Chapter 23

FOUR YEARS AGO

Rory stepped off the shuttle and onto the ground. Even though the islands of vegetation she grew up on had things like roads and tarmac for shuttles, she could feel the substantial difference as her feet landed on the tarmac. Her long, wavy, sun-kissed brown hair flowed in the gentle breeze as she walked over to a planter and examined the dirt for a moment, marveling at how dark it was.

"This way, ma'am." A boy of only twelve was her greeter at the spaceport. She followed him and wondered a bit as she walked, not seeing any women. Men were working on shuttles, men sweeping, men assisting people getting onto shuttles, but no women.

She knew that The Blessed Accord viewed this place, Eden, as backward as did plenty in other areas, but she refused to judge a book by its cover. She knew they had some pretty forward ideas on agriculture and were cultivating some historical plants. That was what initially drew her to the colony.

They had warned her about the conservative traditional christian aspect, but when she did her research, she found out that they wouldn't require her to do the locals' things--some provision of the Galactic Union.

The boy showed her to her quarters. They were technically in the spaceport, as they didn't allow women to live by themselves in the colony. She would have had to live with a family and been made a ward of a 'Man of The Household', which irritated her since she was of age. So she stayed in the spaceport, which was technically Coalition, and was subject to their rules and regulations.

After getting her things stowed - she didn't have much - she went to report to the person who would run her internship.

"Well, hello there, Rory. My, aren't you more beautiful in person?" The older man smiled, and if you only saw his mouth, you would think it a kind smile, but it didn't quite reach his eyes, which threw her off a bit.

"Um, thank you, I guess, sir?" she queried.

"Ah, how rude. My name is Joseph, but you can call me 'Highest' or 'The Highest' when referring to me."

The way he said it, it didn't seem like an option, and she held out her hand, "Nice to meet you, Highest."

He took her hand and held it a tad too long while also caressing her knuckles with his thumb. She didn't like it and looking up when he dropped her hand; it seemed like she had failed some test. "Well, it seems you come from a location with manners; that's nice. So, you know why you're here then?"

Now in familiar territory, Rory answered brightly, "I'm here to intern in your agriculture department. I have been developing some advanced techniques of applying technology to improving yield, and I know you all here have more advanced agriculture, and I hoped to learn from some of the best."

He chuckled a little, and the smile again didn't reach his eyes, unnerving Rory. "Flattery will get you everywhere. I trust they showed you your living quarters?" At her nod, he continued, "Okay then, breakfast is at 0500. Report at Field 12 at 0600 sharp. Your lessons and work will begin there. Understood?"

"Yes, Sir. May I go?" She wasn't sure why, but she felt like he needed people to defer to him, and she didn't enjoy having that feeling.

"You may. We will see more of each other soon, I am sure."

This time the smile did reach his eyes, and she shivered as she left his office.

#

Breakfast was uneventful and filling. The people of Eden ate a lot more meat than they did in Accord space. It's not that they don't eat meat; it's just that when you need to thank the animal for its sacrifice and you or someone you know has to personally kill it, you tended to do it less often and it carried more significance. She showed up at Field 12 right on time. As she approached the field, her head slowly turned as she took in the entire scene, taking mental notes that she would transcribe later. The first thing that stood out was no automation; no robots flitting about neutralizing pests, no harvesters, no waterers. It was slightly unnerving to her as the emphasis in Accord space is on output without harm. Sure, they do their rituals and commune with their gods and goddesses, but they also use the latest in technology so that none go hungry, like in some members of the Galactic Union.

She resolved to think on that later as she looked for someone in authority to report to. There appeared to be a woman that was giving people their daily orders. Rory made her way over, waited patiently for the woman to finish, and watched the other women. They all wore the same uniform, long denim dresses with their heads covered in a beige head covering, making it hard to tell what color hair they had. Also, they all had on a simple sandal that seemed like it would be easy to make as needed.

Having finished giving orders, the woman turned to Rory. "I greet you. May the Lord shine. You must be Rory?"

Rory nodded and said, "Indeed, and I am here to learn! I can't wait to see how you all produce so much, especially without automation..."

Rory held out her hand to the woman who, after taking a moment to look at it, nodded and clasped hands before introducing herself, "I am Sarah Abbey, The Woman of field 12."

Rory noted the title. "Nice to meet you. May I call you Sarah or Mrs. Abbey?" She knew that most women in this society were married upon reaching adulthood, some even before. She shuddered at the thought.

