Legend
Chapter 07
Charles W Bird
[email protected]
Astronomers have discovered that the incredible gravitational strength of supermassive black holes can tear planets away from their star systems and hurl them through space at incredible speeds—as fast as 30 million mph.
This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The story is protected by copyright and may not be reproduced by any means without the express, written permission of the author.
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COWBOYS, SHEPHERDS AND MINERS
Flyer pilots had been reporting small, isolated communities on the high plains to the east of Globe and what appeared to be herds of cattle and sheep.
The panic of the early years immediately following the impact of the Cosmic Wave was over and the communities in the area surrounding Globe were growing. Trade had begun with sailing ships calling at the new seaports of El Paseo, Van and Red Island; new mines were being opened along the south coast and the mountains to the east.
Their energy supply was now assured, uranium had been discovered to the east and thorium was available near El Paseo. A steady supply of metals were being mined locally and imported from Manga-lor.
The trading firm of Zel and Tok Traders, had sailing vessels arriving at the port of Red Island almost daily and wagon trains were bringing cpr and small amounts of irn ores from the nearby mines regularly. The population was growing by leaps and bounds, they were nearly at the limits of their ability to grow food in the Globe area, it was clear that they were going to have to look elsewhere to feed their people.
Flyer Pilots Reg and Billy, both New Humans, suggested they explore the high plains and make contact with the folks who were establishing themselves in those lands. From their flight pass overs, they had seen herds of animals and crops being grown.
Captain Hay and the Council agreed and gave the two men permission to make contact and the authority to sign treaties and trade agreements.
Reg and Billy each collected six person crews that included a Caregiver on each flyer and folks who had knowledge of farming and the raising of animals. They decided to fly together, rather than split up and they were ready to go in two days.
Their crews were all young men and teen boys and their excitement was running high. They were about evenly divided between New Humans and The People and all had superior mind-speak abilities.
Captain Hay and some of the Council Members saw them off as the Flyers lifted off and headed east.
About an hour east of Globe, they spotted a small community and they put both flyers down. The adults of the small community ran and hid, but Reg had a trick up his sleeve, he had children of his own, so he pulled some sweet treats out of his pocket and held them out so the children could see them. He could see the children peeking out of a nearby barn and he made sure the children could see the sweets.
Two tow-headed boys, about 10 years old, showed themselves. Reg and Billy stood absolutely still, Reg handed Billy a piece of the treat and he ate it, making sounds that it was delicious.
Billy reached out with his mind and discovered one of the boys had rudimentary mind-speak, he sent to the boy, “This is good, do you want some?
The boy became frightened and grabbed onto his brother, “H hh how talk you me in head?”
Billy replied, “That is because you and I, we are special people and we can think to each other.”
The little boy came running to Billy, tears flowing from his eyes, “Papa tol’ me I was bad! Me evil!”
Billy picked up the child and held him close as he sent to him, “No, you are not bad or evil. Where I live, most people speak that way”
The little boy shyly whispered in Billy’s ear, “Duggie, my brother, can speak in my mind too, but he is afraid of Papa.”
Reg had been “eavesdropping” and walked slowly to the other twin, still holding the treat in his hand.
He sent to the child, “You are not evil or bad, talking in our head is a good thing.”
He held his arms out to the child and the boy came running to be held.
An older man came running from the barn, screaming and shouting for the devils to release his children! He attacked Reg as he was comforting the child and Billy was forced to knock the man down and plant his foot on the man’s chest to prevent him from getting up.
Caregiver Ton came running over and injected the man with a tranquilizer to calm him down; it put the man to sleep.
A tired and careworn looking woman came out of the barn holding several more young children and a teen boy followed her. She asked Billy, “Can you keep Athol that way, we cain’t take much more of him. We’s was gonna run away ifn’ he hit me once more.”
The young teen spoke up, “He a bad man, him is the only important one, it be all about him n’ usins ain’t worth nuthin.”
The boy looked down at his feet and continued, “He done shot at my, eere, uh, friend, an’ drove him away, now I’s got nobody. He done tol’ me that I’s evil an’ he were gonna drive the devil outta’ me! Fer all o’ me, ya’ can shootim’!”
Reg looked at Billy, they were both fathers and they understood what the boy was saying. Reg asked the boy, “Son, what is your name and where can we find your friend?”
The teen pulled back, clearly frightened, “Ya’ ain’t gonna hurt him none, is ya’?”
Reg chuckled, “No son, I was going to go get him for you.”
The teen replied, “I be called Jonas, Jonas Stogner, and my frien’ be Tolly Hancher n’ he lives in Dat.”
Jonas was clinging to Reg for dear life and soaking his shirt with his tears.
Reg held the boy and said quietly to him, “Jonas, we understand and do not think bad of you. If you and Tolly agree and his parents do also, we will take the two of you with us. We will even take your Mother and your brothers and sisters to a safe place among our people.”
Jonas looked at Reg, his eyes pleading, “I will go and Mama will go too, when can we leave?” Reg mind-sent to Billy, “If I leave now, I can be back first thing in the morning, why don’t you entertain Mr. Stogner while I am gone?”
Billy laughed and assisted the family in packing their personal items and carrying them out to the flyer. Reg’s crew volunteered to remain with Billy so the family would not be overcrowded in the Flyer. The children’s eyes got huge as the Flyer Pilot sat at the controls and lifted off for the short trip to The Hancher home and Tolly.
When they got there, Jonas ran into the house screaming for Tolly. Mrs. Hancher came out of the house and looked wondering at the machine sitting in her front yard. Reg got out and introduced himself to Mrs. Hancher and told her what was going on.
She replied, “Oh, thank goodness, our boy, Tolly, was just crushed by that hateful man. We don’t care that they are together, better that than a lifetime of unhappiness!”
Her husband came out from the house with the two boys, Tolly was pleading with his Father to let him go with Jonas. Tom Hancher questioned Reg on life in Globe and, in particular, about schooling and where the boys would live.
Reg told him that he and his wife had three boys, all older than Jonas and Tolly and that he would put the two boys up in his own home. The family would have quarters in the Cavern at first, until a house could be built for them.
Tom asked, “What about schooling?”
Reg asked, “What grade are the boys in?”
Tom replied, “They are both High School Seniors.”
Reg chuckled, “Well, I know their Principal very well, I am married to her!”
