Chapter 1: The Plan

Hope watched as the Sa'arm threw her mother's corpse onto the growing pile. They seemed to have gathered enough food for the moment, as they were no longer actively searching. They were now all moving back, taking what they'd collected, and getting ready to depart. She stayed still, crouched in the rocks, until she was certain they were gone, at least for the moment. She wanted to cry, but there were more important things to do. Her tears would have to wait. Carefully she moved back to where her younger brother was waiting for her.

"Come on Solomon, the Swarm have gone. We need to get away before they come back. We have to find father."

"Daddy's in the army now," he reminded her.

"I know. We'll find some soldiers and they can tell us where he is."

"Mummy's not coming back, is she?"

"No, Solomon, Mummy's not coming back, nor is little Mercy. That's why we have to find Daddy." Hope took hold of his hand. She knew that the Swarm were to the North and West, so she decided to go East towards the sea. They were sure to find some soldiers there.

Tribune Leo Nevin contemplated the Kindertransport plan displayed in front of him. A finely crafted plan, its many pieces fitting smoothly together so as to deliver a steady flow of children, and a few accompanying concubines, from Earth to the colonies. A necessary plan. With the Sa'arm already established on Earth there was limited time left to evacuate the maximum possible number of people from the planet. Such a wonderful plan. It was named after the pre-World War Two evacuation of Jewish children from Germany, because it had a similar purpose -- to remove children to a safe place away from the fighting. The children and concubines would be flown from their refugee camps to the collection camps offshore. The unsuitable ones would be filtered out and sent back, while the rest would be sent on to transfer camps for extraction to the colonies. Lift capacity had been planned for as well. There were surplus Auroras available and a few Kilopods. A useful pod design had been adapted from the Filles du Roi program. There were also expected to be spare places on the occasional Cube Ship. The pity was that the available capacity was vastly short of what was really needed. There was not enough time left to get even the children away from Earth; hundreds of millions would be left behind.

Of course, whole chunks of the plan were going to have to be scrapped and rebuilt as soon as it met reality, that much Leo knew. His problem was that it wasn't clear in advance which parts would survive reasonably intact and which parts would need major reworking. He would only be able to tell that when he actually put it into action over the next few weeks.

The plan had already been redrafted more than once. The initial version had been very general because at that time nobody had known where the Sa'arm would first land on Earth, or in what numbers. Once they had actually landed in East Africa the plan was quickly revised to account for the specifics of the local environment. In a way Leo was grateful to the Sa'arm for picking Africa. Since that continent contained more human genetic diversity than the rest of the planet put together, the population geneticists were very happy that the new evacuees were going to be carrying that diversity into the Diaspora.

Targeting Africa hadn't been entirely plain sailing. It had been largely omitted from the usual list of extraction locations for good reasons. However, since the Kindertransport program was only going to be extracting children and female concubines, that was agreed to be less of a problem. Children could be educated and concubines didn't have any real influence. A few sponsors would no doubt turn up during testing, but it had been agreed that they would be examined on an individual basis. The acceptable ones would be extracted via the existing channels, while the remainder would be left behind to fight the Swarm.

What Leo had to do now was to sell the plan to the relevant governments on Earth. There had been no problem selling it to the colonies in the Diaspora. The prospect of additional female concubines, all with reasonable motherhood sub-scores and all with actual experience of raising children, was too good an opportunity for them to turn down. The children that would come with them were just a bonus, helping their populations grow faster.

Already it was clear that some elements of the plan were going to work as intended. The civilian population was fleeing from the fighting. A lot of the men were being conscripted for military service against the Swarm. Women and children were being put into refugee camps away from the war zone, often on the coast. All that had been anticipated. Now it was the Tribune's job to implement the plan's second stage: offshore extraterritorial facilities, where the women and children could be tested, sorted and forwarded on for extraction. Leo hoped that the possibility of politicians' families escaping from Earth would help sell the scheme to governments in the region. Until now extractions from Africa had been very rare, just a few Universities or technical companies and the occasional selected individual pre-packs. Offering the bait of getting more of their citizens away from the Sa'arm should ease the path of negotiations.

With limited space available on the ships assigned to the program they would have to be selective. It was envisaged that some women would be sent back as unsuitable and a few would CAP test as sponsors. The rest would be concubines to be extracted as part of the Kindertransport program, together with their accompanying groups of children. Even the children would be screened; boys of eleven and older with a low CAP estimate would be sent back. There was already a surplus of low CAP young males in many colonies.

There were known unknowns in the plan of course. To what extent were the Sa'arm likely to interfere? How many men would present themselves, hoping for extraction? How many people would try to make their own way to the offshore collection camps by boat or plane? All those known unknowns had been thought about, and there were estimates and contingencies in the plan to deal with them. What worried the Tribune more were the unknown unknowns, where there weren't any contingencies allowed for in the plan because nobody had even thought of them. Those would only become clear when the plan was put into action.

Leo's thoughts were interrupted by his secretary, "Sir, the African Union delegation from the UN has arrived."

"Show them in please, Pat." He took a deep breath to calm himself. The plan was about to become a reality.

