Chapter 17

Matt and I were up early the next morning for we knew Yarl and his crew were eager to complete the installation and get back to Vora. I think they were worried that their food would somehow become contaminated by sugar and turn them into sugar addicts. Things didn’t work that way, but many fears are often totally unreasonable.

We needed more drivers than I thought, so Matt, Mary, Bill, Sue, and I went into Greely and picked up the rental equipment that Matt had reserved. With Carla and Ken’s help, the seven of us should be able to drive the trucks around the perimeter, operate the cherry picker and forklift, and translate for Yarl and his crew. At least no one objected to my driving this time. The one thing that I found odd was not calling Ken, Kenneth.

We had defined one of our eight-office portables to be our Security Headquarters, so the control equipment for the detection system and force field would be installed in one of that portable’s offices. A second office was Bill’s office, and the rest of the offices were used by his security people. This was one of our larger portables, so it also had two restrooms, a kitchenette, and a good-sized lobby. Yarl used it as his field office while he was with us.

While I was busy helping with the installation, Sereine showed Misty where her medical portable and mobile home were located. She also took Misty back to Wayside to get the storage containers containing her medical equipment and supplies.

Yarl’s first task was to install the energy broadcast system on the broadcast tower that was installed near the utility buildings. While one group was doing that, a second group installed the perimeter detection control center equipment.

Their next task was to verify that the perimeter detection towers and rover shelters were ready to receive equipment. Once that was done, they started installing equipment on the perimeter’s detection towers. Initially, Yarl had two two-man teams installing the equipment on the towers. It only took three hours to do each tower, but there were a lot of towers.

When the broadcast tower equipment installation was complete, that crew started installing the rovers, the rover charging units, and other equipment in the rover shelters. Once installation of the perimeter defense system’s equipment was complete, Yarl and his crew had to align the power transmission heads on the energy broadcast system’s tower with the receiver heads on the perimeter detection towers and rover shelters. The final task for the outer defense perimeter was a final system test to make sure everything worked the way it was supposed to work.

This last trip created a problem for me that interfered with my expanding my current Embassy staff. I had a plan for bringing my security staff and their families to Earth that was established based on the availability of housing and our ability to provide a safe environment. My having to bring my new people to Earth earlier than planned disrupted the housing plan. We would shortly have a safe environment, but there was no longer any available housing for the rest of my security force.

I had tasked Matt with ordering additional mobile homes and he had talked with William and Jack about additional pads. I suppose I should handoff the coordination of the construction details to Bill since he had handled them previously, but I needed to think on that for Bill already had a lot of work to do.

I knew that we needed decent Multiverse medical care for my people. I had planned bringing in a doctor, which I did, and have the doctor care for my current staff. The second part of my planning was disrupted by my staff of about twenty growing to almost fifty people. It was evident that Misty needed a staff of nurses and medical technicians to assist her. Having those people join us now meant additional housing. Which was part of the reason I had Matt order additional mobile homes.

Considering the circumstances, Bill’s security staff had been adequate for our needs. However, providing security for fifty people, and Kendrick’s insistence that I have additional bodyguards, meant I needed to bring in a few more of our Multiverse Security Guards. I thought the remainder of the single people who were interested in being bodyguards and a few of the married couples without children would workout good, especially for Mac’s wife Martha. Of course, that also increased our need for additional housing, which was another part of the reason I had Matt order additional mobile homes.

One evening during the installation, I talked with Mary about running the warehouse for my business to see if she was ready to start on that. She was, so I would have to find warehouse staff on my next trip to the Multiverse. Until then, she could continue setting up the portables we would be using as our temporary warehouse. More staff meant more housing, which was a third part of the reason I had Matt order additional mobile home.

Betty and Carol did a good job feeding all of us, but it was a big job for them. I was thinking about more kitchen staff to help them, when it occurred to me that with everyone in their own mobile homes, most of my staff would be cooking for themselves. Now Betty and Carol would only have to cook for our family and the occasional guest. My wives had been busy taking care of a house containing over twenty people. Now there were only five people in the house. What if they got bored from practically nothing to do? Oh well, I’ll deal with it later if it becomes a problem. At least we didn’t need even more staff that I would have to house.

I really needed to discuss the need for additional housing with Matt and Bill. Matt and I had made an estimate of how many additional homes would be needed for the new people and additional staff. However, we initially failed to accurately identify the total number of people we would need at our temporary location between now and the time the main Embassy building was completed. I tasked Matt with determining how many mobile homes we really needed.

