A Planet's Bounty: Ransomeers, #2

By C.M. Simpson

Governing a colony isn't easy. I mean, I should be in my last year of school, stressing over exams and annoying my parents, not on some distant planet as a ransom for my world's good behavior. Instead, I'm running a colony of five, while doing classes on planetary development, so when a strange spacecraft goes overhead, flying fast and low, toward a group of colonists I haven't met yet? Well, even my Keepers think we have to move fast, or risk losing friends we've never met. And here I was thinking they'd dealt with the Heritage threat.

• Language: English
• Publisher: C.M. Simpson
• Release date: Dec 18, 2022
• ISBN: 9798215631379

C.M. Simpson

I spent the first twenty years of my life living in different parts of Queensland and the Northern Territory. My father was a teacher who liked to travel, so he took teaching appointments in all kinds of places. I don’t think I stayed in one place for more than four years at a stretch. I wrote stories for most of that time, drawing on the different landscapes we encountered and giving a hyper-active imagination somewhere to run. Seeing so many different places gave me a lot of food for thought as I stepped into the world of adulthood and took my first full-time job, and I never stopped writing and exploring the worlds in my head. So far, I have written four collections of short stories and poetry, and a number of novels, with many more to come. I hope you have enjoyed this part of my journey.

Book preview

A Planet’s Bounty

Ransomeers #2

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C.M. Simpson

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Governing a colony isn’t easy. I mean, I should be in my last year of school, stressing over exams and annoying my parents, not on some distant planet as a ransom for my world’s good behavior. Instead, I’m running a colony of five, while doing classes on planetary development, so when a strange spacecraft goes overhead, flying fast and low, toward a group of colonists I haven’t met yet? Well, even my Keepers think we have to move fast, or risk losing friends we’ve never met. And here I was thinking they’d dealt with the Heritage threat.

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License Notes

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This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase a copy for yourself, and Thank You for respecting the hard work of this author.

Copyright Page

A Planet’s Bounty

1st Edition

Copyright © December 18, 2022, C.M. Simpson

Cover Art & Design © September 5, 2022, Jake at JCaleb Design

All rights reserved.

Dedication

To everyone who believed in me until I finally had to believe in myself.

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Thank you.

CONTENTS

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1—New Beginnings

2—Sensitive Issues

3—Living Arrangements

4—A Pending Arrival

5—Touch Down

6—Introductions

7—A New Arrangement

8—Unpleasant Surprises

9—Building Begins

10—Speaking with Sayyed

11—Touching Base with Taylor

12—Choices

13—Dinnertime Debates

14—Work Lists and Route Plans

15—Hidden Wealth

16—A Short Detour

17—A Quiet Interlude

18—Hunted

19—The Storm

20—Another Cave

21—Mystery on Mysteries

22—A Different Kind of Rebel

23—Strike Two

24—Strike Three

25—More Complications

26—A Sodden Mess

27—Contact

28—Negotiating a Future

Terms and Characters

Author’s Notes

More Work by C.M. Simpson

About C.M. Simpson

1—New Beginnings

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"The Sseritoss’s shuttle will arrive in two hours." S’Kerov’s voice woke me with a start.

Do you mind? I snapped, sitting bolt upright and narrowly missing hitting my head on the overhead lockers. I still hadn’t gotten used to the new pod’s configuration...and I hadn’t earned an expansion. It made me miss my old, prematurely upgraded quarters, but they were still safely tucked away in my forested claim of sapphirite.

The yvernatch had approved my request we leave our old pods where they’d been parked...and even agreed to keep mine ‘off the grid’ for the time being.

Color me surprised.

"I would mind if the colony’s leaders were not present for the Wardens’ arrival."

That got me moving.

They are? I demanded, on my feet and heading for the pod doors. Is everything ready? Why didn’t you wake me earlier?

The damned lizard chuckled...or gave the yvernatch equivalent.

"To answer your questions in order: They are; everything is as ready as you can make it bar this morning’s events; and I woke you at the time you told me to."

I did? I snapped. Why didn’t I give myself more time?

