Honor of the Clan by John Ringo Read Free Book Online Page A

of the failing group before the inevitable asset freeze came down. Besides, who knew? Debt-free humans might be offered enticements to take on new debt—humans tended to be very trusting about such things. For the rest, humans were vicious in killing, but they were frail, and quite vulnerable to accidents. The number would be small and, who knew? Other groups had had a great deal of success having a few humans taking care of their interests. Even with a credit balance in their favor, a tiny bit more money seemed to have a disproportionate motivational effect. The prospect of returning to their home planet, long-lived and with a credit balance that was paltry, as things went, reportedly had enormous draw for debt-free humans of the right personality type. And interplanetary passage was incredibly expensive, relative to their pay.
    Yes, implementing the Epetar representative's final contract—or, more accurately, enabling its implementation—would be very much in his group's interests. Properly controlled, of course. Which would include taking care of the matter himself.
    "AID. Compile me a list of humans with contracts to our group, prioritize by ancestry outside the predominant Fleet or Fleet Strike personnel strains, and then by aggressiveness of personality type." He had no need to give his AID a name. It knew the voice of its master. Keeping an AID depersonalized reduced the risk of dependence, which was small risk for his species, but had been known to happen.
    "Displaying," the device replied.
     
    Memories and musings chased themselves around inside Shari O'Neal's head. She had come a long, long way from the Waffle House in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where she had worked until the first wave of Posleen scout ships had landed practically on top of their heads. The situations she'd been driven through had been like successively hotter fires, refining away the bits of this and that, over and over, until everything was burned away but the pure, bare metal sought. Sought by whom and for what, she had no idea. Whether by some strict, near-merciless divine providence or by the uncaring forces of history winnowing down the masses to the hardiest survivors, she didn't know. For all she knew, it was a bit of both, leavened by blind chance.
    It was the story of her life. Other people saved the world. Shari O'Neal had all she could do and more just saving her kids.
    Which brought her to her meeting with Cally.
    "I don't suppose Papa told you how we were supposed to feed, clothe, house and pay DAG?" Shari asked. "Not to mention their dependents?"
    "Why are we handling that?" Cally asked. "Half of them are Bane Sidhe. Okay, most of those are O'Neals or Sundays but it's still on Nathan." She paused and regarded the woman. "Right?"
    "No," Shari said, shrugging. "It's a bit like a puppy. We brought them in, we have to deal with them. Nathan was clear about that."
    "Well, he could have brought it up with me," Cally said.
    "He brought it up with The O'Neal," Shari said, making quote marks. "So I was hoping that Papa told you what he had in mind. He told me he had a plan, but not what the plan was."
    Cally grabbed her head and squeezed for a moment. She was just coming to terms with having to manage the Clan. Adding DAG to the load was going to be a nightmare.
    "Nope," she said. "Not a clue. But the ones that aren't here on the island are with the Bane Sidhe, right?"
    "Most," Shari said, biting her lip. "And that's another thing. They're out in the cold now and most of them don't have any real experience of that. I'm . . . worried about them. There are going to be repercussions to the Epetar . . . thing."
    From Shari, that meant something. The woman had the best survival radar of anyone Cally had ever met, Granpa included. She'd had to have.
    She was also everybody's mama. If she had decided these people were her baby chicks, as well try to move Mount Everest as sway her. Now that Cally had the job on her own shoulders, the wonder