Chapter 69: Tosca green
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***
Boring job. The Emperor's chair is uncomfortable - it would have been much easier not to make this mess at all, but once you've made it, you won't be able to jump off the train.
Having finished my conversation with the Chancellor, I went to Julian's station without delay. My old friend was lazy, so I wasn't going to give him a responsible job as a friend, but the usual warm place of stationmaster would suit him just fine.
The size of the station was enormous, though most of it was cargo bays. There was still plenty of room to live, the station was spacious and well-equipped to fulfil its purpose of loading and unloading. The number of loader droids was incredible, thousands if not tens of thousands of them. It was time to dispatch another shipment of cargo, one heavy container ship. Entering through a separate airlock into a control bay the size of my entire yacht, I followed the familiar route towards the bridge.
Today's cargo included military, civilian, communications equipment, finishing materials galore, and a truly endless amount of sundries. There were five Correlian shuttles in the hangars of the station - there were ten of them in Sina's department. They were taking recruits to the station. In addition to the crowd of snouts of recruits there were also ordinary civilians - about two thousand people. Various specialists who were brought in by the departments of the Empire.
* * *
The arrival of a new shipment is always an event that few of my subordinates miss - everyone cares about their equipment, which can still be damaged or even part of the orders stolen on the way. The military containers, of course, were closed and sealed, but civilian cargoes were not so safe, so they were afraid. Shin had already complained to me about sloppy carriers, but what could I do? It's useless to give them money, they'll steal it, I can't scare them, it's not my jurisdiction anymore. I had to advise them only to find a quality carrier.
Having rested in my yacht from the excitement of the past day, I went to the office early in the morning. Today I'm gonna be hitting the departments. They're not exactly secondary, but I spent less time on them than on the ministers.
I didn't have to wait long for the heads of departments - health care, social development, transport, education. All of them came at once, exactly at the appointed time. It is noteworthy that the heads of all departments are women. Health was Sabine Papiria, social development Vektisa Zerter, education - Tessala Gauda, and transport - Elissa Yuba.
- Good morning, ladies," I invited them into my office.
- Good morning, Your Majesty," they said in a low voice.
- Come in, sit down," I stood up for the sake of decorum. I'll sit for a while. The women went through and took their seats. When everyone was seated, I started the conversation:
- So, please, who has what? Tessala?
The one named stood up. By the way, a typical strict teacher, forty years old, with a wealth of teaching and leadership experience. Brunette, with the usual middle-European face and a not-young, but not yet senile figure.
- Your Majesty, the list of tasks for my department has been drawn up," she handed me a datapad with a document open on it.
- Well, well... - I took it and looked through the nomenclature of educational institutions, - and where are so many? We have one city.
- As we settle in," Tessala interjected, "there will be students. If we provide quality education, the students will come.
- Of course we'll provide education," I nodded, "and even free education. But do we really need so many schools?
- I underestimated the number," Tessala nodded, "The number depends on the population, of course, but if we're going to provide demographic subsidies, we have to be prepared to teach children.
- Good," I agreed, "of course we should be prepared. I am not promising you priority funding. I have my own thoughts on education.
- Yes? - Tessala sat back down immediately.
- Firstly, education at the elementary level for humans should be standardised. A spread of ages like on Alderaan, where I went to school, isn't very suitable. Of course, I graduated from the academy at the age of fourteen, thanks to that, but that's an isolated and unique case. Schools would be better divided into advanced specialities. I don't like the current Alderaan system of unifying education.
- How? - Tessala wondered, "It has happened before, of course. Parents send their children to places where they don't belong, but they, the parents, see, they know better than experienced teachers. The children also want to go where they are unlikely to succeed....
- I know about these precedents," I stopped her, "in a simple way. Psychological screening. We'll give preferential treatment where the student belongs. Of course, at the current level of social development, economic benefits will have no effect, so benefits should first of all stimulate people to go where they are needed most. I'll describe to you the system that I think makes the most sense for the Empire with its problems and benefits...
- Yes, I'm sorry..." the teacher faltered.
