Hold the Star: Samair in Argos: Book 2 (82 page)

              “More than the Kutok mine?” Vincent asked.  “I know just how incredibly expensive that is.”

              Tamara tipped her head from side to side.  “Point.  But then there’s also the crew requirement.  The station can comfortably run with the crew we’ve got on there now.  Maybe about a hundred or so more souls on there once all the collectors and refineries are installed.”

              He blinked.  “Really?  Even with all twenty sections running?”

              She nodded.  “Yes.  The biggest problem is with maintenance.  A great amount of people are needed to make sure that everything keeps running smoothly.  Only about two hundred or so are needed for control.”  She waved a hand.  “But a battleship?  That’s several thousand people needed to run the systems, fight the ship and if you’re wanting to do things properly, you’d need at least a thousand soldiers aboard for boarding operations and ship security.”

              He slumped a bit.  “So you’re saying it can’t be done.”

              She smiled.  “Did I say that?  What I said is that we don’t have what we need to build one.  Not now.  But do I want to build one?  Absolutely.”

              “What would it take?”

              She leaned back a bit and stared at the overhead.  “Well, getting the materials is easy enough,” Tamara said.  “We’re the only game in town as far as getting the raw materials are concerned.  The problem is having the manpower.  We’d have to expand operations by five or six times the amount we have now to maintain operations and be able to build a shipyard facility.  That means three or four mining ships, more tugs, bots, as well as personnel.  Honestly, we’re going to need outside funding.  Building the facilities and then the ship itself would bankrupt us.  We’d have to do it slowly, piecemeal, and that would take time.”

              “I could talk to the Triarch again,” Vincent mused.

              She smiled.  “That’s nice, Vincent, but a few million credits would only be enough for a startup loan.  We’d need government funding to really get it finished in anything resembling a fast timeframe.  Oh, we could do it without it, but it would take years.”

              He nodded.  “What about another warship?”

              “Another corvette like this one?  Easy enough.  We could build one in a few weeks, if you like.  But I really think that’s the limit of what we can feasibly do with the amount of budget we can put forth for paying the crew, fuel, munitions and maintenance.”

              “How are your fighter squadrons doing?” he asked.

              Tamara nodded.  “Good.  Aplora squadron is up to full strength, twenty ships.  I’ve got Korqath training them up even as we speak.  But the Delphon are a different matter.”

              Vincent frowned, leaning forward a bit.  “Why?  What’s wrong with them?  They seem like pretty good little ships.”

              “Against lightly armed freighters, yes,” Tamara agreed.  “But against proper warships they would be of little use.  And even against other fighters they aren’t that good.  Too lightly armed and armored.  They’re fast and maneuverable, but I’m hesitant to deploy them in any greater numbers.”

              “So what does that mean?”

              “It means,” she went on, “that I need to either find a new ship design or another ship to use.”

              “What about your fighter?” he asked.  “The one you got from me?”

              She shook her head.  “Needs implants to properly interface with the navigation controls.  It’s the reason I can use it without much effort and probably the reason that the ship was rusting away when you found it.”

              “Damn, I thought we’d found the answer.”

              “Really?” she asked with a smirk.  “You really thought I’d forgotten about my own ship?”

              He had the grace to look embarrassed.  “I guess I thought it had been sitting in the hangar and you overlooked it.”

              “No,” she said, “you thought I was trying to keep the ship all to myself.  That I would have a one-of-a-kind ship.  Really, Vincent?  You thought I was that petty?”

              “All right, all right, I made a mistake, I’m sorry,” he said, raising his hands as though to ward off a blow.  She made a face at him and he nodded.  “So where do we go from here?”

              Tamara sighed.  “I don’t know, to be honest.  I’ve put a request out to a few architectural firms and a few engineering companies to try and come up with a usable aeroframe.”

              “Why can’t you do it?” Vincent asked, gesturing to her.  “You designed the mine and the tugs and the shuttles.”

              “I didn’t design the shuttles and the tugs, Vincent,” she told him flatly.  “I copied them as you well know.”

              “And the mine?  I know for a fact you didn’t copy that.”

              “No, I didn’t,” she admitted.  “But building a system to integrate gas collection and refinery is a far cry from building a space superiority fighter.”

              He waved his hands.  “Woo, a
space superiority
fighter
.  Listen to you,” he mocked lightly.  Tamara leaned forward and slugged him in the arm.  He rubbed where she’d hit him, but smiled.  “Seriously, though, why can’t you make it?”

              “Because I’ve got a thousand things I’ve got to be doing, now that you’ve saddled me with command of this ship.”

              “How’s that going, anyway?” he asked.  “Things seem to be running pretty smoothly.”

              “It’s moving along pretty well.  I think things will hold up well if it all hits the fan, but I won’t know for certain until it does.  And short of launching an actual assault on the orbital to see how they react, we’ll just have to wait until Verrikoth shows up.”

              Vincent nodded, with a grimace.  “Tamara, you’ll forgive me for saying this, but I sincerely hope all the military buildup you’re making here is just a colossal waste of time.”

              She just stared at him, anger growing.  “You’re telling me that all this is for nothing?”

              He raised a hand placatingly.  “Easy.  What I’m saying is that I hope that Verrikoth and his forces never show up here.  It’s not that I don’t think that it’s all necessary, I hope that I never have to see or deal with that zheen ever again.”

              Tamara tipped her head from side to side.  “Yeah, I can agree with that, but we both know that good intentions aren’t going to keep him away.”

              Vincent sighed.  “I know.  And I’m really hoping we’re both wrong about this.”