Matt, Bill, and I had a meeting to discuss Matt’s recommendation for the number of additional mobile homes we needed to order. We agreed with Matt’s recommendation. Now I could give Yarl an accurate estimate of how much additional area would be needed within the area to be protected by the force field.

Our current mobile homes and portables were spread out over a large area, but that area would increase once the new mobile homes were installed. Sergei had suggested that we install six force field towers to provide adequate coverage for the additional area.

Author’s Note: A force field tower consists of a force field generator and its support structure.

I spoke with Yarl about our expanding our housing area. He evaluated the area where we would be adding to the additional mobile homes, and he told us he could cover the additional area by increasing the distance between the force field towers and adding two additional towers. I agreed and Yarl had his crew do the modifications to our force field perimeter, to include installing the additional towers.

Fortunately, the equipment Harry shipped to Sergei was for the Embassy Compound installation, so we had more force field towers than we actually needed for our temporary living area. The towers were the ones that were going to be installed on the roofs of the inner perimeter guard posts and the towers did not require pads. Yarl could move them as needed. Even after we added the additional towers to our perimeter, we had extra towers.

We forwarded the information regarding the total number of mobile homes and pads we would need to William. He would discuss it with Jack and get back to us. I decided to split the construction supervision between Matt and Bill. It looked like they would have additional construction to coordinate.

Matt smiled when I assigned the task of ordering the additional mobile homes to him. I got a good laugh from everyone when I told Matt that I thought he just liked to irritate the salesman by calling them mobile homes instead of manufactured homes. Now all I had to do was figure out the best way to tell Rita that she needed to furnish even more mobile homes and portables.

Yarl and I marked the area that we would need protected with a couple of marking stakes with flags, and he updated the plan for installing the towers for the additional force field towers.

The current plan was to leave the force field towers protecting our temporary living area in place until we had a permanent location for the trading activities. Once Yarl and his crew returned to Vora, Sergei would have to order replacement towers for the additional towers we used.

While Yarl and Dan were conducting the final test of the outer perimeter detection system, the rest of Yarl’s crew started installing the force field system. Yarl had increased the number of force field towers from six to eight, and then increased it to twelve. He needed twelve towers for he decided to maintain the tower spacing at the original distance.

Now that we had an operable outer perimeter detection system and would shortly have a defensive force field to protect us, I felt that it would be safe to start bringing in the additional people we needed, once the living places to support them were in place.

Altogether, it required more than an Earth month for Yarl and his crew to install and checkout both systems. At the end of the final week, which was mainly testing, Bill and his security people were happy with the system. The pressure of providing a secure area using just guards was over. Now we had a high tech defensive installation. I would have to check with Sergei to confirm that Yarl let him know of the additional equipment installed at our temporary living site. At least the outer perimeter installation was complete with the exception of reorienting certain components, when we moved the control center to the new Embassy.

Yarl and his crew were happy to complete the job. They could now return to Vora and their families. Once Dan hopped them off of Earth, they would not have to worry about sugar. They were very eager to leave.

Once they left, most of us took a break. We only did what was absolutely necessary during the rest of the week and weekend.

The next Monday, I convened a meeting of my key advisers. I had told them about the meeting and its agenda last week, so they would be prepared to address certain matters.

“As I said last week, this meeting is to review where we are, and where we want to be in the future. As you all know, my long-term goal is for Earth to join the Multiverse. However, I doubt that will happen in my lifetime. What I would like to do today, is to define a series of short- and mid-range goals that will eventually lead to Earth joining the Multiverse as a Provisional Member World.

“Personally, I think developing trade between Earth and the Multiverse will be the best way to convince Earth’s governments and citizens that applying for Provisional Membership will be the best course of action for them to pursue. The Embassy’s charitable activities will also help us to reach that goal, but they are not going to be enough to swing public opinion far enough to convince Earth’s people to take action.

“I have noticed that humanity, both here and in the Multiverse, always asks ‘What’s in it for me?’ I think our short- and mid-term goals need to keep that in mind. Our approach needs to give the average person a reason to support applying to the Multiverse for membership. Does anyone see things differently?”

Looking around the table I could see no one had anything to say. Matt and I had talked before the meeting about Kim. We agreed that including her in this meeting was a risk, but we also knew that we would need her in the future. If she used what she learned in this meeting in a detrimental manner, we would know we could not trust her with some of the more sensitive information that I wasn’t ready to share with her. The other part of the problem was, if we couldn’t trust her, what would we do with her?

