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Chapter 99

Billy caught my mistake, and called for Tommy and Leonard to meet us at the stairs. Joshua picked Niko out of his chair and carried him down the stairs to the first basement, as Billy carried his chair. I looked at Leonard and he nodded, saying "I will replace these with an elevator, Sire."

Alex looked at Leonard and said "If you put it behind a door, I can add security to both."

As we walked to the next stairs, I said "Do as you think best, working with Tommy and Alex. If you simply put an elevator to the first security door, that would be fine."

Billy and Joshua helped Niko down the stairs again, as Leonard shook his head and said "I like the maze, Sire. Unless you object, I want to re-work the top four basement levels, creating a maze and putting in a one level elevator from each."

When we got to the vault door, Tommy said "A maze would allow me to post guards at various locations, Sire. I'm assuming we're heading to a treasure room of some sort?"

I laughed as I said "You could say that, as well as other things."

I opened the vault door and we had to split up, as the elevator was only large enough for 6. Once we were all gathered in the room with four vault doors, I pointed to the one and said "Behind this door are the financial treasures of Dracul, as well as an art collection that would make most major museums jealous."

I turned to my left and opened that door as I said "I think we can start here. As we walk, Vlad will tell us how this project began."

As we walked through the long, sloping corridor, Vlad explained. "To be honest, Sire, this started centuries ago. We, as a race, have always encouraged certain packs to enlist in the military forces around the world. Having had the same individuals serving for hundreds of years, we were able to monitor trends, and shape them to our benefit."

When Igor paused, Reinhardt said "Also, vampire scientists and engineers have made most of the technological breakthroughs throughout history. It is much easier to do when you are building on your own work, rather than picking up after someone else."

I wasn't surprised when Sam spoke up "As technology progressed, we had our soldiers and sailors focus on those forces we saw as vital to our survival. By the end of the cold war, we had thousands of sailors familiar with both US and Soviet naval vessels, pilots and soldiers familiar with NATO and Soviet aircraft, tanks, and artillery."

George finally spoke with "Combining these factors has allowed us to maintain control of the flow of technology, its distribution, and use. With our people situated in key positions, we have always been able to stay ahead of the pack, if you'll excuse the pun."

We had come to another vault door. As I opened it, Vlad looked at our group and said "I am thinking that none of you have served in the military within the last fifty years?" when no one spoke up, he continued "You may think you recognize some of the things you are about to see, but remember, our engineers and scientists developed these. What you are about to see are highly modified and improved versions of what you think you see."

I led the group through the vault door to an office. It wasn't really an office, more of a control room. There were several rows of desks with computers, each with multiple monitors. When we entered, the men and women in uniform at these desks went silent. I'm guessing no one had come through the vault door in quite a long time. Everyone turned to look at our group. Finally, a woman in her 50's, with two stars on her shoulders, walked up and saluted Vlad.

"Forgive me, Admiral, I should have let you know. I am no longer a prince of the council. In fact, I have no rank." He turned to me and said "Your Majesty, may I present Admiral Grace Hopper, retired, US Navy." He turned back, saying "Admiral, King Gregory the first, King of Dracul."

The admiral's eyes shot wide as she quickly bowed, then stood and saluted. I smiled as I said "You would honor me by choosing one or the other, Admiral. I would ask that your first duty be that of teaching me how to properly return your salute. I understand it is a sign of respect, and a poorly executed salute is an insult?"

She smiled back as she said "You are correct, Your Majesty. A sloppy salute is considered a mark of disrespect. I would love to teach you properly, but the truth is, I can only teach you the US custom. Other countries have their own guidelines, and you, or your designated official, will need to come up with customs and courtesies for the armed forces of Dracul."

"I will see that it happens, Admiral. For now, are you free to give my ministers and myself a tour of Kasos Military Base? And please understand, most of us know nothing, so speak to us as if you were speaking to an 8^th grade class."

The Admiral laughed, saying "Let the tour begin. The room you are in now is our base control room." She indicated the rear row of computers and said "From here, we can view any location on the base, as well as communicate with those locations. The next two rows are work stations for the dry docks and motor pool operations. The local workstations all feed into these, and we can get the big picture, or dig into details, of any project we have ongoing. This front row monitors traffic. One station monitors incoming and outgoing boats, while these others monitor vehicular traffic around the base."

I looked at my ministers and said "All of you, feel free to ask questions. We will need to be informed if we are to discuss this later. Personally, my first question is, how big is this base?"

