Haze Gray 109

Taylor sat under the jaws in sparkling whites and lunch was underway. The crowd did their normal pass in front of her and then went to find seats. The press passed through the line but were very respectful. The hour press conference, just the part she had participated in, every allied government had a representative there, and the white house was running it, had settled the press.

That plus all the local football players standing there being corn fed Nebraska boys. The girls firing off glares was helping?

Lucy Johns strode in the tent, introduced herself, shook Taylors's hand, dropped a elegant curtsey, then went to Danny with a briefcase full of documents. Maria made space for her and she sat. Taylor blinked "Was that Alina class flying the St Andrews ensign?" She looked around at the owl-like faces. "Phhtt. Come on eat up. I want to get back out to the Jensen's."

The local girls whined. Jenny took up their cause. "Karl and Mary are coming to the beach. They don't work on Sunday if they can avoid it."

Taylor frowned then sighed "Fine, I can talk to him on the beach."

Cassidy strode up towing Chris "To right. Who's the new Russian carrier? Why do they get two?" She looked around at the puzzled faces. "OK, new and interesting development then?"

Taylor finally managed "East coast?"

Cassidy waved negligently "Bunch of idiots and Legend is, well, I don't know what, but it involves rainbows and no unicorns."

Lisa nodded "Lots of rainbows. That you really don't want to taste. Somebody made him really angry."

Cassidy nodded "He is whipping the protectorate like a rented mule too. Might be a problem. You'll have to call him later Taylor."

"Me? Why me?" She sighed when everyone just looked at her.

Haze Gray

Taylor lay on the river just idling on one turbine and digesting. The other ship girls, and just girls in general arrayed around her. Karl and Mary were busy with groups of about twenty-five people each. Those were the people who were going to manage the large farms she had acquired. From the Jensen's up to the Canadian border.

Tess had another farmer up there in the same situation as Karl and that couple was teaching another group that were working the farms to the south to link up with the ones in America, who were going to be working land all the way to the Canadian border with only two small breaks in it, and those were where it crossed rivers, preventing Taylor from owning a continuous strip from Lloydminster in Canada to Macallan on the Gulf of Mexico of varying widths but none less than a mile. It was a cracker load of land. She wasn't going to have to worry about dairy, poultry, or pork, products ever again. Vegetables either. Did her field ordering agents do that on purpose? A bunch of it was old strip mines but…

'Hey' She looked at the Yeoman standing on her chest in the modest bikini and top, bright white of course, "I thought we were not using that hatch? But they did exactly do that on purpose?" 'Hey' "Farms that raise just grain aren't as efficient. Seem to make decent money though?" 'Hey' "Profit wasn't as much a consideration as sustainability and inputs to the overarching system were prioritized.

"OK, and we spent how much time coming up with this analysis?" 'Hey' "Constant analysis and updates on the A&L network. "You're running that, and you are just going to present me with a fait accompli, aren't you?" Taylor gave her a look. She grinned 'Hey' "Just did, why you! There are eight huge alcohol distilleries in all this, millions of barrels of alcohol a year! Five oil fields, wait, are we buying oil shale and oil sands mines?"

Cassidy watched this discussion and rolled her eyes "Don't know why she is worried. Administration and logistics are what yeomen do. Plus, it frees her up for the tactical and strategic planning and execution. Speaking of which, Alaska?"

Noelle grunted "Another war of waiting. Everyone knows what everyone is going to do. We are all just waiting on someone to make the first move."

Leslie shrugged "Simmie is a bit of a wild card."

Rachel snorted "We could take her, but really she appears to be on our side. Might ought to talk to her."

Kathy face palmed, "Her battle group responded to orders and gave reports when they were working with us."

Missy sighed "We are going to be in MS quarantine for the whole fishing trip."

Aisha shrugged "Finally a vacation? Tay needs one."

Haze Gray

Emily chuckled "Well at least Missy is still thinking. I'm sure it will come to her that we would have said something as US Navy elements were in those battle groups too."

Chaos blinked and raised his hand "Didn't occur to me." Emily pinched the bridge of her nose and waved at one of the screens, the one hooked to the Thinkers output. Which was shaded a pleasant blue.

Haze Gray

Taylor's float had turned into a bit of a conference and the other ship girls were rafted to her sort of bow to the shore now. They didn't want to be on the suddenly very busy seaplane runway after all. The other kids were having fun swimming out and getting blown back to the beach by prop wash. "So Alaska while dealing with SImmie, then find the lizard and kick his stuff in, then work on this cauldron deal we have turned up all this stuff on.

"Meanwhile run the USH. Do what ever we are going to have to do in relation to that whole mess when everyone who was ever a Spanish colony or was discovered by a Spanish Navigator in the age of exploration tries to join the USH." She looked around.

Raem gave her the palms up at shoulder height "Integrate the new girls. Finnish evacuating the Chinese and Russians, plus whoever else wants evacuation from what will shortly be a war zone."

Apropos of nothing Tess said "I'm finding pockets of nearly pure and novel alloys, of all the metals and a lot of minerals. Pockets that shouldn't be, couldn't be really, where they are. We are also collecting millions of tons of micro plastic an hour, streams as big around as the penstock tubes on the Hoover damn."

