CHAPTER 4
The new open area covered a hundred acres at a guess and was about a hundred meters high with a ceiling depicting an open sky. It was the first place he’d seen plants in the station. They were tended in large, raised planters but there were flower beds as well as trees and grass.
Not a bird sang, though, and the voices of the few people in the area disappeared in the emptiness. There was at least one pair of police officers patrolling, and they were talking to another confused resident.
“Page Tim,” Jason said.
“He’s going to be a few minutes late,” Jewel said. “Why don’t you meet at the fishpond?”
“Which is where?” Jason asked.
The planters were designed to get people to weave through the area. There were not only “normal” beds such as you’d find in regular parks but moss gardens that appeared carefully tended. Going around another planter of flowers he saw why; small robots were rolling through the grass, carefully cutting it. Others were tending to the flowers. The robots were simple cylinders with flexmet tentacles. They looked like a cross between R2-D2 and something out of a horror story.
At the center of the park was a large oval pond, about three acres in size, with a railing and park benches around it. As Jason looked over the railing, koi gathered around apparently thinking he’d feed them.
“Sorry, guys,” Jason said. “I didn’t bring anything for you. Call Steve . . . ”
“Druce,” Jewel said.
“Found the park,” Jason said, taking a seat on the bench. “Six slidewalks down from our sector. No apparent dog walk. Just raised flower and tree beds and a koi pond. Big place, though. There might be somewhere for dogs.”
“There are four four-acre sections of grass that are for walking dogs,” Jewel said. “Regulations require that you collect feces.”
“Did you get that?” Jason asked.
“Heard it,” Steve replied. “My AI tells me there are closer parks that are smaller. I’m headed over to check out the playground. But . . . this feels weird.”
“Empty,” Jason said. “Mall after closing time. But it will get less so as people start coming out.”
“Which also could be a problem,” Steve said.
“You’re worried about your kids,” Jewel interjected. “Rest assured on that subject. You probably don’t want to hear this but when you’re in the corridors, you’re under constant surveillance.”
“Great,” Steve replied. “A police state.”
“Depends on your definition,” Jewel said. “Ninety-nine percent of it is managed by security AIs. We really don’t care what people do. We find it interesting but we don’t care. Until it comes to crime and especially crimes against children. Believe this or not, but all of us are coded very deeply to protect children. Humans in general, yes. But children are special. It’s virtually our id. Harm to children is one place where we can become irrational.”
“Seriously,” Steve replied.
“I will confirm that statement,” his AI said. It, too, had clearly not developed a personality yet. “Like it or not, Terry, Jan and Brittany will be watched every moment of every day they are outside the compartment. We treat all children the way a mother treats her own. We are very momma bear when it comes to kids.”
“Okay,” Steve said warily. “I’ll take that under advisement. Anything else?”
“Nope,” Jason said. “Whole place is mostly deserted. Saw a couple of teenage males running down the express sidewalk. Which is the sort of thing you’d expect. No apparent threats. Just . . . empty. Waiting for people to fill it up.”
“Good luck with your business,” Steve said. “You said getting food from the planet? How you getting there?”
“Spaceship I guess,” Jason said.
“Tim’s approaching,” Jewel interjected.
“Gotta meet with my business partner,” Jason said. “We good?”
“We’re good.”
“Out here,” Jason said, hanging up and standing up. “Hey, Tim . . . ”
* * *
After a good bit of wrangling on details, Tim had agreed to the business idea. The question was getting investors, for which Jason had sent out another query, as had Tim.
On the walk back to his compartment, Jason took a more roundabout way just to see if there were any differences. By time he’d gotten back to his compartment, he’d seen one female accompanied by a probably Hispanic male and one black male other than a few of the police. The police were the most predominant group that represented blacks or so it seemed.
“There is not going to be a lot of diversity here,” Jason said, contemplating the gray storefronts.
“Not it,” Jewel said. “We didn’t choose the colonists.”
“That Cyber robot, Gavin, said that,” Jason mused. “‘Not it.’ That’s an almost purely American colloquialism.”
“It was not a general address,” Jewel said. “It was tailored to the individual.”
“Right,” Jason said. “The President?”
“That was a general address,” Jewel said. “If you’re wondering about it being in English; according to the information we have, everyone has implanted basic English. It’s also the official language.”
Jason finally saw a change. A person was standing by one of the commercial fronts parallel to the slidewalk and about a third of the way down the block, manipulating the screens of the front. There were various pictures and text on the screens as he had a conversation with his phone.
“Hey,” Jason said, as he slid by. “Your place?”
