Old Rochester – Goodbye

The whole of Main St. in Rochester MI is torn up. They dug way down – 20 feet some places. and tore out water mains from about 1900. Uncovered trolly tracks.

This is a sketch I made of it a few years ago.

We’ll see what it looks like new. I haven’t seen any drawings.

“Paper or Plastic?” is free 5/27 and 5/28

Please download and enjoy if you don’t have it yet. Both days, approximately Pacific time.

http://www.amazon.com/Paper-or-Plastic-ebook/dp/B004RCLW68

Yes! Amazon has “Family Law” free today 5/19

I wanted to see it actually posted before saying anything again.

A little nature near Detroit – pix from the week

My wife is off this week. We did some day trips and enjoyed each other’s company and ate out a lot. We don’t do a lot of long trips now.

This is a picture she took at a Metro Park down in Gibralter MI. She doesn’t take many pix but she has a good eye. Click to see bigger versions of these photos. It was a pleasant park and the first time we’d been there. It has an area you can fish from very comfortably, and a boardwalk into the marsh. We saw a lot of birds we’d never seen before and in the fall we intend to go back when the hawks and eagles migrate through.

 

 

 

 

This Blue Heron rookery is near our house in Rochester MI. It is on the edge of a Super Fund site. This was shot from a business over a busy road and looking under power lines. It is about a quarter mile away. Done with a Canon Power Shot SX120compact camera – a point and shoot. So it is stretching its capacity. Shot at sunset.

 

 

This is the edge of the swamp in which the rookery stands. Notice the five egrets bedded down for the night in the trees. It was much darker than the photo suggests. I tried to zoom in on the birds, but the camera was not capable of getting a focus in the low light. There were geese in the pond. The whole place swarms with birds.

FREE Kindle download 5/12 – “Family Law”

Not Going to happen. Amazon has software issues. 5/19 maybe.

Family Law is my latest stand alone book and my best writing yet. Grab a copy and remember to review it please.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006GQSZVS/?tag=kindleboards-20

You know people who love their dogs. They put them in their will. They forgo vacations to stay home and take care of them. We are sure humans can love non-humans.

Can a dog love back or is it simple self interest? Affection or love? Unconditional or a meal-ticket? What if you dog could talk back? Would your dog be less lovable?

Is the dog part of your family or property? Who should decide that for you? How much more complicated will it be if we meet really intelligent species not human? How will we treat ‘people’ in feathers or fur? Perhaps a more difficult question is: How will they treat us?

Could humans adopt such an alien creature? Can they adopt a human child into their society?

Usually the people who have these sort of questions thrust upon them have no desire to be on the pointy end of things. They are just doing their best coping and somebody decides they don’t like it.

Of course when the adoptive father is a very smart carnivore similar in size and disposition to a grizzly bear you should at least be polite about objecting. When they are both rich and his race whooped human butts on first contact…What was your big problem again?

 

 

 

Economics – hard to suspend disbelief – is it satire?

I’m going to incorporate some thoughts about economics in the third book of the April series, “The Middle of Nowhere”.

It’s hard to do so because today what the talking heads on TV and the writers in financial e-zines write is so bizarre it is like a well written ‘Onion’ article. You are almost sure it is satire, but not without small doubts you will read it the wrong way and embarrass yourself in front of all your friends.

If you wish to have your car repaired or your teeth cleaned the state requires you to deal with a mechanic who is licensed and certified. Your dental hygienist has to be approved by the almighty state too. If you think this is primarily for your protection  you are a fool. It is to limit the number of people who can enter the profession and keep prices up for them.

Do you know what you need to be an economist?

Well a degree in economics helps. But actually many people work as economists from other backgrounds in mathematics, business, finance or even agriculture.

There is no such thing as a licensed and certified economist.

If you look into the matter closely, you do not even need a personal history of being right more than half the time to continue working as an economist.

If you as a surgeon killed fifty patients in a row on your operating table do you think you’d continue in the business? But an economist can be wrong every week for a year and still be employed, asked to appear on TV networks and given awards and advanced to  better jobs.

The key to being a successful economist today is the same as being a successful priest in a major religion. Publicly profess believe in the dogma of your sect and punish any unbelievers.  Today the sect in power is Keynesianism. The Fed and the treasury espouse it and the vast majority of academic economists are given fellowships and published based on faith in this orthodoxy.

As an example of how convoluted such academic thinking works, online today was data showing the Japanese in the last year have exported gold for the first time since they started keeping records.

The economists painted all sorts of complicated theories about how the psychology of the Japanese has changed because they have not seen inflation in so long it is impossible for them to worry about it. So since gold is an inflation hedge they don’t want it anymore. 0o.

Since 1989 the value of Japanese stocks has stagnated. The real estate market went from homes being an investment to an expense. Everything is expensive. I had a friend go to Japan for a few weeks. He bought a MELON in a fruit market for the price on the sign. When he got back to his rooms he calculated the exchange and it was a $30 melon. The Japanese have layers and layers of wholesalers and inefficient protected industries to drive prices up. Imported rice has a 700some % tariff on it. Japanese industry is being sent to cheaper labor markets just as happened here. The earthquake and nuclear contamination have made everything less certain and more expensive.

Okay, here is my deep technical analysis of why the individual Japanese are selling their gold. They need the money!

 

 

 

New Snippet – 3rd Chapter “The Middle of Nowhere”

Chapter 3

It was too late for lunch and too long until supper when April woke up. She searched in the kitchen and there wasn’t much to snack on. Her parents weren’t keeping much with just the two of them here. Suddenly April really wanted her own place with whatever she wanted in the frig not worrying about if somebody would miss that last carton of yogurt if she ate it. Would she ever be able to safely visit the house she bought in Hawaii again? She wasn’t even through furnishing it and she’d needed to run for her life. She’d never felt such a strong need to have her own space before. She’d always been content with her room.

Cubic was so expensive and she was spoiled having her own tiny bath. Was Eddie going to want some money back? He seemed happy with her last night in the cafeteria, but he’d hardly shout private business in her ear in that mob.

Her gramps had told her whatever she didn’t use was hers to keep when they sent her down, but then she’d rushed back early, and still wasn’t that sure she’d accomplished as much as everybody seemed to think when she got back. Better not to think on spending what might get clawed back. And she decided, if they want it back I’ll be gracious about it and not complain.

There was some cheese spread and she checked in the cupboard. A carton of crackers was almost full still. She took them in the big room and called up the news with stock quotes in the corner. She added Bob’s stocks under hers in the display from the hard copy Gramps gave her. She was only holding a few issues long when she went down to Earth.

Bob had more equities than her and she had no idea what some of them were. One showed a week long trend down a good 8% and she just sold it rather than start reading a big history and analysis. She’d have to establish she had control of the stocks with the brokerage house, but for now she had his login and password so she could trade them unless somebody had notified them of Bobs death. As she suspected it executed the trade with no problem.

In the news the Louisiana State Police conducted a sweep of public land and corporate timber stands eradicating hidden plots of guerrilla gardeners. Unlicensed gardens were both a way to evade accurate census counts and a source of black market income.

They vowed to post guards on conventional farming acreage to prevent a repeat of last year when illicit gardeners burned licensed farm fields in retaliation. The fires spread to timber land and destroyed a number of buildings. Official losses were classified under national security since it was considered terrorist activity.

California passed a bill requiring bathing costumes must cover the elbows and knees on all public beaches and parks, and making the possession and use of still or video cameras on a public beach a misdemeanor.

Tennessee introduced a bill making it a misdemeanor to sit any object on top of the Holy Bible with a five hundred dollar fine.

New York faced a firestorm of public criticism for suggesting an ordinance that would prohibit sending children unescorted in an automated ground car. Parents protested such a law would leave them unable to work and send their children to school safely.

Detroit Michigan announced a new initiative to revitalize the city, noting the core population had stabilized at twenty-two thousand now for three years. The pressure to dig up the old underground utility feeds in abandoned areas for the scrap value was running into opposition from those who didn’t want lines of clear cut dug up through the state owned wooded zone between New Detroit and the suburbs. The scheme was branded as suburban greed by the city council, claiming the recovered funds would go to the state not the city.

Windsor still refused to reopen the bridge to Detroit. Citing lower costs and crime stats in isolation, the Federal government said it was a matter for the City and Ontario. The Canadian side still had a moat around the southern bridge pier and the approach road was torn up and turned into a park.

Little Jocko the Clown died and over a hundred mourners who attended his funeral in New Jersey wearing his face pattern were charged with copyright infringement by his agency.

The Holistic Open School in London proclaimed reading was an unnecessary skill given universal character recognition and audio reading programs in every pad and com unit and eliminated the requirement from all their base courses of study. It was retained in a select group of courses in the arts program described as ‘arcane’ skills and as an aid for the few incurable deaf.

Gold was briefly higher than Platinum in early trading on the New Delhi exchange. Americans could not own the metal unless it was jewelry of ‘artistic merit’. April wasn’t sure if the piece around her neck qualified. Artistic appreciation seemed to vary from judge to judge.

The America First Party said they had removed a number of new members on suspicion of being former Patriot Party members. They cited a loss of ideological purity the new influx would bring and a real danger of proximity to that failed organization either physically or in the taint their programs carried.

April agreed they should worry. She was going to speak with Heather about watching to make sure the Patriot party did not just reappear under a new name.

Gunny dragged out of – his room? Bob’s room? It wouldn’t matter soon if it was merged back into family cubic. He looked stunned and grumpy. April got up and started the coffee maker before he even asked.

“That bed is way too soft for me to sleep on,” Gunny complained. “I woke up feeling like I was being consumed by this giant amoebae,” he said with his hands doing an englobement.” I could sleep on the floor easier I think.”

“Oh, there’s a control on the side that lets you set firmness and keep the bed warmer or cooler than the rest of the room. Nobody thought to show it to you,” she apologized.

“Everybody knows…” Gunny said smiling. “Won’t be the last time that happens.”

“I’m going to meet Heather and Jeff for supper. You want to come meet them and eat with us?” she invited. “They are good people to know on Home.”

“I’d like to, yes. However this brings up an awkward question I should have anticipated. How many hours a day do I owe you? And how can they be staggered out? I don’t mind working a shift or a block in the morning and a block in the evening. But I’d rather not work late and then have to get up and start early without sufficient rest. Unless it is an emergency of course. And am I on duty any time I am with you? Or will we socialize too?”

“Why wouldn’t we socialize? We seemed to get along just fine on the boat. I mean, if you found out you don’t really care for my company I certainly won’t require you to be around me, but didn’t you do stuff with the people you worked with on Earth?”

“No, very rarely. In the military you have a command structure. It’s bad for discipline to blur those lines. Officers have separate mess and don’t socialize with someone too far away from their command level. Some units might have a picnic or something occasionally, but it’s a special event. It’s the same as in business. The CEO doesn’t have lunch with the janitor. And it’s always the higher rank guy who initiates and controls it, not the other way around.”

“I meet with a group Wednesday nights for exercise and we do Thai Chi. The head of security is usually there and Jeff, but we have construction crew and radio room guys too. I guess we don’t have as big a gap from the best jobs to the worst jobs here. There’s some social layering, but it isn’t just who makes the most.”

Gunny looked a little skeptical. “Yeah, you might belong to a gym, or belong to a bicycle riding club or something and never even know what some of the people do for a living. But the people tend to be from similar social strata. If they are upper class they are going to belong to a country club and play golf or a sportsman’s club and shoot skeet, not a bowling league.”

“Does that mean you’d rather not ride if we need a fourth for our polo team?” April asked.

“Heh, you had me for a second there,” Gunny admitted after a tiny hesitation.

“Do what you want tonight. You should have a couple days off really to acclimate and learn where everything is. If you want to meet Heather and Jeff you are welcome to come along.”

“Well, I have to eat anyway. Better with company than sitting in the cafeteria alone. I’ll get to see if this guy is really eight foot high with laser beams shooting out of his eyes.”