He continued, “The Great Ship has a University and they have opened it to us and all our people may attend classes, there are no fees or expenses, except for feeding them at home.”
He then had to explain about the ship and The People and who they were. Tom went over to the boys and said, “Boys, if we let you go to this place, will you study hard and make us proud of you? Will you treat each other in a responsible manner and promise never to hurt one another?”
Both boys promised and were seen holding hands as they went into Tolly’s house to collect his things. Janet Hancher’s eyes were leaking tears as she hugged her son before he got in the Flyer, Denny Hancher, Tolly’s younger brother watched his older brother in envy, he started then planning on joining his big brother in two years’ time!
When everyone had squeezed into the Flyer with their luggage and belongings, Reg told the pilot to head for Globe. Reg mind-sent to his wife back in Globe, that he was bringing some guests for supper.
She sent back, “How many orphans have you collected this time?”
Reg had brought back twin boys the last time he had been out on survey, the brothers were now 19 years old and going to The Great Ship daily for their University classes. Their other son was getting ready to be married and was 24.
Reg told her about Jonas and Tolly and suggested there be just one bed in their bedroom.
Her only comment was, “OK.”
Jonas and Tolly were glassy-eyed at the big city of Globe and Reg took them to see The Great Ship, as he had to report in to Captain Hay. The boys looked in on a University class in Mechanical Engineering, both boys were “WOWED” and decided that was what they wanted to do.
Reg then took them to his home and introduced them to his wife, Helen, and casually mentioned that she was the Principal of Globe High School. Both boys drew back a bit, but Helen wasn’t having any of that, she grabbed them and hugged them in welcome before she showed them to their room.
She grinned when they spotted the king size bed in the room and their faces got beet red. She told them it was their room and nobody would snoop, unless they heard screaming and hollering.
Their faces got even redder until they looked at her and saw she was teasing them.
They let out a breath of relief and hugged her back.
Reg then took Rachel Stogner and her young children over to the housing office and, surprising, they had a vacant house available, completely furnished. After he got them settled, he went back to his own home and was there when his two sons, Albert and David got home from their classes.
When he introduced them to Jonas and Tolly, they said, “You guys are the ones who looked in the door of our engineering class?”
Tolly replied, “Yeah, we are gonna be there next year for sure!”
Both Albert and David seemed to know, instinctively, that Jonas and Tolly were a couple and treated them so.
Helen called them all to supper and both Jonas and Tolly discovered that Helen was a super cook, they ate until they hurt; it was all so good.
Reg flew out the next morning to rejoin his crew and Billy and his crew to continue their survey.
Billy had spent the time talking to the ranchers and farmers in the area surrounding Dat, Athol Stogner would have nothing to do with them, but many of the others were interested in supplying meat and harvest to the folks at Globe. He helped them set up a Co-Op and two days after Reg returned, they had to call for Cargo Flyers to transport fresh butchered meat and fresh picked corn to Globe.
Both items were a “sell-out”, house wives mobbed the market when they heard about the fresh items that had been shipped in! One of the very first purchases the Co-Op was to make was a Steam Tractor so they could put even more fields into cultivation.
The People did not use money, they had been forced to use it when they were living in hiding before the Cosmic Wave had hit, now they instituted a Credit System. The Co-Op was paid in credits and they then used those credits to purchase the steam tractor.
It was to be a fruitful venture for the people involved in the Co-Op, the alluvial valleys around Dat had plentiful water and the soil was very rich. They planted corn, beans, melons and tomatoes, all of which were in high demand back in Globe, as well as among their own people.
Athol Stogner refused to participate and he became a lonely old recluse, hating everyone and shunned by all those he hated. The close-knit farming community was not sad when he decided to move away, none knew where he went and even fewer cared.
The Co-Op bought the Stogner farm and sent the credits to Rachel Stogner, who had changed her name back to her maiden name Rachel Handlemann. She gave her children the option and Jonas didn’t even think about it, he immediately became Jonas Handlemann!
Rachel used the credits from the sale of the farm property to purchase the home they were living in and she supported her children by working as the bookeeper for the local irn works, where they were making the steam tractors and other farm machinery.
Oddly, the irn works were owned by Zel and Tok Traders.
Reg and Billy continued their survey. They spotted a flat topped mountain and a huge lush valley beside it. They set the Flyers down at the edge of a small town and soon a large crowd of teen boys were attracted.
They noticed that a large number of the boys were Indian, but they mingled freely with boys of other races. Reg scanned the crowd of boys for mind-speak and every boy responded! There was no shyness in these boys, they wanted to know who they were and where they had come from!
When Billy told them they were interested in farm produce, four enterprising lads trundled a hand cart up to them, loaded with fruits and vegetables, along with a dozen live chickens tied by their feet!
By then, the village elders had arrived and they told Reg and Billy their community was called Green and they would be interested in selling produce and small animals to the people of Globe.
The people of Green held a festival for their visitors, giving them samples of their produce. One of the teen boys had a bright idea; he rushed home and asked his Mother to bake one of her peach pies for the visitors.
When it was done, he gingerly carried the steaming hot pie to where Reg and Billy were seated as they watched the young people dance in the village square. Billy smelled the peach pie and he just had to have a piece.
That is what Toby Walking Deer had hoped, he whipped out his belt knife and cut a generous section of his Mother’s pie and placed it on a pottery plate he had brought, just for that purpose. He handed Billy a fork and Billy ate the whole piece, even the plate was in danger of being eaten!
He proudly explained that his Mamma had made the pie and that she could make whole pies to send back with them to Globe.
Billy asked, “Could she make forty pies?”
Toby fudged a bit and said she could, knowing that he and all his brothers and sisters would be peeling fresh peaches all night!
Mary Walking Deer was in business.
She almost fainted when her eldest son told her he had sold forty of her pies and the newcomers wanted to take the pies the next day back to their home. Mary had been widowed, her husband, Toby, Sr. had been killed in a hunting accident and she was raising her five children by herself.
Her enterprising son called them the Mary Walking Deer Pie Bakery and the demand became so great, she had to hire other women and their children to help her make enough pies.
She was soon turning out two-hundred pies a week and there was a special flight each Friday to transport the fresh baked pies to Globe!
The farmers of Green agreed to form a Co-Op, demand for their vegetables and fruits were high. Fresh squashes and melons were in such demand, whole Flyers were dedicated to their delivery.
