CHAPTER 16

When we returned I did just that. They purchased the location of the asteroid field for 20,000 credits and would send out one of their mining ships to start mining in a day. They would get about 5 million credits from the field in materials which I promised to buy. It would take them two years with the one mining ship though.

I was happy to be back in Capsulite system, it was definitely feeling like home to me now. Nothing major had happened while I had been gone. We went into orbit and offloaded the parts we had made while on our adventure. Rose sent me the plans for the 1,000 meter space station, only it was 3,400 meters! Was she nuts!? Estimated price tag was 600 million credits. Estimated completion time three years! We needed to talk. These type stations were pretty rare and the upkeep was 8 million a year.

Rose walked into my office on the Prometheus with a neutral expression on her face. I motioned for her to sit. “Rose I reviewed your plans and I do not think it is feasible. Multi-system governments with billions of populace have stations like this. We barely have a million people. Just maintaining the station is going to strain the resources of Chevalier.” I opened my hands inviting her response.

Rose was ready, “Yes captain I agree but I have done a quick population projection over the next five years and Chevalier will exceed 10 million in population by then. I estimate a 2% per annual rise after that. Also if we wait 50 years to reach a population that could sustain Black Citadel, we may never produce the battleships you want. Also this design is much superior to anything else I could have come up with. It will be the crown jewel of anything out there. There will be internal slips for a battleship build, a cruise build, two frigate builds, four corvette builds and six fighter builds. The facility will require massive amounts of resources to function but we have enough resources in this system for about fifty years of full operation before heading out of system. Minus some of the rarer elements.” She seemed pleased with her math. I couldn't fathom what she was thinking.

“And why would we need this. The operating costs of star ships are even more than stations, we will go bankrupt!” I finally said. I thought I had her. But she just smiled.

“Profit captain. We could build ships slightly better than the ones on the market and get a premium for them. Imagine building a battleship for 60 million to then turning around and sell it for 200 million? We have the technology to build ships decades ahead of anyone else but we can just make slight increase to their designs every two years of so and keep our profit line.” She seemed pleased with herself. I then thought about the message boards. This would put a huge target on our backs. PCs would rally to defeat us and take the technology or the station. She seemed to be reading my mind. “Captain, phase one on the station will take one year. It would only be the skeleton, guns and shields, about 20% of the total station. It should be able to completely hold off a dozen battleships.” Yeah a dozen I thought there would be more like 50 if the PCs knew what I had here. She seemed to read my mind again. “There will also be 12 fighter bays of 60 fighters each.” She said triumphantly. Hmm, 720 heavy fighters. Plus the heavy weapons.

“What is the crew total for this masterpiece of yours?” I asked seriously. I think she sensed she was winning me over.

“After one year 1,800. Adding about 100 crew a month through completion to reach 5,600, not including the fighter pilots.” I swallowed hard. The station had life support for up to 25,000 people so the 5,600 and pilots were just the operations staff. I typed the numbers in a data slate. Maintenance/staffing would be nearly 20 million a year including the fighters. We would need a population of one billion to maintain this station with tax revenue effectively. I sat back and dismissed Rose and let her know I would think on it. Even by cutting out the middle men and using Prometheus’ replicator the 600 million credit station would cost 300 million. It was not like I was the sovereign ruler. Why should I invest everything I had for the next three years. It was a real concern. The profits Rose had mentioned would not be mine they would be for the planet Chevalier. What if I was voted out of office? No I don't think I could commit to this project. I spent the next two days talking it over with Katrine. She definitely saw it from my angle and was behind me 100% to not build the massive station and risk losing everything.

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I told Rose on the third day after we meet and she took it well, too well, I should have known something was up then. I went about my business for the next week and I could tell something was up with my companions and rhino squad. They directed me well away from the general public and kept me busy with administrative work.

So what happened was when I told Katrine the first time she talked directly to Maddie, Rose and Lina. They agreed with my sentiment and figured to get me elected the king. A king who had absolute power. They played it off as having royal blood ruling the planet and how I was essentially responsible for the population as is. They hinted I might leave if I wasn't elected as well which was a twisting of my words. While I was worrying about logistics and preparing for the return of the Malkavians they held a planetary election. I was not told until the votes had been tallied. The population voted 88% in favor, 8% opposed and 4% not voting. It was overwhelming considering a 96% turnout. But it was probably just some mathematical algorithm based on my actions to date. I was just sending off the crew of the new mining ship Undermountain when they surprised me with a crown. It was made of precious metals and had a single black opal in it shaped like a phoenix. The metal work imitated fire around the crown. It was pretty with gold and platinum flames. I immediately suspected this was a ploy by Katrine and Rose to get me to build the monstrosity of a station.

Surprisingly I wasn't mad and had the devilish idea to play along that I knew what was happening all along. Holding the crown I looked at the group around me and said to Rose, “I approved your plans for the station already. We will start laying the framework next week. This is beautiful by the way.” I indicated the crown. “I want to the frigate construction bays fully operational as well as the guns and shields after the first year of construction. The frigates are to be designed for heavy combat slug fest and as a military ground force delivery system for the marines. Lets say 500 marines. Get me the plans to review when you are done. Katrine should we retire and celebrate?” I said with a mischievous tone. The group was dumbstruck. They thought I was completely ignorant of everything happening. Now they thought I had perhaps played them like a fiddle to make this all happen. I left without waiting for Katrine to respond to my quarters.

Katrine arrived twenty minutes later with two bottles of wine and glasses. I was already in bed waiting for her. I had begun to think she wasn't coming. She slipped out of clothes and joined me with the two full wine glasses and we rested on the pillows. She began, “Did you know about…” I interrupted her. “I didn't have a clue but don't tell them that. It is better to have them think I know what the hell is going is on.” She paused and we both laughed. The night ended very well indeed. Did I mention that I gained two social standing points for becoming king? This gave me ten points in the stat and another companion. More importantly it opened a new profession, king! I had only made it to level 3 as a captain but I didn't mind switching to king. King had ten levels. Besides experience there was a requirement for the number of subjects you had to be ruling over. Once again I jumped right to level two and was a third of the way to level three on the progress bar. I took plasma projector skill so next time I was out with Rhino squad I would be able to hit something!

King

Level 1 +1 social standing

Level 2 +1 to Leadership, +1 to any skill (required 50,000 subjects)

Level 3 +1 to Intelligence, +1 to Social Standing (required 500,000 subjects)

Level 4 +2 Companions (required 5 million subjects)

Level 5 +1 to any skill, +1 to social standing (required 50 million subjects)

Level 6 +2 to social standing (required 500 million subjects)

Level 7 +1 to any skill, +1 to any stat (required 1 billion subjects)

Level 8 +1 Companion (required 5 billion subjects)

Level 9 +2 to one stat (required 10 billion subjects)

Level 10 +2 to social standing, +1 to any skill (required 25 billion subjects)