Troy Rising 2 - Citadel (21 page)

“You will leave us defenseless,” the French Prime Minister said.

“Not at all,” the President said. "You have left yourselves defenseless. The countries of India, Canada, Britain, Finland, Australia, Chile and Brazil all meet the requirements or come close enough to be automatic members, if they wish to accept the additional provisos. There are already British, Australian and Canadian members of the crew of the Troy. One can be assured that the US will defend it's true friends as if we were a single country.

"The world has become used to the US cleaning up its messes, defending it, stabilizing it and generally reaping the benefits of America's commitment to democracy, free trade and freedom without incurring any of the massive cost involved. Now the world expects the US to defend it, again, reaping even more benefits, while America bleeds.

“Not going to happen,” the President said, looking around. “You can toss your ante on the table or you can damned well die. And that concludes my statement.”

“I need to talk to the President.”

Lance Aterberry, Secretary of Energy, was a rarity in a cabinet position: Someone who actually knew something about their field. Most cabinet appointees had worked in the field they “covered” at one point or another, but most of them were not technical experts. Secretaries of Defense had rarely been generals. Few Secretaries of State had ever been Ambassadors.

Lance Aterberry, on the other hand, had a PhD in electrical engineering and had worked in the field of power generation and supply for thirty years before he ran for Congress. He'd been picked as a natural to run the department and his biggest challenge so far had been dealing with the bureaucracy from on top instead of bottom. He was finding it no more comprehensible as the boss than as a customer.

The fortunate fact was that the increasing access to Glatun designed He3 power plants had made his job easier and easier. Glatun plants produced no radiation, were relatively cheap to run compared to the power they put out and were a very small footprint. Even Florida and California were catching up on their energy requirements leaving him free to attempt to reform the most moribund and entrenched bureaucracy in the US with the possible exceptions of Agriculture and Education.

All that relative ease had just gone out the window, however, with the blockade of the Terran system.

“Everyone needs to talk to the President,” the Chief of Staff said. “There's a war on, you know. Unless it's a warning that the Rangora are coming through the gate . . .”

“How about all the lights are about to go off?” Lance said. “I'm serious. I need to talk to the President now.”

“What do you mean the lights are about to go off?” the Chief of Staff said.

“We've converted fifteen percent of our power generation to He3,” Lance said, patiently. “The only source of He3 is the Glatun. Do the math.”

“Holy . . .” the Chief of Staff said. “I'll call you back.”

“How did we go to fifteen percent of our power depending on an interstellar energy source?” the President said, looking around at the assembled group of advisors. It was late at night on Air Force One and he wasn't enjoying the discussion.

“Because it's clean, cheap and easy,” Aterberry said. “Companies have been shuttering other plants because they get less trouble from environmentalists using annie plants than coal, nuclear or even hydro. And we had a lot of plants damaged or destroyed in the bombardments. It just made more sense to build annie plants.”

“Except it is a strategic handicap,” the Secretary of Defense said. “It's one that we've been bringing up in meetings. But it's not just energy production. All our ships run on He3.”

“Tell me there's an answer,” the President said. “Isn't Apollo working on a plant in the Wolf system?”

“They're at least three months from being online,” the SecEng said. “And they won't go to full production right away. Figure six months before we'll have the same access to supplies that we got with the Glatun. And the total available He3 in the system will last us about three weeks.”

“We need that fuel for the fleet,” the Secretary of Defense said. “We'll need all of it.”

“Forget the fleet,” the SecEng said. “Forget the construction on new hulls. They're going to have to be orbital babies for the time being. Troy runs on He3. No power, no air, no water, no Troy. No food and material resupply.”

“How much fuel do ships use?” the President asked, confused. “They don't use that much energy, do they?”

“Yes, sir, they do,” the SecDef said, looking pensive.

“There's no free lunch, Mister President,” the SecEng said. “To boost out of the atmosphere, to accelerate in free-fall, requires energy. Just because they don't have big, thundering rockets, doesn't mean they're not expending as much energy. A Constitution class can lift itself out of the grav well, technically. Imagine the number and size of rockets that would require to lift something twice the size of a supercarrier up to orbit. That's how much energy they use, Mr. President. And it all comes from He3.”