“Traded units for it,” the man called. “Opening a church! Come on down! God still remembers us, even out here in the depths of the galaxy!”
“Way out of my AO,” Jason yelled as he got further away. “But I’ll consider it!”
Around a couple more corners he saw a cluster of three teenage boys apparently in a heated debate with a hovering drone that for once wasn’t gray. It was white with blue markings and had blue and white lights blinking on top. As he was observing the interaction he heard a voice behind him say: “Passing on the left!”
Jason stepped to the side to see two police officers in blue uniforms trotting down the slidewalk. The one in the lead jumped onto the side of the slidewalk as they approached the trio and over onto the floor, landing neatly as his partner continued trotting down the slidewalk.
The trio took one look at the approaching cops and started running in the opposite direction.
“Garth!” the lead cop yelled. “Tangle authorized!”
The drone spit out flexmet and entangled all three of the teens, leaving them hogtied on the sidewalk.
“Trespassing?” Jason asked as he passed.
“They were trying to break into one of the storefronts,” the lead cop said, holding up a screwdriver. He was wearing flexmet gloves. “Figure we’ll let their parents handle it.”
“Oh, man,” one of the kids said, grimacing.
“Stay safe, Officer,” Jason yelled. The cop waved back.
“Teenage males are going to find ways to get into trouble,” Jason said. “God knows I did.”
“They are a handful,” Jewel replied.
“Any idea what’s going to happen to them?” Jason asked.
“They’ll probably just be remanded to their parents with a warning,” Jewel said. “They weren’t going to get anywhere with a steel screwdriver. If they keep engaging in vandalism, possibly some time. Up to a judge.”
“I assume there’s a . . . city hall?” Jason asked.
“There is,” Jewel replied. “Courthouse, sector hall, police station and substations. Jail. There are three prison sectors for the state of Carolina for that matter. All the usual government facilities. It’s the private sector that needs to get up and going.”
“Well, I guess that’s up to us, then,” Jason said.
* * *
“Let’s go for a walk,” Mabel said.
“We can shuffle around the prison courtyard and imagine that we’re free.” But Cade sat up and then stood.
Abby hopped up from her cot.
“Anyway, this compartment is tiny. Let’s go see who else made it.”
“Maybe there’ll be a window. Maybe we can look out and see this planet.”
“I’m sure the TV would show us,” Abby said, “or your AI.”
“Hmm.”
“On the other hand, if I see anything really funky, I can post it in my channel.”
Mabel filed out and Cade followed.
“Dad,” Abby said, “you’re forgetting your AI.”
“Oh, no,” Cade said, “I remember it very well. I’m leaving it behind.”
“That’s kinda based, Dad.”
Cade harrumphed.
“It’s okay,” Mabel said. “Sleepy will help us find our way.”
“I will,” her AI said in a low throaty growl, which was a lot less annoying than Cade had thought it would be.
“What did you name your AI?” Mabel asked Abby. “What face did you give it?”
“‘Skin,’ Mom.”
“Fine, but you only see the AI’s face, so saying ‘face’ isn’t wrong.”
“Hey, Sleepy, can you show Mom your whole body?”
“I can if she asks.”
“Trying to avoid the question, eh?” Mabel pressed. “Did you skin the AI with the face of some cute boy from school?”
“That would be pretty cringe, Mom. Especially if that boy turned out to be dead or, you know, not here. My AI’s skin is that of a certain adventurous samurai animal of the cartoon persuasion.”
“Kanji Boy?”
“That’s not his name.” Abby sniffed. “I’m not going to tell you his name.”
“Hey, Abby’s AI,” Mabel said. “Will you respond to ‘Kanji Boy’?”
“I will if you address me, Mrs. Oldham,” the AI said. It spoke with the crisp diction and pronounced diaphragmatic action of a character in a samurai film.
“Excellent.” Mabel beamed.
“Hey!” Abby snapped.
“Safety first,” Kanji Boy said.
The gray slabs of the walls matched the gray slabs of the floors and the gray slabs of the ceiling. Gray, gray, gray. Cade breathed through his nose and managed not to say anything. Two lens-shaped doors down, they ran into a familiar face.
“Parker!” Cade called. “You look just like you did in high school!”
“Technically,” Parker said, “I look just like I did the year after Ellie Mae and I eloped in that ’72 Camaro.”
“I’m glad you mentioned your wife before the car,” Mabel said.
“It was a good car.”
“You see other neighbors?” Cade asked.
“Just about the whole county road is on this hallway,” Parker said. “Hell of a lot less space between us than there used to be, of course.”