Hope heard a noise behind them. It sounded like an engine, though it was still distant. She looked round and saw a plume of dust approaching. Quickly she and Solomon hid near the road. It sounded like an ordinary engine, but she didn't want to be caught unawares just in case it was the aliens. As it came round the corner into view she saw, to her relief, that it was a dusty old lorry that had definitely seen better days.

Quickly she stepped out into the road and flagged the driver down. The truck slowed down and stopped next to her.

The driver leaned out of his window, "What are you doing all the way out here, girl? Don't you know it's dangerous?"

"We want to find some soldiers," Hope told him, ignoring his question. Of course she knew it was dangerous here. Everybody did.

"I can drop you at an Army base down the road a way. Will that do?"

"Thank you very much, sir," Hope replied politely. She called Solomon out of hiding and they went round to the other side of the truck and climbed in.

The driver was a talker. He rattled on about this and that as his truck bounced over the dirt road. He wasn't going particularly fast, the road wouldn't allow any great speed, but it was much quicker than the two children could walk. Hope managed to pick a few details out of his barrage of words; it would take all of today and part of tomorrow to get to the Army base. She thought that he probably spent a lot of time with nobody to talk to, and was making the most of his audience while he could. Because of the Swarm there weren't many people left round here any more. They had been lucky to come across him and his truck at all.

As it was getting dark, they pulled into a bar on the edge of a small town. From what Hope could see in the fading light, there weren't as many people around as she thought there should be for a town this size. Perhaps the locals were starting to leave ahead of the Swarm. The bar didn't seem very busy either. The place did have food for all three of them though, together with beer and women for the driver. The driver kindly paid for their meals. Hope thanked him, as she had been taught, and tried not to shovel her food down too quickly. She had no hope of slowing Solomon down. At eight years old, he was impatient to fill his empty belly.

"Look at her!" a woman interrupted their meal, "No tits. You want a real woman with real tits." The woman speaking to the driver certainly had tits. Her blouse was half open so everyone could check that hers were indeed real. Hope didn't mind her comment. Her breasts were still very small, so she looked younger than her twelve years. She knew that looking so young had likely saved her from having to do something bad to pay the driver. He probably thought she was about ten and she hadn't corrected him.

Hope knew that her breasts would grow in time. She did think that her legs looked good. They were long and athletic, having matured earlier than the rest of her. Their Pastor would have called that thought prideful, so she remembered that her teeth were too large for her mouth to try and counteract her pride.

The driver nodded to the woman, "Come back when I've finished eating."

When the driver finished his meal he got up to leave. Hope started to stand as well, but he told her to stay sitting. Worried, she asked him, "You're not going to leave us here are you?"

"No, girl," he told her. "I've just got some business with a lady. I promised to take you and I always keep my promises."

Hope felt herself blush. She had suddenly realised what the woman was, and what the driver would be doing with her.

He went outside with the prostitute. On his way out he asked 'Grandma' behind the bar to look out for the two children until he got back.

"Only for two minutes then?" she cackled at him.

"Hey, Grandma, I'm good for three," he parried, and he followed his partner of the moment outside, still laughing. This wasn't the first time he had visited this bar on his travels.

Grandma only had to dissuade one rather drunken customer who made his unsteady way in their direction, "You sit your sorry ass right back down, Abel Majinge. Leave those two alone, you hear me?"

Grandma favoured the two of them with a smile. Hope smiled back at her, thankful for her protection. Looking round the bar she could see that one of the women was breast-feeding a small baby. She had to look away from the scene. She couldn't let herself be reminded of her little sister Mercy, killed by the Swarm along with their mother. Memories and tears would have to wait until they found Daddy; only then could she let herself remember.

In the morning they set off again. As the driver had promised, by mid-afternoon they arrived at an Army base with lots of soldiers. It came more quickly than Hope had expected. The roads weren't quite so rough closer to the base so they were able to make better time.

The driver waved them goodbye as he left. Not a bad man, but not one that their Pastor would have described as good either. However he had fed them and he had kept his promise.

Sonia Chibueze strapped herself into her crew seat ready for landing. She was almost there! No more having to fuck Andwele, her boss, to make sure he assigned her to the cabin crew on these Confederacy flights. No more having to smile her way through a crowd of anxious women and their attached hordes of children, many of whom had never flown before. No more having to placate VIPs' wives who expected First Class service on what was basically a cattle truck. She smiled at her son Kwanza, five years old, seated opposite her. He would be safe as well. That made it all worthwhile.

Finally, the last of the passengers left the aircraft and started down the steps. She turned to her fellow cabin crew. "Goodbye Karama, only a few more flights to go for you."

Karama hugged her, "Eight more and I'll reach my thirty one. Then I'm off to the stars like you."

Sonia knew that Karama was having to make her thirty one flights the hard way; like herself, she was probably fucking that bastard Andwele to keep her place. Dafina, the third stewardess, was the niece of one of the airline's senior managers, so she had probably managed to avoid Andwele's attentions. "Goodbye, Dafina, good luck."

"And to you Sonia."