Lisa and Kim grabbed their heads shortly followed by two Chinese, two Russian, and on Qatari sub. Dinah paddled up on a floaty "Eighty-nine point nine nine eight percent chance they are helping and it is directed by Simmie." She paddled back to the crowd of girls she had collected.

Missy snorted "She is so weird sometimes." Aisha nodded.

Noelle tapped her lips with a finger making a tinking sound "So Simmie runs the other Endbringers? Something about that seems wrong. Why didn't they attack somewhere and wipe it out? Not like we could stop all three at once." All the other girls nodded and the conference picked up some steam.

Unfortunately, they lacked enough information to come to any conclusions. They were left with talking to Simmie. Before they did that though they were going to war game that out and get all their ducks in a row.

Fortunately, or somewhat terrifyingly they did document the Endbringers helping them. They did exclude both the minerals and metals and the plastics chemicals, minerals and metals in the ocean coming to the miners being natural phenomenon.

They were distracted by Maria and her explanation of the naval version of the F16 she and Danny had. Taylor arched a brow "Eight thousand dollar an hour operating cost."

Maria grinned "No bombs, burning methane or whatever gas. Don't turn the combat systems on so they don't wear out. About three thousand dollars an hour, still high but the yard is working on it. Taking the combat systems out to save weight and get better fuel consumption will be a start. Danny has a spreadsheet. He will get them to listen eventually. Personally, I think three thousand dollars an hour is pretty cheap for a supercruise capable aircraft."

Leslie and Alina were nodding "Beats the pants off the Tomcat cost. And ours are much cheaper than the US Navy's were." Leslie supplied "And that's with the K mod versions the yard is building.

"The helicopters too. None of any of that is cheap. Less for us than regular forces but still not cheap. Of course we got out of development cost. As a fleet we are less cost than a US carrier battle group.

"A10's are the cheapest."

Alina nodded "Which makes you wonder why the congress and the Air force keep trying to get rid of them instead of giving them better systems. The hooks for the bridles went on them easy. Easier than the catapults for the Antietam's."

Noelle grinned "Those are so much fun though. These drop leg holsters are cool too."

Leslie giggled "With teenie tiny 380 autos. You know Ruger makes some in some pretty colors."

Noelle shook her head "Single stack, eight rounds. My Taurus are double stacks. Makes spotting and getting a squadron airborne more efficient." The bird farms all nodded.

Aisha looked at Missy and the escorts "Bird farm problems." They all nodded and firewalled their throttles.

Taylor looked at Lisa who shrugged "Five inch club. Wadda ya gonna do. Surprised we held their attention that long really." Rachel, just behind Lisa, cleared her throat. Lisa nearly cleared the water jumping. Taylor smiled and laughed.

Dinah swam by towing all her friends on floaties. "I still want a deck gun." She swam off toward the beach and the growing crowd of snack boats that had appeared while the fleet was in conference.

Lisa's hot-rodded boat came by with a load of Taylor ham biscuits and Lisa dog paddled along after it. Taylor chuckled "What is it with her and those biscuits?"

Amy smiled "Maple syrup with cayenne pepper. Have you noticed she puts hot something on everything?"

Kim nodded "It just isn't good, or as good, without that sweet kick."

Vulcan nodded "Sweet and hot, cold and deep. Makes sense in a way." All the girls nodded.

Haze Gray

Emily looked at the thinker screen where at least five of them were counting points on their fingers looking at the raw. She sighed. Chaos laughed. Dwayne nodded "Calories and heat. Yep."

Emily huffed at him. Then looked thoughtful "While the thinkers recover, the Endbringers are now not?

"It wasn't touched on but ongoing testing of the known Simurgh victims is saying they are fine. Not sure how far to trust that but the evidence is piling up she has fixed it."

Chaos nodded "Terrifying. She can do all that from the middle of the Pacific? While running a fleet? What wasn't discussed also is precious metals showing up at sites Behemoth has attacked. Except for Arun. He doesn't like oil? Evidence suggest they have been sandbagging."

Dwayne grunted "They aren't the only ones. Brockton Bay's refineries and chemical works shouldn't be able to output five million barrels, or the equivalent in product by weight, a day but she is selling me that. Well, not me, could you imagine? The government through me. So much so the Navy is actually breaking even on it. I'm suddenly the POL supplier for the entire US government.

"Lowest bidder on a standardized product so, all the contract are hers.

"She makes money on both ends because her pipelines are the backbone of transporting it all to various installations and facilities and her tankers take what the pipeline doesn't. They are replenishing replenishment ships from them. POL, food, parts, all categories of supply.

"She sells it to us then we pay her to move it to where we want it."

Chaos nodded "And she services her own fleet, and now more men under arms than the US had anytime except for nineteen forty-five."

"And we, or at least the Coast Guard and Navy, are going to be leasing combat units from her." Emily tossed in while watching Chaos's face.

He obliged her with a grimace. "The least that will be is fraught. Congress is bound to explode."

"Or decide we can lease the Navy, Marine Corps, and Army from her." Dwayne looked thoughtful.

