Colonization (The Seamus Chronicles Book 3) by K. D. McAdams Read Free Book Online Page B

goods will make a perfect anchor. I jiggle a few of the boxes to find the heaviest, which I lift out of the raft.
    Placing the box on the ground will expose it to the water when it rises again. Coming back for our supplies is a priority anyway so the risk is minimal. Once the rope is secure I go to my reactor and lift it out. Having the reactor as my priority does not make intellectual sense. I can’t eat it or drink it and it won’t keep me warm or cool, but something inside tells me to grab it.
    When I turn to head back to the clearing my heart skips a beat. I’m completely disoriented and cannot decide where on the horizon my fellow refugees are. The foliage along the shore all looks alike and I don’t see the break we used to get inland. I think I’m scanning the wrong part of the shore.
    Smoke! I see smoke and it is coming from a place that feels right.
    I head off towards the smoke carrying my reactor. It wasn’t heavy at Ames but I never had to carry it further than down a few flights of stairs. The heat is getting more bearable but it is still a strain to walk with a load.
    Once I’ve covered what I estimate as half the distance I stop and put the reactor down. Water would have been a smart thing for me to bring.
    Speaking of smart things, a time check when I marked the rafts would have been good. I’m going to miss a full cycle of data on the tides. Once we figure out protection from the radiation we can leverage the tides and the rafts to ferry supplies from the plane to the shore.
    A few of us will have to ride the empty rafts back to the plane. Once they are loaded we can pull them while they float on the rising tide. But we’ll need to know when the tides are moving and how long we’ll have at the plane.
    I wonder if the tide will recede as far as the space plane? I wish we had prioritized supplies and loaded the top ones on all three craft. Our food supplies are temporary, but we need to build things to create a life. The 3-D printer on the space plane could be the key to the survival of our colony.
    It dawns on me that the smoke ahead could be coming from the other plane. If they crashed in the forest instead of making it to the water or the lakes bottom the result could be fire.
    I lift my reactor again and set out with more purpose. If the smoke is from the other plane they may need our help.

Chapter 7
    The smoke was from dad, I should have known, he loves to burn things. I’m a little frustrated that there wasn’t more discussion. I could have used that cardboard as sun protection or to write on. I’ll have to talk to mom about consuming resources.
    Recycle, reuse, reduce has been a part of my life forever; I forget that my parents learned these things as adults. Any use that destroys or materially transforms something needs to be carefully thought. A deadly virus and a nuclear winter destroyed the Earth, but it could easily have been the destruction of natural resources that did us in.
    Everyone was grateful that I stood with the rafts and prevented them from drifting further away. Mom was kind of pissed that I brought my reactor back and not food, but that didn’t last too long. While I stayed by the clearing as a point of reference, Henry and my family went to the rafts and brought back supplies.
    The sun and the large moon are setting and the small moon is rising. The temperature is falling and I think we may be headed for our first true night. That would mean that the days on this planet are long, though it could be a seasonal thing.
    “Seamus, how about you stop playing with your reactor and come up with an idea for opening cans.” Grace is annoyed with me.
    In a stunning move of efficiency Liam did not pack a can opener. There were two in the galley of the C-5 and he was sure that the life of the can opener would out last our supply of cans. More of me rubbed off on him than I imagined. Unfortunately, that means a trip back to the C-5 before we can have soup.
    “Grace, I can’t open