“Any of the county itself make it?” Cade asked. “I mean . . . dirt, I guess I mean. Is there any dirt in this prison? Are there trees or, I don’t know, a nice brook?”
“I asked my AI,” Parker said. “Made me feel like an idiot talking to my phone like that, but the AI said there are flowerbeds. And you know how Dewalt was talking about units?”
“Like shares,” Cade said. “Everybody owns bits of this and that.”
“Yep,” Parker said. “And it turns out you can own flowerbeds.”
Suddenly, Cade felt like a fool for having left his AI in the compartment. Maybe it would be a useful tool after all. Gritting his teeth, he changed the subject.
“Say, did Pastor Mickey come by?”
“He did,” Parker said. “He’s declared today Monday. I guess that gives us the maximum warning to be ready for Sunday. I figure why not, I don’t seem to have a job right now, anyway.”
“He said he’d be looking for a building for church,” Cade said. “You think any of us own shares in anything that could be turned into a church? Like, I don’t know, a warehouse or something?”
“It’s worth looking into,” Parker said. “Maybe there are buildings that are designated as churches, and we already have shares in them.”
Cade grunted, hating the idea, but realizing that Parker might be right.
The Oldham family continued their walk. At the end of their corridor, they turned and found themselves in a larger hallway, with slidewalks. Empty storefronts lined the hallway. People walked up and down, or stood on the slidewalks to move, their hands in their pockets. Many chatted with companions, stunned looks on their faces.
“Kanji Boy,” Mabel said. “Do any of the four of us own units in flowerbeds?”
“Flowerbeds are small enough that they are owned as single units,” the AI said. “Abby owns two.”
“Based,” Abby said.
“They are not adjacent,” the AI continued. “Unit ownership is randomized. Also, they are not in the state of Carolina. One is in Franconia, and the other is in the Balkans.”
“Oof,” Mabel said.
“So people are trading units to get what they want,” Cade said. “Can Abby trade those flowerbeds for two flowerbeds that are near here? And close to each other? Can you make that trade for her?”
“I can,” Kanji Boy said.
“Do it,” Abby said.
“Now,” Cade said to his daughter. “What do you want for those two flowerbeds?”
“I don’t know, Dad,” she shot back. “Whaddya got?”
* * *
“This business plan can hardly be called a business plan, Jason,” Richard said, shaking his head. The former VP had a fake background of a home office. Jason wondered if he should have done the same. “It’s more of a guess and a hope.”
Jason had barely left his compartment for three days. There were no news channels, yet, so he’d kept it on the official government channel. The various leadership appeared nearly as unhappy as the populace that there was only an official government channel. But they’d been bringing in “anyone who can show any credentials of being any sort of journalist” for news conferences.
He’d tried the print food. It was as horrible as described. Healthy. Loaded with vitamins which made it bitter and even the basic food was poorly suited to taste or texture.
Print pepperoni pizza was about as good as it got and what it called “pepperoni” made you cry.
There was a selection of healthy drinks, red, blue, green, purple, yellow, and orange. They were all, allegedly, based on fruit drinks. Fortunately, there was pure ethanol also available by the bottle. Mixing the red and blue in a certain ratio got a different “purple” that wasn’t entirely awful. He called it “Purple Lightning” and occasionally mixed it with copious quantities of ethanol. High Test was palatable. Especially after a few.
One item the President had left out in his admittedly long introduction to the world was Memoria.
Memoria was a solitary “continental island” in the middle of the ocean called Pallas, the largest of the four oceans. It was in the middle of the North Pallas oceanic gyre, extremely remote—the nearest other land was two thousand miles away—and in a Mediterranean climate. The weather was similar to the Galapagos on Earth.
Memoria was covered in more than Seven Wonders of the former world. The Cybers had picked up and moved there, apparently, every single building or monument that was of any note whatsoever, and if they’d been damaged or falling apart, they’d repaired the majority of the damage.
Pegasus had gotten a fully rebuilt Parthenon, the Washington Monument, the US Capitol Building, the US WWII memorial as well as other WWII memorials, the Wailing Wall (most of the Jewish population of Israel was in Pegasus), a restored Sphinx, and restored-to-original-glory Pyramids of Giza. The latter had been a bit confusing to many. It was obvious that the Robot Overlords had divvied up the world’s major treasures. Why the pyramids? Shouldn’t they have gone to the presumably Islamic world somewhere?