"Your words, and I quote, were that if I gave you more time than that, you would find a way to...’stuff everything up.’"

I said that?

"You did."

Wow, I must have been really stressed.

"You were a little agitated, S’Kerov stated, but you and Mitchel were not in agreement, and I believe you were trying to devise a plan for creating more harmony between your colonists."

Which was when I remembered what Mitch and I had disagreed on.

He wouldn’t let me go and ‘speak’ to Su-Lynn and Blossom about their attitudes toward Taylor...with my fists...since being reasonable hadn’t worked.

You’re not at school anymore, he’d told me. And I know this isn’t how you want the colony to run.

"Right now, it’s exactly how I want it to run, I told him. I can take the pair of them with one hand tied behind my back."

Mitch had cocked an eyebrow and smirked at me.

That might be true, he’d said, grabbing me before I could turn and stalk away in disgust.

My face heated at the memory of being dragged into his arms and hugged...and of the way I’d buried my face in his shirt and wrapped my arms around him in return.

It got even hotter when I realized S’Kerov had heard what I’d said next.

You know I’m eighteen, already...

And you know there’s a risk neither of us are ready to take, he’d replied, his arms tightening at my stomp of frustration.

I wondered which particular piece of ‘not in agreement’ S’Kerov had meant, and then decided I didn’t need to know.

I’d put Blossom and Su-Lynn on latrine duty for the rest of the month, instead. There were only eight of us, for God’s sake! And they were going to learn to treat everyone decently, or so help me, I’d bury them in the latrine pit, myself.

"Stop!" S’Kerov’s command broke through my thoughts, and I realized my hand was on the access panel.

I stopped, turning to glare at the pick-up, with a heavy sigh.

"What now?"

I can’t say my attitude had improved much after our little tete-a-tete on the yvernatch ship. They’d saved us, sure...but the scaley little jerks were the reason we were here in the first place, hostages for a war they didn’t want to have.

Personally, I think they should have tried picking on my home world in a traditional invasion. If they had, at least we’d have had a fair chance of handing them their scaly backsides.

I sighed, again.

Except we wouldn’t have. They outclassed us in weapons, numbers, support tech, and every other way that counted, and because we hadn’t gotten ourselves properly off the ground, so to speak, we didn’t even rate a voice in interplanetary politics.

We weren’t sub-human, or sub-alien, or whatever the right term was, but as a species we definitely hadn’t earned the right to be thought of as equals—or given the keys to interstellar travel. We were like a naughty cousin, who had to prove they could be responsible.

It sure sucked to be human, right now.

"You have not completed your morning tasks," my yvernatch handler informed me, and I swear he was laughing behind the stern tone he’d tried to adopt.

But I have things to do, I argued.

"And you don’t want to be talking to the new Wardens in your sleeping attire," came the gentle reminder.

I was?

I glanced down, registering soft pink flannel, and blushed as red as a beet.

Well, if you put it that way... I managed.

"You’re welcome," S’Kerov replied, and I wanted to slap him.

Since he was on the Sseritoss and would arrive with the shuttle, I settled for opening my closet and pulling out another set of fatigues. They might not be the most stylish of garments, but Mitch was right about one thing: they were comfortable.

I was showered, dressed and had my boots on inside the next five minutes, and then I settled down in front of my terminal to see what I could do to add chocolate to my day.

I don’t know where the yvernatch had gotten their information—and I hated that it worked—but somehow, they’d worked out that chocolate was a great motivator when it came to a lot of young humans...and that I fell squarely into that demographic.

What do you mean ‘Practice Negotiation and Delegation?’ I asked a few minutes later.

My choice of subjects had expanded since the Heritage had come and tried to kill us. It had expanded from ‘Exploration,’ ‘Survival,’ ‘Xenobiology,’ ‘Community,’ to include ‘Settlement,’ which included ‘Governance,’ ‘Administration, and ‘Security.’

I don’t know why ‘Practice Negotiation and Delegation was under ‘Community’ and not ‘Settlement,’ but I guessed it couldn’t go under both, unless...

I tabbed back to the start and selected ‘Settlement.’

