“Oooh, low blow,” Bill said. “Hurry up and put your stuff away. I’ll walk over with you.”
Jordan disappeared into his room and within minutes was back.
Because they were relatively close to headquarters, they were among the earliest to arrive. It was their first time in the building, never having had a reason to go there before, so they weren’t quite sure what to expect. What they saw was an open foyer, with oil paintings and large-format photographs on the wall showing various Explorers. There was a desk at the end of the foyer where an older Explorer sat. From what they could see, it wasn’t obvious she was a survivor of some incident. Knowing the Corps as they did, the two men suspected she probably had some type of traumatic disability that kept her desk-bound.
“Good morning,” she said, and then asked them if they were just off Zion. The two nodded, just as Mindy walked through the door.
“Mindy! How good to see you,” the receptionist said, standing up. As she came around the desk Bill could see her using a cane.
She and Mindy hugged, and then Mindy to Bill and Jordan. “Boys, this is Glenda Slater. Glenda, this here’s Bill Clark, one helluvan aerial survey specialist. The other is Jordan Washington, biologist, and all-around ground pounder.”
Glenda shook both their hands and congratulated them on a successful survey. Turning to Mindy, she said, “I’ll notify the Commandant your team is arriving. Why don’t you take the crew into the large conference room.” She left the group and walked down the hall and into the Commandant’s office.
While she was gone, others from the Zion team came into the building, including Meri, who sidled up next to Bill and took his hand. Bill realized it was the first time that they were going to be seeing the Commandant since the two had become lovers. No wonder she’s holding on for dear life, he thought.
Mindy directed the Explorers into a rather large conference room, big enough to handle all six crews. Soon all twenty-four were gathered in the room. Mindy told them it was tradition for the Commandant to welcome them back and then they would check in with Glenda to formalize arrival on base and taking leave.
Commandant Lewis came into the room trailed by Glenda and greeted the assembled crew. Spotting Meri, his face broke out into a huge smile. To the group, he said, “Welcome home! I’m certainly glad every one of you made it back alive, but I guess you can say I’m especially glad that a certain co-pilot made it back.” With that, he came over to her for a hug. She released Bill’s hand and hugged her father back.
After the hug, Lewis said, “Sorry, she’s the only one that gets a hug. But I sure am glad to see all of you.” He proceeded around the room shaking the hand of every Explorer. When he shook Bill’s hand, Bill could feel a sense of warmth and welcome coming off the Commander, like a father welcoming home his son. This made Bill think of his father, whom he had been corresponding with for the past several months, using old-fashioned paper letters.
While Lewis was welcoming them, Slater had pulled out several bottles of whiskey along with enough tumblers for all. Pouring two fingers of the liquid in each glass, she began handing them out. Bill wasn’t sure what the protocol was, but since nobody was drinking, he held on to his glass.
When everyone had a glass, Lewis raised his and said, “To you!” then took a sip. Bill was about to raise his glass, but nobody else did. Then Lewis said, “To the Corps,” and that’s when the veteran Explorers took a sip. Bill and the other new Explorers followed suit. Lewis made a final toast, “To absent companions” and drained his glass. The others did, too. Bill thought, Damn, I’m glad I took up drinking whiskey months ago. No way I would have been able to do this without choking on it.
Lewis then said, “As of now, you’re all on leave for thirty days. Check out with Glenda before leaving, and have fun. And, stay safe out there,” he finished with a chuckle.
As the others said their farewells and headed out the door, Meri and Bill hung back, with Meri still holding on to Bill’s hand.
Lewis took one look at them, then said with a grin, “So, looks like you two kind of hit it off, eh?”
Meri nodded. “Daddy, it’s gone way beyond hitting it off. We’re moving in together.”
Lewis looked at them sharply, then grinned again. “Hell, it took you long enough. I thought you’d move in together months ago after you spent the weekend at Lewis Landing.”
Holding out his hand to Bill he said, “Take good care of her.”
