A Planet For Emily

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Suzanne reluctantly gave a sleeping Emily back to Carol.

“Bye, darling. A few weeks and I’ll be back.”

Emily woke up, looked at Suzanne with unfocused eyes, yawned and closed her eyes again to doze on her mother’s shoulder.

“Well, that’s sort of goodbye,” said Carol.

They were at Lucifer III standing by the entrance ramp to a small freighter bound coreward and thus to Earth Station, Suzanne would change ships at Tyrone III for the lengthy hop to her destination.

“I wish you wouldn’t go,” said Carol. “It’s sounding really dangerous at Earth Station. People are being killed over food.”

“I’m only staying as long as I need to convince my mother and Richard to come. You know the secrecy on – you know, the thing – the only way I can convince them to come is by going there.”

Rods’ first act after Eve shot a load of antibiotics into his arm was to feverishly insist on taking the lead in the project and to turn what the colonists had hoped would be idyllic hideaway into a major new city – a hub for all the mining colonies in that part of the galactic arm. Rods had told them he wanted a city with schools, specialised medical services, restaurants, sporting fields, sports teams that would use them, colleges, banks, theatres, cinemas, coffee shops and amusement parks and that was just the start. Fermat II was not just a planet with a terra-formed valley, he told them, but a new homeland. They muttered but had little choice. Rods had the only ship – The Drawn Treader had to be traded away but they got the rest of the cargo – and he was calling the shots. In any case, it was better than living in an isolated settlement. There was also the problem of the other mounds in the valley, also all occupied by these proto-Zards, wherever they had come from. People were now working on that mystery. But the valley’s existence seemed to be unknown to the Zard civilisation, so the Zard navy would not come calling any time soon, and for the moment that was all they needed to know. They would take the land around the destroyed mound, turn away any proto-Zards from the other mounds and start building their city.

In the meantime, to keep the Zards in ignorance, the valley and all the work in it had to be kept secret, and that meant total lockdown. The planet’s name or designation was not to be entered into any information system except under the strictest of conditions. No hint of the discovery was to be written in an email, memo or any form of social media, or communicated to anyone except for a trusted handful outside the valley. Rods had told anyone entrusted with the secret that if they broke confidence, they would find that The Max’s main airlock worked well, in deep space. The handful who were told included Emily and her extended family from Finn’s Reef. They were to be among the first not from the original party to move to Fermat. Emily would be the first baby but it was expected that she would soon have plenty of playmates.

Suzanne also intended to make the planet her base along with her mother, Eve and Richard, but first she had to get them to come and that was the problem. There had been no word from either her mother or Richard, and very little news from Earth Station apart from reports of hardship. It was very worrying. Those in the secret had tried to talk her out of going. Those who knew nothing about Fermat II also tried to talk her out of going. Eve had advised against it, but in the end agreed that it was the only way to get their mother, and Richard, out. Rods, still feverish from being bitten, had received the news in silence. He had grunted when Suzanne asked for the necessary funds for fares and expenses, then agreed and turned away. She was affronted but put Rods’ manner down to the infection and made the necessary arrangements.

Part of those arrangements was to brief Eve on her duties as cruise director. Suzanne wanted to keep her job on The Max, the best she had ever had and even better now that The Max’s main job would be to ferry colonists to an acceptable new home. But leaving it vacant with Rods in such a terrible mood was not a good idea. Eve protested that she was needed as a doctor on the new planet but agreed as part of the deal in which Suzanne would fetch their mother. The sisters had been joint directors for one trip and Suzanne planned to slip away leaving Eve in charge, and trust to Rods not bothering to change arrangements until she got back. Hopefully, his mood would also improve. Eve also hoped that.

Carol had gone and suddenly there was Rods, looming before her out of the crowd that was shuffling between the dock and the adjacent shops. He was still mildly feverish and, as she could tell, in no good mood.

“Your sister informs me that she is the stand in cruise director.”

“I was going to talk to you about that…”

“I was under the impression that as captain of the ship I appointed the staff.”

“Well, yes…”

“There was also an understanding that yours was a temporary appointment. You were looking for your sister. Haven’t you found her?”

Oh dear! Oh no! At other times she might have thought Rods was simply being stern and turned a soft reply, but he wasn’t being stern, she realised. She was going to be fired from the best job she’d ever had.

“But I thought you liked me as cruise director,” she said miserably, suddenly remembering the woman from Stacey’s Rods had been talking to a few weeks ago. Stella was it? A ridiculous name. “I wasn’t involved in any scams and things ran well, and we got on, I thought.”

“I thought we got on to, but at the first test you described me as nothing to your sister.”

“I didn’t….” Suzanne was about to deny this accusation indignantly but then she remembered the conversation with her sister. She had called him “nothing”, she just hadn’t meant it like that. So that was it! Other girls might have laughed at this fever-driven misunderstanding said “Ohhh! Poor thing” and tried to dismiss it with a smile. Suzanne, however, knew that approach would get her the sack.

“But Rods, I had just met my sister in the company of a guy who wasn’t my fiancé, down a horrible hole about to fight for our lives. I just meant we weren’t together romantically. This job is the best, and it’s been fun with you, and you’ve been really good to me, even when you’re grumpy… and look, can’t we just forget it. I’m really sorry.”

Rods grunted.

“And I took command when you were out of it. I was the last off. I shot that Zard with Mr. Sig-Saur. Doesn’t that count for something?”

Rods glared at her. She noticed that his fists were clenching and unclenching.

“What can I do to apologise? Did you want me to give the fare money back?”

Rods waved this offer away impatiently.

“Of course, you have to have your fiancé and mother out here – it’s just that, to be spoken about like that at the first test.”

“I’m really sorry,” said Suzanne, “I just didn’t mean it like that. It’s just that you’re feverish. You should rest...”

She stopped when Rods glared at her. She was guilty of taking the matter lightly.

“It’s just,” he said, “it’s just.. oh, forget it.” He thrust his hands into his pocket and strode away. Igor, who had been a few paces away the whole time, waved and followed the trader.

“Do I still have a job?” called Suzanne, but Rods was already out of sight.

“You’re Suzanne Clark?” asked one of the freighter crew, “you have to come now”.

Suzanne followed the man, near tears, but then whipped out her PA out and started dictating messages. The ship would not be out of range of the planet’s systems for another hour or so. She and her sister could repair some of the damage.

End of Part I