Iron Gray Sea: Destroyermen Read Online Free PDF Page B

She almost laughed out loud when Matt frowned at her.
    There’d been female ’Cats aboard ever since Walker started supplementing her dwindling human crew with Lemurian cadets. That was the Lemurian way, and if Matt wanted sailors, he had to take both genders. All were “Americans” now, having sworn the same enlistment oath as Walker ’s original crew. The Marines and the Lemurian Armies were also entirely integrated. Many of Walker ’s losses in the recent campaign had been made up with former Imperial women , however, and incorporating human females into the Navy and Marines made almost everyone uncomfortable except said females—and the Lemurians, of course, who didn’t know what the big deal was.
    Sandra had initiated the integration aboard the new Lemurian purpose-built carrier USS Maaka-Kakja (CV-4), originally recruiting women from Respite who were escaping the then-all-pervasive institution of indentured servitude that most women in the empire endured. Matt was furious when he found out, but by then it was a fait accompli. The Imperials were (publicly) furious too over the equality the move implied, not to mention the almost unavoidable precedent it set for their own navy.
    When his rage passed, Matt secretly suspected Sandra’s move was a stroke of genius that had solved a lot of problems, both for him and for Governor-Emperor Gerald McDonald, who was doing his best to eliminate the age-old “Company”-inspired institution of virtual female slavery throughout the Empire. Having uncorked it, Sandra had made it practically impossible to put the genie back in the bottle.
    Regardless, there were now human females, sea . . . women running around Walker , to the amusement of half the crew—and horror of the rest. Matt understood it, accepted it, even welcomed it for various reasons, but he didn’t like it.
    “I’m sure you’ve all met His Excellency, Ambassador Lord Forester,” he began, looking across the table at the tall, somewhat heavyset man. Matt didn’t know Forester well, but the man was a personal friend of the Governor-Emperor and that spoke well for him. He waited briefly while most politely nodded. “Good.” Matt smiled. “Try to be nice to him. It’s in all our interests, his people’s and ours, that we get along.” There were chuckles, and even Forester’s face broke into a smile. There had been, and doubtless would continue to be, tensions between the Western allies and the Empire. The Empire had spawned the criminal Billingsley, after all, who’d managed to cause so much trouble. Even now, in its death throes, the legacy of the Honorable New Britain Company was still cause for concern. The societies were very different, and some enmity remained.
    “I will do my part,” Forester said, absently twisting the graying ends of his massive, stereotypical Imperial mustache. “I’m rather new at this; the Empire has had no diplomatic department, per se, and no real tradition of negotiation. And though we allowed the Dominion to maintain an embassy in the New Britain Isles—which they apparently used primarily to intrigue against us—there has been no ambassador to the Doms for a decade.” He grimaced. “Hopefully, there won’t be one until the evil that rules there is destroyed.” He spread his hands with a small smile at Matt. “Then, of course, we had no one else to talk to until you came along.”
    Matt refrained from pointing out that the Lemurians had always been there—and the Empire knew it.
    The ambassador straightened. “It is no secret that I feel inadequate and wholly unprepared for my new, consequential post, but though I may not be a polished envoy, I understand that I must learn all I can about the military and political structure of your elements of our Alliance. Just watching and listening helps me with that.” He smiled more broadly. “I assure you, even listening to the . . . English-Lemurian patois you have developed is most helpful.”
    There was