Vicky Peterwald: Survivor (Vicky Peterwald Series Book 2) (7 page)

S
TRIDING
confidently toward Vicky was a Navy commander in undress greens. He looked tall, strong, and handsome, with a self-deprecating grin that almost left him boyish.

He saluted the admiral, then offered Vicky his hand.

She did not take it.

“I don’t need another escort sacrifice,” Vicky snapped.

“I believe you do. Commander Franz Boch, this is the Grand Duchess Victoria. Vicky to her friends.”

“So Gerrit told me,” the fellow said, smile still there.

Vicky decided to squelch it fast. “Commander, the last two men who got too close to me ended up dead or broken. That doesn’t include the two dead admirals.”

“I know, Your Grace. Gerrit told me a lot.”

“A lot,” Vicky said through a scowl. How much danger would a man risk for a chance to get laid?

“He warned me you can get shocky when you’ve been under a lot of stress, and that I should keep a thermal blanket handy or be prepared to surrender my coat.”

“You know Gerrit?” Vicky said, only half a question.

“We were roommates at the Academy and shared rooms
aboard several ships as junior officers. We know each other very well.”

“How well?”

The commander looked at Vicky with the most open face she had ever encountered. “He told me you keep your promises.”

“You’ll be getting no promises from me.”

“No problem, Your Grace.”

Vicky spun around to face the admiral. “Where does the Navy get these lemmings, so eager to die?”

“I do not know, Your Grace, I’m just glad that Greenfeld still has a few. Maybe enough to get us through these times.”

Vicky raised her eyebrows at that bit of philosophy and stormed off to where a limo awaited her.

The commander managed to get there first and open the door for her.

She settled in with an ungracious “Thanks,” and suppressed the urge to tell the driver to move on while the commander scrambled around the car to his own door.

Somehow, she kept her mouth shut. As he settled in beside her and buckled up, he asked, “Where are we going?”

“I’ve been asked to chair a meeting of The Initiative. It appears that some things were not fully considered the night I was almost blown up.”

“How interesting.”

“Can you fly a shuttle?” Vicky snapped.

“Yes, Your Grace.”

“Fly a spaceship single-handed through jumps?”

“It would depend on its size and equipment, Your Grace. A Revenge class battleship might be a bit much to handle single-handedly.”

“Do all Navy commanders come equipped with a weird sense of humor?”

“Most that I’ve met, Your Grace.”

“Quit ‘Your Grace’ing’ me.”

“Yes, Your Grace,” came out with that boyish grin.

“I’m Vicky.”

“I’m Frank, more often than not, though a few still keep the ‘Z’ sound and make it Franz.”

“What do you want me to call you?” Vicky said, then realized she’d left herself open for some bedroom reply.”

“Frank or Franz, whichever rolls off your tongue easier . . . Vicky,” he said, testing the last word and finding it . . . acceptable.

Vicky decided he might be a keeper. “I hate to be made a fool of in public. If you think you have a better idea, hold on to it until we can talk it over in private. Exception to that is when you’re in the command chair of a shuttle or ship. You call the shots there. I listen and do what I can to help.”

“Gerrit told me how that worked out well for you two.”

“I don’t know what else Gerrit told you, but I’m drawing a new line. You’ll have your quarters. I’ll have mine. I will make you no promises.”

The grin was gone from Frank’s face. A look of puzzlement replaced it. Then enlightenment.

“Ah, so it was that way.”

“What way?”

“I beg your pardon, ma’am. There were things that Gerrit got quiet about. Evasive. Him being very good at evasion, I didn’t figure out what they were. I think I’ve got a better understanding now.”

He paused as if to choose his next words as carefully as one might choose a next step in a minefield.

“Commander Schlieffen told me nothing about any personal relationship that he and you might have had. If you think that I accepted this job with any expectations of any relationship except a proper professional one, or that which a subject might have with his Grand Duchess, I wish to correct that now.”

He eyed Vicky for a moment, then let his gaze fall to the seat between them.

Good!
Vicky thought.
That’s cleared up.

Probably.

The rest of the drive was a silent one.

V
ICKY
had often joked that her education at the palace had included little beyond needlepoint and the Kama Sutra for both offense and defense. The joke had been bitter . . . and true.

Hank had gotten all the business training from the time he was six. He’d learned the ins and outs of manufacturing, markets, and trade.

Of course, then he’d gone to the Navy and gotten himself killed.

