That number astounded Mylea, she had no idea that there were that many homeless children. She was surprised that there were that many on a world as prosperous as Trena. “Are all these children orphans?”
“No,” Lamile replied seeing the worry on her mother’s face, “many are homeless because their parents are. There may be only a hundred thousand or so kids who are homeless and orphaned.”
That was still a lot of children. She wasn’t certain they had the resources to find them and evacuate them. She made a note to talk to Lady Hawthorne about Lamile’s findings, and see what she needed to find and rescue the kids. The first thing she needed to do was find more housing for all these kids. The old boarding school might be able to handle two thousand. The problem suddenly got much bigger.
“Of those hundred thousand,” Mylea asked, “how many are in the cities?”
“Maybe ninety thousand,” Lamile replied, “Mom. That’s just an estimate based on demographics. We could have much less.”
“Where did you get this estimate,” Mylea asked.
“The Royal Library,” Lamile replied surprising her mother how into it her daughter was, “There was a book written a while back about homelessness. There was a chart based on population how many homeless families there might be. I took a rough number and didn’t plug in any variables. I didn’t factor in such things as our economic status, family types which all had an impact on the real estimate. I could have asked for help; should have; but I haven’t had the chance to!”
“What’s the name of this book,” Mylea asked. Lamile turned to the work station and brought the title of the book up. A holograph of the book floated above the work station.
“Frazer I need your help,” Mylea spoke calling for the Artificial Intelligence that supported the Mounties.
“Yes Chief Atomi,” the AI materialized next to them. He presented himself as a typical Mounty in a day to day uniform.
“Please retrieve the book, ‘A Discussion of Homelessness in High Tech Societies.’,” Mylea read the title of the book Lamile had found, “Please read the book and apply any calculations the book may contain using the variables from Trena. I am interested in an estimate of our homeless populations and an estimate of orphaned children.”
The AI reached for the book and appeared to read the book. Shortly, the AI’s image changed to that of him standing before a black board working an equation. It appeared to check his work and turned to them.
“Based on this book’s equations,” The AI lectured them, “Based on actual number numbers; I believe we may have twenty thousand people homeless. That represents maybe seven thousand families. The calculations estimate, possibly four thousand orphans, planet wide.”
Mylea breathed a sigh of relief, and ordered, “Make sure Lady Hawthorne is aware of your results.”
“I’ve sent it to her,” Frazer responded.
“Thank you, Frazer,” Mylea spoke to the AI, “Please package up the results of Lamile’s research and create a report for the command team.”
“Yes ma’am,” Frazer replied. He began looking at what the chief’s daughter had discovered. He was quietly impressed. The girl had organized the reports by geographic location and had even started a map of where the children had been seen. He even saw where Lamile had flagged any report that mentioned the Theocracy priest Father Pierce. Frazer quickly read through the reports and mapped where the priest had been sighted and forwarded it to the team searching the agent. As he finished up the package he was amazed. Lamile had spent maybe ninety minutes and had analyzed and organized some one hundred reports. Something he could have done far faster, the connections she had made the AI wasn’t certain he would have made though. Like any experienced investigator he would have discounted them; but when presented together they jumped out at him. He did some research on his own and added his results to the girl’s work and published the report as directed putting Lamile’s name as its principle investigator on the report, with his name second.
After they left patrol headquarters, Mylea asked, “you can come with me to the palace or I can take you home?”
“I thought you were meeting with General Langtree?” Lamile asked.
“I am,” Her mother replied. “He’s at the palace waiting on me.”
Lamile thought for a minute, “I think I’d like to go home. I need to think about what’s happened today.”
Mylea nodded and drove her daughter home.
As they pulled into their drive, Lamile’s tablet beeped telling her she had received mail. She got out of the car and went into the house. Once inside the house she took her tablet out to see who was sending her mail. She was surprised to say the least when she saw who the email was from, Frazer. Even more surprised when she opened the attachment it was the report on what she had researched. She spent the rest of the afternoon digesting the report and making plans to find and rescue some children. She soon had her target, a small group of kids who were walking to Trenaport. There couldn’t be more than twenty. So far the authorities had done nothing to gather them up. She wondered why until she read a couple incident reports. The kids had ran and hid from the cops. The cops hadn’t tried too hard to find them as they were walking in the right direction. The cops thought they would be picked up eventually. She now had her group. She only had to find a way to get to the group.
This turned out to be easier than she thought. There were advantages to being a military brat. The next morning Lamile took a bus out to Fletcher.
She knew that General Langtree was at the O club getting lunch. He always walked over to the club figuring he needed the exercise instead of having Hoi driving him over. It was his lunch time habit. Lamile knew about it as she sometimes hopped a ride out to the base to share lunch with the general. He had given her a standing invitation. Sergeant Hoi didn’t suspect a thing when she wanted to hop a ride with one convoys. She convinced the sergeant to put her on a convoy going near the small town of New Rome. She told him it was a school project. The MP riding with the convoy had been one of her baby sitters years before and was more than willing to help her old commander’s daughter on her homework assignment.
