“Oh, and would I not mind coming to you with yet another sign of our impending death just as your leadership has started?” She laughed.
“If you don’t mind.”
Moving our possessions over wasn’t labor intensive. We had both chosen to only bring a few things up from the shelter. A file with Marcus’s baby photos on it. The paper flower that Eliza had folded and hid my engagement ring in. A few other knick knacks that meant enough that we wanted them along for the long haul. Though it was an easy move, by the time we had finished making up our “bed”—still a pad with a two person sleeping bag overtop it—the hour had grown late. It was well past the evening meal and people would be heading in the direction of bed. Still, we had to break the news. Perhaps it was a blessing in disguise that we couldn’t address the colony at once; leaking the information out slowly would help control any panic.
At least, I hoped so.
Chapter Five
I ‘knocked’ on the door to Fang’s tent.
“Just a minute!” Shuffling followed and I was greeted by a bedraggled Alexander. He ran his hand through his hair to neaten it. “What’s up Fiona? I was just going to sleep.”
I motioned him to step away from the tent. “I know Eliza’s the official leader now, but given your position and experience, I felt it prudent to speak to you as well.” That caught his attention, the bleariness disappearing from his eyes. “We have a problem with the potato crops.”
“What kind of problem?” he said slowly. The guy had been through enough in recent days to know that a late night talk wasn’t a cause for celebration.
“My father and I were harvesting today and discovered several potatoes that appear to be afflicted with blight.” When no recognition crossed his face, I clarified. “A fungal disease that can spread from plant to plant very rapidly. It’s known to wipe out entire crops in a matter of weeks.”
“Fuck.” He cringed a little, as if trying to spare me from the burden of his swearing.
“I’ve discussed it with Eliza and I have a plan to slow down the blight, but there is no known cure. We’re going to address the rest of the people in the morning, but I have to emphasize that it is entirely possible that we won’t be able to stay here.”
“You’re kidding me, right?” Alexander’s voice rose far above the whisper I had been talking in. He seemed to remember his surroundings and quieted down. “Don’t you think it’s a little premature to tell everyone? You don’t even know exactly what kind of disease it is yet.” I glared at him. It was the eternal curse of being a woman, and a feminine one at that. Men had the tendency to magically forget that I had years of study and expertise.
“Yes, Alexander. I’m kidding you. I have no idea what’s going on and even with twenty years of experience I’m just taking a guess.” I was tempted to add the words you idiot to the retort but held my tongue. As pompous as he was, I would need his help in the coming days. “Look. I wouldn’t be coming to you and sharing this if I wasn’t sure. Doesn’t matter what strain of the disease it is, it’s infecting the plants-quickly. I want you to help heading up the task of harvesting every single healthy plant tomorrow. Anything with discolored blue or brown flesh is infected. Those have to go in a separate pile far away from the fields. If you touch an infected potato or use a tool to dig it up, everything that touched it has to be sanitized before it can be used again.”
“All this for a fungus?” He rubbed his hand over his face. “Won’t we lose most of the crop anyway, harvesting everything at once?”
“If we don’t harvest we’re guaranteed to lose everything. I’d rather pull the healthy plants and look into preservation options while I still can. We need to open up food access for the foreseeable future, too. I want to see everyone in this camp pack in as many calories as they can. They’re going to need it.”
Alexander stared at me, unblinking. Okay, doing this so late in the day was a mistake. Come the morning I was going to be surprised if he remembered half of what I was telling him.
“You got it?” I looked at him from over my glasses.
“Yeah, I’ve got it.”
“Goodnight, Alexander.” He turned and went back into his tent. If I didn’t know better I would swear I heard him cursing under his breath. That was fine. He didn’t need to like the situation. He did need to help us manage it. My next stop was Marcus’s tent where I found him with his date for the evening. Since our return to the real world, Marcus had rarely found himself without an offer of company for the evening. His newfound beard growth and the explosion of muscles from manual labor no doubt helped the situation. As soon as I realized there were two people in the tent I coughed loudly and called out from a distance away.
“Mom?” Marcus stuck his head outside the entry to his tent, being careful to shield his paramour of the day from my view. I rolled my eyes. As if I cared who my son was sleeping with. “What are you doing here?”
“Please tell your date I’m very sorry for the interruption. I wouldn’t be bothering you at this hour if it weren’t important.” He turned and murmured something to the person in the tent before carefully stepping into the open. Thankfully for me he had some pants on. I know every parent sees their child naked when they’re born, but it wasn’t a view I needed to be treated to at this stage of life.
“What’s up? Is everything okay?”
Unlike my conversation with Alexander, Marcus took