Vicky had gone to the Navy with nothing much at all. Less than nothing. Admiral Krätz had made it clear to her that she had a lot of bad habits, and he intended for her to break them.

After she got caught in a paint locker with a really cute ensign, the admiral had taken her out back for a tanning. His words, not hers, and brought back a young Vicky with a vow of chastity.

She had managed to live with it about as long as the admiral managed to survive her.

The Navy had taught her to stand a watch, shine her shoes, and do a decent job of analyzing a problem in gunnery.

Unfortunately, the problems Vicky faced now had more to do with markets.

Once again, she was learning.

She had seen planets starving and come up with a solution not all that different from the times when she’d shared out stolen cookies with her five-year-old playmates. Of course, it had been a bit easier, then.

Today, she sat down with people who saw a trading-and-marketing system that had choked up and needed to get moving again. They were older, but the hunger in their eyes wasn’t that much different from her five-year-old friends.

“Those crystal miners,” a gruff fisherman said. “You can’t offer them survival biscuits. They risk their life to harvest that stuff. They know its worth. They’re gonna want fresh shrimp and lobster.”

“Steaks, hams, and good frozen fruit and vegetables,” a rancher added.

“Some of those miners follow religious dietary rules,” another put in. “I’ve got the mutton they’ll want.”

“We’ll need a refrigerated cargo ship,” Mannie concluded. “Is there one laid up in orbit?”

“Commander Boch, will you check on that?” Vicky said, glancing from her seat at the head of the table to where he sat behind her.

“Already on it, Your Grace. The
Frozen Christmas Goose
has been laid up for three months. I’ve got a call in to its skipper to see if he can raise a crew and get his ship up and running in three weeks.”

There was a beep. The commander glanced at his wrist unit. “He says, ‘Hell yes, or he’ll push the old girl out of orbit himself,’ Your Grace.”

“I think we have the ship you want,” Vicky said.

“There are three other refrigerated cargo ships trailing the station,” the commander added. “They’ve been parked longer. If the
Goose
won’t run, one of the others will.”

“Good,” Mannie said. “Sevastopol is loading out most of the first fleet. If we make it happen, there will be more following us.”

“If I get my hands on that market, those latecomers can sing for their supper,” the rancher growled.

“Assuming we don’t lose our shirt,” the fisherman pointed out.

“No risk, no bucks,” was the rancher’s final rumble.

Vicky was hardly needed for the rest of the meeting. There was a lot of talk about spare parts and raw resources likely needed by the fabricating mills on both Posnan and Presov. The people around the table had streaming databases of what those planets had usually ordered before trade collapsed. They were ready to supply those needs again.

The difference between what had been done in days gone by and what would be happening if Vicky got her wish to start trade again was one single word. Money. When credit had dried up from the central banks on Greenfeld, managers found they could neither sell their products nor buy critical spare parts or raw feedstock to support production.

When enough businesses fell into this vicious cycle, everything collapsed.

Trade for this initial round would have to be handled strictly on a barter basis. If you want what the trade fleet brought, you’d have to offer something in return. If St. Petersburg offered enough of what they wanted, and they had what the people around this table wanted, trade would start up again.

If not, the collapse would continue. Only this time, there would be no hope at all.

A lot depended on the men and women here at the table guessing right and putting the right product on the four ships the Navy would escort.

Five now that the
Frozen Christmas Goose
had been added.

About halfway through the meeting, Vicky began to get a bad feeling.

“How much of these ships’ cargo holds do you plan on filling with your goods and gear?” she put in when the room fell silent for a moment.

“We don’t know exactly what the crystal miners will need. It’s better to take extra cargo than discover we don’t have the right part to get a mill up and running when we get there.”

“And how much of the cargo space will that leave for humanitarian supplies?” Vicky shot back.

“There will be space for some.”

“How much?” Vicky bore in.

“Maybe a third. Maybe less.”

“No,” Vicky snapped.

“What do you mean, no?” the rancher shot back.

“Half of the cargo is for survival rations,” Vicky said flatly.

“You can’t be serious about that?” had way too much skepticism in it and maybe a bit of “little woman,” cut off just in time.

“You give me half the cargo by cubic meter, or you can get some other figurehead to open the next meeting.”

“You’re willing to risk that we won’t have a critical part?” one industrialist said, incredulously. “This whole effort could collapse for want of a nail, as they say.”

“Poznan will collapse completely if we don’t feed the workforce that’s been driven into the badlands to fend for themselves. We need to feed those starving to death quietly in the outback, where no one has to look at them.”

