Bootstrap Colony

by Hechtl, Chris

  There were only thirty four large, and twenty two small cargo trailers left, as well as a half a dozen flatbeds. Most of the gear was not short term critical, things like textile mills, the autoclave, asphalt maker, kilns, helicopters, plane, and other gear were nice to have long term, but he could in theory live without them. Not that he intended to do so unless it was absolutely necessary. He hooked up the tractors and last fertilizer truck and headed off.

  It would have been nice to be able to tow something other than the small trailers with the hummers, but they just didn’t have the grunt. For the umpteenth time he felt that regret, then wryly snorted. “Split milk, split milk. What the hell am I going to DO with all that milk anyway, I don’t have the room?!”

  His hummer took the lead as they arrived at the Rex kill; warily he watched them as he crossed the field. The security AI beeped, warning him. “No shit Sherlock,” he commented dryly and then “Acknowledged.” To the AI. It beeped insistently again, and then his HUD built into the hummer came on and pointed to the nearby bushes. He squinted, and then pulled out the binoculars as the hummer slowly creeped along. “Well well, late dinner guests,” he observed. He flipped to IR, noted the raptor body.

  “Uninvited ones too,” he commented as the winds shifted and one of the Rexes looked up and bellowed a challenge. Caws answer it. “I think it is time to get out of dodge,” he commented. The Rex family was definitely agitated, flapping their arms, and clopping their mouths together with gunshot like cracks. “Yup, definitely time to get the hell out of dodge!” Mitch commented, feeling a thrill of fear as he accelerated past the fracas. His vehicles followed, dipping through the gully and then onward.

  Back at the base he parked and sighed. He had the tractors unload as close to the places he wanted the cargo pods as possible, and then sent them to refuel and park for the night. With that kill it might be a day, or even two days before the Rex family moved on. A little too dangerous to be driving by regularly, let alone let an unmanned unarmed vehicle drive by. He couldn't risk losing one. “Another damn delay,” he muttered, then sighed. He returned his attention to the wind farm.

  The robots had set up the parts in neat piles where he had indicated. One robot was almost finished driving the base of the last one into the ground. He took a look around, then shrugged and headed over to start putting parts together.

  The next day he throttled the urge to go check the Rex kill several times before giving in and sending the medium range UAV to check. A half hour later he got a beep, taking a look at the tablet he noted the snoozing Rex family, just as he had suspected. The carcass was torn apart, but there was still a good amount of meat left. Vulture like birds hovered overhead. A small bird like therapod darted in, the adults snort in annoyance then the juvenile chased after it. Mitch sighed and redirected the drone to return to base. “So much for that!” He sighed in annoyance as he turned to the chores.

  He knew he was in over his head, or at least starting to be. Dividing his time between the animals, construction, maintenance, and farm was too much, even for a twenty eight hour day. The thought made him snort and look over to the makeshift sundial. It had taken him a week of careful plotting to get the day straight, then an hour of programming to get the clocks in all the machinery reset. Fortunately he had planned for it, but the software patch designed to do the change all in one go had gone hinky, forcing him to manually reset a few clocks that had balked at the change. The tedious repetitive programming had been enough to drive him to distraction.

  There was still a lot to do, the farm machinery was on the sixth field, he still needed to get the pastures up, the fish tank needed cleaning again... the list went on and on. The second batch of tilapia had hatched the day before, a minor triumph, but one that again reminded him he was on borrowed time. He had only a few weeks to set up the various pumps, tanks, and ponds for them before they out grew the small tanks they were in. Fortunately they would still use their yolk sacks for another few days before needing feeding.

  Then of course there were the other various animal related chores, and building the base was a big headache. Constantly trying to balance power need with power available was also a headache. He couldn’t start on the walls, the fences or the cave interiors until he had more power and more TIME! The farm was going the best he could manage, fortunately the combine and farm equipment were mostly self sufficient and automated. Maintenance was a pain; the droids just didn’t have the reflexes and fine control to do small connections or to clean themselves when muck got into various joints or gears. Plants should be sprouting soon, they would need water. He rubbed his brow.

