Chapter 10

I took Stacey’s hand and kissed it. “Stacey, I don’t get upset easily, and Renee is a very good judge of what will upset me. If she says I won’t be upset, believe her,” I tried soothing her. I could see that my attempt wasn’t working so we got into a shuttle and headed to wherever her project was.

I was stunned. The formerly almost barren desert floor below us was no longer barren. In two and a half days, she had transformed large parts of it into a ranch and a farm. “Wow, I’m impressed,” I commented. She smiled and relaxed noticeably.

“I was afraid you’d be upset at how much money I spent,” she told me.

“Stacey, money means almost nothing to me. Your happiness and the safety and happiness of the other girls are what matters to me. So, tell me what you did,” I asked.

Basically, she had worked her ass off for the last seventy-two hours. She located a dairy in California that had been trying to liquidate for over a year. They were near a town that wanted to expand and become a city. Unfortunately, current UN regulations forbade building on agricultural land. The only way they could expand the city would be to move the dairy and all the other farms in the area, and replace the topsoil where they intended to expand down to at least twenty feet deep. The developers were obviously sure they would make a ton of money because they offered to pay two thirds of the cost to replace the topsoil. All they wanted was to have enough topsoil left to put a two-foot layer over ten percent of the area for landscaping.

Stacey was upset because it was a great deal, but all we had to trade was sand, and she knew they couldn’t build on sand. She called her dad and explained the situation. He told her that she was in the best position she could hope for. People would pay a premium for sand because it was getting more and more difficult to acquire. All she had to do was deliver the sand to someone who needed it in exchange for an equivalent amount of non-agricultural soil and deliver that soil to the town to replace the agricultural soil she would deliver to our place. In addition to swapping the sand, the people buying the sand would pay twenty-five percent more than the non-agricultural soil would have cost us. She estimated that a quarter of our unused land was sand. She also found a commercial buyer for the gypsum sand that blew back and forth across parts of the base, getting even more for that than for the regular sand.

Unfortunately, or so she thought, Renee had advised her against leasing soil moving freighters and told her to buy new ones. It meant she spent over half a billion Planetary Dollars for ten new soil movers and two trenchers to fill them. She was freaking out at the cost. She knew how much the interest on equipment purchases ate into her dad’s profit every year. I hugged her and told her it was fine, that Renee paid cash for everything and there would be no interest charges. It took over a minute to get her mouth to close after that announcement.

“So you’re not upset?” she finally asked.

“Heck no, I think you did a great job, much better than I could have. I would probably still be trying to figure out how to grow everything in the sand,” I admitted. She giggled at that mental picture and decided to finish the tour.

She had the construction androids build a huge dairy barn and building for a dairy. The agricultural androids built fencing, installed underground pipes for water for the livestock and for irrigation. They also set up areas to compost manure. Most of the equipment from the purchased dairy was fairly new and she used it, including the grain silos, silage towers, and equipment for pasteurizing and bottling the milk, additionally buying only what she felt needed to be replaced. She also built a section onto the bottling plant to make butter, yogurt, sour cream, cottage cheese, and cheese. Since she bought the entire dairy, there was no surcharge on buying so many cows at once.

The UN had decreed cattle to be a source of air pollution (methane from cow farts) over two centuries ago and limited the number that could be sold for beef every year. People were limited to sixteen ounces of beef a week at a reasonable price, paying exorbitant prices for more. Once agricultural terraforming shields were developed, the methane was filtered out, collected, and used. There had been pressure on the UN to remove the limits, but they then decreed that it took too much land to raise cattle, and the land could be better used to produce food for people instead of forage for cows. Personally, I think it was the Hindu lobby pushing to keep limits on slaughtering cattle since there was already plenty of food available for everyone. Any problems with getting enough food were caused by delivery issues.