“You probably couldn’t sit long in the cafeteria before somebody was curious about you and asked to join you. But come on. We’re going to the beam dogs cafeteria at the other end. It’s quite a bit different. It caters to the short term workers, the young folks who work in vacuum.

“”Does my new card work there too?”

“Yeah, but you asked about customs. Custom is we don’t crowd the place when it is busy with actual workers near shift change. They need to eat and get to work or maybe eat and get to bed. But if you go a little off – time then everybody is welcome. I never thought of it when you asked because  we don’t have a lot of rules. One other I thought of – It is considered very poor form to wear strong scent of any kind. Sealed up in limited cubic it’s rude to impose on others.”

“Oh yeah. I’ve been stuck in an elevator with some old lady that just bathes in that crap. You like to faint away before your floor comes up and you can escape. That’s a good one.”

“Gunny, people raised up here, who have never had their sense of smell dulled by pollution have really sensitive noses. All my friends carry sanitary wipes and don’t just wipe with paper after using the toilet, they wash with a wet wipe. You might think on adapting it because they will smell you if you don’t. A lot of people shower mid-day too. I always shower if I go to the gym and work out or have a run.”

“Is there any limit on water use? Or is it metered and the charges will add up?”

“No, we can have as much water as we have power to distill it. They use a low pressure still so it’s cheap to recycle it. And they use a column separator to remove the other volatiles, so it is cleaner than most water you’d get down in the USNA.”

In that case I better take a quick shower before we go,” Gunny decided. “You need to tell me where to take my laundry too.”

And we’ll set the house lock to your hand on the way out too,” April promised.

* * *

         When Gunny stepped out of the elevator it was his first visit to the seven tenths G level. April had warned him so he was cautious. He walked a little normally, then tried breaking into a run, which was hard to do, and making quick turns. There was a real lack of traction when you were lighter.

The corridor was not as fancy as at the full G level, although it wasn’t industrial. They could smell the food as soon as they stepped out of the elevator and the music was a low beat. Gunny surprised her by dancing a skipping step ahead to the music. He moved lightly for a big guy. He spun around, totally adjusted to the lower G already, and had a grin like she hadn’t seen on him.

“That some good music,” he declared. “Is that the Arrogant Aardvarks?”

“I don’t know. I don’t really follow popular music. I tend to stuff that’s, uh, quieter.”

“There’s a time for quieter, but this makes you move.”

Heather and Jeff were at a table near the buffet table, There was a room to one end with a big screen and a little dance floor. The bar was in there, and the music. The other side had another room with smaller screens, lounge furniture and tables that was perfect for gaming and cards. In between was a self serve bar where you could make your own burgers or omelets.

Heather got up and hugged April. Gunny went ahead and introduced himself to Jeff and sat down opposite. April did manage to introduce Heather formally, and just patted Jeff on the arm.

“What are they serving today?” April asked.

“This week is Mexican/South American,” Jeff answered. “The chiles rellenos, the empanadas, and the feijoada are really good. The cheese and vegetable enchiladas  have nopales and diced tomatoes in them. The cook will make fresh gorditas for you if you ask.”

“Do you folks know those people?” Gunny asked with a slight nod. All three looked over at the loud bar, and a dozen people waved and one fellow stuck his fingers in his mouth and let off a whistle that would shatter glass. They all waved back so Gunny joined in not wanting to look stuck up or unfriendly.

“I don’t know any by name, but everybody knows April,” Heather said matter of fact. April blushed but she’d learned talking to Jelly that protesting was usually counterproductive.

A large fellow in subtle Tangerine shorts and a yellow silk t-shirt came over to their table with a tray. It had a large pitcher of dark beer and four glasses.

“Thanks for your service,” he directed to April. “This is Apogee Amber. We had a brewing house open in Home last week. I highly recommend it.”

He’d have left without pushing his company on them, but April asked his name.

“I’m Steve. I service pressure suits and hard shells too. I like to hang out with the folks who use them.” He had a playful cartoon dragon tattoo around one wrist and a colorful and very Japanese cluster of chrysanthemums around the other. “Join us later if you have a mind to,” he invited gesturing at the party room.

“Maybe, thanks for the offer, and the beer,” April told him.

“The natives hold you in high esteem,” Gunny observed pouring for them.

“Beats the last time we were here,” April noted. “We had a couple creeps steal our dinner, insult Heather and assault Jeff. I like this better.”

“Oh my, that is good stuff,” Heather agreed after a long sip.

“What, uh, was the ultimate outcome to that previous visit?” Gunny wondered.

“Oh, the cook came and read the riot act to the vacuum rats, the one flipped out and acted like he was going to lay hands on the cook and Jeff stepped between them and they did a little dance that involved broken bones. Before it could get really ugly Jon the Security Chief came in the door and Air Tasered the guy in the head. After medical got him treated and trussed him up they tagged him for expulsion to the slumball.”

Gunny looked at Jeff in a new light. He’d have to find out what sort of ‘dance’ that was.

They filled up plates off the steam table and Jeff put an order in for four gorditas. There was minimal talk until they were somewhat sated. The bartender delivered them another pitcher and informed them their money was no good here when they offered a card.

“So, what has happened while I was away,” April asked before hitting the buffet again.

“We almost had our first duel,” Heather informed her.

“Wow, over what? A bad business deal? A woman? I know the assembly allowed for it but I never expected to see one happen.”

“Do you know the goofy looking guy in supply named Albert?” Heather asked. “Albert Nielson? He is real lanky and looks like he cuts his own hair?”

“Sure, I’ve dealt with him to send you guys stuff in your regular deliveries. He makes weird jokes that don’t make any sense but he seems harmless. Certainly not violent.”

“Well, when it finally dawned on him that all the old USNA laws were gone and we have created very few laws of our own he suddenly realized there was no law against public nudity. Seems he was a fan of going to nude beaches when he was an Earthie and he decided he could do the same here. He showed up for lunch one day au naturel.”

“I wasn’t there thankfully, but Wanda told me Mr. Gidley who has two young daughters tried to talk to him about it and Nielson got all preachy about how healthy and natural it was and got kind of loud. Gidley just informed him he found it a matter of his honor to preserve the custom of clothing, and he didn’t intent to have to sit staring at his hairy butt while he tried to eat, so he could show up with weapons at the north terminal corridor in the morning and they would settle it or he could retract his stand on it and he’d let the matter pass.”

“What if he refused to meet him and still refused to cover up?” Gunny asked.

“The fourth assembly of Home, they talked about avoiding all the nuisance laws Earth has, spitting on the sidewalk, what you can do in your own cubic like bake cookies or run a business.”

“Stuff like showing ID and sleeping on the grass in a park, licensing dogs They all seem like a good idea, examined one at a time.” Heather explained, “but the cops can use them to make anybody they want to arrest a criminal instead of the original purpose. Especially the ones that are subjective like creating a public disturbance. Cops seem to be capable of seeing a disturbance easily if they have some reason not to like you. Collectively it gets to where it is impossible to live without breaking some law.”

“Yes,” Jeff agreed. “The same with consumer protection laws. Who can cut hair or be a private investigator or run a restaurant. Pretty soon they are just to keep the current businesses from any competition. They have laws that forbid companies from advertising their products are superior even though they are and can prove it. Laws about how many bugs are permitted in your breakfast cereal!”

“So, they decided not to get into those sort of laws, and the whole mess of libel and slander laws that have never worked. If somebody offends you then you have the right to call them out on it. You can demand satisfaction, and if somebody will neither satisfy you or meet you then the assembly of Home will expel them.”

“You said almost,” Gunny remembered. “How was it avoided?”

“Well, at first Albert told him not to be ridiculous, that he wasn’t about to fight him. When he was told to read the assembly record he scoffed at it. Gidley just repeated that he needed to meet him in the morning. He pointed out it was his choice of weapons, or if he brought nothing they’d go at it bare handed.”

“When he went and read the assembly record he realized he would be expelled if he didn’t back down or fight him. Push come to shove he called up Gidley before the morning and tried to apologize. Gidley said he wasn’t looking for an apology. He just wanted him to put some pants on in public and acknowledge the fact since it had become a public matter. Albert made up a very short text message saying in the matter between them about public nudity he was following the custom Gidley demanded rather than meet him to duel. He posted it to the com sent to ‘all’.”

“I’ve got mixed feelings about that,” Gunny admitted. “Sooner or later some nut job is going to kill the reasonable fellow we all feel is in the right.”

“Oh, absolutely,” Jeff agreed. “It’s just a question of whether this method ruins less lives than the myriad laws North America has. Certainly all those laws have hurt many people and even resulted in unjust deaths. Don’t you agree?”

Gunny thought on it before answering. “True. If it doesn’t work you can change it later. I suppose it’s too much to expect that once you start making laws you’d be, moderate.”

“There doesn’t appear to be any historical instance where it didn’t eventually run amuck, I’m sorry to say. Better not to start. You should read the debate yourself,” Jeff suggested.

“Oh, I will. I haven’t finished the second assembly video yet. I’ll get to them all.”

“You’re here to stay then?” Heather asked.

“I feel I got used down below. I’m wanted for arrest because I got caught between political factions. I may go down for business if it’s safe, but I’m done with the USNA to live there.”

The look on Jeff and Heather’s faces changed. There was some reserve that disappeared.

“Why don’t we take some dessert over and join the folks who brought us beer?” Gunny suggested. “I think they’d very much appreciate it if their heroine visited a bit.”

April snorted like it was a joke, but Heather and Jeff said, Yes, it would be polite.

Gunny it seemed, loved to dance. April wasn’t against the idea but had little experience. Jeff kindly showed her some steps and danced with Heather and a slim vacuum rat who looked like she wanted to eat him alive. He escaped however.

They ended up the three of them, April, Heather and Jeff at a table watching Gunny dance. Their novelty had worn off and everybody who wanted to meet April had. They had drinks in front of them with no idea who had bought them. Jeff tasted his and wasn’t sure what it was but slightly fruity and very strong. They nursed them slowly after all the beer.

“You remember you strongly suggested we start a bank before you went to Earth?” Jeff asked.

“Yes, have you had time to look into it? Does it seem practical?”

“You assigned me your Rock rights. They have been allowing folks to take their payout in kind. The fab shops have been taking iron to make steel and nickel. I got in early and grabbed us the rights to the platinum.” He reached in his pocket and got a disk and passed it to her.

It was smaller than the coin Papa-san Sato gave her on Earth. She’d been carrying that since he gave it to her, but hadn’t shown it to anyone. She fished the silver dollar  out and traded it silently to Jeff, who laughed in surprise she’d have such a thing.

The coin was heavier for its size. It had a deep relief but a heavy raised edge to protect it. The one side had an image of Home with the Rock trailing, closer than reality, the arch of the Earth behind them, and the Moon showing above it all.

She flipped it over and there were no graphics on the other side. It said System Trade Bank of Home – 25 grams Pt – 99.9999 Pure – One Solar.

“It’s money,” April exclaimed delighted. “But, Solar? Not EuroMarks or Dollars? Who is going to take it? Won’t its value go up and down with the price of platinum?”

“It depends on your viewpoint,” Jeff said. “I intend to deal honestly with people. If we are a known to be of good reputation, and if Earth governments keep treating people as disposable, well, it is possible people would regard the value of a dollar or EuroMark as going up or down against a Solar.”

April looked uncertain.

“Do you take Argentine money if you have a choice?” Jeff asked her.

“No way, and I’m not thrilled to take Brazilian or Macedonian either.”

“See? Money does have a reputation. You trade your own stocks don’t you?”

“I do, in a very limited way,” April admitted.

“You already have formed opinions about the markets then. May I suggest you take some economics courses? I’m not saying the things you learn will be right or wrong, but it matters what other people think makes the economy work.”

“After you have some ideas about economic theory then we can talk about how the bank will work. They haven’t separated enough platinum yet to matter, so this is just one of a few prototypes, but the bank exists not just on paper, but in reality enough it would be hard for people to try to stop us from having it now. We’re grandfathered in as they say.”

“So I’m part owner of a sort of a ghost bank that doesn’t have much yet in assets, but it will as they keep mining the Rock?”

