Wayland Terraformers, INC: Rogue Planet
Fenmoor is a little known planet in the deep suneast, barely lit by a red dwarf star whose rays struggle through a fog of rock dust. Life on Fenmoor is gloomy and tough, and so are those who live there–outcasts from the solar system, too bad at being bad to stay out of jail anywhere else in the galaxy.
But then, Fenmoor is a rogue planet–not owned by Earthcorp or Krancore, or by one of the little guys like Liberium or Envision. It’s not even all owned by a single person–like the Rockefeller System or the Duchy of Jupiter-Winslow. Most of Fenmoor is no man’s land, and the rest is a medley of tiny stake outs–usually a long day’s walk from each other–where each family independently farms just enough to feed and clothe themselves–most of the time.
Without capital–and without resources to attract it–terraforming has been slow in Fenmoor. Aegis, the biggest terraformer of the galaxy, hasn’t touched it with the long end of a stick ever since Jim Settler (formerly the notorious con artist Jamie Kalypso) scammed them out of a fifty acre wheat field and the waterworks to match by promising an Earthcorp job that wasn’t his to offer. Aegis tried to get Krancore to go after Settler, but Fenmoor was too far off the beaten path to go hunting con artists and besides, Krancore’s board felt that it served Aegis right for wanting to work with Earthcorp.
So the terraforming companies have all steered clear of Fenmoor–and besides the fifty acre field that got the planet going, all other terraforming has been a home job. A zero export planet, Fenmoor receives virtually no imports–except for Jim Settler’s Christmas gift, which comes regular as clockwork. For Jim’s daughter has been Duchess of Jupiter-Winslow for a decade now–which, as a surprisingly unromantic romance, is worth a story to itself sometime–and though the first year she sent him an infuriating vial of Jupiter dust (plus a sweet note, “just thought you’d want a smell of home this Christmas”), ever since then she’s packed a treasure trove of useful seeds and fertilizer and machines that make the rounds of the Fenmoor homesteads until they literally crumble to bits.
The Wayland Terraformers’ Christmas advertisement was Jaydie’s idea. “Give the Gift of Terraforming,” the flyer ordered, complete with a luscious Christmas tree of a size and quality no amount of terraforming would have achieved anywhere off the original Earth. Bronth chuckled over it until H.O. slapped him on the back and West Alia looked ineffable scorn. So when a job came in the very next day, Jaydie strutted into the break room feeling like a million bucks–literally.
“Queen of stupid advertising, am I?” she mocked. “Who ever wanted terraforming for Christmas, hey? How about the Duchess of Jupiter-Winslow, that’s who!”
West Alia looked up from her book with a sourly unimpressed glare. “Coincidence,” she said.
“Not,” Jaydie retorted triumphantly. “The Duchess said–and I quote, ‘I was looking at your advertisement…’ Direct result! The Duchess of Jupiter-Winslow!”
“That’s odd anyhow,” Bronth reflected. “Jupiter is pretty well terraformed, but I guess she wants a garden to surprise the Duke with? Doesn’t sound like a big job, but not a bad little stroke of business for the holiday season.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. This is no pleasure garden. Lucy wants a–“
“Lucy?!?” West Alia spluttered. “We’re on a first name basis with the Duchess of Jupiter-Winslow are we? This is really going to your head, Jaydie.”
“Lucy Kalypso wasn’t so high and mighty back when I knew her, that she would be likely to mind…” Jaydie began.
“When you knew her?!?” H.O. gasped.
Jaydie chuckled, enjoying herself thoroughly.
But West Alia returned to her unimpressed self. “So this wasn’t about the advertisement at all,” she said smugly.
“Yes it was! Lucy had no idea I was working for Wayland.”
“Oh, get over it,” Bronth said hastily, before West Alia could do more than open her mouth. “What is the job? You made it sound big–I’m dying to know.”
“Thirty-three thousand acres,” Jaydie said impressively. “From rock soil to basic farmland. Moderate water on the planet, might have to bring some in, might not.”
“Moderate water on what planet?” West Alia asked.
“On Fenmoor,” Jaydie said, hesitantly.
“Fenmoor?!” West Alia gasped, jumping out of her chair.
Even H.O. was looking a little concerned. “Last time we worked on a prison planet…” he said.
