The BridgeBook III: The Starhell Mutinyby euhal allen |
Table of Contents Chapter 2, part 1 appears in this issue. |
Chapter 2: Planning |
part 2 of 3
* * *
Jo’Eya, not able to hold her mirth in, burst out laughing at the sight before her. “This must be good for me, Cyr. I haven’t laughed so much since before grandfather died.”
“It,” replied Cyr, a bit frostily, “is your grandfather’s image that I am trying to project. I am projecting him just as he appeared numerous times and do not see what is so amusing.”
“Oh, Cyr, you have his features down very well, but his movements are those of a not very coordinated robot. You make grandfather into a very funny character.”
“I have to admit,” added Katia, “that Jo’Eya is right, Cyr. You are going to have to practice really hard to smooth out the motions and get it right. Still, I don’t think that Jonkil would mind. I think that he would be very honored that his holo-form is the one you have chosen to use with the people here.”
“You must realize, Katia,” Cyr replied, “that I just cannot appear in Jonkil’s form so soon. It would be a dishonor to an old friend should others laugh at my efforts.”
“Nonsense, Cyr, they will all appreciate that you are trying to make their lives easier. Besides, a little humor now and again can’t be a bad thing. We will see you at the meeting this afternoon.
“Will you be going to the meeting, Jo’Eya? We really should introduce you to the Oversight Committee.”
“No! You must not do that. My involvement is on the behalf of my grandfather and our family. It must not be known outside the three of us. My people would be shamed if it were.
“I shall just slip back to Qwell and finish up some chores that I have to do there.” And, as a Door appeared, that is what she did.
* * *
Li Guo-fan’s people, having made the wonderfully simple, but very long-lasting, black boxes for Charlie’s surface plant starting project insisted that they be the ones to place them in their destined locations.
After all, had they not entered into Garden Master Philip’s course on plant propagation and survival? Were they not now trained to do these things?
So, soon, groups of Charlie’s people and the Cabinet Master’s people were spread out in many places in the equatorial areas of Starhell placing the boxes, filled with inoculated soil and starter plants, in locations that would take the greatest advantages of sun and water then available.
At the same time, others in both groups were out over the lake water areas, those of sufficient temperature, to sow fresh water life forms that were to be the next layer of the ecology that was being built.
So, the ecology of the planet was being built and people of very different skills were learning to respect each other and work together. It was an exhilarating experience.
Shortly after the return of the groups from these trips Li Guo-fan was astounded as he listened to his Master Craftsmen petition his permission to start that school for teaching the basics of their craft to any who wanted to learn and had shown some scholastic promise.
It would seem that they had come to the conclusion that just as they would never be Master Gardeners, so that those Gardeners, immersed in their own projects, would never be Master Craftsmen. The same must be true of the other specialties. Why not teach others and then, in their turn, learn new skills from them?
* * *
Dreamers’ World Minister Me’Avi stood at her desk in the Great Hall of the Galactic Council. It felt good to have made it at last. It had been a good call to choose to use her Grandmother’s surname, Shapirov. That name had opened many doors and created great respect for her to play upon.
That and all those years of working her way up through the civil service to the office as et Sharma and being the one to finally seal the englobement of the Blue Planet had won her this post. Today she would introduce her first bill seeking to officially claim the name Earth for the planet they now called home.
Still, there were the shadows of Cyr and that virtual Katia and their illegal activities left on her mind. Her grandmother, the real Katia Shapirov, had been the one who brought about the rescue of those on the Blue Planet and their transfer to Dreamers’ World. What the traitorous Cyr and this virtual Katia had done now could bring the name of her grandmother into disrepute.
They had actually convinced Me’Avi’s parents and most of those on the Blue Planet’s observation post to join in their treasonous conduct. Such activities would have to be shown to be acts of insanity and not those of ones loyal to the Galactic Council. Me’Avi, if she was ever to follow her grandmother’s footsteps, and be elected Grand Minister would have to be the one to erase any smudge on her grandmother’s name and any tainting it may have on her own name.
The gavel sounded and the assembly came to order. Grand Minister Pwirkavi opened the session.
