“Knock it off, Roberto. You too, Jake. She’s just a kid,” another said.
“Who put you in charge of me?” said the one called Jake.
“Nobody, but someone here needs to show some respect towards our hosts.”
Jake’s eyes narrowed. “Fuck them and fuck you too, Simon. If you’ve got a problem, tell the boss, or sort it out with me now.”
Simon turned to Joyce, who stood with her head lowered. “Thanks, Joyce. Why don’t you run along now.”
Joyce nodded and hurried away.
Jake leered at her departing figure. “You’ll keep, sweetheart.”
By the time the passengers from Lander Five arrived, lunch had finished for most of the newcomers. Led by David and Grace, the final group threaded their way through a mixed group of Havenites and newcomers waiting to greet them.
The Havenite children had already met their counterparts from the other landers and were curious about the rest. They could hear them before they could see them. The complaining grew louder and louder as they approached.
“I’m NOT carrying this stupid case!”
“No, I said I’m NOT. You carry it!”
“I’m hungry. I wanna burger, NOW! Get me one!”
“I don’t want to live here! This place sucks already! I want to go home!”
The adults of both camps shared a look that spoke volumes. Then the new arrivals came into view, and the Havenite kids gasped.
Good genes, a healthy diet, and regular exercise meant they’d never seen an overweight person. A man appeared, carrying more than a few extra pounds. He was suffering in the heat, his face red and beaded with sweat. But his children! They were perhaps eleven or twelve, but far from small. Both looked as if they’d been inflated somehow, and neither was the least bit happy to be there. They only stopped complaining when they saw food on the horizon.
Behind the two well-fed children came Sabine. By contrast she was slim, but her tattoos and body piercings made her into a creature the children could never have imagined. And that was before they noticed her fluorescent-purple hair.
They stared.
Sabine noticed the group of children standing with their mouths open, staring straight at her. She looked at them sourly.
“What the fuck are you looking at?”
Almost as one the children drew back, mouths snapping shut.
Sabine grinned. This never grew old.
CHAPTER NINE
The newcomers drifted away as lunch drew to an end, either toward the lake or to collect their baggage.
Edward approached David. “Thank you, Captain, for making us welcome.”
David smiled. “Why don’t you call me David?”
Edward nodded. “Certainly, David. I’d like to get my people settled in their accommodation now.”
David nodded, although Edward’s reference to “my people” triggered a warning at the back of his mind. Stop worrying, he scolded himself. They’ve only just arrived, and they’re tired and suffering from culture shock.
“Of course. Let me show you what we’ve prepared, and later we can assign quarters.”
Edward inclined his head. “Thank you.”
David extended his arm toward the new housing units. “This way.”
Carla joined them, and they set off across the park.
“When we first learned of your impending arrival, we built four new houses,” he said, pointing, “and they’re ready for occupation now. They each have three bedrooms, and can accommodate six people.” He kept his expression neutral as he glanced at Edward. “Once we discovered the Inspiration’s crew was so large, we began on these units here,” he said, pointing to a double row of semi-detached townhouses. “These higher-density units are quicker to build. Each has two bedrooms and can accommodate four. Six of them are ready now, and we’ll have another twenty ready by the end of next week.”
Edward didn’t seem at all perturbed by the lack of notice they’d given and made no mention of it. “Good,” was all he said. “And in the meantime, while you finish building?”
David looked at him. He didn’t expect thanks, but he had the uneasy feeling Edward expected him to be there to serve.
“The tents,” he said, pointing at the tents they’d fabricated and erected in the park, not far from the pavilion. “There’s enough space there for everyone, and they’ll be comfortable – the climate is controlled here, so the tents are only needed for privacy and shelter from the irrigation.” He pointed up toward the cavern ceiling. “You can see the sprinklers up there. We water the park twice a week.”
“I see,” Edward said, glancing at Carla. “Let’s allocate the houses and tents, shall we?”
Carla smirked at David as they turned and walked back to the pavilion, leaving him alone to ponder.
Edward and Carla’s allocation of the housing left no one happy, except perhaps them.
David and the others were stunned to learn Edward had allocated two of the three-bedroom houses to himself – one for him and Carla to live in, the other as an office. Rather than assign the other larger houses to families, he’d divided them between his security team, three in each house. For the rest, he’d just told his passengers to distribute them as they saw fit, sowing the seeds for a near riot.
“I guess it’s up to us to sort this mess out,” David said, as he and the rest of the original eight surveyed the scuffle going on outside the townhouses.
“Although …”
As they got closer, they could see order emerging from the chaos. The trouble centered on the people from Lander Five, which was no surprise to David, having seen their behavior already. But there was a group trying to keep the peace – not Edward’s security crew, though, who stood back and observed. One of the would-be peacekeepers, David noticed with interest, was Kevin van Zyl.
“Just calm down,” they heard him say over the crowd. “Calm down, please! No one will miss out. We’re building more houses and everyone will have a permanent place to live within a few weeks.”
“You have no authority here! You can’t tell me what I cannot have! Get out of my way!”
