Vicky Peterwald: Target Read Free Page A

better and better.
    Her newsie was waiting for Vicky at the end of the pier. By now, her hood was again fully covering her face. She let the reporter guide her anonymously through the mob of other newsies hanging around the station.
    Actually, Vicky had put the cape over her dress to avoid drawing a mob of every functioning male in the place. The dress was called a halter top, but there was no halt in it. Not at all. The top shouted come and the short skirt was one big invitation.
    Vicky figured her outfit would give her an extra five minutes on camera.
    They quickly covered the distance to what the station laughingly called a hotel. The room was small, but a camera team was already set up with a star-covered backdrop behind Vicky’s chair.
    Good, these folks know their business. That should make doing my business a whole lot easier.
    Vicky settled herself in the offered chair. She had to pull the hem of her dress down. It still didn’t get close to midthigh. As the Marine had already discovered, the top wasn’t much. There was no back. The front consisted of two strips of cloth that struggled to cover her ample breasts as much as they revealed them. When Vicky pulled the dress from one of the foot lockers shipped over from the
Fury
when she asked Doc Maggie and Kit and Kat to join her, there had been strips of double-sided tape to hold it in place as she moved.
    She’d left the tape in her quarters, as the Marine sergeant had already discovered and the newsies would find out in due course.
    The woman producer smiled with delight and offered some whispered advice to the cameraman before asking, “Are you ready, Your Imperial Majesty?”
    “Always,” Vicky purred, not bothering to correct the title.
    “So,” said the interviewer, a man selected for eye candy rather than intelligence. “What did you think of the idea of the Great Voyage of Discovery?”
    “Oh, it was wonderful,” Vicky gushed. And Vicky knew that she did gush very well. She laid it on thick about how exciting it was to be going out, deep into the heart of the galaxy. “Daily, we would see things no one had ever seen before. Our scientists were so excited. They would babble on and on over supper. We knew that we all were living a dream for the rest of humanity.”
    “So, how did the Great Voyage of Discovery become the Great Battle?”
    Vicky twisted in her seat. Now the strap of her dress went limp, just as she wanted it. All that held her top in place was hope. And every male viewer would be hoping it didn’t. Behind the interviewer, the producer smiled and nudged the cameraman. He zoomed in close.
    Vicky had their attention. Not with her words. Her boobs.
    “I have no idea how things changed,” Vicky said, breathlessly. “I was invited over to the
Wasp
for dinner with Princess Kris Longknife and then things started to go sideways so quickly that it was impossible to keep track. The admirals had all decided to go back to human space. All of them.
    “But the princess would have none of that. She insisted we must attack these aliens. She had these fancy new weapons her king had sent her and she just had to use them. Somehow she got the admirals to change their minds and join her in the attack.”
    At the “somehow,” Vicky twisted in her seat. She didn’t have to glance down. She knew she had a nipple showing by the way the producer grinned, and the camera cut in closer. Vicky went on talking, though she doubted any of those present were listening. She went on and on about Kris and the way she twisted the admirals to her wishes. She yammered on . . . and they let her.
    This was as good as she’d hoped it would be.
    “I know Admiral Krätz was all for returning. He’d been the first to insist we come back for further instructions. I think Kris paid a visit to the
Fury
before he changed his mind. I think Kris visited all the admirals personally to somehow persuade them.
    Let Kris take the fall. I’m certainly not going to.
    By now,