Devil's Due (Destroyermen #12)(9)
“And put on your hat!” Karen admonished, raising her voice and gesturing at the sky. The sun was stabbing through the clouds, raising steam from the sodden ground. Alan Letts had a very fair complexion and burned easily. He didn’t spend as much time outdoors these days and sometimes forgot to protect himself.
“Yes, dear,” he called back dutifully, quickly adjusting his high, tight collar and plopping the white hat on his head. “I’ll see you and the girls tonight,” he added, finally sitting as the carriage lurched onto the main, gravel-mixed street. For all the younglings running loose, even more had been adopted by females working in the shipyards or factories, both Lemurians and expat Imperial women. Some families with the wherewithal, still intact because they ran businesses essential to the war effort and weren’t allowed to fight, had adopted half a dozen or more. Alan and Karen had taken two themselves, both female, and treated them as their own. They would’ve taken more, but their duties already required that they have a nanny—a young, one-armed Marine veteran of the Battle of Raan-goon named Unaa-Saan-Mar—with three younglings of her own. For the first time, he noticed the many furry Lemurian faces watching from the newly built ground-level shops and porches lining the road, their amused but respectful blinking still coming as a surprise.
They actually enjoy that I’m henpecked! He realized with a mental snort. Then he reconsidered. But maybe that’s why they’ve accepted me. It makes me more a person to them, regardless of what . . . species I am. Alan still found his official status as the leader of the new, wildly diverse nation they’d built a bit overwhelming, and more than a little unbelievable. True, he’d been accepted as acting chairman during Adar’s absence, and the members of the Grand Alliance, including the Empire of the New Britain Isles and the Republic of Real People, which hadn’t joined the Union, were accustomed to that. He even thought he’d done a good job, under the circumstances, managing the logistical side of the war effort in particular. But he’d never dreamed he’d be practically drafted into the job for real, after Adar fell into enemy hands.
It might’ve been easier to understand if he’d just been acclaimed High Chief of Baalkpan. He was well-known there, and even—as were all his surviving shipmates from USS Walker, USS Mahan, and S-19, to various degrees—beloved. They’d saved the city, after all. But the fact they’d also, literally or by extension, saved Aryaal, B’mbaado, B’taava, North Borno, Sembaakpan, Sular, Austraal, Chill-Chaap, the Shogunate of Yokohama (which included the tragic village of Ani-Aaki), and all the Filpin Lands—not to mention the eleven seagoing Homes that had joined the Union—apparently hadn’t been lost on anyone. Though still amazingly fractious (particularly in the case of Sular, which still argued over representation after all the seagoing Homes joined as a single, relatively high-population state), the various Homes had apparently recognized the validity of some version of the old axiom “Never change horses in the middle of the stream.” Or war.
It also probably helped that Alan came from the one Home or Clan that every other had to materially support and considered most impartial: the “Amer-i-caan Navy Clan.” It not only protected everyone, but most of its members now came from every clan or Home. They swore allegiance to its flag and a constitution that had served as a guide for the one adopted by the Union, but though their loyalty to its high chief—Captain Matthew Reddy—was unquestioned, everyone knew they remained loyal to the United Homes as well. In addition, every Union warship belonged to the Amer-i-caan Navy Clan except those designated as reserve, such as Salaama-Na or Salissa (CV-1), and an increasing number of auxiliaries entering service. It was no longer required that all sailors join the Amer-i-caan Navy Clan forever, but officers must in order to be commissioned. Regular sailors’ oaths would be allowed to expire (if they wanted) when the war was over and they went home. But the Marines practically belonged to Captain Reddy. The Navy Clan also had a few land possessions, such as the islands of Tarakaan, Midway, and Andamaan. And there was a “daughter” colony being built at a place it called Saan Diego, so far away that it was literally on the bottom of the world as far as most were concerned. Even that didn’t cause disputes, because all contributed solely to the maintenance of the navy and would never become independent Homes.
Alan often wondered to himself if the mishmash they’d put together would survive the war. He also worried that the unusual powers he’d helped reserve for the Navy Clan might be abused by some future high chief after they were gone. He hoped not. He hoped the tradition of selfless service Matt and the others had established at such a terrible cost would last a very long time. Either way, though, for now at least, the Amer-i-caan Navy Clan—as the one most responsible for the conduct of the war—had to remain a very slight “first among equals,” even as it truly was viewed as the most neutral when it came to disputes among other Homes.
He stuck two fingers in the collar at his neck and pulled. Damn thing’s getting tighter as I sweat! he grumped to himself. What the hell was wrong with my khakis? It was his wife’s idea that he always wear his best whites in public. Despite his complaints, he supposed it made sense. He was the chairman—practically president, for God’s sake!—after all. He should try to look the part. And at least whites don’t show sweat like khakis, he conceded. But maybe most important, the uniform’s a good recruiting tool. We need more people than ever to crew the ships and fly the planes we’re building, and fill the ranks of our armies.