The Indian man with the strong sense of entitlement was at the front of the objecting newcomers. His name, David had discovered, was Ananda Kumar, and back on Earth he’d been a wealthy businessman used to getting his own way.
“Don’t worry, Ananda,” Kevin said, “you’ll get what you are entitled to.”
“What I am entitled to is one of those,” he said, pointing toward the three-bedroom houses. “None of them are much good, but those are the most acceptable to me.”
David glanced at John, his expression leaving no doubt as to what he thought of Ananda’s opinion of their building efforts, or what he could do with his attitude. David shouldered his way through to the front of the crowd, where Kevin and Ananda stood.
“Everyone! Listen to me! I’m David Miller, the leader of this colony. I’ll explain to you what will happen.”
The noise of the crowd died away as they focused their attention on David. Ananda Kumar stared, and David suppressed a smile. It seemed he hadn’t realized David led the colony when not flying the shuttle.
“As Kevin said, no one will miss out. There’ll be enough houses for everyone by the end of next week, sooner if you pitch in and help. In the meantime, we can accommodate twenty-four people in the units we’ve already finished. Each unit has two bedrooms, and two can sleep in each room.”
“I’m not sharing,” said Ananda, earning him a look from David that would’ve made others think twice about voicing such a comment.
David continued. “The tents you see in the park have enough space for everyone, and tonight, that’s where you’ll sleep.”
Groans and complaints greeted his words. David held up a hand. “No arguments. Until we can take a census and understand your individual requirements, we won’t allocate housing. In case you hadn’t noticed, this is a construction site.” He pointed to the robots, now silent, and stacks of raw ma
terials. “It won’t be safe to move into the smaller units until we finish this block.”
This was stretching the truth, but he wanted to buy them breathing space until they could organize everyone.
“You’ll find the tents comfortable. As you will have noticed, we have a roof over our heads, and the temperature is mild. There are no dangerous animals or biting insects. There are kitchen and bathroom facilities nearby. It may turn out to be the best camping experience of your life.”
That got a few smiles, and the hostility faded.
“I am NOT sharing a tent with anyone,” Ananda said.
David frowned. “There are twenty-five tents there, Mr. Kumar, and they each take four. You probably don’t have to share, but if you do, you will. Am I clear?”
Ananda bristled. “You don’t seem to know who you are talking to!”
“Oh, I think I do. I’m speaking to someone who is no wealthier than anyone else in a colony that has no money.”
For once, Ananda Kumar had nothing to say.
“So what do you think?” Grace asked.
The eight of them had gathered at the Miller-Ng house, and were nursing drinks after day one of the invasion.
“The kids don’t seem disappointed,” Nigel said.
Grace quirked an eyebrow. “Disappointed?”
“Yes, remember the presents the visitors were supposed to have for them?”
“Oh, those,” Grace said. “They’ve forgotten all about them, they’re too busy making new friends.”
“Just as well, because there aren’t any gifts to be found,” David said.
John put his drink down. “Hey, how do you know when a shuttleload of Terrans have arrived?” he asked.
Nigel shrugged. “Go on, tell us.”
John grinned. “After the turbines shut down you can still hear the whining.”
His joke drew as many groans as laughs.
“That does apply to Lander Five,” Grace observed, looking at David, who nodded.
“Actually, it’s not that funny in real life,” he said, but he was grinning too.
“So what do we really think?” Grace said.
Their smiles faded. “I’m not that worried about Lander Five,” John said. “They’re a bunch of whiners, but I don’t imagine they’ll cause too much trouble.”
“You know what they are, right?” Josh said.
“Paying passengers? Yeah, I know.”
“But do you know how much they paid?”
John shook his head.
Josh looked around the table. “Anyone?”
“No.” David leaned forward. “How much?”
“Five. Billion. Dollars.”
John whistled. “Damn.”
“Each.”
Grace’s jaw dropped. “You mean Kevin’s family cost them …”
“… twenty-five billion,” Josh finished for her, nodding his head.
Silence fell. “And there’s forty of them,” Veronika said, holding up the manifest she’d produced with Nathalie’s help. “So that’s two hundred billion dollars altogether!”
“That’s a fair chunk of a starship’s price tag,” John said, nodding. “Now I get why they’re here.”
“Yeah,” Josh said. “It also explains why they’re such a pain in the ass.”
“Spoiled rich people?” Heidi said.
“You got it. We’ve all seen their like back on Earth.”
Nathalie sighed. “I was hoping never to see them again.”
The others nodded in agreement.
“Well, they might be annoying, but they’re not the real problem,” John said.
“Edward.” David said only one word.
“And that Carla,” Nathalie said. “I don’t like her at all.”
“Me neither,” Grace said. “She’s creepy.”
David exchanged a glance with John that said volumes. They both had a good idea why their wives didn’t care for that particular woman.
“And then there’s his ‘security’ team,” Nigel said.
“And the fact that they’ve set themselves up in their own little command center,” John said. “I don’t like that at all.”
David looked around the table. “Suggestions?”