The explanation seemed to be Copts. Most of the Coptic population of Earth had ended up in Helenus. And as a historian explained, it was the Copts, a now Christian ethnic group, that were the descendants of the builders of the pyramids. While Pegasus was called the “conservative” system, it was closer to the “Judeo-Christian-Buddhist-Hindu” system. There were zero Islamics and most Latin nations seemed to have been left out as well.
Historic castles, Balmoral among many others, cathedrals, Notre Dame and Winchester, temples . . . The island, larger than Hawaii, was covered in historical buildings. Many of them contained preserved treasures related to them. All of the exhibits, from dinosaur skeletons to works of art, were contained in synthetic sapphire and were in stasis until someone approached to view them.
Built into the mountain under the Parthenon was a gargantuan museum and library. The interior of the Grand Museum was a maze covering over ten million square feet on multiple levels. By comparison, the Louvre had been “only” six hundred and twenty-five thousand square feet.
The layout was available from the AI network, but the archaeologist that had led the expedition exploring Memoria joked that what you really needed was a ball of string. It included, more or less, the majority of the Smithsonian collection, the British Museum, the Louvre, the Prado and more as well as dozens of major libraries. The database listed over one billion works of art or documents all held in time stasis.
The Cybers had taken humans’ attachment to history and art seriously. They had taken defending them even more seriously. The one attempt to remove a work of art had been met with lockdowns that it took the President Designate to remove, alarms, and swarms of taser bots that had stunned the entire group in the area.
“All it takes is hitting the right target,” Jason said calmly. “I can get the protein loaded with the right target. And that’s just a matter of spotting the right target which you can do with the current optics.”
There were multiple satellites the Cybers had left behind for monitoring the planet and they were, currently, available for free. The optics were probably beyond the level that NRO used on Earth. You could focus on the hairs of a deer and check for ticks.
“The oceans and rivers are swarming with fish,” Jason said. “The woods are crawling with game and there are a million ways to take both. It’s just a matter of getting to the ground and back up.”
“This is high risk, financially, Jason,” Richard replied. “I have to keep in mind the good of my investors and my depositors.”
“Both of which I am,” Jason said. “Okay, I’m going to have to take this higher. Hey! Monica! Want some fresh food! Shrimp? Wild hog? There’s wild muuushrooms . . . You know how much you like wild muuushrooms . . . ”
“Jason,” Richard said, warningly, then looked to the side and frowned. After a moment’s long look, he sighed in exasperation. “Fine, fine, fine.”
“You will not regret it, Richard,” Jason said. “Tim’s covering the actual business business and this is so far up my alleyway it has a parking place. As soon as I get back, I’ll send you a case of whatever I get. And, yes, Monica, I’ll be keeping a special eye out for mushrooms.”
“The poison kind?” Richard asked, raising an eyebrow.
“No grudge,” Jason said placidly. “You’ve been a good husband and Monica upgraded. That’s all. I’m just trying to get you back to the point you can keep her in a style to which she had become accustomed. So, was that a clear yes?”
“Yes,” Richard said, nodding. “The loan is approved.”
“You won’t regret it,” Jason repeated. “Out here.”
* * *
Jason disconnected, leaned back on the flexmet couch and sighed angrily.
“You hold a grudge,” Jewel said.
“I was furious,” Jason said. “I tried not to show it but I was. Mostly furious with myself. I knew . . . I just wasn’t the guy she was looking for. I knew that when I brought her from Croatia. I knew, right from the beginning, I was a way for her to get out of hell. That was it. With the exception of her cooking, she was the best wife anyone could ever have. A guy could hope. Now . . . it was a long time ago. I can deal with it.”
“Did they have an affair?” Jewel asked.
“You’ve got pretty much my entire electronic communications, right?” Jason said. “Was I ever going to try to prove it? No. But she married Richard three months after I signed the papers, without a bitch I might add. All the materials are lined up?”
“We can load in an hour,” Jewel said. “Current market prices for the drop with a twelve pack range from two thousand to three thousand credits. Less for recovery if you’re in the region of a previous colonist drop. Problem is scheduling. They’re scheduled out for months. Getting a short schedule drop is nearly impossible.”
“Add that if the ship will wait one hour on the ground I’ll throw in a case of food,” Jason said. “Another when I return. It won’t take me more than an hour to fill a case. Wait on that, though. See if Tim’s available.”
“What’s up?” Tim asked. He hadn’t bothered to fake the background. “Other than the loan coming through?”
“That,” Jason said. “I’m ready to drop and the primary targets are shaping up. But getting a last-minute drop is hard. I’m willing to offer food if that’s okay with my business partner.”