Buying cattle for beef was trickier. Ranchers were limited to selling five cattle a day to any one buyer and had to pay a tax equal to half the selling price for each one they sold above that. While that slowed down the number of cattle sold, the cattle didn’t pay much attention to the law and continued to breed. Ranchers frequently had to kill calves to keep the size of their herd down. Stacey bargained with a hundred small ranchers and purchased thirty-five cattle from each. The agreement was drawn up so that five cattle were purchased each day for seven consecutive days.

She purchased a small freighter designed to haul livestock and had six of the agricultural androids take it to each of the hundred ranches every day to collect the five cattle and then bring them here. She had to take seventeen steers and eighteen cows from each rancher, roughly a fifty-fifty mix. The steers would be slaughtered and eaten; the cows would be bred. Okay, so we had to get a few bulls, too. The first crop she planted was alfalfa, for grazing. She purchased quite a load of hay to keep them fed until then. I told her I would like to triple the size of the cattle herd as I had something in mind in the near future. We flew over first the small, temporary slaughterhouse, and then the huge slaughterhouse and meat packing plant she was building. In the future, different sections would be used to prepare cattle, hogs, sheep, turkeys, and chickens. We continued on to the chicken ranch. She had purchased those outright near the same town where she bought the dairy. Half of the chickens were for egg production and half were for meat.

I was dumbfounded to see so much new construction and several completed facilities. Only androids could have accomplished it. There was a turkey farm, as well as pigs and sheep. Next, she guided me to an area where the sand was currently being replaced. Stacey talked excitedly about how the soil movers were able to carry half again as much and could travel twice as fast since Katie did the upgrades to them. I watched as one dropped down and attached itself to some sort of scoop device. Then, it simply moved forward, leaving a ten-foot deep and fifty-foot wide trench in its wake. Minutes later, it stopped and unhooked from the scoop, and I watched two smaller shuttles detach from the soil hauler before it took off.

Stacey explained how any living creatures that were scooped up ended up in one of the shuttles. There, it was kept in stasis until it could be released outside of our cloaked area. Any vegetation was ground up and added to the compost. She already had the androids do a thorough study of the area before tearing it up to make sure there were no endangered plant or animal species involved. The venomous snakes and scorpions were saved and taken to yet another temporary facility. There, androids milked them for their venom. With my permission, she wanted to build a huge, world-class facility and bring in thousands more snakes, spiders, and scorpions from around the world to use for making anti-venom.

She planned to name it the Miller Venom Lab. This was what she had actually gone to school for. She finished college and had just finished her two-year residency in veterinary medicine, specializing in reptiles. She chose her dual majors of veterinary medicine and business so she would be able to run the business when she finally got it built. Business was one of the rare instances when the government would allow a dual major. She grew up on a farm, but her sister almost died from a snakebite because there was always a shortage of anti-venom. I gave my blessing, noting that the facility would be built in a rocky area we couldn’t use for agriculture. I did suggest working with Renee to bring in an expert of some sort to help design the facility. She laughed, telling me that she’d been designing the facility of her dreams for almost ten years now. One of the Vets at school (yes, AIT had a medical and a veterinary school) had reviewed her plans last year when he heard what she hoped to do. He had made some minor changes but found the plans to be sound overall and promised to give any recommendations he could to help her.

I called and ordered another four dozen construction androids, feeling that the venom facility, shuttle dealership, and overall agricultural construction would require the extra help. Hesitantly Stacey agreed that we would need more agricultural androids for a project this big, probably another forty-eight now and another forty-eight in a couple of weeks. I went ahead and ordered them all now hoping it would make the jobs go faster. I also ordered (actually, I gave her my com unit and had her order them) several shuttles full of plumbing and irrigation supplies and equipment and a dozen additional tractors of different kinds. She didn’t call them tractors. She used the fancy names. I guess the guy she was talking to knew what she wanted, and he promised delivery to our rooftop tomorrow.

I was shocked to discover that she planned to turn every potentially arable acre of the base into farmland. She estimated we would end up with around six or seven million acres producing. We would easily be able to grow fruit and vegetables out of season using only ten percent of the spare power from the old, deserted Holloman Air Base which currently used only five percent of its generating capacity to maintain the base. She would create agricultural terraforming shields that could maintain temperatures below freezing and block enough of the sun’s rays in the middle of the summer in the desert to duplicate winter conditions.

