. 11

This chapter is non-erotic.

*****

Chapter 11: Suitable Leaders

He led them first to the converted saloon. "This is where we run things. I want to introduce you to the other counsel members."

They stepped onto a covered patio that creaked underfoot. Tad ushered them through a new, polished wooden door in the frame where Ellie thought swinging saloon doors might once have hung. The air carried the heavy, sweet smell of antique lumber. It wasn't unpleasant.

"It's a shame you replaced the original doors; I wanted to bust in here like a dusty troublemaker with my cowboy boots," said Ellie.

Tad let out a bark of a laugh and leaned over to slap his knees. He looked at Hannah. "I like her!"

Hannah grinned. "Told ya."

The room was tall, crowned by a balcony that led into rooms above. Fans dangled on long poles from the high ceiling and churned quietly in the dusty air.

Three empty office chairs, modern but outdated, sat behind a long polished oak counter. Crates of files, folders, and documents sat haphazardly piled along the far wall, and uniform binders lined the shelves where liquor once stood. The space had been converted into a utilitarian town hall or city counsel chamber of sorts.

Two individuals -- an East Asian woman in her 40's and a younger white guy with long hair pulled into a man bun -- worked their way down the stairs in greeting.

"Sandra, Mitchell -- I would like for you to meet Ellie." Tad gestured toward her. "Ellie, these are the other two counsel members."

They both approached and extended greetings. Ellie noted that they each looked fatigued, but they were gracious enough.

"So what does the counsel do?" asked Ellie.

"We make the big decisions," Mitchell offered. "Supply shipments, project prioritization, conflict resolution, that kind of thing."

"What do you mean by 'projects'?" asked Ellie.

"Pretty much what you'd think it means," piped in Sandra. "Construction. Additional housing. Crop rotation. Just things that need to be done as our community grows."

"People petition their requests based on their need," added Tad, "and the adults meet here once a week to make their voices heard."

"We hold votes and make it happen," said Mitchell. "Not to mention -- we're basically the only contact with the outside world. And with Yeltsin's people, it's a lot," he nodded wearily, and Ellie knew he meant it.

"So this is basically pretty democratic," said Ellie.

"We have to make decisions on everyone's behalf sometimes," said Sandra. "Not everything can be put to a public vote. But we do our best."

"And you're elected? Do you run for office?" asked Ellie.

"Yes to the first one, no to the second," said Mitchell. "We don't do political campaigns. That's strictly not allowed."

"Wait, so how do you win an election?"

"We serve if people want us to serve," said Sandra. "No speeches and no asking people for votes."

"So then..." asked Ellie, working on this, "How do you not just end up with everyone voting for themselves? Or just a few votes for, like, eighty different people?"

"She asks good questions," Sandra said to Tad.

He smiled and nodded. "Voting does not work here like it does out there," said Tad. "You can almost think of it like a tournament. You move down brackets or get disqualified based on the number of votes you get in each round. Eventually winners emerge."

Mitchell snorted. "Winners."

"You didn't want to win?" asked Ellie.

They all shook their heads in unison. A gust of wind outside made the building groan around them.

"Like Mitchell said, it's a lot of responsibility," said Sandra. "We're mandated to serve whether or not we want to. One of our core tenants is that we don't reward ambition."

"You ever heard that old saying, 'the person capable of getting themselves elected President is probably the person least suited for the job'?" asked Mitchell. "That's the spirit of it. And I must be pretty fuckin' suited for the job, because I am not having fun. It all comes back on you when the biggest things go wrong. I'd rather be out there playing with the kids or teaching them how to cook or whatever." He crinkled his nose and looked around the drab old saloon. "Nah. I wouldn't pick it."

"It can be hard on us," said Sandra, giving Michell a slightly disapproving side eye. "Everyone else enjoys equality. Our burden is higher. Poor Thaddeus has been doing it for twenty-three years."

"Wait," said Ellie, "That means you've been on the counsel since pretty much the beginning."

