Comings and Goings

First thing next day:

A tractor rode up to Lucy's gate, Homer operated. It circled the turnaround and parked. Erin and Grube's tents were struck, the campfire seating logs rolled away under the trees and the ashes watered cold. Four departing colonists waited: Grube held Sikar II, Erin held Grube's elbow and Christina stood on her far side.

Homer stepped from the cab and went to the rail: “Ready?”

Erin didn’t speak but had Grube walk her to the ladder. Christina followed and looked up at Homer: “We have a crate in Newton.”

“I’ll stop for it.”

“You don’t need to escort us.”

He smiled and nodded, wiped a speck of dust from his brow: “There’s a tractor shortage, I have to bring it back.”

Erin reached the catwalk: “So you honor us with your presence one final time.”

“I have nothing better to do today. And it’s time I checked in with Peter and his crew.”

“So long as we aren’t an inconvenience.” She took her future husband into the cab, to the forward seats, rotating them to face the rear.

Christina held the Administrator in a long sober stare.

Homer: “Is there something you want to say?”

“I won’t waste the air.” She went to her seat.

Homer entered the cab, started the tractor and selected Newton. He rode on the front catwalk and took the breeze, avoided the frustration inside the vehicle.

They went up a spur road and halted in front of the house Sikar had built.

Everybody’s personal effects fit into a single packing case, albeit a heavy one. Homer remained above and watched Christina and Grube wrestle it into a cargo bin. He looked for Chilperic.

The laborers climbed back up.

Homer addressed Christina: “Where’s your husband?”

“Chilperic is no longer my husband. The last I saw of him he went with Bokassa and Owen to the stillhouse in Drunkard’s Den.”

“Well that’s too bad.”

“I think I’m better off. You can have him.”

Erin: “We need to get to the spaceport, Homer.”

“Yeah—right.” He went in, started the machine and returned forward to his bowsprit position.

Tractor rolled on. Past the colony’s farms and over the creek out of the Games Grounds, the next reach was a straightaway atop a levee separating the marsh from a drier tract slated for agriculture, closely mown but not yet cultivated. Ahead were the sandstone hills.

A car appeared, rounding a turn into view.

Going into the cab, Homer got behind the center console and took the controls. He slowed the tractor to a crawl and steered it to the rim of the narrow berm, let half the width of his right wheels hang over the edge.

The two vehicles came together.

Pyteman took the car off to his side of the levee.

There was scarcely an inch of clearance between the machines.

Homer stopped and stepped out on the deck. He leaned over the rail and watched the car creep alongside: “Good morning! Sightseeing?”

Pyteman craned an upward look: “Making a delivery.”

“You’re very prompt.”

“We like satisfied customers.”

“It’s good for business—huh?” Homer watched the car pull abreast, close enough that he could step onto the roof if he desired. He made a rueful smile: “When I built this road I never imagined two-way traffic.”

“Now you’re stuck in a jam—you should widen it.”

“I don’t know—it’s a pleasant social interlude. But if you were driving a tractor one of us would have had to back up.”

Pyteman needed to see in front and couldn’t turn his head around. He shouted a final comment over his shoulder, Homer never heard it.

Still early enough for a good mood, Chloe took amusement watching Pyteman squeeze around the looming tires. She looked out her window, below was a pool of muddy water, she wondered if it was deep enough to swallow the car should it tumble off of the levee.

But it cleared the obstacle and entered town, they stopped at the Biology Hut.

Just like the day before the street was void of humanity.

Pyteman got out and went to the cargo bed, removed a parcel. Chloe emerged as he walked to the door they had opened yesterday.

Nothing within but an empty office.

Pyteman yelled a ‘Halloo!’ and Chloe investigated the second entry, discovered a dim corridor leading to shadows.

A door opened at the far end, two women appeared: “Who’s there?”

Chloe: “We’ve got whiskey—for Kaila Flexer.”

A second voice: “Yeah—sorry. Forgot you were coming. We were talking… ”

Kaila and Charlene came forward, into light, they walked without enthusiasm and said nothing.

Kaila received the package: “Thanks,” she tried to smile, failed. “Homer always picked up the orders… am I supposed to give you a tip?—nobody carries money around here… I could give you a credit… ?”

“No need. If I may pry… you’re not as cheerful as yesterday—neither of you. You seem rather distracted—is there something wrong?”

Charlene: “We had some terrible news… ”

“A friend of ours was hurt… ”

“Kaila—we should respect her privacy.”

