The Circadia Chronicles: Omnibus: The Complete Colonization Sci-Fi Series

by Heather Heckadon

  Walking over the creek, past the supply hull, I came across the architectural team. They had tons of crew members helping them build what resembled actual townhouses. The contrast of the modern-looking milled wood against the untouched nature as a backdrop was sharp. I yelled to Ronald, “Looks good!” and gave a thumbs up. He returned the gesture, and began to walk towards me.

  “You really think it looks good?” he asked.

  “Oh yeah, they look even better than the houses from back home. They're beautiful!”

  “I have to tell you how we did it! It’s amazing. Of course you know we used the sawmill to saw the lumber. The lumber Circadia’s trees puts out is beautiful and strong, by the way. Then we sealed the wood with the resin from the largest trees here. The chem team said that the resin is highly flammable when wet, but when it’s dry, it seals just fine,” he said. “I’m pretty sure that’s how the little squirrel creatures survived. I think they froze into the resin in the trees. When they thawed, they came back. Resilient little things!" He shook his head back and forth and laughed a bit, then his eyes lit up. “I almost forgot the best part! See the windows in that house?” he said, pointing to the green glass.

  “Yeah, how did you do that? They surely didn’t let you bring glass up here, right?” I asked.

  “Well, no, of course not. We made our own!” His eyes kept growing wider. I worried they would pop out of their sockets. He was eager to continue his explanation. “Turns out, Circadia has a particular sand that consists primarily of silicon dioxide, like the sand on Earth. So all we had to do was make a kiln, and light that baby up!”

  “That’s amazing... but why is it green?” I asked.

  “Oh! That’s the iron. Back on Earth, there are ways to get it out but it’s pretty involved, and we kind of liked the green tint. What do you think?”

  “Oh, I love it. It feels modern, but rustic all at the same time!” I thought the glass was interesting, but I wasn’t quite as excited as Ronald, understandably. I did my best to show some enthusiasm anyway.

  “We did that before the panic about having more people on their way started, but I hope one day we can get back to it.”

  “Me too.”

  “Well, I better get to work! We have a lot more to do.” He waved goodbye as he walked up the hill.

  I waved back and carried on.

  The solar team worked quickly behind him, delivering power to the new houses. Darcy Mayhew, the lead physician, was all set up in a very large wattle and daub hut he had created to use as a clinic. He had been working out of his bag to do wellness checks on everyone, but it was nice to see him with an ‘establishment.’ The chem team had also set up a similar situation, and had their microscopes and containers out and ready to go. The space team, a.k.a our flight crew, had set up a station for communications and directions for other newcomers.

  Circadia was really starting to come together and grow.

  A WEEK LATER, I WAS helping the nutrition team gather supplies for the next meal when one of the girls from my crew came running through the creek towards the supply hull where we were dropping off our harvest from the day. “Aella! Aella, come quick!” she yelled.

  I immediately dropped everything in my hands and took off in a mad dash. My feet hit the ground hard through my strapped-up boots, until they were splashing wildly through the creek. I didn’t even know what was happening, but it must have been urgent for her to be yelling. When we reached the other side of the creek and came upon the field, she suddenly stopped at the edge. “Look!” she said, her hand pointed down to the ground. I didn’t even stop to catch my breath, and instead got down on the ground to quickly inspect further.

  It was a tiny green sprout from a soybean seed sticking up out of the soil. I wasn’t even mad that I had run across hell to see it. My heart melted and my eyes filled with tears of joy. We had done it. Really done it. Knowing that I was an expert in the field never mattered to me. It was always a surprise when the first sprout emerged. We had done it! We had planted a seed on Circadia, and it had grown.

  Late that night, I laid in my hut and listened to the fire crackle once again. The days were so warm on Circadia, but the nights were cool. It was a relief to warm my toes by the fire at night. I got out my notebooks and looked over the measurements and numbers about the soil tests and seed counts. The scientific aspect of my notes were wonderful, but I wanted to document how I was handling colonization. I put the pen to the paper. I thought about the day with a smile on my face, and then I heard footsteps just outside my hut. They seemed to pace back and forth, until finally coming closer.

