1921: Tau Past, #2

By Richard R Lockwood

In Tau Past - 1920, Admiral Kosciusko travels into the past and arrives at an alternate Earth being invaded by aliens. After dealing with them he decides to make use of their space folding technology and begins to rebuild the Tau Fleet. An atrocity keeps his attention on Earth for a while, but the stars always beckon. Lothar von Richthofen is recruited to command a fighter group on the first of the new Jump Carriers, Alpha. In 1921 they will both have their challenges.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Richard R Lockwood
• Release date: Oct 16, 2022
• ISBN: 9798215380116

Richard R Lockwood

Was born in Miami FL. Worked for the University of Florida until I retired. Been married to the lovely Cecelia for 40 years now, proof that I'm a lucky guy. Now living on the Nature Coast in Citrus County. Enjoy all kind of wildlife, especially reptiles and insects, so I'm pretty sure I'm in the right place. When I'm not writing I enjoy wood carving. Both of the heads beside me in the picture are cedar from the Chassahowitzka Forrest. I also love to walk my dog Bark Anthony. Probably need to go do that now. A Chronology of the Twins Alternate Universe novels and some thoughts and rationales - https://www.ricklockwood.net/Chronology.html My Books on Books 2 Read - https://books2read.com/ap/RaZ9Br/Richard-R-Lockwood  

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Postscript

Tau Past 2 - 1921

1

Rumors began flooding Europe and Scandinavia the day after his forces descended on the chaos of the former capitol of Imperial Russia. It did not take long for the exiled Whites to follow the gunships. Many of the previous owners received possession of their estates back from the new Grand Duke of Petrograd, and they were happy to swear fealty to Pyotr Wrangel if that was the price.

Gangs and groups of former military on both sides were little challenge to his new forces and were quickly destroyed or absorbed into the militia. Transports visited the camps in Ukraine and Siberia and the officers and nobility willing to give allegiance to the new master of Petrograd were collected. Emigres in Berlin and Paris and London took ships to Petrograd and Wrangel was happy to see the faces of many old friends, but he was even happier to see their talents and skills return with them and soon found places for them in his new government. In February of 1921 he was pleased to welcome the engineer Igor Sikorsky to Peterhof, the grand palace on the Baltic of the former Romanov rulers of Russia.

With his elevation as Grand Duke, Wrangel had felt that he must resign from serving on the board of any company and he had come to a new arrangement with Admiral Kosciusko. The Tau would lease a factory complex of six lines to him, in exchange he would give the Tau six of the former Imperial estates; three in Peter and three in the Lake Ladoga area. Wrangel had been too busy getting control of the region to do much with the new factory complex, but now he was ready to start production and thought Sikorsky would be perfect to manage the complex. He took him for a tour of the site the next morning.

It was a typical winter day in Russia; severe cold, gloomy skies, a biting wind and snow flurries, but the site was warmed by atmosphere fields and large heaters. We already have enough military ships, said Wrangel as they floated around the site on the landing pad of his cruiser, our agreement with Tau is limited to civilian production here. They circled the complex and he continued as they moved through the overlapping air buffer fields, sometimes moving through snow flakes and other times rain. I have three platoons of the militia guarding the site. We've started mining rare metals, but what I want to do first is replace our transportation system. So much of the rail and road systems have been destroyed and it would take years to fix them. I want you to design a fleet of balloons so we don't have to do all that work. The system already has a design for the big lifter balloons, but I want something smaller, something we can also lease to small companies and produce in the thousands. Maybe even a personal balloon. What do you think?

All I have in my head right now are heavier than air craft, sire, said Sikorski. Balloons have always seemed like targets to me.

That's a good idea, Igor. We can set up a testing range out at Kronstadt. Make a few dozen and try to shoot them down. I'd like to know how hard it is and it will give the sailor boys out there something to do.

The Kronstadt sailors are on your side, sire?

The ones who are left are. Build me a balloon fleet suitable for Russian conditions, Igor. I'll let you build more interesting things as well. They floated into a BabyLux, a silver midsize luxury yacht, parked in the middle of the complex. There were two shuttle craft parked in the hold and the militia on duty saluted the Grand Duke. This will be the headquarters of the factory staff, said Wrangel. The militia have access to the bottom three floors and the dining room. Your staff will have the top ten and the factory control and design floor. What do you think?

I'm amazed, sire. Two questions if you don't mind.

Of course.

Is this an aircraft you're offering me as my headquarters?

It’s a spacecraft, capable of flying where there is no air. The factory manager will have his own personal spacecraft.

Amazing. Sire, I am pleased and honored to be offered this position and I accept, of course, but I am also puzzled as to why you are trying so hard to recruit me? I'm not a famous engineer and I obviously have a great deal to learn.