- Firstly, training should be started and conducted at the same age for humans, Twi'leks, Togrut, Miraluks and other races with similar maturation dynamics. Other races should have their own classes, with their own curriculum optimised for them. Secondly, the school should be divided into three conventional groups, with rotation of students at the end of each age group. These are primary school, middle school and high school, respectively from six to nine years, from nine to twelve and from twelve to seventeen.
- But that's not right! - Tessala was indignant, ''Let the children be children!
I used my imperial glare to nail the lady to her chair, cooling the tone of the conversation:
- Children will be children. But what is childhood and what we call childhood are different things. Man has the property to quickly forget the bad and long to remember the good. Therefore, childhood seems to us a wonderful time, carefree and fun. To think that children have as much fun and carefree as our memory is a mistake. Therefore, it makes no difference when and how much to teach a child. The earlier he gets off mum's tit, the more successful he will be in life. You don't need to look far for an example, it's right in front of you.
- Good..." Tessala said sadly. The other ladies looked at her with sympathy.
- Okay, I'll continue. The first group is the children. They need to be taught the general concept of learning and behaviour. The second group is to impart proper social skills, communication skills. The third group - the most difficult training, together with the last stage of school skills - at their age they just start to be interested in the opposite sex, and in an inadequate scale, so you need to instil in them family values and properly explain their place in life, the importance of study and the dependence of future life on their diligence in studies. And that I would not have teenage suicides and pregnancies in my empire! This is not primarily the task of the police or the parents, but of you, the teachers.
- There won't be, - Tessala corrected herself immediately, - I promise, we'll keep it to a minimum.
- Promising is one thing... you show me in practice. Okay, there are two levels of education left. These are specialised educational institutions based in the Empire and the highest level. The specialised ones are to provide specialisation, pardon the tautology. First of all, these are institutions for applied speciality training, and good training, so that graduates would be highly valued in the galaxy. Graduate school speaks for itself. It's for specialities that require deep knowledge, like physicists or engineers.
- Makes sense, but what about the separation? In the end, it will end up with higher level students being negative towards the specialists....
- As far as I know, scientists earn less and worse than ordinary workers. The exceptions are only for the best ones, who get the best positions, but on average... I don't rule out that they will run after a physicist to become a mechanic or an ore miner.
- It's unlikely," the teacher sighed.
- It all depends on the quality of training for labour professions. If one worker will want to get a dozen large companies, the price for his labour will be high. Well, we'll talk about the rest later, when you start forming classes. Sabine?
- А? - The Doctor was distracted from her thoughts. A young woman, a man with a very decent appearance for her eighty years of age. Yes, in the galaxy, medicine can do a lot of things - in the central worlds they live up to two centuries, it happens. She was uncommonly plain and unassuming, the kind of person you'd forget about on the street. Her face was plain, her eyes were brown, and she had no distinguishing features.
- Bae. I didn't read your reports. Because I don't know and I'm not going to get into the health care process anytime soon. Can you please put your thoughts in plain language?
- Yes, yes," she stood up and picked up her datapad from the table, "at the moment the entire infrastructure of the department is limited to medical centres at the military and construction bases. There are plans to build a network of hospitals in Cinnagar, fifteen in all. The structure is standard for most central worlds....
- I see your point," I nodded, "in that case, I'll leave it to you. It doesn't mean that I'm going to turn a blind eye to your activities, but for now you're not required to report or do anything extraordinary. One thing I can tell you beyond your current task is that we'll need to build a special hospital on the outskirts of the city.
- What kind of hospital? - Sabin was surprised, "Don't you have enough regular ones?
- Yes. But I need a hospital for my own purposes, for experimental medicine. It must be equipped with first class facilities, everything. From well-protected grounds to luxury services. Approximate load - a thousand patients a month, it is required to provide them if not hothouse, then very decent conditions. It's not a given that we won't be visited by important people. As I said, there should be a full range of diagnostic equipment and maximum security, it is desirable to allocate personal fenced guarded buildings for important clients who want to be incognito ...
- We'll do it," Sabina nodded immediately, remembering her colleague's fate.
- Good. I'll also need doctors there... all kinds of doctors, but first of all surgeons. With a good knowledge of theoretical material - it is almost the main thing in their work, not practical skills of operation. We can take those who have already retired from surgery. We will also need scientists who are ready to work on a new direction of experimental surgery and can keep their mouths shut.
