Chapter 24: Announcements

My concubines laughed and gave me a hug before Bethany and Tina dragged Meiko away for a whispered conversation. I turned back to Donna and Lindsay. "I hope you are feeling happier now," I said to Lindsay. "Donna keeps telling me she loves you unconditionally."

Lindsay smiled and leaned down to put her arms around Donna's neck. Lindsay was already the tallest of the female concubines, but the three-inch heels she was wearing made her nearly a foot taller than her mistress. "Oh yes!" she enthused. "I guess I never explained it well to Donna, but Tina caught me at the school one day and helped me out. In high school, I acted a bit like Tina used to. I spent time on my back as men used me for sex, but I never felt a connection. One of them talked me into modeling, but it was Donna who discovered me at a little fashion contest in Arizona. She was such a surprise though. Although she'd spend hours helping me look my best and getting me to shoots, she never made a pass or treated me as anything less than a person. I'm not very smart, but it was still a surprise that she never talked down to me."

She took a breath and I looked at both of them. "So neither of you was..."

Donna laughed. "Nope. And I guess technically we still aren't. Jacques gets plenty of sex from both of us, and I do treat him with respect, but even he finally started pushing me into Lindsay's arms every night. He said that while he would love to wake up with us both clutching him, he can see that Lindsay and I are lifemates with a connection he doesn't want to harm. Its funny, but I love him more now, for showing that care for us."

Lindsay laughed and smiled. "And he is damn good in bed. So it's worked out well for all of us."

Jacques must have realized we were talking about him because he looked up and waved. "Don't believe a word of it," he shouted. "At night they tie me up and spend hours in a passionate sixty-nine embrace while I'm forced to lay there and watch." He winked as Lindsay shook her fist at him.

Giggling from my concubines brought my attention back to them, but before I could walk over to where they had clustered the other sponsors started to arrive and I found myself in a whispered discussion with Yvette while the last sponsors filed in.

Jack was the last to take a seat and was counting chairs as he did so. He noticed that all the seats were filled and called out. "What happened? I'm guessing two of us are in the command post, but even with James and Yvette standing we are missing a person."

I held up a hand. "Some of you might already know, but I guess we can start with that news. Tasha is dead. She must have used the battle passage to exit and visit Dennis. While she was there one of Dennis' concubines snuck out and managed to get to our area. Dennis pursued and became angry when he was informed that he had forfeited his right to the girl. In his fury he threw Tasha against our outer door and shot her."

Jack seemed even more upset. "Why didn't you just give him his concubine back?"

"First, we didn't know that Tasha was with him. No one knew she had left our tunnels. Second, the girl was already nearly dead from the multiple beatings she had received. Right now she's in the medical bay and will be there for..."

Ed saved me. "She's going to require a full day in the pods, although we are going to do it in four hour sections. Right now the goal is to stabilize her and make her a bit more comfortable. Honestly, without the medical treatment, it's likely she would have died within the next three days, she had lots of internal bleeding and injuries."

I could see the gathered sponsors wince as Ed gave a summary of the damage Kitty had received and waited for any murmurs to end before continuing. "Thank you, Ed. Meanwhile, I'm sure you all heard that a Sa'arm ship visited the system yesterday. It appears to have been a courier or scout and vanished back in the direction it came from, so now we need to prepare for more visitors. We already have battle armor being produced for Fred, Xavier and Brad and myself. This will provide people for using the lasers, but we will need to start drilling on them. Also Louis is producing a plan to scatter the resupply base and conceal it better. Most of the pieces should be moving shortly, although we may have to reconstitute the base in the future. Finally, we did hear from the navy, but it's not the best of news. Officially this base was not scheduled to be operational for another three months, and the commander I spoke with did not promise any immediate response. We might have to hold out for a while."

The murmuring started up again, but Gina surprised me by crying out. "I have to admit its not great news, but we can be prepared. Any chance of warning the rest of the colony?"

Yvette shrugged. "We can send them a message, but most will ignore it. They appear to be fighting a cold war right now, mostly watching each other's moves and trying to terrorize the last of the neutral holdouts into taking a side."

"How many of them are left?" Timothy asked.

The AI was silent and I finally had to answer. "We don't know. The AI reported twelve known fatalities shortly before the fight at the entrance where we killed four of Manuel's followers. That would leave at most sixty-four sponsors out there. From the latest information, I believe that number still holds. However, it's hard to say as both Manuel and Ruth have captured some of the neutral sponsors and forced them to move in with them. As many as nine formerly neutral sponsors are now under either Ruth's or Manuel's control."

The murmur started up again, but stopped quickly when I held my hand up. "That's about all for now. I should mention that Eric's and Tasha's former concubines now reside in a dorm that is part of the hydroponics pod. For now its best if Eric's concubines stay together, so please do not attempt to take one. Theoretically you can trade in your current concubines, but I personally would like to remind you that concubines are humans and deserve respect. If you are going to trade one in, make it for the right reasons."