The freezing temperature was necessary for the fruit trees in order to produce a crop the following spring. Rotating one twelfth of our orchards each month into conditions simulating different seasons allowed us to have a crop of every fruit coming ripe each month. The rest of the areas would be maintained at the optimum temperature and light conditions to grow crops all year. I gave her the go-ahead, telling her again that she was doing an excellent job and a much better job than I would have done. She giggled again thinking about me trying to grow crops in the sand and alkaline soil here.

She had discovered that I used one of the lakes on the estate for bass fishing. She enlarged it, carefully preserving the existing life in the lake with a shield that pushed them out of the way before the scoops came through. The lake was now ten times the original size, and she had imported more reeds from overgrown spots along the Rio Grande. Before starting, she had scanned the lake, and then re-stocked it proportionally. The types, quantities, and sizes of fish and everything else had been matched as exactly as physically possible. She had even left my favorite point for fishing intact. A second, larger lake on the base had been expanded and deepened. Power from Holloman was now aerating the water and cooling it to a constant sixty degrees. Work was progressing on a large hatchery and acres of raceways near the lake for raising trout fingerlings to a size where they could survive and thrive in the lake. She explained that trout was a favorite among people that ate fresh-water fish. She had also taken an area that had several smaller lakes and made them larger and shallower for raising catfish, another commercial favorite.

I asked about an area that looked like it already had an orchard of full-grown trees. The trees came from the same town as the dairy. We now had dozens of acres of mature trees and grape vineyards. They used force fields to lift out large sections of an orchard down to thirty feet deep to save most of the roots. Most of the trees will bear fruit this summer. She had also contracted with a grower in Costa Rica for banana trees, a grower in Hawaii for pineapple plants, and several growers along the central California coast for berries of all types. She estimated that, by the end of the year, we could be growing seventy-five to ninety percent of the food we ate and could trade for the rest or buy it with what we made selling off the excess we produced. She estimated that we could easily feed a million people with what we could eventually produce here using high yield techniques, year-round terraforming shields, and agricultural androids.

I asked her if she could recommend anyone to take over running the farm (she winced at that word) when she started with the venom lab. As an afterthought, I told her that part of the job of whoever took over from her would be to supervise leasing the soil movers when we were done. We would obviously be able to command top dollar since they could carry so much more on each load and could finish faster, which would eventually more than pay back the cost of buying them. She promised to find someone capable before then.

I also told her that I would build and equip the venom lab and then it was her baby, the Stacey Knauer Venom Lab. It would be my gift to her and to the world. The only condition was that she couldn’t tell anyone that I built it. It was hers and hers alone. Every cent she made was hers to do with as she pleased. She tried telling me that it was too much when she finally stopped crying. I reminded her that she was one of my women and as such, it was my right to spoil her outlandishly. She tried to jump my bones in the shuttle, but I told her she had to get a green necklace from my wives, first, and then I would be happy to oblige her.

“So, now you need to decide what you want as a thank you gift for all the hard work you’ve done,” I told her.

“But ... the lab...,” she sputtered.

“No, the lab is my way of spoiling you. I want to do something just as a thank-you for everything.”

Just before we landed, she finally offered two suggestions. The girls were talking about wanting a sports field nearby so they could play. Either that or find a way to help her dad out. Evidently, the interest payments were eating deeply into any profit the farm made.

“You asked your dad for business advice, didn’t you?” I asked.

“Yeah,” she answered, wondering where this was going.

“Did you discuss a consultation fee with him beforehand?”

“No, he’s my dad. I just asked him for advice,” she countered.

“And that advice saved me over five hundred million dollars?” I asked.

“Yeah,” she answered cautiously.

“Well, since standard consulting fees run from five to ten percent of what is saved, I guess I owe him fifty million then,” I said calmly.

