“You know the training program Jillian is helping develop for the new Orbital Authority ships? That’s just a cover story; the ships the new branch will be getting are just going to be smaller, stripped-down versions of the Starwolf-class design.” Jackson turned to lead Pike away from where the technicians were trying to work.

“What her team is doing is setting up a streamlined program to train up crews quickly on a whole new generation of Terran starship. Integrated reactionless drives, anti-matter weapons and sensors far ahead of what we have now … five new classes of ship, each needing crews that are trained to their higher performance envelopes.”

“Where are these ships?” Pike asked hopefully.

“The first keels are being laid at a secret facility run by Barclays Ironworks,” Jackson said after a long pause.

“Holy shit,” Pike said softly. “You’ve cut Tsuyo Corp out of the loop completely on this?”

“For right now all system designs stay under the strict control of this project office,” Jackson said. “I wasn’t privy to the decision-making on that one, but I don’t necessarily disagree with it.”

Tsuyo Corporation had been the provider of military hardware to the Terran Confederacy since there was such a thing. The company was so old it had originated on Earth and had actually been involved in the project that developed the first functional warp drive. As such, their power was immense, both politically and militarily. Few decisions were made within the old Senate without their approval or at least input, and they ran such a tight ship that there was little anybody could do about it, at least not if they still wanted access to Tsuyo tech.

They were so guarded that even on CENTCOM starships there were systems that were forbidden to be accessed by Fleet engineers. The company was so large and influential that before the Phage War had turned Terran politics on its head the board of directors had actually been colonizing its own planets with the intent of making Tsuyo Corp a sovereign power. Given their stranglehold on technology and manufacturing it was entirely plausible that they could have pulled it off without much of a fight.

With that in mind and once it became apparent that Prometheus would produce useable outputs quickly, the project oversight had decided that maybe it would be better if someone besides Tsuyo was given the contract to begin manufacturing the prototypes. Barclays Ironworks, a commercial ship builder in the Britannia enclave, had been quietly approached about running a secret shipyard for the new generation of starships. Despite their partnership with Tsuyo, the smaller firm had leapt at the opportunity and agreed at once.

“You’re not going to give me the location of this new shipyard, are you?” Pike asked.

“That depends on what sort of agreement we can come to.” Jackson shrugged.

“What do you want?” Pike asked, almost afraid of what the older man would say.

****