The Abandoned (Part 3)

Rose Catterly

“I think I got it!”

Dr. Rose Catterly had called her follow survivors, Captain Janet Pinkerton and Lisa Williams, to the city library because she had found the answer to some questions they had. 3 days after they had their debriefing from Kettle, the trio of survivors of The Pagoda had went into the city and got the culture shock of their lives.

Williams had seen women were pulling men on carts like animals; at a construction site, Pinkerton saw women who did all the manual labor while men sat under the shade supervising them by shouting out what sounded like insults; and Catterly herself saw an adult woman who knelt and bowed her head in submission to a little boy no more than 6 years old. On the planet of Eridani, men were the rulers while women were slaves and the 3 of them had been wondering what to do about the situation.

A scientist to her core, Catterly knew that the first thing they needed was information and had found the local library of the city. For the past week, she had found several pieces of information about the planet, Eridani, but nothing that explained why society had turned out the way it did.

Nothing till today!

“What you found?” As the captain, Janet Pinkerton had seniority over the 3 survivors and had been the most anxious to know more about the planet.

“I found this.” Catterly showed her follow survivors a small blue crystal.

“What’s that?” Williams asked.

“It’s what called an “energy crystal”.” 

“I think I read about it. “ Pinkerton said. “Wasn’t it the main source of energy storage before it got replaced by newer technologies like lasertech?”

“Yes,” Catterly was impressed the captain knew about ancient technology. “For about 100 years, it was the main source of energy storage but about 400-500 years ago, it got replaced. It seen that Eridani was a mining planet for these crystals.”

The captain and Williams looked at each other. Captain Pinkerton was the one who spoke. “It’s an energy crystal but that doesn’t prove this was a mining planet?”

“It’s what we called an energy crystal,” Catterly corrected. “However, the local uses it for more than that. They found a way to store information data on it."
"How they managed that?" The captain asked.
"My best guess is that as they were cut off from the UPF, they were unable to follow the latest technological advances." Catterly said. "They had to make do with what they have and advance their tech along those lines. Follow me and I’ll play it for you.”

Catterly led the duo to a room in the library where a table sat in the middle of it. Most tables on the planet were made out of stone but this one was made of metal. There was a device on the table and Catterly carefully placed the crystal in this. The blue crystal lit up and an image appeared about the table. 5 men were sitting around the table waiting for something and after a short while, the image began to move and sound came from the device. The 3 survivors stood silently and watched the images unfold.

The oldest man in the room cleared his throat and began speaking. “Attention! This meeting will now commence. John Petroff will be presiding; in attendance are Oda Katsuragi, Rick Perterson, and Kamal Colvin.”

The men looked at the old man who was obviously called Oda as he had turned and nodded to each man when he spoke their names. He now turned and looked at the man called John Petroff again. Oda nodded his head to Petroff, indicating that he should take over. Seeing all eyes on him, Petroff stood up and did so. He started speaking;

“The Makgeni Corporation is the last galactic corporation still with a presence on this planet. Last month, Diana Sheffler was informed that Makgeni will be abandoning their colony on 82 Eridani to “concentrate” on its more profitable colonies in the Compress system. The Makgeni Corporation will be leaving within the month and the majority of the colonists will be leaving with them. Thus far, we have 4,221 people who have indicated that they plan to stay on the planet. This meeting is called so that we can have a working plan of the colony when the Makgeni Corporation leaves.”

Oda addressed the other 3 men at the table. “The 3 of us are the oldest of the group who intend to stay. Leadership of the group will fall to us when the time comes. So I think it is important we are all on the same page for the colony.”

“Then why is he here?” Rick Perterson pointed at Petroff. “You’re staying?”

“Yes, I am”

John’s answer surprised the men.

“Why are…nevermind.” Rick quickly corrected himself. “I guess you have your own reasons for staying. So what’s this plan you have?”

Petroff looked at Oda who nodded for him to continue. “Right now, this is what we have so far. When Makgeni leaves, food and water will not be a problem as we will have the 3 greenhouse to grow our food and the water plant will be working. The main problem we will have is whether we can have long-term success without the backing of a corporation behind us. Basically, we need to find a way to be self-sufficient.”   

