Chapter thirteen

Wolf

“Admiral follow the drone on the floor. It will show you to your room and make yourself comfortable. Oh and I didn’t ask did you eat lunch yet?” Asked Wolf.

“No I didn’t.” Answered the Admiral.

“So when you finish unpacking why don’t you ask the drone to show you to the mess.”

“Is there anything specific that you would like for lunch?”

“No, your food is usually very good. I will trust your judgment.”

So with the admiral following one of the drones to her room I headed to the mess. When Palace was designing the ship she included a big kitchen because she knew that I liked to cook. So I took out a pot and turned on the fire. While I was waiting for the water to boil I gathered the other ingredients I would need to make spaghetti and meatballs.

First I prepared the meat balls and put them on the side. After that I started working on making a dough for the spaghetti. Once the dough was made I took out the machine that would make it into strings. Then I added some salt to the boiling pot of water and put the spaghetti in. With the spaghetti on the fire I took out a pan for the meat balls, put a little oil and turned on the fire. When the pan was hot enough I put in the meatballs.

Just after I finished putting them in is when the admiral showed up.

That smells very good. What are you making?

I’m making meatballs and spaghetti. Why don’t you watch the meatballs while I go grab something to drink.

Sure just don’t be long because I was never very good at cooking.

I headed next door to a room that was similar to a cellar. From there I took out one of the bottles of wine that were stored in the palace that were there from the last people that occupied the palace. No they weren’t people, they were family according to that video that I saw. But it’s not important now but what is, is that they left a cellar full of different wines. When Palace and Ship were filling the different rooms on Ship they moved some stuff from the Palace. One of the things they moved was a few bottles of wine. So I grabbed one and headed back to the kitchen.

Once back in the kitchen I put the tomato sauce into the pan with the meatballs and lowered the fire a little. Then I drained the spaghetti and got out the dishes. I put some spaghetti in each bowl then added a few meatballs and some sauce.

“I will take the bowels to the table. Why don’t you bring the wine?”

“Why is this table set? I would think that you wouldn’t keep it set all the time.”

“How do you know that I didn’t set the table while you were unpacking?”

“I don’t know but I don’t think you had enough time. So are you going to answer my question?”

“This is the table that I usually eat at while on the ship so I always keep it set. As for the reason why it is set like it’s a fine dining restaurant. Well that’s because of the etiquette classes that I took and there was something that I learned while taking them. That was that I like etiquette. With etiquette everything has its place so I keep the table set the way I learned it.”

“But let’s eat before the food gets cold. We can discuss what needs to be discussed after we finish eating.”

“Let’s clear the table and get out some pastries for dessert. We could speak over dessert.

So we cleared the table of the plates, utensils and cups. It all got put in the dishwasher. After that I got some pastries from a cabinet and we headed back to the table. But not before getting cups and some fruit juice.

We sat down and then the conversation started.

“I think it’s time that you told me the whole story. So that I could start making my plans for the future that include you in it. So to speed things along I will tell you what I already know. Then when I finish you could fill me in on what I don’t know.”

“I think that’s a very good idea especially because I will be able to appreciate this dessert while you speak.”

“Ok so from what I know you joined the lycanthrope war college and excelled. You graduated as a junior lieutenant and started your service in the fleet. Where by all accounts you excelled again and eventually reached the rank of Rear Admiral. With the last promotion you got command of the base on Vikra. Which was a mess at the time but you fixed it up and made it into one of the most efficient bases in the empire. But because it was so successful you got pushed out for someone with more pull and more friends.”

“Of course I left out a lot of stuff like the medals you got but that was the short version. So how did I do?”

“You got my military career right. You want to tell me about before I joined the war college.”

“I would love to but I couldn’t find any information about where you are from. The only things I could get a hold of were after you joined the war college. Since you never told me much about that time that is why we are having this conversation. So you could tell me what happened before the war college. Like that I could start thinking about what we are going to need to get done. So I think it’s your turn to tell me the information that I’m going to need for this relationship to move forward. So it’s time to spill about what happened before the war college.”

