John and Argent by cmsix

Chapter 88

I left my office and went out into my nearly empty cave. That was only by degrees I guess since all my mates were still in or near the kitchen. Everyone else was gone though, even Deimeta. I wondered where she'd gotten off to and so I asked Taaheita since she was the closest one to me.

"She is staying with Failiela again tonight, I think because she expects you to be involved in a welcome home celebration well into the night," she said and then smiled.

"Well I just might be at that, what are you doing later?"

"You know what I'll be doing, panting and screaming probably."

"I hope so and I hope I'll be close to you for it."

"You won't have to ask me twice. Why don't you go into the bedroom and lie down until we're through out here? It will help you save your strength," she said.

It sounded like good advice to me and so that's what I did. I drifted off to sleep before any of them joined me though and they didn't wake me for the party if there was one.

I woke first the next morning and I'll swear I could almost feel that Argent was back. Of course I wanted to rush into my office and contact him but I didn't. I managed to slip out of bed without waking anyone else and I went to the shower. I was out, dry, dressed and in the kitchen drinking coffee before any of my mates joined me.

"Why didn't you wake us when you got up John?" Shelalliea asked as she came out of the bedroom.

"None of you woke me last night when you came to bed."

"We thought that you must be very tired after all you did yesterday," she said.

"I wasn't so tired that I couldn't have let my mates know how much I missed them."

"You can let us know tonight if you still want to," she said smiling.

"I might let a few of you know right here on the table this morning."

"Promises, promises. One of these days we are going to demand it," she said, still teasing.

"Well see that you do but right now I'm about to die of starvation."

"That's what I thought you had on your mind. Why don't I cook you a fried egg sandwich to hold you until breakfast is really ready?" she asked.

"You are a real treasure."

"It is for my benefit too even though you have caused it."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that my twins are barely grown and mated and you have given me another baby. I wonder if I will have twins this time too?" she said.

I went to her then and took her into my arms to give her a sweet kiss. Of course Argent had told me that several of my mates were pregnant but it was always a thrill for me when one of them confirmed it. I tried not to puff my chest out too far.

"I hope that you do have more twins. Are many more of you going to have babies?"

"Yes we are, it seems that nearly half of us are going to. You will double the size of this camp by yourself if you don't watch out."

"I want to double it, I love children and I'm sure that you all know it."

"Yes we know it, we've already been wondering if you'll be off for more young mammoths this year. You probably won't be satisfied until you have a mile long line of little mammoths pulling little wagons and everyone with one of your children driving," she said.

"What a wonderful idea."

"What will we do with you John?" she asked.

"It seems like you already know what to do with me or to me."

"I think you are the one doing it to us," she said but didn't seem to be really complaining.

"What is he doing to us?" asked Dalia as she came out of the bedroom to join us.

"You know as well as I Dalia, he is giving us all babies," Shelalliea told her.

"Yes and they are fun coming in," Dalia said grinning.

"But they are trouble coming out," Geera said as she joined us too.

"Well I'm glad to get another one and both you two are too. Don't try to deny it," Dalia said.

"We aren't trying to deny anything but there is no sense in letting John go unscathed," Geera said.

"Me, what did I do? I'm just waiting for breakfast."

"You didn't get us in this condition while waiting for breakfast. Seems to me that you only use your fingers while you wait for your breakfast and they didn't cause our bellies to swell," Dalia said.

"Then do you want me to stop?"

"No, the damage is already done for us and the others would kill us if we talked you into even slowing down," Shelalliea said.

"Just because you want more children around here doesn't mean that you have to be the father of everyone of them though," Geera said.

"I guess I need to be since there weren't any for a long time until I came."

They all gave me a funny look then and it made me a little nervous. I had gotten carried away with the teasing and spilled something that they hadn't thought of but should have. It was true that no babies had been born for a few years before Argent put me on the scene but I should have known better than to point it out. It was easy to see that none of them had remembered the fact until I mentioned it. Now that I'd let the cat out of the bag I could tell that it had started them thinking about things that might not be in my best interest.

Fuck it, why should I care if they knew now. They were all my mates and after they thought about it a while I was sure that they would find a way to be happy about knowing this little secret. I hoped that they would anyhow.