"I have been here since day one," said Tad. "Fyodor put me in charge of running the day-to-day, before there was a single reset or recruit."

"So you're close to Yeltsin?"

"Extremely," said Tad. "He has been a close friend since his father died in... I think that was 1990."

"That was before he was even famous, right? How did you meet?"

Tad gave her a sly smile and his eyebrows bounced again. "I was his drug dealer."

Ellie's mouth dropped open. "Shut the fuck up, no you weren't."

Tad gave his resonant bark of a laugh, then nodded. "It is true. I love the reactions I get. I had just immigrated from Haiti" (Okay, not Jamaican, thought Ellie, glad I didn't ask), "and I made a living selling party drugs at nightclubs in Miami. I barely spoke English, so decent jobs were hard to come by. A boy has got to eat.

"One night Fyodor comes in with his ... rich boy entourage, you know. His people... And he is drinking away his sorrows after his father's passing -- well... not sorrows exactly, that is a complicated story --" Tad made eyes that said, don't get me started-- "and one minute I was selling him and his friends Quaaludes and cocaine and the next, he pulled me into his party."

Ellie shook her head in disbelief. "So then how do you end up here?"

"Because I am fucking smart (fooking smaht), and Fyodor recognized it immediately. When he bought his first software company, he put me in charge of running it while he managed his other affairs. Would not take no for an answer. I was a close partner of his for ten years."

"So I guess he told you early on about the ... you know, the..." Ellie mimed an explosion with her hands.

"Yes he did," said Tad, "and he decided to make me head of this project. And the rest..." He simply gestured broadly around him. "Obviously, I was the executive with final say on all matters, and that was okay when there were only six or ten of us here with a very small nursery. But I quickly realized that would not be scalable. For this to work, I needed to dilute my power. So I created the counsel structure and it stuck. Now I have no more power than Sandra or Mitchell here."

"And Fyd let you do that? Dilute your power?"

"I made the same deal with Fyodor that he made with the federal government: I would only agree to do this if he did not interfere with my decisions. Fyodor builds the rockets. I produce and train the colonists. And Fyodor respected the idea. He trusts me."

"But they just keep re-electing the poor bastard," said Mitchell, and Tad laughed.

"I will not lie, it would be nice to take a breather. But if they want me to serve, I will."

"Why don't you just change the rules so that you don't have to serve so long?" asked Ellie.

"That kind of measure requires a popular public vote, and they'd never accept it," said Sandra this time. "They're too attached to him. Seems Tad's stuck for now. We vote annually, by the way. I'm on year three. Mitchell's in his first year."

Ellie nodded. Then, a new curiosity:

"What is Yeltsin like?"

Tad smiled, and exchanged meaningful glances with the other two. "An acquired taste. You do not achieve a eleven-figure net worth with a normal personality." Mitchell and Sandra both nodded knowingly.

"So you've all met him?"

"Yeah, he's all right," said Mitchell, "but I wouldn't commit to more than one beer with him. He's a little intense."

"I don't mean to interrupt the conversation," said Hannah, gesturing at a clock mounted over the bar, "but we kind of have a schedule to keep, and it's already 3:30. Riley's gonna need to get Ellie out of here before dark."

Tad handed Ellie's NDA off to Sandra and asked her to make copies and send them off to "the usual recipients", which Ellie found a little spooky. Sandra agreed, and she and Mitchell bade them farewell.

Tad led them up the high street toward the school. He opened the double doors at the front of the old church and stepped aside with a welcoming smile, and Ellie stepped into a space that could not be more different than the one she had just left.

The sanctuary of the church had been converted to a giant common room, and it was open air. The entire rear wall was missing, replaced simply with a pine log column to support the rear section of the roof. This granted a light, airy quality to the building. Rows of benches had replaced pews, but plenty of space had been left available presumably for the children to stand, gather, and socialize. A small, low stage sat at the front of the space against the non-wall where a preacher would have once stood.

