Plague Planet (The Wandering Engineer) (3 page)

The clusters of refugees had been driven mad by hunger. Eventually
they had broken out of the confines of the camps and turned on the land like
locusts. Like many other colony worlds the devastation had torn the bonds of
civilization apart. Ships stopped coming to the planet and the people were
trapped with no place to go. They spread out, eking out a living the best they
could with whatever they could get their hands on. Apparently some places like
Crater city held on to their civility but only barely. He wasn't sure why and
apparently Sprite wasn't either.

Skip ahead through the dark times until about a century ago.
There, a renaissance of sorts, started. A group of people emigrated to the
planet and started up small cottage factories. One was a sleeper but Sprite
lacked a name, the highlighted blank spot fairly jumped out at him. Apparently
this person had turned Landing back into a small town, and then grew it into a
city of industry and commerce.

The renewed industry had slowly trickled to the farms. With
eighteenth and nineteenth century farming machinery the farms that had needed
dozens of people to maintain them now needed less than a handful. They were
also far more efficient. Looking for work the people had turned to the cities
or built their own.

When people heard of this they flocked to the old city. It grew
exponentially, and eventually they settled across the river to form the gothic
city of Gotham. The cities of Metropolis and New Chicago had started up a
decade later. Each of the cities was strategically located, as were the new cities
that were popping up all over the planet.

Each had something to contribute to the economy. Some were cross
roads of commerce; others were located near large pockets of minerals that were
needed to fuel the growing factories. New Chicago had become a rival after some
of the younger generation broke out on their own to put their own ideas into
action. It now produced most of the hydrogen/electric hybrid engines the
vehicles and aircraft used. Most of the vehicles were also produced in New
Chicago. Aircraft were built in New Seattle on the western coast.

Since the planet had been terraformed over a thousand years ago it
had little natural fossil fuels which was a problem. The industrialists had
solved that sixty years ago by investing in hydrogen engines. That wouldn't
have amounted to much but a passing ship had traded them a hydrogen fuel
cell... which some wise entrepreneur had taken apart and copied.

Port town and Fisherman's wharf in the southern part of the main
continent built most of the ships on Epsilon. Up until a few years ago they
were traditional wooden sailing vessels, though now outboard or paddle board
engines and steel hulls were starting to make inroads into shipping.

Ground vehicles such as cars, trucks, and public transportation
were making a comeback. Apparently they and aircraft had been re-invented by a
few entrepreneurs and historians with access to old footage files. Unlike many
industrialists they hadn't thrown up their hands in despair and given up on
trying to recreate the vehicles and technology of the old Federation. No, they
had set that aside or at least set it as an end goal. Instead they had focused
on what they
could
achieve, delving as far back to the nineteenth
century Earth time period for inspiration. Now that mass production was in play
their world was finally changing and evolving.

Apparent attempts to copy air cars and other modern air vehicles
had met with dim results so far. In attempting to understand why, the makers
rediscovered that these vehicles were made out of incredibly light weight
metals and plastics that were heat and wear resistant. They couldn't have
replicated the repulser force emitters that kept the cars aloft. That project
had been picked up and then abandoned several times over the years with little or
no progress made apparently.

The most common aircraft was a copy of a Douglas DC-1 with
upgraded hydrogen/electric hybrid engines. It had a crew of two, could carry up
to twelve passengers,  it was eighteen meters long and had a twenty six meter
wide wingspan. Its engines were better than the radial engines they had been
based on, with a top speed of three hundred and fifty one kph and a twenty five
hundred kilometer range. Over a hundred of these aircraft as well as others
filled the air, moving cargo and passengers.

The planet was on the cusp of a second industrial revolution,
teetering there but unable to see their full potential. They were definitely in
the late nineteenth and possibly early twentieth century in some places, in
places like Metropolis or Gotham or Hazard, much further along the admiral
judged.

Interstellar trade had picked up as the planet's civilization had
improved. It was aggravating from a spacer's perspective though, they only
allowed water for fuel trade, not the hydrogen or hydrogen fuel cells.
Apparently there was some sort of law preventing their export, which was ironic
since they had gotten the technology by importing it and essentially copying it
and stealing it. Five years ago they had finally started filtering and
distilling the water. He could only imagine what centuries of unfiltered water
had done to the fusion engines and drives of the ships that came and left from
this world before then.

Of course the mobsters were still there, getting their cut of all
trade and most of the businesses. That was still a problem, though many had
'gone legit' with titles such as commissioner. The so called county
commissioners were the equivalent of colony leaders on the planet. There was a
governor, Mr. Oman, but his was more a puppet regime than a true source of
power. He was in it for the prestige and under the table bribes and power
brokering. There were rumors of another, shadow government of godfathers, but
no proof of it.

Now that industry and surplus food had taken root the population was
growing exponentially once more. The interest of interstellar trade had
encouraged some of the leaders to return to the good old days. They wanted a
return to the golden days before the Xeno war, if only so they and their own
could be on the top raking the profits from it all.

Sprite estimated the population at around twenty million, most of
that was clustered in the major cities. Gotham had the largest population of
nearly one million, though Metropolis wasn't far behind with something like
eight hundred thousand beings. The capital had about six hundred thousand
people there.

