The sheriff and I lugged the man and woman to his carriage and heaved them into the back. The sheriff was none to gentle with the wounded fellow, and heedless of the woman's gender, flinging them as if they were sacks of grain. The sheriff took a closer look at the front of the shirt of the fellow I shot, then he rolled his eyes in my direction.
"You and I need to have a little talk tomorrow, so don't leave town."
I gave him a nod and a respectful "yes sir."
The women and I had hidden most of our weapons, as well as the ones we had confiscated, in our packed bedrolls before we rode into town. We wanted as few questions about our cover story as possible. The only weapon we had accessible was a small stunner Tonya had concealed at the small of her back. I had my pistols in my saddle bags that were draped over my shoulder, but it would have taken some effort to retrieve them. Thankfully, the sheriff did not seem overly concerned about checking us for weapons.
We only had a five or six minute wait before a young woman pulled up riding one of those pedal-less bicycles. The woman fit the mold of the typical female of the future; she was tall, slim, healthy and attractive. The only surprise value she held for me was the rich chocolate color of her skin. I had seen people of color around Paradise Valley, but most of them were lighter complexioned than this woman. The woman dismounted her conveyance, flipped down an arm to keep it upright, and walked over to me. She gave me a dazzling smile and stuck out her hand.
"Jeremiah Brock, I presume," she said as she gave my hand a firm shake. "I'm Deputy Minister Devers, but please call me Lucy."
I raised my eyebrows at her knowing my name, but it really did not shock me that much. From my first glimpse of New London, I could already see that these outlanders were not backwoods yokels.
Lucy dropped my hand and turned to my companions.
"I won a pile of credits, betting it was you two that the Pleiad sent. I swear Sonja, those councilors couldn't organize a picnic unless you were involved. I figured they'd send you also, Lawson, nothing but the best to keep an eye on their caveman."
Sonja was looking at Devers in shock.
"Councilor Bearclaw said you transferred up to the north power generating plant," Sonja said.
Lucy laughed and gave Sonja a hug.
"The council doesn't like to acknowledge defections, so they invent stories to explain people disappearing. You are going to see many familiar faces here. Now mount up and follow me, Liz is quite anxious to meet Mister Brock."
So much for sneaking in, eh?
Lucy led us through the neatly laid out streets until we reached the town square. We halted in front of a three story mansion done in the southern plantation style. The house with its columned portico would not have been out of place in Atlanta before the war. At the back of the house were a nice sized stable and a two acre paddock. Lucy led us to the barn and we quickly squared our mounts away. I was in a quandary about the weapons we had rolled up in our bedrolls. I was thinking of trying to hide them somehow, then gave up on the idea. Finally, I just asked Lucy.
"Lucy, I have some weapons in my gear that I brought from my time, and I have a more modern weapon I took from the man you called a Juicer. Do you have a place where I can secure them?"
Lucy did not seem surprised that I was armed. She shrugged and told me to bring them in with me, unloaded and rendered safe. I took out my pistols, broke open the action and removed the cylinders, and then I unloaded the stage gun. Tonya took out the beam rifle and removed a part from it. Lucy took the strange looking gun and looked it over.
"This is the third one of these that we've seen in the last six months. We had to start equipping our patrols with diffusion vests because of them. We need to find where they are coming from and how the juicers are reactivating them."
As soon as we walked onto the back porch, my world lurched again, just as it had in the cavern back in Wyoming. Only this time it wasn't a time machine that caused my disorientation. Instead, it was a petite, stunningly beautiful blonde woman with big royal blue eyes, who was standing in the doorway. She was wearing a simple long gingham dress buttoned high at the collar. Her figure was trim and compact. Her hair was cut in a short bob that framed her face. I stopped short, doffed my hat and bowed at the waist.
"Your Majesty," was all I could think of to say.
I guess it was enough though, because she gave me a dazzling smile and held out her tiny hand.
"Gallant as well as brave, you do not disappoint me, Mister Brock," she said.
Even her voice was perfect, I was smitten. As soon as I took her dainty hand in my big rough paw, I think she felt the same way, because her eyelashes fluttered and her nostrils flared. She reluctantly dropped my hand and stepped back away from me.
