Politics and My Boys
New Yugoslavia, 2212 a.d.
The Tellefontu normally carried an organic version of the Disappearing Gun in one of their front claws. This was necessary, since they lived in an ocean filled with large, small-brained carnivores like bluefinned tuna, who sometimes mistook them for a tasty treat. But while killing your attacker eliminated the immediate problem, it didn't teach him anything. It only killed him, leaving the others with no change in their behavior. Therefore, the Tellefontu had developed a weapon that caused intense pain, but no physical damage. It was a beam that really rattled the pain centers of the brain.
The pain-generating weapon had proved ineffective against the Earthly lobsters the early inhabitants had tried to grow in New Yugoslavia's oceans, as these crustaceans lacked enough of a brain to feel pain, apparently. And since the lobsters had developed a taste for young Tellefontu, our new allies had made a point of eradicating them.
I had been unaware of this, but with demand and no supply, it looked to be profitable to grow lobsters in tanks on my land, especially since as carnivores, they would give me something to do with that half of a cow (eyeballs, lungs, etc.) that people didn't want to eat.
The first eating-sized lobsters were finally coming out of the tanks, and Kasia and I ate the first two with gusto!
Bellor declined to join us.
My annoying uncle, Wlodzimierz Derdowski, the President of New Kashubia, was now lording it over the Interplanetary Council of the Union of Human Planets. The new constitution was still being haggled over, and we still didn't have anything like a single individual in charge, but my uncle was currently the closest thing we had to it.
He'd written me that my "discovery" of the Tellefontu had been tremendously important, politically. The fact that I hadn't discovered anything, and that they had come to me didn't faze him in the least. Politicians are never very concerned with actual facts.
While the governments of the various planets were still behind the huge defense budgets that were required to prepare us to face the Mitchegai, the people were getting increasingly restless about the taxation and the dearth of civilian goods available.
Now, however, there was a race of intelligent beings who had witnessed and suffered through an invasion by the Mitchegai, and this forced people to take the whole thing seriously. While it would have been better if they could have been furry, cute, and cuddly, instead of looking like crabs, they nonetheless were instrumental in keeping the war effort going.
And the Tellefontu were cooperating very nicely, giving lots of press interviews and showing up regularly on talk shows.
In addition to the psychological boost, it was expected that as the new technology that the Tellefontu were giving us worked its way into the market, the economic boost would be considerable, and that would help the political situation a lot. What we had been able to learn from the Mitchegai scout ship wouldn't hurt, either.
My uncle invited me to come to New Kashubia, so he could pin a few more medals on my chest. I respectfully declined, claiming the press of things to be done.
Actually, I still hated the bastard. I never have forgiven him for letting the courts give Kasia and me the choice of death or joining the army, all those years ago, not when they had aborted our first child in the process.
My boys were now my great joy in life. The oldest were getting to the point where I could teach them to fish, to ride horses, and to play ball. They were spending more and more of their time in the golden castle that I'd had built, but couldn't sell, and that was good. The spirit of true knighthood was starting to grow in them.
Our machine tool industry was expanding with surprising rapidity. Our intelligent computers were keeping everything working twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and without holidays. There was very little downtime. A great deal was being done very quickly.
The engineers computed that with the Disappearing Guns, and the other things that Bellor had suggested, we could produce the fallout shelters at a quarter of the price originally estimated. We would want the Guns as weapons anyway, so we built a production line to mass produce them. We also built lines to make the self-powered lighting fixtures and the power-generating air conditioners.
Kasia never mentioned these savings in her dealings with the local governments, and got full prices out of them. I took much of the extra money, and spent it on better food supplies. We would now be able to serve something a little bit better than gruel. But we didn't tell them about that, either. It might have hurt sales on the luxury apartments.
As these new factories started to come on line, the shelters started to be dug in a hurry. One of our standard tanks, usually with a young soldier in training inside and oblivious to what his tank was really doing, could cut a tunnel eight meters across and ten meters high while traveling at eighty kilometers an hour!
It was a fast way to make floor space!