“Fenmoor isn’t a prison planet,” Jaydie interrupted indignantly. “These are free people who have a lot to lose if they chase us away.”
“And nothing to lose if they let us do our job,” Bronth said dryly. “Isn’t the Duchess Jim Settler’s daughter? There’s a reason no one’s worked on Fenmoor for fifty years.”
“Lucy’s way too high profile for such nonsense. Besides, she offered half a million down,” Jaydie said smugly. “Does that sound like a scam?”
Bronth broke the impressed silence. “Well then, I guess I’m ready to go when you are.”
“Good,” Jaydie said. “Lucy told me she’d be ready in three days, so if we can swing by Jupiter and pick her up…”
“Now you can hold it right there,” West Alia brought Jaydie up tight. “We don’t need a Duchess along with us for a terraforming mission!”
“Especially not a married one,” H.O. murmured.
“Don’t be absurd,” Jaydie said, and H.O. and West Alia each took it as meant for the other. “Lucy’s a smart woman and won’t be in our way at all. She just wants to visit her dad. He’s eighty-seven next November.”
Bronth shrugged. “We have the room and may as well pick up supplies at Jupiter as anywhere else. I’m happy to take as many million dollar customers on board as want to come.”
West Alia sniffed. “Well, don’t tell me THIS comes from the advertisement. Because I just won’t believe you.”
The foggy, dusty air of Fenmoor gave little advanced warning of the incoming terraformers–and gave them little indication of where the best landing spot might be. Bronth had his sonar going full blast, but he still couldn’t tell if he was landing in a field of wheat or weeds. The Duchess wasn’t as helpful as Bronth thought she ought to have been–she said she’d never been to Fenmoor, but that seemed to be little more than an excuse for hanging out with Jaydie and, if West Alia’s complaints were true, redecorating the girls’ berths.
But the terraforming job was straightforward enough. Rocks to clear or pulvurize, depending on their composition, a simple farm layout to establish–no strange beasts in this ecosystem nor any previous shoddy work to undo. West Alia, Bronth, and Jaydie put in long hours and their machine outfit put in even longer hours, working all day, all night, to reshape these 30,000 Fenmoor acres. “I’d like to get off this planet again as fast as we can,” Bronth had confided to Jaydie.
“The atmosphere is pretty bad,” was all she said, but Bronth shrewdly suspected she meant it in more than a literal sense.
H.O., though, was having the time of his life. A planet with no hostiles was a field day for him, and after he’d done a bit of the leg work of getting machines set up he was free to amuse himself around the homesteads and escort the Duchess anywhere she wanted to go. West Alia renamed him P.B. for Personal Bodyguard–and H.O. was the only person who thought it meant Peanut Butter.
“You ought to be staying here and guarding our ship, P.B.,” she told him, but H.O. shrugged it off.
“No one here would know what to do with it if they had it,” he said.
“And we wouldn’t know what to do if we didn’t have it,” West Alia said dryly.
“Aw, quit worrying,” H.O. retorted. “We’re perfectly safe here–no one is going to be walking ten hours just to sabotage us. And of course, I only lend my barcloud to the trustworthy ones.”
“You’ve been lending your barcloud?!” West Alia gasped in horror. “You promise me right now that is not happening again or you’re grounded!”
West Alia found Jaydie mopping grease and grime off her sweaty forehead under a floodlamp at two a.m. sixteen days after their arrival at Fenmoor and asked her why the three ton land churn had suddenly stopped running.
“Because we’re done with it,” Jaydie said gleefully. “Another day to smooth it and it’s a job well done–if you’re satisfied with the concentration.”
“We need a higher nitrate level,” West Alia said wearily, sitting down on a giant tool chest. “But that’s just a morning’s work.”
“Good,” said Jaydie. “We can be out of here day after tomorrow. I’ll be honest, it’ll be a relief. These Fenmoories look at you kind of like you’d make a good dinner. –Guess we gotta tell H.O. his vacation’s over. Where is the boy, anyway?”
“Up at the Settlers’,” West Alia said. “–It bothers me,” she added after a pause. “I don’t expect your friend to come back every night and don’t care if she does, but H.O. ought to.”