- We'll do it, - Sabina nodded less confidently.
- Okay, I won't overburden you. Give Warner the problem of construction, he will take care of it. You concentrate on hiring good, very good doctors and scientists. Including geneticists. Okay... that leaves Yuba and Vektisa, right?
- Yes, - the ladies looked at me.
- Yuba and the others who have already reported, you may go. And you, Vectisa, I'll ask you to stay.
All but the head of the Social Development Department left the office with barely concealed relief.
Vektisa was almost the main department, so with her I have a special conversation.
- So, what do we have so far?
- Everything as planned," the woman replied immediately. By the way, the youngest of the mosquitoes - she was only thirty years old. And she had the most unofficial look of all.
- I mean the plans. What we planned, I already know. What have you managed to realise now?
- So far, three main programmes have been implemented - benefits, construction and distribution of housing, and the population stimulation programme.
- Good," I nodded, "that's great. Now let's move on to the plans. At the moment there is a shortage of citizens that needs to be addressed.
- I can't help it," she shrugged, "the system is isolated.
- And if I invent a way to overcome the barrier, how will we proceed? Keep in mind, I need a healthy empire, and even on Null-Hatta, the sentient beings can go crazy.
- In that case it gets more complicated," she nodded, "a restriction on entry may reduce the flow of unwanted visitors, but in that case it will also restrict the development of the sector.
- Partial restriction? - I was curious, - for those who are not wanted and have no previous convictions?
- Maybe," Vectisa nodded.
- And deportation for serious offences. Without the right to return...
- Not desirable," the lady shook her head, "it would create an apartheid between citizens and non-citizens, and that could lead to an unhealthy atmosphere within society.
- Okay, that's taken care of," I nodded to her, "in that case, let's move on to real estate. How many properties do we have?
- Five thousand seven hundred mansions and two million eight hundred thousand flats in high-rise buildings. A total of one hundred and sixty million one hundred and forty thousand square metres of living space ...
- Excellent, - I agreed, - take care of their distribution. First of all - to the apparatus and the military.
- I've already done it, - Tserter gave me another document, in which it was written down who would get what flats.
- Good, - I agreed, - in that case, continue this business until everyone will be provided. According to their position in the empire, of course.
Zerther remained silent. I had no further questions for her, so I finished: - That's all. Good luck with your work.
- Thank you, your majesty," the woman got up and left my office. I still have to talk to Kevin about security, but it's not something that can be solved in a hurry. There aren't many people, there are plenty of patrol droids, and the justice system is working well.
After a couple more minutes in the office, I warned the droid that I would be gone for a long time and went to the hangar.
By the way, the first batch of two dozen fighters had already been completed. The droids worked well, and I didn't have to spend much time tweaking them. In the hangar they stood with their wings folded and took up a decent amount of space by hangar standards - almost the entire lower deck. Scratching my head, I moved to the bridge, switching off all the shop equipment.
The captain had hardly been on the bridge during the anchorage, but was chilling in the fresh air. Not finding him at his post, I had to call him on the comlink. He arrived twenty minutes later, dishevelled and clearly not expecting a call from me.
- Prepare the ship for departure. We're leaving soon.
- When?
- Tonight. Now, get your men together.
- Aye! - the captain of the yacht stretched out and in a few seconds went to the command centre to gather the crew, which had become lazy from idleness. I had to kick out the entire government of the empire before I could lift the yacht, because they had chosen my Mystery of Darkness as their headquarters and white house at the same time.
I had to drive them out into the cold, that is, "out there", towards the city. Warner was the only one who didn't get confused and asked:
- "Is it time to move?
- Yeah. I need a boat. If my eyes are right, there's a lot of space out there. You can have any building you want as a government office.
- I see," Warner nodded, "Actually, the government building complex hasn't been built yet, but there's a wonderful office complex nearby. It's already finished.
- Then..." I shrugged, "move in. You don't want to sit on a yacht like bandits. My personal yacht, by the way.
Warner grinned and said nothing. The rest of the people present, that is, the whole government, nodded in agreement, and at my command scattered to take away all the valuables.
By the way, I was fed up with their endless secretaries and other subordinates.