Meri let go of Bill’s hand, which allowed Bill to take the Commandant’s. After the two shook, Meri grabbed her father in a bear hug and said, “Thank you, Daddy.”
He asked the two what they were planning on doing.
Their first course of action was to get set up in housing together, then they were planning on spending their month off traveling the west coast of Ti’icham.
“We’re not sure what after that, but I’m sure somebody will work to keep us together,” Meri said, shamelessly batting her eyes at her father, who just laughed.
“Well, go get checked out and get your housing arranged. Will you have time to join an old man for supper any time soon?” he asked.
The two agreed, and after arranging a date and time to show up at the Commandant’s residence, they went to make their new living arrangements. Bill thought, It’s a good thing she knows what she’s doing, ‘cause I’m clueless.
22
Meri took them to the housing office, and twenty minutes later they were standing in the living room of their new living quarters, a small one-bedroom apartment in the family section of the base.
“Say, shouldn’t we be married if we’re going to be living here?” Bill blurted out.
“Well, that’s certainly the least romantic proposal I’ve ever heard of,” Meri said, crossing her arms over her chest and giving Bill a mock glare.
It was then that Bill realized what he had said, and Meri laughed at the look on his face. He tried to explain that it wasn’t a proposal, just an observation, but she wasn’t buying it.
“If you’re going to propose, then do it right!” she said. “In the meantime, let’s get our stuff and get moved in.”
The first thing they did was to set the biometric lock for the gun safe to operate for both of them. Since there was a lot of stuff to move, they had rented a small electric Kenji then went to Meri’s cabin for her belongings. Bill had been surprised to find out early in their relationship that she didn’t live at the Commandant’s, that it had been her idea to move out once she started training. “That way people won’t think that I’m the Commandant’s daughter. I’m just another Probie.”
Soon, all they owned was in the little apartment, which now looked even smaller. Fortunately, it had some basic furniture, but that was all. While the Corps supplied all housing necessities for new arrivals, it didn’t do so for those who moved out of their initial housing. They took the small truck to the base exchange to get some of the other essentials for living, such as pots, pans, cutlery, coffee pots, mugs, dinnerware, et cetera. And then to the commissary for some basic foods, but nothing that would spoil if left in the refrigerator. It was almost nightfall when they were finally finished unloading and putting everything away.
Rather than try to cook, they decided to have their first night back on Hayek at the old standby, the Cave Bear Cave. They dropped off the Kenji at the rental shop and walked to the Cave. Dinner consisted of stew and beer. While they had had plenty of stew during their survey, beer was another matter altogether. Very few ever drank the concentrated beer provided as their daily tot, eschewing it for whiskey or vodka. Bill enjoyed the feeling of carbonation in his nose when he took his first draught of the brown ale he had ordered.
The next couple of days were spent getting settled into their new digs. Along with getting organized, they had supper with the Commandant one evening. The two took turns describing their adventures and then told him about their plans to ride up and down the coast to see the sights and to spend a couple of days fishing for
chinook on the Nch'i-Wana. Bill couldn’t tell if the Commandant was happy or not that his only daughter was shacking up with a new kid, but he decided not to worry too much about it. It appeared that Lewis was accepting him as part of the family and that was good enough for him. Considering how much Bill had worried about “the Colonel’s” opinion before joining the Corps, this was quite the mindset change for him, one that he didn’t really notice had developed.
As they left the Commandant’s quarters, Meri gave her father a hug while Bill simply shook his hand.
By the third morning, the two were ready to take off, so they each packed a bag, grabbed their rifles, and headed off to the skytrain station to catch the maglev to Cascadia. Bill had looked at a map before they left, finding small cities in the same locations on Hayek as they were on Earth. He wasn’t sure if that was simply because the geography was ideal for trade, or if some underlying cultural desire was at play.