“Oh, H.O.’ll be fine,” Jaydie said. “He gets along well with mean people.” She came to a dead stop, wondering how that sounded and if there was any chance West Alia would take it personally.
There didn’t seem to be–West was too busy snapping at the first part of the sentence. “It’s not H.O. I’m worried about,” she retorted. “It’s us. Where are we going to recruit a new defense man with an equal level of useful stupidity if we have to leave him behind?”
Jaydie yawned three times trying to process that statement and then gave up and went to bed.
Bronth was up at the crack of dawn the next morning finishing the leveling. Jaydie could hear the machine running from her berth. Judging by the blanket on the floor, West Alia was up too and out with the nitrates. Jaydie yawned and turned over to get another couple hours. There was nothing left for her to do.
She was rudely awakened at eleven when West Alia came in and dumped a glass of water on her face.
“West Alia!” Jaydie spluttered. “You know I’d wake up if you just called my name!”
“That’s flat and uninteresting,” West Alia said. “Listen up.”
“Well? You’d better say it before I think of the bitingly sarcastic remark I want to make right now.”
“H.O.’s not back yet and Bronth and I both think the scanners are picking up a surprisingly large gathering of warm blooded creatures on the Settler homestead. It’s fishy. I want him and your friend back on board so we can lift off the moment we’re done here.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Jaydie said lazily.
“I’m telling you to go get them,” West Alia snapped.
“This is what I get for finishing my work before you and Bronth finish yours,” Jaydie grumbled.
“You shouldn’t have to go all the way to the homestead,” West Alia said. “Once you’re within a couple miles you should be able to contact H.O. over the comms.”
“What if I can’t?”
West Alia looked frustrated in anticipation. “We need those two! Losing a team member is seriously bad PR–and losing a Duchess–you’ve got to bring them back.”
“All right. I’ll be back with them as soon as I can.”
West Alia sighed. “I have a bad feeling about this… I’ve had a bad feeling ever since your stupid advertisement…”
Jaydie hurried out to her barcloud to avoid hearing more of the doom and glooming.
She reached the cultivated outskirts of Jim Settler’s land and stopped to try to make contact. Receptivity seemed to be good, but H.O. just wasn’t picking up.
“H.O., this is an urgent message. H.O., I repeat, this is an urgent message. H.O., please make contact. H.O., I repeat–“
Jaydie caught her breath suddenly as something crackled over the comms. Then a strange voice came through clearly.
“How do this con-found-ed thing work?!”
Then it was H.O.’s voice. “Jaydie!”
“H.O.,” Jaydie said, trying not to sound relieved. “What’s up man?”
“I’m being held hostage,” H.O. said dolefully.
“What’s that for?” Jaydie asked, forcing a laugh over her rising panic and trying to remember a dozen things at once. Don’t betray weakness… don’t betray that he’s our only trained soldier… don’t betray where you are… laugh, sound calm and incredulous. “Ain’t nobody going to pay to ransom YOU,” she grinned.
“That’s what I tried to tell them,” H.O. groaned. “But they asked if you guys needed me in order to operate the ship and I said no.”
“Brilliant move,” Jaydie said.
“Just hurry, will you? The food here is awful.”
“Hurry? Where?”
“Hurry and get the Duchess’ ransom!”
“Oh!” Jaydie said, things starting to make sense. “How much is it?”
“I dunno, just hurry!”
“H.O., I need more info–what do the Settlers want?”
“Mr. Settler’s favorite color is blue, he told me last night that he always wanted a screened-in porch with a blue rug. Blue! And his grand-daughter asked for a puppy dog, and I promised to bring her one next time we came, but her dad said no, it’s too hard to feed pets on this planet. It doesn’t matter anyways. I’m not likely to ever get off,” he finished despondently.
Jaydie stared unseeingly at the far horizon. Was H.O. talking in some kind of code or were they really expected to bring a blue rug and a puppy dog, or had the boy been drugged or something?
The strange voice spoke again. “What for these people hire you? You some kind of idiot, blabbing about puppies? We want the deed to the terraformed land. This is not Settler land. This is Fenmoor land. This belongs to us, and we not exporting grain to feed rich Jupiter-Winslow while we children starve!”