“Exactly. And I’m already doing various small transactions so there is a record of the bank existing and forming contracts from several days ago. If I let out contracts to fabbers I use it.”

“Nice. Can I get a loan to buy some cubic?”

“The bank can loan you one Solar,” Jeff offered gravely. “Can you offer collateral?”

“How about an antique silver dollar?”

“A done deal. I’ll have your papers tomorrow. Perhaps you’d like to put some funds on account with us?” he asked very formally.

“Maybe. Let me talk to Eddie first and we’ll see,” April said remembering another worry. “I’m tired and I drank too much, she announced. “I need to go home, and it’s a long way back.”

“You stayed at our place before,” Heather reminded her. I’m ready to go home too. Drop a message at your family com and come stay. It’s pretty close.”

“Okay, I’m going to tell Gunny.” She waved him over.

“I’m not going home tonight. Can you find your way back yourself?”

“Sure, I know the way. But I might not make it back until tomorrow myself,” He went back to his dance before she could register surprise.

“Nice to see your man fitting in so well,” Heather said with a smirk.

Snippet – 2nd Chapter of “The Middle of Nowhere”

This is the third book in the “April” Series – “Down to Earth” being the second.

Chapter 2

The next morning when she got up it felt strange to be in her own room. Somehow it made her feel about eight years old. She showered and dressed, and when she went out Gunny was sitting watching the recording of the second assembly of Home. “You been up long?” she asked.

“Hours and hours. It’s been boring and I thought I’d go mad waiting.”

“Just got up, huh?”

“Yeah, just saw your mom before she took off. She explained something you should know. Part of the reason everybody was in such a jolly mood when we arrived. Last night when we were in Tonga, the Patriot Party made a big move and tried to pull a coup on Wiggen. They let them carry it out far enough to really nail down who were talkers and who seriously intended to overthrow the government. There were about seven hundred arrested and about three hundred killed. The Patriot Party is pretty much gutted. Word was getting out while we were on our way up in the shuttle. Most folks here figure you precipitated it with Harrison.”

“Does that change anything for you?”

“Not for the better! They were willing to allow me to be arrested if it helped them flush out all the bad guys. Never mind the danger to me or to you. That terminates my service. I gave them years of loyal service and they use me like a pawn. I’m done.”

“I don’t blame you, but wouldn’t it be smart to leave as gently as possible? You know they screwed you, but if you can leave and still get your retirement, sell your house, and feel free to go down there again openly…Well, I’ve heard living well is the best vengeance. If things get back to normal, and I can call Wiggen, I might even be able to put in a good word for you.”

“Amazing advise from a young lady who ends her disputes by orbital bombardment.”

“How about if we go get some breakfast. I think much better on a full belly.”

* * *

         Gunny declared the cafeteria breakfast ‘not bad’. April bought him the standard service plan and he got his own card. He could get anything on the menu as often as he wished. Any special orders or catering he had to pay upfront. Air and water she’d arrange off her pad.

April pointed out a number of characters and told a few stories about them. Nobody mobbed them but five different people stopped and welcomed her back. They walked out down the main business corridor and she pointed out the bank, employment agency, ship’s chandler and general store, as well as a shop new since she left offering bespoke clothing for men and women

“Is there a gun shop? I really need to buy something. Is that a problem?” he added.

“Nah, you want a laser?” April suggested. “I have to go get one from Jeff and explain I loaned mine out. I can try to get you a deal if you want.”

“As much as I’d like to try one out, I’d rather go with what I know right now.”

“In that case, Zach sells firearms,” she turned back to the Home Chandlery and Provision Company. “I remember seeing them on his special board.”

First think she did was buy Gunny spex and sign him up for com service. She figured she’d cover that as he might be on call. Then she let him see to his own pistol.

There were three pistols laying on the carpeted counter. Gunny wasn’t happy with any of them. Two were caseless Sigs and one was a Portio Custom Arms chambered for 10mm Hornady. He’d never carried that caliber before, but it looked like he was going to try it.

“What kind of ammo you stock in 10mm?”

“Full metal jacket for cheap target shooting, frangible copper rounds, special segmented defense rounds,  memory metal rounds, armor piercing and special hard core armor piercing.”

“A box of each and three of the cheap plinking stuff. I need a hanging holster and a lefty inside the waistband clip holster. You got a leather holster? I’d rather that than synthetic.”

“I do indeed. And I will throw in a free cleaning kit and a bottle of neatsfoot oil.”

Gunny tried his new card and was relieved when it worked. He loaded and holstered the new gun and clipped it inside his pants on the left, cross draw. The rest was bagged. He reached and touched hands lightly with Zack instead of shaking grounder style.

“Ah, another little custom thing,” April said, embarrassed she hadn’t told him.

“Yeah Mr. Muños taught me that one last night in the cafeteria. I think he’s going to be a friend. He impressed me. That feels better,” he said, pressing the pistol against his hip with his elbow.

They walked back home in companionable silence. “What is on the agenda for the day?” He finally asked when they were inside.

“I need to talk with my Grandpa about Bob’s businesses. I suppose Jeff and Heather next and Eddie Persico or the other way around if one is busy,” she prioritized. She put a call in to her com and waited. “And I need to get back with my Japanese study group and see if I learned anything visiting the Santos. I’m hoping my instructor thinks my accent is a little less horrible.”

“You’re still in school?” The idea seemed to surprise him.

“I don’t ever expect to not be in school. There’s too much to learn. I need a ticket for ground landing shuttles too, and I bet I’ll never get back to Hawaii before my student driver permit expires. I’ll have to start all over again,” she complained.

Gunny just horse snorted through his nose in amusement.

“Hello little gal,” her Grandpa greeted her on the com screen.

“Gramps when can we get together and talk?”

“Right now if want. I’m at home.”

“Yeah, please. Come on around.” His apartment was cut out of common cubic, like Bob’s, but it had its own door on the public corridor. It was a seven meter walk. He had the codes so he came right in a minute later. April introduced Gunny and he went off to the other side of the room and seemed to get engrossed in his pad. Gramps had a cheap portfolio, well stuffed.

“I know you’re probably wondering if this was something your brother did after your breakup with him. I think you will be happy to know he wrote a will leaving everything to you right after your first business venture together. Remember what that was?” He asked smiling.

“The  meal delivery service? Where we picked up a meal from the cafeteria and delivered it to peoples apartments? I was what? Nine years old?”

“No, even a little before that. I think you supplied the money again, because he’s spent all his and he took care of all the footwork.”

“Oh, the used clothing. He offered to buy clothing from tourists after they wore it. Why clean it or take it back to Earth when he’d give them more than the retail price for dirty and used? That worked pretty well didn’t it? Even though we got maybe two or three tourists a month back then. And he picked up the down leg luggage shipping it freed up cheap too.”

“It did,” her Gramps agreed. “It’s interesting, Bob sold the company off, but retained an interest. He was still getting a small income from it. He did that with almost every venture that succeeded. Individually they aren’t much but they add up to a nice little income. Here, there is a folder on each one, and notes about any obligations you have.” He gave her a short stack of hard copy and a memory chip.

“Then making me his heir wasn’t something he did in guilt. It gives me hope I didn’t cause his other – behaviors.”

“We’re all responsible for ourselves little gal. You can influence people, but blaming your behavior on others is a lie. Nobody made your brother selfish,” he insisted. “If you assign blame for what a person is then who made Eddie generous? See? If a person has good qualities people are happy to allow it is their own volition. In fact I imagine it was just plain inertia that you stayed his heir. It reflected his earlier personality, not lately.”

“I don’t understand why that happened. Mom and Dad or not selfish. You certainly aren’t selfish. He wasn’t raised that way so where did it come from?”

Her Gramps shrugged. “People are complicated. I’m not sure it is learned. There are all sorts of things folks do that we just put up with because they are not extreme enough to warrant intervention. Where do you draw the line? Pretty soon you are counseling people for taking the last biscuit.”

April remembered some fellows who rushed to hog all the stuff in the cafeteria, and saying something didn’t sound too extreme to her at all, but she didn’t say it.

“We gave Bob’s clothing and shoes and stuff we were sure you wouldn’t want to charity. Fred Folsom in station com who preaches a Sunday service keeps a locker of household things for folks who need a hand.” He explained.

“We saved this for you though,” he said opening the box he’d kept to last and laying the contents out on the couch between them.

A few memory modules were a mystery she’d have to explore, a food service card apparently he didn’t like to carry, A couple certification cards for environmental tech and some IT specialties. A couple hard prints of photos. The one on top was a girl on a beach. That must be her grandparent’s neighbor in Australia. Decency dictated she should be notified.

There was a short stack of business cards with a rubber band. The top one was blank with a hand written blurb, probably a password. It said – SAF)dz$PckXib.  Out of curiosity she checked and the other side was blank too. A tiny two bladed pen knife was sharp and apparently unused. It had elaborately embossed and enameled handles with a level of finish that said expensive. There was also a common multi-tool still new in the box.

Oddly there was a man’s tie, something she had never seen Bob wear. It was so different she could see why they saved it out of the clothing for her. Besides being a mystery. It was very pretty, with shades of blue and grey in a fine basket weave and subtle dark red edging to the grey parts, rolled to fit in a small clear box that was almost a cube. On the back a little label said, ‘Hermes – Paris and underneath that – SILK. She rolled it back up and fit it in the box again.

“I suspect these things were gifts,” her Gramps suggested.

That left a small decorative box. It had a sliding top in a dovetail grove, but no notch for your finger like most of that sort had. Fitted so closely it wouldn’t slip on its own. The grain was matched to the body so maybe they didn’t want to mar that. There was a band of carving around the sides and a very complicated dragon inlaid on each end. The inside was divided with thin wooden partitions.

There was a substantial rose gold chain. What they call an anchor chain but the links were puffy like they had been made out of dough and allowed to rise. There were some plain gold hoops, an impressive pair of simple diamond studs and the emerald and diamond earrings her grandparents had given Bob. April pulled those out and held them. She couldn’t help it, she started quietly sobbing.

“Those mean something to you,” he grandpa said, arm around her shoulders. She couldn’t answer she just nodded yes. She put them back in the box. The chain she put on over her head. Her Gramps held her until she stopped crying. Then they put everything back in the portfolio and  closed it up.

“I’ll read the business summaries in the next couple days,” April promised.

“They’ve been waiting, a couple more days isn’t going to matter,” he assured her. He went in the kitchen and made them tea without asking. He used the big tea pot and carried a cup to Gunny too who nodded his thanks.

“What are you going to do now?” her Gramps asked gently. He must think her fragile, April thought. He never used that hushed tone of voice.

“I have to see Heather and Jeff, she still has the Moon thing going on. Eddie deserves to hear what all his money bought. That looks a little better than it did yesterday. At least we know the Patriot party isn’t going to be in power next year. What are you doing now?”

“I’m helping Heather get her expedition ready as I promised you. Jeff and I are still working on some things even though we have the next generation of ship designed. We are saving up ideas for the next level of ship, and beyond. I’m getting some treatments from Jelly you were worried I’d skip. He can do everything important for life extension therapy without me going down to Italy. I’ll see you soon, Dear,” her Gramps promised and patted her knee. He got up and made a abbreviated wave of his hand to Gunny who wasn’t even looking up, and left.”

She took the personal items in her room and returned to the living area. It seemed rude to disappear and leave Gunny alone without a word. It wasn’t like having a guest,” she thought. But it wasn’t anything else that fit the rules of behavior she’d picked up either. She contacted Jeff and Heather and agreed to see them over supper. Gunny saved her from wondering what to do by announcing he was still not adjusted to Zulu time and he was going to take a nap. That sounded pretty good actually, so she said she would nap too.

Snippet – First chapter of “The Middle of Nowhere”

The Middle of Nowhere

By: Mackey Chandler

Third book in the “April” series.