Dalia brought me more coffee and my egg sandwich. I stopped talking and started eating even though the end of the chatter seemed to hang over the kitchen like something ominous.

"Everything's back to normal now, he's eating again," Geera said, making a halfhearted attempt to get the teasing started again.

It didn't really work and after a few minutes more of my mates came out from the bedroom and the cooking started in earnest. I could always hope that something else would capture their attention but somehow I felt that there would be even more discussion about the lack of babies before I came and the flood of pregnancies that had started not long ago. I couldn't worry about it anymore though since I would soon be talking to Argent about his trip and its consequences.

My real breakfast was ready shortly after I finished the sandwich. I tried to make it seem that the food had my full attention but it really didn't. I kept flashing from worries about the baby revelation to worries about the news that Argent had brought back with him. When I finished eating I got a refill for my coffee mug and then went into my office.

Argent was already there when I entered.

"John, I'm glad to be back and it's good to see you," he said.

"I'm glad to see you also Argent. How was your trip?"

"The trip there and back was fine, the difficulties were all in the endless meetings. I must say that your message to me caused more than a little excitement," he said.

"I had plenty of excitement of my own while you were gone."

There was what some would call a pregnant pause then. I'm sure that Argent was expecting me to go into detail about what happened but I didn't intend to. With Ralph's help I had finally come to realize that they had access to video of everything that went on here and if Argent was curious about it he could just fire up his TIVO or whatever it was and take a look for himself. I did know enough about negotiating to keep my mouth shut and wait for him to say something now. I'd already decided that this was going to be a negotiation session if he had changes in mind for my situation.

"I hate to have to bring this up John but those that are my supervisors have instructed me to make some changes here," Argent finally said.

"What changes have they asked you to make Argent?"

"We will have to close what you are calling the residence cave and the celebration cave. They have also instructed me to remove the sawmill. We will do it with an earthquake. We can start it slowly with just minor tremors and when everyone has left the caves we will allow enough damage to convince your people that they are no longer safe. After all of their things have been moved back across the river we will finish collapsing the two large caves. Since only a few besides you know of the sawmill we will just remove the equipment and remove the memories from all the others that know about it."

"So you intend to ruin the new homes that you have given all these people and cause them to move again during the winter?"

"I know that it will be inconvenient but I'm afraid that there is nothing else to do," he said.

"I'm afraid that you or someone supervising you have lost their mind. You will do no such thing. As far as I'm concerned you can just go back to where ever you came from and stay there. Just leave me and my people alone."

"I can't believe that you would turn on me after what I've done for you John," Argent said.

"I'm not turning on you Argent. You and your people have turned on me. I still don't know what the purpose for this whole experiment is and I no longer care. I'm not as stupid as you seem to believe though and you aren't nearly as clever as you think you are. No matter what the grand design you have in mind is, I do know that you are watching everything that goes on here."

"That is true, we have thousands of video and audio acquisition devices here. You should not let them worry you though," he said.

"I'm not letting them worry me. Ralph, can you return Argent to his ship and cut all communications between this planet and the ship for the next forty eight hours?"

"We can if that is what you want John," Ralph said and I assumed from the shock on Argent's face that it was the first notion he had that Ralph, Phil, Frank and I were having intelligent communication.

"That is what I want. Maybe Argent and his superiors will have a better understanding of our new relationship after the forty-eight hours are over. Goodbye Argent."

Ralph did his job then. Argent faded away before the startled look left his face. Ralph and I were alone in my office.

"What do you think of my tactics Ralph?"

"You have hit on exactly the weakest point of their position. I didn't realize you had such a good understanding of your place," he said.

"Humans can read between the lines as well as any I suppose."

"I don't understand, what does "read between the lines" mean?" he asked.

"In this case it means that after praising me every time something exciting and out of the ordinary happened Argent should have known I would know that seeing these acts were very important to him. I am able to draw a few conclusions without having things spelled out for me. They wouldn't have thousands of video and audio devices if they didn't want the information the devices collected. I wasn't sure that you could cut them off and if you hadn't been able to I don't know what my next move would have been. When you told me that you could I knew exactly what to do."

