Chapter Nineteen
Annika could feel her face redden with discomfort and then pale with fear at the implications.
He had to be wrong, though!
Right?
She and her crew were the first humans to set eyes on the place!
Weren’t they?
And if they weren’t, then there was a damned elaborate charade being perpetrated here and she wasn’t sure she could ever figure it out let alone think of a way to report it.
She’d probably just get buried in a mental institute if she tried.
And that was assuming she could actually bypass the company men and get somewhere to report!
“That’s ... that just isn’t possible,” Annika managed to gasp finally. “None of my people have been here before! We—me and my crew—were sent to find places where colonies could be established.
“I mean ... as far as I can recall, they discovered the planetDFY1360 a couple of decades ago, but there are all sorts of studies and research that has to be done before a planet is chosen for human exploration and development. We don’t just jump into this kind of thing! We have to determine if it’s worth it economically before we put human lives at risk!”
Even as she tried to convince them, though, it was tumbling around her mind that the company had known about the planet for decades. She couldn’t say, positively, that they hadn’t ignored protocol and immediately launched a survey.
And that survey—whenever it was launched—had uncovered riches beyond imagination—deposits that would’ve been hard for anyone to resist.
It would be like discovering a sunken treasure ship off the coast of a country that refused to let you explore it and claim it even though you were the one that found it!
So she could accept that it was possible, but was it true? And could she ever really determine one way or the other?
Did it really matter as much as the outcome? The end result was that, if they weren’t stopped, the company was going to take over the entire planet. The courts might rescind their ownership and hand it back to the natives, but that wouldn’t be easy to enforce even if it went through the court system.
The company was a very wealthy and powerful entity.
“Is possible,” Ragnor insisted. “Come look. I show you.”
Annika glanced at Zhor questioningly. He reddened for some reason that she didn’t understand. “I see ting.”
Since it didn’t look like Zhor meant to object, the two men sheathed their swords and the three of them moved cautiously through the jungle on foot—to Annika’s very great relief—until they reached the edge of a clearing. They crouched there for a short while and determined that itwasoccupied. There were three men—that they could see—but Annika could also see that there was a sizeable habitat. This particular one was capable of housing several dozen workers.
She could see construction bots, but those could have been left over from when they cleared the site for the habitat.
It was a manufactured habitat, though, which she found disturbing. It hadn’t been built on site. It had been brought as a ship—which was basically what it was—fully capable of taking off at any moment and moving to another location or into space.
That at least supported Ragnor’s claim. The construction bots—designed for clearing and leveling the land—were the same ones used to demolish old structures as far as she knew. They were certainlycapableof being programmed for that type of work. And the fact that the habitat had been flown in seemed to make the presence of the construction bots superfluous.
“I should talk to them,” Annika said after a moment.
Ragnor grabbed one arm and Zhor the other, preventing her from moving.
“No!” both said almost in unison.
Annika gaped at them. “Well! We aren’t going to find out anything here!”
“Wan Ah-na dead,” Zhor growled. “You go, dey shoot, we doan fin’ out nu’ting!”
Annika looked at Ragnor. “These are the ones that offered the bounty?”
He shrugged. “Mus’ be. No see de one come to village.”
