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A fiery arrow crossed the sky and pierced the land somewhere below the horizon. Sergey Vladimirovich gazed after it. No, the earth didn’t start to shake under his feet, but in his mind the world seemed to sway and shift to an even less stable position.
One careless move – and everything would run downhill to destruction.
“The rescue capsule is alright.” The voice from the earpiece stated like a well-trained secretary. “Rutier chokes up the air with profanities, but according to the telemetry he’s fine.”
“It’s just for now, Gosha.” Sergey Vladimirovich forced out. “When he comes down I’ll give him red-carpet treatment with a court martial and execution by firing squad at the nearest wall.” He chuckled sardonically.
“Come, come, Commandante! We have precious few people if this tunnel doesn’t open.”
“Enough.” The flash of humour gone, he was serious again, “Ask Kosygin to come in, he had some ideas about the management of the colony.”
Sergey Vladimirovich closed his eyes and tried to imagine that he was sitting in an actual office worthy of a senior officer, in a magnificent arm-chair made of crocodile skin, behind a massive desk with a holographic projector in the center, and the walls were covered in slick, state-of-the-art monitors displaying operations reports… Unfortunately, he still saw that fiery swash in the evening skies. Who was he fooling? There were only two walls, and even those were tarp pulled over some bars: instead of the arm-chair there was only a standard camp stool from the settlers’ package in this make-shift tent.
It’s a good thing they managed to create the bridge, Sergey Vladimirovich thought. Kosygin was apparently sitting nearby in one of the empty containers reequipped to be the analytical center. The next scheduled flight had been rumored to be bringing materials for building a normal space port with an office building, a waiting room and a customs terminal… But where was that ship now?
“At your service, boss!” Kosygin sketched a salute quickly and sat down on one of the rubber mats near the wall, ignoring the business etiquette. He paid no attention to rare stools for visitors.
Sergey Vladimirovich wanted to sit cross-legged himself, but his leg broken two months ago was still hurting, especially in the mornings and evenings.
“A few minutes ago a shuttle failed to enter the landing curve. Thankfully Jess didn’t play hero and ejected himself in the stratosphere. I hardly need to say what that means for the colony.”
“If the technicians don’t fix that tin can that’s dangling at the alternate pad…” Sergey Vladimirovich trailed off, winced and took off the headpiece. “If they haven’t fixed it during the last two months, the chances of it happening are slim. All this fuss is three parts of pure psychiatry moving fast toward psychosis of denying the obvious.”
“Oh, great sultan, please allow your humble servant to speak the truth. Without summary execution.”
Piotr Kosygin was one hell of a wisecrack, but he wouldn’t rub it in for no reason. Sergey Vladimirovich Sultanov got up and rolled his shoulders stretching. The leg will be fine, but for the sake of business…
“The French complain about the actions of the administration.” Kosygin barely waited for the governor to sit down before he whispered. “Russians are the first to blame. The French say we steal everything and will create the new Soviet here with camps and repressions. The Greeks from the last transport are listening, but haven’t decided what to do yet. The English are still supporting us, for the moment. When we still had enough of our shuttles that could deliver cargo from orbit there was some hope, but now everyone will understand that we have only ourselves to lean on. Today’s crash has ended all hope. In such situation the administration’s authority... will be inevitably shattered.”
“I know.” Sultanov shook his head. “It’s nothing new. When the schedule of incoming transport faltered, it became obvious then that we’d have to survive on our own. If you have some ideas, explain them quickly. Otherwise Gosha will be worried that I haven’t troubled him for too long and will come here. He’s a nice guy, but, you know, this is a delicate matter…”
“I calculated the social dynamics, boss.” Kosygin said. ”It doesn’t look good, but there is still a chance. But it’s short term only. If everything goes according to the plan, the colony will be dead in a hundred years. If we try really hard – in hundred and fifty years.”
“Wait!” The governor interrupted. “May I ask what you used to count it? These sort of calculations need multiple factor analysis! Without customized software you won’t get any results, and our only computer with such software got busted a week after the disaster.”
“There was that little program on the geosynoptics computer.” Piotr confessed. “It’s weak, dumb, slow as hell – four hours for every alternative to calculate! – but it’s worth it. That computer had to be written off quietly to avoid all the unnecessary questions….”