Reg had received some seeds from Zel that he had picked up on his travels to Manga-lor and he gave them to the best little hustler he knew, Toby Walking Deer to try out.
That summer, a strange new melon appeared in the loads from Green, it looked like a cantaloupe, but its flesh was bright red and very sweet. Toby started calling them Tobylopes and before long, he had amassed enough credits to build a pie factory for his Mother.
Others tried to grow the new melon and cash in on the demand, but there was something in the soil of the property owned by the Walking Deer Family, nobody could grow a melon that tasted like Tobylopes.
Toby, the little hustler that he was, never hesitated to give someone a sample, then sell them a whole load! His sisters had no lack of suitors when they came of age and all his brothers married into good families, but Toby did not find his own partner until Julia Gunther came to town with her father.
Poor Toby was smitten at first sight. John Gunther was a New Human from Globe and had been hired by the Co-Op to design and build a dam on the local river that fed the farms in Green. Julia was an only child, her Mother had died young and she lived with her Father.
Toby tried his best to get to know her, but Julia had no interest in a farm boy. The dam was a three year project and Toby did everything he could think of to attract Julia’s attention and get on her best side.
He finally did in a nearly tragic way, Julia’s Father was mapping out aqueduct routes from the dam site and had his transit set up on the hill above Toby’s melon field. Toby saw the man jumping and waving his arms, he didn’t pay much attention until the man fell onto the ground.
Concerned, Toby walked up the hill and found John Gunther lying on the ground, he had been bitten by a rattlesnake!
Toby followed the instructions his Grandmother had always told him and his brothers in treating the bite of a rattlesnake, then he picked the man up and carried him into town.
Toby had become a big, powerful young man and he carried John Gunther with ease. He brought John to his rented home and knocked on the door. Julia answered and screamed when she saw her Father and Toby showed her the fang marks.
He waited while she called for a Caregiver, when the man arrived, Toby told him how he had treated John and that John would be alright by morning. The Caregiver told Julia that he agreed with Toby, that her Father would be fine in the morning.
Julia wasn’t having any of it, she screamed and insisted the Caregiver “DO SOMETHING” for her Father. Toby said, “Miss Julia, I will sit with your Daddy and, if he gets any worse, I will go and get another Caregiver to come and treat him.”
He winked at the Caregiver and sat down in a chair beside John Gunther’s bed.
That didn’t satisfy Julia Gunther, but there was nothing else she could do. She went into the other room and the Caregiver left. About suppertime, John began to come around and was asking for water.
Toby went into the kitchen and drew a cup of water for John. Julia followed Toby into her Father’s room and was amazed at how much better her Father looked. She looked at the young man who had brought her Father home in a new light, but she said nothing and went back to her room.
John Gunther continued to improve through the night and, by morning, he asked the young man if he would help him bathe and get clean clothes on. Toby said he would and, with Toby’s assistance, John slowly walked out to the kitchen in time for breakfast.
One thing led to another and before the aqueducts that John Gunther had been surveying had been completed and Toby Walking Deer was walking Julia Marie Gunther Walking Deer down the aisle after having just been married to her in the local church!
Julia came to love Toby’s Mother and one day, she asked, “Why don’t you and Toby combine your businesses? A larger company always gets treated better by its customers and you can combine things like billing and sales to eliminate duplication.”
Mary and Toby discussed the idea at length and finally decided to try it. The first thing they were able to do was lease a Flyer and pilot from The Great Ship and they had their new logo painted on the sides. Looked at from one side, the viewer saw a flying pie and on the other side, a flying Tobylope.
Business was so good, during the long growing season, the nearly overworked pilot was making five round trips to Globe a week. Each flight, the flyer was loaded to its maximum capacity.
They rewarded Julia by making her the new company’s Business Manager. By the end of her first month, Julia was not sure it was not punishment rather than reward!
Every day there were agents begging for pies or vegetables, especially the Tobylopes. She asked Toby if he could get some additional land into production, she had more orders than he had ‘lope vines! Mary insisted Toby take some of the profits and invest it in additional land AND to hire some help.
Toby was working from dawn to past dark trying to keep up with the orders. They were selling the ‘lopes directly, but all the other fruits and vegetable they sold only through the Co-Op. With the additional land, Toby moved his vegetable farming to the new land and enlarged his Tobylope production in the vacated vegetable garden.
They had to hire a second Flyer Pilot, they were shipping 7 days a week and on Tuesdays, they had to make two flights to supply the traditional Wednesday shopping day.
Both Mary and Toby were beginning to wish that Julia was not so good at what she was doing, both had to increase the number of employees to keep up with Julia’s sales force! Toby solved his problem by hiring two foremen, one for veggies and one just for the ‘lopes and told them that they had hire and fire responsibilities for their respective crews.
Flying Pies n’ Veggies was off and running and in a few short years, was the biggest producer and employer in the area.
In the mountains to the east of Green, irn had been discovered and most of the overburden had been removed, exposing the ore body. The strike had been discovered by two boys who had been searching for magnetite to make magnets for their toys.
The much larger hematite ore body was ignored by them until one of the boys’ father came with them to help break up the magnetite so they could carry it home.
Reg happened to be in Green that day and he overheard the father talking about the rich red-brown ore that surrounded the magnet stone his boy was collecting. Reg asked the man about the discovery and suggested the boys file claim on the area. He even escorted the father and the two boys to the Recorder’s office to file the claim.
Once the claim had been filed, Reg offered the boys a contract that contained a Credit Value at the bottom, the father fainted!
The other boy was an orphan and had no family or home, he lived in an old shack by himself and bought his few needs by trading labor for food. Both boys were 16 and counted adult.
When Carl finally convinced his friend, Jeremy, that half the money was his, Jeremy joined Carl’s father in fainting!
TRADER’S ROAD
Their explorations took Reg and Billy south, toward the South Coast. They flew over small cattle ranches and farms, none big enough or prosperous enough for their needs, as they approached the Southern Coast, large farms, lush fields and huge cattle herds were seen. They spotted the town of Van, the last time either of them had seen the place it had been like the backdoor to Hell itself.
They set the flyers down in an open field and they walked to a large, modern building that said “CLINIC” on the front. As they entered the yard, a young man was busy working on a wagon type machine that had a small boiler and some machinery beside it, under a high seat with several levers and a steering wheel.
A sign on the side of the strange contraption said, “CARL’S TUGGER SERVICE”.