  I looked up from underneath my blanket and saw Garrett peeking into my hut. “I would knock, but there’s not exactly a door,” he said apologetically.

  “Come on in,” I said. “Make sure you take your shoes off, though! I wouldn’t want any mud in my house.”

  He paused for a moment, then realized the joke and laughed. “Okay, Aella, I’ll do that.”

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “Just wanted to congratulate you,” he said, as he sat next to me on my makeshift cot, looking down at the fire.

  “On what?”

  “I heard you had your first sprout today. That’s a big deal, right?”

  “Yeah, but who told you?”

  He snorted and looked at me coyly. “Don’t you worry about that. I have my people.”

  I laughed with him. “So, what did you bring me?”

  “What?” he asked.

  “You know, as like a congratulatory gift, what did you bring me?”

  His face turned instantly red, “Oh...”

  “I’m just kidding. You should try it sometime,” I said. “And thank you.”

  He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair in what seemed like an attempt to hide embarrassment.

  “Sorry, I don’t get many visitors,” I said. “You'll have to excuse my manners. Would you like a drink?” I held up my jar of water for him.

  He took it. “Thank you, that would be great.”

  “So, how are you liking life here on Circadia?” I asked. “Missing home yet?”

  “Oh, ha. Nah, not really. I mean, I was kind of a big deal there, but this has opened my eyes. Everything is so different here. It’s nice. I do sometimes kinda miss home, though.”

  “Did you leave anyone behind? I heard you talking really quiet on the phone when we first got here,” I said.

  “Oh! No, I actually don’t really talk to anyone back home. Not much of a people person, I guess. I have a pretty big family, but we don’t talk much.”

  “So, who did you call?”

  “My dog-sitter.”

  “You’re kidding me, right?”

  His face went red as he rubbed the back of his head. “I wasn’t kidding when I said I wasn’t much of a people person. Why? Think I was talking to someone special?” His eyes tempted me to answer, but I denied him the satisfaction.

  “Why are you really here, Garrett?” I couldn’t help but be straightforward. I think I like Garrett. Really like him. Jane and Smith had found that they were closer friends than they had thought, and since I seemed to have a closeness with Garrett, they didn’t seem to talk to me as much. I wanted to know what was going on in Garrett’s head so badly.

  “Well, you’re forward, aren’t you?” he asked.

  “Yes, I am.”

  “If I’m being honest—holy shit, this is awkward—I can’t get you out of my head.” The words rushed out of his mouth. “I enjoy being around you, I guess. I like the way you make me feel when we talk, I—” He stumbled on his words. “I like watching you, even though you’re always covered in dirt. I like that we share secrets—like the critters in the woods. What did you call them? Skeeters? Scooters? Skr-“

  “Garrett, shut up,” I said before melding my mouth with his. I watched as his eyes shot open in shock, then slowly closed. I embraced the kiss as well, closing my eyes and feeling everything all at once. It was like everything I
didn’t know was even missing, was found. Somehow, Garrett made me feel safe and cozy. I snuggled in closer to him, and he wrapped his arms around me. When the kiss ended, we put our heads together and breathed heavily as though we were exhausted.

  “I, um... I didn’t come here for that,” he said. “I swear.” His cheeks glowed bright red.

  “Yes, you did. Don’t lie,” I teased.

  “All right, you caught me.” He laughed, and it was contagious. When he stopped, he said, “I should get back to my humble abode. I think it’s getting dark outside.”

  I thought for a moment, then in a hushed voice said, “Or you could just stay.” I don’t know if it was the feeling I got from the kiss, or the time spent away from Earth and any kind of social life, but I wanted him to stay.

  “I wouldn’t want to cause any trouble,” he said. His eyes were devious, as his lips approached mine again.

  “Why not?” I asked.

