Exiled to the Stars (57 page)

Ken looked at Lars, who shrugged. "Sorry, it's bigger than a muon, so I don't know anything about it."

"Ask Angel Koh," Jana supplied. "One of his degrees is in Astronomy. If he doesn't know about solar energy he'll know who knows about it." She shrugged, causing distractions for all the men in the room. "Of course," she continued, "You could ask the comp, but I don't think you've got time for that."

Lee grinned at her. "I thought you two broke up years ago," he said.

She flushed. "We did. But…well…he
would
know." She turned hurriedly to Lars. "Uh, we should be going, Lars. These people have work to do." She hustled the big man toward the door.

After a few steps, he stopped. "Uh, Ken, I know you're up to your eyeballs now, but when things finally calm down a bit, would you let me know? There's something we need to talk about." He let Jana drag him out.

Lee looked at the closed door. "Well, well," he said musingly. "That's interesting. And Angel's never married, either." He turned to Ken. "When you call Angel, you might mention who referred you to him."

Ken rolled his eyes. "We do have a small incident that happened this evening to discuss," he said, shaking his head. "I'm afraid that love will have to wait."

Ken considered himself lucky to have snatched a two-hour nap in the training room. The problems began immediately, most of them dealing with effects of the loss of broadcast power on the colony equipment and vehicles. Lars and Jana's efforts had been restricted to the emergency fusactors, originally intended to power the ship itself. But the designers had realized that they might be called upon to power a colony in an emergency, and a small broadcast facility had been built in.

But experimentation proved that the broadcast range was very limited. They could power most of the colony, but the power broadcast faded less than a klick outside the wall of the Castle. This meant that some farms lost power, of course, but more importantly, it meant that colony vehicles would not function past that point.

The ship had been designed to establish an immediate colony of 5000, and the EarthGov planners had foreseen the failure of the finicky Cobb drive. Critical parts and the design of a large fusactor were aboard, along with the design and critical parts of a large distillation plant designed to use the waste heat from the big fusactor to produce fuel alcohol. The ship contained conversion power units for nearly all the vehicles. For the heavy equipment and larger vehicles, the units were designed to work on biodiesel. The smaller vehicles would run on alcohol. Throughout the night, conversion units had been brought out of the ship and carried to the maintenance shops, where the conversions would be installed. They would be installed only in vehicles expected to leave the Castle; local vehicles could still use broadcast power.

Ken spent much of the morning talking, arguing and fighting with the farmers. The new power systems would require vast amounts of plant materials. New fields would have to be opened, farms expanded, new ones established, new farmers found to operate them. The ship contained seeds carefully bred to produce large amounts of fuel. Sugar beets, for example, bred to enhance the production of sugar to the point where they were practically inedible. But used in the colony's still, they would produce large amounts of high-quality alcohol. Other plants maximized the production of oil that could be used in biodiesel. How many hectares and who would get them were subjects for hours of debate. Farm wastes would no longer be allowed to be just plowed under; the harvest leavings would be gathered and carried to the still to produce fuel alcohol.

Then, with their available transportation cut by more than half, they would have to use every horse, mule, and carabao that was broken to harness to pick up part of the slack. Farmers resented losing their best animals, and protested loudly and angrily. The reason those animals were broken to the harness was because their owners
needed
them. But finally, most admitted the colony's need was urgent, and it
was
temporary. A number of draft animals would be assigned to farm use, moving from farm to farm to perform vital tasks until the vehicle conversions could be completed and fuel produced.

By the next afternoon, the empty compartments that had contained the fusactors, still, and conversion units were being filled with hydroponics tanks. There was no worry about atmospheric contamination here; it wouldn't matter, for fuel. But the Council hoped that hydroponics could be used to get alcohol and biodiesel production underway much quicker than the normal growing cycle on the farms outside.

