SImp

I enjoyed the break in fighting, but I knew that it would not last. The more we gathered data on the Xiǎo Māo, the more we understood that this was not going to be an issue for the diplomats. The Xiǎo Māo's psychology was tied very closely to that of the behavior of the large cats. To simplify it; they loved the hunt. They loved to play with their prey, and even more, they liked to kill. Now obviously this did not describe any specific individual, but as a group, this was what we were facing.

In general, we were finding one strange trend in the data. In examing the statistical values of this aggressive behavior, we found that the Xiǎo Māo who only had two primary mammary glands (similar to Homo Sapiens), as compared to the typical Xiǎo Māo who had multiple mammary glands; similar to the family of Felid, of the order Carnivora, most specifically the Panthera Tigris. (Although most of you are probably more familiar with the Felis Catus also know as the domestic cat. ) Well anyway, the Xiǎo Māo that only had two primary mammary glands tended to behave more like a human than the rest of her clan.

This created some interesting side effects. As we found Xiǎo Māo spies, with only two mammaries, who had fallen for a human and they had ended up married—with offspring!

In general, we were finding that the typical Xiǎo Māo behavior was based around a pride of one Alpha male Xiǎo Māo. The rest of his team were all females. And just as in Homo Sapiens the female was by far the most dangerous of the species. What this meant is that we could not just take out the leader of an invasion force, we had to take out each pride individually. The males piloted large craft somewhat between an Imperial Cruiser class and an Imperial Destroyer. These sh.i.p.s were primarily homes for his wives and little ones, but in times of aggression, they served as launch platforms for the females who piloted fighter like craft, only with many times the firepower of our Imperial fighter class sh.i.p.s. So far, we had not encountered these sh.i.p.s. We had only faced our own craft commanded by the Xiǎo Māo.

Lots and lots of other people were compiling this intelligence about the Xiǎo Māo. Neither Serina or I had to do any of this. What we had to do was live, love, and laugh with our family. Especially the newest member. My little Jane was fantastic. Not that my other children through my other wives were any less special. But Jane had something special, she had the air of command even as a young child.

My father-in-law had agreed with Sabrina's and I's recommendation to redesign the imperial fleet into our new design using high powered A.I.'s like Bit to control these craft. This allowed us to build sh.i.p.s out of fields instead of fabricating the entire ship out of metals, plastics and such. Each destroyer class ship could control twelve smaller fighter type craft. These sh.i.p.s had just enough computing power to create the fields that comprised the main body of the ship. Think of a flying power source, and you would have a picture of this class of ship. Just enough room for a human pilot who had a creative ability that sometimes exceeded an AI and then a vast power source and acc.u.mulators that powered flight and weapons. As this craft had such a little amount of physical materials in its construction, we could send them through ports allowing us to move them rapidly throughout the empire. They also could use virtual ports, which allowed them to approach the speed of light as a sustainable attack speed.

Also, we designed a second Galaxy class ship similar to Bit but not as large and which used even more fields than Bit did. This ship, the ISS Nimitz, was the home of our academy, where we trained the next generation of pilots in how to use this new technology.

All of this was not accomplished overnight but during a long five year period. This left us with tons of time to love our little Jane and her two brothers William and Korak. Yes, grandpa had a hand in naming him….

As they say, practice makes perfect. Well, the rest of my wives made sure that Serina and I had plenty of time to try to make perfect, and I think we had finally succeeded, assuming that Serina was not teasing about what we would name her. Just to make things clear I was not allowed to ignore a single one of my wives, but somehow they all conspired to see that I had more time with Serina than I had with any other single wife. I may be the leader of the family, but in this respect, they controlled me utterly. How they chose whose turn it was, I have never asked. I have simply tried to love them all equally.

We had been practicing going through a port and then deploying for the past three months, and our team of cadet recruits had almost got the hang of it. We had found that it was expedient to use actual teenagers for this as they had less to unlearn plus their reaction times were faster than the older officers.

I came awake enough to answer him after the third repetition, [Hey Bit, what gives?]