“Fifty...” she gasped and quit. “Can I borrow your com unit?” she asked. I handed it to her, and she took it in her shaking hands and called Vonna.

“Hi, Vonna, this is Stacey Knauer ... yeah, that Stacey. I need to ask a favor. Mike and I just finished a tour of the agricultural improvements, and I was wondering if I could get your permission to throw him on the floor of the shuttle and rape him.” She handed me back my com unit, grinning evilly, and proceeded to open the storage compartment and pull out the bedding the girls had put into each of the ten passenger shuttles ... just in case.

Vonna confirmed that Stacey had her permission before giggling, “Good luck,” before hanging up.

Stacey wasn’t shy and was undressed and undressing me before Vonna said goodbye. Vonna, Jenna, Helga, and Danielle eventually came out to the shuttle and reminded us that dinner was in a few minutes. Danielle cleaned Stacey up and Vonna did the honors for me.

Once again, the table was set formally, and Mrs. Chisholm flitted around the dining room making corrections where she saw they were needed. I explained to everyone the job Stacey had done, also recognizing Bree and Katie for their work in the lab, and Renee and Tara in the office. Then I told the girls that Stacey had suggested sports fields be built and asked what type they wanted. I should have known better that to ask women what they wanted. By the time they were done, I needed fields for soccer and baseball, courts for basketball and tennis, and a nine-hole golf course. “Good thing I ordered extra agricultural androids,” I teased Stacey.

I told James to have the construction and agricultural androids work together and build two soccer fields, one with a short grass track around it and one with a synthetic track around it. They also needed to build four baseball fields, four indoor hardwood floored basketball courts, four synthetic surface basketball courts, eight tennis courts, eight enclosed handball courts, and the golf course. I gave him a rough diagram of how I wanted them laid out and told him to dig up most of the lawn out front and then put down a concrete pad for the shuttles that was closer to the house than the old runway. I suggested searching the area around the town Stacey was digging up for appropriate sod for the baseball fields and they might get lucky and find some grass appropriate for parts of the golf course. I was sure that we’d have to purchase the specialty grass for the greens, and I told Renee to order whatever hardware we needed for goals, backstops, hoops and backboards, etc.

Renee commented that she and Beverly were going to need a couple more girls in the office to help with the workload. I told her to use as much help as she wanted, and if she needed to hire someone from outside with skills we didn’t have available to let them work from the office she had set up at my place. I also commented that with everything I had going on I was probably going to need help keeping track of everything. I’d actually been thinking of using one of the androids. I could tell him what I wanted and he could tell James who was basically in charge of all android assignments. “I can think of a couple of good choices who would be thrilled to do it,” Renee commented.

“Who?” I asked after the slight delay that it took for me to realize she was talking about people and not androids.

“Penny and Danielle would both do a great job, and both would love to be with you all day,” she said, grinning. Penny made no effort to hide how she felt about me from anyone, and Anna told me I might as well get used to having her around. Danielle was much happier any time she was on her leash, and I had the other end of it.

It sounded good so I talked with Anna first to make sure it was okay with her. Anna just gave me an exasperated look. “Mike, you don’t need to ask my permission. You’re not capable of doing anything to Penny that would upset me, and she’s old enough to start making her own decisions,” she said quietly.

That having been said I pulled the two girls into Renee’s office and told them what I wanted. Both girls were excited about the prospect, just like Renee said they would be. I told them in no uncertain terms that they would hear a lot of things that were top secret, and that anything they heard was never to be repeated to anyone else. If they discussed it with me later, they needed to be absolutely sure there was nobody around able to overhear us. Both women promised and I gave each of them a com unit after I programmed the numbers from mine into theirs. I also gave them each their own pocket computer and gave them access to the buildings except the one we were going to use for the UN prisoners when we rescued them. I also gave each of them an extra set for when I needed one to give to someone, and got a set for Stacey.

“Ladies, we have to leave in about thirty minutes for a business meeting. Penney, you should wear something professional looking unless you want to have wild sex with total strangers this evening. If you do, wear something sexy.