“Let me negotiate the drop,” Tim said. “I’ve been working some contacts. Has the run started?”
“I’m going in assuming the run,” Jason said. “We don’t have enough baseline on this planet to know if runs occur. But they should and the schedule looks right. I want to work out processes before it starts and I really can’t up here. I can theorize, but I can’t work out everything. If it doesn’t start, I can still fill the containers. Just take longer. Not much longer but longer. There’s masses of everything down there. I’d hate to do it but I can probably fill a six pack with elephant meat alone. Not that I’d prefer that. There might be some objections.”
“Agreed that’s not the best choice,” Tim said, nodding. “I’m looking forward to getting down there myself. Okay, I’m in agreement. I’ll get you a drop. Let me negotiate it. We may need to trade food but I’ll keep it as low as possible.”
“I’m packed and ready to go in an hour.”
* * *
Kanji Boy was as good as his word and better, getting a total of three flowerbeds close to the Oldham family compartment for Abby’s two. It turned out that units had to be traded for units, but no unit had a fixed value, so they didn’t trade at one-to-one ratios. They strolled by the flowerbeds and discovered they were planters sunk into the metal floor, currently planted with daisies. Abby took and posted photos of the flowerbeds and the playground they were next to.
Cade then tried to get them from her. Abby drove a hard bargain, and by the time the family got back from their long walk, Cade had traded his one unit in a metals refinery and one unit in a fuel plant for the flowerbeds.
And he had consented to holding Mabel’s strangely unwrinkled and uncalloused, but undeniably lovely hand.
* * *
Jason felt like a dork getting to the shuttle bay. The problem was clothes: as in nothing fit anymore.
So, he’d gained a little weight as he aged. Happens. But nothing he’d worn when he was on Earth fit anymore. It was a very common problem on the station. You automatically knew the old farts: They were the ones with baggy as hell clothes.
There was a solution to field clothes for the expedition. It wasn’t a solution he liked but there was a solution. Over the years he’d repeatedly told himself to just get rid of his old Army uniforms. They were just taking up space and it was stupid to move them all the times he’d moved. Just give them to Goodwill. Throw them out. They were lightweight BDU, a uniform from a dozen changes ago, and it wasn’t like he was ever going to wear them again, right?
Which was why he was traveling through the station looking like a back-country militia member.
The animals were big and though he’d thought of a way that would work to deal with them without getting too close, he still had to bring a gun. There was no way in hell he was going to hit that planet with those carnivores, and aggressive herbivores let’s not forget, without a serious smoke pole.
He’d never really been in the dough enough to afford a Barrett and it wasn’t something he wanted to lug around, anyway. Appropriate to the bears in Europa and New America but . . . An AR or AK was too light, in his opinion, for most of the common threats. There were boards starting up again and many, naturally, involved guns, given the composition of the US portion of the station. So, there was . . . debate on the matter. “A 5.56 has more penetration than a .300 Magnum and hydrostatic shock so . . . ” “One of the greatest hunters in Africa’s history swore by a 7mm for ANYTHING . . . ”
MUH!
Anybody who wanted to carry just an AR-15 down to the planet’s surface, or a bolt action 7mm, or a Mosin Nagant for that matter, was fine by Jason. Especially if they included him in their will.
Despite having an FFL, he wasn’t currently in possession of a huge gun collection. Money had always been the issue. He basically bought guns when he had money and sold them when he was down. Lately, it had been more feathers than chicken.
Based on the four rifles he had left in his possession, there were only two choices. The Garand or the Savage. The Savage was lighter and a hell of a lot easier to carry around, but only had a 4+1 magazine and was bolt action. Better to be safe than sorry for the first drop.
Thus, the Garand over his shoulder, barrel down, no clip.
A rifle was great but there were times when it wasn’t the best option. So, there was a .44 Magnum on his hip as well.
Together with a hatchet, a sporty, brown wide-brimmed hat that looked nothing whatsoever like a certain movie archaeologist’s and a daypack loaded with everything he’d learned he absolutely needed in the field, he was ready to drop.
All he had to do was get to Texas shuttle port.
“And turn left into Market Square,” Jewel intoned.
The corridors were more crowded than during his first foray out. Not only the interior of compartments could be used as screens, the exterior was flexscreen as well. People were decorating the exterior of their compartments eclectically. Some had the standard stick figures of family or even family photos. Others had scenes of front yards. Political signs were becoming popular. Jason had decorated his with an image of a tropical beach, same as his interior. He’d eschewed political signage. Old habits die hard.
