The Krakow Klub (57 page)

John had urged the couple to accept a
luxurious penthouse overlooking the Potomac as a wedding gift. They
declined, opting for a simpler, historic farmhouse in the Virginia
countryside. Neither had a desire for the trappings of wealth that
were available to them. John openly protested, but was secretly
pleased with
their decision.

As a surprise, John had ordered a humanoid
robot as a
wedding
present to Jim and Sylvia.
They named him Churchill and insisted that he
be
given
a British accent and the ability to serve a proper
high tea.

Sylvia continued to run John’s London
operations. She worked from home most of the time and made only a
couple of trips to England each month. To make travel more
comfortable, John made a shuttle craft available to her for all her
trips.

As for Jim Slater, he had always wanted a job
that would make a difference. Now, he had just
that,
and he loved the challenges and opportunities that
it offered. He would serve the next president just as faithfully as
he had served Wilkinson.

John Scott and Julia Compton
married
in
a private ceremony on the
island. Only her family, Jim
,
and Sylvia
attended. John had managed to have General T licensed as a
non-denominational
minister,
and he performed the ceremony.

Afterward
, Julia
challenged the others to a round of golf which she promptly
won.

After only a short time with John and Julia,
both her father and brother heartily approved her marriage and
appeared to be very fond of her new husband.

John decided to postpone his trip to Mylea
until he had more time to be with Julia. He would provide her with
complete and honest information and even take her to the
transporter craft for a tour. If she chose to accompany
him,
he would take the trip to Mylea.

If she chose not to accompany him, then he
would not go alone. Nothing would ever convince him to leave her
side for an extended
period
. The two of them
became almost a single person, experiencing life together to the
maximum. They had untold wealth but chose to establish charitable
foundations to enrich the lives of others. As for themselves, they
spent a great deal of time zipping here and there about the globe
in John’s shuttle. One day, they might perch on the top of Mount
Everest and the next, they might be at Macchu Picchu.

Because of Julia’s love for the oceans, John
had Maxxine construct a craft for underwater
travel,
and that would take them from the depths of the
Marianas Trench to beneath the polar icecap. Julia
was enthralled
with seeing things beneath the sea that
she had previously only
read about
.

Akiro had become their constant companion. He
was never far from the pair that he had trained so well. They
catered to his every whim and lavished him with affection. Somehow,
that little dog brought more healing to John’s soul than he could
have ever imagined.
The pain over the innocent lives
lost during the war with the Krakow Klub would never leave him
completely. But he was able to put it finally in a place in his
mind that enabled him to live with it.

The Krakow Klub, along with Carla Montrose,
was put on trial in Washington. The charges included treason,
conspiracy to commit mass
murder,
and a short
list of lesser charges. John had Maxxine provided as much evidence
as necessary to assure the conviction of all thirteen of them.

The trial ran for more than six months. All
thirteen were convicted and sentenced to life in prison without
parole
and forfeiture of all assets. The
assets that the government was able to access, cumulatively,
amounted to more than ten billion dollars. A small fraction of the
total, but it is not easy to legally seize assets in many foreign
jurisdictions, and John would allow nothing
to be
done
that was illegal by international law.

John also insisted that much of
the
seized wealth be used to compensate the families of
those servicemen who lost their lives in the coup attempt. He even
insisted that the families of the Scorpion Battalion
be included
as well, but not to the same degree as the
others.

The number of arrests was staggering. The
Krakow Klub seemed to have had associates in every walk of life. It
would take investigators and prosecutors years to work their way
through the list of suspects that had been created by Maxxine.

Dr. Wesley Newton, because he was an active
military officer, was also tried, but in a military court martial.
He was convicted of treason and conspiracy to commit
murder. He was sentenced to death, but the president commuted that
sentence to life imprisonment without possibility of parole,
stating that he did not deserve such a quick and final
punishment.

Ferreting out all the Krakow Klub associates
in the military was a formidable task.
General
McGown, seeing that his arrest was at hand, chose to commit suicide
with his service pistol.
He left a note detailing his
involvement and identified many others as conspirators.
Resignations, plea bargains, and confessions were prolific in the
weeks after his death.

Captain
Popovich
was promoted
to rear admiral. He also received
a special presidential citation for his actions
during
the attack on Scott Key. He had exercised
restraint and courage in refusing to continue the military attack
on the island. His actions had saved countless lives and billions
of dollars’ worth of military hardware from certain destruction. He
was delighted to learn that his good friend and superior officer,
Hugh Morning Star, had also been promoted to vice admiral and had
replaced
Admiral Bloodworth as chief of Naval
Operations.

As soon as the public trial of the Krakow
Klub was announced, which listed all thirteen defendants, Hiram Wu
quietly resigned his post at Stanford University and immediately
returned to his native China. He would spend his remaining life
trying to create SEP circuits.

Mitch, that most clever of canines, still
hasn’t decided to become a mother, although she had many an
opportunity on her frequent visits to Scott Key with Jim and
Sylvia. She continues to string poor little Akiro along until the
perfect time, which she alone will decide.