Penny was shaking her head. “No, only with you,” she said soberly.

I hugged her. “Penny, if that’s what you want, I’m honored. I just want you to know that I don’t think it’s fair for me to be able to have sex with so many different women while you only have me. I won’t be upset if you change your mind. After all, even my wives are allowed to have sex with anyone they want.”

“I know, I just ... don’t want to,” she said.

“That’s fine Penny. I’m not trying to make you do it. I just wanted to make sure you know I won’t be upset.”

“I already know that,” she said as she hugged me tightly.

“Okay, first job. Make sure Renee and Kelsey are ready to go to the meeting and stay with them. Tell Kelsey to wear something professional and very un-sexy. We’ll meet you at the shuttle. Oh, tell Renee she can’t wear any underwear and to wear her leash and something sexy for Mr. Sugiyama.” Penny’s eyes bugged out, but she just smiled and left to relay my messages.

“Same outfit for you, lover, no underwear and wear something sexy. There will be lots of businessmen there for you to service,” I told Danielle. I saw her shudder in anticipation. “Meet me at the shuttle by 5:30,” I said as I left.

My next stop was in the back of the estate building. Kateryna was sitting quietly on her bed, apparently deep in thought. “You doing okay?” I asked. She nodded. “Bored?” She nodded again.

“I don’t know if this option is better or worse, but I’m going to a business meeting in a few minutes if you want to go. There will be several men there who would love to spend some time with you. Tonight is entirely optional. I won’t order you to go with us, but if you do, I promise that I will make you have sex with several different men.”

“I’ll go,” she answered quickly. “Even that is better than sitting here with nothing to do. Thank you for asking me, though,” she said, giving me a quick hug. I could see the gratitude in her eyes.

I took a good look at her naked body. She really was pretty. “Let’s go find my wife. I think her clothes will fit you,” I said, extending a hand to help her up. She was shocked when I took off the “traitor” collar. “That’s private. We don’t need to tell the whole world,” I explained.

As we passed my suite, I directed Kateryna to go in, take a quick shower, and put on perfume and light make-up, telling her that I’d be right back with Vonna to get her some clothes. Vonna was still in the dining area with her sister and Helga. “Just the women I wanted to see.” I said happily. “We’re leaving for the meeting in Kyoto in a few minutes. Kateryna’s in our room, but needs something sexy to wear. All she has are military outfits. Can she borrow something of yours?” I asked. All three women were ready to help, and once Kateryna was dressed to kill, or at least dressed to undress, I directed her towards the shuttle.

“Ladies, while we’re gone, I have a project for you” I told the three. “I have prepared a surprise for tomorrow, but I have to spoil it and tell you about it so that you’ll be ready.” They were hanging on every word, wondering what the surprise was. “You each need to pack an overnight bag. Take Vonna’s shuttle to Paris; you know the hotel and the suite number. Pack your wedding dresses and buy one for Helga somewhere between here and there. The wedding’s at ten a.m. our time and 5:00 local time. Helga’s family already has four shuttles to take them. Renee and I will meet you there in the morning. After I give Renee something special to wear during the ceremony, she’ll come down and get you. Afterwards, I reserved the same island for the day. Bring your own toys, ladies.”

I was wrapped up in a group hug and bounced up and down while they squealed. They finally calmed down enough that I could extricate myself.

Helga hugged me again. “I haven’t told you yet what a stud you are,” she laughed.

“You can show me tomorrow afternoon,” I teased.

“No, I’m serious,” she said. “Yesterday you came so many times before we made love and yet you still made me pregnant,” she said, the excitement evident in her voice.

Now I was excited, too. “Really?” I asked.

“Yes. You will be the proud papa of our baby boy,” she announced. “I wish to name him Josef after my father, but as my husband, the final decision is yours.”

“Josef sounds wonderful,” I told her as she beamed. “I will see you three tomorrow morning about 9:30 our time” I said as I kissed each of them and headed out to the shuttle. The four androids James had assigned to go with us as bodyguards met me in the last fifty feet before I got to the shuttle.