Bit sounded worried, [SImp's connections failed in the star system Woden's Haven, it is between the Dragon's Head and the Tarantula Nebula in the way of a general direction.]

[Anything else besides it's quantum entanglement node going down?]

[No, Lance.]

I leaned over and woke Serina by kissing her and kept at it. It was not until I started to c.a.r.e.s.s her exposed upper body as well that she woke up.

After letting Bit give her a quick update, including verifying that we still had the Survey port transponder buried in the moon in orbit around the only inhabited planet, her command mode kicked in, "A live fire training mission? Wake everyone up, and let's get going!"

Grinning from ear to ear, I said, "Ok, Bit you heard the lady, sound the alert!"

The general quarters alert sounded. The intercom screaming "This is not a drill," endlessly. The trainees all rushed to their duty stations, sort of. Some forgot to strip down to put on their armor first and had to face their teammates while they did it at their duty stations. But in general, everyone got to their assignments—eventually.

Little Janie came running into our room and launched herself at me. I hugged her and told her that I loved her, then turned her over to her mother. "Ok, my loved ones, get into your armor now and Janie, sweety, I want you in an escape pod. This should be nothing, but I'm treating it like the real thing."

My response was a "Yes, Daddy," from little Jane. And a "Roger, darling," from Serina. Serina was going to sit this one out in the command chair of the ISS Nimitz, while I launched with the destroyers. I wanted to be out there in my own fighter, so I could be ready to rescue anyone that needed it.

We appeared just a few million kilometers above Haven. Only to see that a firefight was already in progress. Let me repeat that… The firefight that was already in progress.

A dozen Xiǎo Māo cruiser class sh.i.p.s had already taken down all of our garrison fighters and the single token Imperial cruiser that was on duty here, primarily as a token Imperial presence. One would get you ten that they were caught flat-footed and asleep. Unfortunately, they were paying for their lackadaisical habits now.

Serina hesitated no more than a heartbeat before the Nimitz fired up its primary weapon. Energy beams operate at the sped of light, so our presence was made known to the Xiǎo Māo before the Imperial cruiser had even fully ruptured, spewing sailors and marines into space along with a cloud of debris. I prayed that at least some of them had time to get their armor on.

Serina managed to take out two cruisers before they reacted to us. Our near light speed drive allowed our destroyers and fighters to evade, but that was about all they could do. The trainees just had not had enough training to handle attacking as well as defending at the same time. The Nimitz, on the other hand, was too massive to use the near light speed drive. And it was soon the center of a previously unimaginable attack. Both energy weapons, as well as missiles, targeted her.

My pregnant wife and my first daughter by her were on that ship when it went up. That was a significant mistake on the Xiǎo Māo's part. Not only was Serina my life and my heart, every person on that ship knew she was the Imperial Princess, even more, they had also come to love my little princess. Boys turned into men in the blink of an eye.

The Xiǎo Māo may have tiger blood in their past, but they had no idea of the tigers tail they had just grasped. Xiǎo Māo fighter after fighter vanished into vapor. One on one, our destroyers were a match for their Cruisers. It was a brutal fight, but my boys each took their turn at bat and made home runs one after the other.

The thing about a ship made of energy was that as long as the core of the ship survived, it could reform. The Xiǎo Māo did not offer to surrender. Given the mood my boys were in, I doubt they would have been allowed to surrender.

It had only taken moments to leave a path of carnage across the night sky of Haven. Some of the debris was already entering its atmosphere, a fitting tribute of fireworks to honor those who had lost their lives.

Serina screamed back, [I can't find Janie! Lance, I can't find her!]

I was torn between relief that Serina was still alive and terror that my little girl was not responding. We slowly checked the area, making sure that if it was a person that they were recovered dead or alive. Strangely after the word went around that the little princess was missing no Xiǎo Māo were found alive.

The Nimitz reformed and Serina once again was ensconced in the control room. All of the material things, food, uniforms, personal items were all floating out there in space. Not worth the energy to recover while we had wounded and missing. The final tally of eggs? Twenty-four dead, forty-six wounded (six critically), two missing cadet trainees, and one princess.