Within a few days, much of the excitement had died. Outlying farms, powerless since the explosion, were being outfitted with solar panels and methane generation systems as quickly as possible. Essential freight was being hauled by wagons. Horse drawn wagons had hauled power conversion units to the mines, and were hauling metal ores to the Castle. The mines had barely noticed the failure of the broadcast power. Both the mines and the smelter were powered by their own fusactor; only the ability to bring in supplies and transport their products had been affected.

It took over three months for the new fusactor and still to be built, and the alcohol fuel to begin to flow. The biodiesel had been faster, since it required only pressing the oil out of the crop plants. Even so, it'd had to wait until the hydroponic crops were available, and even with the expanded plant, hydroponics could not produce the amount needed.

Still, inside five months, a sense of normality had begun to once again fall over the colony.

In retrospect, Ken didn't regret the loss of the broadcast power, though he didn't admit it, of course. He'd always suspected that its limitations had been a large factor in the colony's lack of development. Now, they could produce their own fusactors, their own solar panels, and their own motor fuel. Instead of the slow, cumbersome, solar-powered airships, they could begin to make more use of the helicopters, now that fuel was available. The flitters had been converted to alcohol, but then, flitters weren't important vehicles anyway. During the emergency, they'd been pressed into service as local couriers for time-critical deliveries.

But now the colony could begin to develop as nations had developed on Earth: with the adventurous exploring new lands, blazing trails for others to follow. Of course, Crashlanding wasn't Earth. But the latest generation of Planetborn were becoming more and more adapted to the new world. In two or three more generations, they would
belong
here. They would no longer be an offshoot of another planet, and they could begin to settle the world!

His optimistic mood continued until Lee reminded him to call Lars. Lars announced that he and Jana would be right over. The beg man's apparent sense of urgency puzzled Ken, and he began to wonder what Lars knew that he didn't. They arrived within twenty minutes. Lars' limp was barely noticeable now, though he still used a cane, and Jana still hovered over him like a mother hen.

"Ken," the big man began, settling his bulk into a chair that creaked at the strain. "We…that is, Jana and I…Well, we think I might have left an erroneous impression after the power failure. Oh, I mean, we didn't
lie
or anything, but…"

Jana nudged him with a sharp elbow. "Oh, spit it out, you old fart!" She turned to Ken. "Have you been following the reports from the R65C

Ken shook his head. "Not really. I was talking to Jorge just before the power failure. He thinks there're problems with it.

Jana shook her head. "No, there's nothing wrong with it. Frank's checked it over half a dozen times. But my,
our
real concern is that while the machine is turning up lots of valuable minerals, so far it hasn't shown any of the so-called 'rare earths', like platinum, palladium or polonium."

From her manner, Jana thought this was an important fact, but it meant nothing to Ken. "And is that a problem?"

She shook her head. "It isn't now, but it could become one."

"Y'see, Ken," Lars took up, "EarthGov expected us to set up the big fusactor, and even provided the critical pieces necessary to make more. But I guess they thought any Earthlike planet would have a supply of those metals. They're essential for the cold fusion process. Oh, in an emergency we can use nickel for a while, but for short periods only. Since we've lit off the big fusactor, and we have the one at the mine going, well, we'll be able to run for about twenty years on what EarthGov gave us. Even so, we'll have to shut down the big one on the ship, the life-support fusactor. The small one will be enough to run the computer and hydroponics and stuff.

Jana nodded. "And Frank tells me that's not a lot of time to find exploitable deposits of such rare ores, and set up to mine and purify them. We've gone back through the R65C's reports looking for references to those ores, but so far, it's only detected trace amounts of them, nothing it would be practical to mine."

Lars nodded. "Now, it
has
found uranium, and the Comp has enough information for us to build a fission reactor, but those things are so damned dangerous they've been banned on Earth."

He shrugged. "I guess the point is that if we don't turn up a source of platinum, palladium or polonium within the next five years, we'd better have a good backup plan."

'And what would that be?" Ken asked.

Lars shook his head. "I don't know. But it's not too early to start thinking about it." He sighed. "I'm sorry, Ken. I know we're letting you down, but…"

So
that
was why Lars sounded so apologetic. "Don't be a fool, Lars. It's not your fault we didn't land next to a pile of platinum. By the way, isn't platinum a precious metal on Earth?"