Just then Maceo and Teo stepped out of the clinic and spotted their friends, inviting them in for some cool refreshments. When Reg asked about the machine sitting in the front yard, Teo laughed and told them that it was Carl’s Freight Hauler. He related how Carl would tow up to ten freight wagon behind the strange machine all along the southern coast, making deliveries wherever people had paid him to carry their freight.
He told them how Carl worked with the traders, especially Zel and Tok Traders, who had commissioned the steam engine for Carl in Manga-lor. Carl had recently completed a new warehouse and, between the hauler and the storage, he had twenty employees and was waiting for another engine so that he could extend his hauling business into the small towns and villages of the inland country.
As they stood to take their leave, Reg and Billy heard loud talking out in the yard and they saw Carl dressing down a young man who had dropped a large box that he was loading onto a freight wagon.
As they watched, the final wagon was loaded and the driver hopped up on the seat and released a lever. The machine started to groan and jump as the slack was taken up in the couplings, then the wagon train began to move slowly out of the yard. By the time it was out on the trade road, it was moving faster that a man could walk and still was gaining speed.
Carl came back to where they were all standing, mumbling something about club-footed wagon drivers.
Carl sat down and gratefully accepted a cool drink from Teo as he sighed, “I need some more help, I have the new tugger all built up and waiting for Captain Zel to deliver my new steam engine. With that more powerful engine, I can serve the mountain towns in N’Mec and Col.
He turned to Reg and asked, “You Flyer guys interested in gol or slvr? I got a line on a whole pile of ore a miner up in N’Mec has, I kin let ya have it at a reasonable price?”
Reg asked him, “How much do you have?”
The young businessman replied, “Oh, about twenty hundredweight of ore concentrate, each.”
Reg looked at Billy and they both said, “DONE!”
Two days later, the Jinda Son pulled into the harbor and the first load swung off the ship was Carl’s new Tugger Engine. The next morning, Carl himself drove the new tugger out of town with fifteen heavily laden freight wagons behind it. He promised that he would have the ore concentrate in Van, ten days later.
He did!
It was the beginning of a promising enterprise, Carl would round up the ore, Reg and Billy would purchase the ore concentrate and pay Zel and Tok Traders to ship it to Globe, or, sometimes, all the way back to Banga-lor!
In a few short years, Carl had freight haulers working over all of the south coast, and, occasionally as far as S’Lui! He became a “silent partner” funding much of Maceo and Teo’s Clinics and was the sole provider for Van Children’s Home, where children from all over the South Coast came when they had no other place to go.
Carl’s Tugger Crews all carried emergency supplies to care for children they came across on their travels, clothing, food, shoes and lots of hugging and holding as they brought them home with them.
Carl could not walk near the Children’s Home without being mobbed by children wanting Papa Carl to pick them up and hold them. It didn’t matter that he was barely older than some of the rescued children, he was PAPA CARL and any child knew, beyond any doubt, there was a sweet treat or two hidden in one of Carl’s pockets.
As time passed, he opened freight offices in every village his Tuggers served and paid his local agents well. He was probably the largest single employer along the Southern Coast. He made it a practice to hire teen boys as apprentice Tugger Drivers and, when they were ready to drive themselves, there would be a brand new Tugger sitting in the freight yard at Van.
Carl kept his freight rates low, depending on volume for his profits and he could be counted upon to turn a “blind eye” if one of his drivers took a package along with him as a favor to someone who needed to get a small object to a relative in the next village.
Most days, the Trader’s Road was crowded, Carl’s Tuggers, herds of cattle, farmers hauling vegetables to market and travelers, all headed from one village to another. One teen boy, Tob, asked him one day, “Mr. Carl, why don’t you haul people, many would pay in order not to have to walk where they want to go?”
That got Carl to thinking, he tinkered around with a couple of freight wagons, putting in some padded seats and a tent over the top to provide shade. He rode in it and it felt rough and shaky, so he tried suspending the seat cabin from leather straps to cushion the jolting. After some trial and error experiments, he had a carriage that didn’t cripple his passengers during a ride from one town to the next.
He hooked four passenger wagons onto a new Tugger and handed the tiller lock to Tob, “This was your idea, take these waiting passengers to El Paseo and make the return trip tomorrow.”
Tob eagerly jumped up, onto the Tugger steering seat and grandly said to those in the yard, “All Aboard to El Paseo!”
As Tob pulled out onto Trader’s Road, all four passenger cars were full! A fast trip, it was not, nor was it dust free and cool, but it beat walking to El Paseo.
Before long, Carl’s Passenger Packets were making scheduled runs between B’lox and El Paseo daily.
MAIL AND PASSENGERS
Carl had read in one of the old “Before Books” about mail service, he decided that his Tuggers could haul this mail as easy as freight or people, so he started charging a cpr bit to take a written message to another village.
The new service was so popular, he sometimes had to send a Tugger and wagons with nothing but bags of mail on them. At first, his Tugger drivers handled all the mail and saw to it that it was distributed in each destination village. That was delaying his drivers, so he hit upon the idea of having agents in each village who would perform that task.
The message service proved to be very popular and, soon, Carl was opening branch offices in each village and the villagers would come to the freight office to pick up their mail each wagon day.
All was not perfect, a group of men decided it was easier to steal from the Tugger Wagons than it was to work for a living. This upset Carl, he had promised each of his customers that he would get their letter or package, even freight, to its destination intact and unharmed.
He hired guards to ride “shotgun” on his wagons, but it was not enough. Wagons parked in a freight yard were being pilfered and the situation became monumental when a passenger wagon was stopped and all the passengers were robbed.
He hired thirty men who had been cowboys and told them to put a stop to the robberies, anyway they could. Out on the open range, a cattle thief rarely lived long enough to enjoy even a steak from his stolen cow and the cowboys hired by Carl applied the same logic to wagon robbers.
It became commonplace to see a body or two swinging from a rope tied to the branch of a desert sycamore tree alongside the Trader’s Road!
It wasn’t pretty, but robberies became almost a thing of the past. It just wasn’t worth a hemp necktie, no matter what cargo Carl was sending as freight and no passenger carried enough valuables to make up the difference!
The freight business showed a profit and in less than five years, every major town and most of the smaller towns were connected by daily freight runs.
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TBC
As the population grew, the need for a central government became apparent, between the Flyer Crews and the Wagon Drivers, that need will be pushed and a new government will emerge.