Haze Gray

John walked around the giant airbase in Nebraska. He had already spent two days on Hispaniola, overflown Cuba and toured some of the areas in the US where the 'fighting' had been heavy. The minority whip eyed him "It will never work."

John nodded "Not with my membership as it is. Plus, she hasn't even been operating for a cycle. People owe her nothing and she owes no one. Total wild card, uncontrollable."

He got a nod "And leasing these boats for the Coast Guard and the Naval reserve?"

John nodded "I actually like that idea as long as they have US crews and commanders. They would be under the Navy and Coast Guards orders and we suddenly have a lot more area to patrol and police."

The minority whip nodded "My environmentalist love her."

John nodded "So do my old-line law and order folks, plus the environmentalist, hey stop laughing, I have a few. The free-market people want to make her a saint or something. The socialist and the monarchist too. Never seen anything like it."

"You have two. So, we can keep a lid on. We get what we want without a permanent investment. The appropriations can stay mostly the same and we can wait and see who can get her onside. The senate?"

John nodded "They will be a problem as always. The imperial senate will do something foolish.

John sighed "Reid and McConnell are both ass hats. We can work around them, at least on the republican side, you have good ones too.

"Now, these Medicare payments."

The minority whip rubbed his hands together and laughed "She's killing you as her people charge Medicare for the indigent, uninsured, and poor. Meanwhile they charge anyone with money as much as the market will bear. I thought this is what you guys wanted?"

John nodded then shook his head. "It is the very model we wanted. The problem is the number of people taking advantage and therefore the cost. Everyone who goes in one of those docks or gets touched by a Haven generates a bill. At least the first time. Some of those bills are enormous. She somehow bills the Canadians too."

"Which you don't hear a peep out of about it. Not an argument you can win I think John. I wonder what the Mexicans will do. I heard they want to give her four of their states." The minority whip grinned at John.

John nodded "Sort of like us giving her most of ours." The grin faltered.

Haze Gray

"Where does the wood come from? I mean we didn't grow it?" Taylor frowned a bit. Then she wriggled and looked down in her top and rolled her eyes. The Yeoman grinned then offered 'Hey. Hey hey hey hey hey.' Taylor nodded "Makes sense? I mean the rivers were right there and there were those cartoons about riding logs down the rivers. Wait a minute, an ax cut log is worth how much? What about hardwoods? Do we get those from rivers too?"

Tess answered this one "All kinds of wood. Trees wash into the rivers, logs were floated on the rivers, all of that. As we channelize and straighten the rivers, we recover tons of wood per mile. The logs go to log yards, some of them are highly prized for furniture, the ones that sank or got jammed in the banks of rivers with high tannin loads, they are beautiful really. Some of it is ground for weldwood. Some of it doesn't pass inspection because of metal or stone imbedded in it. If that metal or stone isn't culturally significant, we mostly break it up and that's what we are burning in the bonfires. Other than that, it gets burned for charcoal or biochar."

Lisa nodded "Before you ask, arrowheads, spear points, napped flint of all kinds. Pottery, civil war cannon balls and bullets. Same from the Indian wars. Rifles from all different periods, a bunch of pistols. Gold and silver coins out the wahzoo. People must have used trees for piggy banks back then, seriously. Good thing is those are worth more as coins than as base metal. The density detectors give us an idea of what is there so we send those sections to be hand worked to get the coins. Fooled us a couple times and turned out to be lots of ore once or twice."

Tess nodded "All of that gets reported and recovered and turned over to museums for nominal fees. Not the coins, we keep those."

Alina snorted "Only if we fight off the government. Those snakes want their cut."

Taylor nodded and looked at the Kpad her now full-sized yeoman handed her "That's a lot of capitol gains, even with this pretty creative accounting." 'Hey' "You didn't write the tax code. No, you just find every loophole or dodge in it. Nice work. How is Jimmy doing? The black gang has been working pretty hard. Good thing I stepped on that fraternization thing right?" She waggled her eyebrows "I mean by the time you as an officer got in a position to command the black gang he supervises as a NCO we'd all probably be sunk. Sort of the reverse of Crystal in the mess decks, girl is an apprentice for goodness' sake, and her midshipman." The yeoman's mouth dropped open and she blushed scarlet. "Yep, I am the ship, I know everything."

Lisa snickered "Play nice over there. You'll give your crew a complex."

'Hey!' "No gossiping, but yes, Crystal is only an apprentice at cooking. She does seem pretty good at wrangling midshipmen." 'Hey' "Or confusing the hell out of them." All the girls looked at each other and giggled.

Taylor recovered, "So since we already had the pyrolysis thing running for the plastic, we just used it on ground wood that couldn't be used for anything else. Probably extracted all the resin, phenols and anything useful from it first. Makes sense. Man, we are sequestering some carbon now." She looked up and grinned.

Amy sighed "You are so weird. Half the time complaining about taking over the world and the other half scheming how to make people pay you to do it."

Taylor laughed "Scheming. Yeah sure. More like riding down the face of a hundred-foot tall wave skiing barefoot." She held a finger up to the yeoman "No comments about big feet."