“Ah…” Jaydie breathed. Not strictly a legal perspective, but an understandable one. She could work with this. “Good. And you need me to…”
“The Duchess she’m say to sign on Jupiter. We are no stupids to let her go and not come back. She cannot sign without legal person–you go, bring legal person and so she sign.”
“In my defense,” H.O. interrupted, “they didn’t explain it so well to me.”
“May I talk to Lucy?” Jaydie asked.
There was a bustle on the other end of the phone and Jaydie heard Lucy’s voice–Lucy’s voice with a sharp edge of nervous anxiety that made Jaydie instantly suspicious of the stranger’s simple explanation. What was it H.O. had said? Blue rugs and puppy dogs?
“Jaydie. You wanted to talk to me? I’m lying here in my father’s house with the family, but don’t worry–don’t. Ask me anything you want. There’s a nice dead plant here, I think it died just two hours ago, isn’t that funny? You’d better hurry with a lawyer so I can sign off. Don’t forget to… to… to move the bucket I left on our bedroom floor before you leave. I hope you have a safe trip!”
“All right,” Jaydie said. “You hang tight, we’ll be back and doing paperwork in no time! –And maybe we’ll bring that puppy dog along, you tell H.O. See ya!”
Ten seconds later Jaydie was flying at top barcloud speed back to the ship. Two hours?!? And dead?!? Lying. She’d caught that word and it was all she really needed to know. After all, it added up. Why go through legal rigamarol when you could just cut the knots? The Duchess of Jupiter-Winslow’s disappearance would be a nine day’s wonder, but the Fenmoories could deny responsibility and who’d be left to set them right, if all the Wayland Terraformers–and all the Settlers–were dead within two hours? If they said there was a crash landing and the Terraformers hadn’t done their work, no one would come after them for the exports–certainly not the Jupiter-Winslows, who would get their down payment back after a few months in the courts. Who would prove them wrong–who would care to? It was a smooth move–sickeningly smooth for the Wayland Terraformers, caught under the wheels.
Bronth and West Alia were waiting impatiently for Jaydie under the ship’s docking hatch. It was easy for them to tell at a glance that her mission had failed. But Jaydie had a lot more to say, and it came spilling out in rapid fire sentences.
“Two hours,” Bronth said nervously.
“Why two hours?” West Alia asked. “Why haven’t they killed them already? Why did they let us make contact?”
“Way to look on the bright side,” Jaydie said.
“It’s important,” West Alia retorted. “We’ve got to decipher this whole thing in order to make the right move.” She pressed her fingers to her temples and glared at the ground.
Bronth nodded. “We do have contradictory evidence. The Duchess said they were lying–but about what? Are they lying about wanting us to leave? Why would they make a lie like that? If they wanted to come attack us, they’d talk us into staying longer on pretense of negotiations or something, not hurrying and leaving. H.O. and the Duchess both told us to hurry–and that came through loud and clear despite the censorship that forced the blue rug and the rest of the nonsense. Do they want us to leave or don’t they? Who exactly is going to be dead in two hours? H.O. may be our soldier, but we can defend ourselves for longer than that–unless we’re under the threat of explosives.”
“Oh!” West Alia exclaimed.
Jaydie waited for more, but West Alia was evidently still working the line out in her head. Bronth drummed a pen on a rock with a meditative air.
“The bad guys’ plans seem indecipherable to me,” Jaydie mused, “and there’s no guarantee that they’re mastermind geniuses who have thought every step of this out perfectly. What bothers me is the unintelligible part of Lucy’s message–and the blue rugs and puppies from H.O. Conceivably H.O. was just spitballing, but I’m sure Lucy meant something when she told me to move the bucket on the floor of the bunk room before we left. There’s no bucket on that floor–there never was. She wants us to do something before we leave… but what?”
“Keep talking,” West Alia said.
“Well… once H.O. told me his only regret was never owning a puppy. It was after he made five wrong turns in New Chicago and got the two of us surrounded by hoodlums, so he was just trying to get under my skin. Blue… blue is supposed to be a relaxing color… it’s my favorite color… we have a bunch of blue masking tape… is this helping?”
West Alia looked up excitedly. “They do want us to leave–and they don’t want us to get anywhere. Something’s been rigged to explode when we take off. It’ll look like some sort of failure–in case anyone ever asks.”
“But who has the know-how to do that–or the resources?” Bronth asked in disbelief. “On this planet?”
