Chapter 9 - A Bully from a Good Seed.

Whitney was still hugging Tamara when a man entered the command post from the teleport room's passageway. "Hey! It's the unattached slut! Are you giving it out now! You refused me on the ship! You're unattached and can't do that!"

The man reached out to grab Whitney. His hand had barely touched her when James burst from his chair and in a flying tackle slammed the man against the wall of the room. "Tamara, get her out of here. Xavier! Get me whoever is in charge of the Tintagel crew!"

Xavier gasped as James pressed the man's face into the wall. He turned around and shouted something to Terrence. I could not hear the answer. Meanwhile Tamara had quickly guided Claire and Whitney from the room. Moments later most of the remaining concubines left as well, leaving only Esther, Tina and I with the citizens.

The man was fighting against James. "What the fuck! She's just some unowned cunt! Who cares if I have a bit of fun with her? She's not even pregnant and my family created four citizens. Her next child could be a citizen."

"So could her current one," James hissed. "And while I'm not able to ban you from abusing your own concubine, you don't do things to anyone else's concubine on this planet."

"James," Xavier called out, causing everyone to look his way. "Lieutenant Kathy Krupke here is the senior officer alive."

I watched Yvette sigh as James nodded. "Sorry about this, but it seems we have a discipline problem. But it sounds like I can't just send him back to the ship. Lieutenant, do you have a suggestion?"

The Lieutenant stepped into the room. She proved to be an extraordinarily plain woman. In some ways her plain features were striking, as they were so different from the bold and beautiful women on Ishtar. However, the only thing I noticed was how her face fell when she saw who James had pinned to the wall.

"I can do nothing about him," she admitted. "He barely listened to Captain Jordan. I don't know of any officer he'll listen to."

Just then Mike called out. I whirled in surprise to find him sitting at the communications station with Linus handling tracking. "Incoming boost signal from Borneo. Putting it through."

"This is Ishtar Control. We have a minor incident with one of the crew of Tintagel Castle, give me a moment," James called.

"What's the damage," Admiral Himmel's voice growled.

Before anyone could answer, the man James had pinned cried out. "Father! This man is abusing me! He's got me pinned against the wall. All I did was ask a concubine to have sex!"

I heard several people gasp, but my master's response showed no hesitation. He bounced the man's head against the wall. The action appeared to stun the man. While he was still groggy James stepped back and used the boot of his left foot against the man's back to again pin him against the wall. He looked over at Yvette.

"Yvette! You're into the interesting bedroom games. Would you have a ball gag, some cuffs and perhaps a chastity belt for this ass? We can't send him back home and I really don't need to hear him whine about how he's being treated," James growled.

The speakers hissed out a long slow sigh. "I've always known he was arrogant, but never thought he was stupid," Admiral Himmel supplied with a groan.

"But father! I committed no crime! And you are in charge out here! You can order James to let me go! You have to! I'm your son!" William Monroe cried out.

I heard a very feminine sob. Just then a voice called out. "I can't believe you, William. A true son would never force himself on another woman, but how many does that make now? Is it seven or eight?" The voice was harsh and filled with pain. I looked around the room to see everyone looking up at one of the speakers.

Admiral Himmel sighed. "William, right now I'm damn fucking glad you don't use my last name. I personally warned you about your little power games and how they would be received on Ishtar. Considering the fact that I still don't have a report on the damages to Tintagel Castle, I'd say you didn't last five minutes. I'm done."

"You're what?!" William Monroe screamed.

Admiral Himmel continued. "James, you should know the laws. You can't actually charge Sergeant Monroe with more than disorderly conduct, but he's got priors so I can assure you that the district command would look the other way if you decide to place him in close confinement until Tintagel returns to service. Once he gets back to Borneo I'll be transferring him out of the district."

"You're going to what?!" William Monroe shouted again. He was struggling some with James, but Philipe and Tom appeared in the doorway. They walked over to William and pulled his arms behind his back. Moments later his wrists were held behind his back encased in some fur-lined handcuffs.