  THE NEXT MORNING, I woke up to Garrett Wells sleeping by the coals of the fire in my hut. It was surprising to see him lying there exposed. It was always so easy for me to get caught in the moment, but after a night’s rest, it was jarring. Had I really slept with him? I liked him, but didn’t imagine it would go that far.

  Sitting quietly against the fire-baked wall, I wrote in my journal about the times we’d had on Circadia, including the best, most recent event; the growth of the new sprout. They say that once you grow crops somewhere, you have officially colonized that place, which meant that we had officially colonized Circadia, and that was my goal. Now we had to sustain ourselves, and survive. I set my notebook down and moved towards Garrett.

  I shook his arm gently to wake him up. “Garrett. Garrett. Hey, good morning.”

  “Hey, good morning,” he said groggily.

  “Hey, you should probably get back to your hut and get cleaned up. We have work to do, you know. I have to go make sure the fields are hydrated and taken care of. I’m sure you have stuff to do, right?” I asked the last question to make the room not feel so awkward. It didn’t work.

  “Not really. You know, I’m a lunar astronomer—but this planet has no moons and Earth’s moon doesn’t have much effect on Circadia. So, I’m not really sure why I’m here. Maybe it was just so I would cause trouble for the TV show.” He shook his head in obvious disappointment. “Maybe I was for ‘just in case’ Earth’s moon affected Circadia. I don’t know.”

  He was visibly lost. I felt terrible for him but didn’t know what to say. “I’m sure you'll find something to do,” I offered.

  “Think I can go to work with you today? Maybe make up for the ‘farmer’ comment from Earth?”

  He was sincere in his offer, and I couldn’t refuse him. I hesitated for a moment. “Yeah, that would be fine. We can always use extra help.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  I prepared for the day as Garrett waited outside my hut. When I stepped out, his smile spanned across his face. “Ready?” he asked.

  “Ready if you are.” I bumped into his shoulder playfully as I walked past.

  We walked side-by-side over the creek and to the large fields. When we arrived, the crew was already working the ground, removing any flower weed that had sprouted, watering the rows of crops manually, and providing support to any plant that was having difficulty. Garrett and I watched from the edge.

  “You really have an operation going on here, huh?” he said.

  “Yeah, I really do. We do,” I said bashfully. “Today we are positioning and testing out the center pivot irrigation system! I am so excited. It will cut down on a lot of manual labor. I’m sure everyone else is excited, too.”

  “Can I help?” he asked.

  “Well, you can’t just stand around, right?” I gave him a smile and got to work.

  Together, with a group of about twenty-five people, we all pushed or pulled on the large metal bars to navigate it across the field. Once it was cleared through the field and brought to a place where it could be moved manually, we also cleared paths so that in the future it could move on its own with ease. The T-L pivot system I had requested provided manual movement by pumping the water through a hydraulic system. The hydraulic system continuously moved the outer wheels of the contraption to navigate across the field of crops.

  Hooking up the pump and hose to the center pivot irrigation system that led to the creek, we started the solar-powered pump with no success. I worried for a moment the solar team had wired something wrong, or that the small solar panels located on top had been sitting in the shade somehow. Then, with one last try, it fired up. It sounded like a lawn mower at first, until it worked itself into a purr. We could feel water flood the lines of the hose, but it wouldn’t go through the pipes of the waterer.

  It felt like all hope was lost, until Garrett unscrewed the hose from the pipe to discover a closure to prevent debris from entering the pipe. He removed this easily enough and hooked it back up securely. We heard the pipes fill with water, until it rained down from the sky onto the whole crew.

  We all celebrated, drenched in water.

  EVERY DAY AFTER THE center pivot irrigation system started, the crops seemed to grow half an inch overnight. The extra moisture in the rich soil of Circadia gave birth to enormous and abundant yields far quicker than any other crop grew on Earth. We were all amazed. When we realized how different crop seasons were on the new planet, we began to document growth rates and yields. The numbers were triple what we had previously seen anywhere else. Plants would grow inches overnight and yield the fruits of our labor rapidly. It was astounding to see the progression of the crops. Soon we would begin the harvest.