"Woman is fine. Field 12 is primarily an orchard. I'm sure you will also work in Field 3 as it is more ground crops. But for now, I will assign you to Ashley. She is in charge of the orange grove. You will find a map on your Personal Comm Device." Rory thought it odd that she didn't just say PCD, also that they used tech, since it didn't seem like they were using it to grow crops.

After a moment, Sarah inclined her head, and Rory took the hint. She pulled out her PCD and saw if she could find where Field 12 was. Rory did and saw that it wasn't far away. "Thank you, Woman. I'll go find Ashley now." And with that, she turned and left, wondering what she had gotten herself into.

#

It took a while for Rory to find the orange grove work point. She got distracted wandering up and down the rows, marveling at both the oranges' abundance and health. The Accord produced oranges like this, but they used a lot of technology to do so. She was looking forward to learning how they did stuff here on Eden. Rory was marveling at an orange when a voice startled her, and she dropped it, leaving it swinging on it's little twig.

"Hey! You must be Rory! Whoops, sorry, I didn't mean to startle you. You okay?" A woman who looked like Sarah Abbey but younger had popped out from the next row. Her similarities to Sarah ended at her features. This woman, in contrast to Sarah, was personable. Rory thought it was cute that her hair had escaped her head wrap in several places.

She picked up the orange and turned. "Are you Ashley?" Rory asked. Ashley nodded enthusiastically. "Ah. Good, I was going to look for you, but the oranges grabbed my attention. These look great! Oh, Sarah, er, Woman, assigned me to you. So I guess we're going to be working together." She finished by offering her hand to shake and then, realizing she had an orange in it, swapped hands and offered it again.

Ashley smiled and took the hand, appreciating someone that seemed like they might be more like her than many people she knew. "So quick, first question!"

Rory responded as directed, without thinking, "How do you get this kind of yield without robotics?"

Ashley dropped Rory's hand and began walking down the row. Dappled sunlight filtered down and caught on the wisps of hair that had escaped her head wrap. Once she saw Rory was walking with her, she answered her question. "Short answer, and if you ask anyone, they'll tell you; it's prayer." She looked over and said with a smile. "Something tells me that answer won't satisfy you, though."

Reaching up, she plucked an orange and, as they walked, continued the explanation while peeling the orange. Rory, seeing her preparing to snack on the orange, followed suit and listened as they strolled down the row.

"So the long answer is obviously more complicated than that. And even the long answer has a short answer and long answer." She said with a smile and shrugged, "The short, long answer, or should that be the long-short answer, anyway, whatever it is, is that women do the work that you would traditionally have robots do. I also think that's why our quality control is so good. Robotics can do extraordinary things, but I don't think that their eyes and tactile sensors are quite up to human snuff. So the long, long answer is that we have had generations of diligent record-keeping to fine-tune procedures, a readily available and captive workforce," Rory frowned and made a mental note of how she referenced that, "And a climate that is particularly suited to agriculture."

She took a bite out of her half-peeled orange. After swallowing, juice dripping down to her denim dress, she turned to Rory, "So, I'm not sure how much you're going to get out of being here, but" She dropped the orange and took Rory's hands in hers, causing Rory to drop her orange as well.

"I really hope you stick around for a while. It's terribly dull, and I would love to hear about other places!"

Rory smiled, and they continued walking down the orchard. Rory enjoyed the weather and the company, causing time to fly as she asked questions and Ashley answered.

Two resounding, penetrating bongs reverberated through the fields, and Ashley turned before Rory could say anything, skipping away down the row of orange trees, her denim dress flitting in and out of the shadows created from the thick foliage, "Come on, it's lunchtime!"

#

Lunch was a picnic-like affair. There were pavilions set up for inclement weather, but most were eating in a grassy area off to the side when they walked up. There was an outdoor roofed-over kitchen area for preparing lunch. Rory and Ashley stepped up to the line that had formed to get the food. She took a tray and soon furnished it with a plate, cup and utensils. Lunch was a salad that Rory assumed they had picked today, a hot casserole-style dish, and a fruit salad, also recently picked, she supposed.

Rory tried not to be negative, but she couldn't help thinking as they made their way to an open spot of grass that the reason they had this picnic-style lunch out in the field was to keep the women close to the work. Get as much work out of a day as possible. She shook her head as she sat down, clearing the thought and smiling at Ashley. "So, what's on the agenda after lunch?"

"Later, later, for now, I want you to tell me about, hmm... Accordion?" Ashley asked.

Rory said with a laugh, "Close, it's Accord. As in the Blessed Accord."

Ashley grinned. "Okay, that makes more sense. I couldn't understand why someone would name their government or culture after an instrument. A weird one at that. Accord means agreement, right?"