Sequel to “Down to Earth”

       April was tired and a bit depressed. Her trip down to Earth was a failure. She hadn’t rescued the two lieutenants who had asked her to help them get to Home. She had certainly tweaked the Giant’s Nose as far as irritating North America. But she couldn’t see she had really improved anything about the USNA ignoring their treaty obligations with Home. She’d spent a great deal of Eddie’s money, but if it made war less likely as he was hoping she didn’t see how. His fortune was still at risk if whoever replaced President Wiggen wanted war with Home.

About the only thing she could claim to have accomplished for sure was Preston Harrison was not going to ride the Patriot Party ticket to the USNA Presidency. He’d tried to arrest her and she’d shot him dead for his trouble. Her Earth hosts the Santos intimated that might not have been the best PR move of all time. However the fool swore to her face he’d kill her family and nation as his first official act. What did he expect?

Whatever their private plans and opinions April doubted other candidates would make such a public threat if they ever intended to stand under an open sky again. She’d certainly be happy to put a smoking crater where any of them showed themselves. Harrison had certainly underestimated how difficult one young girl could be to drag off under arrest.

Things were sort of a mess. Her Earth hosts were unsafe to go back to their home and instead were going off to do her job and rescue the men she’d intended to extract. Her bodyguard was sitting in the other shuttle couch beside her, apparently betrayed by his own government, the same as the lieutenants. Mixed up in politics that didn’t concern him. Assigned by Wiggen it was true, but because she’d asked for him, and she felt responsible.

She had to sort out the businesses she’d inherited from her brother. She wasn’t even sure what all of them were and if he’d left anybody in charge running them. There was the real possibility some people would blame her for precipitating his apparent traitorous theft of the armed merchant Home Boy and the destruction of it in Lunar orbit while collaborating with the USNA.

Since she’d walked away from her interest in their courier business and left her share to him she certainly had not expected him to leave anything to her. She had bluntly made clear she didn’t approve of his business practices and had separated herself before going down to Earth. So why had he left everything to her? Why not their parents or her grandfather? A friend even, if he had one. Was it guilt?

Just about everyone she knew had a good reason to chew her out or blame her for things ending in such a muddled mess. She wasn’t looking forward to facing the music.

This was a freight shuttle, so it would dock at the north end. They wouldn’t go to the passenger dockage for two people. Not unless they were high end VIPs, and VIPs didn’t ride freight shuttles. To switch docks was another hour for the flight crew, a couple hundred bucks of propellant for maneuvering jets and an expensive hour on the shuttle airframe to move it. The north end was industrial and lacked carpet and bright colors and shops. There would be an unlocked com pad at the airlock with a camera and touch pad for crew. Jon might not even send security all the way up to the north hub for one person knowing both crew and she would direct them to check in.

“I don’t know much about Home,” Gunny spoke up from the other couch. “I mean I know about you, because I read your folder. That told me a little bit about Home, but otherwise I only know what I’ve seen on the news, and we know how reliable that is. Are there any customs I should be aware of to avoid offending people?”

“I’ve been thinking about my own problems so much I didn’t stop and think about what you need in practical terms. I have a bad habit of assuming everybody knows what I do and probably more. Look, I’m not sure who I’ll get you placed with. I have to look at the companies my brother left me. One of them may need you,” she assured him.

“Believe it or not we got an actual employment agency running before I came down. How about if you stay on as my bodyguard for a month? You hang out with me and I’ll try to explain things as they come up. You can read the recordings of the public meetings when Home was formed. Especially the few before the war will explain how we voted to break off with North America. You can meet people and get a feel for how things work. I have to go around and smooth things out with a whole lot of people. Don’t be surprised if some of them are angry with me. I didn’t get the basic things I intended to done on Earth and blew a bundle trying. But I don’t think anybody will be mad enough to hurt me. Guarding me shouldn’t be hazardous.”

“How much you paying, and where would I stay?”

“Say, a hundred-ten for the month plus basic cafeteria access and your air and water fees. The Holiday Inn is really expensive for a month. Let me see if the company still lets transients rent out space in the company barracks.

“A hundred-ten?”

“Yeah, thousand dollars, USNA, unless you insist on EuroMarks.”

“That seems, generous,” he said. So generous he was somewhat dubious.

“It won’t after your first hundred dollar t-shirt and you need to buy lunch off station and it’s a forty-five dollar cheeseburger and a fifteen buck beer with a ten buck tip.”

“I see,” Gunny said slightly stunned.

“If we hadn’t had the devaluation back the year before I was born think what it would be.”

“That’s of course easy for me to remember. My paycheck was suddenly one tenth what it was the month before. The prices didn’t all instantly adjust either. I kept a bunch of clean uncirculated notes figuring they would be worth more as collectibles in my lifetime rather than turn them in. I’m pleased I’m on the plus side of that deal already.”

“But if they were in your house or a bank box you might never recover them.”

“No, no. They are out in the piney woods. You have to dig down as far as my arm will reach  under a big old pine tree where you have to crawl under the branches. You get down there and you find a screw out cap. Then the stuff is on a line hanging down at the end of a three meter plastic pipe. There’s old money, some newer money, a few gold coins, and a spare pistol. I’m sure I’ll be able to recover it someday. I have the GPS coordinates memorized.”

“Kind of hard to do that on an orbital habitat.”

“Not at all. I can hide stuff on a ship or an aircraft. That’s one way I can earn my keep. I will teach you how to cache stuff so others don’t find it while I’m working for you. Perhaps there are a few other tricks an old man can teach you if you want.”

April was still processing the original question. “Gunny, we don’t have many customs different from North America, I can’t think of anything important, but I’m sure we’ll run into little things as you get settled in. But we do have a lot less laws. Don’t assume anything you see is illegal by ground side standards. You can let your minor child alone in your apartment, or let them go to the cafeteria unsupervised. They can be in public in short sleeves or even shorts. Marijuana and tobacco are legal to own and use, but it is against regulations to pollute the air or have an open flame in public spaces. And you can own and carry any crazy sort of weapon you want.”

“Burn in thirty seconds,” announced their pilot. After a very sort burn there were a couple minor taps on the attitude jets and the lurch of the grapples pulled them the final couple centimeters flush to the station with a >clunk<.

The number two passed through and opened the airlock hatches. The pilot waited at the hatch of the flight deck for them to exit before she’d leave her vessel. There was the slight pressure change when it opened and they had to swallow and force a yawn to get their ears to feel right. Neither had any carry on to deal with. April motioned Gunny ahead. He’d never been in zero G and she wanted to watch and help him. He was so big he sort of blocked the view, which is why she was to the outer door before she saw it was the tunnel for the south end passenger docks.

She grabbed the edge of the flange. “Why aren’t we up at the freight docks?” she asked their copilot. “You didn’t have to dock here for us.”

“We were told the north docks would create a problem. It isn’t set up to handle a crowd meeting the shuttle,” she explained.

Just then Gunny reached the end of the tube. It did have a line for newbies to go hand over hand. April heard a murmur of voices. She hurried after him without another word to the crewwoman. Where the tunnel opened up there was Jon manning the entry station himself, and here outside spin where they restricted access were her parents and Jeff and Heather, Ruby and Easy, Eddie, Doris, her Grandpa Happy, and a couple of Jon’s off duty people as well as a half dozen of the militia guys.

Around the entry bearing to spin there were folks elbow to elbow all around the rail looking through at them, and there was a banner strung beneath it that said, “Welcome Home April”. It was so long you had to watch it a full turn to read it all. The crowd noise indicated there were quite a few out of sight on the other side of the rail. She looked up there and most of them waved. What else could she do? She waved back. Then a dozen people all tried to hug her at once and she was squished. Somebody had her left hand and was patting the top. She couldn’t even see who it was so she just squeezed back.

She folded her arm over her ribs worried she’d get bumped but people were careful though they still reached to touch her hand.

Gunny had been signing in at the entry com before she’d looked up and waved. It didn’t look like she was going to get a chance to log in. She was more or less dragged along by both hands and elbows as the mass of friends and family all took off for the rim of the bearing like a bird flock. Somebody kindly grabbed her by the belt in back and pulled her over to the rail as they approached it.

She gave the rail a symbolic touch but there was no need to swing over it. More hands grabbed her patting back or arm or shoulder, whatever they could reach, urging her along and a succession of people most of whom she at least knew by sight hugged her.

The astonishing thing was the brief greetings spoken softly in her ears as she was passed along. “Good job, good job, welcome back.” – “You scared us. Damn Earthies.” – “Hated to see you on the slumball, but thanks for going.” – “‘Bout time you came Home.”

She had home and a bed in mind. They ended up at the cafeteria. A hand fell on her shoulder and a male voice asked what she wanted? “Coffee please,” she told the fellow, giving the hand a touch. Wasn’t he from maintenance? She wasn’t sure. The coffee when it came had whisky in it. Pretty good whisky by the taste of it. She didn’t object. Music started up and people started dancing on the other end of the room. The chairs all scooted down and one with Gunny was inserted next to her.

Somebody reached past and slid a plate unasked in front of April and then Gunny. They had a nice little steak and fresh rolls and butter. It didn’t take long before a cold shrimp plate and a sweet potato casserole and fruit salad got passed down the table to them.

Gunny had a glass of amber fluid, the same as hers minus the coffee. “I’ve never seen so many civilians with weapons,” he said in shock, “and all of them pissed off at you just like you warned me,” he said straight faced over the noise. “I’m moving. People want to talk to you,” he pointed out with folks reaching across his dinner and leaning out past him. He moved down to the end of the table but opposite so he could see her.

The chairs next to April kept changing owners. Eddie took too long talking to her and somebody grabbed his chair back and dragged him off into the crowd. The next chair was just slid down and it was her mom.

“I am so glad to see you,” April turned and hugged her as best she could sitting down. “I thought I’d just come home and get Dad to settle my hired man Gunny in and I could go to bed and sleep a shift. Do they still sell transient bunking down in the Animal House?”

“He’s your body-guard isn’t he?” her mom asked.

“Yeah, but I just have him on a thirty day contract. I imagine I’ll find him a slot somewhere else. I don’t really need him here,” she insisted. “He’s sort of another rescue. He got caught up in the politics for guarding me and they wanted to arrest him.”

“You should keep him close, not all the way across the station. We boxed all Bob’s stuff up for you, and gave away his clothing to charity, but the cubic is still partitioned off and there is still a bed in there. Why don’t you stick him in there?” her Mom offered.

“Wouldn’t that make you feel weird, having somebody in Bob’s room?”

“I’m not going to make it a shrine. Some folks leave everything like it was as if maybe the person will walk back in some day if they keep it the same. I’m sad, but that’s just sick.  I’m not in denial, Honey. I just haven’t got around to hiring out the remodeling to tear it out. Go ahead and use it. Even a hot bunk with a small locker is around two hundred-fifty a day in company housing. No reason to throw that away. Besides, if you have a body guard use him for now. The same people who would hurt you down on Earth might infiltrate somebody here.”

“Okay Mom, thanks.” April had worried. She thought her Mom favored Bob, just like she was sure she and her Dad were closer. But if she didn’t seem any warmer she didn’t seem any cooler either. That was a relief.

When Bob had gotten so selfish and driven he’d tried to take advantage of their parents. Her Dad had firmly resisted. April wasn’t sure if her Mom could have resisted without her Dad to quietly point out what was reasonable and not. She worried she’d be blamed for Bob’s actions, but so far nobody was looking daggers at her.

“I’m whipped. This is nice, but I need to get home and get some sleep.”

“Collect your man then and we’ll go home. These folks are all charged up and out of sync with your day by almost twelve hours. Let them party on and you can talk to them when you aren’t sleep deprived.”

April gave Gunny a ‘come on’ jerk of the head and he excused himself. It was Mr. Muños next to him. That was a good choice to find out a lot about Home in short order. But he had to be tired too. He could speak to him another day.

Making a book is easy – Hah!

Don’t you believe it for a minute.

I started out using MobiPocket Creator to make a file which the Amazon web site would convert into a Kindle book. It sort of worked.

Of course it looked like it was assembled by a typesetter on LSD. There were unexplained gaps and lines and indents…and sometimes what I wanted centered would be on the left margin. At one point all my hyphens showed up as solid black triangles.