The maglev stopped in Tahoma, then headed south toward the small city of Multnomah, situated at the mouth of the Willamette River where it joined the Nch'i-Wana. As they traveled south, they saw a volcano with a large crater. Bill realized that he was looking at Mt. St. Helens, and asked Meri about it.
“Oh, Loowit. That erupted about forty years ago. Caused a bit of problem in Milton, I hear. What, with all the ash.”
Wow, Bill thought. Some things don’t change.
Multnomah, on the location of Earth’s Portland, was more a working city than a place for hipsters, but there were a few fishing guides who operated from the small city. Meri had contacted one of the guides the day before, so they were set to get out on the wide river and hopefully catch some fish.
And they did. Bill was amazed at the size of some of the salmon they caught, and after catching, and releasing, his third one, his arms were feeling like noodles. The two decided they would keep one salmon, the smallest, and share it with the guide. They took their portion to a restaurant located near the small boat dock and had it grilled on an alder plank. Bill was amazed at the amount of wildlife he saw, including dozens of bald eagles, flocks of swans, ducks, and geese. There were also flocks of birds so large that they created shadows as they flew overhead. In the water, he saw river otters near the banks and a small family of giant beavers near a suitably sized giant beaver lodge.
The backdrop for this experience was the cone-shaped mountain Wy’east, rising east of their location. Bill still couldn’t think of it as anything other than Mt. Hood.
The next morning, they were back on the maglev and Bill was getting, yet again, another education about his new home. He was glad to see all the wildlife but wondered how it was possible to feed people without displacing all the animals, as had been done over most of Earth. As the train slid south, he could see miles and miles of forest, with only a few farms located near small towns and cities along the maglev route. There was nothing that looked like the typical agribusiness he knew from drives up and down Interstate 5 back when he lived on Earth. Nor was the landscape marred by the high voltage electric towers he was used to seeing. It seemed most homes were powered with solar, wind, or both, and most towns had small nuclear reactors. Bill had asked Meri about the reactors and what they did with the spent fuel, learning that most of it was reprocessed and reused. What little spent fuel couldn’t be reprocessed was actually placed on another parallel planet, supposedly out of harm’s way. Bill wondered about that, and what exactly that meant, but didn’t push the issue.
They soon crossed the pass over the Klamath Mountains and entered the northern part of the long central valley of Yokut Canton. It was here they saw larger farms, but still, nothing that resembled agribusiness. A few short stops along the way where people boarded or disembarked, and soon they were entering the Ohlone Bay area, which Bill knew as the San Francisco Bay. While some things looked familiar, most did not. About the only things that were even remotely similar to his experiences from trips to the Bay Area before were the Golden Gate, without the bridge, and the two bigger islands in the bay, Alcatraz and Angel. Other than that, the bay looked bigger, more natural, and had far fewer humans. They spent a couple of days there, then down the coast again to some smaller settlements along the coast. Eventually, the two wound up near the tip of Baja California, where they lazed in the sun for a few days before making the trip north to Cascadia to visit the town of Squamish. The small town on the Salish Sea was where Bill remembered Vancouver, British Columbia, being. The mountains overlooking the town were just as beautiful and imposing as he remembered.
Finally, the two returned to Sacajawea Base to spend a few days at “home” where they spent some time salmon and steelhead fishing on the Naches and Yakima Rivers.
The Friday before their leave was up both received emails stating that they were to report for more training. Bill’s training was mostly refresher training on remote sensing platforms, mainly digital aerial imagery along with infrared sensing. Meri was going to spend more time in training on the S-1 Monarch as co-pilot, and both would be spending a day on navigation skills.
“Y’know,” Meri said after they had finished reading their emails, “they wouldn’t be putting us through this training unless they were planning on using us for an initial survey.”
Bill raised his eyebrows and felt a thrill course through his body. The ultimate survey! “That’d be awesome!”
A relaxing weekend spent in the apartment, around Milton for some non-essential shopping (”ooh, look at this rifle”), and supper with the Commandant, and the two were ready to report for training Monday morning.