Wrangel laughed, My friend Matt Kopje tells me you are famous in the future, mostly as a designer of something called a helicopter, but for other kinds of aircraft as well. He's sending me a systems engineer after lunch to get you started here. I'm just a beginner in the design area.

After lunch? How did you know I would accept?

I didn't. I have a radio in my head and I'm speaking to him right now. He says the engineer will be able to show you some of your future designs.

Sire, I hope I will be able to get over my shock so that I may be of use to you. All the new things and ideas, knowledge from the future...

Lunch will help. I suppose the automated dining room will contribute to your shock as well, but you'll get over it.

2

There were some sparse cirrus clouds up around 9000 meters and a brisk westerly breeze up top with a mild southwesterly just above the waves where Raya flew her dragon. A few boats were scattered around the area but she ignored them; all her friends were in the air. She had left the Santa Ana peninsula behind ten minutes earlier and was coming up on her destination of Spike Island.

Fourteen year old Terza Santos was beating her own dragon with a crop and trying to close the hundred meter gap between them. Raya looked back and waved at her every few minutes to encourage her. Raya closed her own eyes and looked out of her dragon's for a minute, sampling her emotions at the same time. She had named the dragon Miri after a childhood friend, and the dragon was so full of triumph and pride at being in the lead that Raya wondered why she had needed the lace to sense it.

Miri knew where they were headed, she had run this course before, and Raya took her attention off the dragon to look around. She knew that several of the dots in the air around were her military and parents on airboards, but they were giving the racers plenty of room. Some of the larger dots were gunships and cruisers, she knew that many of the watchers were urging on other fliers. She took a moment to do the same, standing up in her stirrups and giving a wild Malay yell to the twenty dragons and riders strung along behind her. Some of them yelled back and Raya smiled as she approached the huge white spike stuck on the highest point of the tiny island.

Feeling generous she flew wide around the spike and let Terza close the gap to forty meters, then urged Miri to fly higher and take advantage of the faster westerly winds for the final leg.

Video of the event showed that she was about 130 meters past the pole, and the main mass of the followers were crowded around it to make the turn, when a tremendous blast shook the island, knocking most of the racers out of the air and filling the area with flying rocks and dirt.

Raya and Miri were tossed wings over elbows and for a moment she hung in her harness below the animal, but they had been high enough to give the dragon enough time to almost recover before they hit the water. Raya unsnapped her harness and pushed away from the struggling creature, then tread water nearby and covered her head against the falling debris. Once she was unencumbered Miri quickly righted herself and floated on the water, then gave vent to her anger at the interruption. Raya looked back to try to see what had happened but wasn't able to see anything. She realized the spike was gone along with the other fliers just before her mother splashed her airboard down beside her.

Raya! Are you all right! but Raya could hear nothing and wondered why her mother was mouthing words at her. Her mother quickly saw that her daughter was dazed and could not hear and a moment later had her up on the board headed for a cruiser.

Many of the other fliers were not so lucky and Rafe Ortega was calling cruisers with medical pods from Formosa and Luzon at the same time as young bodies were pulled from the water. Camiguy! he ordered, Get up and tell me if any boats are leaving. Stay high and follow them if you spot one.

Yes, sir, said Jose. He knew what the boss wanted and told his gunship to review radio traffic from the area. It didn't take long to spot one that had sent a short signal seconds before the blast. The boat looked to be a Chinese fishing junk and had no name or identifiers on its hull. It had been on course to the northwest before the blast and had not changed its speed or direction. Reviewing the traffic once more to make sure there were no other likely candidates, Jose sent Rafe the data, then said a prayer for the young souls as he followed their likely murderer into the East China Sea.

3

So how are you feeling tonight, darling?

How many women have you done this to, Robert Kosciusko?

You're the first in this universe, my lovely Oksana. Why?

I'm thinking you should know how I'm feeling with all your experience, but I'm glad you're keeping me company.

In my experience pregnant women like to tell me how they're feeling. Are you sure you're pregnant?

She used the rail to help herself out of the spa and stood before him with her swollen belly dripping on the floor, Well, I look pregnant, and something in there is kicking me. I think he likes the water as much as I do.

Why don't you get back in for a little while longer and I'll join you. His clothes fell off his body to the floor and he helped her back into the water. Aah, he said as he began to float, the young master has some good ideas already.

Oksana curled up beside him and put her head on his chest, Did you talk with Ilya?

He put his arm around her and enjoyed the feeling before replying. Yeah. He says he's happy to be a ranch manager, but he would probably be happier back in the military. I'm sending him back to Crimea for a month to get up to speed. Matt has started a little academy there for officers.

Mmm, and with Boris in school in Virginia we'll all be separated again.

It'll be a little different this time, darling.

Yes, because of you. You are so good to us, Bob. I don't understand it, but I'm grateful. Anything you ever want from me, just ask. Um, OK, I guess you can just show me, too.