“I was born on the planet Shemra. I was born to a widowed mother and she died in childbirth. So I was raised in the house of the patriarch of the shemra clan. When it was time to decide on what I was going to do after I finished university. Well you already know what I decided. So I applied for the lycanthrope military academy. I also asked the patriarch for a recommendation letter since it was one of the requirements needed to get in.”

“So when it came time to go to the lycanthrope military academy I got a surprise. That was that the patriarch’s youngest child was also going. We were actually very close from growing up in the same house. So when we got to the academy we asked to bunk together in the same room. We got approval and everything was good for the first week.”

“That was until Rexha met this boy. She didn’t like him and tried to tell him that but he never got the point. It all came crashing down when I came back to the room we were sharing early. When I opened the door the first thing I heard was Rexha screaming. The second thing I noticed was that the boy was on top of Rexha and she was trying to get away. The third thing I noticed was that he was trying to take her pants off.”

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“I ran up to him and from behind I smashed my forearm into the back of his head. He lost his grip on Rexha’s hands and she started punching him. She didn’t have much power in her punches but it was enough for the boy to concentrate on her. Since he wasn’t focused on me I was able to deliver two quick punches to his kidneys. Then I grabbed him by his hair and dragged him out of the room.”

“When I went back in to check on Rexha she was a mess and I wasn’t sure what I could do for her. So I called the Shemra Compound on the home world. I asked…”

“Just a moment, what's this about the Shemra compound?”

“To do that I would have to explain the concept of compounds. After I finish explaining you should understand what I’m getting at.”

“So how about I give you a moment to think while I clean up dessert.”

I cleaned up the table and then sat down and waited for a few minutes for Bebe to figure out how to explain it. As I waited I realized that there was a lot that I didn’t know about the lycanthrope government. But then I remembered what Pakas told me and that was when faced with something new the thing to do was learn about it. The point he told me was that not knowing something was ok. But when faced with something you don’t know you should learn about it. So I waited for Bebe to explain something that I didn’t know.

“The different lycanthrope clans have compounds on the lycanthrope home world. They are representing the head of the clan, be it the matriarch or patriarch. The compound is very similar to a foreign empire’s embassy. The head of the compound is appointed by the head of the clan and is usually a very close family member. The compound's job is to advocate for the clan and represent the clan's interests.”

“So when I found Rexha lying there I didn’t know what to do so I called the compound. It took a few minutes until I got in touch with the person in charge of the compound. When I did get to speak to her and told her who I was and what the problem was she said that she would be there right away. She also told me not to let anyone into the room. So after I ended the call I told the computer to lock the door.

“Then I went back to the bed and sat down and held Rexha. I waited about twenty minutes and then the computer told me someone was at the door. When I asked for a name the lady at the door said something but I only caught the last name which was Shemra. So I let her in. She came in with a second lady and quickly got Rexha dressed then gave her a long coat and a hat to cover her face then we walked out.”

“As we walked out I saw a bunch of people that looked like soldiers at the door and when we left the room some followed us and some went into the room. We left the dormitory building and out by the curb were a few hovercrafts that we got into. Once in the hovercraft it took off about an hour later we stopped on the roof of some building that I didn’t recognize. We all got out and headed into the building. Once in the building the security left us and we’re replaced with some staff.”

“I was separated from the group and one of the staff brought me to a conference room. I waited there for a few minutes then the lady that picked us up came in and we spoke. She told me after the conversation was over that someone would give me a ride back to the military academy. She also told me that they would do everything they could for me. That was the last time I saw any of them. I was always to ashamed to go back to Shemra.”

“That’s my story. The rest you already know.”

“Ok thanks for filling me in. I think we should head to bed and we will discuss what I have found tomorrow.”

We got up from the table in the kitchen and I walked Bebe to her room. After that I headed towards my room. Once in my room I started getting undressed then I headed to the shower. After the shower I went to bed. As I was laying down I told Ship to gather all the information on Shemra. Then I went to sleep.

