Former Pittsburgh Airport Staging Area, Pennsylvania
May 16, 2440, 6:48 AM
Ashton Boone Marmaduke was finishing breakfast when his phone notified him of a change to his morning schedule.
He expected a revised shuttle departure.
Instead, it was a message from the Marmaduke Inc. corporate office in Columbia.
The board meeting scheduled for that morning had been moved to May 17.
Ashton read the notice twice.
Then he called.
“Morning. What’s happened?”
“The meeting’s been moved to tomorrow. Matt won’t be available this morning.”
“Something with the V’ren?”
“We haven’t been given details.”
“Is he all right?”
“We’ve been told he’s all right.”
Ashton considered that.
“Fine. Tomorrow was reserved for exactly this sort of thing.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Have all the directors been notified?”
“They’re being notified now.”
“And nothing on the agenda requires emergency action today?”
“No.”
“Then we’re fine. Leave the agenda as it stands unless somebody has something that actually needs changing.”
“Understood.”
He ended the call.
Bertram Kahn looked up from his breakfast.
“Problem?”
“No. My board meeting’s been moved to tomorrow.”
“Another day in Pennsylvania?”
“Looks that way.”
James Yokohama glanced toward him.
“I thought you had to get back to Columbia.”
“I do. Tomorrow.”
“What happened?”
“Matt’s unavailable.”
Kahn smiled.
“An occupational hazard of being High Lord of an alien civilization?”
“Something like that.”
Ashton took another drink of coffee.
“We scheduled two days for the meeting because we knew this might happen. Matt’s got obligations to his companies, the Freehold, Amazon, and now the V’ren. We weren’t going to put the directors in a position where everything falls apart because he gets called away.”
“Could you conduct the meeting without him?” James asked.
“Certainly. But there’s business on the agenda that needs his participation, and we’re not under a deadline that justifies changing everything around.”
He picked up his phone again.
“Besides, I handle his day-to-day Columbia business. I don’t need him looking over my shoulder every time somebody wants a decision.”
Kahn considered that.
“Forty-seven percent of Marmaduke Inc. and the chief executive’s office would give him considerable influence.”
“It does. But we’ve got other shareholders, a board, management, and an employee trust. The organization doesn’t cease functioning every time Matt’s somewhere else.”
Ashton smiled.
“Which is fortunate, because he’s usually somewhere else.”
James laughed.
“What will you do with the extra day?”
“Spend it watching the most interesting construction project I’ve ever encountered.”
“I thought you might say that.”
“Three Stanford degrees in materials science, and I’ve never had an opportunity to study anything remotely comparable to Wonder Foam.”
“You saw it at Leta.”
“I did. And the Columbia road repairs. That’s what made me want to come here.”
He turned his tablet toward the two professors.
The previous afternoon’s terrain surveys showed three enormous areas of shattered ground, each intended to become a standardized sitio.
The working area extended far beyond the twenty-seven square kilometers reserved for the settlements themselves.
“Look at that. Yesterday they spent an afternoon tearing apart enough Pennsylvania to keep an ordinary civil engineering consortium occupied for years.”
Kahn examined the latest returns.
“And today they start finding out what’s underneath it.”
“Exactly.”
Ashton enlarged the construction model.
“The bombardment is interesting, but this is what I’m here for.”
The proposed engineered ground appeared over the newly altered terrain.
“Once they establish the foundation, they aren’t simply pouring individual footings or constructing isolated roadbeds. They’re producing the ground structure beneath an entire settlement.”
James nodded.
“Provided the geological preparation is adequate.”
“Which is why you’re here.”
“And why Dr. Kahn is watching for seismic consequences.”
Kahn smiled.
“An excellent division of labor.”
Ashton closed the meeting notice.
“I’ve got a free day. You’re both staying. I suggest we make ourselves useful.”
8:36 AM
D’vann was reviewing construction assignments when Ashton approached his workstation aboard the T-24.
“I thought you were going back to Columbia.”
“So did I.”
“Something changed?”
“Board meeting moved to tomorrow. Matt’s unavailable this morning.”
D’vann looked up.
“Is everything all right?”
“As far as I’ve been told.”
“Then I’m pleased you can stay.”
“So am I. What are we doing today?”
D’vann brought up the regional development model.
“Your first question should be what my wife will allow us to do today.”
S’rethi looked over.
“A wise man.”
“I’m learning.”
The three future sitios occupied separate portions of the terrain model. The bombardment had altered all of them, together with substantial areas between and around the planned settlements.
The finished sites would not occupy one uniform elevation.
The first sitio was on the lower ground nearer the river. The other two were positioned progressively higher, taking advantage of the terrain instead of requiring the entire region to be reduced to one level.
S’rethi had marked the areas where further kinetic treatment was planned and others where the newly exposed subsurface needed additional investigation.
James leaned over the display.
“What’s the condition of the first sitio?”
“Ready for the ground construction,” she answered.
Ashton looked at her.
“Already?”
“The geological preparation there is sufficient for the first structural layer. We’re not waiting for some imaginary perfect landscape.”
“Then when do you start laying the foam?”
“Not this morning.”
D’vann looked toward his wife.
“You see? I’ve been asking her the same question.”
Ashton examined the approved area.
“What’s holding you up?”
“Other kinetic operations. We still have sections of the development to treat.”
“And?”
“And I have no intention of laying a relatively thin first layer over a large area while we’re still striking the surrounding ground with megaton-class kinetic tools.”
James nodded.
“The ground motion.”
“Among other consequences. We could damage the new layer before we’d accumulated enough material to give it the strength of the completed structure.”
“So you’d be destroying yesterday’s work tomorrow,” Ashton said.
“Today’s work later today, potentially.”
D’vann smiled.
“Which would annoy her considerably.”
“Waste material, waste equipment time, and leave us repairing a structure we haven’t even finished,” S’rethi answered. “We can afford to let the bombardment finish.”
Ashton looked toward the other two sitios.
“So the first site’s not waiting on geology. You’re sequencing the construction around the remaining strikes.”
“Precisely.”
“Then the ground crews can still do their other preparation?”
“Yes. There is plenty they can accomplish without putting down the finished structural layer.”
Ashton smiled.
“Good. That’s a much better problem.”
D’vann laughed.
“I was hoping you’d convince her to let me begin.”
“Not a chance. I’m not going to argue with a geological engineer when she’s plainly right.”
“Traitor.”
“I sit on a construction company board, D’vann. I have a professional obligation not to waste expensive materials.”
S’rethi looked pleased.
“I rather like your cousin’s representative.”
D’vann sighed.
“Another ally for the opposition.”
Kahn, who had been studying the monitoring display, looked over.
“May I join the opposition?”
“You already have,” D’vann answered.
Ashton laughed.
For a man who had expected to spend the morning discussing quarterly business in Columbia, Pennsylvania was turning out to be an excellent alternative.