"Exactly. It's both the name of our area of space and the document that governs all of our laws. It's called Blessed because we consciously modeled our government after magical laws and spiritual practices. I can go into detail at another time, but you could boil a lot of it down to respect."

Ashley paused in mid-bite, processing, before saying, "It makes sense to base a government or society on respect." "Could use some more respect around here." she said in a whisper as she looked around.

Rory leaned in closer, inviting her to continue.

Ashley, catching on, said in her low voice, "Well, I'll just say that there are some who get respect and some who don't."

"Really? I hadn't noticed." Rory said with a sarcastic smile.

Ashley turned red, thinking she had revealed something she shouldn't have when she looked up and saw Rory's smile and grinned, before prodding, "Tell me about the world you're from.."

"How much do you know about the Blessed Accord?" Rory asked.

"Not much; if I remember right, you have four planets?"

"Yes, four worlds. I say world because two are planets and two are moons. So you know nothing about the planets themselves?" At Ashley's head shake, she said, "Okay, so here is a quick introduction." She ate a few forkfuls and a drink of water before going on, "Okay, so the two moons are Zephyr and Terrene. Zephyr is a wind-whipped world that orbits a multi-ringed gas giant. They have this plant that is a cross between a tree and a kind of grain. It's called a filamental, and it's filaments fly in the wind. Pretty amazing to see. I've only ever seen it in holos. I haven't been there. The other moon, Terrene, is very mountainous. Most of the cities and developments are actually underground. I had to go to its orbital before coming here. That's where the First Families settled when they first established the colonies. It's also where the seat of government is."

Taking another drink, she said, "And then there are the two planets. Ember is a mostly desert, scorching planet. All the people live at the cooler poles. It has a wide array of colored sand we use in various arts. The black sand is just amazing to see. And then there is my planet." She visibly beamed as she talked about her home planet. "Cat's Eye is a phenomenal planet. Close your eyes. Now picture a planet completely covered with water. Now you might think, where do the people live? Continuing with that image, imagine large islands, some of them almost continent-sized. And," she paused for dramatic effect, "They float. The islands consist primarily of floating vegetation which can be up to several kilometers thick. It collects dirt, which attracts plants and creatures that then create more dirt and such. Entire cities, all of civilization, are on floating islands." She stopped and took some bites and looked up and saw Ashley's face of astonishment and smiles. "Amazing, isn't it?"

"I really hope I can see that someday," Ashley said as she looked off into the distance and imagined herself elsewhere.

"Me too," Rory responded. They finished the rest of lunch in contemplative silence as they both thought about where they came from and where they were going.

#

After getting a tour of the various fields and having dinner, Rory went to retire to the quarters they had assigned to her. She spent all day with Ashley, and she offered to escort Rory to her sparse quarters at the station. After talking for a bit, Ashley excused herself, and before she left, gave Rory the first, but if she were honest with herself, the second sign that something was not quite right here; she said as she was leaving, "Make sure and lock this behind me. This is a Galactic Union spaceport, so locals can't get in unless you've committed a crime."

And with that ominous warning, she left. Rory stood and locked the door, wondering for the second time what she had gotten herself into.

The night was uneventful, and the following day after breakfast, Rory was in the orchard. The planet was in a harvest cycle. They had bred a lot of their crops to produce two harvests because of the suitable climate. She was walking among the orange trees humming to herself, deep in thought, when she thought she heard a twig snap somewhere nearby.

Stopping, she looked around, not seeing anyone; she chided herself for thinking there was something there when there wasn't. She unconsciously reached up and fiddled with her pentacle before continuing with the harvest. No matter how hard she tried, she could not shake the feeling that someone or something was watching her. It didn't help that it was pretty dark under the thick canopy. They had a system for efficiency to have a fruit picker and a carter. The picker would pick fruit and fill crates, and a woman would come along with a cart, load the containers, and take them for processing. Robots would be so much more efficient, Rory thought, as she picked.

#

The next night Rory took a while to get to sleep, the unfamiliar room and the weird warning keeping her up. She finally got to sleep a little after midnight. Not long after falling asleep, she was dreaming of playing a tabletop game and rolling dice. She was startled awake, confused at why a game would wake her up. As she sat there, she heard a muttered curse from the hallway and shivered, suddenly both very alert and terrified. She wondered at that moment if the small amount of self-defense The Accord offered before she left would work.

#

Having only gotten a few hours of sleep, Rory woke groggily and was not at all ready for the day. It was only her usual morning routine that woke her up. She had set the alarm and slept right through it. But her normal time to get up was about now, so while being late, she wasn't terribly late.