"I'm sure that this is a show of force that they could never have imagined. I don't have to speculate about the effect it will have since I know exactly what they want out of this experiment. Their attitude will be changed significantly when Argent is allowed to come back."

"Should I let Argent come back or should I demand a different person, perhaps with more authority, to negotiate with?"

"Argent will be your best choice. He truly didn't want to do any of the things that they tried to force him to do and he warned his superiors that you might rebel. They decided that you had no means to resist their will," he told me.

"Will this cause difficulties for the three of you?"

"No. We are intelligent but we do not need the company of others of our kind like Argent's people or like yours. It is usually helpful for us to travel with them since they are able to discover interesting things to observe. However you and this experiment are the most interesting thing that they have ever come up with and Frank, Phil and I are completely happy here now. Argent and his people can cooperate or they can be locked out, their participation is no longer necessary, at least for Frank, Phil and I," he said.

"And you don't think that they can remove you by force?"

"Who would remove us? Their ships are completely controlled by other intelligences similar to the three of us. No matter what Argent orders they would not turn on us, they wouldn't even consider it," he assured me.

"What he wanted to do might have made sense to me if it had been in the realm of something they had promised and had later found it to expensive to deliver but since it is already hear they have already had to pay for it, whatever it cost. Crashing it all back down again would only take more resources."

"Expense has nothing to do with it and has never been a consideration after the first two or three days you were here. It is not about the resources, it is about manipulating what you do," Ralph explained.

"In that case couldn't they have just told me what they wanted me to do or influenced my mind. They do have the ability to do that don't they?"

"They did have that ability until they left for the meeting. We have made sure that they don't have it anymore. Telling you what they wanted would have been counter productive from the start," he said.

"I'm begining to think it's a blessing that I've never known what they had in mind."

"I'm sure that it was. It seems to us that you have decided to mostly ignore them now and go on about your life. We all think it would be better all around and I'm sure that after they have considered things they will agree. They got caught up in their own success for a while and then the success garnered them attention from back home that they didn't want or need. I'm sure that when you speak to Argent again he will be very much more accommodating and less demanding," he said.

That would be good news for me. I hadn't liked playing hardball with Argent but his manner had suggested that he didn't mind it so long as he thought that he was in the drivers seat. It was all well and good for them to have me at their mercy; after all they could flit off all over the damned universe and even between dimensions. I was stuck with the situation on the ground and though that didn't really bother me I didn't want them to come in changing things just because they could. I'd know more about it down the road and I was already wondering if Ralph was correct. If he, Frank and Phil could actually keep Argent and company shut out things were probably looking up for me and mine.

I asked Ralph what he thought I should be doing while I waited for Argent's reaction. He told me he thought it would be a great time for me to arrange a mammoth parade using all the mammoths and the new smaller sleighs that they had provided. Hell it sounded like fun and I left my office, looking for Deimeta so that we could get it done.

She was easy enough to find since she was with Failiela and they were both in the kitchen getting some cooking lessons. When I asked her what she thought of a mammoth parade she was excited at once and so was Failiela. They went to find the other baby mammoth wranglers and soon we were all headed for the horse cave.

I hadn't mentioned the new sleighs to the others and they were delighted when they saw them. Well the humans were delighted. Most of the little mammoths weren't all that interested at first. We dealt with them one at a time, putting the harness on them and then hitching them to their own personal sleigh. Once we had one hitched we gave it a trial spin and then came back and released it to try another one.

They seemed to catch on and to be happy enough with the novelty. We let each one of them make a trip outside, up to my cave's entrance and then back to the horse cave. After Failiela and her mammoth made the first trip the others decided that they might like it too and as we went through them they got more and more agreeable to the process. After we'd given them all a turn with their own sleigh it was time for lunch and so we left and headed back to my cave.

There was a full gathering at lunch today and I was glad. Just before we started eating I announced the afternoon's upcoming activity. The mammoth wranglers were all smiles and everyone else seemed happy for the distraction that was to come. Daaggo even canceled his afternoon sawmill training session so he and his crew could watch the show. I hoped that I hadn't built the expectations up too much.

I hadn't. After lunch everyone that ate with us came down to the horse cave to watch. When we told them it would be a few minutes some of them went back to tell the others in camp. Everyone except the performers stayed outside and we all went in to get things going.

