Troy Rising 3 - The Hot Gate (4 page)

“The main reason I want to up the power continuously, just keep making mirrors until the sun is starting to look like a Dyson sphere, is defense. We need to be talking that up and seeing if we can shake the government tree for direct contributions. Okay, we’re beyond what we need for purely commercial reasons. Fine. Let’s see if the government will cough up some money to keep building and maintaining it. God knows they’ve used it enough. Wolf, how’s the Wolf SAPL coming?”

“Nominal,” David answered after a moment. “We’re continuing to about double power levels every year. And the newer designs should be less maintenance intensive than the early ones.”

“We were making it up as we went along,” Tyler said. “Staff cuts? I know I just said ‘build a new division’ but do we really need all the people we’ve got? My experience is that when you first go into something, you throw people at it. Then as you get more efficient you can lose some. Maybe we move them into the new division?”

“I think we’ve been through that period, already,” Skiles answered. “I don’t have any moral issue with cutting people but with the increases you’re asking for in power it’s more like hiring. That’s part of the cost.”

“Is Starbucks still in business?” Tyler asked. He desperately wanted to get out of his suit but it would be hard to segue while still on the phone.

“Yes?” Vance answered.

“They’re big on environmental stuff,” Tyler said. “And knowing them they’re still building outlets. How about ‘all orbital’ espresso makers?”

“We’d need fabber runs,” Skiles pointed out. “Which are being pretty much consumed by the military.”

“Figure it out,” Tyler said. “We can free up fabber runs if we sweet talk the right admirals. People need…stuff even in a war. Get with Wal-Mart. Get some civilian production going. Shake the government money tree since we’re beyond commercial use for the time being. Be honest about it and don’t get greedy, Mizell. We’re just asking for money to do upkeep and production past commercial needs. When commercial needs catch up, we drop the amount we need from the government. Apollo and LFD both have lobbyists on payroll. Use ’em. I’m done here. I’ve got another meeting.”

“Yes, sir,” Skiles said.

“Outside the box!”

* * *

“Hey, kids!” Tyler said, entering Bay Nineteen.

The view had apparently not palled despite the fact that he was late. Most of the kids were glued to the sapphire, pointing to all the activity that was going on in the main bay. They more or less ignored him.

“Uh…Mister Vernon?” a lieutenant said. He’d been standing near the door watching the controlled mayhem.

“The same,” Tyler said, looking around the room. There were two Navy officers, the LT and an ensign, in blues and a couple of pilots in flight suits. Make that a coxswain and an engineering mate from the tabs. Those two were answering most of the kids’ questions. The cox, who was female, looked like she was getting a little ragged. Come to think of it, he vaguely recognized her but he couldn’t place where.

“I didn’t know you were planning on visiting, sir,” the lieutenant said. “We were getting ready to wrap this up…”

“I know your schedule,” Tyler said. “I’m glad I’m not too late. I’ll need to interrupt it a bit since I am. Paris, lights up, please. Slowly. If I could have your attention!”

Dana turned away from the latest question as the lights came up in the compartment and was surprised to see Tyler Vernon standing by the bay doors.

“Shhh…” she said, holding up her hand and pointing to the rear. “I think you want to see this instead.”

She and the chaperones got the kids pointed in more or less the right direction after a moment.

“Hi, kids,” Mr. Vernon said. “My name’s Tyler Vernon. Let me just welcome you to the Troy. I’m sure other people have but… Anyway, this thing is pretty cool, huh?”

There was a polite murmur of agreement. Some of the kids were dumbstruck while others clearly weren’t sure who Vernon was. Or didn’t believe that the richest man in the system was talking to them.

“Come on over closer so I don’t have to shout,” Vernon said, waving for them to approach. “I was the guy who okayed you kids coming up here. There’s a bunch of reasons for that. I don’t know if you know how you were chosen but it was on a bunch of matrixes. When they pitched this idea to have a naming contest for Station Three I wasn’t too keen. Bottom-line is I name the stations.”

“Why?” Donny asked. Of course. “I mean, why you?”

“I came up with the idea,” Tyler said, grinning. “Maybe cause I’m short so I think big. I came up with the idea a long time before anybody thinks, long time before you kids were born. Before that Coxswain there or these officers were born. I was thinking about these when I built my first mirror, when I realized I could build my own mirror on maple syrup money. You think that counts for something?”