“H.O. does.”
Jaydie stared in disbelief. “H.O. would never…”
“Not usually,” West Alia conceded. “Probably he was threatened with your friend’s death–or the death of the whole Settler family. That’s why they’re all still alive; they’re security that H.O. laid the bomb and won’t go rogue and deactivate it. From H.O.’s point of view, he can’t let the Duchess die–for our sake, if nothing less. And he knew we’d get in touch somehow before we tried leaving and was confident he could tell us.” West Alia laughed suddenly. “He must be sweating buckets right now, hoping we understood the message.”
“That adds up,” Bronth conceded.
“Well fun,” Jaydie said. “It’s a pretty tangle and I’d say our hands are neatly tied.”
“You may be overlooking something though,” Bronth suggested.
“Like what?” West Alia asked.
“Why not just murder us and dismantle the ship for parts? Why blow up all this useful raw material? It’ll be months–maybe years–before anyone is out here to verify the Fenmoories’ story of how we died. Maybe no one will ever come.”
“So… maybe it’s not outsiders who have to be convinced there was no foul play,” Jaydie suggested.
“Maybe not,” Bronth agreed. “And that means we might have allies.”
“I hate working with allies,” West Alia growled.
“It beats dying,” Bronth said.
“Speaking of dying, may I remind you that Lucy’s deadline–no pun intended–was two hours… and that was twenty minutes ago?”
“Yes,” West Alia said. “Your allies idea kind of breaks down there. I suppose the bad guys could make it look like we died productive of an accident, but they can’t pretend the same if they kill the hostages.”
“They’ll just take advantage of the confusion. H.O. went wild when the explosion happened, grabbed a gun, shot the Settlers–so they took him out. Simple. And everyone who knows the truth is dead.”
“What if we just don’t take off?” Jaydie asked. “What’ll they do then? If you guys have it figured our right, they won’t be able to straight up kill the hostages–the ‘allies’ would prevent that.”
“At the very least,” West Alia agreed, “they’d be sure to make contact first and see why we haven’t taken off yet. I think that’s a safe bet, allies or no allies.”
Jaydie frowned in perplexity. “Then what? This is rough,” she said, “and reminds me why I didn’t go into politics.”
“It’s like a puzzle–with life on the line,” West Alia said with a relish. “Listen up–I got some ideas.”
H.O. was after all sweating no buckets at the Settler homestead. Contrary to West Alia’s supposition, he’d planted no explosives. After all, he figured his life wasn’t worth a day’s purchase after the rest of the Wayland Terraformers took off, whether they made it or not. He’d done a lovely pretend job with a lot of blue masking tape, and he was gonna enjoy these last couple hours of life if he could. Pity the food wasn’t better! He made a wry face over a tiny half cooked frog leg at Kat Settler, the puppy-wanting grandchild.
Lucy, who thought the bomb was planted–H.O. hadn’t got an unoverheard moment–stalked up and down the room, looking nervously from the old clock–a Christmas present she remembered making six years ago–to the gaunt, fierce eyed Fenmoorie standing in front of the door.
Her ears were straining for sounds of an explosion, but she heard only the slow ticks of the clock, reaching ever closer to the two hour mark. One-fifty, one-fifty-five, one-fifty-eight, one fifty-nine–Lucy felt a rushing in her ears that would have drowned out any explosion–and the first minute of the second hour came and went, and nothing changed, not her father’s gentle snoring, nor the scratch of her sister’s pen against a sketchbook, nor any of the quiet noises of the family room–even H.O.’s obnoxious whistling didn’t skip a beat.
Another long, slow, silent hour–then someone–it was that truculent ruffian Manford, the one who’d spoken to Jaydie earlier, the one who’d threatened her if H.O. didn’t plant the bomb–stuck his head in at the door.
“You, idiot one,” he said. “Where is that thing what you use to talk to your people?”
“Comms?” H.O. asked, pausing in his whistle and standing up to stretch and yawn. “I got it,” he said, tapping his helmet.
“Come along, you use it. I must talk to your people. Why they have not left?”
“Takes time to lift off a planet like this,” H.O. shrugged, following Manford from the room.
