The Transdyne Awakening (3 page)

Those weird instruments again. Over them a voice sang;

“He fills my cup to overflowing, what more could I desire?

I am bound for a far off city, each day he leads me higher”

Yes, a far off city. Sometimes the urge came up within him to just keep moving. He wondered what was really out there. He had travelled all right and covered a lot of territory, but what was right out there in the big beyond? There had been a time, he knew, when men rode to the other side of the earth in airborne vehicles like the military ones he had once seen. He thought he would like to do that. This planet must be a huge place and what had he seen of it?

Maybe it was the solitary journeys in the desert that provoked these thoughts, but now and then he did feel sort of trapped, fenced in.

When it came upon him, the wanderlust was strong and stirred something deep. It was edged with a sort of fear, a fear of something unknown to him. All the same it was pleasant - a peculiar kind of thrill.

Occasionally he varied the speed or height of his course to stave off the monotony of the travel. Once again he controlled the machine manually. He thought for a while about the vast distances he must have covered in his work for Ahab. He made a mental note to compute that sometime.

The soundsheet compilation had played multiple repeats by the time he reached his destination.

There was no reason for urbancivil types to come this far out from the Citizone’s sprawl. It was a deadly place, populated by strange lizard life and assorted scavengers. In these vast stretches of outland a traveller could quickly lose their bearings and meet their death in some parched dune. Only the vultures would ever find you out here. You might go for some time without food, but lacking water you’d shrivel up in no time.

He altered his trajectory, pulling higher from the ground to take in the mind-numbing size of the crater. The landscape fell away steeply in a series of jagged ledges. He tipped the nose of the vehicle into a smooth descent, taking him into the heart of this vast scar on the terrain. Longtime past, a meteor had exploded in the atmosphere over this place. The massive depression it had left evidenced the shattering power of its death throes. Fragments had scattered, falling to ground in a gigantic circle. In an instant the topography had been altered forever.

Now, the remains of this extraterrestrial traveller lay buried somewhere around the area of this abyss. Something of such magnitude was awe-inspiring. He stared around him as the terraglide swayed downward past layer after layer of discoloured rock.

He cast around for visual clues in the chasm below.

Finally, his eyes settled on the snaking outline of the track. You had to know that it was down there somewhere. The chances of finding it by accident were a million to one. Like the settlement where Jacob’s people lived, there weren’t many visible features in the landscape to identify its presence.

It took a while to get used to the scale of objects against this background.

At the base of the crater, in the shelter of an overhang, he finally picked out the shape of a big, camouflaged terraglide. He brought his own vehicle to rest on a flattened area in front of the huge cave entrance. The aircon had been hissing in his ears for the whole journey and the silence was arresting as he flicked it off.

It was only when you had come close upon this place that you noticed the sandy landscape had become buildings. The main settlement at the bottom of the incline was almost invisible on approach. At the side of the track a very small, faded wooden board was staked low on the ground. It read simply ‘
The Way’.

He stepped down from the terraglide and started stretching out the cramps. He wasn’t aware of anybody approaching and started when a voice spoke close behind him.

“Are you the courier?”

Clay snapped around. “Yes.”

“Good wishes, sir. John sent me to meet you and show you in when you arrived. I expect you could use some refreshment?” his greeter offered. Clay nodded.

“Please follow me.” The speaker appeared to be a good looking, fair skinned man of around thirty five years. His face wasn’t even flushed, let alone suntanned and it creased into a broad smile.

Clay collected himself and went along.

He was surprised that he hadn’t picked it up immediately.

He reminded himself that the sincere looking smile was merely a series of convolutions in the thing’s frubber. The face rubber that Transdyne used at the plant was almost indistinguishable from human skin but, despite the intense heat, his companion wasn’t sweating at all.

Yes, this was one of their friendly Trans for sure.