The next morning I woke up and went to the gym and practiced my katas. When I finished my katas I lifted weights. But I did a low amount and went for higher reps. The point of this was that my muscles wouldn’t get too big and I wouldn’t stand out. After lifting weights I did a few more katas then I headed back to my room. Once in my room I took a shower got dressed and went to the captain's office on the side of the bridge.

Once on the bridge I asked for a full report of what Ship found out about Shemra. Ship knew how I liked to be given my report’s so he had a tablet for me to read off of while he spoke. When I read and heard the shortened version I decided on the base course for the next few months. Once that was done I went to the kitchen to wait for Bebe. A few minutes later she showed up and we started breakfast.

“How about you let me make breakfast as it’s the only thing I’m good at making?”

Asked Bebe.

“Sure, go ahead, we will discuss my decisions after we eat. You cook breakfast while I get the table set.” We were eating at the same table that we ate dinner at and since we had guests and Ship knew I liked this table so it wasn’t set. I gathered the items I needed and set the table and waited for Bebe. A few minutes later she finished cooking breakfast and it was served.

After breakfast we cleaned up and headed back to the table to discuss what I thought would be a good idea from the research that I read.

“How about I tell you about the plan that I have then when I’m finished you start criticizing it. After that we come up with a better, more comprehensive plan.”

“Ok I’m listening.”

“So first I have a question. When was the last time you went back to Shemra.”

“I haven’t been back since I started the academy. I always felt guilty about what happened to Rexha. So I never went back. I couldn’t face the rejection if there would be any. Even though they helped me out with my career in the military and the money they gave me. I still felt that in some small way they were doing it to keep me away. So I never went back. Since you asked, I'm assuming that going to Shemra is part of the plan.”

“Let’s not forget what originally brought us together. That was to build a space station to do that we are going to need certain stuff to even begin. The first thing I would say is that the person controlling the planet we are going to be building next to should like us. Even more want us to succeed and from what you tell me that is Shemra. Shemra also has other qualities that make it a good choice for what we want to accomplish.”

“Now as to my plan. I was thinking about buying a ship building company that operates next to Shemra. From there we start building ships. We are going to have to build multiple types of ship’s. Some of them will be for our use in building the space station and some will be for sale. The reason for that is that I don’t have enough money to last for the building of the whole space station. So we are going to have to design some new and improved ships. I was thinking maybe get a military contract for something small yet worthwhile. From there we are going to have to build the station slowly and it will take years.”

“Chances are I won’t be there for it all so you will be in charge as we agreed. But I want you to also manage the other companies I own. That’s my idea so far. I'm sure that you have some stuff to add. So come on and let me hear them.”

“Well I don’t really have anything to add because as the saying goes no plan stands up to first contact. So once we start working on it some of the things that you wanted to accomplish will have to be changed. But the overall plan that you have is good.”

“Ok then I think it’s time that we started heading to Shemra.”

“Ship please plot a course to Shemra and execute.”

“Affirmative.”

“So how about you fill me in on what I will be facing when we get there.”

“I don’t know, I haven’t been home since leaving for the military academy. But as far as I know it’s still the same people in charge of the clan. But that’s about it I could tell you.”

“Ok. We will just have to play it by air, which is where I’m more comfortable anyway.”

So that was how the rest of the days went with me studying about Shemra. Cooking for Bebe and myself. The last thing I spent my time doing was the best part of the time on the ship and that was practicing my martial arts. I would spend hours in the gym going through my katas. Both armed and unarmed.

I appreciated the time that I was able to spend on martial arts as it always got me in focus.

So when we got to Shemra I went to the bridge and programmed Ship to go to the edge of the system when we departed. With that taken care of I headed to the landing bay. Where the Admiral joined me and we headed down to the planet.

Once we cleared planetary control I headed towards Jeng, the capital city of Shemra. I stopped the shuttle on the outskirts of the city in a large parking lot for a nice hotel. We got off the shuttle and headed inside the hotel. We got a suite with two bedrooms and two bathrooms. Once I paid for the room we went to the elevator and headed up. Once we entered the suite we each went to our rooms. Once I. My I unpacked a little then went to bed.