He was back in a half an hour, glowing with suppressed excitement. “They want to see us,” he said. “I don’t know why. Then they’ll take off. I don’t know. Come along, come along! Everyone!”
Behind him, Manford grunted a grudging assent. “We go to Field Hill. The way is long. Six, eight hours walking. Your people”–he grumbled at H.O.–“are too stupid. They say, they must see hostages on Field Hill; but Field Hill too far to see hostages. I tell them so. No matter–they can see so far. Hostages will not arrive until dark. I tell them so. No matter–they can see in dark. What!” He glared around at the group, most of whom were unaware of any danger. “No one runs,” he ordered. “Five-six men. They let no one escape.” He pointed a meaningful finger at his six assistants, who grinned malevolently in reply.
After walking for an hour at a brisk pace H.O. found the prohibition against running absurd. He glanced enviously at Kat, who was swinging along at an easy rate. Walking hours was nothing for a Fenmoorie. H.O. looked to his left and was relieved to see the Duchess trudging along desperately.
The red dwarf sun was setting as the hostages arrived at Field Hill, where H.O. was surprised to see a cluster of spectators already gathered. True, Field Hill was a central spot, where homesteaders often met for trades on neutral ground, but this was hardly the time of day. Manford evidently thought so too, but he was forced to be satisfied with the natural explanation; they’d heard that the strangers’ ship–a mere blip on the horizon from this vantage, was about to take off and would be visible from this point.
H.O. was on the comms–and feeling suddenly wide awake after his exhausting walk. Bronth’s location dot was showing him only yards away. H.O. glanced nervously at Manford. No, he didn’t know how to read that. “Bronth, come in. This is H.O., over.”
“H.O., we see you. Please confirm the presence of all hostages as we prepare for take off.”
Beside H.O., Manford grunted in satisfaction.
“Full tally of hostages confirmed, over.”
“Preparing for take off, over,” Bronth said, with a peculiar emphasis on preparing.
“See you back here with a lawyer in a month,” H.O. grinned.
“You got that, brother. We won’t let any grass grow under our feet.”
H.O. glanced around him, on the qui vive after this second hint. What he wouldn’t give to have that plasma blaster himself instead of seeing it swung over Manford’s back… But Manford was busy watching the ship… and the night was dark… H.O. edged close to him…
The darkness suddenly split with a jagged roar of flame. Startled, H.O.’s hands clutched involuntarily around the plasma gun–only to have it slip from them the next moment as Manford spun around, his two hands going straight for H.O.’s throat. After the blinding flash of light and with the glare still on the far horizon, H.O. found himself unable to see a thing. He flailed desperately around, thrashing his feet in an attempt to get Manford off him.
The white light of a flashlight glared abruptly in his eyes as someone struck Manford a resounding blow against the side of the head. He fell like a downed tree and H.O. struggled to his feet. “Thanks, West,” he gasped.
“That was my pleasure,” West replied grimly, glancing around the rest of the small battlefield.
It appeared to be well under control, with Bronth tucking his tiny wave ray pistol back into his belt and H.O. kicking Manford a time or two to make sure he was well and truly unconscious.
Far out into the night, Jaydie’s flare rose over the ship to announce the safe execution of a false explosion.
There was still some explaining to do to the bewildered spectators. But H.O. had his plasma gun back, and no one looked inclined to mess with the Terraformers. Lucy made large promises, and Jim Settler, coached by West Alia, drew a strong picture of the plot Manford had cooked up, and the Fenmoories were convinced, if not satisfied.
Jaydie was waiting for the others at the loading dock with sandwiches and drinks and a lecture on how bad midnight snacks were for your health. “How’d it go, anyways?” she asked, once she was off her soap box.
“I didn’t hit that Manford fellow hard enough,” West Alia said.
“But on the whole, it went well,” Bronth supplemented.
“He’ll be out of commission for a bit,” H.O. chuckled. “Which is the improvement this planet most needed.”
“Oh, that’d be a good line,” Jaydie joked. “We don’t just terraform planets, we terransform communities!”
West Alia stared at her.
“You ARE the queen of stupid advertising,” she said.
Enjoyed the story? You might also have fun reading these other stories of mine:
Malcolm DefrosterPrating PiratesA Ghost, a Graveyard, and a GirlfriendThe Master Gunner’s RevengeChasing Troodon