Well it turned out a great deal of the trouble was I didn’t know how to use MS Word properly to produce a correct .doc file in the first place. I’m 64 years old and learned to type on a mechanical typewriter. It’s a miracle I could work around being deaf to learn to word process on a computer at all.

It certainly didn’t help that Word 2009 fights me tooth and nail in many ways. If you started any files before knowing you MUST have a .doc file to convert it will never forget you started that document without specifying a .doc file in your options. It will change back to a .docx file at every opportunity – even if you go in and change the default in the system registry. You must convert the document – reset the options to save as .doc and do a save as choosing .doc – three separate steps every time you save. It’s worse than Simon says. MS is evil because they know better than the customer what is good for him.

I really didn’t appreciate that the one book I bought made fun of elderly people for using the TAB function to indent paragraphs. But after taking the time and space to mock us he said it was not the purpose of his book to teach us how to use Word. He assumed (demanded) that we know how to use it properly in order to follow his instructions, although he obviously had cataloged a number of such common errors. He was above sharing them with us.

I now have a copy of the software caliber downloaded and I understand it will make an even cleaner file for Amazon to convert. Perhaps after I am done learning it I can get the page numbers for the table of contents over on the right side of the page where they belong.

I’m not sure – but I think those of you who have bought my books and found these terrible formatting errors can delete the copy in their Kindle and force a newer copy from your Manage my Kindle page. I’d appreciate your experience if you try that.

I very much appreciate all of you readers who looked beyond these faults to enjoy the story I had to tell. It is of great value to me if you will give me your thoughts and review my books on Amazon. – Thank you. – Mac’

April is FREE again Sat. 4/21

Help yourself please. I’ve updated the file on Amazon to make it much easier to read. I’ll post about that later tonight.

If you have an older copy of “April” you should be able to get the update by deleting and getting it again off your Manage my Kindle page.

“April” is a free download Sunday 4/8 on Kindle

No Fun at All – Mackey Chandler

Jeremy Kyle was hurting. He’d got a whipping from his uncle on top of the one from Billie Lee Osborne and a lecture about how the only way to deal with a bully was to stand your ground and fight them even if you got whipped. It rankled him that his uncle felt it his place to act like his daddy even if he was living under the man’s roof.

He was still heart broke that his daddy died going on a year ago now and instead of sympathy uncle Earl seemed to think everything gave him cause to ‘toughen’ the boy up. It was irritating as hell that his old uncle could still whoop his ass one handed when he was fourteen. With Billie Lee he stood a chance. That boy was just mean and didn’t have his full growth much more than Jeremy. Uncle Earl was a full head high over him and twice as wide. Years of felling trees and cutting lumber gave him a grip like a vise and massive shoulders and arms.

It didn’t seem like he’d ever grow out of his skinny long arms and legs. He had delicate long fingers his grandma said were meant to play piano, but with his ma and pa dead and living off the charity of relatives that was a joke. He didn’t know anybody that could afford a piano. He didn’t even know anybody who had a house big enough to fit one in.

Uncle Earl was agreeable that Jeremy might not win a fight. He admitted up front he’s got the bad end of a few over the years. He pointed out some fathers would give a boy a whipping for losing.  But he was absolutely firm that you had to give it a go. He wasn’t mad Jeremy lost. He was mad he tried to run.

“You watch all those nature shows on the TV,” he reminded him. “There two kinds of critters in this world. There’s the ones that get up in the morning and go looking for breakfast, and  there’s the ones that wake up and are looking over their shoulder scared before they ever take a morning piss, because they know they are breakfast. What do you call them?”

“Prey,” Jeremy supplied.

“Well if you want to be like that, looking over your shoulder and jumping at every little noise afraid all your life then keep running. Once you make a habit of that Billie Lee and all his kind will never give you any peace. They’ll go after anything running like a mean dog.”

“My teacher is just as likely to punish me as the guy making me fight,” Jeremy pointed out. “She and the district head don’t believe in self defense for anything. I’m going to have detentions or even get suspended if I leave a mark on Billie Lees face.”

“Miss Blanchard is paid by the government to come up here in the hills of Appalachia,” he said with a sarcastic twist. He never did like that word. “She’s set to teach us poor hillbillies about civilization like we was a bunch of heathen savages. That’s fine, you need all your letters and such you can get to live today. But this isn’t Cleveland and things don’t work in the hills like they do there and maybe never will. You do what’s by God right and I’ll stand by you with Miss Blanchard. If you get a suspension, well they got to let you come back. I spent a few days in jail when I was younger. If you aim to never upset nobody you’re gotta be a damn little mouse of a man.”

That was yesterday and it was good it was Friday. He had the weekend to get over being sore and he didn’t have to see Billie Lee again for a couple days. Billie was always all agitated about something. By Monday chances were he’d be on somebody else’s case. Miss Blanchard ground her teeth a lot dealing with Billie and said he was borderline something or the other that didn’t sound good. But she’d never lift a hand to him no matter how much trouble he stirred up.

He didn’t want to see uncle today either. He got a hunk of cornbread left over from yesterday and a candy bar he had saved in his dresser. He put a length of fishing line wound on a stick and a snuff tin of hooks and bobbers in his jeans. If he decided to fish he’d cut a pole wherever he happened to be.

His daddy had given him an old nine-shot .22 revolver before he died. Uncle had not taken that away. He actually felt better about Jeremy roaming around out in the woods if he took it. They just had another big talk like he’d had with his dad about responsibility and never, never, ever, taking it to school. That got tucked in his waist and some loose cartridges in his jeans pocket with the pocket knife and the few coins he had right now.

He had on his sneakers that were too ratty for school, with holes worn in the sides where they bend, his Tractor Supply Company t-shirt and a baseball hat that said DRB across the front. He had no idea what that stood for. It had been in the lost and found box at the diner forever so he’s rescued it. That’s where he’d got his sunglasses too.

* * *

            Diroc worried the last little bit of flesh off the bone and tossed it in the bushes. He had gobbled it down so fast he let out a mighty belch. Yorpac hadn’t been as thrilled with the deer as his partner. It had given them a good chase, and the pheromones it threw off in terror had been just lovely. He just didn’t care for the flavor. The People had excellent taste and sense of smell. He could taste too much of the bitter plants the deer had been eating in its flesh.

Still, this world might be worth claiming as a private hunting preserve. The People did not trade nor did they form alliances. They claimed worlds as private preserves and occasionally they found those who objected. About two thousand years ago they had found a race who objected so strenuously that six worlds of the People had been rendered uninhabitable. They now refrained from any expansion in that direction.

This world had a very heavy population of bipeds that looked like they really needed to be managed back to a more sustainable level. The People always saw to it that a race they owned was taken care of and properly managed and responsibly harvested. They probably would not be as fast as the deer they’d just run down, but maybe they’d taste better too.

The alien chemistry of the deer didn’t bother them at all. They had a digestive system that processed anything remotely organic with an efficiency that made a Death Angel mushroom a spicy garnish. Diroc had eaten a discarded plastic water bottle a few miles back and thought it had a pleasant texture even if it had little flavor. In fact the People sorted others into two groups, fun to eat, and impossible to digest due to owning Nova bombs.

Just another half hour and they’d come to a cluster of the bipeds and get a decent sample.

* * *

            Jeremy was deep in thought climbing the long familiar trail. He’d cut himself a good hiking staff from a downed maple tree. He’d eaten the cornbread and was saving the candy bar for later. He didn’t think he was done with Billie Lee and he was working himself up to a good snit. If he couldn’t punch his face in without getting blamed for defending himself then he needed to use his head. How could he give him a really memorable thumping and not leave a mark above the neck? Didn’t somebody tell him a piece of hose left no marks?

He looked up and there were two very strange creatures walking down the trail toward him side by side. They were sort of dog like, but big for a dog. The head and shoulders were kind of exaggerated like a male lion. They wore stuff, not clothing exactly, but a collar and a sort of harness around the shoulders and crazy as it seemed, what looked like safety glasses.

When they got real close they had a pink triangle of a nose like a cat, and they were both actively twitching. You didn’t have to be real smart to see they were not animals.

As they came down the trail well, here came a native, climbing to meet them. He should have been able to see them from far away but he didn’t slink away into the brush.

“Is he blind?” Diroc asked. “Why didn’t he take off when he saw us?”

“He’d have to be deaf too, not to hear you bellowing to me.”

“Maybe we look like some local animal. When he gets closer and realizes we’re different he’ll soil himself. Be ready for him to give us a good chase.”

“He’s awfully little,” Yorpac remarked critically. “The ones we saw from the ship were easily twice his size.”

When they got close they all stopped. Jeremy could not have reached out and touched them, but he could with the hiking staff. He was well inside their jumping distance, but he had no reference for comparison.

Now that he was close they looked very much like the paper mache lions  on each side of the entryway at the Thai restaurant in town. Sort of cartoonish. He wasn’t sure what business these weird creatures had in mind, but he could sure tell they were not from around here.

This was his country, his horizons kept him from thinking his planet, and his mountain, and sure as hell his trail. He had pretty well had all the back down and run knocked out of him yesterday so that option just never occurred to him.

“He doesn’t smell afraid,” Diroc said disappointed.

“No, no I think that’s anger, Yorpac agreed. It was actually more entertaining because Diroc was so out of his element with anything that didn’t flee.

“A little noise and a display of teeth will fix that,” Diroc assured him. He didn’t step closer but he leaned forward and opened his mouth wide and gave a mighty roar.

Jeremy smacked him right on that pink nose with the maple shaft so hard the last six inches busted off. He was – quick.

“Oh, oh, oh, I think he busted it.” He said holding his nose in both hands.

“Oh come on you big sissy. It isn’t even bleeding.”

Then the native did the damnest thing. He clearly motioned with his free hand for them to get out of his way.

“Of all the impudent…I’m going to just shoot this crazy biped. He’s obviously deranged. Probably driven out by his own kind to wonder the hills until he dies.” He drew his weapon and pointing at the sky he thumbed the charging bar with a chuh-chunk.

Jeremy had been taught responsibility for owning a pistol, but when somebody pulled a gun out and waved it around that was a direct threat. He pulled the .22 out of his waist and held it the same as the critter, and rolled the hammer back. The click, click, click was loud in the silent woods.

“I do believe that is a projectile weapon,” Yorpac cautioned his friend.

“It doesn’t look like much of one,” Diroc said. But he kept his gun pointed at the sky.

“I’ll have that engraved on your memorial plaque in your clan hall if you are wrong.”

“He smells really pissed off now,” Diroc noted.

“Uh-huh. Why don’t we just back up a bit?” he suggested sensibly.

After they had a little distance opened up Yorpac suggested, “How about if you turn around and holster your weapon? I’ll keep an eye on him.” When Dirac had done so Jeremy stuck his pistol back in his waist band.

Yorpac considered the conciliatory nature of that matching gesture and the distance they had opened up and turned away like his friend. Not without a certain itchy feeling at having his back to the native, even at a good long range for a hand weapon.

“I’m pretty sure that was an immature specimen of the locals,” Yorpac decided. Unsaid was if the kids were so hard case nasty and run around the woods armed what were the adults like?

“Yeah, they looked so promising from afar.”

“My vote is we write this one off,” Yorpac suggested. “It looks to be more trouble than it is worth.”

“Oh yeah, Diroc agreed. “The locals are just no damn fun at all!”

END

New book up – “Down to Earth”

April seems to make a habit of rescues. Now two lieutenants from the recent war appeal to her for help to reach Home. The secret they hold makes their escape doubtful. Her family and business associates all think that is a good idea. North America, the USNA, has been cheating in their treaty obligations and a public figure like April taking a very public vacation there would be a good way to remind them of their obligations. Wouldn’t it? Things get difficult enough just getting back Home is going to be a challenge. It’s a good thing she has some help. Why does everything have to be so complicated?

How it goes…

I ended up giving away over 5,000 copies of “Paper or Plastic?”