"Fur handcuffs?" Kathy asked, her eyes widening at the sight.

Yvette shrugged. "We don't have any regular ones on the planet. Never needed them before."

James took his foot off of William's neck. The man made a dash for the door, but his attempt to escape was quickly quashed by Philipe and Tom, who drove him to the ground. Shouted obscenities filled the air. Finally Philipe punched William in the jaw. That stopped the struggling and the two concubines then dragged the still body of Admiral Himmel's son from the command room. James just sighed.

'"I hate to do that. He's almost as bad as the cavemen who used to infest our colony," he said.

"Almost?" Admiral Himmel's voice asked. "Could the others who used to live there have been that bad?"

Yvette giggled. "We only know what was said of them in story mostly. But what we did hear was rather nasty."

"Well, let's not talk about the family disappointment," Admiral Himmel growled. "How soon can you get my corvette back into service?"

"We can't," Louis' voice responded. I looked over to find him reviewing the scan logs and shaking his head. "There is no structural integrity on the forward half of the hull. The only reason the ship survived was because the damage was confined to the forward part of the hull and the starboard engine, but I'm amazed it emerged from the jump. The bridge is open to space."

"There was no one at the helm?" Admiral Himmel asked.

"Not since about five minutes before we jumped," Lieutenant Krupke's voice rang out clearly. "I had to write overrides down in engineering to activate and later deactivate the portside jump engine. Corporal Sloan promised me that he had the ship pointed at Ishtar, just before he died, but I had no way of knowing if we'd held course while I finished writing the code I needed. And I was less sure we'd hold course once we jumped. I was writing all kinds of adjustment codes in an attempt to balance the thrust around the one engine. Thankfully, Corporal Sloan deliberately aimed a bit to the left so the drift I couldn't eliminate didn't push us out of the system when we emerged."

"Who is this?" Admiral Himmel asked.

"Lieutenant Kathy Krupke," the woman responded. "I am the engineering officer on Tintagel."

"And do you concur with the people on Ishtar about the possibility of repairing Tintagel?"

"No, I don't. I've been listening and they believe that they can rig up something that will allow Tintagel to jump to Borneo. I've seen the damage and don't think it's possible."

"Wait," Admiral Himmel said. "You are saying they think they can return my ship and surviving crew. Well, the surviving crew they can return. It sounds like you all agree that Tintagel will not fight again."

"If they had used anything explosive at the end, we wouldn't have made it," Lieutenant Krupke replied. "They kept firing those sliver missiles and aiming them ahead of us. That's why the forward sections are so ripped up. I think we got hit by more than fifty of the things, but it was always forward, and we managed to seal off the rear of the ship."

"What were you fighting?" The Admiral asked.

Lieutenant Krupke shrugged, even though Admiral Himmel could not have seen it. "A reaction force coming out of the orbit of Wolf three-six-seven. We caught four heavy slow transports just inside jump distance for the sun there and had just finished blowing both of the engines on one when the first missiles appeared on our radar. Corporal Sloan and Captain Jordan spent the next sixteen hours dodging the missiles while we tried to run down the other three transports. We crippled a second, hit the holds of the third and must have struck something vital because the resulting explosions not only destroyed the transport, but gave us a temporary respite from the missiles as the debris became a rather effective anti-missile shield. We were lining up the final one when a sliver missile burst just off the starboard bow and took out the engine. After that Captain Jordan tried to run, but it was too late."

I heard a snort from the Admiral and a muttered comment about checking the diets of some of his commanders. Lieutenant Krupke was blushing at this and fell silent. The silence extended and then Admiral Himmel sighed. "So after that you tried to run?"