“It is the pleasure of my office to welcome a new minister to this body. We welcome the new Minister from Dreamers’ World, Minister Me’Avi Shapirov. It is well to have such a prestigious name again in our midst.
“In fact, though it is unusual for a new Minister to submit legislation on their first day, Minister Shapirov has put before us a bill to rename Dreamers’ World. It is requested that from this day forth that their planet take and hold the name Earth.
“Being such a small thing we will limit debate to the minimum allowed and, I am sure that all will be in favor of such a request being granted. Minister Shapirov, you have the floor to voice your request.”
“Grand Minister Pwirkavi, fellow Ministers of the Galactic Council, my people are the last of those who found life on the planet once called Earth, now known as the Blue Planet. It is part of our heritage, that name, Earth, and we would like to reclaim it for our children.
“But I have a more personal reason to seek to have this request granted. My grandmother, Katia Shapirov, loved the name Earth. She had hoped that when she died she would be buried there. As you know, after her awful accident, a grateful galaxy interred her on our present home world. For her, if for no other reason, grant this request and let us have our true name and true heritage back.”
After the applause died down, the Grand Minister, because of procedural concerns, called for any debate on the bill. And then, surprised as he was, he found himself recognizing the Minister from Qwell.
“Grant Minister Pwirkavi. Fellow Ministers, I would concur with this request but with one small change. Earth, now referred to as the Blue Planet, has been englobed as instructed by this Council, and thus need not be, at least after this day, of concern. However, in passing this measure we may find it so that a great expense will be incurred in updating the many, many documents that refer to that planet.
“As you know, even though we have referred to the world as the Blue Planet, in deference to our fellow citizens on Dreamers’ World, the world still, in official and legal correspondence has retained the name Earth. Dealing with that problem could be of great expense to the Council.
“We of Qwell are known for our carefulness with funds. Some even say we are a bit on the stingy side. But it is true that we prefer not to use any more funds than necessary on any project. It would be so much less expensive not having to update old documents and much less confusing not to have two separate worlds referred to with the same name. Therefore it is the request of the Qwell’Na that this bill be passed with the requested name Earth be changed to the name New Earth. This way their heritage will be preserved, their name reclaimed and our cost in granting this reasonable request lessened.”
A murmur of approval was soon heard all over the Great Hall. The Minister from Dreamers’ World signaled a request to reply and was recognized.
“Grand Minister Pwirkavi. Fellow Ministers, we of Dreamers’ World — or should I say, New Earth — are quite content to bow to the wisdom of the Minister from Qwell and would be honored to accept the change for our people have, indeed, been favored with a new start and what better way could we recognize that start than to accept the name New Earth for our home?”
The Grand Minister, calling for more comments and seeing none, called for a vote on the amended measure. It passed unanimously. So, upon passage the Grand Minister again spoke words of welcome, “It seems that I was premature in welcoming the Minister from Dreamers’ World. Let me straighten matters out now by extending the welcome of the Galactic Council to Minister Me’Avi Shapirov of New Earth.”
* * *
Out in the Oort cloud around the Starhell system, one group of engineers aboard Alexei's Pride and another aboard Harrigan's Whelp were surveying the CO2 and H2O asteroids for selection to be towed in system and inserted into Starhell’s atmosphere. With the last great increase of population the need for temperature gain and water availability was becoming critical. The planners could not hope for Starhell to be hidden forever. Not knowing what the Galactic Council, especially now with a suspicious Me’Avi Shapirov a Minister, would learn in the near future, made it necessary to greatly accelerate the building of the atmosphere and the biosphere.
The engineers were convinced that the greatest immediate need was for the carbon dioxide level to be radically increased to bring about a quicker warming. It was possible to get too much of it and set a warming trend that might end up with too much gain, but it was also possible to mediate temperature gain by landing large ice asteroids at the poles and create ice caps that would act as a cooling factor.
Katia and Cyr, though being host and hostess to the engineers, were also carefully cataloguing those asteroids, at the request of their engineer friend, George, as to those that might meet certain specifications for his ‘moon’ calculations. Already, on the trip out, they had listed and sent the specifications of number of inner system asteroids to their friend. Now it was the Oort cloud’s turn. They would go back by another route and catalogue still more inner system asteroids on their way home. It was a lot of unexciting work and, even now, they were planning a way to thank Charlie for his help in creating it.
