Triage

[Ethan Talon]

Ethan sat at the kitchen table with David across from with a pot off coffee sitting in between them and PADDs strewn about the table.

Ethan refilled his cup and sighed, "With everyone off fighting Dominus no one was growing corn so grain has doubled on us."

"We were able to get a fourth cutting of hay this summer," David added helpfully.

"Lloyd was a lifesaver while we were gone," Ethan responded. He signed and rubbed his face with his right hand. "Still we could put in twenty hour days for the next month we'd still be behind."

"Don't I know. Them calves are no longer babies so branding and cutting them is going to be pots of fun, and there's still the North pasture where the water gap needs to be properly fixed," David replied.

"Let's get that fixed tomorrow. Send Lloyd and the rest of the bunkhouse to start the fall round-up."

"We could use more hands. If nothing else they can pick Trinity's strawberries freeing her up to help with the cattle."

Ethan sighed, "A lot of Marines and sailors are being discharged from service as the force shrinks. There's a lot of veterans in need of help."

"The bunkhouse is full," David replied. "And there's going to be a lot of men and women suffering from the effects of combat. Between the Son's of Scion and Bellatrix's clones they've seen horrors no one ought to see. I can't run this place and play counselor too."

Ethan nodded, "I can billet them at Camp Ryder until we get a second bunkhouse built, and maybe we can hire an on-site counselor to help them."

[Trinity Talon]

"What about Teri Kellow?" Trinity said as she walked into the kitchen, Diana firmly clasped onto her right breast and walked over to the mugs and found her favorite. "We've been chatting and she's ready to give up the ship and go back to something ground based. I think we pushed her too hard too fast, she just barely got her doctorate and finished med school and we give her a bird on her collar and a bird in the black." she put the mug down and used her free hand to pour herself a mug of coffee. "As for housing, why not just use that frigate that's been parked about 20 miles away that no one is using because the drive system is entirely shot. Mother was about to scrap it or donate it for target practice. I could bat my eyelashes at someone and get it tractor beamed here. Providing you're willing to give up some actual land for it, but we can hold quite a few there, at least until we get something permanent. Then again... remember 'Camp Tecumseh?' that was the TAS Tecumseh that crashed and ended up becoming a kids camp?" she chuckled. "Wasn't that where we almost..." she blushed and looked at David. "Anyway... "

[Ethan Talon]

"It would be a bit of an eyesore, but I don't think I want to keep a larger staff on a more permanent basis. Do you?" He asked Trinity. "As far as towing goes, we can use the Charger. Being a Corps commander has it's benefits. Besides we aren't transporting any troops anywhere. The 9th Division was brought back from the old front line last week."

[Trinity Talon]

"Eyesore or not, still need a place to put them and... I always intended this ranch to be a place for veterans. When you gave me this land and the money to start it, that was what I had in mind all along." Trinity replied as she pulled her blouse closed and put Diana into her bassinet and kissed Ethan on the cheek. "Remember who technically owns this. T stands for Trinity." gesturing with her hand she brought the coffee pot over and refilled her mug. "The big issue is getting them out of combat mode. Move some of the ones that are used to the simpler labor to my fields, the other more aggressive guys and gals put them on the cattle moving duty, they can bark orders and react quicker." she sipped her coffee and used the iljuna to grab her padd. "What the biggest challenge is managing to keep our supply chain moving since we lost a lot of our usual drivers and getting things to market isn't as easy since the Scions pretty much knew that trashing our markets would also make things easier for them to conquer."

She checked a few things and grimaced. "And some of the people I used to deal with are dead or still in the hospital recovering. We haven't had the kind of all out war on this planet in a long time and even then that was nothing compared to with the bombardments we've had. We also have to keep in mind that we can't repair all the damage since the construction crews are too busy with the cities and other infrastructure. It's on us or we have to make do with what we can scavenge, luckily Bella Price did manage to put a law in place during her term that states that civilians can claim military salvage to rebuild. And we do have industrial replicators and matter reclaimers. Helps being Nick Ryder's granddaughter. I had them stored in our underground storage facility."

[Ethan Talon]

"Don't worry about the cattle. I already spoke to dad. He'll get them moved to processing when they are ready. It will come off the total price, but the beef market is way up anyway. We should consider culling the herd anyway. It's going to be rough winter with all these animals to feed and no feed corn on the market to speak of. Hay is sparse too, but thankfully we have our own."

[Trinity Talon]

"Yeah... Dominus did a number on all of us but this is going to be a long road." Trinity said and sighed heavily as she took a sip of her coffee. "We may not even have a local government after the election, too many of the leadership either quit or were killed. We're self sufficient enough, but not everyone is. Our brand new city hall is rubble right now. Which also means that we may not have anyone keeping an eye on infrastructure. Our irrigation lines go down, or the sewage processing doesn't work... and we produce a lot of waste. Could get very bad very quickly. We can be completely independent for about a year but that isn't factoring in a lot of things that could go wrong in the meantime."

She looked out the kitchen window. "I feel like Diana and Arthur are going to be teenagers by the time all this is fixed and cleaned up. Crystal Lake is going to be unsafe to use for at least another year since the Scions tried to poison that water supply. "

[Ethan Talon]

Ethan pinched the bridge of his nose, and sighed. "I suppose we can get our new hands to help around town. Lake City isn't going to be able to bail out the whole region, and let's face it. There's just not enough of us here for Capital City to divert a lot of resources to."

[Trinity Talon]

"That's true." Trinity said and looked into her coffee mug. "Ethan... what if... and if you tell me no with a good reason... I'll drop it. But... we're on our own out here." she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "I know I wanted to run for Sheriff but a Sheriff can only do so much. And governor will only take more paperwork to get things done. What if we ceded from the local government, formed our own. We won't get their support but... do they even have support to give us? When grandfather built Terra Alpha he did have the Terraforming crew make it so any habitable region can be self supporting, with or without a central government's aid. Remember it wasn't until the fall of the Federation that this planet even had a government, let alone become a Hub World." she sketched a few things on a napkin. "If we set up our own water processing, waste processing and power grid, we can keep this region running. Since we'll own it, we'll control it. We can also be in charge of its defense and the taxes that everyone is already paying will go to reimbursing for this, not simply going to the central till and being doled out. It's not much different than what happened in our era, except that was because Capitol City was on fire half the time."

[Ethan Talon]

Ethan frowned, "Like the Scots? They've been angry about losing their king since 1715. Let's be honest the British government was heavy handed with them early on, but we don't have those sorts of generational grievances. I sure as hell don't want to be king, or president, or whatever is in vogue right now."

[Trinity Talon]

Trinity laughed at that. "I'm sorry, I'm just picturing 'King Talon' on a sign, sounds like a badly translated Chinese restaurant I went to called 'Lord Crab and Talons' it was a lobster place but the real translation would have been King Crab and Lobster Claws - but they put up Lord Crab and Talons. Obviously Aunt Ari had to take me there. She wouldn't dare take mom with her linguistics minor.. it would probably give her a stroke." she calmed down and sighed. "And not entirely like the Scots, we're not going to form our own military and ships and all that. BUT I think I could probably get some of the Marines into a loose Sheriff's office, would be more organized than it is now. Face it love, we're from families too stubborn and impatient to sit back."