Chapter 18

The original families of the clan now were ready to start recruiting friends and colleagues, some of whom would be sponsor grade and beginning their own households. Certain individuals would pose special challenges, which might be addressed by a medical department perhaps more extensive than strictly needed when medtubes were available, and the AIs regard people with behavioral problems as damaged goods.

All knew they had to deal with children both before and after Sponsor age, but relatively few had experience with children. Bob and Siobhan were the only ones that hadn't worked in a leadership or intelligence role. Bob, who also was their father-in-chief, was a quantitative analyst who had gone to the elementary school teaching he loved. Siobhan was a cognitive psychologist. They, and Mary, were the only Pirates who had young children.

There were several reasons to work the children into the Pirates. Most of them would be able to assist primary Pirates, and, in several cases, a youngster just might have a talent that could bloom into early genius. Perhaps there could be a Mozart of Sa'arm killing.

Some children just might move into specialties that no one in the clan covered. For example, unless and until they could convince Harry Sinatra to join them, there was no full practitioner of one of the major intelligence disciplines, geospatial and imagery intelligence -- taking and analyzing pictures. Many of the skills there overlapped into electro-optical MASINT. Bob's son Charlie was fifteen, a photographer, but also had been studying photographic engineering. With maturity at 14, children of the Confederacy had to grow fast, and Charlie seemed to have inherited his father's mathematical abilities.

The Pirates' plan was to bring the children to stay with their parents, in conventional rooms to start. While neither Bob nor Siobhan had ever refused to discuss sex with their children, Bob dated very little and Siobhan not at all. As a result, the children did not have much exposure, at home, to adult sexuality, although they had seen lots of affection and respect. Siobhan and her late husband, however, had kept the children quite unaware of D&S, and the Pirates were not sure how best to handle this in the closer quarters of the Nest.

There was a little time to deal with Siobhan's brood, as they were staying with the Marine training center where she had worked. Very informally, her older children were getting quite a lot of Marine training. Terry had received a message from a somewhat puzzled Marine liaison, offering to keep the children and cats safe at the Marine station. In particular, they thought the twins, Brigid and Brian, were, according to the Sergeant Major, "a shitload better than anything we get in Basic -- hell, better than half the butterbars. In fact, they might even be safe with a map." The latter was the ultimate compliment from a Marine top sergeant, since it was widely known that the most dangerous thing to the Corps was a second lieutenant with a map.

Several of the children, even though young, had promise of being very useful assistants. While the concubines had not gotten sponsor level CAP scores, none had low intelligence and adaptability scores and all had passed their smarts and their flexibility to their children. Terry was confident that some of the children would qualify as sponsors, and, as well, some of the concubines would on retesting. More often than not, the concubines had not achieved the needed score due to a lack of confidence, aggressiveness, or other personality traits that he guided the household to improve. Terry continued to talk to the Confederacy project working on to find ways to raise CAP scores, and knew that experience in actual Confederacy operations could easily raise scores.

The more traditional adults had long talks, and decided that the Pirates needed a little more bonding time before initiating two more into the Crew. "Initiating", in this case, probably was going to have more than one meaning. Bob didn't think that they had had full intercourse yet, for they had been more interested in their research than in dating. Greta, who did manage to work modern dance into her long days, had more contact with peers. In general, he had answered their mostly scientific questions about sex, and made it clear that he would always answer any sex-related question as best he could. As long as they weren't hurting anyone, he also would help them be safe in whatever they did, or deal with consequences of unwise act -- without trying to blame. He thought they respected that.

Greta and Rebecca, with their intelligence, certainly knew that they were starting to have new privileges. Bob, as well as other Pirates with whom they talked, told them that the next few weeks would be so stressful that it wasn't a good time for them to complicate their lives more than necessary. The adults promised to help them ease into the new roles, and would respect Rebecca and Greta's choices.

The adults did agree that some things would stay behind closed doors for a while, such as BDSM. No one was ashamed of these things, but the assumption was that they needed to be introduced, on an individual basis, as members of the Junior Crew were ready to deal with the matter.

Bob Owens' son Charlie, who had just turned 15, was fascinated with photography, and had been learning advanced mathematics from his father. Confederacy forces really hadn't created a mechanism to bring young sponsor-level people into the system while the military was building, much less mentor them through sleep learning, and then the application of sleep learning.

Charlie had met Dolores through his father, and managed to be charming if only slightly concealing that he considered her a quintessential MILF. With Terry's encouragement, Dolores chatted with Charlie about his intellectual interests and professional aspirations – "yes, I know you're 14, Charlie, but in this Brave New World, you're an adult and need to think about adult things." It wasn't easy to get Dolores to blush, but when he grinned and she thought about it, she did get a bit red, then laughed and thrust her chest forward.

"Charlie, I don't think you've yet met Elaine, but she will interest you for a couple of reasons. First, she's a forensic scientist who knows more about photography than any of us. Second, she's shorter and slimmer than I am, which makes her large boobs look even larger. Your turn to blush, now?"

"Again for mixed reasons, you'll want to spend some time with Kim. While Elaine has the breadth of practical and scientific photographic knowledge, Kim is the expert on geospatial information, photogrammetric measurement, and some of the related image processing."

Charlie was no slouch, and decided to try exploring an adult concept. "So you're telling me that Elaine's breadth do or do not have as much depth as Kim's?"