"So that part is true also. Miss Ferrens chose well. Are you hungry Mister Brock? We held supper for you in case you were."
My eyes lit up at that statement, because truth be known, I was hungry enough to gnaw on my boot.
"I could eat a bite or two if it was not too much trouble, Your Highness."
Tonya snorted and Sonja snickered.
"He'll eat anything that doesn't eat him first," Sonja said.
I tried to look at least a little bit offended, but the truth was the truth. The Queen of New England gave me another of those amazing smiles.
"Why don't you call me Liz, and I'll call you Jeremiah. We don't stand on ceremony here. And it will be a pleasure to dine with a man with a robust appetite. All the men I'm accustomed to eat like Sparrows."
We dropped the weapons on a table by the back door, then Liz and Lucy led us to a small and intimate dining room that reminded me a lot of the ones at Camille's place in Boulder. The five of us filled all the chairs except one. Liz sat at the head of the table and sat me to her right. Lucy sat to my right, while Tonya and Sonja sat across from me. As we were getting situated, I noticed that Lucy kept looking at me. Finally, I had to ask.
"What is the matter Lucy? Have I drooled on my shirt or something?"
Lucy's dusky skin actually tinged deep red, and she quickly looked away from me.
"I was just trying to gauge your reaction to being so close to a person of my color. I know you came from the south during the slave days."
I stared at her for a second and shrugged.
"That is all?" I asked. "For your information, my family was too poor and proud to own slaves. Matter of fact, I never even met a slave. I met some freed men and I did work with some Buffalo Soldiers once in Colorado. Oh, and I know a couple of Negro muleskinners. I met some good folks of color; they were Negro, Red Indians, Mexicans and Chinese; and I met some bad ones too. My Mama taught me it is that way with all of the Lord's children, so I judge them one at a time."
She looked at me strangely for a few heartbeats, and then stuck her hand out for me to shake.
"I hope you consider me one of the good people," she said with a smile.
I lifted her hand to my lips and gave her a look.
"I don't know about that yet, but you sure are a beautiful woman."
Yes, I was undoubtedly the suavest, most debonair, silver tongued muleskinner in 2525.
My little declaration broke the ice and made everyone laugh. Before another conversation could start, an older woman started bringing in the food. She was the first person I met here that appeared over forty. I only noted her relative age peripherally though, because most of my attention was on the platter of steaks she was toting. It seemed as if it had been a month of Sundays since I last had a steak. The woman sat the platter of steaks on the table and retreated back through the door she'd come through. Lucy jumped up and went with her. It took Lucy and the woman two more trips to bring out the rest of our meal.
When the last platter and bowl was on the table, Lucy returned to her seat and the older woman took the empty chair at the foot of the table. The meal was much like Sunday dinner at my family's home back in Cheyenne. The most noticeable difference was the food included for the two altered people (Lucy and Sonja). I stood up until the ladies were seated. Liz shot Lucy a grin when I did that.
"See Lucy, manners are not just some sort of archaic court protocol. They are a sign of respect that people used to show one another. And speaking of manners, I seem to have forgotten mine tonight. Everyone, this is Mary, my mother and the chef that prepared this excellent meal."
Liz went on to introduce her mother to each of us, then we dug into the food. I was putting a serious whooping on the big piece of beef that Mary slapped onto my plate and Tonya stayed with me, bite for bite. That woman could pack away the grub! Conversation swirled around the table as Sonja caught Liz and Lucy up on mutual friends and favorite places. Sonja even told Liz about me playing my fiddle at Pecos Pete's. In between medium rare bites of steak, I even agreed to play a couple of numbers for them later.
When the meal was finished, Liz wanted to talk to me privately, so Lucy and my women headed back to the barn to fetch our bags and lock up our weapons. I had to chuckle when the woman who the Pleiad said suffered from delusions of grandeur started clearing the table while we talked. It was even funnier when we both ended up in the kitchen, busting suds and scrubbing pans. As we worked, she confirmed much of what I suspected about this time period.
"Jeremiah, I am not some megalomaniac looking to dominate the world as Bearclaw and the Pleiad want you to believe. In fact, if this was not the only way I could think of to insure a future for mankind, I'd still be perfectly happy teaching history at the University. However, the fact is that if we don't make some serious changes, we are headed for extinction in a century or two.