While the move was in progress, I visited my son. Shiai, along with Nyner, was learning the basics of martial arts. Judging by the fact that Nyner was mostly throwing Shiai around on the mats, my son wasn't showing much progress. His foresight wasn't helping him perform even simple sets of punches.
- Shiai! - I called out to him. Shiai turned towards me. Niner, looking at me disapprovingly, stopped and stepped aside.
- We're leaving," I came closer, "don't you have anything left on the planet?
- No," he shook his head, "where are we going? And why?
- You need to know everything... - I sighed pretend, - we're going to help a friend of mine. If you want, you can stay on Koros....
- No, of course not! - Shiai was indignant.
- In that case, we'll leave tonight. We'll replenish our supplies and fuel at Julian's station and we'll be on our way. It'll be very boring, by the way.
- Still," Shiai insisted on flying, "I want to go with you too.
- Well, it's up to you," I sighed, "Niner?
- Yes, your majesty? - The Mandalorian looked at me.
- 'It's your business too. We won't be interfering, only observing, so we'll be hanging around in the mandalorian's sector without much to do. Take whatever you need for further training.
- Will do," Cassados nodded briefly.
I left these two behind. By the look on Shi'ai's face, he was sad that he wouldn't have to take a saber to the enemy. I understand, but I can't let it go or actively interfere in the process. So...
* * *
With my preparations complete, I went to the hangar. But not to work on the fighters - they'll have to wait a few more days until they have enough professional pilots, preferably Forsusers, but mere mortals with well-trained piloting skills can do the same.
I've taken up hyperdrive. Hyperdrives of the class above one were, in fact, completely different - because it was required a speed higher than the limit - a hundred years ago, it was believed that the first class is the speed limit. And the ranking of hyperdrives was calculated from this theoretical limit, but... as always, they did not guess. The speed limit was safely overcome, but the design itself... to understand what I was going to do, you need at least a minimal knowledge of hyperfield theory. Hyperdrive consisted of two parts - the emitter of the base field, which immerses the ship in hyperspace and the hyperdrive itself, which provides the movement of the ship in hyperspace, that is, space outside the usual three-dimensional universe. The first part prevents the ship from disappearing in hyperspace, i.e. keeps the ship itself, its physical structure and even the flow of time on the ship, in order. The speed of the ship's movement in hyperspace is ensured by the energy saturation of the hyperfield, i.e. hyperspace waves that emanate from the hyperdrive winding and push the ship forward. This is remotely similar to jet propulsion, or rather it is, only as a propulsor is an intangible, energy structure in the form of hyperwaves, which is created in the winding. The maximum speed of the ship's movement through hyperspace for many millennia was considered to be one, as it was impossible to create an emitter that creates a greater number of hyperwaves. The resistance of hyperspace to change grows avalanche-like and proportional to the speed of the ship, that is, when reaching the first class, it, in theory, should have increased to the level that would require the ship a huge expenditure of fuel to overcome the resistance. But, scientists have found that the increase does not occur as planned - after overcoming the speed of the first class, yes, that's when the effect appears, and not the one that was expected, but from the third to the first level of speed, the resistance is stable. After overcoming the resistance decreases sharply, but there is a side effect in the form of accumulation of hyperfield energy on the winding, which, when moving, creates hyperspace vortices like those around black holes and especially large stars. This is the "hole effect" - the speed exceeds the threshold at which the hyperwaves can be displaced by the winding waves, and they are, roughly speaking, "squeezed" into the winding, into its metal. And they remain there, as they cannot leave the conductor because of its own energy, which keeps the hyperfield inside. Although it's designed to keep it inside, tearing through hyperspace. And that's far from the only drawback, and the solution... so far it's cost a hell of a lot more to mass-produce hyperdrives faster than first class. However, I can still do some work on the ship's engine - I can already create a hyperdrive, and the problems... the problems are solvable. The basic solutions had already been found, and I owed some of the answers to the Old Man who had told me the theory. In addition to the main hyperfield could be created another, with completely different characteristics, which does not so much resist hyperspace, but glides in it, gently pulling apart in front of him and back to close hyperspace behind him. This method, with a "gliding field" exists, but at the moment has not gone beyond laboratory research. The gradation of speeds is also a little inadequate, and does not correspond to the real speed.