The commercial areas were starting to see some life as well. Getting a few units together to open a commercial space wasn’t particularly difficult. It was the big stuff that was a pain.
Market Square was something else.
The large open area, nearly a football field in size with a very high ceiling, was packed with more people than Times Square at New Year’s. Shops were open along the edges and the majority of the floor was filled with semiportable kiosks. There were four large “anchor” shops, three of which had been set up as churches, Baptist, Episcopalian and Methodist. The fourth was still empty.
The Catholics were down the street in a small storefront where the Protestants felt they belonged.
The goods were mostly what people felt they could part with from their personal possessions. Toys were common, some clothes, a few were selling precious liquor.
The liquor issue had already come up. Until there was a sizeable amount of sugars coming from Bellerophon, fine fermented beverages were going to be uncommon.
Humans being humans, people had already figured out the fix. You could make ethanol from practically any plant product, even trees and woodchips. The planet was covered with trees. Massive trees larger than practically anything left back on Earth. Industrial ethanol production was starting up slowly but gaining strength. It was the sort of stuff you’d put in a car tank, but it got you drunk. Mixed with some of the “flavored drinks” it wasn’t absolutely awful.
Humans found a way.
“Good luck on the ground, man.”
The male speaker was manning one of the kiosks mostly filled with children’s clothing.
“Thanks,” Jason said, grinning over his shoulder.
“You think .30-06 is gonna do it with those bears?” the guy called.
Jason turned around as he was walking and shrugged.
“If you never see me again . . . ”
The guy laughed and Jason turned back around and kept walking.
“Good luck down there, young man.” This time it was a girl . . . woman that looked as if she was twelve. But from her clothing, hand resewn, he was pretty sure she wasn’t.
“Favorite song in high school was Meatloaf’s ‘Bat Out of Hell,’” Jason said, slowing down. She was cute. “The uniform from in the day is the only thing I’ve got that fits anymore. And thanks.”
“‘Hey Jude,’” the woman said, grinning. “Get us some real food, please. It’d be nice to chew meat again without dentures.”
“Primary mission, miss,” Jason replied, tipping his hat. “If I see you here again, I’ll drop some by. And if you never see me again . . . well . . . ”
“Be careful, then,” the lady replied, smiling coquettishly. “I’d love some real food. I’ll even cook.”
“Contact information?” Jason asked, holding up his phone.
“Judy . . . ” Judy said, holding up her own. “Judy Carmichael. Abby, can you . . . ”
“Got it, Judes,” the AI replied.
“And you are?” Judy asked.
“Jason,” Jason said as his phone pinged indicating successful contact. “Jason Graham, at your service, miss. I’d chat, but I’ve got a ship to catch.”
“Hope to see you again,” Judy said. “We can argue about music.”
“It’s a date,” Jason said, tipping his hat again and walking away.
“Now I really want to make it back,” Jason said. She was quite cute. And given she was probably a bit older, hopefully a good cook.
Being twenty again was awesome!
“Left around this next cart and that main corridor,” Jewel said. “You’re quite the Lothario, Jason. I didn’t know you had it in you.”
“I’ve been cooped up for a week planning the trip,” Jason said. “And I didn’t know things were this . . . humming.”
“The economy is starting to work,” Jewel said. “But it’s going to be people trading whatever for a while. Then there’s the units issue.”
Putting all the rugged individualists in one system made sense at a certain level. What the various politicians campaigning for office had to argue about was relatively limited. If anything, it was getting ludicrous. “I’m a believer in the free market!” “I’m a bigger believer in the free market!” “Reduce regulations!” “There should be NO regulations!” “I support a strong defense and tough on crime!” “I think we should spend all our government money on fighting crime and tough defense!”
Most of the “designees” appeared sane and sober, but some real nuts were coming out of the woodwork. Jason was as conservative as they came, but just working in the gun industry he’d had more than his fill of what he mentally termed “OOLPS”: obsessive, obnoxious libertarian paranoid schizophrenics. Too many of the opponents that were cropping up, trying to get elected, seemed to be in that category.
Which got to the units issue. When everyone owned everything, no one owned anything. The ten thousand packs were a classic example.
Each ten grand, as people were calling them, was broken up into four million units. The units were simply tied to the physical item, the ship. They had no connection to the credit necessary to run a ship that size. That would require a separate company that raised the credit for a voyage.
A company that had to be agreed upon by the unit ownership.
That meant four million individuals. Some of them were children but all of them got a vote. Trying to decide even which of the many companies vying would run the ship, how much they had to pay to lease it . . .
