Living

John Morgan informed Elle via a servant that he was leaving for the capital, Maxel City, in half an hour's time - and she was to come with him. That was the disadvantage of being a very attractive new (and fifth) wife - the novelty hadn't worn off yet.

She always kept a bag packed so she could leave in a hurry. And she always packed a low cut dress and high heels - she was one of John's status symbols; and he took her everywhere that his status was important.

They were only a few hundred meters down the road, when the encrypted hot line rang. He placed his thumb on a finger print reader.

THUMB PRINT CONFIRMED 

John Morgan, "John Morgan"

VOICE PRINT CONFIRMED 

Brigadier Chappell, "Bad news Minister, they shot it down."

"Shit!"

"I still find it very hard to believe - it was an X72 missile and they shot it down just 200 meters before it would have crossed their border - it's as if they were watching it and only decided to shoot it down at the last moment."

"This is a country of hippy horsemen - for god's sake - and you're telling me they shot down an X72."

"I know - unbelievable. And to make matters worse they played with it first - they pushed it off course and then shot it down."

"We have to break their encryption."

"It's impossible; it's factorial encryption; finding an informer is our only chance."

John Morgan grabed Elle's hand and put it down his pants. She knew what she had to do - she graduated from the Maxel Family Academy. She knew him a lot better now - she could predict him so well - such as when he was likely to want sex - and stress certainly brought it on.

Brigadier Chappell, "I see you're on the way - your estimated time of arrival is 45 minutes; I've called the meeting for an hour's time - OK?"

"Yes good - have Colonel Rodman meet me when I arrive."

"Yes, Sir"

"Terminate Call"

VOICE CHANNEL TERMINATED 

And there was something about this morning's meeting with the head gardener that was still nagging her. As a wife she had to take some managerial responsibility and Fiona (wife one) had given her the garden. She wanted to grow some apricots but she was told by the head gardener that it was an ornamental garden and they couldn't grow fruit. She'd ask John to intervene - but not now he's busy..

"Aaaah! Aaaah! - Oooh! - that was so good - Elle you are so sexy!"

"Thank you - that was good."

"Sorry about the mess, Elle."

"It's alright, I have a change of clothes."

" - what would I do without you, Elle?"

She smiled. She moved to the back of the bus - she needed to look her best when they arrived.

Colonel Rodman briefed John Morgan while they walked to the conference room; Morgan didn't like surprises. Colonel Rodman was easy to distract; he couldn't look directly at Elle. He knew if he did he would lose it. She was taller than him and her always visible cleavage was at his eye height and always there to take his concentration. As a colonel he was only allowed three wives and at his last promotion he was only allowed to pick a class 9 wife and Elle was a 13. He knew he would never get a level 13 wife - but if he got to be a general he'd get a fourth wife - and a class 11 at that. He was amazed that Morgan took her to these high security meetings. But Morgan was the Minister - and he could do what he liked.

John Morgan, "Let's start! So Colonel, what are we going to do?"

Rodman, "The boffins have gone over and over the data - the Rubicons have developed an anti-X72."

"But they're a bunch of hippy yokels! - how?"

"They did leave us a couple of hints - for the first time we picked up some very short duration multi-frequency and multi-positional bursts - mostly in the ultra-violet range."

"So - what does that mean?"

"The boffins think is might be a radar designed to see through our cloaking. And then 5 seconds before it blew up we detected a very high energy laser which knocked it off course and another burst of laser which destroyed it."

The Colonel glanced at Elle to see if she was impressed with his report. It was hard to tell - she was the perfect wife - attentive to her husband but not interested it the technical detail. Morgan liked it when men looked at one of his wives.

Attache Hargraves, "But how would they process all that radar return information quickly enough?"

Brigadier Chappell, "That is the biggest worry - they must have some amazing super computer."

John Morgan, "It looks like we'll have to delay the bombing of the eastern province."

Attache Hargraves, "Maxel won't like this!" He went very red in the face. Even Elle stared for a second.

John Morgan, "We'll give it the highest priority; we'll fix it; we'll be bombing next week."

"... or we'll find a minister who will." Attache Hargraves slowly packed his papers, handed them to his assistant and the left. The room was silent until they left.