* * *
Out in the fringes of the Cernon Sector, fringes that no one had officially visited yet because the stellar turbulence made communication with Galactic Central difficult, were several outposts that were busy mining for the minerals needed on Starhell. Every few days, when the turbulence allowed, Doors were opened up and finished products transferred into great warehouse caverns on Starhell.
The mining work was dirty and the miners’ lives were lived in grimy outposts that had to be as primitive as possible so as not to gain unwanted attention from the Galactic civilization. Crews, because there were now too many on Starhell itself, had started to be rotated and they now had some time each month in a clean, if cold and crowded, environment.
All of them were looking forward to when they could retract the Doors and quit those Cernon Sector outposts for good. But, before that could happen, there had to be a way to move some of the people out on the surface of Starhell, and that did not look to be any time soon. So, every two weeks they got their personal gear and went back to the ever less productive mines of the Cernon Sector. It was not good for morale.
* * *
New Earth Minister Shapirov scrutinized her wardrobe very carefully and finally decided on a lovely black satin strapless gown for the party that night in honor of her election to office. She hoped to make many new friends and start a network of connections that would help her in plans for her future.
Of course, that idiot Vertraumer was going to be there and she would probably have to dance with him at least once. “Perhaps,” she thought, “that won’t be too bad. He is well connected in the Council and he is highly admired, especially since his performance of the Requiem.”
Already that piece of work was being hailed as the finest work done since the Dreamers left the Blue Planet, and being touted as the new wave of music that New Earth’s composers would be creating for the thrill of all the peoples of the Galaxy.
“So,” murmuring to herself, “I can stand his company for long enough to have him introduce me to some of his very important friends.”
* * *
Kalvin Vertraumer had tried to get out of the party that night, but could not, since it was being given by the Grand Minister himself, and the invitation politely asked that he play the second movement of the Requiem for them. He could not refuse because it was the Galactic Council that had supported him all these years while writing that work, and a artist had some responsibility towards his fans.
Still, the evening could go all right if he could stay away from the former et Sharma of Earth. It was a party for her. She would probably show up in some sort of Galactic Council uniform and go on and on about how her grandmother, Grand Minister Shapirov, had been her inspiration to be of service to the people and how terrible it was that her visage was being used traitorously by a computer.
“It is a good thing,” he thought, “that she does not know about Starhell and the work going on there.”
* * *
Natasha Borisovna grinned as she remembered telling the people of her village that she was to marry the Administrator. They had all laughed at the thought that her new surname would be Tinker. “Always,” Katrina, the village healer said, “you have been involved in many things. It is good that you now will have a name that fits. Natasha Borisovna Tinker. It starts to roll smoothly off the tongue and then, at the end, it trips off the teeth.”
Now, married and busy with new duties as the Administrator’s spokesperson to the various groups on Starhell, she had conferred her office as village leader onto the healer who had laughed at her change of status. Now, her life was much more crowded with appointments and meetings as she tried to explain things that were going on and progress that was being made in conditions and people for life on Starhell’s bitter surface.
There seemed to be so little time for herself and her new husband. It had almost destroyed their lives together until, both realizing what they could lose, had set aside, as inviolable, two evenings a week to be together. Now they were doing much better and the work was going better also.
It was during those nights that they talked and each learned of the other’s early life and goals, influences and fears. Here Natasha was finally given the whole story of the Bridge named Cyr and its long partnership with Olga’s mother, Katia. Here Natasha began to learn the many songs that the Dream Singer sang and the story behind each of them and how they had helped motivate a people to find hope and fulfillment and a purpose, a separation from the long history of wars and hatred that had plagued man for so long.
Before too long, Natasha Borisovna found herself caught up in the greater goals of the Shapirov Project. Soon Starhell and its transformation became more than just a new and safe place for her people to have a new village. It became a symbol of what she and others saw that man could be and achieve. That is when Natasha Borisovna Tinker started to sing the old songs.
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Copyright © 2005 by euhal allen