When the convoy turned off to go to Hilliard she got off the truck and began to walk into New Rome. When she had gotten far enough up the road where no one would see her she changed into some clothes she had fished out of a trash can. She wanted to look like she had been on the land for a long time. She slept that night in an abandoned barn. The next morning she wandered into New Rome. An abandoned town that had at one time a thousand people living in it. She poked around the town for a couple of days before she stumbled on anyone.
“Who are you,” a small girl not more than 2 crimens old startled her. Lamile had been poking through an abandoned grocery and service station to see if there was anything left on the shelves to eat when the girl startled her. “Lamile,” the teenager replied, “Who are you?” “J’lie,” the little girl said.
“Hungry?” Lamile asked. She spied a bag of dried fruit and snatched it off the shelf.
She opened it and handed it to the little girl, “Is your mom around?”
“Mommy’s asleep,” the little girl said. “She’s been asleep for a long time.”
“Where is she,” Lamile asked.
The girl walked to the back of the store where a young woman lay on the floor. Lamile could tell immediately the thonian was dead. She checked to see if there was a pulse. There was none. Lamile took the little girl out of the service station and had to make a decision. Although she was certain that the woman had died of natural causes, she couldn’t just walk away from the woman. The cops had to be made aware of it. But if Lamile turned the thing in, she would have to give up on this town and try another. She made a compromise. She fed the little girl, bathed her and put her in a clean dress she had found in a small store. She waited until the little girl was asleep before she called the police. As she called the cops she wondered where the gi
rl’s father was. She knew the girl’s father’s body should be around somewhere. Her mother had been lucky her father’s death trauma hadn’t killed her, this girl’s parents may not have been so lucky!
“There’s a dead body in the New Rome service station.” she told the Police Dispatcher. “There’s a little girl next to the woman.”
“Who are you?” The AI asked, but Lamile cut the connection. However the AI had heard enough to recognize Lamile’s voice, as per its instructions the AI sent a priority message on the evacuation’s classified communications network. Within minutes the message was routed to the intelligence team in the Mountain. Mylea received a simple and plain message. “Wanderer heard from. No further info.” The next morning Mylea saw in the overnight reports that a body had been found by a young girl who had not left her name. The time of the report was the same time that Lamile had been heard from the night before. It was some relief but only some.
After Lamile finished with the police she looked around the town hunting for a place to hide. That was when she found the father. She found him under a car. It had fallen on him. He had slowly died from a crush injury. As he slowly died from his injury he lost conscience causing his lifemate to lose conscience and eventually to die also. She left him alone and found a place to hide.
Lamile watched the police and EMS units arrive from a small out building near the grocery. She held her breath when one of the crime scene people looked right at her. She looked down at her scene scanner and back at her. She knew she had been discovered by the cops. The CSU tech walked over to where she was hiding. In a low voice only Lamile could hear, “She’ll be taken care of Wanderer.”
The tech had been added at the last moment, she was a member of the Black Guard who had been part of the Interstellar Rescue Service Criminal Investigation Service before being chosen to become a Black Guardsmen. Her job was to get to the scene check on Lamile and ensure that the dead woman wasn’t Lamile.
“Stay hidden, we’re only a short shout away if you get into trouble.” With that the woman walked back to the service station.
Shocked, Lamile stayed hidden until the team had left. When she was certain that they had left she went back to the service station and found a small package left for her. It was out in the open on one of the counters with her name on it. It wasn’t there earlier. The package included a very small ear bug radio, a couple of ration bars, and an envelope with a note in it. Shocked she opened the note, “Lamile, your mother is furious with you. You’ve scared the crap out of her. That being said I want you to be safe. If things get crazy just yell and the Black Guard will have you picked up as quick as they can. No, they are not in direct eye sight of you; but the ear bug is a tracker. Thank you very much for your courage. Take care Wanderer and be safe.” It was signed Aggie.
Astounded she folded the note up and hid it very securely on her person. She slept that night in an abandoned home. The next morning she wandered down the road to the next town. Remembering how lucky that she had been not to lose her mother also when her father died. She couldn’t help but feel sorry for the little girl when she had seen the two bodies loaded into the ambulance the night before.
###
“Jill!” Mylea stormed into the dining room at her parent’s home the day after Lamile gone missing. Jill was eating lunch with her step mother and grandmother. She looked up to see the nearly six foot six furious Thonian woman. “Yes?” “Did you know about this?” Mylea asked.
“Know about what?” Jill flinched in surprised at her aunt’s tone of voice.
“Lamile has gone missing.” Mylea said.
“Missing?” Jill asked, “What do you mean missing?”
“Yesterday,” Mylea said, “Lamile managed to get a ride with one of the convoys heading out of Fletcher. She left me a note saying that she was going to be home in a while and hoped to solve the abandoned children problem. Did you know she was going to this?”
“No! We were supposed to go with Lady Hawthorn to the Trenaport Boarding School today, where a lot of the kids are being taken.” Jill answered trying to cool out a bit. She was getting angry at Lamile for doing what she did without talking to her.
