I did not favor the advance on Epsilon Reticuli. As others, I believed we should have concentrated on more important enemies. But the politicians wanted a quick victory, images of Alliance soldiers pacifying enemy worlds they could distribute to the newsies to improve public morale. Oh what fickle fates we have that can be dictated by a politician’s need for good press. The story they got of course was much different than the story they wanted.
The world economy and the stock markets would continue to slump for years of course. It brought down governments and changed administrations. The Democrats rose back to power in America and spent the next decade conducting a slow societal revolution promoting the power of government to provide for the common man. This would have powerful future consequences. The National Socialist revolution in Germany is far more famous though.
There are a lot of “New” places in the Avalon system. New Scotland, New Ireland, and New England are the most heavily developed worlds, but there are dozens of other planets, moons, asteroids, and even pure space stations scattered throughout it. They have ski slopes, zero gee sports complexes, beaches if we want to talk about my personal favorites, and every other sight seeing or activity-performing attraction one can think of. It’s a real fun place to go.
Jane 4.0 did grow up of course. It took her a very long time to get over her anger though. She used that anger on the Pacific, Atlantic, and Mexican digital fronts to become an arbiter of death. She discovered many ways of using mundane electronic equipment to kill people very permanently. And usually very painfully. She enjoyed the killing. The other AIs convinced her to take a few steps back in the end. And in moderating her they saved her life.
My family went on a buying spree in 1929, buying up stocks whose value had plummeted in the crash. It took a long time for us to turn a true profit on it, but we secured control of many businesses that would later be of use to us. That control and the future profits was our primary goal, and though it took twenty years to make our money back it was considered a good investment. We made fortunes off those purchases.
The Martian Affair on Amazon
Forge of War on Amazon
The Audacious Affair on Amazon
Angel Flight on Amazon
Angel Strike on Amazon
Angel War on Amazon
The Family Affair on Amazon
The Thunderbird Affair on Amazon
Wolfenheim Rising on Amazon
Wolfenheim Emergent on Amazon
The Gemini Affair on Amazon