She stopped and looked into the off-worlder’s eyes: “Yeah—I guess you guys don’t need to know—I just need to talk about it… ”

“That’s what I’m here for, why we have tea… ”

“Uh-huh.” She looked down at the liquor bottles in her arms. “I don’t have much party mood today, these are almost superfluous. I’ll get around to it.”

Charlene, to the visitors: “We should go… ”

Pyteman: “Sorry to come at a bad time.”

Sitting in the dark, shunning the day:

A wide-eyed Chilperic: “When we were doing those all night runs—I got a charge, a kick-ass feeling. But I never felt this good. What’s in those white pills? Where did you get them?”

Bokassa: “We got new friends, used to work at the Glatz farm.”

“I thought they were all bums… ”

“Not these guys. They bossed the bums.”

Owen: “Kind of the spaceport cops—you were a cop, right?”

“You’ll like these guys.”

“Okay—when can I see them?”

“Later today—after lunch.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Me neither, but when did you last eat?”

Chilperic had to think, frowned and rubbed an ear: “Yesterday morning… I guess.”

“Yeah—even these pills won’t keep you up forever… ”

Owen: “Besides—they bring lunch down here.”

“Ain’t too bad—I could do with more meat.”

“Those grains keep my shit solid, life’s better that way.”

Bokassa laughed.

Chilperic: “When is lunch?”

Bokassa: “It’s only morning, still.”

Owen: “Been a long night.”

Chilperic: “How much did we drink?”

“Couple gallons, I guess.”

“I don’t feel a thing… ”

“You feel good, don’t you?”

“Real good!”

Bokassa was center in the row, clapped his buddies on the back. “We’re gonna feel good from here on out!”

The door opened and the stillhouse filled with light. A shadowed figure spoke with Delgard’s voice: “Who’s in there? Bokassa and Owen? Ya cookin’?”

“Nah,” Owen yelled. “And we drank the reserve supply.” He laughed.

“That’s not very social… ” He entered and went to the kettle, opened the copper domed lid: “I think this beer’s about done, anyhow. There’s more brewin’ outside if somebody helps with the barrel… ?”

Bokassa stood and Owen followed. “We’ll do it,” the potter growled. “Save your bad knees.” The two burly men went to the still and lifted the kettle between their shoulders, carried it out the door.

The sleepy Delgard hadn’t trimmed his beard in recent months, smiled behind the mossy brown mass. He had finally gone to the clinic in Firstown and Kaila replaced his lost front teeth—pearly white incisors were mismatched in the alcoholic’s rugged face. He noticed Chilperic and gave the Townie a long quizzical stare: “Wouldn’t of thought to see you down here… ?”

“Just visiting friends.”

“Yeah—Bokassa and Owen built this shack, you know?”

“They told me. Did a good job.”

“Owen knows his wood and Bokassa knows his stills,” grinned more, he liked showing them off and the polish was guaranteed for twenty standard years.

Homer’s tractor drove onto the spaceport apron and approached the Glatz landing palette. It was a platform four feet above the ground, a hundred feet along the sides. A crew worked from it, hoisted containers onto a flat-topped trailer.

Three men broke away as the colonists drove up. Heavyset men with sidearms, they stood patiently while the machine came near and halted.

Homer stepped out and a round headed man with less hair than the Administrator shouted: “What do you want?”

“Dropping off the passengers.”

“Passengers?—Pyteman didn’t tell me.” He scratched his scalp and made an ugly scowl: “Well, bring ‘em out.”

Homer went to the cab and fetched the disgruntled émigrés. As before he watched them struggle with their crate, the round headed man offered no assistance. He held fists on hips and stared.

Rid of his burden, Homer drove away in search of Peter’s work site. It was an easy hunt, earth moving tractors shuttled between landing pad and the job, he followed one through the blast wall. It went left and continued past the ‘T’ intersection leading to the main warehouse row. The industrial zone lay ahead: manufacturing sheds and chemical tanks, power plant, water system and drains.

The southeast corner of the spaceport had been built out into the marsh and the enclosure wall made a square corner. Excavated soil from other construction heaped up dry ground and compacted flat. A filled-in trench carried sewer pipes half a mile past the wall and emptied into a muddy pit in the heart of the wetlands. Untreated wastes overflowed the reservoir and soured the natural waters.

The wall’s panels had been removed, two lines of support columns met at the corner post, the spaces between stood open. Tractors worked on the far side and heavy equipment noise rumbled, rattled, beeped and boomed.