“For the first part of this meeting, I want to define where we are today. To save time, I will add my tasks, status, and goals to our plans after the meeting, and we can review everything during our next full meeting.

“Matt, tell us about what you have been doing and the status of your efforts.”

“My part in arranging the presentation of your credentials and getting the first batch of mobile homes and portables ordered and installed is complete. Do you want me to include the expansion of our living space as part of this status?”

“No. I think we should address that as if it were part of our future effort.”

“I talked with William and he thinks the main Embassy building will be ready for occupancy in a little over a year and a half from now. The rest of the compound will take another six to eight months to complete. For this area, I made an estimate of how many people will be joining us during the coming year and we ordered a second batch of mobile homes. Our meeting last week changed that number, so I will be increasing that order’s quantity, and William will be modifying the drawings he was preparing for submission to the building department.

“Jack got the building permit a couple of weeks ago, and so the construction of the Embassy Compound is officially underway. Of course we started digging holes two months ago. If we use our official start date we are two months ahead of schedule. Using the date we started digging holes, the construction is on schedule or slightly ahead of the original schedule. William tells me it’s difficult to get a good status, as Jack Tander has started a few activities earlier than their scheduled start date. However he also said, the exact percentage of completion is not that important this early in the construction schedule. He indicated that the percentage of completion relative to the schedule would become more important to him during the middle and final third of the construction period.

“Abby is still in the process of defining and arranging for support staff for her new position, and I have been helping her with that. That covers most of the current tasks I have been working on, Doug.”

Looking at Mary, I said, “Where are you on your warehouse tasks?”

“I received the storage racks I ordered before our last Multiverse trip. Bill loaned me two of his security people who are in the process of assembling them and securing them to the floor of our warehouse portables. They should be finished with that task in two days.

“I set up the warehouse computer and installed the software for ordering and tracking inventory. Once all the racks are installed, I will be ready for someone to hop all of the storage shelters of merchandise down from Wayside, so we can inventory the contents and allocate rack space for the various items.”

“Good job, Mary, but out of curiosity, how are you tracking an item’s location?”

“I assigned numbers to the portables and to each rack in the portables. I used masking tape to divide the 8-foot shelves into zones one foot wide. The shelves are assigned letters from top to bottom and the zones are numbered from left to right. Therefore a storage location like 3-12-C4 means Portable number 3, Rack 12, Shelf C, and Zone 4. When we move into the warehouse, we can use the same numbering system, simply by eliminating the Portable’s number.

“As I said, I’m not ready to start unpacking storage containers, but when I am, I would like to have about six of the new people who want to learn the warehousing business, to help with the unpacking. The quicker the new people learn English the easier it will be for the manager of my warehouse operation to train them in that profession, but I still need to find and hire someone for that position.”

That sounds good, Mary. Bill, where are you in your tasks?”

“Well, as Matt said, you have presented your credentials so my part in that effort is finished, and so is my part in the construction of our current living area. Although I am helping Matt with the expansion of our living area when needed. I started defining the Embassy Security Group’s structure and I started writing a Security Department Policies and Procedures Manual, but that’s still just a rough outline.

Moving on to the next topic, I said, “Tammy told everyone about being licensed to carry energy weapons in the Multiverse. While we were on Slave World, Tammy made arrangements for our Earth security personnel to go through the energy weapon training that Chairman Smart provided. They were issued their energy pistols, but for now we left their pistols and energy rifles on Wayside.

“Bill, I think that up to now stun guns have been adequate for our security personnel. I don’t see the Security Guards needing energy weapons in the near future. However, we should have them available for when they are needed, so I want you to order several lockable gun cabinets or racks and install them in the Security Portable. Once that’s done, we will bring their weapon here and everyone can store their energy weapons in the weapons’ storage area. I will leave it up to you to determine if my bodyguards need to carry energy weapons on the ranch or when we go to town.

“Oh, and one other thing, Bill, I talked with Sergei’s D-Hopper about why they carried both energy rifles and pistols. He said his people had gotten into the habit of stacking their weapons during their rest period when hopping. At one of their stops, some of the local carnivores attacked them and they were lucky that someone was able to get to their weapons and kill the beasts before someone was hurt. On this last trip, I noticed that we are starting to develop a similar habit once we feel the area is safe. I think we need to carry energy pistols in addition to energy rifles when we are hopping, and we need to be more alert to local hazards that we may not be aware of being present. Stacking our energy rifles may be okay, but we need to wear our energy pistols all the time.”