I also saw somebody returned a copy of “April” for refund. That’s the first that is ever happened. Upon investigating I found I had edited a typo somebody pointed out and when I submitted the new file it did not convert properly to Kindle. All the hyphens were solid black triangles. New lesson – view manuscript after any change no matter how minor.

What’s happening 3/31/2012

I’ve finished the sequel to “April”. It will be titled “Down to Earth” per beta reader Xander Opal. It has to have a little editing and it will go up as my fifth Kindle book.

The third book in the series is started and will be titled “The Middle of Nowhere”

“Paper or Plastic?” already has over a thousand free downloads the first day. – Make that 2k.

Free book 3/31-4/1 “Paper or Plastic?”

Paper or Plastic? was not the first book I wrote, but it was the first I published to Kindle.

It started because of a discussion in the AIM baenbarchat room on channel 5. It was remarked science fiction has exotic scenes of star ship bridges and exotic worlds, but few everyday places. So of course I had to write one that goes into a grocery store and other common places.

I have recently finished a sequel to my book “April” and it will be my fifth book on Kindle.

Sequel to “April” – second chapter

I’m well along on my sequel to April. I have not named it yet and no, May will not do. It has some necessary lead in material that any sequel needs to catch the reader up to date. It may be a spoiler if you have not read “April” so be warned if you don’t want to see spoilers.

The first chapter is a set up for further action in the book and not very interesting standing alone. That’s why I went on to the second chapter. As always any insights and comments are very welcome as long as they are slavishly positive fan boy raves.

Chapter 2

April carefully appraised the gentleman across from her. He looked older to her in the way she was coming to associate with Earthies. However she knew from her research yesterday he was only forty-two. On Home now the norm was to have life extension therapy or LET and start it as early as possible. That meant as soon as a person was firmly into adolescence for most doctors.

When it was new many people delayed for years because of the expense and fear of leading edge treatments, waiting to see how others fared before they committed themselves. But now it was cheap enough if you could afford to live above the atmosphere you should be able to buy life extension, and a whole generation of pioneers had grown from adolescence to adulthood carrying the basic elements of LET. There wasn’t enough data yet to show getting an early start had any great advantage, but that was the common assumption. There was enough data to show all the dire warnings about sudden gross mutation and raving madness were nonsense, mostly.

April’s parents first bought it for themselves. Obviously they needed it more, and still managed to afford it for her and her brother later. Only her grandfather was still visibly lacking the treatment and April was afraid to ask him why. She knew he had the money to buy it.

Below on Earth it was still priced beyond most of the middle class unless they devoted their whole means of living toward it. It was controversial and even outlawed some places. Oh, in absolute numbers there were a whole lot more North Americans with life extension treatments done on them than the whole population of Home, but they were a tiny fraction of the population down below, wealthy, and already keeping out of the public eye. The smart ones kept their status secret for their own safety, some politicians and media stars adding gray to their hair now instead of color.

Once looking older might have built confidence in a person because their face to the world declared this was a person with some experience in life. Now, on Home it was more likely to say – Here is someone that is poor and can’t afford to take care of himself or worst here is a religious nut who feels life extension is profane, a presumption to medically turn aside the stroke of heaven. Such a religious stand on LET was not exclusive to such groups as the Amish, but common to many who otherwise embraced a modern society.

Her breakfast companion was bald on top with a wreath of short gray hair reaching in a band around the back of his head from temple to temple. That was unusual because there were cheap treatments to fix that problem which didn’t involve LET at all. But it was a sure sign he had not started any life extension therapies or that little matter would have been cleared up and other small changes would have had him looking closer to thirty. She’d seen that happen with her father when he lost his little crow’s feet around his eyes and his skin smoothed out. Otherwise he seemed fit enough for someone who was in his forties, but not vain. He didn’t have on any makeup or tattoos either, and a simple bracelet was his only jewelry.

April had seen him a number of times in recent months having breakfast alone in the cafeteria. She made a habit of observing people here, and his behavior was consistently different than others. For one thing he always looked happy. Not the mindless happiness which some simple folk have or the false mask some devious people put on to beguile the unwary. He seemed to be genuinely satisfied with life every morning, poised and relaxed not rushing through his breakfast and jumping up to hurry off like some driven working people but savoring his food, reading the news off his pad or doing the same thing April did, watching the crowd and enjoying seeing the variety of people interacting. She was predisposed to like him before ever speaking with the man.

She’d been behind him in line before and heard him charming and chatting with her friend and favorite cook Ruby. He’d complimented her skill and gently flirted with her without being vulgar. She trusted Ruby as a judge of character and knew if Ruby had doubted the man’s sincerity she would have cut his banter right off.

Yesterday, the last time she saw him in line however something remarkable had happened which had taken all the casual out of her interest in him and sent her home to research his history as a priority over her planned business for the day.

It was a remarkable coincidence that she sat down and glanced up in time the witness the scene. The time window was literally seconds. There was a couple at the front and a secretary she knew worked in one of the offices here on the full gravity corridor next in line and the doctor at the end behind her. The woman had on Earth style business dress with those silly hard sole shoes they wear.

As they moved up someone had spilled something on the floor and as the woman stepped forward on it her heel slid forward, knee locked straight, going out from under her uncontrollably and she struggled to regain her balance long after the point recovery was hopeless. She jerked her tray back and up as she fell, and her silverware and full mug of coffee went sailing over her shoulder straight for the doctor.

April just happened to look up at that instant to see clearly what happened. His left hand shot out like a snake striking and gathered the tumbling utensils into his hand. Then, after they were snug in his palm he snagged the mug with an index finger through the handle. The coffee was a long brown splash still climbing in the air when he stepped out from under it like it was falling at lunar gravity instead of standard and reached out with his free right hand and cradled the falling woman’s head to soften her fall. He succeeded enough to keep her from sharply cracking the back of her head on the hard floor. Likely he saved her from serious injury.

April had been working out with Jon’s exercise group every Wednesday doing Tai Chi both unarmed and sword, and watched people of other disciplines working out. She knew the normal limits of reflex and training. She was certain the doctor had moved with greater speed than any normal human was capable of doing. He had not just swatted the items away but gathered them in a controlled manner that spoke of being so fast he had time to carefully observe the action and grasp all four objects with thought as to what he was doing. It had looked more like rehearsed stage magic than a spontaneous save. She replayed and replayed what she had seen in her mind again and still had a sense of awe.

Yesterday she found Dr. Ames had moved here soon after the hostilities ended with North America last year. He had gone on vacation to Hawaii and then just never returned to his tenured, secure position at the University of California Riverside. Instead he had lifted with a very small shipment of his most important belongings on a supply shuttle from Tonga. It was as slick a carefully planned defection as she had ever heard of anyone doing successfully from North America, and it was done with no public fuss.

She had no doubt if he could slip away that smoothly he probably got all his money out too. Financial restrictions were the biggest handle the USNA had on defectors. In fact the terms of surrender Home had imposed on North America last year addressed freedom to travel to Home but made no provision to force them to allow the transfer of assets for emigrants. It was up to people to be smart enough to do so themselves. That was a sort of unofficial intelligence test that kept the flood gates from opening for just anyone who wanted to emigrate.

She also was able to document online that the man was associated with the U of C Davis Veterinary program. That would have been regarded with suspicion down below. The inclusion of animal genome in humans was perhaps the touchiest legal aspect of genetic engineering in North America. If you tested for non-human code in your genome it was enough in North America to have your citizenship revoked and either be deported if you were naturalized or imprisoned if you were native born. So to even have a human geneticist associated with a veterinary school in North America was to invite an uncomfortable level of scrutiny from the government and religious groups. The slightest rumor or accusation invited the modern equivalent of a mob of villagers with torches and pitchforks storming the castle.

The name of the Agency regulating gene mods in North America said it all. The religious forces which had demanded its creation named it The Genetic Hygiene and Heritage Board. So you knew from the start promoting change was not what it was all about. Most USNA students insisting on a Genetics career track were in foreign schools by the time they were in graduate work and never returned to America to seek employment.

Italy was the country of choice for careers or treatment involving human gene mods, because China was still a strange and difficult place for a foreigner to live and work. China’s anything goes attitude was hard for even the most liberal genetic modification proponents to swallow. China didn’t even have an authority which considered the ethics of genetic manipulation so the only limit was each researcher’s conscience. At least Italy, having gone through one cycle of banning and then a moderate relaxation, had some concept of ethics. You might easily get your eye color altered in Italy but in China they wouldn’t balk if you wanted webbed fingers and toes.

Dr. Ames was named Gerald, and she had no idea what he went by or if he liked to be formal or casual. But the fact he had accepted her invitation to breakfast without insisting on knowing what she wanted to talk about or how she was acquainted with him was a good start. He was not an M.D. She thought – hoped – the company he had formed was aimed at offering genetic modifications if the title was any indication. After a year of independence the making of new law and custom was still proceeding with slow caution on Home. There was no legal basis for incorporation yet in Home law. There might not ever be as some were arguing for personal responsibility being more important than promoting a uniform environment to attract business to the habitat. Certainly there was no shortage of business coming to Home on their terms so far. So his business had to be a DBA unless he had some silent partners.

The name on his corridor door, and his business cards, one of which she had acquired, was Custom Tailored Genes. The name alone would get his office burned out in California. If he had sold genetic services here yet he was still keeping a low profile because nobody had bragged or complained about him yet on the business rating boards. That raised the interesting question of how he was supporting himself if he hadn’t sold any of his services. Home was an expensive place to live.

Dr. Ames had carefully inspected his silverware by eye and passed a small pad over the utensils and breakfast. She assumed he had a pad plug in which looked for pathogens, but he wasn’t as fussy as some Earthies who wore gloves or even masks in public. Of course some of the recent epidemics gave them cause to be cautious. Her own mom could be a bit of a clean freak when they went Earthside.

He had a substantial breakfast of waffles carefully brushed with butter and piled with fresh strawberries and blueberries and covered to excess with whipped cream, and an eggs and bacon plate to the side with orange juice, but paid attention to the waffles first. He wasn’t in any hurry to talk either, patiently waiting on April after a brief greeting.

“I do the same thing,” April told him nodding at the waffles. “If you don’t eat them fairly quickly they get all soggy and aren’t very good.”

“Yes the butter slows it down but you really have just a few minutes before they are all limp. When I came up here I wondered what the food would be like because I do enjoy eating so much. I was really getting tired of the pressure at the University to put on a public display of limiting consumption. Skipping a decent meal doesn’t really mean anything if there is no mechanism in place to let a starving person buy the food I just skipped. I knew having all the equipment and space to cook myself would probably not be practical. I have to say, I am very pleased with the service available on the standard monthly contract. Do you have a private kitchen available to use Miss Lewis?”

“Yes, not what an Earthie would consider a real kitchen but we have a two burner stove top and a small combination oven, as well as a coffee maker.”

“Then your family must have been fairly well to do to have room for that even before you gained notoriety last year for your part in the revolution.”

April blushed because she was already uncommonly conscious of the fact her family had a much bigger apartment than usual even before the war and the hostilities over the Rock had improved the family fortunes. Since then she had become much more publicly visible as a crew member of the Happy Lewis. Now there was no way to conceal her interest in Lewis Couriers and Singh Technologies. Her family’s partnership in the captured asteroid trailing Home in orbit, the Rock, hidden behind a corporate name before, was too well known now. It had been easy to turn such comments aside before by saying everybody on Mitsubishi 3 was relatively wealthy because it is so expensive to live here you have to be well off. But now her finances were so public it was impossible to shrug them off.

“My grandfather was among the riggers and beam dogs who constructed the station and he came from a family of working people who were all shrewd investors and savers. He put all his money in buying cubic here when it was speculative and undervalued. If he hadn’t acted boldly the family wouldn’t have had the financial base to buy into the Rock. We still own cubic outspin on the North end and we were one of only two families that didn’t throw their zero G cubic away cheap when the South hub cubic opened to the public for dockage. Everyone said, ‘Who is going to dock up North where there are no facilities?’ They didn’t see the industrial value.”