Through the back of the building, Ellie could now see a spacious U-shaped courtyard that was surrounded on three sides by classrooms accessed via covered walkway. The yard was equipped with a wooden playground, swing set, and several climbing structures. Twenty-ish children were out playing; they all looked the same age at about eight. Their teacher, Sven with the mop cut, stood leaning against a support beam supervising. He waved idly at them when they entered.

Tad waved back at Sven, then led Ellie and Hannah down the left-hand flank of classrooms. "Each year has their own classroom, starting with three years old all the way to fifteen; though, you will notice, our younger groups are beginning to push the limits. It will be time to expand the school soon."

Ellie glanced into the first classroom on her left, the door of which was marked with a skillfully hand-carved number "3". Saanvi sat at the front of the room in a rocking chair. One of her tiny students lay across her lap nursing, and the rest of them sat on the floor. Saanvi was drilling them on multiplication tables. It was getting crowded for the space. Ellie thought she counted roughly thirty kids.

"Multiplication at three?" asked Ellie.

Tad looked back and smiled as he walked. "For obvious reasons we must accelerate math, science, and technology education. Other subjects are deprioritized. The children mostly skip history, learning only generally about the development of human civilization."

"You said they're only in school until they're 15?"

"Yes," said Tad, "after which we pivot their focus to mission training, which you will see later at the Academy."

Ellie peered curiously into each room as they walked. The four year olds were drawing diagrams of electrical circuits at the instruction of a young woman with cropped undercut hair. Five year olds were tinkering with computer components. Six year olds were dripping chemicals on plant leaves, wearing goggles. Seven year olds were doing worksheets, referencing ballistic trajectory graphs drawn on the white board. Ellie was floored by this. She recognized the lesson from her own Physics class in high school. She also noticed that the class sizes got progressively smaller as the children got older.

The eight-year classroom at the end was empty; Sven's kids were on the playground. Ellie assumed they did recess on a rotating schedule.

"There really are a lot more younger kids than older ones," said Ellie, as Tad led them across the far end of the yard to the other half of the classrooms.

"Yep," said Hannah. "That's how it works. More recruits over time, more Resets get to reproductive age, and the baby-making becomes exponential."

As if in perfect timing to illustrate this, Ellie caught a glimpse into the 15 year old classroom. A couple of the girls looked pregnant.

"Wait, are the teenagers doing the O-day thing Riley told me about??" Ellie was horrified.

"No," said Hannah, "that's recruits only. We're responsible for producing this generation. They reproduce at their own pace. We just don't stop them from having sex with each other. They will be what they make of themselves. We just get them started."

"Uh...um..." said Ellie, not nearly at ease, "well still, they're so young. Fifteen and pregnant? I don't like that at all, Hannah."

"Why is it a problem?" Asked Hannah. "Afraid they'll get kicked out of their high school? That they'll miss out on college? That a boy will never marry a teen mom? Hurt their career prospects?"

Ellie thought about what Riley said on the plane: "Motherhood is only limiting because they made it so."

"Listen, it's like I said: They're gonna be what they make of themselves," she repeated. "We just make sure they exist in the first place and try to give them the values and education that will help them survive. None of that includes telling them to not touch each other. We don't actively encourage it but we don't discourage it either. That would just be a projection of our own issues."

As Hannah talked, the rest of the older kids' classrooms passed. They were learning advanced equations Ellie didn't recognize, diagraming human anatomy, and assembling foreign-looking equipment. Again, Ellie found herself in the position of trying to poke holes in logic and coming up empty, but something -- she supposed at the end of the day, it was culture shock --wasn't sitting well.

They had circled back to the common room, and Tad turned around. "You are not comfortable," Tad said to Ellie, "so now it is time to talk about this. In twelve years the Resets will not have us to dictate sexual morality to them, so we do not do it today. They receive a comprehensive sex education in terms of core mechanics, fertility, and gestation because that is important for their ultimate survival and independence, but otherwise they are on their own. That said, some of the Resets have reached adulthood. I am sure that you inferred this, correct?"

"Actually Hannah told me. She said the oldest were like twenty..."