"Regardless of what you've been told, going back in time to keep the dark times from happening isn't going to work. It won't work because time and history are not straight lines that you can alter the direction of. Instead, they are more like a funnel into which events are poured and out the tip squeezes the present.
"The minute we are living right now is the sum result of everything that has happened on the Earth for the last five billion years. Anything that we could change as a result of going back in time has already been accounted for. For instance, the Hawkingium Sonja and her team brought back from your time is a good example of that concept. Everyone was surprised that you all brought back so much of it, because in our history, only a small amount had been found at the site. That's because the scientist who discovered the site in the 1960s only found what Sonja and her team left behind.
Finally, traveling back in time would not stop the string of natural disasters that befell the Earth. Earthquakes, exploding volcanoes, drought, floods, cyclones and you name it, killed off two-thirds of the Earth's population. Volcanic ash and radio active dust clouds produced a two hundred year ice age that we still haven't recovered from. The polar ice cap has receded a couple of hundred miles, but still covers most of what was once Canada and northern Europe. With all that water locked in the ice cap, most of the Earth is still facing a severe drought. Only a narrow temperate zone consisting of the middle third of the Northern Hemisphere is inhabitable.
"I think the time program could be a greater benefit to us if we used it to change the future instead of trying to mess with the past. Bringing the Hawkingium forward proves that point. As a matter of fact, so does you being here.
"The time project is only a symptom of the larger problem, though. The big problem is the fragmentation of our social order, brought about by the males of the species opting out of our society. In only three generations, men removed themselves from being members of society, to being disinterested observers. By the forth generation, men had become a self-flagellating, monkish clique of know it alls, unconcerned about the future, and fixated on the past.
"At first, Homo Superior, as they so modestly call themselves, were exactly as advertised. For the first fifty years, we made amazing progress. The population increased by fifty percent and life expectancy rose above a hundred years of age. Cellular rejuvenation was perfected and the aging process was slowed by sixty percent. Then, about ninety years ago, the population stopped growing and for the last seventy-five years it has actually declined.
"I'm going to try to fix all that and secure a future on this planet for our race, Jeremiah. We might never rival the splendor of the golden era, but we will survive and flourish. We'll repopulate the Earth and be better stewards of it. We will do as people have done down through history, we'll make a better world for our children and our children's children."
When she finally wound down, she gave me a lopsided, embarrassed grin.
"Sorry, I am a little passionate about what I believe in," she said unnecessarily. "I told you all that because there is a big role for you to play here, if you are up to it."
I shrugged noncommittally. Liz had just neatly summed up all my misgivings about the future in one five minute lecture. I really didn't know what part I could play that would really help, and besides, Liz seemed as if she had a handle on things already. I acknowledged what she said without answering her and changed the subject.
"You seem to know a smart amount about what happens in Paradise Valley," I said.
"There are many women and more than a few men in the valley who share my beliefs. We are also plugged into the citizens' computer network. I have as many people working within the Valley as I have here in new London, including a couple on the council."
I was surprised she would reveal information like that. She knew I was here to arrest her at the council's request, yet she was not bothered by that fact in the least. Since she was in a sharing mood, I asked her another question.
"The council led me to believe that you outlanders were a bunch of exiles and criminals. How many of you are there anyway?"
Liz laughed and replied, "I suppose in their eyes we are, although I think only about six people have been exiled in the last twenty-five years. Most of the people here left the valley or one of the other city/states because they wanted something better than trying to relive the past. Their city councils try hard to marginalize and ignore us, which suits our purposes fine for the time being.
"When I joined the exodus, there were already three towns the size of New London and several smaller settlements. I simply helped organize them into one government. We have a population of close to twenty thousand, including over three thousand children. We control all the land between Paradise Valley and the City/State of Casadega, ninety miles to our east, and we expand that area almost daily. Right this minute, we have survey and exploration parties scouting in every direction."
I smiled at that statement because it fit my wanderlust. We were quiet, both lost in our thoughts as we finished cleaning up the kitchen. Before we rejoined my women and Lucy, Liz grabbed my hand and looked me in the eye.