  He had relocated one of the cats and one dog to the mobile home after he had spotted a spider rat trying to sneak in. The damn things were everywhere now, six legged varmints, and four beady eyes. They stayed away from the cats and dogs, but were constantly in the animal feed or running through the herds, causing them to moo or neigh in fright.

  A few had been stomped; he had gleefully tossed them in with the cheetah. The cheetahs were another concern, constantly pacing in their cages. They needed outdoor space, placed to run as did many of his other animals. He sighed again.

  It always came back to the animals he mused. He tightened the last bolt and then stepped back, allowing the robot clearance to lift the shaft of the turbine and place it into the base. He connected the electrical line, then the bolts to the base. He watched as the robots played out the guy wires, then drive the stake ends into the ground. Then he shook his head and moved to the next one.

  Releasing the cats and dogs was not an option, with their limited gene pool and pregnant condition he couldn’t take a chance that one would be injured or killed. The idea of letting the cheetah loose was also disregarded. The wrench slipped and he skinned his knuckles. Swearing he checked it, then shook it as the skin smarted, reminding him to pay closer attention to what he was doing. He looked over the area, waiting for the pain to recede a little.

  A wall of cargo pods along both sides of the garage opening had framed it nicely. The wall to the north was for the animals, the wall to the south was for storage, and more animal corrals. As soon as he had the time he planned to pull solar panels off the tops of the crates and hook them to stands or lean them against blocks where they could get the most light. The way things were now many weren’t getting much power after seventeen hundred. In fact the ones closest to the wall were completely shaded after sixteen hundred and therefore only getting a trickle of ambient light... and therefore only generating a trickle of power. He'd have to move them.

  He finished the second turbine then turned to the third as the robot put it on the base. With these three wind turbines he should have enough power to better expand things. There were six other windmills; two of them were giants that would require concrete foundations before they could be erected.

  He was still a long way away from turned on the mainframe, but getting closer. Setting up the water turbines will be a major hassle he realized, and the potential for injury high. He now was dreading it.

  He had four portable waterwheel versions, already set up and chugging along under the falls. In fact they were producing a lot of his energy, almost too much for the little alternators to handle. Fortunately the windings were superconductors, so his concern was more for the metal shaft holding out under the load over anything overheating. Keeping the liquid nitrogen topped off was handled by the super conductive cable, its outer sheath acted as a hose, channeling the super cooled liquid around the cable, and up around the windings and then back to the small refrigerator unit. It was all self contained and therefore one less thing for him to have to worry about.

  The final turbine was completed as the sun began to set. He hurried the final connections, accidentally fumbling the bolts before getting things sorted out. The cabling was connected in the last ounce of light. He trudged to the motor home, sighing in contentment as the lights came on automatically. He could hear the turbines chuffing slightly in the light breeze,
he now had more power, and better yet, more power at night and during cloudy days, things were looking up.

  The next day he impatiently sent the UAV out before he turned to his morning chores. The Rex family was still stubbornly parked at the carcass, but the carcass was much smaller. He might luck out with them abandoning it later in the day as the sun rose over the horizon. If the Rex family waited too long the main herd would get too far away from them after all.

  He had directed the robots to clean the pens, now he replaced the gate with a more secure one, this one with vertical slats only twelve centimeters apart. He had the robots refresh the water and place empty crates inside on their sides, and then turned the dogs out into the first pen. They sniffed around for a bit, wrinkling their noses at the smell of the other animals. Tails were wagging and it didn't look like they could get out so he fed them then quickly and then left the pen and went on to the next chore.

