After Major Paget finishes his briefing, his place is taken by General Chambers.

He nods at me after stepping behind the podium saying, “Your Majesty, you’ve seen, by all reports the Alkarin invasion has been devastating, although not quite rising to catastrophic levels. This means if the Alkarins come again in numbers anything approaching what they did this time, we’ll likely lose the system.

“Therefore, the JCS has come up with several recommendations. One: Until the fleet is repaired, the destroyed ships replaced, and planetary defenses repaired, we should recall our fleets from Sigma Draconis. Two: We’re recommending an all around upgrade of all planetary offensive and defensive systems. Three: We’re recommending the development of low-cost high offensive power autonomous AI controlled satellites to be deployed around the planets, moons, colonies, and placed in clusters throughout the system. We had thought about this before, but decided against recommending it based on the intelligence we had concerning the Alkarin.

“With what we’ve learned from Ambassador Ke-Vol, we have to assume there are other highly aggressive intelligent species in the galaxy. My deepest apologies, Your Majesty, but we’ve failed you in our duty to protect the system as it should have been. You can see the results of our lack of foresight before you. Had we just though this through a bit more thoroughly, we doubt the Alkarins could have made actual landings on Earth and Mars.

“If you want it, you’ll have our resignations on your desk within the hour, and we’ll gladly stand for a court-martial for dereliction of duty. I,” he pauses to shake his head with a sad expression, then gestures to the other members of the JCS, “we, have no excuse for our failure, but are ready to answer for it.”

When he finishes, the remainder of the JCS stands with him and turns to bow to me.

The tap of my fingernails on the table is extremely loud in the overly quiet room, until the loud smack when I stop and slap the table with my hand makes everyone in the room jump.

My almost whisper is clearly heard around the room. “General… Jason, have I said anything that would indicate I was displeased with the outcome of the invasion?”

“No, Your Majesty,” he replies.

“Have I said anything to any of you or your staff to make you think that this is what I want?”

“No, Your Majesty,” he replies again.

“Mhmm, that’s because I’m not angry, nor do I want your resignations.” I stand up, and walk over to him. Touch his shoulder and say, “Jason, stand up, my friend. That goes for the rest of you, too.

“Gentlemen, and lady, I’m not upset. I’m saddened that we lost so many lives during this, but as we all know, lives are lost in wars. The most that we can do is our very best to minimize the losses.”

I pat Jason’s shoulder and begin walking around the room as I talk, looking at each person in it as I do. “The people in this room hold a lot of power. One thing we don’t have the power to do is preserve every single human life in the system when there is a rather aggressive species doing their very best to wipe humanity from the face of the universe. I’m sure that each one of you join me in mourning our losses, both civilian and military.

“Is there more we can do to safeguard the lives in our charge?” I nod. “I’m sure you will all agree with me that there is always more we can do, and we will be doing it.” I stop in front of Jason again and look him in the eyes. “I have no need of your resignations, nor for you to stand trial. There’s enough blame to go around for all of us to drown in, beginning with me. I am the Queen, after all.”

Jason begins to say something and I don’t need to hear it to know what he’s going to say, so I simply smile and shake my head, which stops him. I turn around and face everyone else. “So, here’s what we’re going to do…

“Budgets are gone. What good is money if none of us are around to worry about them later? If the designers want it, and it’s feasible, build it.

“The Corps of Engineers are to draft individuals with construction and engineering experience from where they are so they can begin building underground cities to house our people. Use whatever methods you want to build them, but I do not want a repeat of the destruction of the bunkers.

“Where are we with the construction of the Titan and Leviathan?”

Admiral Brown responds, “I’m sorry to say they are behind schedule.”

I quirk an eyebrow as I ask, “And, why is that?”

“Lack of construction personnel. Many civilians experienced in space construction methods, regardless of how much money we offer, are not applying.”

“Is that so? Well, I can fix that. Mr. Jaques, you will return to congress and introduce a bill for a system-wide draft. You will direct both houses of congress to pass said bill within 24 hours, or I will fire every single one of you, and the lot of you will be the first ones I have drafted when I sign a proclamation declaring a draft. Am I making myself clear?”

He pales as he looks at me, and murmurs, “Crystal clear.”

“Good,” I purr sweetly. “Mel, you’ll draft whatever construction crews you need starting day after tomorrow. If you have to shoot a couple of them to gain compliance, so be it. It seems some folks want the benefits, but don’t want to help safeguard said benefits of citizenship.”

Admiral Brown replies, “Thank you, Your Majesty.”