"I shared a lot of information with you, Jeremiah, which I'd like to stay between the two of us. You can go anywhere you want here and ask all the questions you wish; we have absolutely nothing to hide from you. Your lady friends, especially Sonja, are a different story. I'd like to spend more time with you, but it will be catch as catch can around my other duties. Lucy will stay with you and act as your guide."
We parted ways with Liz giving me a hug and a kiss on the cheek. She said she had a few things to attend, and that she would see me on the morrow. She pointed me in the direction of the stairs and said my suite was on the second floor to the left of the stairway. Liz had sure given me some things to chew over. I wandered upstairs and found our room on the first try.
The suite we were in was as nice as Sonja's apartment in Paradise Valley. We had a sitting room with a fire place and a large bedroom with one of the ubiquitous giant beds in it. Sonja and Tonya were sitting on the davenport talking, when I slipped in the door. They jumped up and hugged me, then dragged me down onto the sofa. Both women were astounded by what they had seen.
"This place and these people are not in the least what I expected to find out here!" It is amazing what Liz has accomplished in only seven years. She is a much greater threat than the Pleiad ever imagined." Sonja exclaimed.
Tonya shook her head in disagreement.
"How is she a threat to us? All she has done is take what we don't want anyway. It is obvious that those 'Juicer' creatures are the ones that attacked the farm, so she is even innocent of what we came to arrest her for," Tonya said.
Sonja was not ready to concede that point.
"The Juicers may be working for her, or they could even be her creations. As far as being no threat to us, look around you. These people do not share our values or concerns. What if they turn their attention towards capturing what we have?" Sonja argued.
They both turned to me then and Tonya asked what I thought. I chose my words carefully.
"I think that I need to find out more of what's going on here before I decide anything. Lucy is going to show us around tomorrow, so I will have an opportunity to speak with some regular folks. Plus, I have to meet with the Sheriff tomorrow. Maybe I can find out if there is some connection with the Juicers if we talk lawman to lawman."
"It's all a facade," Sonja sniffed haughtily, "she even has the cheek to establish her own laws and hire someone to enforce them."
Sonja was all for leaving first thing the following morning so she could report to the Pleiad, but Tonya and I nixed leaving for at least a couple of days.
"Think about it Sonja, the longer we stay, the more information you can gather," I said reasonably.
It was my hope that Sonja would view Liz and her folks in a better light if she was exposed to them for a few days. In the end, she reluctantly conceded me the point. Looking back on that conversation, I should have known that she was just humoring me, but I was too intent on spending more time here to notice. So, I bear much of the responsibility for what happened to her and Tonya.
After our discussion, we all took showers and tumbled into bed. Even though the night was young, we were too tired from the excitement of the last two days for anything except sleep.
I woke up the next morning ready to see more of New London and eagerly looking forward to seeing Liz again. The women slept through me doing my duties in the bathroom and dressing, so I slipped out of the room without awakening them. The smell of coffee drew me to the kitchen like a magnet. Mary Smith, Liz's mother, was the only person besides me stirring. She gave me a sweet, tentative smile and pulled me a ceramic coffee mug down from a cabinet next to the sink. I returned her smile and poured me a cup of the steaming brew. I added a dollop of cream from a small clear jug, blew across the rim of the mug and took a sip. Thankfully the coffee was not the thick strong brew of the Pleiad; rather it reminded me of very good trail coffee.
"Good coffee, thank you," I told her.
"You are most welcome Mister Brock," she replied.
Since I had her talking, I asked the question that had been on my mind since I met her.
"Missus Smith, I hope I am not being indelicate asking this, but why are you the only person I have met here that is not young looking?"
She looked startled by the question then chuckled.
"I guess your visit in Paradise Valley did not include a trip to a retirement center. There are more of me around, but most of them are living out their last years in one of the centers. I stopped responding to the rejuvenation matrix about six years ago. Instead of accepting retirement, I walked out of the Valley and started working here for my daughter."
I asked about the rejuvenation process, because I remember Coleen referring to it.
"Every citizen receives a complete physical exam during their twenty-second year. The exam measures and records a snapshot of you at the peak of your health and development. At the same exam, spinal column stem cells are harvested, cloned and stored. Every two years after that, a new physical 'snapshot' is taken and compared to the previous one. The cloned stem cells are sequenced and administered to erase seventy-five to eighty percent of the aging process.