  The sows grunted as he checked things over, the water was topped off, and feed was okay. The robot assigned to feeding and watering was only one pen ahead of him so he paused to check the stats from the windmills, then the water turbines and solar efficiency logged. He really needed to relocate many of the panels that were catching too much shade soon. One hundred thirty nine cargo pods were arranged as he had planned, and the spaces for the greenhouses had been plowed and leveled. The materials for each of the greenhouses were stacked beside each plot. The habitat domes were still packed, with the caves he decided he could do without them.

  He spent the day removing solar panels from the roofs of the cargo pods, a tedious task that the robots could not do without damaging them. They did transport them out to the solar field, propping them up with rocks and running a cable out to them. Having the robots run the lines made it much easier to make the connections. The afternoon check with the UAV showed the Rex family up, but not far away from the kill. The juvenile was rather impatient, being herded back to the pack by the rest of the adults. Birds and more scavengers had settled on the remains of the kill, the Rex’s were ignoring them, a clear sign they were about ready to move on.

  The next day he rushed through the chores as the UAV flew to the Rex kill site. Seeing that they were finally gone he grabbed a Bushmaster and headed out with the vehicles. He was cautious near the kill site; there were a few scavengers roaming about, but no sign of the Rex family. Moving on he arrived at the park. He had been worried about the park, he had only three robots on security, and they had limited access to power with only the thirty four cargo pods left. Most of what remained were on flatbeds, which lacked the large solar panel roofs of the cargo pods. He was pretty impatient hitching things up, accelerating a bit to get back to the base and turned around.

  An hour later he had arrived at the base, and set to work on a few chores while waiting on the arrival of the tractors. The automated dairy machine was almost full; he would need to do something with all that milk soon. He had the machinery to make dairy products, butter, cream, yogurt, cheese, etc, but lacked the time to set them up and figure out how to use them properly. He tapped the tank, filling a couple plastic containers and then draining them into the troughs for the hogs.

  The spider silk milk was a different story, that protein was not something he wanted to feed to animals. Fortunately it had a way to go before the tanks were full, maybe another day or two at the current rate of milking. He had to bump the priority up on setting up the protein straining module, that protein was just too valuable to dump.

  The tractors arrived with the loads, he watched as the helicopters were towed through the gate area. He had to redirect the tractors to an airstrip area; it had been on course to the garage. The garage area was pretty cluttered, the stacks of vehicle parts were bad enough, but the vehicles themselves really made a mess of things. He had six quads, two electric bikes; along with the five other hummers, fire truck, ambulance, construction vehicles, and the two disassembled dune buggies.

  He grabbed a sandwich, munching it as he unhitched the tractors and sent them to return to the park. If he was lucky he could get most of the gear in before it got dark. He rushed off to the hummer. The tractors were half way to the park when he passed them, warily he watched for predator sign, but not finding any he accelerated to the park and checked the perimeter.

  He hitched the first tractor as it arrived, getting it turned around and on its way just as the second arrived. By the final one he was tired and sore, but feeling good. He turned and froze, seeing a Rex looking directly at him from across the field. It was huge, thrumming quietly and one hell of a monster. He felt the trickle of fear, smelled his urine and knew real terror for the first time.

  One of the security robots, an ED-209 style robot stomped up. The Rex turned, staring, and then bellowed a challenge. It clopped its teeth together, and then thrashed the front arms. Knowing an attack was imminent Mitch cursed leaving the rifle in the truck just because he thought he was safe. A second Rex joined the first and he knew he was in serious danger. One was bad enough, but two were probably more than the robot could handle.

  He fumbled with the Bluetooth. “Security, flash bang ten meters in front of the Threat,” he muttered, trying to be quiet as he edged to the truck and dubious safety. The juvenile emerged from the bushes on the other side of the truck, making him freeze once more. The pop of the mortar made him close his eyes tightly. The flash was bright, the noise deafening. He opened his eyes to see the Rexes moving off, he assumed they were making noise, but his ears were still ringing.