“And unlike some Earth families I’ve observed where the family fortune creates conservative caution in the second or third generation yours seems bold still, Miss Lewis.”

“Thank you, I hope so,” she agreed. “I haven’t seen the world carefully taking care of the shy and tentative I’m sorry to say. But if it doesn’t offend I wish you’d call me April. I’ve never felt like a Miss Lewis.”

“Well, I appreciate the offer. It sets my mind at ease.” He heaved a big sigh of relief from a tension she wasn’t aware was there. “It would please me to call you April, and honored if you would call me Jerry. Although if you eventually count me a friend you’ll find most call me Jelly.”

“How did you get such a name? You seem nicely trim and not Jelly-like at all.”

“Perhaps now, but when I was in school they didn’t have the meds they have now and I constantly struggled to keep an acceptable weight. I’m one of those unfortunate people who when they carry extra weight wear it as a soft disgusting spare tire right around the middle were it squishes over the belt. Not one of those flat sided solid fellows who look like a fireplug,” he illustrated with his hands, “On top of which I had a reputation for always having a pocket full of jelly beans and when I met friends I’d offer them a few so the name was an easy choice.”

“And why,” she asked genuinely puzzled, “would it be such a relief to be on a first name basis with me? A lot of people are very uncomfortable with such informality. I met a very nice Frenchman, a Msr. Broutin last year and he would agree to call me April, but he was more comfortable to be addressed formally himself. Using his given name made him feel as funny as Miss Lewis did me. But usually older people like formality and the younger ones don’t.”

“I was relieved because I was concerned perhaps you or your family disapproved of my business and this meeting was to tell me so. When I saw you were gene mod yourself I thought surely that couldn’t be, but then when you asked to be on a first name basis I know you wouldn’t extend that courtesy to someone you’re going to ask to leave.”

“Leave? Jerry, I have no authority at all to ask anyone to leave anything. Not even this table, certainly not Home if that’s what you meant. Banishment is the worst possible criminal punishment the people voted for so far. It’s reserved for those who we don’t want to live with anymore.”

He took the chance while she was talking to polish off the waffles and placed the platter of eggs and bacon on top of the empty dish.

“Well you may have no official authority,” he agreed, dusting the eggs heavily with black pepper. “But I’ve been generally informed that what the Lewis or Singh families want to happen generally does. When I came up here a few months ago everybody from the agent who rented me my cubic to the fellow who fibered up my data net said what a great place the habitat was, how the future was here and a man could do anything he could dream, and don’t piss the Lewis or the Singh clans off or they will flush you out the airlock in your boxer shorts and teach you to whistle without air,” he said, and went calmly back to his breakfast.

“Why would anyone think such a thing?” she argued indignantly. “I can’t think of one person these people have ever actually seen me harm. I mean, we did run down those troopers that invaded us from the Cincinnati, but they were invaders after all. Margaret had already blown half of them to hell and gone at the dock. She blew their shuttle folded over double. Now there’s a lady with whom to be very polite,” she advised him. “I helped Easy fry one outside the Holiday Inn, but Neil was the one who nailed the rest of them in the lobby with a homemade Claymore when we chased them in there. Jon’s crew and the Prentice family wiped out so many of them in the corridors I don’t even know if I ever did get a decent hit on anyone out there blasting away in the smoke and confusion. North corridor was just horrible – bullet holes and fires half way across the station and a trail of dead Earthies in breached armor. And it’s true Easy and I toasted the Pretty As Jade when we ambushed those two ships but I was sitting laser weapons board and had hardly even got a start on burning the James Kelly, just took their laser mast out, when Eddie put a missile in them and made ‘em confetti – made my contribution kinda moot.”

She stopped suddenly, stricken, realizing how counterproductive her testimony was, and sank her face in her hands in understanding for the first time. “Oh crap, I never stopped and really thought out what it all looked like before,” she admitted.

“Indeed, by the most amazing coincidence there does seem to be a history of expensive damage, death and destruction strewn closely behind when you get rolling. If it isn’t by your own hand you can’t blame people if they think you must at least be an inspiration to this crew who seem to run with you. I might point out, when your people got through with North America the best they could come up with for the Presidential succession was the Postmaster General. Most of us assumed the rest of them hadn’t gone into hiding to avoid taking the office. That took what? About a week? Speaking as one who has just recently come up, and I still maintain contacts below, they are still trying to hide from the public just how badly you pounded them. In military circles I believe the term is decapitation.”

“Yeah, well, I heard they stopped trying to dig into the bunker at Cheyenne Mountain and the Deepwell bunker they’re calling the Charleston bunker now on the news. The mountains are so broken up inside they shift and are too dangerous to open up. They’d have to work down from the top like a strip mine, and what’s the point anyway? Nobody is alive in there.”

“Hey,” she said, thinking back on what he said. “Who says I’m gene mode anyway?” She managed to sound a little indignant for the privacy issue, but her heart really wasn’t in it.

Jerry just lifted his chin and looked down his nose at her basic four thousand calorie breakfast with an expression that invited her to deny it.

“Well, yeah,” she admitted, defeated, and changed the subject quickly. “So, I have a couple questions for you but I really don’t mean to coerce you to answer them because I’m a Lewis. Just for me, not anything to do with Home or the militia. If you want to tell me it’s none of my business and to butt out it’s fine,” she assured him.

He took a sip of coffee and nodded his agreement for her to continue on those terms.

“You’re in the gene business but I notice you don’t try to pretty yourself up so the customers are impressed with how you look. I mean, for most people it’s a huge part of it. Maybe the most important part for some. They may want to live longer but if you gave them the choice between living longer and looking good I bet not a few would take the looks. So I’m wondering why? I saw you catch the lady’s stuff off her tray yesterday morning and I know you have to have some alterations to be so fast. It has to be a real advantage to be that quick. Is that something you’d sell?”

“Well, yes. I intend to offer a number of mods eventually but I’m rather cautious, waiting to see how the political landscape settles out here before I make myself too conspicuous. Eventually I’d like to attract business from off station, but if there is a sudden movement to restrict such things I’ll be in a very bad situation. I’ve cut myself off from North America and I’m not sure where else I’d be welcome. I’ll do some gene business eventually, but I’m not so broke I will worry about buying lunch for some time. I have some other small sources of income. You however make two who’ve noticed this mod,” he said with a grimace that briefly replaced his happy face.

“After I made the mistake of moving too quickly I went back up to get my bowl of oatmeal from your friend Ruby. She didn’t say anything to me, but when she turned around she held it and the little pitcher of cream on a saucer well up off of the counter and just let go of both of both and turned away. I have to say she is very fast herself for an unmodified person. She was turned fully, back to me before they had fallen very far. By the time I caught it without spilling anything she wasn’t even watching. I thought at first she was testing me, but on thinking it over she would have watched if it was a test. She was just telling me that she had noticed. I think that’s just how her sense of humor works.”

“Not much gets past Ruby. Her husband was our primary command pilot on the Happy when we rescued the Singhs. Among other things she is a Doctor and professor of Medieval European Music and has military experience.”

“She makes a wonderful Western omelet too,” he added.

“Sometime have her make you an asparagus and mushroom omelet with Monterey Jack

cheese,” she suggested.

Abruptly her expression altered and she changed the subject as a thought hit her. “I bet you would be one tough sucker to shoot wouldn’t you?” she asked, looking at him real hard. “You’d see the person reach their aim point and start to squeeze the trigger and – zip – you’d not be there to be drilled. It would actually be harder to shoot you up close. Better to stand off down a corridor and hose the whole hall down with a continuous beam.” She illustrated with a sweeping index finger.

He looked down at the finger of death sweeping over his breakfast with considerable apprehension. “April, believe me I understand and appreciate the survival traits you have. The same as you can appreciate a leopard in a nature video. But it’s harder to look up in a tree and admire one hanging off a branch looking down on you like it’s reading the luncheon menu. You are a lovely young woman and so dangerous you don’t look at someone and say ‘Can I take him?’ You progress directly to ‘How?’ But when you think about it you unconsciously shift your weight to the left and cup your hand, poised like you are thinking through the motions to draw and burn the life out of me. I really think you need to learn not to telegraph these things so I can enjoy my breakfast and not be sitting here considering ‘Could I possibly reach the door if I jump up to run, and zig – zag fast enough?’ it does not aid one’s digestion.”

“I’d think it would be more effective as fast as you are to close on me instead of run.”

“You flatter me,” he assured her, looked pointedly at the pebble textured handle sticking forward from her wide belt. “Whatever the handle is connected to I don’t want a close up experience with it.”

“The aikuchi? It’s a present from Genji Akira,” April said, touching the hilt lightly. “He sent it as a gift after he won the Publishers and Editors award with a piece which used some material about me. I suppose he was apologizing in a roundabout way that he didn’t ask permission to use his stringer’s pix of me. He indicated this was a proper mate to a couple pieces my grandfather gave me. He thought it a bit easier to carry than a tanto.”

“The Japanese writer? I didn’t even know he’d won something. Would you care for some more coffee?” he offered, getting up with his own empty cup.

“Please.”

When he returned he commented on the coffee, “Smells good.” He took the small pad he favored and passed it over the cups as he had done when he sat down. You couldn’t see the laser.

“You are checking for bacteria?” April inquired.

“Actually this one checks now for bacteria, viruses, drugs, poisons and pollutants.”

“Nice. I didn’t know they had gotten so much coverage in a pad plug-in. The coffee here is OK, but my friend Heather’s mom Sylvia Anderson has me to dinner now and then and she has me appreciating a much better sort of coffee. She serves a very mild roast which isn’t as bitter, and it’s the sort we buy now for our shipboard use. She’s one of the few people here who really get serious about cooking. I’ll introduce you if we get a chance. Now they have a real kitchen.”

“April. You mentioned a Msr. Broutin. You don’t seem the sort to drop names, but I have to ask, are you speaking of the Foreign Minister of France?”

“I don’t think so. I thought he was some sort of art broker. I meet him at the lady’s house I was speaking about, Sylvia, just before the war. From what he said over breakfast he was there to speak with my friend on behalf of the Treasurer of Lebanon. Nice middle aged fellow – spoke English with almost no accent, just sort of softly inflected. A handsome fellow with a bit of a pointy nose and a little patch of gray at each temple, and dressed like a million Euro. He had on one of those expensive handmade suits which hang just perfect around the collar,” she demonstrated stroking both hand like she was smoothing lapels down, “even when he sat, and the cuffs actually unbuttoned to fold back to wash. He had cuff links on I asked about and he made a present of them to me. I wear them all the time now. I should really get some more.”

“For the Treasurer of Lebanon? He seemed perplexed, tapping his pad. “Is this him?” he turned the little pad around and she had to look close to see the small screen.

“Well! I’ll be,” she was genuinely surprised, “it is him. He never mentioned he did any government work. But then why would he?” she shrugged. “He wasn’t here for them; he was doing his friend a favor.”

Jerry refrained from explaining how much some people delight in flaunting their position and power at every turn. He suspected she would be disdainful of such pettiness.

Jerry stopped talking for a bit to do a search and kept pecking at the pad while stuffing his face. After a bit he admitted, “Ah – my mistake really. He was appointed after he was up here, but quite soon after the whole mess last year, when the previous Minister was sacked.” His eyes narrowed slightly, and he looked at her. “You wouldn’t have had anything to do with that though would you?” he asked suspiciously.

“No not, uh, explicitly,” she denied automatically, and could see Jerry purse his lips at the qualifier. She wondered now if Broutin had turned the knowledge his visit gave him to some advantage. “He was nice. He warned me the North Americans would blockade us.” She wanted desperately to get away from discussing politics, and grasped for anything.

“The French have this cute custom of kissing,” she started to relate with a smile, remembering how he took her hand and brushed her knuckles with his lips, but when she looked at the expression on his face, she cut it off and said, “No, never mind. I can tell you think I’m making things up.”

“On the contrary I don’t think I’ve heard the half of it. How many other famous people do you know?” he asked directly.

“The most famous person I will ever know is Jeff Singh,” she said without hesitation.

He carefully considered how she phrased that and marked it as important to remember.

