Chapter 495

The Retreat

Diana hung up the phone, having just finished a last minute update to one of her orders. She was going over the coming trip in her mind while sitting at Jeff’s desk in his main office when the door burst open and Selina, red-faced, rushed in.

“You were going to 2214 without me,” she accused.

“Well now, Baby...” Diana almost stuttered, but even as her words stumbled out, she knew she was in trouble. “Baby, 2214 is a prison planet. There are dangers...”

“Morales would not harm me,” the child interrupted to say. “Did I not hear you say he is just a big wuss?”

“Selina, he did kill...”

“And they probably needed killing,” the seven-year-old repeated what she had heard the Prime say as she locked eyes with the Clan Queen. “I am going. Please! I shall make certain that I do not present a problem. Now, it is cold there, therefore I need to search my winter closet for appropriate clothing. Will we be spending the night?” Interrupting herself, she continued, “I shall pack with that possibility in mind.” Then, in almost the same breath, she rushed on. “This visit presents a unique learning opportunity for me. I have never experienced a cave, nor have I ever visited another planet, and, in addition, I am eagerly anticipating an interchange with the wolves. They clearly appear telepathic. What do you think?” Not giving Diana time to respond, Selina continued, “When is our departure scheduled?”

“Uh, four hours or so, I suppose. But...”

“I shall be ready,” the little tornado said before bolting out the door.

Diana sat for a second before a grin touched her face. “Oh, Jeff and the General are going to love this,” she muttered to herself.

When Dave returned from his trip to Winter Park, he stopped his pickup near the back door where Jeff stood waiting for him. “What’s in the boxes?” Jeff asked as Dave got out.

“Sorry, Jeff, I don’t have a clue. Diana gave me a list of stores that would have something waiting, and I hit the road. When I arrived at each of them, the boxes were on the loading dock with someone waiting to put them in the truck for me. All I had to do was sign for everything. If I had ordered the stuff, I would still be waiting for it. But Diana...”

Jeff let out a chuckle. “With as much as she buys, I suppose they were worried about losing her business should they piss her off by not having her order ready.”

“So, where does all this go?”

“The Ship,” Jeff said as they got into the truck, “but we need to stop by the inside garage door. I left the rifles, ammo and other equipment there, plus my travel bag.”

At the mention of the bag, Dave frowned a question, and Jeff went on with a grin, “Diana, remember? I have long since learned that I can’t predict her, so I’m going prepared. She also said she and her sister-wives would bring the rest of the things, whatever that means.”

“And all this is going to the prison planet?” Dave asked a moment later as they loaded the rifles, ammo and other gear into the pickup.

“Yep.”

Dave snapped a quick look at the Prime, but didn’t say anything.

After putting both hand trucks on the tailgate, they got in the pickup again. Jeff, after glancing at the mound of things in the back, said, “I told Di to keep it down, but judging from the number of boxes back there, I don’t think she paid a lot of attention.” Then with a chuckle, “Whitworth is going to shit when he sees all this. I imagine he’s expecting her to bring a few household items instead of the infamous bottle of wine. Hell, I can’t wait to see his face.”

Dave chuckled as he dropped the truck into gear while glancing over at his boss. “If I were you, I’d be careful about mentioning how much Diana brought. Notice how the pickup is squatting in the rear after we loaded all that ammo? And as far as the General goes, I’m going to be long gone before he sees all that.”

“Chicken,” Jeff teased.

“To use a favorite expression from someone I know – ‘damned straight’.”

“Well,” Jeff responded, “Conners requested that the General come talk to her, and ... things seemed to escalate after Di invited herself along.” Then with a sigh, “Women...”

There was a moment of silence before Jeff heard something and stared hard at Dave. “That better not be a snigger I just heard. Remember, I can always tell Diana to tell Evie that I’ll need some help with the boxes when we get to 2214. Guess who she’ll volunteer.”

Instead of shutting Dave up, he snorted before bursting out laughing. “Ain’t gonna happen, Boss.”