Yup, ‘Practice Negotiation and Delegation’ was under that tab, too, and under ‘Governance’ right along with ‘Administration, and ‘Security.’ Lucky me. And. of course. it had a different spin to it for each subject. I hated it when they did this to me.

So what do you actually want me to do? I asked in exasperation. Negotiate with my colonists, or negotiate with the Wardens?

A series of short hisses came over the speakers, as S’Kerov laughed, and I almost wished I could go back to when our yvernatch handlers had pretended to be computer systems. Who knew a reptile could have such a sense of humor?

Honestly, it was worse than my dad’s!

Both, he replied, and I sighed.

Of course, it’s both, I said. Now, why is it my only task for today?

Don’t you think it’s enough? S’Kerov asked.

I thought about it and glared at the monitor.

And, besides, you can always add more as the day progresses, I remembered.

I’m shocked you’d even think that, he retorted, looking anything but.

I just bet you are, I thought, but didn’t say, chalking up a mark for yvernatch sarcasm.

I skimmed over the other categories. They were a repeat of many of the tasks that had been disrupted, with a list of everything between where I’d been at when our ‘training’ had been interrupted, and when it had resumed at an accelerated pace.

"I don’t know how you expect any of us to complete these in the time-frame you’ve set," I grumbled as I pushed back from the desk.

"We have already seen what you can accomplish when you are under pressure," S’Kerov reminded me. Now we are curious to see how much more you can achieve, when that pressure involves family as well as friends.

Great...just...great... I thought, pushing back from my desk and heading for the door.

This time, I was dressed, and just awake enough to be thinking.

I was still surprised when the door didn’t open.

"What? I demanded, turning around and glaring at the nearest pick-up. I’ve gone over my tasks. I’m dressed."

I swept my hand up and down to indicate my fatigues.

What more do you want?

"Breakfast," S’Kerov stated, and crossed my arms over my chest.

Isn’t that what the mess is for? I asked, because one of the elements of ‘Community’ had been to ‘establish places of communal gathering,’ and we’d done that.

To wit, one communal mess hall and kitchen, one crafting area, which we’d soon have to expand, and one communal garden. Yup. You couldn’t get much more communal than us.

We did most of our socializing in the mess and kitchen, because our yvernatch ‘benefactors’ kept us so busy with other tasks that we barely had time to exchange the time of day with each other, let alone just hang out together...which was probably a good thing.

The mess is a perfect place for you to touch base with your people while you eat, S’Kerov agreed, But it is not ideal for when you wish to discuss matters of colony concerning them. You need a structure for governance that allows you to meet with your high-level advisors over a meal, or in private, to discuss sensitive issues.

Or both, I concluded, and warmth touched his next reply.

Or both, he agreed.

"And when, exactly, do you want us to construct one of those?"

All in good time, he assured me. For now, your quarters will have to do, even though my cultural advisors tell me it would not be considered entirely appropriate.

What— I began, just as the door hissed open, and Mitch walked into me, almost knocking me off my feet.

I rounded on him, even as he grabbed me to stop me from falling over. "What are you doing here? And haven’t you heard of knocking?"

He side-stepped around me, and the door hissed closed behind him.

Sselti? he asked. Didn’t you tell her I was coming?

His voice said his advisor had better have, but she didn’t seem to agree.

I delegated that task to her handler.

My scowl intensified at her use of the word, and I shrugged Mitch’s hand from my shoulder.

S’Kerov? I asked.

My apologies, I had not reached the part where I was going to say that in the absence of a suitable structure, your pod had been designated as the meeting space when only one or two advisors were involved.

I tapped my foot, my arms still folded across my chest.

I only had one advisor, and he was standing awkwardly on the other side of the pod cabin, leaning against a wall that could be erased and dump him on his ass outside, if I so willed it.

That thought must have shown on my face, because Mitch pushed off the wall.

"Are you sure you’re in a suitable space for making decisions?" he asked, and I stomped across to the small table that served as my study space and eating place.

Swinging the computer monitor into its niche in the wall, and touching the tabletop so the keyboard sank into it, I indicated the space across from me.