  The plan was to set back the first harvest in a cave that Jane had created while mining with the chem team. After the second harvest, everyone could harvest at their leisure when they needed it. Every once in a great while, the agricultural team would make a small harvest to store back in the cave. We began harvesting a month and a half after the first sprout. It was always in the back of our minds that it was a possibility that the planet could ‘shut down,’ and that we would need to have food stores for that.

  The unknown was exhausting. We didn’t know what caused the ‘shut down,’ or if it was even real. All we knew were rumors. If the rumors were true, how bad would it get? How long would it last? How often did it happen? The unrelenting questions plagued me at night, but I just tried to keep progressing. If it was going to happen, we would deal with it when it came—but I was hopeful the rumor was an exaggeration. It was obvious that the planet had gone dark recently, due to the hue of the trees, but it was possible extremists from Earth had blown it out of proportion. All I knew was that I was having a blast building, and I wasn’t going to stop.

  Harvesting was the fun part. Everyone on the planet pitched in. It was fun to pick the corn, collect the soybeans, and fill the baskets with wheat. The whole thing was done within a day, which was deemed ‘harvest day.’ The whole lot of us carried the harvest about a mile or two away from the field to the abandoned mining cave. The cavern provided a dry, cool place to store the crops so that they would keep longer. Shelves had been built by the architectural crew and prepared for us so we could organize. Four whole shelving units, including eight shelves about three feet deep, were filled with ears of corn and twelve large barrels filled with soybeans. Enormous baskets were lined to the brim with wheat to be processed. The community stood back in awe of the amount of food we had stored back.

  “This is amazing. Thank you, Aella,” Idris said to me.

  “It wasn’t all me, I promise you,” I said. Raising my hands and stepping out from the crowd, “It wasn’t me at all. It was all of you who made this possible. Thank you all so much for making this dream come true.” The echoing cave filled with a round of applause. There was hugging and crying. It was absolute bliss.

  Everyone celebrated that night with a larger-than-normal meal. It wasn’t a buffet, by any means, but the extra food was welcomed gratefully. A brilliantly bright salad with
fire-grilled rabbit and homemade salad dressing made from the root milk of one of the plants made for a delicious meal. A cobbler of Circadian berries came next, warm from the stone oven. The aroma of the melted berries mixed with the natural sugars to create a scent of pure ecstasy.

  The next day we received a call on the softphone. Idris addressed us all at lunchtime while we ate our fresh corn on the cob and rotisserie rabbit. “They just called, Earth that is, and they have launched their first group of civilians. Should be here in about five days. Their ships are not like what we had, so it will take a bit longer,” he said.

  “How many people are on the ship?” someone from the crowd asked. The collective group could be heard mumbling to their neighbor before he answered.

  He paused for a few moments, “There’s around five hundred on the ship.”

  Everyone was quiet. I could feel the panic that surrounded me. Garrett was sitting next to me and I could feel the sweat start to drip down his arm that touched mine. Jane, on the other side of me, began to breathe heavily.

  “Look. I get it, it’s a lot of people. We're prepared, though. We have enough housing and huts to keep a roof over everyone’s heads. The nutrition team has a handle on things, we have livestock that will be producing any day now, and the fields are yielding a harvest. We will be fine,” Idris said. “I know this is a huge change, but like we said, they will have to help and provide just like everyone else here. Don’t worry. We got this.” Idris winked at us and took a seat to finish his meal.

  The gathering area became so loud it was hard to hear myself think. Smith looked at me and asked, “What do you think about all this?”

  “We didn’t have a choice, Smith.”

  “Well, we kind of did,” he said.

  “Not really. I couldn’t live with myself. Could you?” I asked, and stared him down. I eased up a bit on my steely stare, and said, “The only thing I’m worried about is them not wanting to help.”