“Well,” Jeff said with a sigh. “At least Di only had a few hours to prepare; otherwise, we would have needed a moving van.”

At the fake building, the two began unloading the truck, first with the rifles, ammo, cleaning supplies and Jeff’s overnight case. That inside Ship, they began with Diana’s boxes. Jeff, grunting as he grabbed one of the sealed boxes, said, “Damn, what did she order, anyway?”

“Search me?” Dave said as he slid the next box onto the second hand truck,” but some of the boxes are darn sure heavier than I expected them to be.

The Prime had already informed Ship that they were going to the base and then via portal to the prison planet. “House warming gifts,” he told her as he and Dave began bringing in Diana’s store order. Ship meshed her mind with his, learning more in seconds and in much more detail than he could tell her verbally in a much longer period of time.

“Mr. Morales and Ms. Conners should be pleased,” Ship commented mentally.

“Hope so,” Jeff returned aloud.

Just as the two had finished unloading the pickup, Di, Arlene, Kayla and Selina came through the hatch, all of them with their arms full. Selina was wearing a big backpack and carrying a small crossbow. “We brought two Escalades full of packages,” Diana said to a stunned Jeff.

Jeff and Dave passed a glance, but both decided not to comment. Instead, they turned and hurried to unload the Escalades.

Outside a moment later, “Shit,” the Prime grumbled as he saw that the SUVs seemed to be still fully loaded even after the women and Selina had brought in their loads.

Dave stood waiting as Jeff raised the rear hatch on one of the Escalades. “Selina...” he started. “Uh, I mean, she has a crossbow, but there’s no way she can cock it.”

“Wrong,” Jeff said as he grabbed a bundle, pulled it out of the SUV and handed it to Dave before reaching in to get another one. “She can fire a normal-sized pistol by supporting it with TK.” Then, as he handed Dave another bundle, he continued, “I suppose that watching the vids must have started her thinking about a crossbow. I’ve learned the hard way that assuming she can’t do something usually comes back to bite me in the ass. If she’s carrying a crossbow, chances are that not only can she fire and cock the thing, but with her TK, she can probably shoot it as accurately as most adults.”

“So, you’re going to let her go? I mean...” But Dave stopped when he realized who he was talking about. Instead, he said, “When she’s sixteen, to understate, I fully believe you’re going to be in for one hell of an experience.”

“Everybody is marrying me off,” the Prime grumbled as he shouldered one bag, and carrying another, followed a laden Dave toward Ship.

The women, led by Selina, came hurrying out to help bring in the boxes and packages. Dave, fighting back a snigger, made every trip Jeff and the women did until the vehicles were unloaded. Putting down his last load, a chuckling Dave bid his hasty goodbyes and escaped before the General arrived.

As their departure time neared, Whitworth stepped through the hatch carrying a military backpack. Jeff cringed as he saw Whitworth’s eyebrows go up when he realized what was going with them and who. Probably astonishing everyone, Diana included, Whitworth chuckled when he saw Selina, but amazingly, didn’t say anything about the amount of goods or the seven-year-old. Instead, he leaned to hug the child and whisper something into her ear.

Selina grinned and kissed him on the cheek.

Standing back up, Whitworth hesitated only a second before asking matter-of-factly, “Everyone ready?”

Jeff had previously given Ship his mental commands. The words were barely out of the General’s mouth, when the wall turned into a viewscreen to show that they were already high over the Retreat. A second later, they translated to appear above the base, leaving behind a rolling boom over Matthews Mountain. The inertialess drive kicked in again and they were almost instantly easing through the giant doors into the underground hanger.

Followed by most of the others, a grinning Whitworth trudged down the ramp when several troopers came hurrying up with big carts, obviously ready for whatever they were to move to the portal chamber.

A smaller cart pulled up with a stack of still-hot boxes of pizza sitting beside the operator.

Diana had remained inside standing guard over a large box. “This is very fragile,” she told a trooper as he reached for it.

“Yes, Ma’am,” he responded as he handled the box with care, and a moment later, also told the driver of the cart what the Clan Queen had said.

