Chapter 10a: Settlement (Mountainside, Morning of the Third Day)
Jim's own childhood was bad enough that he didn't comment on Blair's. He was a cop though. When he heard that Naomi left her son with friends or relatives, he had to imagine horrors. Blair had never been able to explain how safe he'd felt. Naomi's friends weren't strangers to him. They were his village, even if they were scattered across the globe.
In return Blair was silent about his own grief that Jim had only had one or two adults to rely on. Even if Jim's father had been more loving, so small a family seemed terribly at risk. One disaster could destroy everything a child knew.
Twenty or thirty people, or even more, that was the right size for a family. You always knew there'd be someone to take care of you, then, and you always had someone your own size or attainment to play with.
Which was bad luck for Major Crimes, maybe, because they were going to find themself pulled into the foster-parenting gig. It was good luck for Jim, though. His jealousy wasn't unprecedented, but it meant Blair needed to balance his roles as shaman, guide, and father.
"Serena, I'm asking a handful of the girls to help you out today, all right? Let them babysit, or send them out fishing or something."
He lowered his voice, and hurried on before she could object.
"You know Kim's pregnant, right? I think she needs to be exposed to a positive maternal model. Seeing you and Kimi together, well, maybe it will let her pick up some of the skills she's going to need."
"It isn't really convenient, but . . . ."
"Thanks! I knew you'd want to help out!" he said, loudly enough to be overheard.
Several huts had ended up clustered together. Aline sat by the firepit in the center of that cluster, keeping her head down so she wouldn't have to look at the fragile walls and fearsome space around her. Blair edged over to Joel.
"I've asked some of the girls to hang around you and Aline today. Maybe you can have them work on construction, or help Aline keep the fire going? She may feel less exposed if she's got company."
"That could help," Joel admitted. "Thank you."
"No problem! Megan, hey, Megan! Could you do me a favor . . . ?"
Fifteen minutes later he had Kim and four other girls helping Serena, five girls working on the huts with Joel and Aline, five learning self-defense from Megan and Rafe, another five helping Naomi and Jack, and five more helping Caroline and Dan Wolf start smoking the extra venison and fish.
"Hey, Simon . . . ."
"No, I don't have anything your girls could help with!"
"Da-ad, we could think of something," Darryl protested.
As Blair waved his hands placatingly, he made a mental note to supervise the teenagers' interactions. A star-crossed romance was probably inevitable, but he'd head it off as long as he could. Dealing with a new planet was hard enough without adding in first love.
He was probably being hypocritical again, but fatherhood was like that.
"I wasn't even thinking of it, Simon. The stuff you do, well, it's not like you could teach them enough to help, right? Maybe later. No, this is about Jim. We were talking last night, and there's some stuff people should know."
Simon looked across the clearing. Ellison leaned against a tree, obviously eavesdropping. His frozen expression said he wasn't happy, but he wasn't charging across the clearing to shut Blair up.
""Can't you give this stuff a rest, just for a day?" he asked. "All right. Darryl, could you help . . . ."
"I'll go break up some wood for Mrs. Taggert, " Darryl agreed, heading for the closest concentration of girls./span/p
Looking after him warily, Simon caught Blair wearing the same expression. Blair grinned ruefully. Simon snorted.
"Looks different from this side of the fence, doesn't it?"
"At least I know what to watch out for."
"Doesn't help. You're so busy looking for the ploys you know, you miss the ones they invent. What do you want? Are you and Ellison going to explain yesterday's little fainting spell?"
"Ah, that kind of gets into stuff you don't want to talk about. Jim thinks, I mean, Jim and I think . . . we need to tell everybody about the sentinel stuff."
Which meant Blair had come up with the idea, and managed to argue Ellison into it. Simon watched Ellison stroll closer (Henry took one look at him, and almost fell over getting out of the way) and decided the time had come to put his foot down. Ellison had always been adamant that his secret couldn't get out. If Blair had gotten him at a weak moment, Simon had to protect his friend.
The trouble was, ten minutes later Blair was close to convincing Simon too. Ellison didn't help.
"I don't like it, sir, but I think it has to be done."
"You always acted like the world would end if anyone found out, and now you're planning a press conference? What's different now?"
"We got away from nosy reporters out here?" Blair suggested.
"Which is fine, until we get home. You tell this many people your secret, and somebody's going to spill the beans."
Ellison looked graven. Blair looked angelic. Neither of them denied his point. Simon got a sinking feeling.
"You don't think we're going to make it. Jim, are the odds that bad?"
He looked for Darryl, who laughed with one of the girls. They were so young.
"We're not going to die, Simon!" Blair said.
"Sir, our situation may be . . . somewhat more remote than we could expect."
"That's right! We'll be traveling so long that Jim's secret is sure to come out anyhow."
"Ellison, it makes me nervous when you start pussy-footing."
Blair made a choking sound that Simon didn't try to interpret. Ellison squared his shoulders.
"So far I haven't found any trace of civilization. We're not going to walk out in a hurry, wherever we are, and rescue is unlikely. As you said, we have to find ourselves a safe encampment. We can argue then over what comes next."