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Astronomers have discovered that the incredible gravitational strength of supermassive black holes can tear planets away from their star systems and hurl them through space at incredible speeds—as fast as 30 million mph.
This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The story is protected by copyright and may not be reproduced by any means without the express, written permission of the author.
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COWBOYS, SHEPHERDS AND MINERS
Flyer pilots had been reporting small, isolated communities on the high plains to the east of Globe and what appeared to be herds of cattle and sheep.
The panic of the early years immediately following the impact of the Cosmic Wave was over and the communities in the area surrounding Globe were growing. Trade had begun with sailing ships calling at the new seaports of El Paseo, Van and Red Island; new mines were being opened along the south coast and the mountains to the east.
Their energy supply was now assured, uranium had been discovered to the east and thorium was available near El Paseo. A steady supply of metals were being mined locally and imported from Manga-lor.
The trading firm of Zel and Tok Traders, had sailing vessels arriving at the port of Red Island almost daily and wagon trains were bringing cpr and small amounts of irn ores from the nearby mines regularly. The population was growing by leaps and bounds, they were nearly at the limits of their ability to grow food in the Globe area, it was clear that they were going to have to look elsewhere to feed their people.
Flyer Pilots Reg and Billy, both New Humans, suggested they explore the high plains and make contact with the folks who were establishing themselves in those lands. From their flight pass overs, they had seen herds of animals and crops being grown.
Captain Hay and the Council agreed and gave the two men permission to make contact and the authority to sign treaties and trade agreements.
Reg and Billy each collected six person crews that included a Caregiver on each flyer and folks who had knowledge of farming and the raising of animals. They decided to fly together, rather than split up and they were ready to go in two days.
Their crews were all young men and teen boys and their excitement was running high. They were about evenly divided between New Humans and The People and all had superior mind-speak abilities.
Captain Hay and some of the Council Members saw them off as the Flyers lifted off and headed east.
About an hour east of Globe, they spotted a small community and they put both flyers down. The adults of the small community ran and hid, but Reg had a trick up his sleeve, he had children of his own, so he pulled some sweet treats out of his pocket and held them out so the children could see them. He could see the children peeking out of a nearby barn and he made sure the children could see the sweets.
Two tow-headed boys, about 10 years old, showed themselves. Reg and Billy stood absolutely still, Reg handed Billy a piece of the treat and he ate it, making sounds that it was delicious.
Billy reached out with his mind and discovered one of the boys had rudimentary mind-speak, he sent to the boy, “This is good, do you want some?
The boy became frightened and grabbed onto his brother, “H hh how talk you me in head?”
Billy replied, “That is because you and I, we are special people and we can think to each other.”
The little boy came running to Billy, tears flowing from his eyes, “Papa tol’ me I was bad! Me evil!”
Billy picked up the child and held him close as he sent to him, “No, you are not bad or evil. Where I live, most people speak that way”
The little boy shyly whispered in Billy’s ear, “Duggie, my brother, can speak in my mind too, but he is afraid of Papa.”
Reg had been “eavesdropping” and walked slowly to the other twin, still holding the treat in his hand.
He sent to the child, “You are not evil or bad, talking in our head is a good thing.”
He held his arms out to the child and the boy came running to be held.
An older man came running from the barn, screaming and shouting for the devils to release his children! He attacked Reg as he was comforting the child and Billy was forced to knock the man down and plant his foot on the man’s chest to prevent him from getting up.
Caregiver Ton came running over and injected the man with a tranquilizer to calm him down; it put the man to sleep.
A tired and careworn looking woman came out of the barn holding several more young children and a teen boy followed her. She asked Billy, “Can you keep Athol that way, we cain’t take much more of him. We’s was gonna run away ifn’ he hit me once more.”
The young teen spoke up, “He a bad man, him is the only important one, it be all about him n’ usins ain’t worth nuthin.”
The boy looked down at his feet and continued, “He done shot at my, eere, uh, friend, an’ drove him away, now I’s got nobody. He done tol’ me that I’s evil an’ he were gonna drive the devil outta’ me! Fer all o’ me, ya’ can shootim’!”
Reg looked at Billy, they were both fathers and they understood what the boy was saying. Reg asked the boy, “Son, what is your name and where can we find your friend?”
The teen pulled back, clearly frightened, “Ya’ ain’t gonna hurt him none, is ya’?”
Reg chuckled, “No son, I was going to go get him for you.”
The teen replied, “I be called Jonas, Jonas Stogner, and my frien’ be Tolly Hancher n’ he lives in Dat.”
Jonas was clinging to Reg for dear life and soaking his shirt with his tears.
Reg held the boy and said quietly to him, “Jonas, we understand and do not think bad of you. If you and Tolly agree and his parents do also, we will take the two of you with us. We will even take your Mother and your brothers and sisters to a safe place among our people.”
Jonas looked at Reg, his eyes pleading, “I will go and Mama will go too, when can we leave?” Reg mind-sent to Billy, “If I leave now, I can be back first thing in the morning, why don’t you entertain Mr. Stogner while I am gone?”
Billy laughed and assisted the family in packing their personal items and carrying them out to the flyer. Reg’s crew volunteered to remain with Billy so the family would not be overcrowded in the Flyer. The children’s eyes got huge as the Flyer Pilot sat at the controls and lifted off for the short trip to The Hancher home and Tolly.
When they got there, Jonas ran into the house screaming for Tolly. Mrs. Hancher came out of the house and looked wondering at the machine sitting in her front yard. Reg got out and introduced himself to Mrs. Hancher and told her what was going on.
She replied, “Oh, thank goodness, our boy, Tolly, was just crushed by that hateful man. We don’t care that they are together, better that than a lifetime of unhappiness!”
Her husband came out from the house with the two boys, Tolly was pleading with his Father to let him go with Jonas. Tom Hancher questioned Reg on life in Globe and, in particular, about schooling and where the boys would live.
Reg told him that he and his wife had three boys, all older than Jonas and Tolly and that he would put the two boys up in his own home. The family would have quarters in the Cavern at first, until a house could be built for them.
Tom asked, “What about schooling?”
Reg asked, “What grade are the boys in?”
Tom replied, “They are both High School Seniors.”
Reg chuckled, “Well, I know their Principal very well, I am married to her!”
He continued, “The Great Ship has a University and they have opened it to us and all our people may attend classes, there are no fees or expenses, except for feeding them at home.”