"The main level here, is roughly 12 square kilometers, of which, the naval base takes up 10. We also have 3 storage levels and a housing level, each of which is 4 square kilometers. Combined, we have 28 square kilometers here."

Billy did some math on his phone, looked up and said "That's about 4 times the land we had in Pennsylvania, in an underground base."

Niko asked "I notice you said here. Are there other bases?"

The admiral smiled as she said "Very observant, young man. This base is production and refit. Our larger base, under Karpathos, is designed for operations. The naval base is 12 kilometers, with 15 of storage, and 10 for housing. There is also a much smaller base under Saria, strictly naval operations and housing."

Tommy asked "The entire military is housed in bases that can only be accessed by submarine? That seems odd."

Admiral Hopper nodded, saying "Of course, you can make any changes you desire, Your Majesty, but right now, our entire force is based around our submarines. Unless you object, I will let others explain the reasoning?" I nodded, so she continued "If you'll look far to the right, you can see the western entrance to the base. The eastern entrance is 500 meters in front of us, hidden by that rock wall, and the third entrance is on the far side of the island, 5 km north of here. All entrances are 300 meters wide and 50 meters tall, with the top of the entrance 20 meters below sea level. Titanium doors with rock exteriors that open and close hydraulically. Karpathos has six entrances, while Saria has two"

She led us through a door to a hallway, then to an elevator. When we gathered on the main level, she led us to some golf carts. The admiral sat behind the wheel and I sat beside her. Joshua put Niko's chair on the cargo rack as Billy put Niko in the middle seat, then he and Billy sat on either side. The others piled into two other carts, and we took off. She started to tell me about things as she drove, but I stopped her, asking her to hold the descriptions until we were parked, so everyone could hear everything.

She nodded, and stopped beside a massive submarine. Joshua and Billy had Niko out before everyone had gathered, as the Admiral said "If you know submarines, you would assume this was a Soviet Typhoon class Ballistic Missile sub. You would be right, and wrong. In the early 1970's, our Soviet engineers came up with this design and we let them build 6, to test the concept. For their purposes, it was an adequate design, but they have since moved to the Borei, which is slightly smaller. Our Typhoons, on the other hand, are quite a bit larger than the ones built by the Soviets, and ours have a few special features. This particular one is one of our 5 carrier subs, which is easy to note, as the sail is located at the extreme stern of the boat."

She looked at the platform, 60 feet above the dock, then at Niko and said "Sadly, there will be many stairs today. I hope your friends won't mind constantly carrying you." She glanced at Joshua and Billy as she said this last part.

I realized we had been quite rude, so I took the time to introduce the group. Joshua and Billy both said they were fine with helping Niko, after which, I said "If they tire, I will carry him. We may need to sort out accommodations for him in the future, as he is my assistant, and may need to be down here."

"My apologies, Your Highness. I'm sure our engineers can work out whatever you need. If you will follow me?" She turned, and went up the stairs. When we were all on the platform, she pointed to the sub and said "As you can see, rather than missile doors, this boat has six sets of retracting doors, that create 10-meter by 20-meter openings. Below these openings are elevators, which lift our X47 fighters to the deck, to launch. We don't even have to be surfaced to launch them. Each carrier sub contains 114 aircraft, and we can have all of those in the air with 30 minutes notice."

Joshua asked "You said ours are larger than the ones the Soviets used?"

She nodded and said "Yes, the Soviet Typhoon was 175 meters long, 23 meters wide, and 12 meters deep. Ours are 220 meters long, 46 meters wide, and 30 meters deep. In the hanger decks of the carriers, the jets are packed in quite tight. Add in crew compartments for the aircraft and the sub, we are actually considering making the next generation 260 meters long."

"You said there are 5 carriers? What are the other types, and how many are there?" Lucas asked.

"We have a total of 16 ships based on the Typhoon,. 5 carriers, 5 assault craft, 2 tankers, 2 cargo ships, and 2 research vessels. If you don't mind, rather than explain, we can see an assault craft next. Tankers and cargo ships should be self-explanatory. In addition to the 16 Typhoons, we have 20 based on the US Ohio class missile sub, 50 based on their Virginia class attack sub, and we recently built 40 based on the Skipjack."

Billy did the quick math and said "We have a navy with 126 ships?"

She shook her head, saying "We have 126 submarines. We also own 6 cargo vessels and 2 tankers that we can divert to our needs at any time." She looked around and, seeing no more questions, said "Let's move on to our assault craft."