Clay followed into a large space with benches and eating tables. Behind the permaglass door of a large refrigerated cabinet, frosted tubes of drink glistened. Clay opened the cabinet and took one. The Tran smiled broadly again. “I will tell John that you are here.”

The greeting at Jacob’s settlement had been a lot more to his liking. The edginess returned. He remembered his conversation with the Transdyne technician and recalled the term he had used: ‘the uncertainty’. He finished pouring the drink down and reached for another. During the trip he’d tried switching the aircon off periodically, but the heat was unbearable without the jets of cooling air. Now his throat was dry and sore. Leaning against the cold drinks cabinet, he looked around. Through the opposite doorway he had a view of the compound to the side of the building. There was a lot of routine activity going on. Conversation drifted inside. Some of the community were digging a new section of garden, marked out with rope and stakes. Others were weeding the patch next to that.

Two men were redirecting the jets of a water spray onto a patch of plants laid out in orderly rows. Clay could pick up some of the workplace banter. “You can’t even keep a neat space around your own somacot, Abe, so don’t tell me how to lay out new plant beds!” The recipient of this rebuke pulled himself up from a stooping position as a gale of laughter and jeering broke out around him. Clay walked closer to the open door. It was just a conversation between a gang of working men, but he was struck by the friendly nature of it. He hadn’t heard a lot of that kind of thing and he was drawn to move closer. He found himself smiling as he watched the man called Abe. Abe waved his arms, mounting an impassioned defense of his personal housekeeping habits. He was laughing because he simply could not hear himself above the noisily shouted insults of his workmates. Clay almost wanted to join in. It must be something to work in that kind of atmosphere. It reminded him of times he had spent with Joey.

“Clay, it’s good to see you again!” John hailed him from the other entrance. He extended his right hand in greeting while, with his left, he unwrapped the cloth covering his head. Clay had seen these head coverings in very old pictures at Ahab’s place. People standing in another desert somewhere with large constructions called pyramids in the background. The covering seemed a sensible arrangement, going around and over the head with a tie. John’s craggy features were fully visible now. He was an older man. Clay had guessed at his age but had never enquired. He hadn’t met that many older men, especially older men in the rude health John seemed to enjoy. There were deep lines etched into John’s tanned features and he had striking blue eyes. Whenever they talked together, Clay got the feeling of being truly important to him. It was slightly disconcerting but pleasant just the same.

“Got all the stuff we requested?’ John enquired.

Clay nodded. “Most of it. Couldn’t get seeds for radishes, though. Ahab says he’ll keep a lookout.”

“Ah well, something of a luxury I guess.” John waved his arm towards the growing areas outside. “Some of ‘em will be disappointed but they’ll live, eh? Your supplies have helped keep that part of the programme on track. Look at it all now. Talk about the desert blooming!”

Ahab’s procurers were thorough. Wherever there was demand they could usually find what was required. John and his crew had no use for Ahab’s vast stocks of recreational merchandise. Their requests were mostly for natural seeds.

Back in the 20
th
Century, the overclass had effected material changes in seedstocks. They had introduced genetically modified seeds. These were inferior in nourishment value and only produced one crop. After that, those who needed to grow more were forced to purchase their seeds from the massive Agribureaus. In time, this became enforced by law while the overclass hoarded mountainous reserves of naturally re-seeding stock. Most people were not aware of the cavernous, subterranean farms in which the foodstocks for the overclass were grown. Agri-technicians laboured day and night in temperature controlled chambers to keep them supplied with nutritious vegetables, tubers and fruits. In the megacity hypermarts, the ordinary citizenry could only purchase containers full of the genetically modified foodstuffs. Citizens’ health began to decline rapidly and there weren’t many who remained in good physical condition after the age of about forty. There were exceptions, of course. State employees, bureaucrats, the polibros and politicos all had access to excellent nourishment. Positions with these agencies became highly sought after. The State only employed a work force sufficient to maintain control and meet production. Their mechanized factory complexes retained minimum labour crews. The social engineers of the New Society sought to bring about massive population reduction among the underclass, retaining only the number of healthy employees required to serve State interests.