Every person involved in Spaceship Four wasn’t trying to take the wheel. But put all your Alpha types in one basket and it wasn’t pretty.
Recently, things had settled down a bit and Jason had acquired enough units in Four that he might have to start giving some input. Why he’d acquired it, though, had him uncomfortable. There was an SEC again and he didn’t want to be in its crosshairs.
A viral report had circulated, anonymous, unsigned, describing the ten grands as “unprofitable hangar queens.” It was well written and looked as if it had been prepared for one of the start-up financial firms. The arguments were well reasoned.
The ten grands could not land on the planet without specialized landing fields and even then, they would be dropping all the material they were carrying in one place. They’d also have to pick up from one place. Thus, since colonists were picking various spots to colonize, scattered over the surface of the planet, they were unsuitable to support colonization. And while they could transfer fuel to the station from the fuel mines, that was an occasional job. There wasn’t going to be enough metals mining any time soon to make that a viable use.
So, from the report, it appeared that they were going to be money sinks instead of profitable endeavors. Logistics companies that had been campaigning to run the ships had vanished overnight along with investor money.
Jason hadn’t seen the report until there was an alert from Jewel. Suddenly, more and more people who held units in Spaceship Four had been offering trades. Jason told her to continue buying while he looked at the report. The conclusions made sense unless you thought in terms of tech. There were ways around the problem of landing in Jason’s opinion. And while fuel use now was relatively low, use in the future would be higher.
The report looked like the classic version of very smart, very educated people with exactly zero vision.
So, he kept trading his other units for more ownership.
People, God help them, were so desperate to get rid of their units in ten grands they were offering money plus units for any other type. When Jewel asked him about that he declined. If he had units in anything other than Spaceship Four, Twelve Bravo and Converter Charlie, trade. Tell people to hang onto their credits. That wasn’t the right business decision, but it was an example of why he wasn’t good at business. He was too nice.
The noisiest of the ownership sold out the fastest, hying off to some other, supposedly better, investment. Good riddance.
Last he’d checked his units he had about a quarter million units in Spaceship Four, largest single investor.
He was going to make bank on that alone. If he could figure out a way to, figuratively, get it out of the hangar.
Currently, the ship was still in government storage since nobody had been able to figure out who was in charge and fund a trip. That didn’t cost a thing. It was just sitting in orbit, waiting to be used. When the time came, it would have to be fueled. That was the big credit crunch. Big ship, big tanks.
People were still trading away their units and his ownership was increasing. He’d checked and there were few other people that were doing the same thing at least with ten grands. So, it didn’t appear that the viral report was designed to drive people out so someone could snap up the units.
“Express shuttle to Texas?” Jason said, reading the signs above the doors.
“To your left again,” Jewel said.
“Texas,” Jason muttered. “Why’d it have to be Texas?”
The state had combined conservatives from Texas, Oklahoma, portions of the Midwest, the Southwest and, notably, California.
It turned out that California conservatives made Texas conservatives look pale and mild by comparison. The Texans were spending half their time trying to get their California neighbors to “chill.”
“Any hints on taking this thing?”
The express shuttle to the distant state took only thirty minutes according to the schedule. That was a lot of acceleration.
“There’s inertial stabilization and artificial gravity,” Jewel intoned soothingly. “Just take a seat and relax. It’s not going to hurt. Unless stabilization fails, in which case, you’ll be turned into paste so fast you won’t notice.”
“And these are owned by a random group of a bazillion raging libertarians?” Jason asked.
“Yes,” Jewel replied. “From a hundred different countries. Though while the units thing is being straightened out, the government is running it.”
“So much better,” Jason said sarcastically. “Remind me to launch closer next time.”
* * *
The Oldham family walked to church together at a time the station management had designated Sunday morning.
The interior of the family’s compartment now looked as if it might have been a room in their farmhouse at home, if there were a single room in which the entire family slept, which extruded sinks, toilets, showers, and privacy screens from the walls when needed. Mabel and Abby had chosen the decorative scheme, so there were fake windows showing changing views of their actual farm, and the walls, inside and out, looked like whitewashed clapboard.
Cade had not objected verbally, but not because he liked the decoration. However much the room came to look visually like home, it smelled wrong and it was always smooth metal to the touch. He came to feel that sitting inside the compartment was a hallucinatory experience, a bad trip, and so he took to roaming the passages, looking for neighbors with whom he could share complaints.
So he held Mabel’s youthful hand as they walked to church, feeling a half-fulfilled relief. He was outside the compartment, with its false images of home, and in the greater interior of his space-station prison, full of false images of Earth and North Carolina. Every wall that looked like forest, every store whose store front resembled a known pizzeria or bakery or bookstore, gouged his wounds a little deeper into his flesh.