I nod. “We’re all in the same boat here. We can’t have some decided they want to let others do all the hard, dangerous work. As Benjamin Franklin reportedly said, ‘We must all hang together, or we shall all hang separately.’ It was true then and far more clear now that he is most certainly correct.” I pause and look around the room, then look back at Kevin. “Mr. Jaques, if your constituents want to whine about being drafted, you may remind them that yes, they might die in the service to the Commonwealth, but if we fail to defeat the Alkarin, we all die. It’s as simple as that. Tell the other congressmen that I will be giving a news conference where I call for a general draft of everyone from 18 to 65. With the medical nanites, they will be more than healthy enough to serve in some capacity.”

“Now, if that’s all, I have other places I need to be.” I pause and no one says anything. “Good.” I turn around and look at the JCS for a moment before deciding on something. “You,” I look at each of them, “are with me. We have more to talk about.”

Namely, about them wanting to fall on their swords when it isn’t their fault. None of us foresaw this happening. Hell, Persephone and the intelligence AIs never saw it coming either!

　◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇

We walk into my office in the palace and I say one word, “Sit.”

Leaning back against the front of my desk, I frown unhappily as cross my ankles while I wait for them to get situated.

“Does anyone have an idea why I called you here?”

I’m fairly sure they have an idea, but no one says anything.

“Really? Not one of you? …Alright, then I’ll get straight to the point. What happened today will not be tolerated again,” I state emphasizing each word. “We can’t be seen as fracturing. We can’t be seen as weak. Don’t you think I feel the weight of every single death during this invasion? Even though I know… I know, we did everything we could up to that point. We had far more fleet than even the worst projection called for. Far more planetary defenses than called for, and far more troops, and yet, we still lost a lot of people. Hindsight is 20/20, and all of us will be judged using that at some point, but right now, I need all of you where you are. Based on the data and intelligence available, we made the best decisions we could.

“Okay, we fucked up.” Everyone does a double take at my use of a curse word, which makes me grin at them. “So, now we throw all of that out, and start anew. If the Alkarin thought we put up a hell of a fight in the outer system before, they haven’t seen anything yet.

“We will be massively expanding the fleet, including any new dream ships your wonder boys can come up with. We’ll be massively expanding the shipyards around Mercury to accommodate this. That means people, resources, and everything else. Jason, I’m accepting all of your recommendations, so run with them. Do what you think is best, but if you have a question of whether you should do something or not, you have my number.”

“The same goes for the rest of you. No more falling on your swords bullshit. I can’t quit, so neither can you. Unless you massively fuck up, you're in the position for the duration lady and gents. Look, I’m not just your Queen, you are also close friends of mine, so say whatever, I’m not going to get offended. Any comments, so far?”

Melanie looks like she wants to say something, but holds her tongue. “Spill it, Mal. Now’s the time.”

She looks down and quietly murmurs, “How can you simply overlook our failure?”

“What failure? If you’ve failed, so have I. We all had the same data and all came to the same conclusions. For that matter, so did the AIs, and they are far better at collating obscure, seemingly unconnected data points than any human could ever be. As they say, shit happens. Unfortunately, in this business, people die when it does.”

I look at their downcast expressions, and make another decision. Reaching behind me, I tap an icon on my desk, and Akari answers almost immediately.

“Yes, Sora.”

“Cancel all my appointments for the day, for that matter, tomorrow morning as well, and inform the press I will be holding a briefing tomorrow at 0900.”

“Of course, Sora.”

“Now, we,” I gesture to all of us, “will be taking the day off. Our underlings can handle things for a day while we have a few drinks and sun ourselves out by the pool.” Jason begins to object, and I cut him off with, “Did that sound like an invitation or an order?” He nods. “Good.”

Reaching back again, I tap another icon on my desk, and soon Michael answers, “Do you need something, Your Majesty?”

“Yes, I’ll need 6 rooms for the JCS tonight since they will be staying over. I’ll need you to provide the men with swim trunks as well.”

“Certainly, Your Majesty. Is that all?”

“Is it. Thank you, Michael.”

Turning back, I look at them again.

“So here’s what’s happening. We’re going to raise a few glasses to those who gave their lives, and then get good and drunk today.” I look at Mel and say, “I have the perfect bikini for you,” with a wink and smile, which makes her mouth fall open.

A moment later, she almost sputters, “Your Majesty, I’m in my 50s, and far too old to wear a bikini.”

I cock my head to the side and peer at her for a second. “I think you need to look in a mirror. Haven’t you noticed what the nanites have done for you?”

As Mel said she’s in her 50s but doesn’t look to be more than 30 with what the nanites have done for her. Before she took the nanites, she had gray hair and a few wrinkles here and there. She was still good-looking, but nothing like she is now. Her hair is a lustrous blonde again with nary a wrinkle to be found.

I have Michael take them to their rooms to change, while I call Victoria to get my silver and lilac bikini and lend it to Mel. Then, I call Yui and hold a short conversation with her, and finally ask her to write me an announcement about the draft. That done, I head upstairs to change myself.

In the end, our little party expands to include Akari, Yui, Chinatsu, and Ryu.