He then had to explain about the ship and The People and who they were. Tom went over to the boys and said, “Boys, if we let you go to this place, will you study hard and make us proud of you? Will you treat each other in a responsible manner and promise never to hurt one another?”
Both boys promised and were seen holding hands as they went into Tolly’s house to collect his things. Janet Hancher’s eyes were leaking tears as she hugged her son before he got in the Flyer, Denny Hancher, Tolly’s younger brother watched his older brother in envy, he started then planning on joining his big brother in two years’ time!
When everyone had squeezed into the Flyer with their luggage and belongings, Reg told the pilot to head for Globe. Reg mind-sent to his wife back in Globe, that he was bringing some guests for supper.
She sent back, “How many orphans have you collected this time?”
Reg had brought back twin boys the last time he had been out on survey, the brothers were now 19 years old and going to The Great Ship daily for their University classes. Their other son was getting ready to be married and was 24.
Reg told her about Jonas and Tolly and suggested there be just one bed in their bedroom.
Her only comment was, “OK.”
Jonas and Tolly were glassy-eyed at the big city of Globe and Reg took them to see The Great Ship, as he had to report in to Captain Hay. The boys looked in on a University class in Mechanical Engineering, both boys were “WOWED” and decided that was what they wanted to do.
Reg then took them to his home and introduced them to his wife, Helen, and casually mentioned that she was the Principal of Globe High School. Both boys drew back a bit, but Helen wasn’t having any of that, she grabbed them and hugged them in welcome before she showed them to their room.
She grinned when they spotted the king size bed in the room and their faces got beet red. She told them it was their room and nobody would snoop, unless they heard screaming and hollering.
Their faces got even redder until they looked at her and saw she was teasing them.
They let out a breath of relief and hugged her back.
Reg then took Rachel Stogner and her young children over to the housing office and, surprising, they had a vacant house available, completely furnished. After he got them settled, he went back to his own home and was there when his two sons, Albert and David got home from their classes.
When he introduced them to Jonas and Tolly, they said, “You guys are the ones who looked in the door of our engineering class?”
Tolly replied, “Yeah, we are gonna be there next year for sure!”
Both Albert and David seemed to know, instinctively, that Jonas and Tolly were a couple and treated them so.
Helen called them all to supper and both Jonas and Tolly discovered that Helen was a super cook, they ate until they hurt; it was all so good.
Reg flew out the next morning to rejoin his crew and Billy and his crew to continue their survey.
Billy had spent the time talking to the ranchers and farmers in the area surrounding Dat, Athol Stogner would have nothing to do with them, but many of the others were interested in supplying meat and harvest to the folks at Globe. He helped them set up a Co-Op and two days after Reg returned, they had to call for Cargo Flyers to transport fresh butchered meat and fresh picked corn to Globe.
Both items were a “sell-out”, house wives mobbed the market when they heard about the fresh items that had been shipped in! One of the very first purchases the Co-Op was to make was a Steam Tractor so they could put even more fields into cultivation.
The People did not use money, they had been forced to use it when they were living in hiding before the Cosmic Wave had hit, now they instituted a Credit System. The Co-Op was paid in credits and they then used those credits to purchase the steam tractor.
It was to be a fruitful venture for the people involved in the Co-Op, the alluvial valleys around Dat had plentiful water and the soil was very rich. They planted corn, beans, melons and tomatoes, all of which were in high demand back in Globe, as well as among their own people.
Athol Stogner refused to participate and he became a lonely old recluse, hating everyone and shunned by all those he hated. The close-knit farming community was not sad when he decided to move away, none knew where he went and even fewer cared.
The Co-Op bought the Stogner farm and sent the credits to Rachel Stogner, who had changed her name back to her maiden name Rachel Handlemann. She gave her children the option and Jonas didn’t even think about it, he immediately became Jonas Handlemann!
Rachel used the credits from the sale of the farm property to purchase the home they were living in and she supported her children by working as the bookeeper for the local irn works, where they were making the steam tractors and other farm machinery.
Oddly, the irn works were owned by Zel and Tok Traders.
Reg and Billy continued their survey. They spotted a flat topped mountain and a huge lush valley beside it. They set the Flyers down at the edge of a small town and soon a large crowd of teen boys were attracted.
They noticed that a large number of the boys were Indian, but they mingled freely with boys of other races. Reg scanned the crowd of boys for mind-speak and every boy responded! There was no shyness in these boys, they wanted to know who they were and where they had come from!
When Billy told them they were interested in farm produce, four enterprising lads trundled a hand cart up to them, loaded with fruits and vegetables, along with a dozen live chickens tied by their feet!
By then, the village elders had arrived and they told Reg and Billy their community was called Green and they would be interested in selling produce and small animals to the people of Globe.
The people of Green held a festival for their visitors, giving them samples of their produce. One of the teen boys had a bright idea; he rushed home and asked his Mother to bake one of her peach pies for the visitors.
When it was done, he gingerly carried the steaming hot pie to where Reg and Billy were seated as they watched the young people dance in the village square. Billy smelled the peach pie and he just had to have a piece.
That is what Toby Walking Deer had hoped, he whipped out his belt knife and cut a generous section of his Mother’s pie and placed it on a pottery plate he had brought, just for that purpose. He handed Billy a fork and Billy ate the whole piece, even the plate was in danger of being eaten!
He proudly explained that his Mamma had made the pie and that she could make whole pies to send back with them to Globe.
Billy asked, “Could she make forty pies?”
Toby fudged a bit and said she could, knowing that he and all his brothers and sisters would be peeling fresh peaches all night!
Mary Walking Deer was in business.
She almost fainted when her eldest son told her he had sold forty of her pies and the newcomers wanted to take the pies the next day back to their home. Mary had been widowed, her husband, Toby, Sr. had been killed in a hunting accident and she was raising her five children by herself.
Her enterprising son called them the Mary Walking Deer Pie Bakery and the demand became so great, she had to hire other women and their children to help her make enough pies.
She was soon turning out two-hundred pies a week and there was a special flight each Friday to transport the fresh baked pies to Globe!
The farmers of Green agreed to form a Co-Op, demand for their vegetables and fruits were high. Fresh squashes and melons were in such demand, whole Flyers were dedicated to their delivery.