“All right, Doug, both ideas make sense to me. Carrying energy weapons here on Earth is one of the things I wanted to discuss with you. I agree that our Security Guards don’t need to carry energy weapons at this time, but I would like for your bodyguards to start carrying energy pistols in addition to stun guns when they accompany you in public. Their stun guns will be the preferred weapon, but if they need additional firepower, they will have it. I also want them to have energy rifles stored somewhere in their vehicles.

“The building permit for our temporary housing area has been signed off, so that effort is complete. Jack Tander obtained the building permit for the Embassy Compound. I talked with Matt and William about the additional pads. The manager of the Weld County Building Department is still very cooperative and let me know that there would be no problem getting a permit for the necessary expansion.

“I was talking with Matt about the vehicles we have on order. Most of them will be for my group, but Matt suggested I consider armoring some of the other vehicles. I’ll look at that again and define what the Embassy needs immediately, and define what we will need in the near future.

“Except for the items I mentioned and a few minor tasks, everything I’ve been working on is on schedule or complete.”

“Okay, Sue, where are you in your tasks?”

“Up until recently, I have been helping Bill with the tasks you gave him. For the past two weeks, I have been researching what will be needed to sell medical equipment and medications in the US and other countries. In my spare time, I have been thinking about how to organize the Analysis Department. I need some clarification to proceed with the research and defining my department.”

“Okay, let’s wait on that until we get to near future goals. Sereine, do you have anything?”

“Yes. I obtained some policy and procedure documents that were prepared for a Trade Check Point on a Provisional Member World. Many parts of the documents are applicable to Earth. Although I will need to adapt, delete, or create new sections for those that do not apply to Earth, as written. I talked with Carl about this while I was on Vora.

“There is nothing for the police officers who will be assigned to the Embassy’s Trade Check Point to do, right now, and I won’t need them until the traders start doing business on Earth. However, Carl thinks it would be a good idea for me to staff their positions early. He said I could use them to help me prepare for business, and they will need time to get acclimated to the area. I will need to get them identification cards; and you will need to do whatever, to have them hired by your Security Company.

“There is one point that Carl and I discussed, and that’s in addition to being the Ambassador. You are also a trader. Your company’s current trade should be going through my Trade Check Point. Unfortunately, we aren’t ready to perform that function. I am considering bringing in one or two people to help me with defining the policies and procedures; so we can test our policies and procedures using your trade activity.”

“Thanks, Sereine. I had sort of forgotten that I created the Security Guard Company. I suppose I should formalize it as part of my Earth businesses. I also have the Bullion Trading business that Slim and I set up in Boston. I will need to get a couple of accountants and lawyers for those businesses.”

No one else had been assigned tasks that needed a status report, so I asked if anyone had something to add. It surprised me and most of the others, when Kim raised her hand.

“Doug, I have a couple of articles finished. Do you have time to look them over before I submit them to the paper?”

“Sure. Bring them to my office after the meeting. I will be happy to read them for you. Would you mind if Matt reads them also?”

“Sure! I’d welcome his opinion, also.”

While we had been talking, Cindy had been taking notes. We would have to update our action item list, later. I would have to have her add a couple of items that popped into my mind while we were talking.

“All right, if there is nothing further for current and completed tasks, let’s move onto future goals.

“Matt, let’s start with the expansion of our current living space.”

“In last week’s meeting, we revised our estimate of the number of people to be brought to Earth in the near future. We revised our estimate of the additional mobile homes and portables we would need in order to house all of the people we want to bring here in the next year and the number we will need to alleviate our current crowding. I placed the order for the additional mobile homes and portables with the manufacturer, William started on plans for the addition, and Phyllis will consult with Jack Tander for his input for a cost estimate and get back to us. Phyllis estimated that the addition should be complete within two months of starting the construction.

“The mobile home and portable manufacturer will need at least six months to build all of our new units. I made two arrangements with him. The first is to build the mobile homes before starting on the portables. The second is to install the new mobile homes as soon as they are finished rather than wait until the order is complete like we did last time. Hopefully, that will allow us to start bringing key people to Earth within the next two or three months; it should also help alleviate the crowding.”

“Thanks, Matt. Does anyone have any additional tasks that they are working on that need to be addressed?”

Bill said, “I am going to need some help with developing my policies and procedures manual. We need to define the level and type of security needed for the ranch and within the Embassy compound. It would probably be a good idea to set up a series of meetings to discuss what will be needed and to review the policies I will need to establish for the Embassy. I may also need help with creating the procedures for implementing the policies.