“We need to let them know who’s in charge,” John said. “This is our place, not theirs. They’re our guests, they’re not taking over.”
“Amen, brother,” Josh said.
“Wait one minute,” Veronika put in. “They’ve done nothing wrong, have they?”
“Apart from acting like entitled, spoilt children, you mean?” Nathalie said.
Veronika pursed her lips for a moment. “Other than that, which isn’t hurting anyone. So far, they haven’t done anything to cause us to mistrust them. We’re just assuming they might. Shouldn’t we give them a chance?”
There were a few skeptical looks, but David spoke up in support.
“We expected more to come, remember? Until we lost contact with Earth, the Inspiration would bring more. They’re not guests, they’re here to join us.” He glanced at John, who cleared his throat and looked a little sheepish.
“We should focus on building bridges for now. But we need to be vigilant, and in particular keep an eye on what our friend Edward does. It’s possible he may intend to take control of the colony, and we’d be stupid not to realize that we’re outnumbered if he tries. But we must keep in mind our need for a bigger community – the more people we can bring into the fold, the less there is to worry about. And that starts by quitting the jokes.” He looked at John. “Even if they’re funny, every little thing we do to make the newcomers into ‘them’ and not ‘us’ makes it harder. We don’t want them and us, we just want us.
He looked around the table to see heads nodding.
“We have to consider the children, though,” Grace said.
“Yes, we do,” David said. “And that limits our actions. We have to protect them at all costs.”
As David walked to the park the next morning, he thought about how best to manage their visitors. An influx of new talent presented a great opportunity for the colony, but he couldn’t shake off a bad feeling about how they’d arrived, and the behavior of certain people.
When he reached the park, he couldn’t believe his eyes.
There was a scattering of trash outside many of the tents, and one in particular. He walked over and picked up a couple of wrappers lying on the ground. Cheese puffs. Chocolate. Potato chips. He shook his head. They’d come twelve light years and spent their luggage allocation on junk food.
“Good morning.”
David looked up, still frowning, to see Kevin van Zyl.
“I see you’ve discovered what some of us have been doing.”
David tried to keep the disapproval out of his voice. “Yes.”
Kevin shrugged. “We’ve got some work to do.”
“We?”
He smiled. “I put myself at your disposal, to assist with camp administration.”
David relaxed a little. “We can use all the help we can get right now.”
“Consider it done. What have you got planned for us today?”
“To start with, breakfast, followed by a roll call to see who we’ve got and what they can do. A tour of Haven after that followed by lunch.” He looked over to the housing units. “We should finish another three today and make them available. We can discuss allocating them in the afternoon.”
Kevin pushed his lips together. “Hmmm.”
“You think we’ll have problems?”
Kevin motioned with his head toward the lake, inviting David to walk with him. Once they’d put some distance between themselves and the tents, he continued.
“You may have noticed some of us have been a little difficult?”
“It came to our attention.”
Kevin smiled. “You know who we are, right?”
David nodded. “Paying passengers. I hear you paid five billion a seat?”
Kevin stopped and stared. “
Where did you hear that? Oh, it doesn’t matter I suppose. You’re right. Some who paid had an entitled attitude to go with their money. It’ll take time for them to adjust.”
David nodded. “And the others?”
“Mostly engineers and scientists, and their partners. Some doctors, a mix of various professions among the partners. Professionals – good people, most of them, although not all of them are blessed with great social skills.”
“You seem to know a lot about them.”
“Let’s just say I made it my business to know.” He handed David a data card. “You’ll find a complete passenger list on this.”
David took it. “Huh.”
“It’s not as comprehensive as the one Harper could give you, but I suspect he won’t.”
“What do you know about him?”
Kevin shrugged and looked around as if he was concerned about being overheard.
“I wonder about his motives. He signed us all up twenty-five years ago – well, you know, twenty-five years before we set off. He needed the money then, and we could pay for the opportunity to escape Earth if it all turned sour, which of course it did.”
“Mars would have been a lot cheaper.”
Kevin shrugged. “We took a chance. We couldn’t be sure about Mars, either. Mars is more or less owned by Harper, and it’s not well-suited to human life, with low gravity and almost no atmosphere.” He gazed out over the lake, taking a deep breath. “It’s nothing like this. Besides,” he said with a grin, “it was hard to resist. The idea of star travel, once in your mind, evokes an adventure too hard to refuse.”
“And so here you are.”
“Here we are,” he said, nodding. “Check the manifest and we can talk more. As I said, I want to help. This is home for us now, and we want to play our part.”
Edward surveyed his new domain. He’d set up the modest house he’d claimed for office space as best he could, using the dining table as a desk. An array of equipment from his extra luggage now adorned the tabletop.
He was pleased and somewhat relieved. They’d taken a huge risk, coming here without knowing what awaited them. Unlike the first expedition, they hadn’t come with a wide range of tools and supplies to help them set up a colony from scratch. Instead, they’d traded the equivalent mass to bring people – lots of people. If they’d arrived to find no established colony, they would have been in trouble.
The Seasoning Page 7
