Free The Terran Mandate by Michael J Lawrence

compliment him for me."
    Emmet poured root tea into each of the
cups, then placed the pot back on the coil burner stove and turned it off. He
lifted his cup and made a toast. "That they shall not perish."
    Dekker picked up his own cup. "That
they shall not perish." Each man took a small sip. Dekker blinked hard.
"A little bit goes a long way, doesn't it?"
    Emmet chuckled. "One of the few
things around here that does." He took another sip and shook his head as a
shudder ran through his body. "But I think you need it today."
    Dekker carefully placed his cup on the table
and leaned forward. "Emmet, be honest with me." He glanced around the
small cube that felt like the inside of a freight container. "How much
longer can your people hold on?"
    Emmet let out a slow breath through
tight lips. "Yeah, that's a good question." He took another sip of
root tea. "With the new rationing schedule, we'll lose another 10% of the
colony this season. Our stockpile will be gone by then, too."
    "How long can you make it after
that?" Dekker asked.
    "They don't tell me these things.
I'm sure the mayor's made his report."
    "Reports are for politicians. I
need to hear the truth from a man I can trust. You've been here longer than
anybody." Dekker picked up his cup and took another sip. His body swayed
and he grunted as he set the cup back down. "What's the story,
Emmet?"
    "Well, as we lose more people, the
crops we manage to scrape from this ground go further, of course. But the real
problem is we're losing women faster than men."
    "And you're not breeding right
now."
    "Nope. Generational decline."
Emmet took another sip of his tea and leaned back against the wall. He levelled
his gaze on Dekker and said, "Seems like we're back to square one."
    "Yeah, maybe we should have just
stayed home."
    "Nah. No chance there at all."
    "How long, Emmet?"
    Emmet shook his head and bit his lip as
he thought of the farmers like himself scratching at dirt, forcing it to yield
to their will and the bit of magic that came from chemistry. "We can't
make the ground here grow anything more, Ben. Whatever we pull out of the
ground this season. Well, that's all we're going to get."
    Dekker froze. He stared at Emmet and his
eyes washed over with a glaze of panic that he couldn't quite hide.
"What?"
    "After this harvest, we start
starving to death."
    "If we get the Highlands -"
    "We start having babies."
    The doorway curtain rustled and Jommy
burst into the room. A twitchy 11-year-old wearing the same faded field service
overalls as his father, he stopped in mid stride when he saw Dekker. Turning to
the Colonel, he stood up straight and gave an exaggerated salute.
"Sir!"
    Dekker smiled. "Hello Jommy. How
have you been?"
    Jommy stared at the cups and pointed at
them. "Do you like them?"
    Dekker smiled and said, "I like
them very much."
    "Dad said it's against the
rules."
    "It is." He winked at Emmet.
    Jommy looked at his father and asked,
"Am I in trouble?"
    "I don't know, son. That's up to
the Colonel here."
    Jommy's eyes flitted nervously between
the two men.
    Dekker lightly tapped his cup and asked,
"Why did you make these?"
    Jommy knelt down next to the table and
rubbed his fingers along the surface of the cup sitting in front of his father.
Staring into the root tea, he said, "I made them for Mama. I wanted her to
have something nice." He pulled his hand away and looked at Dekker. "They're
not very good, are they?"
    Emmet eyed the Colonel, seeing the man
choking back something.
    "They're fine Jommy," Dekker
said. "They'll be our little secret."
    Jommy looked up at Dekker and a toothy
smile spread over his face.
    "Go on outside," Emmet said.
"Check the roots for me."
    "Yessir." Jommy stood up and
bounded out the door.
    After the boy left, Emmet said,
"There's something else." He lifted his cup, took a sip and leaned
back against the wall. "Some of our farmers went to talk to the
Guard."
    Dekker scoffed. "Any luck with
that?"
    "They never came back." He
took another sip. "I