She hurried and got ready fairly quickly. Rory left, made sure to lock her door, and jogged down the hall to find Ashley. She was two corridors in when she turned a corner and ran into someone. She apologized and was feeling embarrassed, but then she heard Ashley's laugh.

"It's fine. Someone is in a hurry! Hungry?" She said with a smile as she helped Rory up.

"I. Um, sure. Yeah." Flustered, Rory allowed herself to be helped up and started walking with Ashley.

Ashley looked over at Rory as they walked. "Hey, you okay? Something seems off."

Rory almost gave her usual response to someone inquiring as to her well being: smile, deflect, and act like nothing was wrong. She wasn't sure why she did it, but she did. However, Rory was growing closer to Ashley and felt that friendship was something she would like to continue developing. So instead of deflecting, she opened up and talked about what she was feeling. "Remember how you told me to lock my door?" At Ashley's nod, she said, "Well, someone tried to get in last night. I almost didn't notice. I don't even want to think of what would have happened had you not told me to lock the door..." she trailed off as they walked to breakfast.

They were almost at breakfast, and Ashley said with a little shrug, "maybe they were just after money.."

Rory shook her head as they got in line. "I don't want to think about it anymore. What's on the agenda today?"

Seeing her expression, Ashley dropped it and put on a playful tone to help her new friend, "Today we're going to the cornfield! You guys grow corn, right?"

"We do." Rory stopped and accepted food for her tray before saying, "Not a lot, at least not on Cat's Eye. It would be best if you had a lot of space. We tend not to hyper-focus on anything on Cat's Eye." She thought for a moment as they took their seats, "Come to think of it, we don't really hyper-focus anywhere. Interesting... Oh, wait, Terrene focuses on Mushrooms, but even then, they have lots of varieties."

"I could see why you wouldn't. While increasing yield in the short term, the genetic sameness sets you up for enormous failures in the long term. We've had a couple of those." She looked around and lowered her voice a little. "It's God's will or a witch. I think any first-year biology student would tell you it's neither."

"What do you all do when the crops fail?" Rory asked between bites.

"Well, we pray to god, and he either fixes it, or he doesn't." Ashley said with a little huff.

"You don't sound like you believe..." Rory asked.

"I believe, just at a different level than some, most.." Ashley said in a low voice.

Sensing a tricky topic they should probably discuss in private, Rory changed the subject. "How often are days nice like this?" She thought it was funny to switch topics to the weather, but it was appropriate. She realized that the current morning weather, which was 21 degrees and slightly breezy, with occasional white clouds on a bright blue sky, is the same as it has been every morning since she arrived.

Ashley smiled. "It's like this most of the time." Then, sensing an opportunity to reaffirm her faith, she said, "God provides."

Rory said with a smile in return. "It sure seems that way. Shall we?"

#

Arriving at the cornfield, the first thing that caught Rory's attention was the detail. Not in how orderly the rows were, though they were that. The thing that caught her attention was that every leaf of every plant was the same. It was as though someone had copied one plant and pasted the rest from the first.

"Ashley?"

"Yes?"

"Why are all the plants the same?" Rory asked in wonder.

"Oh that, well, after an especially nasty affliction made its way through a planting, about, well, before I was born, they bred a variety that was resistant to that pest."

Rory rubbed her chin in thought. "But wouldn't that then put you in a situation where you are vulnerable to another pest?"

"I hadn't thought of that, but yeah. I guess that's why the government is so strict at the port on making sure everyone who comes in is clean." Ashley took Rory's hand and skipped off into the rows of corn. "Come on; I want to show you something!"

They ran through the rows of corn for a bit, Rory unsettled by the sameness but the joy of Ashley's careening through effecting her. It wasn't long before she, too, was skipping through the corn.

Finally, they barreled into an open area in the corn that delighted Rory. There was a room laid out about 4 meters square. Colorful rugs covered the entire "floor". She had affixed brightly colored tapestries to the stalks to create a sort of wall. There were a few bean bags, an old recliner, a table with a tea set (solar-powered, Rory noted), and even a bookcase with books.

Ashley let go of Rory and jumped into a beanbag. "You can have the chair as you are a guest."

Rory laughed. "I thought you were supposed to be teaching me?" she stated as she sat in the surprisingly comfy chair.

"I am," Ashley laughed. "I'm teaching you how to relax, secretly, if you have to even. And how to make your own space wherever you are. Shithead, make us some tea," she added.

At Rory's raised eyebrow, Ashley colored bright red. "Sorry, I, um, can't say stuff like that around other people, so that's why I programmed it that way."

Rory waved her hand. "No matter, this is your space. And what a space it is! I'm definitely going to remember this!"