Near the corner post there was a house-of-cards shed with three sides and a roof made from concrete wall sections. Homer drew up and parked.

He climbed to the ground, looked inside the structure—nothing.

Turned around and faced the work.

Tractors and excavators operated below, a dirt ramp led from the skeletal wall into a huge trench, twenty feet deep, it fingered out into the wetlands beyond his sightline.

The bottom of the pit was a muddy churned up mess, but pumps pulled water out, kept the work possible. Concrete wall panels set on-end held back the marsh. More than two million cubic yards of polluted soil were being removed and spread across a quarter of the landing field for the sun to bake away volatile chemicals.

The area reeked a cocktail of raw sewage, industrial fluids and tractor exhaust.

Homer tolerated the stink but it was the odd occasion when he wished he still smoked cigars, just to perfume the surroundings. He watched, glad it was a job he wasn’t doing. From the contractor’s perspective it looked well organized, Peter deserved praise.

He wondered how to attract attention and one of the tractors, a smaller single-seat model with a front-end loader, split away from the site and moved up the ramp. It came around to Homer’s vicinity, stopped and Peter let himself out of the roll-over cage: “Hiho!”

The Administrator nodded and came near. He waved at the shed: “Nice hut—what are you using it for?—camp?”

“Nah—we jus’ stacked that up t’ practice workin’ with th’ wall parts. Thought we had a nice shady lunchroom an’ somebody said ‘What if there’s an earthquake?’ an’ now we’re afraid t’ go inside.”

Homer chuckled: “You’d be flattened… ”

“Shit right! That roof section weighs ‘bout four tons.”

“I’d like to sit. Can we go up into my tractor?”

“After you.”

They climbed up, opened both doors to ventilate the glass-box cab and took face to face seats.

Homer: “How’s the job going?”

“Jus’ fine. We’re gittin’ th’ contam’nated shit out, waitin’ on Charlene t’ give a final rundown of jus’ what kinda crap’s in there—looks like mostly sewage, solvents, spilt fuel—ain’t too nasty—gotta use resp’rators in a couple bad spots.”

“She told me the report will be finished in a couple more days.”

“Fine… So meanwhile we’re settin’ up th’ big washout.”

“Any problems?”

“Nah… th’ water main an’ th’ sewer are right t’gether—easy crossover.”

“You lead a good job.”

“Hah!—We’re jus’ diggin’ in a big mud-hole—any kid could do it an’ have a ball!”

Homer smiled and changed the subject: “I take it there hasn’t been news out of the Vale in the last day… ”

“No… ?”

“You need to hear this from me, I have the facts… One of the refugees attacked Synoveh… ” Reluctantly, Homer related his story.

Afterwards Peter shook his head but was in a rare speechless state. He avoided Homer’s gaze, looked at his dirty trousers, the hands on his knees flexed and trembled. At last he said: “We shoulda thought ‘bout them guys… People said things on Leon, Hildy an’ Bobol had warnin’s—Tamborak, too—poor guy… Never seen him do nothin’, but shit… I met Jason… took him dinner couple times… Tol’ me some story ‘bout himself… ”

Homer: “What?”

“Said he was in that war y’ were in. He was a Paratantin.”

“I fought against them.”

“I know—I woulda too but th’ recruiter said I was too young.”

“We’re the same age.”

“What county you from?”

“Turlock.”

“Uh-huh—y’ became an adult at sixteen. I’m from Butte County, they won’ let a kid do nothin’ ‘til he’s nineteen.”

“Do you ever miss Calico?”

“No. Do ya?”

“There were some regrets… after what happened with Jody. It didn’t last.”

“How ‘bout right now?”

“Regrets, certainly, but I’m not feeling nostalgia for the old home world—too far gone now.”

“I wanna git back t’ th’ Vale an’ see Luenda.”

“I’ll take you to the trailhead.”

“Gotta git Edzy—left him in camp.”

“Who’s babysitting?”

“New girl—wunna Hermione’s crew—Alicia. She’s sweet.”

“How do you manage such an active bed life?”

Peter slapped a knee and cracked a laugh: “Ain’t my doin’, they come to me… ”

“And your companions never clash?”

Peter shook his head again.

“Not like Ruben—his girlfriends always fight. Can’t put them on a crew… ”

“Used to be… ”

“Right—Sheila and Trish have him thumbed down these days. I think you’re the last serious bachelor.”

Another burst of guffaws: “Never serious!”