“Sure…” Donny said, nodding.

“Most of my life is history at this point,” Tyler said, walking over to the sapphire through the cluster of children. “And when I say history, I mean the kind that kids like you study already and will be studying as long as humanity holds onto life. The Maple Syrup War is just history to you kids. I lived it, every damned day.”

He paused and placed his hand on the sapphire, staring out at the main bay as if he’d forgotten the children behind him.

“The Maple Syrup war, the Horvath attacks, the Johannsen’s viruses… That’s all history to you kids and so it should be. You’re looking at the future. This is the future you kids are going to inherit and grow. Two million kids suggested names. About half that actually wrote essays. Half were more or less illegible so we’re down to five hundred thousand. There was room for thirty. The top thirty name choices, including the actual choice, were picked out. Then a group of people went over the essays looking for the best ones. You thirty were out of about three hundred thousand kids. I won’t say they were the best on any historical or artistic scale,” Vernon said, turning back around. “But they were pretty good. I read the last thousand. What I was looking for was something the rest weren’t. I used to be a cartoonist. That’s a lot of writing believe it or not. I was looking for…heart? I was looking for passion. I was looking for kids who weren’t doing the well-written essay as an exercise but really wanted to go into space.”

He looked around at them and you could have heard a bacteria drop in the room.

“I wanted to see the kids who were going to inherit this in heart and soul and mind,” Vernon said, gesturing out into the main bay. “At least that had a chance. We’re not going to be at war forever. I hope that her generation,” he said, gesturing at Dana with his chin, “will make it safe for you kids to grow up without fearing missiles from the sky. And if they manage it, you should be eternally grateful. That will make it possible for us to really get started on space.

“There are two terraformable worlds we’ve found so far. There are more systems beyond that we can’t even explore with the war going on. Space isn’t just the final frontier, it’s a frontier that keeps on expanding. I’m old. I mean, I know you think thirty is old. That your moms are old,” he said, smiling at the chaperones to defray the potential insult.

“That’s how kids think. But I’m old, kids. I may not live to see the end of this war. You will. You’re the torch bearers. You’re the people who are going to grow up and carry us to the stars. That was what I was looking for. The kids who were going to carry that torch. Not just the best argument for Islawanda.”

“Did Islawanda win?” one of the kids asked. Dana had noticed he had an accent. She realized he was probably a South African.

“Nope,” Vernon said. “Not this round. But the other reason I wanted you here was to be the first to learn the name of the new battlestation. What was the historical significance of the battle of Thermopylae?”

A dozen hands went up and Vernon smiled.

“You,” he said, pointing to one of the girls.

“Darn,” Donny said.

“Thermopylae was one of the three critical battles in the history of the wars between Greece and Persia,” the girl said as if quoting. “Despite being a defeat, it slowed the armies of Xerxes long enough for the Greeks to come to a union so that they had sufficient forces to defeat the Persians at Palatia. The heroic action of the Spartans at Thermopylae encouraged the Athenians, especially, to enter into a binding alliance with their traditional enemy, Sparta.”

“But what did the wars between Greece and Persia mean?” Vernon asked.

“Ooo! Ooo!” Donny shouted, waving his hand.

“I’ll get to you, chap,” Vernon said, pointing to the South African kid.

“The Greeks were fighting for freedom,” the child answered. “The Persians were slaves.”

“The Greeks kept plenty of slaves,” Vernon said. “But that is the essential point. At Salamis, another of those critical battles,” he said, nodding at the girl who had answered earlier, “the Greeks painted their ships with names like ‘Citizen,’ ‘Freedom,’ ‘Democracy.’ Even the Spartans, despite a rigid lifestyle that subsumed their identity to the state, were freer than any Persian. The Greeks, for all their problems and weaknesses, were the cornerstone of the concept of freedom and liberty which infuses Western culture. There are many reasons that the West was so successful and even now leads the Alliance to defend the solar system.