General T, although proud of his high
military rank, continued to manage the island and serve John and
Julia faithfully. He claimed to be the happiest robot in the
galaxy. When in public, he used his alias, Al
Genret
, which John had cleverly come up with by
reconfiguring the letters in “General T.”
H
e
had a large collection of wigs, beards, and eyeglasses that he wore
to conceal his resemblance to John Scott when they traveled
together. He also finally agreed to accept other robots on Scott
Key and currently commanded a crew of ten. But only one of them, a
female version programmed to be a housekeeper, was allowed inside
the villa or guest house. General T insisted on personally handling
the duties of cook, butler, and personal aide to John and
Julia.

Maxxine continued her work on the deep space
project for John and has designed many new types of robots in the
process. The manufacturing of the Mister T class of robots
was finally begun
after waiting while General
T stubbornly refused assistance in operating and maintaining the
island.

In her spare time, she has come up with
several rather creative and diabolical plans to put Maxx in his
place at least once. She would never harm him as she had
rather a strong
feeling of electronic fondness
for him even though she would never admit it. Offspring, even
electronic ones, seem to want to outdo their parent, at least once
in some way.

Maxx continued his epic journey through
space, but with a definite destination and an increasingly complex
plan for repopulating Mylea in its new location. He would continue
to talk with John Scott from time to time. Maxx valued John’s
insight into the emotional side of biological beings. The project
of raising a whole new generation of Myleans was beginning to get
more complicated on a daily basis.

Also
, he has secretly
amassed a gigantic DNA store just in case John
Scott,
and Jim Slater should decide humans were a lost
cause and needed a repopulation of Earth.

The Greenbrier was restored to its former
glory without a single hint as to the carnage that had happened
there on that bloody Thursday. All restoration costs
were paid
from the confiscated funds of the Krakow
Klub.

The bunker
remains,
but
it is again deactivated and available for tours by hotel
guests.

The United States Congress
was
finally reconstituted
with many new faces. Not only from the
one hundred thirty-seven members who lost their lives, but from the
resignation of several who were rumored to have
been
implicated
with the Krakow Klub. As their terms ended,
many
who had survived the Greenbrier massacre
decided to not stand for reelection.

A crisis can bring out the best in
people,
and that happened at the Greenbrier.
These people who had led a privileged life
were
suddenly faced
with death in a most brutal manner. They saw
their friends and colleagues slain before their eyes. In those
chaotic moments, they were totally helpless and only survived
because of the random paths of the bullets that tore through the
hotel. They would never understand why one person
was
killed
instantly
and the person beside
him left unscathed. Was it luck? Was it divine providence? Many
experienced survivor’s guilt and suffered grievously. Many others
returned to the religious roots that had made their families and
the nation strong. They found solace in faith and found the
strength to unite and work together to heal the nation.

The Krakow Klub

All twelve members of the
Krakow Klub, along with Carla Montrose, were found guilty of all
charges.
They
were sentenced
to life
imprisonment without the possibility of parole. These formerly mega
rich, mega powerful individuals, were soon reduced to a state of
madness probably because they already had personality flaws.

Stoellar was the most pathetic of all. He
became a frail wraith tottering about in his cell, talking to
himself endlessly about rebuilding the group. His handsome face was
now gaunt, his beautifully coiffed hair was now only a short gray
stubble. Sometimes, at night, he could be heard sadly calling out
to someone named the Dragon Lady.

Number Eleven, the formidable Dragon Lady,
feared by all who knew her, spent her days
in a
women
’s prison far away from her former colleagues. She
could be heard weeping piteously throughout the day and night,
begging
for someone
to believe that she was
only a humble Chinese immigrant. She swore that she had only
been arrested
for a rather insignificant
offense but had been switched with the real Number Eleven in the
jail bus carrying several inmates to court for their trials. The
bus had
been involved
in an
accident,
and several prisoners required medical care.
That’s when she claimed the switch had happened.

No one listened to her.

No one believed her.

Halfway around the world, at an exotic
private island, Laucala, near Fiji, a beautiful Asian woman in
SCUBA gear swam through the crystal clear water and examined the
breathtakingly beautiful coral reef below her. Exotically colored
fish flashed curiously around her. It was a perfect morning. She
looked at her dive watch, swam quickly to the surface, and climbed
into the sailboat waiting for her.

She tossed her diving gear to the teak floor
and waited patiently. Within seconds, a strikingly handsome young
man came forward with a towel and a rum cocktail. She purred softly
to herself. It was time for lunch. She licked her lips in
anticipation.

As the young man gently toweled her, she
sipped on her
cocktail,
and when he had
finished, she took a seat on the nearby lounge. Reaching out, she
took his outstretched hand and pulled him down beside her on the
lounge.

This time, she would not be deterred from
pursuing her pleasure.

But, that’s another story.

To be released in early 2016

The interstellar transporter is proceeding
relentlessly towards its goal, an average size star in an outer arm
of the giant spiral galaxy (the Milky Way). It left Earth’s solar
system less than year ago and it has a bit more than nine years of
travel left before it reaches its final destination. Along the way,
Maxx will be busy implementing his plans for the rebirthing process
of the Mylean people. The further into his planning process he gets
the more complicated it becomes.

Maxx knew at the beginning that he would be
busy cloning Myleans, and manufacturing the many robots that would
be required to care for and nurture the young into adulthood. What
he had not realized initially was the level of complexity that he
faced in creating a Mylean society that would appear “normal” to
the young Myleans. For all his enormous intelligence, Maxx had
underestimated the scope of his project.