chief concubine's mother would love to know what happened to Chloe, as well. "Her mother is aboard the troop transport CSS Bandera, riding herd on the rest of my family." He gestured through the large observation window to another ship floating just off the Barnegat's bow. It was a blocky, fairly ugly ship, one of the new mass-produced fast troop transports that existed to ship large numbers of Marine infantry into battle. It was also useful when transporting already-integrated, disciplined harems when warships were being reallocated to other colonies that didn't need the pods of an Aurora. It was less than ideal if you were shipping newly extracted families or untrained, undisciplined mobs of recruits.

"And will you be accompanying the Kilo class transports?" Sandy asked.

"No, we'll leap on ahead, tomorrow morning – that is to say, Saturday morning. We'll travel with our sister ship, the CSS Chincoteague, and the transport CSS Bandera. We'll settle our families in at Thule before our first combat cruise. The concubines we take with us on warships are normally not pregnant, but as this is just a repositioning cruise, we can use the time to give the pregnant ones some face time before we swap them out for non-pregnant ones."

Sandy nodded as if this made complete sense to her.

"I understand that the colony transports need to finish collecting dependants and special cargo for Thule," Matt added. "They'll leave on Monday."

"Thank you, Captain Schlemmer, of the CSS Barnegat. This has been Sandy Hause, reporting from Earth orbit."

"And cut." Lyn gave her the thumbs-up. "That shouldn't take much editing at all."

"Great," Sandy sighed in relief. "Let's get some lunch first. I'm starved."

Captain Todmorton entered the Arthur C. Clarke's mess room for the midday meal. It had been a very busy yet routine morning, with the Science Division taken up with mission planning and the other divisions conducting General Quarters drills.

The Captain was a fussy man and like all fussy men in a position of authority he drove his ship's crew quietly, desperately nuts. One of his manias was for proper dress and decorum at meals. His crew would have preferred to spend at least one meal a day with their families, but he insisted that every sailor mess with their fellow sailors, and in full dress at that. After much protest, he did reluctantly include those concubines who worked for the Sciences Division, although he insisted that they wear the standard concubine shift.

Toddy stopped dead in astonishment at the apparition he beheld upon clearing the hatchway. The figure was indeed clad in a Confederacy uniform, but this was not a Confederacy colour Toddy was familiar with. Fleet Auxiliary blue, he knew – indeed was wearing. The Navy's black, he knew. The Marine Corps' green, he knew. Even the Civil Service grey he knew.

Butternut, on the other hand...

Standing in front of Toddy stood what appeared to be General Robert E. Lee, Confederate States of America, correct right on down to buttons and sword.

"You do look remarkably like him with that salt-and-pepper beard, Alex," one of the ship's officers was assuring Lieutenant Payne. "Is that resemblance a gift of your genetic heritage, or a miracle of the medical tubes?"

"The General is a distant relative, or so I've been told," the Virginian responded in his gentle Southern patrician accent.

Toddy was still standing silent, giving an excellent impression of a gaffed fish. Finally he found his voice. "I ... I told you ... to wear ... your uniform..."

"This is my uniform," Payne advised him calmly.

"Your Confederacy uniform?" Toddy squeaked.

"Yes," General Lee, or rather Lieutenant Payne, responded with a calmness that was palpable. "Before I was extracted, I did Civil War re-enactments. Before she died, every year my wife and I would go to Bull Run, Gettysburg and Appomattox Court House."

"I didn't mean for you to wear the uniform of that Confederacy. The other Confederacy. You know, the Stellar Confederacy?" Toddy was getting desperate to insert some sort of reality into the conversation.

Payne, on the other hand, felt no such desperation. He deepened his Southern patrician drawl and advised the pompous little popinjay, "Sirrah, I have no idea what you could be referrin' to."

"By your leave, Captain," came a voice from behind Toddy. Moving aside, he found himself making way for two other members of his Sciences Division, Lieutenant Wilson and his concubine Sheila. Perhaps predictably, the Lieutenant's uniform was that of a Lieutenant in the Army of Northern Virginia and his concubine was dressed is a southern belle, complete with parasol.

"Mint Julep, my dear?" Wilson enquired of his concubine. He noted that Payne had yet to be served with a drink. "Ah, General, no one has served you yet. Perhaps I could interest you in a Mint Julep as well?"

"Certainly, Lieutenant Wilson," Lieutenant Payne nodded politely. "Thank you kindly. That would be most welcome."

By the time all six science officers and the four concubines assigned to assist them had arrived for lunch, Toddy found himself surrounded by a sizable contingent of the Army of Northern Virginia's officer corps. A row of six swords and six CSA officers' hats dangled from six pairs of pegs that lined the bulkhead beside the hatchway.

Toddy decided the most graceful path of action was to accept his ship's Science Division's latest act of borderline insubordination with all the grace he could muster. At least they were behaving like old-style Southern gentlemen, and the conversation in the Mess was convivial. It was quite close to the standard of decorum Toddy wanted in his ship's mess. For him, that made it a win-win situation.