Free Kris Longknife: Defender by Mike Shepherd

Gordian knot as mine,” Kris said.
    “I don’t quite get your meaning, but our org charts look very logical and methodical,” Ada insisted.
    “No they aren’t. They don’t have any place for me on them,” Granny Rita grouched.
    “Hi, I’m Iago,” said a thin, young man with blond hair. “My job is to coordinate with Rita. Trust me, it’s a full-time job.”
    “I find that easy to believe,” Kris said. “I know I’m going to end up meeting all of you, but I’ve got some working folks here who are eager to get working. Amanda Kutter specializes in strange economic systems. She’s quite interested in what you developed and how it interfaces with the Alwans.” Kris knew she’d given only half of the young economist’s subject of study, but something told her she needed to pull her punches.
    Amanda stepped forward, all smiles, and said not a word in disagreement.
    Ada turned to a young woman. “Baozhai, you’re the closest thing we have to someone who handles the economy, or what we have of one. She kind of collects taxes and figures out ways for us to pay for the common things, roads, bridges, and the like.”
    “I wrestle people into donations and volunteering, you mean,” the woman said.
    “Just people?” Kris asked.
    “If I can persuade the Alwans there’s something in it for them, I get them.”
    “That television camera that they used to interview me didn’t look like something volunteers knocked together,” Kris led carefully.
    “Oh, then you also want Kuno,” Baozhai said. “He’s coordinator of Mining and Industry. He’s the one that works real close with the Alwans. Until recently, they’ve been death on anything like heavy industry or intrusive mineral extraction.”
    “Yeah, I’m glad their attitude is changing,” Kuno, a tall, middle-aged man said as he took up the story, “because about all the nano miners we knocked together eighty years ago for low-impact leaching of metals are gone. You don’t happen to have more mining nanos with you, do you? It would make my job a whole lot easier.”
    “I’ll have that checked on,” Kris said.
    Y OU NOT GOING TO TELL THEM ABOUT ME, K RIS?
    N O, N ELLY, FROM NOW ON YOU’RE MY TOP SECRET. I F G RANNY GIVES YOU AWAY, OKAY, BUT OTHERWISE, IT’S NOT HAPPENING.
    A YE, AYE, Y OUR T YRANTSHIP.
    The gaggle of folks began to break up enough so that Kris’s team could circulate freely among them. Amanda and Jacques added to their circle of friends an Alwan who was something like Watcher of Wisdom and Traditions of the People. Penny and Masao latched onto Anyang, the Coordinator for Public Peace, as well as an Alwan who was styled something like Bringer of Harmony between The People and the Heavy People. Masao got to talking to the human who was the Historian of the Colony, and the Alwan Watcher of Wisdom. Through it all, Penny and Masao managed to not quite lose bodily contact in one way or another.
    “I got to talk to those folks about scheduling a wedding,” Granny Rita whispered to Kris.
    “Granny, it’s the modern age. Holding hands and even sharing beds does not mean a wedding has to be scheduled. We don’t have shotgun weddings anymore.”
    “Honey, I told my great-granny the same thing, and she laughed and told me that she’d said the very same thing to her great-granny. You ask any bunch of kids, and they’ll swear to you that they’re the first generation to discover sex. And insist their parents never, ever had sex themselves.”
    “Well, Granny, there are the fraternization rules.”
    “Yes, that’s something I keep meaning to talk to you about. But correct me if these old eyes are totally shot, but isn’t that couple in civilian clothes?” she said, nodding at Amanda and Jacques.
    “Yes,” Kris agreed.
    “Now that other lass, Penny you call her. The guy who can’t take his eyes off her and vice versa are in uniform, but his ain’t quite the same as hers, is it?”
    “He’s Musashi Navy. That’s where