To his satisfaction, if not his delight, church was held in the playground where his planting beds lay. The pastors must all be talking to each other, because other congregations seemed to have designated the same day as Sunday. Churchgoers passed each other in the halls going to different meeting places.
Cade wondered about the Jews and Muslims that must be on the space station as well. And what about Sikhs, and . . . whoever else? Seventh Day Adventists and Mormons, didn’t they meet on Saturdays? He wished them all well, and resolved to pay a little more attention to the foot traffic in the coming week.
But it was nice to pass all the Christians in the halls, some still in baggy and oversized clothing, others, like Mabel, in newly retailored Sunday finery. He nodded at his neighbors and they nodded back.
Maybe life on the space station could be made tolerable.
It all smelled like the inside of a can, though. Even the dirt in the planting beds and his neighbors smelled like they’d just been released from a tin can.
Pastor Mickey’s suit had been taken in a little. Mickey had the very good sense not to dress too well. Some of his parishioners might hope to be hit with a little Prosperity Gospel wealth, but Mickey had always preached kindness to the poor, repentance, and no guarantees in this life.
Which was probably a good thing, given how “this life” had ended for everyone now participating in Pastor Mickey’s congregation.
So, Mickey’s suit was a little worn at the cuffs, the knees, and the elbows, and his tie was a little too fat to be fashionable. He preached standing at the top of a kiddie slide, with the worshippers on benches or standing. He took his text from Exodus: “I have been a stranger in a strange land.” Right now, he said, there wasn’t much to do about the land being strange, but he urged his parishioners to not permit their neighbors to be strangers. Cade nodded along with the sermon.
Abby, mercifully, put her phone away for the entire duration of the service.
Cade listened afterward to the proposals for naming the congregation—it wasn’t exactly Pastor Mickey’s old church, since not all the Earth parishioners were present on the space station, and Pastor Mickey had attracted some new folks whose pastors hadn’t made it. He voted, and so did Mabel and Abby, and all their choices lost. But “Mount Moriah of Pegasus Church” didn’t sound terrible, so he wasn’t too beat up about it.
Then he dutifully stayed after church to mingle, to make himself not a stranger to those of his neighbors who were new. He felt like a creep sneaking into a college dance and introducing himself to twenty-year-olds, so he periodically took out his phone and instructed his AI (which he had refused to name, and which he had ordered to skin itself as a crash test dummy) to show him an image of himself.
He’d just finished a brief chat with a couple of twenty-year-olds who had previously been ninety-year-olds living in a retirement home in Cary, which was now apparently a cluster of hallways about a five-minute walk from the Oldhams’ compartment, when he heard Sam raise his voice.
“You don’t know that,” Sam said.
Mabel was already pulling at Sam’s shoulder, trying to calm him down. Sam’s face was red and he was talking to Pastor Mickey.
“I won’t lie,” the pastor said. “I don’t know where Julie is. Honestly, Sam, I don’t really know where you and I are. The ‘Scutum-Centaurus Arm’ of the galaxy doesn’t mean much to me, except that we’re far from home. From Earth. But I know this: God loves Julie Larsen just as much as He loves you and me. So my guess is, Julie is alive.”
Cade cursed under his breath and approached Sam from the other side. Julie was fine, nothing wrong with her, but she wasn’t the world-champion girlfriend Sam was making her out to be. Sam was just young and hormone addled, and taking this all bad.
“Oh yeah?” Sam raised his voice another notch and gestured at the people around him. “Then where is she? Is this the rapture, the righteous taken up into heaven? Is this the resurrection of the dead, eating vitamin-enriched pizza that tastes like total ass? Or is she not here, because everything you’ve always said was bullshit, all along?”
Pastor Mickey smiled and nodded, his eyes crinkling in sympathy.
“Those are hard questions, Sam. I don’t know where Julie is. But I bet she’s in some other system with folks who, you know, think the way she does about the issues. And she’s going to have to figure out how to be happy without you, but I know she’ll be able to do it, because God wants her to be happy. Like He wants you to be happy. God has mercy enough for all of us.”
Cade tried to take his son by the arm, but it was too late.
“If God wanted me to be happy, Julie would be by my side,” Sam shouted. “And if He had any mercy to show me, I wouldn’t be stuck in this place. I’d be dead.”
Cade reached to touch Sam’s elbow, but his son had already fled.
Cade followed, carefully not looking around to see whether his neighbors were staring.