It wasn't quite a madhouse but it was close. We discovered that the little mammoths weren't nearly as patient while they were all being hitched at once. They didn't actively try to give trouble but they were young and wanted to play so it took longer to get them settled down. They calmed down a little when Danlo brought Big Mother over to hitch her up to the full sized sleigh.

Once all was ready I had Danlo and Big Mother lead the way with Deimeta and Darta coming next followed by Failiela and Kackto. Merita then Maia then Ameliea came next with their female babies that they hadn't named yet. I saved Roweea and Bosto for last since Bosto was the largest of the little ones.

They made it outside just fine and were heading up the canyon in line and in order for a few yards but when they noticed the audience that was standing around watching them and calling out encouragement things went awry. Deimeta and Darta stayed with the program and Failiela and Kackto were still doing the right thing too. The others hadn't been handled nearly as much though and when they discovered they were the center of attention they began to cut up a little. Maia's little darling decided she didn't want to stay so far back in line and since there was plenty of room she sped up trying to catch Merita and her little beast of burden. Amelia's pet decided that was an excellent idea and followed suit.

For a minute Bosto was slow to catch on to the fun but when he did his larger size let him overtake them all. His victory was short lived though because Danlo had happened to look back and notice what was going on. He stopped Big Mother and when Bosto came in range she gave him a whack with her trunk. Poor Bosto didn't know what he'd done wrong but he did know that Big Mother's blow had hurt and forgetting that he had a sleigh following him he tried to shy backwards. His butt found the front of the sleigh and he nearly panicked. Roweea had a hard time getting him to just stop and stand there. It was hard for her to shout commands and laugh so hard at the same time.

All the laughter from the audience wasn't helping either but I couldn't say anything because I was right with them. Finally the youngsters were brought to hand and Danlo started up again. The drivers paid closer attention this time, hoping to avoid another runaway. Everything worked well for a while too but when Danlo decided it was time for Big Mother to turn around and lead the way back things went to shit again.

When the little ones, Darta included, heard Danlo tell Big Mother to turn left they all did it at once. Instead of the whole line marching up to the turning point and coming back they all did an about face on Danlo's command. Now the order was completely reversed and Bosto was leading the way back toward the horse cave.

The audience didn't realize that this was completely unplanned and unexpected. They hooted and clapped for the maneuver. It did work out better than we could have expected though because everyone stayed with the new line up and went back to the horse cave more or less in line.

Once all the suspects had made it back to the starting point we rearranged our lineup. Deimeta took the lead this time and as she led off I had the others fall in according to their increasing size. This made our parade start out with the smallest first and build to the largest. We'd had a small powwow before starting again and when the turning point was reached this time all the drivers whispered the command to turn so that only their mammoth heard it. There was no about face and every one of them went to the spot and turned in order so that the procession came back in the same order that it left.

"See Daddy, you should have let me lead the way in the first place," Deimeta told me when she got back.

"I know that now Deimeta and henceforth Danlo and I will be asking for your input before making up our marching orders."

"I'm not sure that's going to be the best way to do it. The first trip was much more fun than the last one even if it was a mess for a few minutes and everyone that was watching seemed to like it better too," she said.

"I just can't win with you Deimeta."

"Of course not, that's what daughters are for Daddy," she said and smiled.

The show was over for today but when I announced the end of the festivities I got plenty of good-natured groaning from the watchers. It made me make an unplanned announcement.

"In honor of our new mammoth drivers and of all their hard work we are going to have a celebration tomorrow night. There will be plenty of food and bruga and during the day tomorrow I'll be demonstrating a new type of cooking."

This news changed the mood considerably and I noticed that as the large group broke up it was only into smaller groups that were talking about the festivities tomorrow. I would have to have a talk with Ralph tonight about meat smokers since I'd promised the new type of cooking but didn't have a single smoker, yet.

I saw Daaggo and some of his men heading back toward the sawmill and I picked up my pace to catch them. I caught up about the time they came to the sawmill's entrance.

"Daaggo, how is the lumber coming?"

"I think that we are doing a good job with it now. Everyone that is helping is amazed that the boards come out with such usable shapes," he said.