Lars nodded and grinned. "Yeah. A platinum fusactor contains a fortune in the stuff. That's why they found ways to use the others. But at least here, we won't have jewelers competing for it."

They chatted for a few more minutes before Lars and Jana could be ushered out. Ken sighed. That was all they needed, he decided. An energy crisis. And if the R65C hadn't found any of the stuff they needed in the years it had been prospecting, it told him the elements were as rare here as on Earth, and there was little chance they would locate any in time.

They were going to need a miracle.

~~~~~~

BOOK III: CITY

~~~~~~

Chapter 23

Thirdmonth 15, Year 39 A.L.

"Good morning, Administrator."

Ken rose to greet his visitor. "Messer Brooks," he acknowledged. He proffered a hand with obvious reluctance, and Jack Brooks took it with a sardonic half-smile.

"I'll bet that was hard," he commented, with a significant glance at their hands.

Ken sighed as he retrieved his hand. "As Administrator, one becomes accustomed to performing unpleasant duties," he replied. "Please sit down, sire."

Ken looked at the man he'd tried to ignore for so many years. He certainly didn't
look
like a villain or a monster. He appeared to be in his mid-40's, pudgy, slightly below average height. Instead of the ubiquitous ship suit, he wore a bright green tunic that only enhanced the lighter green tinge to his otherwise sallow complexion, above blue trousers.

His face was generally NorEuro, though a slight epicanthic fold to his eyes revealed that the heritage was not pure. Of course, there was virtually no 'pure' stock left, of any race. Nor was his walk the swagger of the villain. Overall, Ken was struck by the very
ordinaryness
of the man. Richest man in the colony he might be, but except for his wardrobe, he would disappear in a crowd of three.

Jack nodded as he took a seat. "Yes. Your dislike of me is known colony-wide, though I confess I know of no reason for it, since we've never really met."

Ken's professional smile surfaced. "Yes. Well, this is probably not the time to discuss it. We have other business."

Jack shook his head. "I'm sorry, sire, but I think this is the
perfect
time to discuss it." A sardonic half-smile rose. "Since you so studiously avoid me, we're unlikely to have many chances."

Ken shrugged, his formal smile fading. "Ah! It's
honesty
you want. Very well, sire. I consider you a parasite. You have become very wealthy by preying on the weaknesses of the people, draining them of resources they could be using to improve the lot of their families, while helping the colony develop."

Jack's sardonic smile faded to seriousness, and he shook his head. "I thought it was something like that. You think I'm some sort of Planetborn Doug Ryles. Well, if I may lecture a bit, perhaps I can correct a few misapprehensions.

"Ryles was a cheap grifter; a small-timer whose ambition and greed far exceeded his intelligence. He traded in blackmail, threats and other assorted mayhem. I do none of those things. I'm not a Doug Ryles, sire. I'm simply a businessman. Yes, I'm ambitious, but not in the way Ryles was. I don't want to take over the colony, or destroy it, or slow its development. Do you seriously think I don't realize that my welfare is intimately tied to that of the colony? If the colony dies,
I
die.

"I simply provide what you and the colony do not. Recognition that 'time off' does not mean time spent simply sitting and waiting to go back to work. I deal in Recreation and fun. You know I built the children's playground in the square, complete with monitors."

Ken nodded, his expression skeptical. "Yes, to provide a place for parents to dump their kids while they waste their money in your casino."

Jack nodded. "To a certain extent, of course, you're right. I'm not married, but I have a number of friends with children. I've seen that parents
need
a place to take the kids, a place they can know the kids are safe, while they take a break from the constant stress. It's been a long time, I know, sire, but think back to your own children. Did your wife never beg you to take a day off, to hire a sitter, to go somewhere, just the two of you?"

Ken's shoulders relaxed slightly. He
did
remember those times. With guilt for the times he'd had to refuse, and with pleasure in the memories of the times he hadn't.