Twenty Eight Farmers Took Their Places Before Anyone Could Sign

At our second meeting, every member came.

Alma borrowed a longer table for the sign-in sheets. Ruth brought coffee. Dale moved the ice melt before I had taken off my coat.

“We learned something last time,” he said.

I placed the thermometer on the table and waited. Sixty-four, then sixty-five.

Nobody asked me to hurry.

Chika had sent the full settlement and proposed license a week ahead. That night, each farm had a numbered copy, a plain summary, and a ballot.

The company's owners had already removed Blake and Martin from their board seats. Blake was no longer chief executive. Marian was serving in that job until a replacement could take over.

Blake's twelve percent ownership had not given him enough votes to stop the change.

He still owned his shares. They were shares in a company selling for much less than he had promised.

Chika stood beside the ballot box.

“There are three decisions tonight,” she said. “The settlement. The new license. The operating budget. We'll take each separately.”

She read the money aloud.

Prairie Relay would pay $610,000 to the cooperative. Red Acre would pay $240,000. The company would cover another $74,000 in agreed legal costs, including the expense of defending me against Blake's suit.

The $850,000 settlement would sit in escrow, held by a neutral agent, until the copy audit met the written terms.

Red Acre had to destroy the test model built with our records and remove the material from its working systems and backups. Lian would verify the steps. Until then, the court's limits remained.

Prairie Relay would refund Red Acre's $185,000 purchase price from its own money.

“They aren't using our payment to refund the other company?” Ruth asked.

“No,” Chika said. “Different obligation. Separate line.”

That answer mattered enough for Alma to write it in the minutes.

Blake would return his $92,500 fee to Prairie Relay. His lawsuit would be dismissed with prejudice, which Chika explained meant he could not bring that same claim against me again.

No one had to call the breach a misunderstanding.

“Any gag rule?” Dale asked.

“Farm details stay private,” Chika said. “The settlement does not prevent you from discussing what happened or reporting concerns.”

We answered questions for forty minutes.

Then the farmers voted. Twenty-eight accepted the settlement.

I felt my shoulders drop, but I kept both hands on the table.

The license came next.

Morrow Vale would pay the cooperative $420,000 a year for three years. It would get approved records with contact tables and direct farm details removed, under strict limits on use.

It could not hand those rights to another buyer. Any later transfer needed a fresh vote.

Each farm could stop new data streams on ninety days' notice. Existing licensed uses would end with the contract unless the members approved another term.

There was no automatic renewal.

“And the code?” a cattle producer asked.

“Morrow Vale buys it from Prairie Relay,” I said. “Your data license doesn't change who wrote or owns that code.”

He nodded and marked his page.

Twenty-seven voted yes. One abstained because he planned to retire and wanted his son to review the next season's choices.

Nobody called him difficult.

For the budget, I stepped outside while Ruth chaired. The proposal included a salaried engineering position for me at $124,000 a year, paid from license income. There had been a posted job description and a review of other candidates.

I would answer to the cooperative board. I could be removed by it. Being the founder did not make me the owner of anyone else's vote.

My father waited with me beside a rack of work gloves.

“You don't have to wait out here,” I told him.

“I know.”

He studied a pair of leather gloves.

“These used to last longer.”

We talked about stitching until Ruth opened the door.

The budget had passed, twenty-four to zero, with four abstentions on my hiring. All twenty-eight had approved the settlement fund plan: $210,000 for notices, technical cleanup, and audit costs; $220,000 kept in reserve; and $420,000 distributed equally to members.

That meant $15,000 for each farm.

I went back inside and signed my employment agreement after the minutes were read.

My thermometer had settled at seventy.

Six weeks followed. They were full of checklists, copy records, questions, and revised reports. Red Acre rebuilt its test work using other material. Lian checked rather than taking its word.

The companies signed. The court approved the agreed resolution. Blake filed his dismissal.

At last, a courier brought a sealed envelope to our small cooperative office.

Across the front, Lian had written: Final Copy Audit And Release Conditions.