Devil's Due (Destroyermen #12)(11)
Always objective when it came to analysis, Stokes nodded at Forester. “Not to be a knocker, but that hasn’t worked as well lately, if you’ll pardon me sayin’.”
Forester grimaced. “Combined with the . . . impetuosity of youth, she did perhaps allow her inflexibility to overrule the better judgment of more experienced minds,” he allowed, acknowledging the debacle that led to the naval Battle of Malpelo, against the twisted forces of the Holy Dominion. In hindsight, the battle had been a great victory, as had General Shinya and X Corps’s desperate defense of Fort Defiance. It even appeared a turning point may have been reached in the war against the Doms. But that was in spite of Governor-Empress Rebecca Anne McDonald’s decisions, not because of them. She’d done a great deal to rectify her errors, helping the situation do perhaps a bit better than simply stabilize, but her inflexibility had undoubtedly cost lives.
Alan threw his hands up. “So you both give me hell about being too familiar, then tell me I’ll lose us the war if I’m too imperious. Which is it?”
“Both, I suppose,” Forester said. Stokes nodded agreement.
Alan avoided rolling his eyes in frustration and changed the subject instead. “So, Bolton,” he began, stressing the ambassador’s first name, “how was your visit to the lovely, friendly paradise of Sular?”
Forester rolled his own eyes, and began relating his latest discussions with the most recalcitrant member of the Union. He may not have been a citizen of the United Homes, but it was in his nation’s best interest that the Union thrive, and Alan often used him as a trusted, “objective” go-between. The carriage slowed again as it moved through crowds of workers coming off shift, even as others headed in the opposite direction. Most were Lemurians, of course, their furry coats dingy from long hours at machines or forges, their large-eyed faces slack with fatigue, tails hanging low. Quite a few were human females, however, generally dark-haired and -skinned, averaging about five feet, five inches tall. They were the expat Impie gals, who’d come to Baalkpan and the Filpin Lands before Governor-Empress McDonald “emancipated” them, nullifying the indentures many labored under. Some went home after that, but most remained. This was home now, and they were just as much citizens of Baalkpan, the Filpin Lands, even the American Navy Clan, as anyone else. They were weary too, often performing work difficult even for Lemurians, but they were free, and helping the cause with determination.
The thing that struck Alan most was, in spite of their exhausting labor—and the prospect of more for those heading to work—everyone’s morale seemed good. Many even tiredly cheered when his carriage passed! This after word had already spread about the sinking of SMS Amerika by yet another potential foe, and the terrible losses they’d sustained in the battle with Kurokawa north of Mahe. They still trust us to pull this off, to win, in the end, Alan thought. They still trust me. One way or another, I’ll earn it. No matter what, he swore.
“I don’t know how you’ve done it,” Forester said softly, interrupting his discourse on Sular and apparently echoing Alan’s thoughts about the people here.
“What?” Alan asked, falsely cheerful. Many Lemurians spoke some English now, but they’d never hear his words over the ruckus, regardless of how good their ears were. They’d hear his tone, though. “How we’ve killed a generation—and sparked a population explosion of another that’ll never know the culture we destroyed, or even their own parents?”
“No,” Forester said. “How you saved them—despite the rest. They’re fully aware of that, I assure you,” he added. Alan said nothing more.
Past the old ropewalks—now a factory making thousands of wooden barrels and hundreds of wheels for heavy freight wagons and artillery pieces every week—they turned right to parallel a loud, smoky battery of oil-fired steam generators providing electric power to a pair of huge machine shops on either side. As sad as it genuinely made him that they’d turned this almost idyllic city into a massive industrial complex, Alan could never suppress a lurking sense of wonder at all they’d accomplished. What began as his own little Ministry of Industry and Sonny Campeti’s Ordnance Division, which attempted to manage a wide variety of relatively small enterprises—with the exception of the refineries, shipyards, foundries, and ammunition works they’d geared up at once—had morphed into a blossoming, if chaotic, manufacturing infrastructure. Not only here, but at Maa-ni-la, and in the Empire as well.
The shipyards were the most evident example of that, and from the vantage point of the carriage, they’d grown to encompass nearly everything. And the Baalkpan Metal Works was now inextricably combined with them. Under the ownership of two brothers, it had expanded from its prewar capacity of making crude, nonferrous castings to pouring complex iron castings for every manner of thing, and was getting tolerably good steel from Madras. It had multiple divisions of its own, including steel mills, rolling mills, tubing and pipe mills, as well as facilities for making wire and wire cables. The Baalkpan Boiler and Steam Engine Works made arguably better boilers and engines than they’d first copied, and they’d been surpassed by similar works in Maa-ni-la and the Empire in terms of output, as had the Baalkpan ICE houses, which made internal combustion engines. Those here were still amazingly productive, but focused more on innovation than quantity. This was where they’d pioneered the new radial aircraft engines and steam turbines, for example, because Baalkpan had made the longest strides in specialty steel production and treatment.