Chapter 11

Dusty went to check on Beanie.

Somehow, he had collected a dozen helpers. Several of the men had seen him collecting the treetops that hadn’t been recycled for the roads. When asked what he was doing, he explained that he was putting them through the recycler to make things they would need for the new community and to accommodate their new guests.

Two of the men told him they were builders and they already had plans drawn up for a hall and other community buildings. They took Beanie to Whitney so he could see the plans. She still had access to the computer system in Rufus’s old camp.

The planning committee also wanted a large shower and toilet block attached thus the men were soon staking out the foundations of the hall. Other men had been assigned to help dig a foundation, and still others were on assignment to find gravel and sand.

Beanie was happily making frames to build the community hall, while other volunteers were knocking the frames together or collecting him the other natural resources he needed. Beanie would make the windows, doors, plumbing and electrical components next.

One of the men mentioned that there was a cave not far from the old camp that had some farming and engineering machines. Rupert had kept them because he had intended to build better accommodations; this didn’t happen because he had the people so drugged up that they couldn’t work.

Dusty decided to grab Pat and take several people to retrieve the equipment. They could load up the troop carrier too and bring it back. They had a reasonable storage area in the Striker so even if they only got the machines to help get the buildings started it would move things along.

She knew that she and the other mages could erect the buildings a lot faster but she felt that the people wanted to take charge of their lives. It would be better if they supported the colonists’ endeavours and only helped where the people didn’t have the means to do it themselves.

Dusty headed back to the camping area and found ten people busy with a couple of computers and several large drawings, which they had printed out. She stopped to admire the Flag. It was Black on the half that was tied to the ropes and the trunk of the massive tree, and it was white on the other half that flapped lazily in the light breeze.

Horizontally, about a third from the bottom was a design that looked like a twisted rope, half blue and half red. A forearm wearing a silver vambrace rose above the rope. The bare hand held a broken spear. In the bottom third, printed in an old script, was the word, Carmichael. Curving over the top of the hand was the motto, ‘Tout Jour Prest’.

Dusty was quite impressed with the flag considering they had whipped it up while she had walked to where the Striker was parked and then talked to the prisoners. She turned her head when Whitney stopped beside her and said, “I got out voted.”

Dusty chuckled, “I didn’t even get voted in. Bloody Lee has made me the hereditary owner of McGee County. What the hell am I going to do with a continent?”

Whitney shrugged and then grinned at Dusty, “In your case, whatever the hell you want to do with it. You are a Mage, are you truly going to want to run around the galaxy playing cops and robbers for the next three hundred years or more? It will make a great base for you, James and your families.”

“I’m only twenty-four, it’s hard to plan for a hundred years when you’re my age,” Dusty replied with a big grin.

“Well, I can appreciate that. Even so, you now have a place to call your own. I suspect Empress Lee has plans for you. I also think that once word gets out that a couple of High Mages own a continent on this planet, it will make many people who are thinking of settling here for nefarious purposes think twice.”

“It’s probably Lee’s way of making sure we are protected. I for one have no problem with her solution and once the others here know, I doubt you will get any flak from them either. If anything those still thinking of leaving just might change their minds. We have all heard the stories of how life is a lot better with a few mages around.”

Dusty replied, “Well, we do have to go to Terra to investigate a few other crimes. I was thinking that we might claim the gunship and find a couple of people we can trust to take the prisoners back to Earth. It will be a bit crowded on the ship but if we put a cube with the essentials in it, it shouldn’t be too bad.”

“You could even build the cells in the cube or just partition off an area and leave them in it for the two-week trip,” suggested Whitney.

“Hum, you have given me an idea. By the way, the shuttle is due in about ten minutes. Are you ready for them?” Dusty asked.

“Yes, the committee is printing the Charter so our guests know we are abiding by it. Bindy helped us send messages via the satellites to Earth and Terra about our claim, who survived if people are looking for family and the pirates’ arrest. It should beat whoever is going back to Earth.”