As soon as everything was loaded, other carts pulled to a stop by the group. The General and Colonel swung aboard the first cart and the women and Selina boarded the second one. “Ready, Ladies?” the trooper asked. At Diana’s nod, they were off.

Everyone was dressed for cold weather, Jeff having warned his women that the temperature on 2214 would be just above zero degrees Fahrenheit. Even he wore a light jacket.

The portal was considerably larger now than the last time Jeff had used it with his team, the scientists having finally overcome much of the size limitation. Even so, it had required some careful stacking of the bulky boxes and bags, now covered with a tarp, before everything and everyone fit inside the chamber. The Matthews all stood waiting as the General spoke with the lead portal scientist. The two shook hands before the General stepped into the chamber followed by two armed and armored troopers. Once inside, the troopers activated their camouflage.

Whitworth motioned to the portal commander. The overhead lighting blinked on and off, and a siren blasted for a few seconds followed by: “STAND CLEAR! STAND CLEAR! PORTAL ACTIVATION IN TEN ... NINE... “

Jeff’s wives pressed against him with Selina in the middle, and even as they tensed, colors beyond imagining swirled about them. For a millisecond, their bodies seemed to turn inside out before they were suddenly standing on hard-packed snow, an icy wind announcing it was definitely winter. Most swallowed as their ears popped from the slight difference in air pressure.

There were mutterings and exclamations as well as the sound of zippers closing.

“Oh, my,” Diana said, holding Selina close as they looked around them, everyone’s breath puffing white in front of his or her mouth.

“This is effervescent!” Selina exclaimed as she moved a couple of steps away from the others while trying to look everywhere at once; although, she held her crossbow ready.

The General, a lot more nervous than he had expected to be, scanned the area, crossbow in hand. “This thing feels damned inadequate,” he grumbled. “You can get to those balls on your belt in a hurry, right, Colonel? Shit,” he continued without waiting for Jeff to answer, “the top of the hill where the snow leopard attacked Jasmine and Morales seems a lot closer than it appeared on the vids. How in the hell did they manage to kill that thing before it got to them?” Then with a nervous sigh, “I confess that I’m now even more impressed with their shooting abilities.”

“Stay close to us,” Diana cautioned Selina.

Selina was obviously trying to take in everything, but she didn’t move any farther away from the group.

Embarrassed that he had shown signs of being nervous, Whitworth continued, “Well, shall we go knock on their door?”

Jeff, holding the stack of pizza boxes, let out a chuckle. “With what I’ve seen of those wolves, I doubt we’ll have to.”

The words were barely out of his mouth when Morales came out the entranceway, crossbow in hand. But it wasn’t Morales that everyone focused on. The wolves, ignoring the visitors, and at what must have been an unheard command from their master, separated, trotted a distance away and began circling the area, each going in different directions.

Morales stepped to the side and Jasmine moved up beside him. “Welcome to our home,” she called out while walking past Morales and heading toward Diana, even as the Clan Queen trudged forward on the packed snow to meet the anthropologist halfway.

“We finally meet,” Diana said as she put out both her hands. Jasmine had already dropped her crossbow to hang down her back by its lanyard as she reached to clasp Diana’s hands for a moment.

Morales had held back, but quickly caught up. As he stopped beside Jasmine, she put an arm around him, prompting him to do the same to her.

The General, having lost his grand entrance, if, indeed, he had planned one, stepped up to shake hands with his prisoner, both men obviously ill at ease. Whitworth turned to introduce everyone, and by the time he was done, the tension had lessened somewhat.

“Looks like we have someone that wasn’t on the picture I received, but, Little Lady, you are certainly welcome, although there isn’t anyone your age to play with,” Jasmine said, inserting her foot firmly into her mouth as she reached to take Selina’s free hand.

Selina brightened. “If you are willing, I am extremely interested in your analysis of the mental interchanges between Lobo and Lila, Mr. Morales and yourself. Of course, I am equally interested in certain aspects of the column area. Perhaps we will have time to discuss, in depth, facets of both, and ... any possible interconnections that you might have noted?”