Chapter 14

I left two days later. It was the second day into lucky week thirteen. Oh joy.

I didn't leave the next day because I needed to get ready. During the night our 'benefactors' stepped in once more and stirred the pot. When we woke the next day we found out that most of the ATVs had vanished. They left us four standard six-by-six vehicles and trailers, but they'd taken the rest, including my 'explorer' vehicle. In their place, they'd given us three new vehicles with matching trailers. They were 8x8 modules and when I put my hand on one, I quickly learned that it was called an 'Argo'. Vicky informed me that she'd seen a few of them before, while working with the Guard. I guess the manufacturers make a militarized version.

The Argo is a big ATV. The ones that they'd given us were tricked out with all the latest gadgets. They had a 'Roll Over Protection Structure' about the driver/passenger area, a front Brush Guard, a light weight winch mounted in the front, and a swivel style tow hook on the back. As well, my vehicle had a GPS mapping system in it and all three of the vehicles had a two-way radio that could be jacked into our helmets. It would allow the drivers to communicate with each other when we were driving.

The sight of those radios put smiles on everyone's faces, especially when we found that a fourth unit had been mounted on the exterior wall of the kitchen unit. We'd later find out that a fifth unit was now permanently mounted out at the construction site. That piece of news made a lot of people happy.

Naturally each of the Argo's came with its own trailer. All were dual axle models, designed to give us more stability while we were travelling cross-country. Mine turned out to be a camper. The side frames could be extended outward like an old style tent trailer as could the rear, and a tent could be raised over it. Properly set up it could sleep three people. It would be a tight fit but considering our new lifestyle no one looked like they were going to start complaining. The other two trailers were small cargo variants. They could be filled up with gear if we ever went out for an extended period of time.

The sight of the new ATVs and their associated gear silenced any real opposition to me going out and doing my job as the explorer in the family. Tilly still grumbled about it over breakfast. At least she did until right after she'd eaten. One minute she was drinking her coffee and voicing her opinion and then suddenly she was looking at me with a look of surprise. Before I could even ask what was up, Tilly was gone. She grabbed her mother and headed to the medical clinic. Half an hour later, a very happy and mollified Tilly was back amongst us. Tilly was pregnant.

That was the other reason that I didn't take off that day. I had to stay around and congratulate a whole whack of women who were suddenly realizing that they were pregnant. It turned out that the women got a feeling after they had conceived. That feeling appeared between twelve and twenty-four hours after the deed had been done. As it turned out, Rebecca had a busy day. Four other women dropped in on her throughout the day. They included my wife Emma, my sister Jane, my mother-in-law Betty, and Angela, Tilly's sister-in-law.

It turned out that I was batting a thousand. Every woman that I'd ploughed and seeded yesterday turned up pregnant and the stats were impressive. Both Tilly and Emma were knocked up with boys. That meant the total of boys was up to five. I kept my mouth shut when Emma told me the news. Of course, being my wife she knew exactly what I was thinking, but she let it slide. She was too happy to slap me for being a pervert.

The others reported that they were carrying girls. That news made everyone happy. It was a nice start at balancing out the future generation, although at the time I didn't say a thing about it to the women. I was too happy to care about anything beyond the fact that they were both pregnant. Truthfully, I was as happy as a pig in a wallow on a warm summer day.

Unfortunately, I never got around to properly congratulating the mothers-to-be until much later in the day, and I definitely didn't add any notches to my belt, although I did try. For the most part I was too busy getting ready to roll about in the hay and so were most of the others in the camp. Even with all the excitement over the baby boom, there were jobs that just needed to be done. After all, we didn't have automated feeders on our farm and animals need daily attention, regardless of their size and disposition.

Picking who was going with me on my trip became a priority. Vicky had volunteered to spend the day with us to help us get ready and I wanted to ensure that she didn't waste her time. Anyone could operate the big excavator; it was tricked out like everything else we touched around here, providing the person touching it with the knowledge they needed to use it. Vicky was still the trained expert and I didn't want to keep her away from the job site for long. Not that I minded her company. Like I said before she was very buff and very sexy.