“She has a point. Fabrication mills don’t run themselves. The more skilled the worker, the better,” the fisherman agreed.

“Right now, too many of those workers have been driven away from the plants. You may have the part in storage, but if they can’t find the worker to install it, what good is it?” Vicky demanded.

“That’s the likely situation on Poznan. Presov may be in better shape.”

“Presov is only a few short jumps away,” Vicky pointed out. “You need one spare part, you make a call back to St. Petersburg and have it sent out on the next ship.”

“They’ll charge an arm and a leg,” an industrialist pointed out.

“And you won’t charge the same arm and leg if you find out that you hold the kingpin for that whole arm of industry?” Vicky asked.

The man reddened but made no answer.

A call went up to see if some more ships could be quickly made ready for the fleet.

Vicky had to smile.

Kris Longknife had put together a Fleet of Discovery. She hadn’t actually commanded all of it, but she had admirals following her corvettes around in their mighty battleships like puppies after their mommy.

Vicky was putting together a Fleet of Desperation. If she was lucky, she’d have maybe seven or nine worn-out and ill-crewed merchant ships.

But unlike Kris Longknife, Vicky would know what she was heading into. She’d have spare parts and survival rations in place and not have to wait for her grandfather to dump some Hellburners in her lap.

Interesting difference.

Of course, Princess Kris Longknife had known how to buffalo admirals and get them stampeding in the direction she wanted.

This Grand Duchess just hoped she could get these businessmen, intent on their own self-interest, to deliver enough stale biscuits to starving people on the verge of cannibalism.

Vicky considered the comparison of missions between her and Kris Longknife and found it well balanced.

Yes, Kris Longknife’s mission was a hell of a lot more than Vicky’s. But then, Vicky’s skills and experience were a hell of a lot less than Kris’s.

Vicky shrugged. No doubt Kris had started out smaller, too. If Vicky had the time, she ought to reread Princess Longknife’s file with an eye toward her younger years.

Then again, Vicky was too busy learning and doing to waste time reading files that usually missed the main point anyway.

The meeting ended with no further surprises. Vicky’s fleet had grown by three ships. That had to be good.

“W
HERE
do you plan to get money for three more ships?” the station manager exploded when Vicky had him called into Admiral van Mittleburg’s office to discuss the latest changes on what was actually being called the Fleet of Desperation.

Take that, Kris Longknife,
Vicky thought with a smile.

“You’ve got the ships trailing the station,” Vicky pointed out. “Certainly the crews are around here someplace.”

“Not on your life. Do you think I wanted a lot of out-of-work sailors lying around my station? No way. I shipped them dirtside as fast as I could. They’re gone. They aren’t available.”

“And the eight crews we do have?” Vicky asked.

“I found odd jobs for the best of them. Got rid of some of my less-than-satisfactory station workers. I can’t say that I’m glad to have them shipping out on your ships, but they’re here for you.”

The admiral glanced at Vicky and grinned.

“And where will you get replacements for the hands that ship out?” Vicky asked.

The admiral nodded, and if anything, his grin got bigger.

“I’ll put some feelers out dirtside. Feelers, mind you. I
don’t want every dog-eyes swabbie hitching rides up here on every empty seat a shuttle has to offer.”

“If you won’t announce the extra crew slots,” Vicky countered, “I will. Or you can give me the name of a couple of good skippers, and I’ll have them put together the crews we need.”

The station manager scowled at Vicky. No doubt, he was getting kickbacks from those he’d given jobs. If she took over hiring, he’d be out of that revenue stream.

The station manager gave her “that look.” It was a good thing she had plenty of experience being the little girl in the room. The room with Daddy. The room with Hank. Hell, just about any room in the palace.

Strange, I haven’t seen that look since I joined the Navy. At least not to my face.

“Little lady, you let me handle the ships, and you can go look pretty,” the station manager actually said.

“You are talking to your Imperial Grand Duchess,” the admiral growled.

“Let me handle this, sir,” Vicky said, and stood to look down on the station chief.

“Captain,” she said, giving the station chief his highest honorary claim. “You will need Navy reaction mass to get these ships away from the station. You will, no doubt, need some assistance from the Navy ship maintainers available here. They are very busy, but I’m sure I can get them cut loose for a bit. You are going to need a hundred different little items to get those ships away from the pier, and half of those will, no doubt, only be available in Navy hands.”