Kosciusko had dug a canal from the Trinity river, then widened it into a lake in the center of the property with an island in the middle of it. He then built a long curved structure at the south side where the lake met the canal. Three stories tall, it was colored the light reddish brown of much of the surface dirt in the area. He had invited a team of construction engineers from the University of Texas in Austin to watch when he had built his home in December. Now the factories on the west side of the ranch produced a steady stream of construction materials to meet the demands of those same engineers. The University had formed a joint company to exploit the new methods. Bob had been named President and had given the venture the gift of a dozen of the lifting balloons as his first executive action. He was trying to get the Governor of Texas to put his weight behind a development project in Matagorda Bay on the southern coast and had an appointment to fly him and several of his advisers out to New Shanghai in two days to see some examples of what was possible. The President of UT and the Dean of the College of Engineering would be along to help make the case for Tau Texas Construction.

Oksana usually retired early; it was her first pregnancy and the changes to her body were mostly unpleasant surprises. Bob had set up the spa in their third floor apartment and given her two maids, then told her to get plenty of rest, advice she was happy to take.

Later that evening Bob watched a report from a Gurkha squad sent to survey downarm. Lieutenant Norbu had reported that everything was normal at D-Tau, then gone to the final system in the chain and left relay satellites along the way. Now that the Tau knew what to look for their satellites had been instructed to search for Mmagam energy signatures. Norbu reported the finding of another group of the huge alien ships way above the galactic plane and apparently headed further into the galaxy. From the light signatures it looked like they had passed by about twenty years ago.

Then came a report from Levi; he was still working on scaling down their Jump drive for smaller ships, although he had told Bob more than once it was already possible to use it on huge ones. He wanted Bob to build something the size of a city, just like the Mmagam ships, but Bob could find no rational reason to do so. No large population on Earth wanted to set off into the unknown, although plenty of individuals had the urge. There was only one reason to use the drive in Bob's mind, and that was to scout the Orion system. If another fleet of Mmagam or anyone else was headed his way, he would like to know about it, and Bob did not want his scouts blundering about far from home in a city sized target. Bob suspected that Levi was just not interested in the problem and was spending his energy on his first love, time research. I should have told him to make one big enough to transport just one person, thought Bob. Levi's other love was miniaturization, maybe that would have worked. That would be interesting, one person in an air bubble, jumping along at 80 lights a clip, the reported limit of the Mmagam drive. Bob smiled and sent off a challenge to Levi, then moved on to a report from Alexey Pahlen.

The President of Tau Europe was now the master of a commercial empire based in Paris with branches in Germany, Poland, and the Grand Duchy of Petrograd. To protect this enterprise he had well paid agents in most of the radical groups and revolutionary organizations across Europe. Bob had just begun watching another boring summary of the activities of troublemakers on the left and right when he got a fleet emergency message from the Philippines. Summoning his cruiser's landing pad to the balcony outside his office, he told the duty officer of his Texas squadron to keep his eyes open and was on his way moments later.

4

Bob reviewed the video of the race and the data forwarded by Sergeant Camiguy, then slowed down as he approached the area. His cruiser could sense no unusual amount of radio traffic in the East China Sea and traffic around the Japanese military centers seemed normal. Bob knew that Rafe had plenty of medical pods by now, but he sent him a message that he was in the area if his was needed, then joined Camiguy's gunship above the junk.

Two minutes later new drones popped out of the cruiser's fabricator and he sent three of them floating down. They were about the size of a small marble, perhaps a centimeter in diameter, and with a mirror finish; if Bob had needed one for night use he would have made it matte black to reduce stray light reflections but the mirror finish was harder to see during the day. The devices approached the boat from above, then settled down on it at the stern, the bow, and mid-ships.

Bob started guiding the mid-ship one to find a way into the junk, keeping it at floor level. Scans of the junk showed one body steering from a wheelhouse on deck and nine more below. Bob found a set of steps and keeping just above the floor and over on one side he floated the drone down. The movement of the ship made it difficult to keep a relative position inside so Bob put it down on the deck as soon as he could. One of the bodies was huddled beside the stairs and Bob slowly moved around to inspect it. As he had expected from the first scan it was a child; a little girl probably about eight or nine. An iron chain secured her ankle to the stairs.

Rafe Ortega entered Bob's bridge and stepped off of his airboard just as Bob made this discovery.

She's guarding the stairs on the junk, said Bob, pointing to the video display.

These are some dirty players, boss, said Rafe. Who do we know who targets kids and also uses them as human shields?

Don't know, Rafe, but if the bomb was set off by radio then they're state of the art for this time. That narrows it down a bit.

Well, it's probably not the Soviets, boss. The Reds who are left have bigger problems than us.

"Unless they feel like this is the