Dogs have a long and illustrious history of going to war with us for thousands of years. The Egyptians, Romans, Celts, Persians, and many others have used them in battle, as guards, or as trackers. The Romans especially were known for armoring their dogs and filling entire military units with them. Their uplifted sentient descendents of the last couple centuries sometimes volunteer to serve in the military, carrying on that proud tradition into the present day.
Minnesota is my home. It always will be. The hills, the lakes, the birds, even the fraking mosquitoes the size of birds. The smell of a morning rain coming in on the lake breeze. That is what I love about Minnesota. I don’t come back to Earth often, but when I do I always come home to see it again. The restoration work has gone well. It looks as good as it did when I lived there. It is home again, even if I’m not there as often as I’d like.
The preparations to leave Alpha Centauri strained the Peloran ability to rebuild their damaged ships, to build new fighters and drones, and to upgrade the Western Alliance ships that would fly with them. They never could have done it without the salvaged Shang fabricators to do the bulk of the heavy lifting. We still missed five deadlines before we finally flew. It’s a good thing Peloran warships are so hard to kill or we would have been in real trouble.
Alpha Centauri was our first stop in The War. We didn’t plan going there of course. We were tracking the fleet that killed the Peloran base and took heavy damage holding the system. It took impressive planning to get out again. The French, German, British, and American squadrons, both fighter and warship, had to be heavily upgraded before they could keep up with the Peloran. I still find what Peloran fabricators can do impressive.
I fell in love on my first trip to Alpha Centauri. Of course it was during The War and I was in the military, so the whole time I was there I was preparing to go to the next battlefield. But the longer I was there, the less I wanted to leave. So I did what I’ve always done best all my life. I cheated. I broke the rules. I did what I felt I had to do, damn the rules, full speed ahead. Even now, I do not regret it.
The Martian Affair on Amazon
Forge of War on Amazon
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