“Nothing we don’t already know.” It was Rick again with the comment. “So what’s the plan?”

“Food and water are issues that can take care of themselves. The planet also has fauna in abundance that are edible for us humans though we might need to increase production of the greenhouse for those of us who just came to 82 Eridani recently. People like Oda who were born on 82 Eridani had long been used to the alien food provided by the planet and used them to supplement the food provided by the greenhouse but newcomers to the planet like myself are only comfortable eating the Earth plants and vegetables provided by the greenhouse.”

The men nodded in agreement.

Seeing that everyone was in agreement, Petroff continued. “The problem we will have is the economy. There are a lot of things we can’t produce on 82 Eridani. The planet just does not have enough metal ore for us to mine to maintain the technology level we have. The transport of metallic materials to our remote planet is one of the reasons why it was so hard to maintain a healthy profit margin for the company and for that, we will need to continue with the mine.”

“Will that be enough to maintain the colony?” Rick asked. “I know we still have the spaceport but it’s going to take a lot of materials to maintain the colony.”

“That’s the big question.” Petroff admitted. “Makgeni couldn’t solve the problem but we can’t go around the problem either. We need to buy materials so we need the mine.”

“Why not cut out level of technology then?” The question was Kamal’s first input in the meeting and what he said caused everyone to look at him in surprise. “Like you said, the planet does not have enough metal ore for us to maintain our level of technology. So why not cut the level of technology we have?”

“You need to explain yourself, Mr. Colvin.” Petroff said.

“We need to maintain technology for the spaceport and medical facility. Essential things like that but for non-essential things like short distance transportation, we can cut them out. This will save materials and resources.”

“Short distance transportation is non-essential?” Oda asked. 

“Like cars for example. We need to maintain the spaceport and things like planes for long distance travel but things like cars are not really needed here. We can use bicycles which are smaller and use less material than cars to operate and maintain.”

Petroff nodded his head. “True. That might be something to look into.”

“Okay, that will be in the future. What else?” Rick asked Petroff.

“One essential provision I suggest we make is to makes it illegal to employ a woman in positions that endangers her physical, moral or mental health. This means we need to take all the women out of the mines and in any jobs that would be dangerous.”

“Why?” Both Kamal and Rick asked together. 

“For the long-term health of the colony! With only 4,000 people left, the only way the colony can continue is if we replace the people who would leave with the shuttles. Basically, we need to have more babies if we are to be a viable long-term colony.”

“That’s never been a problem before.” Kamal said.

“It will be now. At least for the next few years, we need to depend on ourselves.” Petroff explained. “Before we had colonists coming for work and this boosted the population of the colony. However with Makgeni’s withdrawn, we will no longer see new colonists. At the same time, the danger of childbirth will increase as most of the medical staff and medical equipment are leaving. Frankly, we can’t take any chances.”

“Petroff, I’m not comfortable telling the women they will be nothing but breeding animals.” Rick said. “I’m sure most of the remaining people will say the same thing.”

“We will need to explain the situation to them.” Oda was the one who chirped in. “The provision is needed if we are to survive. I think most of them will understand if we tell them the truth of our situation here. All of us already understand sacrifices will be needed by everyone.”

Kamal and Rick kept quiet for a few moments before Kamal gave a nod to Oda. A few seconds later, Rick grudgingly did the same.

“Is that all?” Rick asked.

“For now,” Petroff said. “I have a few ideas down the line but if we don’t survive the next few years, it would mean nothing.”

The images ended and the 3 survivors stood in shock, even Catterly who had seen the program before. All 3 of them heard the stories and this was proof there were some truth in them. In the past, galactic corporations like this Makgeni were a power onto themselves on planets they controlled. They controlled everything on the planet where they had the rights to and were supposed to report everything unusually to the UPF. However, it would be a small matter for them to “forget” to report that a small number of colonists on a remote planet far from the civilized planets of the UPF had decided to remain.

“My god,” Williams said. “Kettle was right; they were abandoned.”