“Bindy’s vambrace, Jax, said that the satellites can relay the messages in a couple of hours and they will even send the new maps to all of the beacons in this system. They will then inform any ships that are passing our way that we are here,” Whitney informed Dusty.

“And that James and I own the other continent,” Dusty added. “I wonder how many will stop just for a sticky-beak?”

“I think you may be surprised. Every ship that Rupert boarded had problems. While we may just get the sick or unwanted people to start with, once we get better established we will get new colonists too. We already have a basic town layout. We hope Rupert doesn’t mind but we have simply modified his plan to suit the compound you built.”

“Lucy Chi is an architect and Bobby Brown a town planner. Rupert had them working on the plans since he found out what they did. Most of the people in the current committee were in his original planning group before we had the crackdown. They all got back together after you left and went to work. Things are seriously happening around here.”

“Good, we don’t plan to interfere, this is your home. As long as you put up a set of barracks and some offices for the UNSEC Police, I’m sure they will not interfere with much either. I suggest you put them over near the landing field, that way they can take over monitoring of the traffic and guests,” Dusty suggested.

“Yes, that’s a good idea; I’ll go talk to the planning committee. Well, have fun with your idea, Dusty,” Whitney said. She gave Dusty a quick hug and hurried off.

Dusty looked up to see the freighter coming down.

Dusty blinked to the freighter once it settled on the ground.

She waited for the ramp to lower and saw that Aaron and Que were in the hold with two of the yellow cubes. “How did it go?” Dusty asked.

“Very orderly, we treated the sickest first and then loaded eight of their groups of orphans with their guardians and the sickest into the cubes. The kids were very excited to be getting off the ship but they did whatever we asked. Shall we let them loose?”

Dusty grinned, “Why not. It’s a little bit of a walk to the others but I don’t think they will mind. Did you remind them the gravity is a bit lighter here?”

“Yeah, they should have worked that by now too,” grinned Aaron. He then went and opened one of the cubes, while Que opened the other. She went in to check on her sickest patients and let the others out. Aaron just hollered through the doorway, “We’re here if you want out, kids.”

Dusty stepped aside to watch the kids leave the cubes. They marched in their groups until they got outside and then just stopped. They were all looking around at the giant trees that hung over the three-metre-high fences and the compound itself.

She then heard one of the girls say, “Wow, this is going to be a nice home. I like the lighter gravity and big trees. The air is so fresh.”

“People, we have to head that way,” one of the guardians said and got them moving again.

Dusty chuckled, as the lines got scraggly the further they proceeded. The teenagers were more interested in the surroundings that following their guardians. They were all excited to be on land and Dusty had a feeling they were not going to be happy to get back on the ship once they were all well again and the ship had been sanitised.

The SWA Alliance might not be happy with her if she poached their teenagers but she was sure they could find plenty more people to come now that settlement ships were moving again. All in all, did it matter if they settled here rather than Terra since the Alliance had wanted to go to Harmony originally? They were going to be governed by the same rules and here no slavers were trying to steal the kids.

James came up behind her and put his arms around her, “You might have to ask the Alliance to send us some people like them for your continent.”

“You mean ours don’t you?” she replied as she wrapped her arms over his.

“Nah, you have always been the boss of me, my love. I’m just the concubine,” he replied.

Dusty laughed and rubbed against him knowing full well how he would react.

Rupert was pacing up and down in his cell pondering how he had lost it all and how he was going to get it back.

He looked up when he realised a woman was standing on the other side of the cell. “Taisia, my love, how are you?” he asked with a big smile. “You look very beautiful today. How is our baby?”

“My son is well, no thanks to you. The mages have removed the Napper from my system and fixed him so he will be strong and healthy when he is born. By the way, he is not your son,” she sneered at him. “Que, one of the MPs, has done genetic testing of our babies and us all. None of us women carries your seed,” she told him with a touch of malice and satisfaction in her voice.

Rupert shook his head in denial, “You lie, I know that you, Manny and Gail carry my children.” He then swore when he was buzzed but it was not as bad as before.