The Lotus Eaters

Carrera a look of something very like sympathy. You don't know what you're missing.

Power corrupts. Luci had been around power since her mid teens, about the time her breasts reached their full development. She was, in many ways, as corrupt as a human being could possibly be . . . and she liked corruption, too. Unnoticed by Carrera, Luci returned to her desk, picked up a phone and began to dial a number.

Parilla was already walking from his desk to the door to greet Carrera. He, too, took in a good eyeful of some of Balboa's loveliest scenery before closing the door behind Carrera and leading him to the small conference table that graced the office. The comptroller was already seated. He stood for the President and Carrera.

After a very brief period of small talk the accountant opened his briefcase and extracted a series of thick folders.

With a dramatic, even melodramatic, air, Dorado, 'Without either a substantial drop in expenditures—or some large increase in revenues—the government will be bankrupt within five years.'

Carrera stared at the accountant as if he were quite mad. Unfazed, he continued.

'Numbers do not lie. With current defense expenditures hovering above two and a half billion per year, and expenditures growing as they are, we simply cannot meet the defense plan past that time. We will actually begin to feel shortages well before that. And if there is an economic downturn, globally, even the admittedly huge sum you've turned over to senatorial control will drain away like dirty dishwater.'

Parilla raised an eyebrow in Carrera's general direction.

Carrera shrugged. 'It doesn't matter. We'll be at war with the Tauran Union within five years. After that, a little thing like bankruptcy hardly matters.'

'Sure,' Parilla agreed. 'But what if we're not at war with the Taurans within that time? What if they can delay things for ten years?'

'Then we have a problem,' Carrera admitted. 'But, Raul, now is the time to be buying equipment. Now is the time to be buying shipping, or getting it under long term lease, anyway. Now is the time to be bringing young boys and even girls into the legions, before the population bubble disappears. Our women used to be the most fertile on the planet. That's changed and I don't know if it's ever going back to the way it was.'

Staring Carrera directly in the face, Dorado said, 'Of all your programs only those run by Professor Ruiz are not ruinously expensive. Even then, his radio, television, films, music, and translations of military works don't quite break even, even with foreign sales. Of course, since you directed that the Military Museum, which falls under Ruiz's department, not charge more than a quarter drachma for entrance, that's a loser. I have given the money from the anti-crime campaign over to the Professor to keep his department running.'

Carrera perked with interest. 'Money from the anti-crime campaign?'

'Yes, Duque,' Dorado said. 'We've had to sell seized property at distress sale prices, but still there was cash, some gold, seized bank accounts, a couple of yachts, one small merchant vessel, some residential property. It made us about two million last month. Of course, if the campaign is ultimately successful, you can expect that source of funds to dry up too.'

Carrera leaned back in his chair, covering his eyes and rubbing his eyebrows with his fingertips. Victims of our own success. I suppose I am pushing expansion faster than I should. But I've only so much time. Where do I get more money? A lot more.

To Parilla he said, 'I'll look into finding some other sources of funds. Or maybe let Esterhazy'—the Legion's comptroller and investment officer—'run a little wild.'

Isla Real, Balboa, Terra Nova

Carrera had come out of his post-Hajar funk with a base suitable for a small corps of about fifty thousand. That amount of barracks space, recreation facilities, housing areas, hospitals and the like was more than adequate for the number of new trainees the Legion had to take on annually, roughly thirty-six thousand. Indeed, it was about three or four times more than was actually required, since thirty-six thousand annually meant about twelve to fourteen thousand at any given time, plus a few thousand regulars in professional development courses. That excess didn't even include the dependent housing areas, most of which were unneeded now that only a small percentage of the population, the regular cadre, was even allowed to have families on the island. Centurions and optios were living in spacious quarters formerly reserved for tribunes and legates.

There were still several myriad jobs to be done before the Isla Real and the other islands of the chain could serve to guard the northern approaches to the capital and the Transitway. There was, for example, already one dual pier for offloading supply ships. For an island fortress with a good expectation of being bombed viciously in the not too distant future, one double pier could not be enough.

There was already an all-weather, hard surfaced, asphalt ring road that roughly paralleled the island's coast, connecting tercio casernes with ranges, training areas, and the more complete facilities of the main post, to the north, by the tadpole's tail. That asphalt could be expected to be turned into craters interspersed with boulders under a sustained, intensive aerial attack. Thus, both a parallel system of easily repaired dirt roads, and a half-subterranean, narrow gauge railway were under construction.

During Balboa's long wet season, roughly eight thousand tons of water fell on every square kilometer of the island . . . every  . . . day. The drainage system they had was adequate for peacetime purposes. It would crumble under sustained aerial assault, making defensive positions untenable, providing vastly expanded breeding grounds for insects, and potentially opening up any defenders to the triple scourges of malaria and yellow and dengue fever.

Thus, the drainage system, too, was being revetted, backed up, supplemented, and—for some lines, moved underground.

Sitnikov had actually given Carrera only a truncated version of the fortification plan. There was much he had not covered. For example, eventually there would be just under three hundred kilometers of one meter culvert and tunnel of varying dimensions connecting various positions within the defense plan.

The Volgan tanker had demonstrated the types of bunkers to be built, but hadn't gone into their deployment in any depth. For example, the centerpieces for the defense were to be thirteen forts, each dominating a piece of key terrain or a probable landing site. Those forts would typically consist of fifty to sixty of the type of heavy bunkers Sitnikov had demonstrated, but those bunkers would be connected by tunnels, trenches, and culverts, draw their air