              She gave him a hard look.  “You know that is just wishful thinking.  That bastard is out dealing with the Republic over at Byra-Kae, but once he’s done with that, he’ll be back out in the Cluster again, doing what he does.”

              “What the hell does he
want
?” Vincent demanded, frustrated.  “I mean, he goes around, stealing cargoes, but then out of nowhere, he commissions warships to be constructed and goes on to attack the Republic of all things?”

              “I think he’s carving out his own little kingdom out here in the Argos Cluster,” Tamara said slowly.  “I think he wants to run things and he doesn’t want anyone, much less the Republic, to be around to stop him.  And I suspect if he doesn’t already know about Seylonique and their battlecruiser, he will soon.  Which means that this system needs better defenses.”  She drummed her fingers on the table for a moment.  “But FP, Inc. can’t do it all alone.  We need more help from the locals.  They have to start getting involved in this.”

              “Tamara, we have almost fifteen hundred people involved in our operations so far, nearly all of them are from Seylonique,” Vincent pointed out.

              “That’s correct, but we’re going to need ten times as many if we really want to fight Verrikoth on anything approaching equal terms.  You know what he’s got,” she said.  “That flotilla of his would cut through our current defenses without even slowing down, and that’s assuming the
Leytonstone
can even leave the orbital under its own power.”  She sighed again, looking off to one side.  “I think you need to load up on cargo and get the hell out of this system.  Be somewhere else when it all comes down.”

              “Really?  And how do you know when he’s going to show up?” Vincent asked.  “Do I want to tangle with him and his ships again?  No, of course not.  But if you think I’m just going to fire up the hyperdrives and bolt out of here and leave you and all this that you’ve built, well…”

              She smiled wanly.  “That’s very noble, Vincent, but in the end, fruitless.  We both know
Grania Estelle
can’t stand up to the pirate forces, even with the repairs and overhauls she’s had.  The only thing you would accomplish by staying here would be to get yourself killed.”

              “No,” he said firmly, shaking his head.  “What we’re going to accomplish is to get you those fighters you need. 
We
need,” he corrected himself.

              “And where are you going to find these mythical fighters, Vincent, hmmm?” Tamara asked.  “I’ve scoured the
Grania Estelle
’s database, there’s nothing there that will help.”

              “No, perhaps not.  But I’ve got an AI and three engineering teams that are lazing about thinking about beer and females when they could be doing something useful.  Besides, I’ve got replicators of my own that are currently sitting idle.  I think that if you and the engineers sit down, you might be able to hammer out a working prototype.  And then from there, they can assist in the building for at least a little while.”

              “You know you’re just burning credits staying in system like this,” she reminded him.  “The big girl is meant to be out there, hauling freight.”

              He nodded.  “I know.  But this is important too.  The whole point of setting up shop here in Seylonique was so that there would be a safe harbor to return to.  If I’m just going to shove off when things look like the might get rough again, I’d be starting up the itinerant merchant life again and I don’t want that.  Besides, it worked well, until it didn’t and we all nearly died or were sold as slaves.  I’d like to have a stable region to trade in and if that means sacrificing a bit of flight time to get it, so be it.”

              “All right, what about this?” Ka’Xarian asked, putting up the new design on the display.  The wardroom of the
Grania Estelle
was crowded with engineers from the ship as well as Eretria Sterling and Kay’grax from the
Samarkand
.
 
All the others gathered around and looked at what he’d added.  There were murmurs of assent from around the room.  “Tamara?”

              The engineer nodded.  “It looks good,” she admitted grudgingly.  Then she made a sigh of frustration.  “I should have known.”

              “What?” the zheen asked.

              “I’ve been in charge here in the system for so long, I thought I had to do everything myself,” she said ruefully. 

              “Well, that certainly isn’t true,” Stella said from where she was sitting on the holo projector in the corner.  When they looked at her, she shrugged.  “Well it isn’t!  You’ve been delegating things to Eretria and to Corajen and to the other engineers.  Why was this one such a problem?”

              “I’ve been telling you that for weeks, ma’am,” Eretria put in, her voice a bit low.

              Tamara shrugged, smiling.  “I don’t know.  I just got… overwhelmed, I think.  But I’m glad that the captain finally broke through and got you involved.  I’m actually ashamed that I didn’t think to come and ask.”

              “Pride,” Quesh said with a grin.  She made a face at him.

              “I suppose,” she said heavily.  “But, I really like what we’re doing here.”  She looked to the AI’s image.  “Stella, are you running diagnostics on the new designs now?  With the updates that Xar suggested?”

              She nodded.  “I am, Tamara.  It should finish running in about four more minutes.  But, my initial impression is that this is going to work.  I think that it might be a workable aeroframe.”

              “Good.  I’ve already got Korqath working up the Aploras and I’m looking for new recruits for the Delphon.”

              “You?” Quesh asked, grimacing at her.  “You were the one just saying that you were overwhelmed with this project.  Why the hell are you the one doing that?  Isn’t that Korqath’s job?”

              Tamara sighed.  “Korqath has his claws full keeping up with the Aploras.  He’s got potential, but he’s a flyer, not a manager.  I want him right where he is.  Right now, there’s no one really in command of the Delphon and I’m acting as
de facto
leader.”

              “From where?” Xar asked.  “You’re the commander of the
Cavalier
now.”

              “Well, for now, they’ve been operating pretty close to the station and the surrounding asteroid field, never more than a few hours flight time.  I’ve kept the
Cavalier
within roughly that area of space as well.  So it hasn’t been too hard to keep them working with me on the corvette.”