The station chief blanched as Vicky laid out the long list of things he’d have to scrounge to get just these eight ships ready to pull away from the pier. No doubt, he never expected a “little lady” to have any idea of what it took to get a ship ready for space.

Thank you, Admiral Krätz,
Vicky prayed.

“As
Imperial
Grand Duchess, I can grease the skids for things that need to cross the line between the Navy and civilian world. Between Navy accounts and civilian accounts, I can sign documents to lend materials in both directions and have the values settled later.”

Vicky paused to make sure it all sank into his thick skull.

“You can find yourself doing this a really hard way. You can find someone else doing it, or you can play ball with me. Which is it?”

It didn’t take him long to see which side his turkey was buttered on. “Whatever you say, Your Majesty.”

“My father is His Imperial Majesty. I’m Your Grace, or ma’am, the second or third time you chance to address me.”

“Whatever you say,” he stuttered.

“What captains do you have for my eight merchant ships?”

Vicky had watched the dickering that morning around the table, putting her oar in the water only when she had to to make sure the water was still there. Now it was her turn to try her hand at dickering.

The station manager had picked four captains to start with and the ships they’d most recently skippered. Admiral von Mittleburg brought up problems that his maintenance people had identified with two of the ships.

Two ships were substituted for them along with the three more dry-cargo freighters added and their most recent captains contacted. Very quickly, they were recalling their old crews and moving them all toward the station.

One of the ships dropped earlier was added back in when it proved to be in better shape than the one initially nominated for the eighth ship. That ship had a major reactor issue buried in its records. There was no yard at hand to mend that problem.

The
Frozen Christmas Goose
did turn out to be the best refrigerated ship.

The haggling went on into the evening. Ships that had gone out of service needed maintenance and spare parts to bring them back. Who would pay for them?

Vicky ended up on the net, talking not only to Mannie but several other mayors. The idea that 100 percent of the profits from this first cruise would go to Sevastopol started to look more like 60 percent.

The swapping back and forth ended in time for Vicky to enjoy a pleasant supper with the admiral.

“You assumed a lot of power today,” he noted over the first glass of wine.

“Did I assume too much?”

The admiral pursed his lips and eyed the commander, who
had stayed at Vicky’s side through the meeting. He had said little and done a good job of fetching facts when they did not prove to be immediately in evidence.

“Would you prefer if I left, sir?” the commander asked.

“No. You’re more likely to be the one dead before either I or the Grand Duchess encounter that grim fate.”

The commander flashed that boyish grin. “I wouldn’t be too sure about that, sir. By my count of them that hung around the Grand Duchess here, to date it’s two admirals dead. Among the JOs, one captain is, alas, gone to his reward, but one commander has managed to stumble from the field bound for rehab.”

The admiral raised both eyebrows. “You have a strangely optimistic viewpoint.”

“Us field grade types can easily fall into that error, sir. We’ve survived our time as junior officers, and we have yet to discover the full burden of command.”

As much as she didn’t want to, Vicky found herself liking Frank.

“As I was saying,” the admiral continued, “you are assuming a lot of power. The situation is so bad that if someone doesn’t stand in the middle and let all the lightning strike her, we are not likely to get any power at all.”

“I find that image, ah, burned into my vision, Admiral,” Vicky said.

“The question that many will ask is this: Are you assuming power to make good possible, or are you taking this power as the beginning of a power grab?”

Vicky listened carefully, measured each word, then sighed.

“No doubt, there will be those who see what I am doing only from their own perspective. The people who want to seize absolute power will assume that any use of power by anyone else only siphons it away from them.”

“What do you assume?” the admiral asked.

Vicky twirled her wineglass and studied the eddies in the liquid. Then she put it down.

“As strange as it may seem coming from a Peterwald, I want to save lives. Save as many as I can. I want to get markets flowing that will improve the lives of millions of others. Yes, Admiral, I know there are other games afoot. I grew up in the palace. I found games in my morning cereal.”

Vicky considered what she’d just said, then chose her words carefully.

“I know games, and I know what is real. Starving to death is as real as it comes though I suspect it doesn’t come all that much to those of us who have never missed a meal. Please, sir, let me do this one good thing. Maybe the only good thing I’ve done in my whole life.”

She paused, then added after a moment. “Maybe the only good thing I will do in my life.”

“So,” the admiral said, “let’s get across this bridge before we talk of burning any others.”

“Let’s build something,” Vicky said. “Who knows, maybe we won’t have to burn anything.”

The commander raised his glass. “What do you know? I’m working with an optimistic Peterwald.”