Reg had received some seeds from Zel that he had picked up on his travels to Manga-lor and he gave them to the best little hustler he knew, Toby Walking Deer to try out.
That summer, a strange new melon appeared in the loads from Green, it looked like a cantaloupe, but its flesh was bright red and very sweet. Toby started calling them Tobylopes and before long, he had amassed enough credits to build a pie factory for his Mother.
Others tried to grow the new melon and cash in on the demand, but there was something in the soil of the property owned by the Walking Deer Family, nobody could grow a melon that tasted like Tobylopes.
Toby, the little hustler that he was, never hesitated to give someone a sample, then sell them a whole load! His sisters had no lack of suitors when they came of age and all his brothers married into good families, but Toby did not find his own partner until Julia Gunther came to town with her father.
Poor Toby was smitten at first sight. John Gunther was a New Human from Globe and had been hired by the Co-Op to design and build a dam on the local river that fed the farms in Green. Julia was an only child, her Mother had died young and she lived with her Father.
Toby tried his best to get to know her, but Julia had no interest in a farm boy. The dam was a three year project and Toby did everything he could think of to attract Julia’s attention and get on her best side.
He finally did in a nearly tragic way, Julia’s Father was mapping out aqueduct routes from the dam site and had his transit set up on the hill above Toby’s melon field. Toby saw the man jumping and waving his arms, he didn’t pay much attention until the man fell onto the ground.
Concerned, Toby walked up the hill and found John Gunther lying on the ground, he had been bitten by a rattlesnake!
Toby followed the instructions his Grandmother had always told him and his brothers in treating the bite of a rattlesnake, then he picked the man up and carried him into town.
Toby had become a big, powerful young man and he carried John Gunther with ease. He brought John to his rented home and knocked on the door. Julia answered and screamed when she saw her Father and Toby showed her the fang marks.
He waited while she called for a Caregiver, when the man arrived, Toby told him how he had treated John and that John would be alright by morning. The Caregiver told Julia that he agreed with Toby, that her Father would be fine in the morning.
Julia wasn’t having any of it, she screamed and insisted the Caregiver “DO SOMETHING” for her Father. Toby said, “Miss Julia, I will sit with your Daddy and, if he gets any worse, I will go and get another Caregiver to come and treat him.”
He winked at the Caregiver and sat down in a chair beside John Gunther’s bed.
That didn’t satisfy Julia Gunther, but there was nothing else she could do. She went into the other room and the Caregiver left. About suppertime, John began to come around and was asking for water.
Toby went into the kitchen and drew a cup of water for John. Julia followed Toby into her Father’s room and was amazed at how much better her Father looked. She looked at the young man who had brought her Father home in a new light, but she said nothing and went back to her room.
John Gunther continued to improve through the night and, by morning, he asked the young man if he would help him bathe and get clean clothes on. Toby said he would and, with Toby’s assistance, John slowly walked out to the kitchen in time for breakfast.
One thing led to another and before the aqueducts that John Gunther had been surveying had been completed and Toby Walking Deer was walking Julia Marie Gunther Walking Deer down the aisle after having just been married to her in the local church!
Julia came to love Toby’s Mother and one day, she asked, “Why don’t you and Toby combine your businesses? A larger company always gets treated better by its customers and you can combine things like billing and sales to eliminate duplication.”
Mary and Toby discussed the idea at length and finally decided to try it. The first thing they were able to do was lease a Flyer and pilot from The Great Ship and they had their new logo painted on the sides. Looked at from one side, the viewer saw a flying pie and on the other side, a flying Tobylope.
Business was so good, during the long growing season, the nearly overworked pilot was making five round trips to Globe a week. Each flight, the flyer was loaded to its maximum capacity.
They rewarded Julia by making her the new company’s Business Manager. By the end of her first month, Julia was not sure it was not punishment rather than reward!
Every day there were agents begging for pies or vegetables, especially the Tobylopes. She asked Toby if he could get some additional land into production, she had more orders than he had ‘lope vines! Mary insisted Toby take some of the profits and invest it in additional land AND to hire some help.
Toby was working from dawn to past dark trying to keep up with the orders. They were selling the ‘lopes directly, but all the other fruits and vegetable they sold only through the Co-Op. With the additional land, Toby moved his vegetable farming to the new land and enlarged his Tobylope production in the vacated vegetable garden.
They had to hire a second Flyer Pilot, they were shipping 7 days a week and on Tuesdays, they had to make two flights to supply the traditional Wednesday shopping day.
Both Mary and Toby were beginning to wish that Julia was not so good at what she was doing, both had to increase the number of employees to keep up with Julia’s sales force! Toby solved his problem by hiring two foremen, one for veggies and one just for the ‘lopes and told them that they had hire and fire responsibilities for their respective crews.
Flying Pies n’ Veggies was off and running and in a few short years, was the biggest producer and employer in the area.
In the mountains to the east of Green, irn had been discovered and most of the overburden had been removed, exposing the ore body. The strike had been discovered by two boys who had been searching for magnetite to make magnets for their toys.
The much larger hematite ore body was ignored by them until one of the boys’ father came with them to help break up the magnetite so they could carry it home.
Reg happened to be in Green that day and he overheard the father talking about the rich red-brown ore that surrounded the magnet stone his boy was collecting. Reg asked the man about the discovery and suggested the boys file claim on the area. He even escorted the father and the two boys to the Recorder’s office to file the claim.
Once the claim had been filed, Reg offered the boys a contract that contained a Credit Value at the bottom, the father fainted!
The other boy was an orphan and had no family or home, he lived in an old shack by himself and bought his few needs by trading labor for food. Both boys were 16 and counted adult.
When Carl finally convinced his friend, Jeremy, that half the money was his, Jeremy joined Carl’s father in fainting!
TRADER’S ROAD
Their explorations took Reg and Billy south, toward the South Coast. They flew over small cattle ranches and farms, none big enough or prosperous enough for their needs, as they approached the Southern Coast, large farms, lush fields and huge cattle herds were seen. They spotted the town of Van, the last time either of them had seen the place it had been like the backdoor to Hell itself.
They set the flyers down in an open field and they walked to a large, modern building that said “CLINIC” on the front. As they entered the yard, a young man was busy working on a wagon type machine that had a small boiler and some machinery beside it, under a high seat with several levers and a steering wheel.
A sign on the side of the strange contraption said, “CARL’S TUGGER SERVICE”.