After we navigated the stairs and got back in the golf carts, Admiral Hopper took us to another submarine, this one in dry dock. We didn't need to climb onto a platform to see the features of this ship, the hinged nose cone and extendable ramp were obvious. She explained that each sub could, if packed properly, transport 18,000 troops,120 tanks, along with the support vehicles, and supplies needed for such a force. Delivering them to any coastline in the world, without warning.

Tommy asked "Tanks?"

"We have helped Israel develop their weapons systems since it became a nation in 1948. When it was decided we needed tanks, they were happy to quietly build 500 for us. We also developed the K2 for South Korea, and had them build 500 for us. Shall I list other vehicles, such as self-propelled artillery, armored troop transports, response vehicles, and trucks?"

Tommy shook his head, saying "No, sorry. I was just surprised there were tanks."

Reinhardt said "Humor me, Admiral. I don't need to know how many, but what types of artillery and troop transports do we have?"

She smiled and said "We lean more on missiles than traditional artillery, but we developed the Crusader, a 155mm self-propelled system, for the US military, and intentionally let it fail their trials. We have 300 of them in storage, if needed. I'm told they are much better than the human designers asked for. We also have 200 of the German built Panzer 2000, and 100 of the Zuzana 2, from Slovakia. We have an assortment of Chinese PL-16, and US M-142 and M270 ground-based rocket launch systems. If you will hold your questions, we are headed to view the most lethal weapons in our arsenal."

We all nodded, and climbed back into the golf carts. This time, the drive seemed to take forever. We finally pulled up at a submarine somewhat smaller than the Typhoons we had seen. While the Typhoons had a flat top surface, these were nearly perfectly cylindrical. The tall, slim tower near the front, had wings on either side of it.

Once again, we gathered around Admiral Hopper. "This is one of our Ohio subs. They are adaptations of the Ohio class we helped the US develop. Ours are much quieter, faster, and more efficient. There are 10 like this one, armed with 24 Trident D5 missiles. Each missile can target 12 individual locations. That means we could simultaneously destroy, or severely damage, 2880 separate targets. To put it bluntly, we could level every meter of every major city in Europe, or destroy the center of every major city, worldwide."

Frederick asked "Why in the world would Dracul need this type of destructive power?"

She shrugged as she said "We don't. No one does, but because others have it, we need to have it also. During the cold war, the concept of Mutual Assured Destruction, or MAD, was developed. If they know that we can wipe them out if they attack, they might not attack. The superpowers took it to extremes though, and, at the height of the insanity, there were over 76,000 nuclear warheads. Two studies, one in 1945, and another in 2018, determined that humanity would end if more than 100 warheads are used at one time. We have almost 3000. The US and Russia each have roughly 6000. England, France, India, Israel, and Pakistan each have 150 or so. No one is sure how many China and North Korea have, but we think the two combined have 500 or so. We are pretty sure Iran has about a dozen, but we confirmed that, or shared it with anyone."

Mike asked "Where did Dracul get the radioactive material for all of this? And how do we get more to refuel them? I thought the superpowers kept it under tight control?"

Admiral Hopper looked at me, so I said "We will get to that shortly, Mike." I turned to the admiral and said "I believe you said there are 20 Ohio subs, yet you just talked about 10. I am confused."

She nodded, saying "Yes, Sire, there are 20 of this type sub. 10 are ballistic missile subs, and 10 are guided missile subs, armed with 154 Tomahawk missiles. With these, we can support ground troops, or execute a precision strike, 1000 miles inland."

Tommy asked "And that leaves the Virginia and Skipjack class. What are they? And why so many?"

The admiral nodded as she said "I see why the King depends on you all. Everyone is paying attention to the details. Yes, we have 50 Virginias and 40 Skipjacks. The are both attack subs, with the Virginias being 115 meters long, and the Skipjacks are only 77 meters. These act as escorts for our other ships. The only ships that patrol unescorted are the Ohio Nukes."

Billy looked very confused as he said "I may not have been in the military, but I have read about submarines during the cold war. I didn't think subs could communicate while submerged? How can the coordinate their escort?"

Admiral Hopper took a breath, but Sam answered before she could speak "If I may, Your Highness, many of your questions as to how things work will be answered shortly." He turned to me and asked "I am assuming you plan to show everything, Sire?"

"That was my plan, Sam." I turned to the admiral and said "We have no need to visually see everything. If you would take us back to the control room, I believe we should head to the lab."