People dressed in various fashions, mostly Victorian. Some near
the city center of power still dressed in Victorian outfits or ancient
twentieth century business suits. Others dressed in a mix of steamer punk or
other styles. Some folks near the space ports or on the outskirts of the main
cities dressed in twentieth century or even American western wear. Normally the
western wear was reserved for the ranchers and farmers, in cities like Hazard
it was one part practical, and one part showing your roots. Some of the factory
workers preferred denim and simple shirts and suspenders.

The planet's population had a mix of alien species but about half
of the population was human. There were thousands of neo's, but most were dogs,
gorillas or chimps around the towns and cities. Full feline neo’s and others
like wolves and bears preferred the back wood wilds. Apparently Sprite had
found colonies of Neo Otters, a Neo species Irons had thought extinct. They
were clustered around the coasts but some ranged inland in small clans.

Some of the cities were metropolitan, with the species mixing. But
others had towns, areas that were strictly one species that rarely went into
the other species towns. Each town had its own trademark style and markings.

The admiral had of course seen it before, but it was a bit
disheartening to see such segregation here.

Veraxins were the second largest population, with Elves, Gashg,
Naga, Talasians, T'clock, Relgarth, the occasional Tarq, and Telerite thrown in
for good measure.

Some of the species preferred various climates, for instance Naga,
and Relgarth preferred cities and towns near deserts. Telerites preferred
mining towns; their natural inclination to dig helped them there. Gashg
preferred marshes and swamps in the tropics near the equator. T'clock preferred
the hot jungles.

He'd heard that the various species got along well outside of the
cities and towns, in the wilds they did their own thing and pulled together well,
each using their specialties or interests to better themselves. He wished them
well.

There were a dozen major cities on the main continent. The cities
were at the pinnacle of civilization as the forefront of technology and
industry. Most were still clawing their ways out of the dark ages. Most were in
the early twentieth century in terms of style and level of technology.

But the impact was mainly centralized, only a little of its impact
was filtering down from those with the most money to other classes. There
apparently was a growing middle class; they were based in the industries and
construction workers building the towering buildings in the cities. So far
unions had only a minor impact on the industries. The capitalists still reigned
supreme.

He'd wondered how they'd gone so long without a pirate raid.
Epsilon was a better target than say Centennial; after all it had a tech base
close to the twentieth century. Phoenix pointed out a series of ground defense
installations, one per continent. Each was on a mountain in a mountain chain.
The energy reading danced around; most likely they had a central fusion reactor
with decoys or a series of micro reactors. Keeping them up and running would
deter any pirate, after all one of those planetary class energy weapons could
tear a cruiser apart at an AU out.

Also, each had a good sized city nearby. Most likely because the
fusion reactors needed to power the defensive guns was tapped to power the city
when not in use. Also, he was fairly certain they needed parts to keep them
running. That partially explained the steep port fees, it wasn't all graft
then.

Indeed, he'd been challenged when they'd entered orbit. He'd been
told to pay the port fees, they were non-negotiable. He'd grumbled but agreed.
It wasn't like he had any other choice. At least they scaled them to the ship
size.

Nineteenth and early twentieth century medical technology, radio,
rail ways, and even flight had made a comeback over the past twenty years.
There were of course teething issues integrating such ancient technology... and
reinventing much of it and its' supporting infrastructure... More modern
technology was haphazardly strewn around the planet, mainly centralized around
the protective planetary defense communities or the space ports. The people
there jealously guarded it too.

The vehicles and other transportation methods were a mix like any
colony. It was better than Gaston, which only had animals, wind, boats, or
bicycles to transport people or goods. Here there were the usual mix of animals
for riding or pulling carts, but also steam locomotives, and early automobiles
were mixed with elderly air cars and primitive aircraft. There were steam ships
plying the oceans and waterways, Sprite had pointed out a casino paddle boat
the American Queen. She'd apparently picked up an article about how it had
burned in the middle of a river killing hundreds of people who hadn't been able
to escape. There was something to be said about knowing how to swim, he thought
with a pang.

Pockets of modern Federation technology were here and there on the
planet, but with little knowledge of how to repair or maintain it, let alone
power it all, they were not in use. So it would of course break down over time
he realized. No new computers but plug and play with what they've got had
attritioned their parts supplies, no wonder they were so interested in outside
trade. Trade with ships had sparked renewed interest in repairing and
rebuilding their tech base. No one had that ability in the sector until he had
arrived on the scene. Lately better education and an interest in repairing tech
had sparked an engineering explosion. People were reinventing tech all over the
place.

Eventually Destiny or another ship from Pyrax would come along and
really kick things off. Hopefully soon he thought.

There were three space ports, the primary one was in a county
called Hazard on the main continent. At one point the old port had been along
the sea next to a growing metropolis. That had changed sixty years ago when a
shuttle accident wiped out over a dozen blocks of real estate and thousands of
people.

Now the shuttle ports were kept at least ten kilometers away from
the nearest town or city. For some reason this port was on the edge of three
counties that intersected. Apparently they occasionally fought for jurisdiction
over the port.

The port wasn't as crude as the one on Triang, but it was still a
far cry from the ones on Earth or Mars back in the day. He tried hard to stomp
on such comparisons though. He didn't want to start looking down on them so
much... nor start feeling sorry for what was gone and now for the most part
forgotten. It was best to look at the situation as opportunity.

The port had a nice strip, paved with crumbling cement. Still it
worked, and whoever had put it in had been smart enough to add the proper slope
and drainage ditches on the runways and taxiways. That was good. They had even
added lines in the pavement to help shed the water when it rained. That was a
very nice feature; it meant the runway wouldn't be slick.