"Three," Hannah finished.

Tad nodded. "Recruits are strictly forbidden from sexual contact with the Resets, adult or otherwise. That would be inappropriate." Tad looked stone-faced serious for the first time.

"Okay... well... Let's not get ahead of ourselves but hypothetically what if we're nearly the same age? I'm only 25," asked Ellie.

"Irrelevant," said Tad. "It is not entirely about age. You will be here on a mandate, should you choose to join us. You are a caretaker. A guardian. They did not choose. We are not the same. Their generation must be their own. In a way, they are sealed," he added, swiping a hand through the air. "I cannot emphasize this enough. They must be their own people. We are marked by our upbringing in a society that taught us to exploit and manipulate each other to greedy ends. We cannot pass that on, sexually or otherwise. It is why they do not even know who their own biological parents are. We call them Resets for a reason. This is strictly enforced."

"O... Okay..." said Ellie, taken off guard by Tad's gravity. "I understand." This was at least partially a lie.

They exited the school and into the late afternoon sunshine. Tad began leading them up the hill toward the newer log buildings set back from the High Street. He resumed his bubbly demeanor almost instantly, giving a hearty wave and greeting to the day-laboring colonists who crossed their path.

An intermittent breeze sent oceanic ripples through the swathes of grass and wildflowers where foot traffic hadn't carved permanent trails. The breeze carried the aroma Ellie first detected on Hannah centuries ago at Luann's.

"Like home." That's it. That's the smell.

Dozens of people -- ranging from slightly younger than Ellie to maybe 45 or 50 -- crisscrossed the hillside village going about their business. Many wore broad straw hats against the afternoon sun. They dressed similarly to the children, though Ellie could spot the occasional article of clothing that must have come from their previous lives -- a pair of jeans here, an Adidas tank top there.

Many hauled wooden wagons or wheelbarrows laden with various supplies. A dark-haired man in his '40s lugged firewood up the hill. A blonde woman in her '30s walked along the lake shore towing what looked like sacks of flour.

It was quiet. The babble of talk and laughter was carried from various directions on the wind. Birds chirped in the pine trees left standing in the village proper. And highest in the village, skirted by the seemingly old-world life, stood the modern campus of glass and concrete Ellie had spotted from the airfield as if a castle overlooking its estate.

"But you do pass things on," said Ellie more quietly to Hannah. "You're educating them, right? You're feeding them, housing them, you talked about all those values--"

"Values that optimize their chances of survival," said Hannah. "That's the extent of it. In the project's opinion, that includes group welfare and loving the collective as much as one loves oneself. And, of course, the practical skills and knowledge they need for the journey."

"But... You make it sound so neutral and scientific but there's ideology in there," said Ellie, spotting an inconsistency. "You said it yourself, you're raising little communists." She was beginning to pant as she climbed the steep hill, pulling on her shorts.

"Sure, there's no completely objective way to approach this," conceded Hannah, showing no signs of Ellie's fatigue. "I also said we probably don't have it all figured out. But we're doing our best."

"Okay fine, but who decided this was the best way?" asked Ellie.

"The original recruits in the first few years. Sandra was right, you ask good questions." Hannah smiled. "Remember when Tad said he needed to dilute his power?" Ellie nodded. "That was why. There was some disagreement over how to raise the Resets before they got old enough for it to start mattering. So he created the other two counsel positions and deferred what he could to public vote -- the 'public' at the time being like fifteen people. The original batch of recruits all came from sociology backgrounds and this is what they decided, more or less."

"Why am I here?" Asked Ellie. "I don't have an impressive background. I did Sociology I in community college, but.."

"That's not as important anymore," said Hannah. She looked around with a reassuring smile. "You'll be useful, don't you worry. I already have some ideas on how your background can help us out around here. Nowadays, for recruiting, we focus on lack of attachments, self-determination, and open-mindedness. You passed those with flying colors."

Ellie wondered if she passed the 'open-mindedness' check when Hannah rode her face.