“Jill what do you know about this?” Lisa asked.
“We were talking about sending someone out among the kids to see what is going on with them but; Lady Hawthorne had someone in mind. That wasn’t Lamile!” She added quickly, “A Mounty who could pass as a teenager. No, I don’t know what she is up to.”
“What is the mission Jill,” Mylea asked, “This was something that Delores was to brief us on tomorrow.”
“We were hoping to send someone to be the Pied Piper to bring these kids in. We thought they might follow a kid to the port or into Trenaport for processing.” Jill replied. Mylea was still furious; but she could see why her daughter might chase something like this. It was not the drama. In fact, Lamile always found a way to make things happen without a lot of drama. If Lamile thought she could help these kids without a lot of fuss it was something she might do. “Aunt Mylea, just leave me enough flesh so I can have my pound too. I wish I would have been given the opportunity to talk her out of it. This is too dangerous for me! Jenny told me that she would lock me up if I even thought about doing what Lamile is doing. She suggested that it was really dangerous and since she lived on the streets for a while when she was my age she convinced me.”
“I get the feeling that you may have to stand in line.” Lisa said, “After Mylea gets done with her, then it’ll be my turn then your father’s turn.”
“They grow up fast don’t they Commander,” Joyce said using Mylea former
Thonian Space Service grade. Then pointed to Jill she said, “This one did big time!”
“I know,” Mylea said, “it’s hard to see them grow up.”
“It is at that,” Joyce confirmed seeing her grand-daughter not as a child but a young adult. It had taken Jill running away and seeing her on Trena and how much the girl had matured for her to realize it.
“Any idea when she’ll be back?” Lisa asked.
“Mom we couldn’t figure out how long it would take.” Jill answered, “There were too many variables. We expected it might take maybe a month to get the first group in. We just couldn’t figure it out.”
“If there is any news I let you know.” Mylea said, “I got to get back.”
###
“Mylea I just heard,” David Langtree entered Mylea’s office. “Are you Okay?” “Yeah, I’m okay,” Mylea said, “and she’s not really missing. That’s for the world. Last I heard is that she was in a little burg called West Jefferson. There a Black Guard unit that has her under observation. She’s made contact with the first group of kids.”
“You guys played that one close to the vest.” Langtree said his feelings a little hurt.
“Not me David,” Mylea said with a flash of anger, she really wasn’t okay with what her daughter was up to. It was just that she couldn’t do much about it without screwing things up for Lady Hawthorne or her daughter for that matter. “She didn’t even tell Jill what she was planning.”
“I see,” David said, “So do you want me to hold her when she gets back so you can spank her or do you want to handle her all by your lonesome.” She just glared at him.
“Of course,” he continued looking at his finger nails, “if she pulls this off, and since it was mostly her plan in the first place, you’ll be spanking a hero.”
She glared at him again then began to laugh, “Well I’ve taught her how to get things done, and what it means to be responsible.”
“Not just that lady,” David said, “you taught her, by your example that when something needs to be done, that if she can help she should. She’s only following in her old lady’s footsteps.”
“I don’t want her to be a cop David,” Mylea said, “It’s an honorable profession, but it can bring so much heart ache and crap to deal with.”
“I kn
ow lady,” Langtree walked behind her desk hugged her briefly and said, “She’ll be okay. Mike’s troops do not want to see him on the war path. No harm will come to your little girl. You know you’ll be getting a young woman back.”
“No she’ll still be my little girl,” Mylea said enjoying the embrace.
“I’ll see you later,” Langtree said leaving. Mylea wished he would have stayed a bit longer his arms felt entirely too comfortable around her.
###
“I can’t believe she did that!” The princess was reading aloud from the diaries in the class room, “I wish she would have talked to me about her plan. Even if I couldn’t talk her out of it I would have liked to discuss her plan with her so I could tell the others how to help her.
“I am so furious with her,” the diary went on, “but I don’t know how mad to be. The courage she is showing in doing what she is attempting is something I never knew she had. But the influences in her life, Aunt Mylea and Uncle Garth, and Dad all have taught by their example what we have to do. If she pulls this off she will be a hero. From a report that Aunt Mylea shared with me, she had already made contact with the kids. I don’t think I could have done that that quickly.
“Talking with my aunt I find out that Lamile liked to take hikes around Trena. Last summer, Lamile had spent part of it hiking with a group of kids from school. She knows a lot about Trena. Something I don’t.” the princess paused for a second, “From what I have been able to find out, Lamile is equally at home in the woods as she is in Aunt Mylea’s home. Aunt Mylea admitted that she could camp and rough it; but she never seemed to enjoy it the way Lamile enjoys it.
“I am so worried about her.” The diary went on, “I know she is being watched over by the Guard but they can’t be everywhere. It’ll take only one incident for Lamile to be in incredible danger. Although I am furious with her and very concerned about her, I am very proud of her. She is doing the one thing I wanted to do but because of circumstance can’t. I hope and pray that she will be safe.”