“But a great reason lay in those battles. Those battles shaped the concepts that lead to these that we now engage upon. There was no reason to fight the Horvath, you understand that? There was no economic reason for the maple syrup war. I was going to get paid for my maple syrup one way or another. And by fighting we placed the whole world in jeopardy. Which, believe me, did not make us very popular people at the time. The only reason that I fought, the only reason that many many other people fought, including my late friend Jason Hasselbauer, was because we believed in the cause of freedom. Does that give you a hint?”

“Changsha’s out, then?” an Asian child said.

“I hadn’t even heard of Changsha until I read the essays,” Vernon said. “And I read so many, Paris just recently had to remind me what it was.”

“Alamo,” a girl piped up.

“Tough one,” Tyler said. “Frankly…sorry, I didn’t think it was important enough.”

“It was the most important battle in creating the Republic of Texas!” the girl argued. “It’s…It’s…It’s the Alamo!”

“Stealing land from its rightful owners,” one of the children said. “Tenoxchitlan!”

“We’re talking about freedom and democracy and you’re arguing for the defeat of a heart-ripping-out theocracy?”

“By a Christian theocracy that was just as barbaric?”

“Whoa!” Vernon said, raising his hands. “And another reason to avoid certain choices. Iwo Jima?”

“Here!” a Japanese girl said, bouncing up and down.

“A famous victory,” Donny said, dismissively.

“The defense of Mount Suribachi is one of the most hard held defenses of all time!” the girl argued.

“Hiding in caves,” Donny said. “Very heroic. Try charging through black sand that sucks you down to your waist!”

“Again,” Vernon said, raising his hands and chuckling. “One that is a potential source of argument.”

“Jerusalem!”

“Which one?” a girl in a headscarf asked. “In defense of Palestine? Holding off the Crusaders?”

“You probably won’t like the choice,” Vernon said, grinning. “But I’m really glad you kids know your history. Maybe you can avoid repeating it.”

“You went for Istanbul,” the girl said, pouting. “Sorry, Constantinople.”

“Nope,” Vernon said. “But getting closer. Sorry, just my opinion, but the advance of Islam can be looked at as the same advance as was fought by the Spartans at Thermopylae. The imposition of control of thought from the East if you will. Islam brought with it that essential mindset that all men are slaves to a higher power. The Persians it was Xerxes and Darius as god-kings. Islam simply substituted Allah and kept the same thought-process. Again, you may not agree, but it’s my battlestation. Okay, that’s the final clue. Any takers.” He looked at Donny. “Come on, kid. You had all the answers.”

“Vienna?” Donny answered. “Uh…Tyre? Uh…Lepanto!”

“Thought seriously about Lepanto,” Vernon said, nodding. “But I just couldn’t come up with a good symbol. Another clue.”

He looked around at the group and after a moment a girl who had mostly been reading a book reader raised her hand.

“Go,” Vernon said.

“Malta?”

“The Knights of Malta were a religious order which had been formed as the defenders of Jerusalem during the Crusades,” Vernon said. “When Jerusalem was lost they relocated to Rhodes. There they were attacked, again, by the Ottomans. They put up such a strong defense that the Ottoman caliph allowed them to withdraw. They relocated to Malta and used it to harass Muslim shipping and keep the Muslims from establishing full control over the Mediterranean.

“In fifteen sixty-five the knights, which numbered between seven hundred and a thousand according to which count you use and men-at-arms numbering about eight thousand, were attacked by thirty-six thousand blooded Ottoman troops. Every time the Western forces had been attacked by the Muslims in the previous two centuries they eventually lost. It was assumed that Malta would be lost as well. I’ll let you read up on the defense. It was wily, bloody and hard-held as anything in history. But in the end, they won. And by winning they blunted the Ottoman advance in the Mediterranean and set up the conditions that led to the victory at…” he nodded at Donny, “Lepanto. Venice could have never become the power it eventually became without the victory at Malta. And what is the difference between Malta and, say, Thermopylae?”

He looked around at the group then pointed to the girl with the book reader.

“Come on, I know you know it.”

“It was a victory for the West,” the girl answered. “Troy and Thermopylae were defeats.”

“I had no clue if Troy and Thermopylae would work when I created them,” Vernon said. “If the Rangora had sent through AVs before we had Therm or more AVs on the last attack…it would have been a near run thing. The best I was honestly hoping for was such an epic defeat that…well, that humans would be as hard to govern by force as they ever are. That in time we might rise to freedom again.”