Just then Maceo and Teo stepped out of the clinic and spotted their friends, inviting them in for some cool refreshments. When Reg asked about the machine sitting in the front yard, Teo laughed and told them that it was Carl’s Freight Hauler. He related how Carl would tow up to ten freight wagon behind the strange machine all along the southern coast, making deliveries wherever people had paid him to carry their freight.
He told them how Carl worked with the traders, especially Zel and Tok Traders, who had commissioned the steam engine for Carl in Manga-lor. Carl had recently completed a new warehouse and, between the hauler and the storage, he had twenty employees and was waiting for another engine so that he could extend his hauling business into the small towns and villages of the inland country.
As they stood to take their leave, Reg and Billy heard loud talking out in the yard and they saw Carl dressing down a young man who had dropped a large box that he was loading onto a freight wagon.
As they watched, the final wagon was loaded and the driver hopped up on the seat and released a lever. The machine started to groan and jump as the slack was taken up in the couplings, then the wagon train began to move slowly out of the yard. By the time it was out on the trade road, it was moving faster that a man could walk and still was gaining speed.
Carl came back to where they were all standing, mumbling something about club-footed wagon drivers.
Carl sat down and gratefully accepted a cool drink from Teo as he sighed, “I need some more help, I have the new tugger all built up and waiting for Captain Zel to deliver my new steam engine. With that more powerful engine, I can serve the mountain towns in N’Mec and Col.
He turned to Reg and asked, “You Flyer guys interested in gol or slvr? I got a line on a whole pile of ore a miner up in N’Mec has, I kin let ya have it at a reasonable price?”
Reg asked him, “How much do you have?”
The young businessman replied, “Oh, about twenty hundredweight of ore concentrate, each.”
Reg looked at Billy and they both said, “DONE!”
Two days later, the Jinda Son pulled into the harbor and the first load swung off the ship was Carl’s new Tugger Engine. The next morning, Carl himself drove the new tugger out of town with fifteen heavily laden freight wagons behind it. He promised that he would have the ore concentrate in Van, ten days later.
He did!
It was the beginning of a promising enterprise, Carl would round up the ore, Reg and Billy would purchase the ore concentrate and pay Zel and Tok Traders to ship it to Globe, or, sometimes, all the way back to Banga-lor!
In a few short years, Carl had freight haulers working over all of the south coast, and, occasionally as far as S’Lui! He became a “silent partner” funding much of Maceo and Teo’s Clinics and was the sole provider for Van Children’s Home, where children from all over the South Coast came when they had no other place to go.
Carl’s Tugger Crews all carried emergency supplies to care for children they came across on their travels, clothing, food, shoes and lots of hugging and holding as they brought them home with them.
Carl could not walk near the Children’s Home without being mobbed by children wanting Papa Carl to pick them up and hold them. It didn’t matter that he was barely older than some of the rescued children, he was PAPA CARL and any child knew, beyond any doubt, there was a sweet treat or two hidden in one of Carl’s pockets.
As time passed, he opened freight offices in every village his Tuggers served and paid his local agents well. He was probably the largest single employer along the Southern Coast. He made it a practice to hire teen boys as apprentice Tugger Drivers and, when they were ready to drive themselves, there would be a brand new Tugger sitting in the freight yard at Van.
Carl kept his freight rates low, depending on volume for his profits and he could be counted upon to turn a “blind eye” if one of his drivers took a package along with him as a favor to someone who needed to get a small object to a relative in the next village.
Most days, the Trader’s Road was crowded, Carl’s Tuggers, herds of cattle, farmers hauling vegetables to market and travelers, all headed from one village to another. One teen boy, Tob, asked him one day, “Mr. Carl, why don’t you haul people, many would pay in order not to have to walk where they want to go?”
That got Carl to thinking, he tinkered around with a couple of freight wagons, putting in some padded seats and a tent over the top to provide shade. He rode in it and it felt rough and shaky, so he tried suspending the seat cabin from leather straps to cushion the jolting. After some trial and error experiments, he had a carriage that didn’t cripple his passengers during a ride from one town to the next.
He hooked four passenger wagons onto a new Tugger and handed the tiller lock to Tob, “This was your idea, take these waiting passengers to El Paseo and make the return trip tomorrow.”
Tob eagerly jumped up, onto the Tugger steering seat and grandly said to those in the yard, “All Aboard to El Paseo!”
As Tob pulled out onto Trader’s Road, all four passenger cars were full! A fast trip, it was not, nor was it dust free and cool, but it beat walking to El Paseo.
Before long, Carl’s Passenger Packets were making scheduled runs between B’lox and El Paseo daily.
MAIL AND PASSENGERS
Carl had read in one of the old “Before Books” about mail service, he decided that his Tuggers could haul this mail as easy as freight or people, so he started charging a cpr bit to take a written message to another village.
The new service was so popular, he sometimes had to send a Tugger and wagons with nothing but bags of mail on them. At first, his Tugger drivers handled all the mail and saw to it that it was distributed in each destination village. That was delaying his drivers, so he hit upon the idea of having agents in each village who would perform that task.
The message service proved to be very popular and, soon, Carl was opening branch offices in each village and the villagers would come to the freight office to pick up their mail each wagon day.
All was not perfect, a group of men decided it was easier to steal from the Tugger Wagons than it was to work for a living. This upset Carl, he had promised each of his customers that he would get their letter or package, even freight, to its destination intact and unharmed.
He hired guards to ride “shotgun” on his wagons, but it was not enough. Wagons parked in a freight yard were being pilfered and the situation became monumental when a passenger wagon was stopped and all the passengers were robbed.
He hired thirty men who had been cowboys and told them to put a stop to the robberies, anyway they could. Out on the open range, a cattle thief rarely lived long enough to enjoy even a steak from his stolen cow and the cowboys hired by Carl applied the same logic to wagon robbers.
It became commonplace to see a body or two swinging from a rope tied to the branch of a desert sycamore tree alongside the Trader’s Road!
It wasn’t pretty, but robberies became almost a thing of the past. It just wasn’t worth a hemp necktie, no matter what cargo Carl was sending as freight and no passenger carried enough valuables to make up the difference!
The freight business showed a profit and in less than five years, every major town and most of the smaller towns were connected by daily freight runs.
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TBC
As the population grew, the need for a central government became apparent, between the Flyer Crews and the Wagon Drivers, that need will be pushed and a new government will emerge.