“Can we make them nuclear somehow?” the President asked.

“No,” the SecDef said. “First of all, it would require so much refitting that we'd use up too much fuel doing the work. Second, they can't dump the heat well enough.”

“Troy might be able to,” the SecEng said, thoughtfully. “It's actually pretty cold.”

“We have six plants from Los Angeles class subs that haven't been torn down,” the SecDef said. “Actually, I think they've already been transferred to your department. Any idea if they can be installed in the Troy?”

“I'm not sure about the construction requirements and getting the plants to them would be a stretch . . .”

“When I was in Switzerland I kept thinking that there was someone missing from the summit,” the President said. “Anyone know where Tyler Vernon's got to?”

“He was in the Wolf system last week,” the SecDef said. “Checking on the construction of the new fabber, some quality issues from the current one and the fuel plant.”

“I think we need to see if we can track him down, don't you?”

As the Starfire cleared the gate, Tyler's implant dinged for attention.

“Hello, Argus,” Tyler said. “Is there any good news?”

The pilot of the Starfire suddenly made a sharp maneuver. Due to the inertial controls, Tyler didn't even feel it. But the chunk of metal the maneuver avoided was clearly visible as it flashed by the crystal wall making up one side of the Starfire.

“Not as such,” Argus said. “There is a critical issue having to do with fuel.”

“I was discussing that in Wolf,” Tyler said.

“On that subject,” Argus said. “The President of the United States has been trying to get through to you.”

“I had my com on hold,” Tyler said. “I was trying to think of a way to find more fuel. Go ahead and put him through.”

The entire battlefield, dispersed as it was, was visible as the shuttle, slowly, accelerated towards Earth. Tyler tried not to curse. He'd have to shut down all the salvage operat . . .

“Mr. Tyler, this is the President.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. President,” Tyler said, chippily. “How are you today?”

“The Rangora declared war, I declared that we're not going to fight it alone, the stock market just tanked and we don't have enough fuel to support our fleet, or Troy. I've just found out that we can't even feed the terrestrial power plants which means people that are already sacrificing are going to be without power. My advisors say that you probably don't have enough fuel on hand to complete your fuel plant. The French option is looking better and better. Other than that, things are dandy. You?”

“I'm in a great mood, Mr. President,” Tyler said, grinning. “Just peachy keen.”

“You sound like you are,” the President said. “In which case you either weren't listening or you've finally cracked.”

“Or I just found a pile of fuel for the taking,” Tyler said, grinning like a fox that just ate the chicken. “I'm not sure how much, but it's enough to finish the Wolf mine unless I'm much mistaken. And the best part is I own it.”

“Along with everything else,” the President said, confused. “Where?”

“The Horvath ships, Mr. President,” Tyler said. “The Horvath ships. They weren't going to come into the system without fuel. They knew we didn't have any. All the ones that aren't toast are going to have pretty close to full tanks. I count seven in view that probably have thousands of gallons. We'll just siphon it out.”

“That's . . . some siphon,” the President said.

“Yeah,” Tyler said. “It's going to be more complicated than that. We'll get 'er done. By the way, congratulations on proving the US actually retains a set of balls. But . . . a unified force? You sure?”

“Better than putting up with crap like Monty pulled in ETO,” the President said.

“That is a point,” Tyler said. “Mr. President, I've got to go. I've got calls to make.”

“Fourteen Alpha, Survey.”

“Survey, Fourteen Alpha,” Price replied.

BFM and Butch were cutting out a set of Rangora laser optics. That was about all Butch could figure out of the explanation. That and the “multi-million dollar” part. And “be very careful.”

Survey generally didn't have much to do with the welders. They were working on the ships that were salvageable whole and preferred to not have people bent on cutting them up around.

“We have a priority tasking,” Survey commed. “You're the closest team.”

“We're sort of busy here, Survey,” Price replied. “Maybe later.”

“The tasking is from corporate, Fourteen Alpha,” Survey commed.