It would be more correct to indicate the speed as usual, in the ratio of time and distance. I generally did not understand those who invented some alien to human understanding measures of length, weight, and all other things that originated from some everyday objects, traditions, or the weight of certain objects. Culture changes, everyday life also changes, objects go into the past, but the system of measurements, which is extremely confusing, in which some parameters are completely unrelated to others, remains. It would be easier to measure the speed of ships in light years per hour - the diameter of the galaxy was one hundred and twenty-seven thousand light years, from one edge to the other, strictly in a straight line through the centre of the galaxy, it would take about fifty-five days to fly first class. That is, at ninety-six light years, the distance from Coruscant to Mandalore was travelled in a week. For class zero-five, the same journey took three days, meaning the speed was in the region of two hundred light years per hour.
My work with the hyperdrive was less spectacular than with the fighters - I wanted to build a fast enough hyperdrive that I could cover the distance without having to spend weeks travelling to Mandalore. I can't change anything on the boat yet - the size of the hyperdrive and its windings are huge, and I don't dare to work with them yet. With the Old Man I made a hyperdrive the size of a motorbike, but here it's the size of a lorry with two trailers, so....
Although, to be fair, it's the small hyperdrives that are considered the most difficult. It's a good fork - the tinier the hyperdrive, the more difficult it is to produce, but this is compensated by the low cost of valuable metals, and the larger the hyperdrive, the easier the work, but it requires... a lot of metal. Therefore, hyperdrives of the golden mean - large enough to not involve special equipment for production and small enough that they do not take tonnes of especially valuable metals, and are the optimal cost. Small hyperdrives are more expensive, because the price of metal is static, and along with the size of the hyperdrive decreases by arithmetic progression, but the price of production with a decrease increases by geometric progression. This explained the economic tactics of Palpatine's Empire and the Rebel Alliance - if the fleet is large, then to equip each fighter with a hyperdrive is not enough money, it is more profitable to build aircraft carriers, and if the fleet is small and mobile, then it is more profitable to put an engine on each Crucible, which would make them more mobile and give a chance to retreat, than to spend money on giant aircraft carriers, which, in addition, reduce mobility. A ship without hyperdrive is not suitable for quick raids and the same quick retreat - it is a machine purely for close combat, unsuitable for guerrilla warfare.
The cost of a first-class hyperdrive for my fighters was over two hundred thousand, though a third-class hyperdrive for the same vehicle would cost twenty-five or thirty grand each. The Crosswings, on the other hand, would make do with a third class. Even though these hyperdrives would cost as much as a dagger fighter.
Creating a more efficient hyperdrive I did "by the book", constantly checking with the experience of the Old Man, who knows a thing or two about them. It took six bloody hours - just sitting in meditation with putting together, piece by piece, a small and powerful hyperdrive. It was also a good thing I had a good supply of metals. In addition to metals, the new engine needed firmware, but only to interface with the navigation computer, so I didn't bother with that yet - I'd rather secretly hire good programmers than try to adapt one system to another. The hyperdrive turned out to be very fast, more than a thousand three hundred slh, but it did not reach the desired speed. With a hyperpath distance to Mandalore of twenty thousand light years, it would take a little over two days to reach Mandalore. But, the important detail is that it's impossible to create such a hyperdrive without using force. Even with nanodroids - they're too imprecise, they can't operate on individual molecules, and a mistake costs too much, given their compactness and power. And there's no way the reactors could pull off such a hyperdrive in a "big" version. Unless you can put it on a fighter jet, but even then it will burn a lot of fuel. You'd have to add extra fuel tanks...
It was the easiest thing to do - just put large canisters under the wings, make flexible connections and connect them as external fuel tanks to the fuel system firmware. After eight hours of work, more or less ready for test flight my fighter was ready. If you don't go into detail - it was three times faster than the first class and faster than even the zero-five by forty per cent.
After effectively killing time and realising that I was not going to become a monopolist in the hyperdrive trade, I stretched out and went to the bridge. It was time to call it a day, though it was a pleasure to drift around the Mandalore sector as an observer.
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