Chapter 4

Well, it looked like I was stuck with the job of working on the wounded. The fact that I was about to suggest that myself was beside the point. I had been trapped, and I didn’t like that part of the situation. I was going to have to be more forceful in my orders if I didn’t want it to happen again.

Fortunately, most of the injuries were simple bites or scratches that could be treated with first aid supplies from the replicator. In one case, there was a broken leg that required a more esoteric treatment. I set the leg and wrapped the break in a special splint that would speed up the healing of the bone and simply disintegrate when its job was done. I did not even have to be there to remove the splint. All I could do was to hope that the injured woman would follow directions.

It took me longer to treat the wounded than it did to bring the meat into the village. Somehow, we had not had to answer questions about how we had killed all of those wolves. For one thing, giving the wolf carcasses to the village caused enough internal conversation as to who was going to get what, that all of the villagers were too distracted over a real situation to worry about an abstract one.

There was still enough daylight to allow us to leave for home, so we got out while most of the villagers were still squabbling over the wolf pelts. We made good time on our way home because I was the only one carrying any weight in the form of a backpack. It was just getting dark and normally past supper time when we finally reached our cave.

I had given a lot of thought to the five people I had revealed my secret to, and it was obvious that I was going to need expert help. Therefore, I decided to stop being coy and to tell them who I really represented and to formally enlist their aid in finding and killing the orlan.

The first thing I did was to say to all of them, “Friends, the time has come for me to tell you the complete truth of why I am here. Also, I am going to make living a whole lot more comfortable for all of us. That second item is what I will do first.”

I had the replicator produce four LED lights with power drawn from Dark Energy. There was considerable interest and awe when the lights were first produced. I showed them how to turn the light on and off, so there would be a light for each family group and one for the toilet and bathroom. For one thing, I was tired of having to go outside into the cold weather to piss and shit.

I had the women carry three of the lights while I carried the fourth. I wanted to go deeper into the cave for a couple of reasons. I led the way from chamber to chamber, marking the way with luminous paint every 10-15 feet. When we finally came to a chamber of reasonable size, I had my group halt while I explained the next phase of the operation.

“What I have in mind is a bedroom for each family, a place for personal hygiene that I will explain when we get to that, and a combination of kitchen and meeting room. Here, I will use some of this paint to mark on the floor what I have in mind for the rooms. If anybody wants something else, let me know.”

I laid out three bedrooms and a bathroom around a central room. There was a short hallway left to reach the exit. I then had the replicator fabricate the necessary panels to make the walls and a ceiling for each room. I wanted ceilings for sound control. Each wall had an individually controlled light fixture. Everybody helped with the assembly of the prefabricated parts, and we had our basic apartments in less than an hour.

There was a panel so that we could close off the exit to keep the heat within our living area. Actually, that was the one we put up first, and I paused long enough to call for a space heater also running off of Dark Energy. That had a thermostat which I set for 68° F because everybody but me was used to cool weather. I would learn to live with it.

Before long, all of us had stripped down to our underclothes. We were hungry by the time the basic walls and ceilings were in place, so I made us a table and some chairs. The replicator produced some goop that we used to level the floor, so we were basically in business.

I set the replicator on one of the tables and had it make a second replicator to add to our convenience. I pushed the second replicator aside and fixed a supper of fried chicken breast, boiled white rice with chicken gravy, and green beans. I selected iced tea with lemon juice and sugar as the beverage. I hoped that this was going to be the treat that I had in mind. (You can probably tell that I came from a Southern heritage.)

I had everybody sit down at the larger table and served the supper, or was it dinner? Anyway, I showed them how to eat the various things, and a grand time was had by all. Hunter of Bear commented, “Now you can see why I wanted to get home before supper time.” That produced a laugh and enthusiastic agreement.

After supper, I told them my full background as a Ranger and about the idiots that had sent the orlan to Earth. I also said that I needed Hunter of Bear and Tracker to help me hunt the orlan. I had realized how unprepared I was to work in this environment. If we did not find the orlan in time, all life on Earth was in serious danger of being wiped out in 500 years.

Of course, the part about the 500 years did not mean much to them because they did not expect to live beyond 35-40 years of age, but they could grasp the part about the orlan killing everything else on the planet. When I asked for their help, all five enthusiastically agreed to help, though the women said that they did not know exactly what they could do to help. “Don’t worry, ladies. If you had nothing else to offer, just what you have between your legs would be a great help to us men!” That produced another laugh, and everybody agreed that sex was a great incentive for doing anything.

It was getting late, so we cleaned up from supper, and I put both replicators to making furniture and stuff for the bathroom. I ordered queen size beds, a table, and two chairs for each bedroom. At the moment, I only ordered a toilet and a wash basin for the bathroom. The toilet had a built in disposal unit and a source of water. Both of those were supplied as part of a single purpose replicator.

We men dragged the toilet into the bathroom, and I demonstrated how to use it. The women especially liked the toilet paper dispenser. The wash basin was ignored until I made an issue of it. Well, okay, if I insisted, but they were really surprised by the soap.

I showed the women how to make up the beds while we men “supervised.” The women knew exactly how to deal with this help—they ignored us.

We went to bed, and there was even more enthusiasm for the beds when they found out how much more comfortable sex was on beds versus on pads on the floor. Sound proof or not, we all knew what was going on because the women’s squeals and screams shook the walls. Chalk up another win for the replicator!

The women were quick learners when it came to calling for meals from the replicators. They had breakfast ready by the time we men finished in the bathroom—dammit, one toilet was just not enough for six people in the morning.

I have no idea how it happened, but we had “Hawaiian Pizza” for breakfast and Pepsis to drink. Sunshine refused to explain what had happened, but I would bet that it was the result of random button pushing. In any case, everybody including me enjoyed the breakfast. Oh, well...

After breakfast, I described what I wanted to do today. We men were going to see if we could track down the orlan while the women stayed home. I called for four carpets and asked the women to put them down while we were gone. I also asked for the women to practice at least an hour with their blasters; I left Sunshine in charge while we men were gone.