I didn't use the lottery to pick my companions this time. It pissed off a couple of my relatives, in particular Lizzy but being the stud about this place, I made a command decision. I picked my sister-in-law Bethany and I picked Tilly's niece Bethany, who went by the name of 'Beth'.

I'd picked my Bethany for two reasons. The first was that she wasn't pregnant yet. It was the same reason that I picked Beth. I figured that if I was going out over night that I might as well take along two women who needed my seed and who were ripe for the picking. My second reason for picking my Bethany was her attitude. While her teasing might have been playful the other day, while we were all chatting during our first real conversation with Tilly, it still irked me to no end. Her suggestion that I wasn't able to perform might have been forgotten by the women in the family, with the revelation that Sarah and Sally were pregnant; it hadn't been forgotten by me. I intended for Bethany to learn just how capable I was in performing my duties. Of course, she might have to watch me prove it with another woman.

What picking Bethany and Beth did in the immediate was to give Vicky a few more things to point out to us that our 'benefactors' choose to give us. They popped into the three ATVs seconds after I'd picked the names.

"Okay," Vicky announced with a satisfied grin, "it appears that the aliens have been listening in on our conversations and they've acted on most of my suggestions. In addition to your helmet, they've provided you with safety goggles, gloves, and knee guards. Since we're all wearing top end work boots that probably exceed any code that ever existed back on Earth, I won't complain too loudly that they didn't provide you with regulation footwear. What I will compliment them on is this..."

At that point Vicky held up what looked like a shirt of chain mail and a heavy quilted linen shirt. We all looked at her in surprise.

"It's not the type of body armour that I was thinking about," Vicky went on, "but in truth it is probably better. This shirt is unlike anything that ever existed on Earth. The metal is titanium and for our purposes it is near indestructible. There's probably not a critter on this world that can rip through it. The fact that it has sleeves ensures that your arms will be protected. Of course this quilted shirt is the real winner in the combo. While a critter might not be able to rip through the chain mail, you'll still be susceptible to blunt force trauma and crushing pressure. That's where this shirt comes in. The aliens have created a shirt that will absorb and disperse a vast amount of kinetic energy. If a bull charged you and knocked you down, you'd be winded but you'd still be able to get up and do something about that bull. Hopefully, if a big cat pounces on you, it'll do the same thing and you'll be able to kill the cat before it realizes that its initial attack has failed."

We all agreed that would be nice. Vicky chuckled at our response.

"Now each of the vehicles has a basic load." Vicky continued, running her fingers over what was in the cargo space of my ATV. "They've given each of you a personal backpack. It has two changes of clothing in it, socks, underwear, and a handkerchief. There is also a toilet kit with a toothbrush, toothpaste, soap, face cloth, and a towel. They've also given you three days worth of emergency rations, a plate, eating utensils, and a cup. In the outer pouches there's a box of matches, a flashlight, toilet paper, a water canteen, and spare magazines of ammunition. The magazines go with the rifle that they've provided you. You've all been issued with M4 carbines."

"An M4 carbine?" I muttered aloud, looking at the rifle that was sitting in a bracket between the driver's and passenger's seats. To me the weapon looked like an M16, just like I'd seen in the movies.

"Yeah," Vicky responded to my unasked question. "It was the current issue in the service when we got snatched. It replaced the older M16 rifle after the Gulf War. The aliens have tweaked this model for us. It's got a telescopic stock so that it can be adjusted to the firer; it has an integral day/night scope and a laser range finder. The firer can choose between single shot or three round bursts. The weapon is fed with a thirty round magazine and our 'benefactors' as Adam likes to call the aliens have given you 'hunting' ammunition. You're guaranteed to take down anything that you put a round into without a problem. Adam might still want to bring along that big old 30-06 for hunting, but for personal protection I'd use the M4."

Who were we to argue?

"Moving on," Vicky said cheerfully, "every vehicle has an emergency kit. This includes a first aid kit, twenty-five feet of half inch rope, flares, a collapsible shovel, a one gallon water jug, cast iron cooking pots and pans, a camp coffee pot, a collapsible cooking grill, a small hand axe, and a saw. There is also a sleeping bag, a large tarp, and an air mattress."