"Yes sir, or at least that's what I understood. The loss of the starboard engine forced me to do all I could to divert thrust to the starboard side so we didn't just run in circles. I was concentrating on that when I heard Corporal Sloan calling over the helmet link. I was surprised because the in-ship was working fine to damage control, the watch stations for both engines, medical, and auxiliary fire control. I responded, only to be shocked when he told me I had command and explained that the bridge had been hit. His final act was to align the ship as I frantically rewrote the jump code and bypassed just about every safety feature we have in engineering. It was a desperate gamble, but it worked and we emerged at Istharat," Lieutenant Krupke said.

There was a snort. "I'm guessing it's far more than that, and I now want my ship back just so I can review the battle records. It sounds like there were some heroics involved and we should honor those. Although I see that Captain Jordan proved the old truism."

"Old truism?" Timothy asked.

Admiral Himmel laughed. "That there are old captains, and there are bold captains, but there are damn few old, bold captains. Captain Jordan was in the top three for most aggressive commander in the district. And it sounds like he pressed the attack a bit too hard and too long and got caught."

James was nodding. "Sadly, others paid the price with him."

"Good point," Admiral Himmel replied. "What was the casualty count?"

"Captain Jordan, Lieutenants Mathews and Thomas from the bridge, along with Corporal Sloan and Private Wedlin. We also lost Corporal Madden, and Sergeant Cosell from the engineering team; they worked on the starboard engine. All the concubines survived, but we do have multiple serious injuries," Lieutenant Krupke responded.

"Three officers and four enlisted? I'm amazed it's that low. You have thirty-seven refugee citizens right now James?" The Admiral asked.

I watched as James looked over at Xavier who nodded and spoke. "Sir, this is Xavier, I was the representative James sent from Ishtar to coordinate the evacuation of Tintagel Castle. We did bring down thirty-seven living citizens as well as forty-five concubines. Seven had serious injuries and have been taken directly to medical here. Another ten require pod time to heal injuries, but we don't have available pods so they are resting until pods become available."

"No one is in the pods on the Castle?" was The Admiral's query.

Lieutenant Krupke was again shaking her head. "I couldn't keep the power flow to them stable. It was too risky to put anyone inside unless we had no choice. Thankfully, your people here on Ishtar sent out some kind of mobile teleport unit and pulled us off long before we reached orbit. A couple of the injured were bleeding badly."

"Not my people. I wish they were, but they aren't mine," the Admiral said gently. "Still, they seem quite content to pull all the weight I ask when I do. James, take good care of my people and send them home once you have Tintagel ready to make it's final jump. We need them."

Another voice, that of the Admiral's concubine Daphne spoke up. "And try to beat some sense into that brat William. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised; he was always an arrogant ass even back on Earth before all the nonsense about CAP scores and such. His brothers and sisters turned out so much nicer too."

"Are they living nearby?" Yvette asked.

"Sadly, they are not," Daphne replied. "Jonathan was selected to administer a breeder colony some sixty light years beyond Earth, away from the Sa'arm advance. Dara is a ship commander, but last I heard she was part of the fleet around Frik. I believe Michael is in the marines somewhere. His last message said he was being considered for First Sergeant stripes, but I don't know which unit. Our youngest Dixie is working in Fleet Auxiliary. She's not all that interested in fighting so they gave her a Stagecoach Freighter. She does love the traveling. It's hard that they have left home though."

"We kept Dara's and Michael's children with us though. Their home planets are even more endangered that Borneo is," The admiral finished. "Now I better let you go. Unless you have an estimate on the repair."

Louis and Timothy were whispering about something and pointing to the display they had made of the schematics of Tintagel Castle. "I think five days to have something that can jump successfully to Borneo," Louis called out. "But we need about nine hours to test it. Tintagel won't be stopped where we can start the repairs for another hour, and it will take about eight before we can see if the remaining structure will stand up to the reinforcements we are considering."

"Do it," the Admiral said. "And I'll brief General Montgomery about this."

The AI rang a chime to indicate that the call was over and everyone sighed. James and Yvette headed over to the display to talk to Louis as Xavier started a whispered conversation with a collapsing Lieutenant Krupke.