“Survey says . . .” Butch said.

“Very effing funny,” BFM commed. “Go ahead, Survey.”

“Need you to go find a readout, get it functioning and give us a reading. We'll walk you through it.”

“Roger, Survey,” Price commed, cutting off his torch. “Let's go take a walk, Butch.”

“Got the power coupling hooked up?” Survey asked.

“Yep,” Price replied.

The readout was mounted on a bulkhead not too far from where they'd been working. Problem was, there wasn't any power.

The sleds had various connections for supplying power, though, and one of them could even be rigged to connect to Horvath and Rangora systems.

“Set to output of128 volts alternating current, sixty-four hertz,” Survey commed.

“Output set,” Price replied.

“And power up.”

“Power's up,” Price commed.

“What's the reading?”

“I can't see it from this position,” Price commed. “Butch?”

“Three-one-six-four-seven-nine,” Butch said. The implants automatically converted the Horvath numbers. Butch didn't even “see” the actual numbers.

“Thank you, Fourteen Alpha,” Survey commed. “That's what we needed.
Break it down.”

“Can I ask what we just did?” Price commed.

“That's the output for the port fuel tank on that destroyer,” Survey replied. “Three hundred and sixteen thousand, four hundred and seventy-nine Galactic gallons. Which are about one point two standard gallons.”

“That's a lot of fuel.”

“For which we should all be grateful. Because it's the only fuel left in the system.”

“Fourteen Alpha, Salvage Control.”

“Control, Fourteen Alpha.”

“Return to the barn. We're being retasked.”

“Roger,” Price commed. “We just about had those optics unmounted.”

“Negative,” Control said. “Just get back here. There's bigger things doing.”

“Crap,” Butch said.

“I could do with a shower,” Price replied. “Let's get out of here, junior. And watch your fricking positioning.”

Nearly twenty years ago, the Horvath had announced their ownership of the Terran system by dropping kinetic energy weapons on Cairo, Mexico City and Shanghai. The Glatun temporarily kicked them out of the system, giving earth time to develop weapons of its own. When they came back they dropped a plague and when that didn't work, dropped more bombs. Then more.

Since every time the Horvath targeted major capitals, the US government had finally gotten the hint and dispersed. Congress met through electronic means, video conferencing and voting, and with the exception of the Pentagon, nobody really gathered in large groups. Most major governments had done the same. Nobody wanted to be the target of a Horvath or now Rangora weapon.

Tyler, therefore, could have had the present conversation in the Wolf system. But he was rather happier with Troy wrapped around him.

“First priority keep Troy running and continue work to upgrade the SAPL system interlocks,” Tyler said. “But at absolute minimum power. Second priority, keep enough fuel going into the Wolf system to keep the work on the gas mine going to completion. I'm trying to prioritize some things there. We've stopped all non-essential production in Granadica and on the SAPL. I'm trying to figure out, my people are looking at, whether we can throw more equipment at the mine to speed things up. The question is priorities, priorities, priorities.”

“We need to keep the fleet fueled,” the SecDef said. “You can't have all of it.”

“Park the ships in the Troy, put the crews ashore and draw down their power to minimum maintenance,” Tyler said. “If we don't get that gas mine finished, we're all going to be sucking fumes. We need to keep an eye on absolute levels and when we're down to minimum reserves, start pulling people out and dropping them back on Earth. You don't want to leave people in space and out of fuel. That includes Troy, by the way.”

“I'm not sure I can accept simply parking the fleet,” the SecDef said. “We need to maintain and train.”

“We've got enough fuel to finish the mine and keep Troy running and the fleet on maintenance,” Tyler said. “But those cruisers are gas hogs. They need to be parked for the duration. We're diverting some of the power to get some processors up and running on the lower platform atmo. We also have to build a tanker big enough to handle the output. We'll have some fuel flowing in a couple of weeks. But running the fleet, for now, has to be the lowest priority. I'll make sure you have enough fuel to make up the difference, later. Right now I'm worried about how much fuel it's taking to get the fuel. You can't, actually, just siphon He3.”