“All right, Bill, just let us know when you need your meetings, who needs to be there, and the subject matter. I will have Cindy schedule them. Anyone else?”

Sue said, “I plan to start a similar effort for my Analysis Group, and I will also need to start staffing my key positions.”

“Okay. Cindy, add those items to our list of things that need to be reviewed in our status meetings. Anyone else?”

Looking around the room I could not see any hands in the air, so I said, “For the rest of our meeting, I would like to define and discuss the goals and tasks that need to be completed in preparing Earth for joining the Multiverse as a Provisional Member World. For our discussion, let’s refer to a goal as a task. The idea is to assign each task we identify to one of three plans: a Five-Year Plan, a Ten-Year Plan, and an Over Ten-Year Plan.

“The Five-Year Plan will include all of the tasks that we plan to start within the next five years. For each task, we need to assign a person to be responsible for the task, and we will also need a best guess assessment of the task’s staffing requirements and its expected duration. Once we have the tasks identified, the person assigned to the task will need to develop a task description, an initial approach to completing the task, and a schedule. Keep in mind that we are making an initial task assessment that will probably be modified before the task is even started.

“For the Ten-Year Plan, I would like to see a listing of the tasks we will start five to ten years from now. It isn’t necessary to assign a person to manage the task and we don’t need staffing or duration estimates, but we do need a brief task description. I also want to list these tasks in the order we think they will be started.

Our Over Ten-Year Plan will be a listing of the tasks we know we will not be starting for at least ten years. It isn’t worth the time and effort for us to do more than just list the tasks and write a brief description, so that should minimize the effort we need to expend in preparing that plan.

“All right, rather than going around the room, does anyone have any tasks that will be fairly easy to complete?”

I could see Sue’s hand go up. “Go ahead Sue, what are your tasks?”

“During our last trip to the Multiverse, I worked on defining the Analysis Department. I have a basic organizational structure blocked out and am ready to start staffing the positions. The one area of your current effort that really needs looking at closer, is your agreement with Amir to support the medical needs of the African countries. I would like to find one or two people to support me with looking into this matter.

“I will need people with special training in analysis, so I thought of my former Homeland Security boss, Charlie Stoddard. I called him and during our conversation he mentioned there is something going on with his boss’s bosses. There have been a few questions sent to his boss regarding him and some questions were also sent to Alan’s boss.

“It’s not clear why, but the questions are about their involvement with you and the diamonds you imported from the Multiverse. Charlie told me that Kim’s newspaper article and the State Department’s report to the Justice Department had shot down Senator Belton’s accusations. Since his accusations are no longer valid, why are Charlie and Alan’s superiors asking these questions?”

I was momentarily dumbfounded. “Sue, did Charlie or Alan have any idea as to why their bosses might be asking these questions?”

“Charlie didn’t, and I wasn’t able to talk with Alan. His boss sent him on a surveillance trip to Grand Junction to check on a rumor that someone in the area had threatened the ex-President with harm.”

“Hmm, I think you should give his wife a call and see what she knows. The last time the HS senior staff was involved with us, there were threats that led to you and Bill resigning from HS. If Belton still has contacts with Alan and Charlie’s bosses or their bosses, he may be the source of their investigation.”

“I agree, Doug. I can see them targeting Alan for supporting you. But I don’t see them going after Charlie. He wasn’t involved with us in the office other than in one or two brief meetings, and I don’t think they know about the meetings at your place in Denver.”

“That’s true, Sue, but someone may have heard a remark or two he made about his involvement with us. It’s also possible that Alan said something that linked Charlie to us. Were you thinking of recruiting Alan or Charlie to support your group?”

“They were the people that initially came to my mind. Charlie has the training and experience my department will need; if he doesn’t object to working for me. Alan hasn’t had the specialized training that he will need for the position. However, he can learn that quickly, and his field experience will be invaluable.”

“Hmm, they have been our source of information about HS activities; but there has been essentially nothing going on in HS regarding us lately, until this came up. This may be a good time to recruit them, but let’s wait until after you talk with Alan and his wife to make a final decision. Did you have any other tasks in mind?”

“Well, sort of. The type of research and analysis you will need me to do requires a lot of data to form good recommendations. I want to establish a computerized database of information related to the areas you are interested in. One of the things I need is advance notification of your plans for the future. That will allow me to staff the Analyst positions with trained people to gather preliminary data on those areas that will be of interest to you.”