Come, sit, I told him, snarkily adding, "Advisor."

His eyebrows quirked, and I saw his mouth curve into the tiniest of smiles.

You haven’t had breakfast, yet, have you?

I thrust a hand at the door.

I was on my way to do exactly that, when I was told I needed a meeting space for discussing ‘sensitive issues’ with my advisors, the implication being, and here I paused to give the pick-up a meaningful stare, that such a space would soon be organized...by me.

And me, Mitch put in, And I don’t know why you’re so mad about it. They’re right.

"They’re always right," I grumbled, regretting the words almost as soon as I said them.

I will remind you you said that, S’Kerov stated, and I sighed.

Mitch, smart man that he was, changed the subject.

So, what are we discussing?

I stared at him.

You don’t know?

I only know that you and I are having a meeting to discuss ‘sensitive issues,’ he told me, And that you need my report as your security advisor.

My jaw dropped, and I hastily winched it back into place.

You’re my what now?

He shrugged, a faint touch of pink coloring his cheeks.

Your security advisor.

I decided to let the poor guy off the hook.

I suppose that makes sense, what with your military training and all.

Such as it was, he told me. I hadn’t been in for very long.

Long enough to be handed a rifle and sent to guard a busful of kids being sent off as hostages to stop an alien attack, I reminded him, and almost immediately regretted it.

He blushed even more deeply and pushed back his seat.

I’ll come back later, he said, in the quiet, even tone he used when he was reining in his temper.

I wondered how this was going to work for him, and watched as he touched the control panel to let himself out.

It was no surprise when it flashed red.

I couldn’t help it. I snickered.

He turned, and laid the flat of his hand on the door panel. It flashed red, again, and a look of consternation crossed his face.

Oh, you think that was funny, do you?

I nodded, still smiling at his discomfort.

Our yvernatch overlords were so predictable. When they wanted us to do something, or learn something, or complete a set task, they could be extremely inflexible about it. It didn’t matter if we were having a bad day, or were in a foul mood because we hadn’t eaten, or had just been insulted. The task still had to be done.

Anyone would think they were dealing with a bunch of school kids or still-maturing young adults.

Oh, wait...

They were.

I snickered, again, stopping as Mitch closed the space between us in two quick strides. He was taller than me when I was standing up, which usually I didn’t mind, but when I was sitting down and he was towering over me?

Not so much.

I remained sitting down, squared my jaw, and looked him in the eye.

Sit down, I told him, as all desire to laugh vanished.

To my surprise, he did. I tried to figure out whether it had been my expression, my tone of voice, or if he’d just decided it was a good idea.

Seeing as you asked so nicely, he shot back, and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.

2—Sensitive Issues

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So, this meeting, I began, addressing the pick-up. What exactly did you have in mind for us to discuss?

We were hoping you had enough of an idea to figure that out for yourself, Sselti replied, and suddenly I didn’t envy Mitch his ‘handler.’

She had an even worse attitude than I did!

Well, there’s my report, Mitch put in, And then there’s that little matter we were discussing last night.

Which one? I asked, and couldn’t stop myself going red.

He blushed, too, which should have made me feel better, but didn’t.

There’s that one, too, he admitted. And if anything can be described as sensitive, it ranks right up there.

Sselti was sudden curiosity. Which matter is this?

Mating, S’Kerov replied.

Honestly, I could have done without S’Kerov’s blunt assessment. I buried my face in my hands.

"It’s not just mating, I said. It’s..."

I didn’t dare look at Mitch, and counted myself lucky when he filled in the gap.

Closeness. The closest a pair of humans can get, he explained.

I couldn’t help it; I snickered.

But it has consequences, Mitch told them. And I don’t think any of us are ready for children. We don’t have the medical facilities for a start.

I...see... Sselti sounded like she regretted asking, and I didn’t blame her.

I regretted the subject coming up, at all.

I’ll look into it, S’Kerov told us.

"We’ll look into it, Sselti corrected. And, no doubt this is something the other Wardens should be aware of, too. We just didn’t think it would be an issue with the young."