Sonia took Kwanza's hand and hurried down the steps to catch the last bus to the terminal. There were still a few empty seats left so she was able to sit next to her son. Thirty one flights: fifteen returns and a one-way. All very hard work and all worth it for the chance to get the two of them away from the Swarm. The one-way flight would take them both to the stars.

Inside the terminal building, the arrivals hall was like a bare shed with no seats. Sonia could see a crowd of women, each with her clump of children gathered round her. Confederacy people dressed in plain grey were moving through the crowd and seemed to be organising something. Small parties of about half a dozen women, with their accompanying cloud of children, were being lead off further into the complex.

Sonia was surprised to recognise one of the grey uniformed Confederacy staff. Rukiya had been a fellow stewardess. She had completed her thirty one trips a few weeks earlier, so Sonia had assumed she had already left Earth. She waved to attract Rukiya's attention.

Rukiya smiled broadly as she noticed them. "Sonia! Kwanza! You both made it. Good for you. You're looking well, Sonia."

"Wonderful to see you, Rukiya." Sonia noticed that Rukiya had put on some weight since they'd last met. The airline required stewardesses to keep their weight within limits. Like Rukiya, Sonia had found that difficult as she naturally tended towards plumpness, and after Kwanza had been born, it was a constant battle for her to keep her weight down. "At least there's one familiar face here," she continued. "Why aren't you off to the stars? They aren't leaving you behind, are they?" Sonia had a sudden fear that she herself might be left behind, like her friend.

"Oh no, nothing like that," Rukiya reassured her. "I'll definitely be going, but they want me to help around here for a bit first. I wouldn't be surprised if they get you to do the same. Us cabin crew have the experience to help them deal with the crowds when each planeload arrives." Sonia could see the sense in that; it was something she should be able to do.

Rukiya continued, "We can talk more in a minute or two once I get you out of this bedlam. You and Kwanza join those three over there, with the tall woman in the red and blue. Talk to you soon."

Once she had gathered two more women into the group, Rukiya led the six of them out of the arrivals hall, and down a corridor to a comfortable waiting room with seats and a children's play area in one corner. Addressing the whole group, Rukiya announced, "You will shortly be going to medical for check-ups and testing," repeating everything in both Swahili and English. "Three of you will go first, together with your children. Then you will change over and the rest of you will go." She briefly demonstrated the replicator and pointed out the toilets. Three of the women and their children followed Rukiya to medical, leaving Sonia waiting with the other two. Kwanza made a beeline for the play area.

When Rukiya returned, Sonia asked her, "Looks like we don't have to watch our weight so much here."

Rukiya grimaced, "With the replicators it's too easy just to pick up something to eat. Far too easy. I want to keep looking good so a sponsor will select me, but it's so difficult."

"I know," Sonia sympathised. At only 5' 5" she quickly showed almost every pound she put on, and her hips had never recovered from having Kwanza. "That replicator does look tempting, though. Can it really make anything at all?"

"Pretty much. It certainly covers all the basics." With a smile she whispered, "It can even make sweets for the children."

Curious as to what was going to happen to her and Kwanza, Sonia enquired, "What happens to us in medical?"

"You'll get checked for diseases and so on. They can fix anything here." Rukiya paused and asked, "Have you been CAP tested Sonia?"

"Not yet, I was never able to get onto flights to Europe."

"Andwele?"

Sonia nodded, "Andwele." Just like Sonia, Rukiya had also had to fuck him in order to earn her place here.

"So, they'll do a quick CAP test while you're in the med-tube."

"Quick?" Sonia asked doubtfully. "Dafina said it took over two hours to test her."

"That was probably a full test then. She had it done in Paris, didn't she?"

"I think so. Her uncle got her onto some of the Europe flights."

"Well," Rukiya explained, "with a whole planeload of people to process quickly, here they just give most of you a preliminary test. If they can see you're going to be high enough for them to accept, but below 6.5, then they'll pop you out early and give you a provisional score. You'll get called back for a full test in a day or two, in between flights when there's space in the med-tubes. If this first CAP test takes a long time, then it means they're doing the full test and you might be a sponsor."

"That would be too much to hope for. I'll be content with just getting away."

"You should be fine. You're fertile," Rukiya glanced at Kwanza playing happily with the other children, "and you're a good mother. They'll only reject you if you score really, really low on your CAP test. Even if you aren't a good mother, they'll still take you if you get a decent CAP score. They'll just send you to the Moon to be an ordinary concubine. With lots of kids for us each to look after, they don't want any bad mothers here," Rukiya laughed.

As her friend was laughing, Sonia noticed that she had a collar round her neck. It wasn't jewellery, appearing functional rather than decorative. "What's the collar for?" she asked.

"This?" Rukiya put her hand to her neck. "It lets us talk to the AIs, the big computers they have here. They seem to organise a lot of the stuff that goes on and keep track of everyone. Very helpful they are too." Rukiya paused, "Enough about me, what have you been doing since we last saw each other, Sonia?"

Hope told the soldier at the gate, "Our father is in the Army, we want to find him please."

"You two refugees?" he asked sharply.

"Yes," she told him, as if it wasn't obvious. "How do we find our father?"

The soldier didn't answer them. He just called to a woman walking by inside the base, "Hey, you! Take these two to the refugee hut."