“What are you grinning about,” Renee teased as we climbed aboard.

“Helga is pregnant with baby Josef, and we’re getting married tomorrow morning at ten,” I said.

“What?” Renee squealed excitedly.

“Yup, her family, your parents, and my parents will be there. The girls are leaving for Paris shortly, and to get Helga a wedding dress. You will be wearing exactly the same thing you did last time. Exactly,” I informed her.

“I hope there are a lot of men there tonight. You just made me so fucking horny it’ll take at least a dozen of them to satisfy me,” she growled.

Kateryna knelt in front of me. “Mike, I know that I have no right to ask this, but I was wondering if you would make love to me before we get there. It’s been a couple years since I’ve been with a man and I hoped that the first time would be someone I cared about and admired,” she said nervously. I noticed she had acquired the necessary green necklace sometime today.

“It would be my honor, Kateryna,” I said. She stood and slipped the dress off her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor. Grateful, again, for the foresight of my wives, I got out the bedding and laid it out on the floor. It was a lot more crowded than it had been earlier with Stacey. The four ladies each sat on the lap of one of the androids to give us a little more room. I made the most of the little time we had, making sure Kateryna had one orgasm before entering her. She was enthusiastic, something that surprised me given the circumstances and how recently her life had turned to shit. Her second orgasm sent me over the edge, and I filled her pussy with my warm stickiness. After making sure Kateryna was okay with it, I had Renee do the honors and clean her up. God but I love watching her as my spend dribbles out of a woman’s sex and on to her waiting tongue.

I watched Kateryna’s breasts shimmy delightfully as she raised her arms above her head and let the dress slip down and cover her form. Every time I looked at her innocent face, I felt bad about her sentence. I motioned to her and pulled her into my lap. “I loved the show,” I whispered. “The one where your boobs jiggled when you put your dress on,” I teased, actually getting an appreciative smile. “Just remember that you are one of my women, and that I will always be here for you to help you get through this any way that I can,” I told her.

“Just hold me. I’d forgotten how good it feels,” she sighed.

“You’re welcome to sleep with me tonight if you want to be held,” I told her.

“Your wives won’t mind?” she asked hesitantly.

“I kicked them out. They’re in Paris tonight and we’re marrying Helga tomorrow morning,” I said.

“I think I’d like that” she sighed into my neck.

I contacted Mr. Sugiyama when we passed through the shielding over Kyoto and got the coordinates for our landing. I had expected a handful of attorneys for the meeting, but the entire roof of their main office was full of people, quite a turnout for three in the morning. Mr. Sugiyama was the first in line to greet us when we debarked, introducing me to each of the six members of their board of directors. They were obviously unimpressed when I introduced Renee and Kelsey, but I had expected that. Their culture was still not very accepting of women in business.

“Mr. Miller-san, we apologize. It appears that your trip may have been for naught. Kyoto Technology, the company that manufactures the engines for us was forced into bankruptcy today by an unknown company. Kyoto Technology invested heavily in the new facility and equipment to build the power supplies, anti-grav plates, and cloaking hardware. Sales have been so poor that they couldn’t pay back the loans that were due and an unknown company bought their loans and called them all due today since they were in default,” he explained.

I asked if there was a place we could talk privately. I smelled a Russian Mafia rat here, but didn’t tell them that. I was betting that the Russian Mafia couldn’t wait to get their hands on those power supplies, anti-grav plates, and cloaking hardware to use to upgrade their ships.

It took us half an hour to get through the crowd of well-wishers, each of whom wanted to shake my hand. Kelsey and Penny got a lot of curious looks. It was obvious what Kateryna, Danielle, and Renee were here for, but Kelsey and Penny had a very professional air about them and the crowd wasn’t quite sure what to make of them. I could definitely see Mrs. Chisholm’s hand at work as the ladies conducted themselves in a very professional manner, shaking proffered hands, but not speaking unless spoken to. I was sure Renee would have a few choice comments to make about it to me later.