Ashley blushed more at the compliment. "Thanks. Well, I guess we can do some learning while we're here." She stood and traced a finger along the books on the bookshelf. That sparked a question from Rory. "How do you protect the stuff here from rain? It does rain, doesn't it?"

Finding the book, Ashley took it and handed it to Rory while answering, "That it does. And for that, I can thank my little tea maker here." At the puzzled look from Rory, she walked over, poured them both a mug of tea, and held it up with a questioning look. Rory nodded her head, and Ashley gave her the mug. After handing the mug over, she pressed a button on the side of the tea maker, and a shimmering formed overhead.

She walked over and picked up a small pebble, and tossed it up. There was a small zzzt and then nothing. "I traded with an out-of-system engineer. This will put up a field that stops most rain. We rarely get torrential downpours; not sure how it would handle that." She sat down on the beanbag, gently sipping her tea. "The fuel cell lasts for about 24 hours at a time, and I can manufacture fuel for it from the very corn around us." She beamed at that.

Rory asked then, "So you have engineering skills?"

"I wouldn't go that far, but I have some chemical knowledge. You kinda have to in this field." She giggled a little at the pun.

#

Things dropped into a routine for those first couple of months. Rory had a hard time sleeping at first, but after Ashley helped her work out with the station authorities, not locals, to add two more locks, she had an easier time of it. She still needed a white noise machine, though. After that, the days blended together; it was pretty idyllic. She ate breakfast, studied crops, ate lunch, harvested or planted, ate dinner, and then usually hung out with Ashley in her field room.

Rory woke from a refreshing sleep and went to breakfast. The sun was warm; the air was that cool morning air in temperate summers. After lunch, she went off on her own to do some harvesting in the apple orchard. Rory had worked for an hour, stretching and grabbing the low apples. She was headed to a central area to get a ladder when she thought she heard a sound from behind a tree.

"Hello, is someone there? Ashley, is that you?" She called out, walking toward where the sound came. She hadn't gotten very close before her instincts took over, and she turned to leave. Right at that moment, she caught a blur of motion out of the corner of her eye, and she went into fight-or-flight mode, and her body chose flight.

Dropping the basket of apples, she tried to run but unfortunately didn't get very far because someone had quickly caught her and grabbed her ponytail that she had done to keep her beautiful lustrous hair off her neck when it warmed up later, as it does in summer.

She tried to remember her self-defense courses, but all she could do was flail. The assailant had her hair wrapped around their hand, and they just stood there, leering at her while she tried to get away. "You're just making this harder for yourself than it has to be. Settle down, and it will be over faster." He said with a growl.

She recognized the voice and turned, seeing The Highest, knowing there wasn't anyone to help her, and he being the foremost authority, she froze and went limp.

#

Gathering her clothes with tears streaming down her face, Rory ran as fast as she could to the closest place she thought she would be safe. When she got to the field room, Ashley wasn't there. Dressing quietly, she sat in one of the beanbag chairs and listened, trying to see if he followed her. Hearing nothing, she leaned back and closed her eyes; the adrenaline wore off, and she quietly cried herself to sleep.

Rory dreamed many men were yelling her name at her in a mean spirit, crowded around her, closing in. Then, they said with a shout, "Rory!" she woke up and blinked, looking up at Ashley. The same Ashley who, upon finding Rory, dropped beside her and hugged her close. "I've been looking all over for you; everyone has. Where have you been?"

Sitting up, Rory had an astounding clarity come over her. She wiped the dried and fresh tears off her cheeks. "I've been raped." Ashley's mouth opened in an O of surprise, but before she could say anything, Rory said, "And I can't report it. Well, I could, but not here as it was the leader; I imagine they would do nothing. I will tell the spaceport authorities who will tell the Coalition. And the Blessed Accord won't be sending anyone here again."

Seeing Ashley's shocked look, she took her hand. "Please, I'm leaving. Come with me. My family will gladly pay for your trip, I'm sure, and if not, I will. I don't want you to be here any longer than I am. I know it's your home, but..." She trailed off and looked at Ashley.

Ashley's eyebrows were threatening to climb into her hair as she sat in shock and had a hard time finding words. "Leave? Like for good? I don't know."

Rory took Ashley's face in her hands and looked closely into her eyes. Ashley had never seen her look this fierce, this earnest. "Do you enjoy living here?" Ashley nodded. "Even after what you know they did to me, have probably done to others." Ashley shook her head no. "Do you want to see the stars, other worlds, visit Cat's Eye?" Ashley nodded yes.

"Come with me. I really don't want to leave you behind." Ashley nodded, and they both headed to the Space Port.