Clay had been with one of Ahab’s recoup teams on a cavern raid once. Ahab’s contacts were well paid to keep him informed of the security arrangements and schedules these places maintained.

Clay had been amazed at the sheer size of the underground emplacement. Behind gigantic doorbridges, the mainway went down clean out of sight. In the immense side chambers located along the central shaft, fruit and vegetables of all varieties were being grown. Temperature, light and moisture for the plants were strictly monitored.

The skeleton staff of agritechs had been taken completely by surprise at the team’s arrival. The security was mainly electronic and Ahab’s tech-men knew exactly how to override the many sensors. The few security guards on duty were dealt with in seconds. They took one look at the raiding party’s overwhelming pulsepower and decided against resistance. The main crew descended quickly to the target zones and massive cargo-type terraglides were brought into position. The crew made the startled agritechs help load them up to capacity. It was an immense haul. With the expertise Ahab’s men had, the whole manoeuvre was over very quickly. It wasn’t the first of these raids, but there hadn’t been the need for too many. With the snatched stock, Ahab’s organization could cultivate enormous harvests of their own and generate healthy profits as well.

Clay had gained a little insight into the process of re-seeding while dropping supplies at ‘The Way’. While John and he had talked one day, he had watched the older man prepare potatoes for planting. John had selected the ones with visible shoots and carefully sectioned them up with his hunting knife. He had explained how each would push out under the soil and produce new potatoes. As soon as green began showing above the earth, more soil was added until the large containers were full. When the crew emptied them, there were new potatoes ready to cook or store. He was fascinated by it. A boy from the Tenacamps would never have witnessed even the basic procedures involved in the cultivation of foodstocks. Permaplast containers on hypermart shelves were the closest he had ever got to naturally grown food.

John yelled out to a couple of the men working outside. “Abe and Greg, come help unload the new stuff.” The extra hands made it easy work. The new stock was checked and the men immediately took some away for planting up. The remainder was stacked in an orderly storage area with numbered bays for the different types of seeds. The men and women working at this place had become adept at the craft of preserving foodstuffs. The people here had the kind of menu that would be considered real luxury by most others. They produced everything, including condiments to enhance the flavour of the food. Clay had often heard them portrayed in State propaganda as homeless scavengers existing in squalor and hardship. That wasn’t what he had seen. They worked hard, but they produced all that they needed to live well. When he watched the young ones returning from the large studylearn block, they all appeared well nourished and healthy.

This trip was well ahead of schedule and Clay started to relax. He had a little time to spend now. Just as on other drops here, he was curious to explore this extraordinary place. Most of his life he had been around people he couldn’t afford to trust. Somehow it was different here. He liked the whole atmosphere. He actually enjoyed spending time with John and the others. They seemed to be on a different frequency to the other people in his life and he was curious to know why.

A plump woman with a red face emerged from the cooking area. She smiled in the two mens’ direction and started to put eating irons on the benches. “Hiya, Berta!” John called to her as the work party started to drift into the building.

“Don’t you sit down to food in here without washing your hands, Abe Lincoln!” Berta pointed at the unfortunate Abe with an eating knife in her outstretched hand. Abe made a mock defensive gesture as if she was threatening to attack him. “I’d stay on the right side of her, Abe!” one of the others shouted. Again there was that shared laughter. Abe made his way over to the far side of the room and poured some water into one of the basins. “Just how hard has a man gotta work before he gets fed around here?” he griped.

Clay wasn’t used to the agreeable table conversations. Where he had come from, people leaned over their plates guardedly, pushing the nourishment down with an eye out for anyone trying to steal it. Here, time was taken to savour the company as well as the food. Talk ranged over the work of the day and what the younger ones had done in studylearn. People took genuine interest in those sitting with them at the mealtime.