They started the climb first thing in the morning in order to get the maximum distance. I knew that they would slow down significantly through the days that the climb would take. They needed the best start possible.
It took four days to get to the top of the pass. We’d budgeted for six, so that was huge. The wind was godawful there, though, so no one wanted to stop. They stretched that march well into the evening in order to get out of the wind tunnel at the apex.
***
The trip down went faster, for obvious reasons. Three days later, the migration streamed into forest again with some stored food left over. As a celebration, they camped for an extra day just at the edge of the forest. They took a break and feasted on the extra food. From here on in, they’d be able to forage and hunt.
It took two more days for disaster to strike.
Riker – May 2166 – Sol
[Firewall has blocked breach attempt]
I stiffened and turned to Guppy, the UN meeting forgotten. “What? Someone’s trying to hack us?”
[Affirmative. Source appears to be the video feed from the UN meeting]
“Ongoing danger?”
By way of reply, Guppy threw up a stack trace. I examined the listings. It appeared that the hacker was basing his attack on the basic Heaven design. The original Heaven vessels had no firewalling, relying instead on all communications being encrypted. However, it looked like the encryption routines had a back door. Someone had injected some packets, which had run right into Bob-1’s firewall.
I made sure the UN communications system was logging all traffic. I would try the hack on sandbox Bob later. There was little doubt in my mind that the attempt originated from the FAITH enclave, but I needed some kind of documentation before I made accusations. And there was the question of what could be done about it. It’s not like there was a planetary police force to complain to.
The UN meeting seemed to be all about routine matters today, so I decided to get an early start on the day’s administrivia.
The first item was a message from Homer, just one phrase, “Space Station!” Complete with exclamation mark. I couldn’t see what he could add to the idea that would make it viable, but I would talk to him when I had a few moments.
I glanced back at the video feed of the UN meeting, but still nothing noteworthy was happening.
There was a message from Julia, fairly long, talking about family history. She seemed to have adopted me as a relative with no qualms. I was a little choked up about that, and I hoped she didn’t send it just on Cranston’s orders.
[Source is New Zealand]
Guppy had traced the packets back to their originating stream. But New Zealand? That made no sense. It also meant that I wasn’t going to have the proof I needed to really make Cranston’s life difficult. Maybe I could bluff.
Meanwhile, the hack attempt wasn’t going to get anywhere, so I might as well just let the perp keep at it.
I did a test ping at Homer, and he indicated he was free to talk. I took a moment to feel awe at being able to talk to him halfway across the solar system without any delay. We no longer had to worry about light-speed lag.
I popped into Homer’s VR. “Space Station?”
Homer minimized the window he’d been looking at, and turned to face me. “The answer to our problems,” he said with a grin.
“Not unless you have something new.”
“Just a new perspective,” Homer replied. “We’ve been thinking of space stations in terms of housing people. Of course that won’t work. Got to get the air right, the gravity right, extra shielding for radiation, extra armor for micrometeors, construction for living quarters, feed them, entertain them, yadda, yadda, yadda. But the engineering is a lot easier if we don’t try to house people.” Homer looked at me expectantly.
“Okay, Homer, I give up. We’re going to raise cattle? Or…” My eyes went wide.
“And the penny drops,” he said, pointing his index finger at me. “Farming. You just need enough spin to establish an up and down, so the structural strain you have to engineer for is reduced. The interior can just be one big cavern, and sunlight is available twenty-four-seven. Some equipment to make sure the air mix stays correct and the temps stay in range, and we’re golden.”
I thought about it. “Plants take CO2 and produce oxygen. Any kid with a match can reverse that. But we need to produce calories in as dense a manner as possible. Got anything specific in mind?”
He gave me a thumbs-up. “Damn right. Remember that library entry about gene-engineered kudzu? Improved nutritional content, simplified growth environment, human-digestible…”
“And high sunlight requirements, and optimum temps in the 20 degrees Celsius range. Where are we going to find those conditions? Oh, wait…” I grinned.
“Yeah. And since we have access to the Svalbard vaults now, we can pick the cultivar that best matches the environment we end up with.” Homer hesitated and held up his index finger. “But kudzu needs a lot of water, so we’ll have to constantly truck a supply up, unless we bring in some icebergs from Saturn—”
“—Using the asteroid movers.” I was becoming enthusiastic about this idea as we worked through the details. “Which we can also use to bring in regolith for soil. Fertilizer will have to come up, but that’s small potatoes, volume-wise. Especially once the operation gets going.”
“And the best part,” Homer finished, “is that the work can be done with my printers, the same ones that are building Arthur’s replacement right now.”
Homer’s last comment made me think of Colonel Butterworth, and I groaned. The colonel very likely wouldn’t be mollified by that line of reasoning. To him, any equipment that could do something else could also work on his colony ships.
“Butterworth is still going to have kittens.”
Homer bounced up out of his chair. “This will be fun. Can I watch?”
***
Not only did Butterworth have kittens, but the UN assembly went ballistic. Everyone except the groups that were facing starvation was beyond apoplectic and well into incoherence. I sat there, jaw dropping, as people complained about criminal misuse (their words) of a resource that wasn’t even part of the construction equation. Finally, I’d had enough. I signaled for the floor.
“Ladies and gentlemen, here’s the thing. People are about to starve, and I mean within six months to a year. Those of you with reserves have refused to consider sharing, so that leaves it to me to fix things. This is a viable option, and it doesn’t even affect the schedule. Yes, it affects future colony ships as we’re using scavenged materials for space stations instead of colony ships. However, I’m willing to trade future colony ships against current lives. And by the way, some of you here will be depending on our kudzu gardens by the time your turn comes around. So let’s not be too critical, okay?”
I turned off my mike, which was the video equivalent of sitting down, and watched as the speaker was inundated with requests to speak. Unbelievable. This crap is universal.