23
Monday morning finally arrived, and Bill and Meri reported to their respective training modules. Bill was back in Room 204, this time with only two other Probies, one of whom was Kim Brown. All three wore uniforms, along with their primary survival equipment, but the major difference about them that stood out was that now all three wore a ribbon indicating that they had been on a survey.
Jim Merriman, Bill’s initial instructor/evaluator for GIS and remote sensing, was the same Explorer leading this training. After a brief welcome, he had the Probies go through some basic diagnostic testing to determine their depth of knowledge on the two main types of remote sensing platforms that they would be operating. While everyone knew the theory and how to convert the data into useful formats, only one person knew how to actually operate the equipment, and she was a graduate of Cascadia Technical Institute.
“Pretty much what I expected. Seems like this is never actually taught in schools on Earth,” Merriman said, shaking his head and looking at the two Earth-educated Explorers.
Merriman released the Hayek-educated Explorer to her next training module, signing her off as suitably trained. He then spent the next several hours working with Bill and Kim to bring them up to speed on the three main systems they would be using: digital aerial photography, near infra-red sensing, and far-infrared sensing.
“You’ve got two things you’re doing when you’re out there on a Monarch. First is getting imagery that can be used to create some basic maps for the secondary surveys, which you guys have already used. The second thing relates to our primary mission, which is to identify potential civilizations or human settlements, be they permanent or temporary.”
By lunchtime, the two were almost up to speed. Merriman wanted them back after lunch to ensure they had everything down cold. By mid-afternoon, he was sure they were familiar with the equipment and software. Rather than release them, though, he ran them through various scenarios until quitting time.
The following day Bill was assigned to refresh his navigation skills. This time, there were more Explorers in the class. While Bill had done some navigating on Zion, he didn’t have a lot of experience with old-fashioned navigational tools, such as the sextant. Most of his skills were with GPS, maps, and compasses. Once again, the Hayek-educated Explorers were much more familiar with the tools used on an initial survey, so after they passed the tests they were free to go. Bill, Kim, and a few other
s had to stay for more training. Bill was beginning to realize that, despite all the time already spent on Hayek and in the Corps, the education he had received wasn’t quite up to snuff. His consolation was that Kim, despite having a master’s degree, was in the same boat.
“There’s a reason we issue you chronographs,” the instructor said; “it’s so you know what time it is where you started. If you can figure out local noon, then you can calculate what your longitude is. The sextant will help you determine your latitude. That means you’ll be able to calculate, with some degree of accuracy, your location on the planet.“
The Explorers were taught how to use the sextant, and then how to determine local noon.
“It’s best if one person uses their chronograph to determine local time while the other keeps Alpha time. That way you know what the time was from where you took off and what the time is from where you’re at,” the instructor advised them. Alpha time was the time at Milton, the entry point for every survey gate. Twelve hundred Alpha meant it was noon in Milton.
He then showed them how to tell local noon using a stick in the ground. “The sun crossed the sky at 15 degrees every hour, so that’s one degree every four minutes. Put the stick in the ground, making sure it’s vertical. Then every minute put a tick mark in the dirt at the top of the shadow. The tick marks will eventually form an arc. The top of the arc is noon. Knowing that the tick marks represent one minute, you can calculate back how many minutes ago noon occurred. From there, you calculate the Alpha time and local time, which should be noon. So, if it’s zero eight hundred hours Alpha, and your watch is showing 1500 hours at local noon, how far east are you?”
Before Bill could even make the calculation, Kim raised her hand. The instructor nodded at her and she replied, “Seven hours, or seven twenty-fourths of the planet.”
“Exactly! Now, a planet consists of 360 degrees, a circle—well, sorta, but close enough for our purposes. So, how many degrees would that be?”
The Corps of Discovery Trilogy Box Set: Books 1-3: A multiverse series of alternate history Page 26