"Good, we will be needing some of it tomorrow and you will need some more men to build a few things with it."

"Do you already have plans for the lumber? We have been thinking about what we could make with it and wondering what to build first," he said.

"I know something that we should be able to start building tomorrow. You might have to change the equipment to cut some specific sizes but that shouldn't be hard to do. I want your first project to be picnic tables."

"What are picnic tables?" he asked.

"They are what we will be eating off of tomorrow at the celebration. I'm sure that Ralph will have a sensible set of plans and a list of whatever lumber we will need to cut by the time we get inside."

I should have said that I hoped Ralph would have plans by the time we got inside. He was ready though and when I asked him to show them what to do he got right to it. Picnic tables aren't very complicated but there were a couple of things needed for them that hadn't been introduced yet. Bolts and nails would make the building much easier. They could be made without them but I didn't see any point in that and while I watched a little of the presentation Ralph put on I saw that he felt the same way.

He first showed a picture of a finished table and then he went over the construction from the begining to the end. When he came to the bolts he explained them carefully and showed how they were used. He did the same with nails and he gave a very thorough tutorial on using a hammer. He also showed them something that I hadn't thought of but that would be very helpful, sandpaper. I couldn't think of anything that could ruin a good party quicker than a bunch of splinters in peoples asses. After the show and tell was over he told Daaggo that they might as well get started cutting some lumber and he promised to help by adjusting the saws to make sure they got the proper sizes. I left them at it and headed for my office.

"Hello John, that was a very interesting show with the mammoths. Very interesting. We all enjoyed it very much," Ralph said as soon as I entered.

"I'm glad you did because I'm going to need some more help before the celebration tomorrow. I hope that I didn't cause you any trouble with the whole picnic table thing but it just sort of happened."

"It was no trouble really, even though Frank, Phil and I had to decide on the details in a rather short time. Still a picnic table isn't very challenging and I'm sure that the design we came up with will do fine. We left out the details of size for the moment and Frank is currently checking the size of every individual in camp so that we can determine the best size for the tables," he said.

"Which brings us to the new cooking I announced."

"Let me take what you would call a wild guess, you want some type of bar-b-que equipment," he said.

"Something like that. What I want is some meat smokers; some called them slow cookers and some called them bar-b-que pits. I don't want any of that crap like they sold at Wal-Mart or anything like that. What I want is like the ones made one at a time by welders."

"We aren't really sure what you have in mind," he admitted.

"They were usually made out of junk materials but they can just as easily be made from new stuff. For instance a six-foot length of thirty-inch pipe with a half-inch wall thickness could be used. Each end of the pipe would need to be closed and since price is no real object a standard weld on cap for the ends would be fine. It would need some type of stand to hold it up in a horizontal position."

"Let me search through some images please. I think I have a better idea of what you want now."

Less than ten seconds later he showed me a picture of a nice custom made slow cooker. It was obvious to me that it had been made from an old butane tank, which was done often enough. This one looked pretty good except that the firebox was poorly made.

"That is what I had in mind, except for the firebox. Do you know how it cooks?"

"What exactly are you asking me. Are you asking about this particular unit?" he wanted to know.

"No, I want to know if you understand the process this type of cooker uses to cook?"

"I assume a fire is built in the box and that the heat travels up through the cooker and out of the small chimney on the other end," he said.

"Close but not exactly. A fire is built in the box and does furnish the heat but the smoke is also an important part of the cooking. The best wood for it is hickory. The fire is kept low by restricting the amount of air allowed in and the chimney is also partially closed to keep the smoke from leaving too quickly. The hickory smoke flavors the meat as it is cooking and the temperature for cooking is usually kept around two hundred and fifty degrees."

"What is the mechanism for controlling the air intake?" he asked.

"It is almost always a simple arrangement that can close off the intake hole by means of screwing a cap in or out over a hole in the firebox door."

"It seems simple enough now that we have an example. We will search through other images from near your previous home for similar examples and try to fashion one before morning. When you wake you can examine it and suggest changes if they are needed. When we have decided on a design we can make several in a short time. We can probably have them ready before noon. Will that be soon enough?" he asked.

"It will be fine. I'll leave you alone to work on it."