  “Thank you Bob,” he muttered, glad Bob had added that feature to the robots. The Rex family was not happy but that was just too damn bad. He got into the hummer as the shakes hit, he shook for a moment, trying to take a deep breath and then sighed as the truck moved off down the trail on its own.

  Damn that was close. He vowed then and there to get the park emptied now. There were a few more loads to get, plus the robots. Fortunately he had designed the robots to hook onto the Hummers. He had left three cargo pods and the charging station behind since they had solar panels and could charge the robots in case he can’t make it back tonight.

  After that encounter he was still a little shook up he realized, gripping the steering wheel with what he recognized as a death grip. It was one thing to see a predator on a screen, another to see it in the theoretically safe confines of a vehicle, and quite another to be eye to eye with it, with nothing around you but open air. He wrinkled his nose. “Going to need a fresh set of pants... and clean underwear,” he muttered, voice slightly hysterical. “Probably going to need to clean the seat too,” he laughed and then sighed.

  He passed the lead tractor just as it was entering the final stretch before the gate. Getting out inside the perimeter, he felt the shakes return as his eyes darted nervously around but he jogged to the mobile home to change and try to force himself to focus. He wasn’t too keen on sending the rigs out again unguarded, but probably would have too he realized. He did a quick strip, then swabbed off with a towel and changed clothes. The hamper was over flowing once more, he bundled a load to toss them into the laundry machine.

  The tractor pulled up at its designated spot just as he exited. He ordered the hummer to the garage, and another to replace it. He hit the release for the brake cable, then the lights and finally the hitch. The tractor pulled forward, and suddenly the load leaned. Startled he jumped back, just as it settled forward and down with a thump, listing to the left side. “Damn,” he snarled.

  He warily approached, finding one of the front feet had sunken into a hole. “Great, gophers, just what I didn’t need.” A spider rat climbed out of the hole and up the leg of the flatbed. Swearing he swatted at it with his hat, then gave up and turned to the next truck. He checked the area before unhitching it, which wasted a little time. Enough for the third and fourth truck to enter the perimeter. Quickly he unhitched each, and then reluctantly sent all four out to the park. The fifth and sixth arrived almost together, he unhitched them and then piled into the
truck. He passed them after the exit the gate, and then sped up.

  Checking the perimeter security at the park, he was amused that the encounter with the Rexes was logged, but no other sign of them had been detected. If he could get in and out, he should be okay.

  This time he vowed to keep the rifle handy. The Bushmaster was a great rifle, easy to swap parts, folding stock, and modular, but it didn’t have the kill power he needed. He switched the Bushmaster for a Barrett. The rifle was a Barrett M107, but the fifty caliber rounds in the current clip were poison darts. If the massive hydrostatic shot didn't kill the animal the lethal poison would stop its heart and autonomic nervous system so it would suffocate. If it had a heart and nervous system that is.

  Topped off with distilled tropical cone snail venom, each round was guaranteed to drop a charging elephant with one prick in less than a second. He wasn’t too happy about having them, playing with poison was just asking for trouble, but having something that can drop a large animal that fast was just too useful to pass up.

  Bob had pointed out that the hydrostatic shock wave from a fifty caliber bullet would blow a hole through a Buick he could fit his hand through, but since he wasn’t sure if he could get clean kill shots, and wasn’t sure what he would run up against, he had ordered the poison darts as a precaution. When in doubt overkill.

  He had standard fifty caliber rounds for the M82 Barrett, but he was not sure they would drop an animal of that size with one shot. Besides, if he had kept the pistol, shot gun, or Bushmaster, it might have just made the Rex mad and its family too. He seriously didn't need to face a wounded predator nor its angry family. Wryly he smiled at the thought, and then put it away to focus on the surroundings.

  He had toyed with the idea of launching the micro UAV, but it didn’t have the range or sensor suite to do a good job. Besides, recovering it could be dangerous, just like that encounter with the raptors.