"The rejuvinatrix works differently with different groups. For those of us not altered, the process works about thirty times at the rate of seventy-five percent. I for instance, was chronologically eighty-five, but physiologically only forty. I received the treatments with a fifty percent rate from the age of forty, until I hit menopause at the physical age of forty-five. That was six years ago when I was chronologically ninety-five. After menopause, the rejuvenation process stops working, so you begin to age normally.
"Altered women usually hit menopause at the chronological age of one hundred and fifteen or so. Altered males fare the best, because the treatments continue to work until they are unable to produce semen. That usually doesn't happen until they are around sixty years old physically and between one hundred twenty and one hundred forty in actual calendar years."
It took a minute or so for what Mary said to sink in. I had my suspicions about the apparent youth of everyone anyway, but the confirmation from Mary was still hard to grasp. The future men had discovered the fountain of youth. At the same time, they were making this extended life not worth living. I asked Mary if the outlanders had access to the rejuvenation process. She replied that they did, although about a quarter of the population did not use it.
Liz came down and joined us about then, and Lucy showed up a minute later. Liz gave me a kiss again this morning, although this time it was on the lips. It was a very nice kiss and I liked it a lot. Lucy kissed me too, but it was more of a sisterly peck. The three of us sat at the small kitchen table while Mary bustled about preparing breakfast. Liz explained what she had in mind for me for the next day or so.
"Jeremiah, I want you to look around and ask questions today. The only reason Lucy is going is to act as your guide and to gain you entry into anything you want to explore. I have a couple of reasons for doing this. The primary reason is to show you that we are a progressive and vital society. The second reason is that you might run across something that, based on your experience, could be done a better way."
I was going to take Liz at her word and kick over a few rocks to see what scurried from beneath them. I was especially going to explore if there was a link between the New Englanders and the Juicers.
Tonya and Sonja wandered down stairs just in time for breakfast. Tonya was ready to see the sights with me, but Sonja pleaded that she wanted to relax for the morning and join us after lunch. She said we could fill her in on what she missed while we were out that afternoon. Sonja appeared to be down in the mouth, so we agreed to her plan. That was my second mistake.
Lucy was proud as hell showing off what they had all accomplished, and I couldn't fault her for it a bit. It was as refreshing as a spring shower, watching the multigenerational outlanders just go about their daily business. We visited shops, small factories and repair emporiums that all dealt with the pre-catastrophe salvage. From building materials to complicated machinery to shiny baubles and gewgaws, the industrious outlanders didn't waste a thing.
"We are actively mining seven huge sites right now," Lucy told me. "Two of those sites are formerly large cities that were wiped out by natural and manmade disasters. One of the other sites was a military research facility depopulated by a hydrogen bomb. We recover technology from the sites as well as artifacts and materials. The hydrogen fuel cells that power our vehicles were a result of finding similar units at the military complex and duplicating them. Unlike the valley dwellers, we are building a manufacturing base to provide materials needed for our expansion."
We headed back to Liz's place at noon. We were going to grab lunch and Sonja, then head back out to see the sheriff. That would have been a most excellent plan, had Sonja been waiting on us. Unfortunately, she was not. Mary told us that Sonja had left about half and hour after we did, ostensibly to catch up with us. I dashed out to the barn to see if any of our mounts were missing while Tonya went up to check our room. When I returned with the bad news that both horses were missing, Tonya reported that Sonja's pack, some of the trail rations and the small stunner were also absent.
"She's headed back to the valley to warn the Pleiad about what she suspects is going on here," Tonya said.
I nodded in agreement. I figured that part out all by myself. What I could not figure out was why Sonja had so little trust in what I had said about taking her home in a couple of days. As soon as I gave it a few minutes more thought, I realized that Sonja had left knowing full well that I would ride out after her. She knew that I would never allow her out in the badlands without me there to protect her. I sighed and turned towards Tonya and Lucy.
"Looks like lunch will have to wait. We need to find the sheriff right now and enlist his help. I am going to blister her butt when I get my hands on her," I vowed.