Mitch snorted. Then you don’t know much about the young, then, do you?

I... Sselti began, only to have S’Kerov cut her off.

I believe he is referring to the human young, my Warden hastily stated. Which is true. We do not know at what age procreation becomes an attractive prospect...or how controlled the results can be.

Controlled? I asked.

That is a discussion for another time, Sselti put in. And it is not the purpose of this meeting.

"You had other sensitive issues in mind?" I asked sarcastically.

S’Kerov made the little choking sound that was the yvernatch equivalent of clearing his throat.

Actually, we do, he admitted. Security was one of them, but the tensions we are seeing in your team are also worrying. We do not understand them.

Su-Lynn, Blossom and Taylor? I asked.

That, S’Kerov confirmed.

I sighed, wondering how I was going to handle this.

I suppose, in a way, it ties into the other question, I said, looking to Mitch for help.

He smirked at me and motioned I should go on.

I huffed in exasperation and glowered at him, my mind racing as to how I was going to word it. Finally, I decided to just ask.

Do the yvernatch ever have someone who is born, say, a male, but who believes they should have been a female?

And whose responses are more female than male? Sselti clarified.

Yes, I answered. Like they are physically one thing, but mentally another at a way-they’re-wired level.

It has been known to happen, the Watcher admitted.

And when that happens, do you have those whose bodies match their minds, be... I looked at Mitch for help, but it was S’Kerov who came to my assistance.

Less than accepting? he asked, and I nodded vigorously.

Is that what the tension is about? Sselti asked, and I nodded, again.

I just haven’t figured out a way to deal with it, I said, raising my head and willing her to understand. I don’t want to drive them away, but at the same time I need them to be not...

I gestured helplessly, at a loss for how to describe it.

Not the way they are.

We understand, S’Kerov assured me.

"So, how do the yvernatch deal with situations like these?" I asked.

You’re asking for advice? S’Kerov wanted to know, and Mitch’s eyebrows shot up.

I ignored him. I knew when I needed to ask for advice, dammit!

Yes, I replied. Like you said, we’re young. We wouldn’t be having to deal with this kind of thing until we were older.

But I thought it happened at all ages? Sselti asked.

No, I meant as a boss, a person in charge, I clarified. Usually, we’d be looking to someone in charge of us to sort it out.

And now you are the one in charge, you need some guidance.

Honestly! The damned lizard didn’t have to sound so smug about it.

Yes, I hissed, glaring at Mitch when he covered his mouth with his hand.

As if that was going to stop me from seeing his smile, especially when his eyes were glittering with amusement. I shot him the finger, and he snickered.

Real mature, Person-in-Charge, he murmured.

The two Wardens ignored the exchange, and I guessed they’d learned some behaviors were better overlooked in their client colonists, after all they were used to dealing with the young of their conquered.

At least, I hoped they were.

What had you come up with so far? Mitch asked, when the two yvernatch remained silent.

I guessed he figured one of us had to pretend to be mature, and as he was actually old enough to be put in that bracket, he might as well be it.

I sighed and leant back in my chair.

So far? I asked, and he nodded. Well, separating them wouldn’t help change their behaviors, and it wouldn’t solve the problem of getting them to understand that being wired differently is okay.

Which is something you’re familiar with, Mitch prodded.

I stared at him, wanting to know how he’d figured it out, but not wanting to ask.

It’s something I’ve had to get used to, I admitted, Albeit not for the same reasons, and my guess is that Taylor has developed her own means for coping with the prejudice she faces.

I notice you refer to Taylor using the feminine pronoun, S’Kerov interrupted.

If that is the way she sees herself, I told him, It’s only respectful to acknowledge that, and address her accordingly.

Except you are not addressing her, now, Sselti observed, and she is nowhere she can hear how she is referred to.

That doesn’t matter, I told them. Changing our own perspective is the first step to acceptance, and she needs to know we accept her as she is.

I caught myself staring at the pick-up, chin raised, and knew the look on my face dared either of them to defy me.

Mitch’s gaze sharpened and he sat a little straighter in his chair, shifting slightly to