“A lot people have been trying to figure out if it is Heather Anderson, or if you are Jeff’s girl friend. Care to let me in on it so I have the straight stuff instead of rumor and gossip?”

“People shouldn’t worry about such things. I’m surprised they’re even interested. We’re all three business associates. Jeff and Heather worked together before me. But I know for a fact they both take anti-bonding medication so they don’t get distracted with romantic complications. But we’re all three bound together in a lot deeper way anyway.”

Our lives, our treasure, our honor, in friendship and loyalty, April thought silently with an inner surge of pride, remembering a toast, a solemn oath and an earnest hope for a nation that had come wonderfully true, but said nothing aloud. That story was way too private to share with anyone, even her grandpa. “If you look at the question, well, why shouldn’t we both be his friend?”

He wanted to say people don’t do that, but they do he knew, if not easily or often, and he’d feel stupid to say otherwise. Still, he thought it would be a rarity if they were close without conflict or deception. Anti-bonding meds or no he had seen even chaste same sex friendships destroyed over refusing to share a friend. The very expression best-friend was singular. Not best friends. Maybe a mate and a best friend? But he had also seen people drive away a spouse’s friends from before their marriage… He realized he had stopped chewing and frozen up all conflicted unable to answer her.

He suddenly wondered if that was why he hadn’t married, because he assumed it would limit whom he could have as friends. How could such a young girl make him ask such disturbing questions about himself? April saved him from answering that he had no idea by going on.

“So, how about your modification to reflexes, is it something I could buy?

“You know I’m not a Medical Doctor don’t you?” he asked carefully. “It’s one of the big reasons I’m here, because I can pursue what I’m interested in without being hampered by studies and regulations which would slow me down. Back on Earth I’d be old and dead before I could accomplish anything. So everything I do will be experimental and there will be risks which are unacceptable to North American law and regulation.”

“We’re results oriented here. You can’t be licensed because we don’t have such a thing yet. Don’t know if we ever will. You must feel this mod is safe or you wouldn’t be carrying it in your own body.”

“More than you can know,” he said, surprised at her perception. “The reason I don’t have many modifications is two-fold. One,” he said lifting a thumb in the European manner, “it was safer in North America to be visibly lacking in any life extension when my work was already suspect, and two,” he said lifting the index finger, “I plan to live a long time so I don’t want any modification done I am not sure I can undo later if something better came along. I’m in good shape and there’s no reason I can’t wait and let the technology mature another twenty years or so before I commit to any significant therapy. Since I’m not living down there I can be a little more liberal with minor treatments which show. When I knew I was defecting it was easy to convince myself to do this treatment because I reasoned it could help me if I were on the run. I’d be harder to capture, and much harder to shoot as you pointed out.”

“I researched you a bit. You were involved with veterinary. Does your treatment use animal genes? I don’t know how I’d feel about that, but I know a lot of people are squeamish about using them.”

“The reason behind the prejudice is people imagined because we don’t know what all the genes express, if we added cat genes say, which altered the eye, we might be adding an unknown change. We might change personality for example, and become a killer lacking in compassion like a cat with a mouse, and far less human. It’s sort of a modern version of the animist belief that you take on some of the qualities of the animal when you eat it. And it has its basis in the same error – not understanding in detail how the process works at a molecular level,”

“Now it is true, in the early days of gene mods, when we just looked for a marker, entire blocks of genes were moved to create a change when it was not understood how all the instructions in the block were expressed. That fear might have had some basis in reality then. But it would be a far greater risk something far less subtle would be expressed wrong, like a change in an enzyme or hormone which would cause the person to be sick or die. Especially when they could not control the insertion point with any accuracy. They created quite a few problems with that crude method including inducing cancers.”

“Now what I do is quite different. I find a model for faster reflexes and then create an entirely artificial gene with that information which causes your body to create the same sort of mechanisms but without ever taking an actual physical piece of genetic material from an animal and inserting it. There is no opportunity for extraneous instructions to be dragged along.”

“But doesn’t that accomplish the same thing?” April protested.

“Let me illustrate. Say your ship built here has a motor in the back with a stainless steel valve and you find out the Chinese have a valve made of titanium and it works a little better than yours. Now if you capture a Chinese ship and yank a valve out of it and adapt it to substitute for your original it’s fair to say your ship is part Chinese now isn’t it?”

April nodded in agreement.

“But if I hear that report and go back to the shop and tell them, ‘Make up some new valves to connect to our pipes, but make them out of titanium now. Change the dimensions or whatever you need to do in our design to take advantage of the new material so it works better but start from scratch with new materials.” Now, is the ship still part Chinese, or is it all Home?”

“It’s all Home but you aren’t as sure you are going to get what you want from the change if you didn’t understand why their valve is better. You may think it’s the material and it turns out it’s the shape of the innards or it how bolts on the pipe or something.”

“Right you are. And so you better have the guy doing it be someone who knows all about the different kinds of valves and why they work. If you don’t have someone like that better leave well enough alone. And there are still lots of poorly understood processes in the human body which we would be wiser to leave alone right now.” He looked in regret that all his plates were empty and salvaged one little fleck of whipped cream that had escaped on his finger and stuck it in his mouth.

“So, is there any down side to being faster?” she pressed to know.

“Oh yes, you are more likely to hurt yourself. It becomes much more important to stay in good shape with training. You might tear tissues or even break a bone if you act rashly without being conditioned. And as I found with Ruby if people become aware of your edge they tend to play tricks on you.”

“If you would consider treating me what do you need?”

“I’d need permission from your guardians,” he said, but stopped because she was shaking her head emphatically no.

“I’m a legal adult. You can check the public record. I have the honor of being the first person on Home voted their majority instead of attaining it at an arbitrary age.”

“I’d heard about that but I didn’t know anyone who had done it. When I meet someone how am I to know if they are a minor or an adult?”

“For business I’d check the public records. Really, even with a set age of majority we still needed documentation before because it was becoming difficult to judge a person’s age with LET. But most of the people here are adapting the social convention that adults wear weapons even if just symbolic ones like a Sikh’s sword might be a pin on his turban. So if you meet a young boy in the corridors and he has a knife on his belt chances are he’s an adult. You might think about doing it yourself. It’s getting to be people think you’re an Earthie if you aren’t carrying,” she teased.

“Then all I really need is a copy of your genome and a history of your in vitro modifications and your usual medical history. I’d still encourage you to discuss the change with a trusted mature friend. Do you have somebody who you’d trust their wisdom in the matter?”

“My grandfather will do fine. He’s extremely safety conscious.”

“You should also not take any anti-viral medications. I’m afraid you are going to have a mild cold for about three days and you’ll have to isolate yourself to avoid passing it to others. I have a counter infection but you’d put us in an awkward legal situation if you were negligent and carelessly changed someone’s genome who might nor welcome it. You also can’t take anything which compromises the immune system, and you must be absolutely sure not to get pregnant. I’m happy actually to have a famous client from an important family. So let’s keep my fee reasonable. Is fifty thousand EuroMarks good for you?”

“Sounds fine. I’m concerned though. Is the infection tailored to me? Is there any danger the infection would be fatal or damaging if someone got it off my laundry or by coming in my room?”

“No the carrier is a really mild corona virus which produces such mild symptoms many people aren’t even sure they have a cold. They may get a bit sniffly or feel tired. But people can get very upset if something is forced on them against their will, even through carelessness. And an accidental transmission might be to someone pregnant or immune deficient.

Are you developing other treatments?

“I will be continuing some studies with that goal. The delay right now is I have to buy lab services somewhere to have them run tests on mice. I’ll supervise remotely and send samples back and forth, but I’m already living in the back of my office cubic and I doubt that housekeeping would like me sharing it with twenty thousand white mice even if I could afford them here.”

“Any chance you could make a mod to help a person take higher acceleration?”

He didn’t hesitate long before shaking his head no. “You better look to an engineering solution on that. It’s way too complex for me to tackle at this stage.”

“Since you’ve had your treatment do you feel any faster? I mean does it alter your time sense? I’d hate to feel like everything around me was in slow motion and it would take forever to get through the day.”

“Funny you should ask that. I never thought of that possibility before I did this. It would have been a big shock if I’d felt such an effect. I feel like I always did but when I move I’m able to get there a little faster. It may look fast to you but it just feels natural to me. Slowed time sense is one of the unpleasant withdrawal effects of a number of addictions. So I do know it’s possible to induce it. In studying the matter I found out a few athletes are capable of basically the same level of performance I’ve induced but I could never get one to agree to allow me to take samples and do biopsies. I’d really like to have access to such a person someday.”

“I’ll mail you what you need. And the fee. Say, half now and the remainder on success?”

“Works for me,” he agreed. “Shake on it?” he offered across the table relaxed.

She grasped his hand firmly and smiled at him. There was just a moment’s awkward hesitation where she delayed letting go of his hand. Looking him eyeball to eyeball. He thought how she could have stopped him from pulling away if she wished, better reflexes or no. He could picture the dagger coming out in the other hand while the right held him trapped. It was a chilling thought which flashed on him unexpected.

As if to underscore it was a lesson she told him, “If you are going to be a spacer now we don’t shake. It doesn’t work in zero G so it’s better unlearned. Just touch your finger tips in the palm of my hand.” This time he reached up and her finger lightly brushed his palm at the same time he touched hers. It was a gentler custom, and so much safer too, he thought.

Find my books on Amazon

Search for:

Recent Posts

• About paper books…
• PDF and EPUB to be available
• Raw snippet Family Law 9
• Small snippet of Family Law 9
• Another short snippet of Family Law 9

Recent Comments

• Cian Hrolfr on About paper books…
• Cheryl Stepp on About paper books…
• Cian Hrolfr on About paper books…
• Edward Patterson on About paper books…
• Sarah on About paper books…

Archives

• February 2026
• December 2025
• October 2025
• September 2025
• August 2025
• July 2025
• May 2025
• April 2025
• March 2025
• February 2025
• December 2024
• October 2024
• September 2024
• July 2024
• May 2024
• March 2024
• February 2024
• January 2024
• December 2023
• November 2023
• October 2023
• September 2023
• August 2023
• July 2023
• June 2023
• May 2023
• March 2023
• February 2023
• December 2022
• September 2022
• August 2022
• May 2022
• April 2022
• December 2021
• November 2021
• October 2021
• September 2021
• August 2021
• June 2021
• May 2021
• April 2021
• March 2021
• February 2021
• January 2021
• December 2020
• November 2020
• October 2020
• September 2020
• August 2020
• June 2020
• April 2020
• March 2020
• January 2020
• December 2019
• October 2019
• September 2019
• August 2019
• July 2019
• June 2019
• May 2019
• April 2019
• March 2019
• February 2019
• January 2019
• November 2018
• October 2018
• September 2018
• August 2018
• July 2018
• June 2018
• May 2018
• April 2018
• March 2018
• February 2018
• January 2018
• December 2017
• November 2017
• October 2017
• September 2017
• August 2017
• July 2017
• May 2017
• April 2017
• March 2017
• February 2017
• January 2017
• December 2016
• November 2016
• October 2016
• September 2016
• August 2016
• July 2016
• June 2016
• May 2016
• April 2016
• March 2016
• February 2016
• January 2016
• December 2015
• November 2015
• October 2015
• September 2015
• August 2015
• July 2015
• June 2015
• May 2015
• April 2015
• March 2015
• February 2015
• January 2015
• December 2014
• November 2014
• October 2014
• September 2014
• August 2014
• July 2014
• June 2014
• May 2014
• April 2014
• March 2014
• February 2014
• January 2014
• December 2013
• November 2013
• October 2013
• September 2013
• August 2013
• July 2013
• June 2013
• May 2013
• April 2013
• March 2013
• February 2013
• January 2013
• December 2012
• November 2012
• October 2012
• September 2012
• August 2012
• July 2012
• June 2012
• May 2012
• April 2012
• March 2012
• February 2012
• January 2012
• December 2011
• November 2011

Categories

• -Snippets-
• > Gallery <
• Ramblings