Dolores laughed in delight. "Charlie, I'm delighted you trust me enough to make a remark like that. Oh, I'm not propositioning you right now, but, again in the new world, you are going to sexually mature quickly as well as grow intellectually. When things feel right, any of the women I've mentioned, as well as others in our clan, are happy to help you explore sex as well as intellect -- not that the most important sex organ isn't your brain. Never worry that honest flirtation, and even a hard pass unless you get a clear no, won't be appreciated.

Charlie let out a sigh of relief, and Dolores gave him a warm, comforting hug. "Let's get Elaine involved. I also want you to interact with some of the young female Sponsors." She stopped for a moment. "I've been making assumptions. Are you most interested in women? It's quite all right if you like men in addition to, or instead of. I've never limited myself to a single gender."

That did get Charlie choking a bit, and then said "I'm straight. Glad to know you feel that way, as I have some gay male and female friends."

"OK, Charlie. Let me talk to Elaine and Kim, and I'll get back soon. Umm ... just so you know you can relax..." She moved close to him, and, while it wasn't her personal best, gave him a deep kiss that was the most intense he had ever experienced. She moved his hands to her butt and gave him a wiggle. When he started to gasp, she let go, and laughed "later. The challenge is going to be with whom you lose your virginity. Take it from me ... as long as you lose it pleasantly, you'll never miss it. Seriously, I think you need some practice first before getting any young concubines."

Dolores dropped into Elaine's lab. "I am so glad to see a smiling face, Dolores. Really, really, I need a break from concentrating on this Harry thing."

"I can imagine. Terry talked to me about it. I know Harry, of course, but I haven't got the close relationship with him that you, Kim, and Terry have."

"Yeah. He's one of the most alive people I've ever known, but the Sa'arm thing, I think, is telling him that his life is over and he should gracefully turn over to the next generations, then fade away."

Harry Sinatra was the grand old man of U.S. imagery intelligence. Terry, Kim, and Elaine all had worked closely with him, revered him technically, and didn't stop there but went into deep friendship and love. Even though Terry was only chronologically 15 years younger, he saw Harry as a spiritual father.

Harry was intellectually vigorous and had a high CAP, but he was also 95 years old, and saw himself as an elder statesman and mentor. No one that knew him felt that was a desirable limitation, but he seemed to think that his being rejuvenated would prevent younger people from going into space. The reality was that his 9.5 CAP would let him bring more, not fewer.

Terry and the others desperately wanted him to come with them, rejuvenated, selecting promising assistants and building the Pirate skill set.

"Maybe I can distract and let you clear your head. We are both, after all, experts in the use of big, shapely boobs. Isn't it nice that we don't have to worry about political correctness any longer? Actually, boobs are part of the reason I wanted to talk, but we certainly can play first, especially if that clears your head."

Both women were large-chested enough to want to wear mild support bras for daily activities, although they had nothing against having bras that enhanced. Elaine tossed her head, showing tension, and Dolores moved behind her chair, squatting so she could pull Elaine's head into her cleavage. She reached around to fondle Elaine, who let out a soft squeal of tension releasing. "Oh, hell, yes, Dolores. You know what I'd like? Get a chair so you can be comfortable behind me, pull my head into your chest, fondle my boobs, and talk dirty to me while I jill myself off. Yep, not PC."

Meeting with the Pirates over dinner, Terry asked, "how can we get Harry to accept his life isn't over, that he has much to give, and there's a point to his being rejuvenated? Dolores, I hate to mention that you're really a little older than I am, but do you have any perspectives? Elaine, I know he's been your mentor and you are close. Kim, while you weren't as close as Elaine, there's been a warm working relationship between you two."

Somehow, they needed to get him to accept rejuvenation and, not facetiously, a second life. Dolores had a thought. "Didn't he mentor you when you were fairly early in your careers?"

Elaine agreed. "Yes, it was informal for me, but there was some informal networking between Harry's group and the Maryland State Police lab. Probably would have been illegal if anyone looked at it. Beyond that, however, he'd do things like lecture and judge at the serious regional photo groups. Hey, hang on a minute -- I remember now that he'd speak to high school groups, and he'd also make assistantships available for high school kids if the clearances could be worked out.

Elaine looked at Kim. "Do you think he might get interested in Charlie and some of the other youngsters that like photographic sciences? Maybe we've been trying too hard to get him involved at the strategic level."

Kim smiled. "You may be onto something. I've been doing some thinking about some optical sensors for the ships, but even more doing some Confederacy enhancements on standard recon packages that we could put into recon drones, satellites, ships, and other platforms. If Charlie has a pretty solid knowledge of fields of view and such, I could use him to help, and, if he's got the math, I could start introducing him to photogrammetry.

"Aren't there some other kids with relevant interests? Harry isn't doing that much. Maybe we could motivate him to be the equivalent of Newton teaching basic physics."

Mary chimed in. "My son Kevin is definitely interested in photography and science. He's 13."

Terry jumped in. "I realize that a former girlfriend of mine, who could contribute to our effort, also had a wisely suppressed interest in teenage men, when she was teaching. She just might be someone that would help initiate our younger men. She is more interested in women than in adult men; I'm not sure where that would place her. Mary, Bob, I'd like you to meet Jill and give me your impression as parents.