“So we are stealing.” Sergey Vladimirovich summarized. “And then we are indignant when the French spread such rumors.”
“That’s exactly the thing, boss! I found a suitable alternative that provides positive dynamics for the colony! But it’s… slightly unethical.”
“To hell with ethics, shoot. We’re not in the position to follow the laws.”
“If the administration works according to the established plan we’ll be able to provide the colony with what we currently define as the minimal necessities for our expected standard of living, except food, for thirty or forty years. With the gadgets we have, terraforming for agriculture will be no trouble thankfully, so food supply will pick up, just enough to keep us all going. The problem will come later when the warehouses become empty of other necessities to keep us at our accustomed standard of living. At that time we’ll get steady negative dynamics in both standards of living and population. In other words, people will feel too uncomfortable to want to have many children, so there won’t be enough workers in the next generation. There are only fifty thousand of us, less than half of them are women. With the population and resources we have now we’ll be able to achieve necessary population increase only if we establish a dictatorship that can force some changes.”
‘You propose to cave the standard of living to the minimum, don’t you?” Sultanov clarified.
“Yes, boss! If we don’t do it right now, then we won’t be able to encourage women to have multiple pregnancies. We have to stop thinking about building cities, and keeping a comfortable way of life, and start planning on being farmers. Living rural, going back to the real basics. It’s one of the main consistent patterns of social dynamics – the lower the standard of living and urbanization is, the higher population growth is…”
Kosygin was clearly doing his best not to go from whisper to shouting. His solution was truly radical. But their circumstances were extreme…
“How are we going to cave it? Have you thought of that too?” Sergey Vladimirovich asked cautiously. “Because we can do it only by destroying some of the equipment in the warehouses. But if we make a single mistake, the colony will face the shortage of vitally important instruments. This is much harder than balancing on a tightrope. We are on an alien planet, Petya. Buryi Yar (*) is not a meadow for picnics. Do you know exactly what equipment and how many items we have to leave? What we can afford to do without? I don’t. When we had one working shuttle and cargo drifting on the orbit we could take the risk and fly for something that we really needed. There are more than eighty containers up there waiting for us – we used too damn much fuel trying to find that five-dimensional anomaly when that cursed wormhole collapsed.”
“But we won’t destroy anything, boss!” Kosygin smiled widely. “The French suggested a way out. The extra amounts from the warehouses ought to be stolen and hidden somewhere safe! In that case we’ll have a chance to control the standard of living in the colony, and if there’s anything we find we desperately need we can dump the equipment onto the black market. The colonists will face the shortage of necessities, they’ll have to make equivalents using minimum technology or learn to do without. The colony will adapt to self-contained existence. And if we face some serious problem in the future we’ll be able to open all the hiding places and try to deal with it as necessary.”
“That program of yours was really slow.” Sultanov sighed and got to his feet. “It doesn’t take into account all the factors. Or you were too hasty, didn’t calculate everything. Four hours for each alternative is too much. But I give you credit nevertheless. Who’d have thought that an ex-pilot can calculate social dynamics. Let’s go, it’s not far.”
“Which factors did I not include in the analysis?” Kosygin asked getting up. “Yes, it’s not the easy way, but…”
”…it requires creating a small group of initiates, fifty or sixty at most, some sort of cross between a street gang and a knightly order.” Sergey Vladimirovich answered. “It needs to consist of people who will be ready to risk their honor for the sake of colony’s prosperity, who will be able to get access to fantastic riches by the local standards and not use them too selfishly just to increase their own wealth. How much should be stolen from the warehouses? What do you think? How to make it work? Fifty thousand people is a really small community, soon everyone will know so much about everyone else that it’ll be impossible to have a double life. Did you calculate that too? The criteria of thief selection, the coordination of their activities, methods of covering each other up…”
“Shit!” Kosygin cursed and exited the tent right behind the governor. “You’re right, I didn’t think about that. It was a nice scheme, though, the only functioning one after two months of work… It’s a pity.” He took a slow, deep breath, “But this means that the colony is doomed. I’ll keep quiet, of course. There is no need to spread panic among the colonists, but I won’t have children. Their destiny is too terrible.”
This monolog lasted as long as the governor walked. Then Sergey Vladimirovich stopped before a metal container that was his official office. Everyone knew that Sultanov hated that box and preferred to meet with guests in the tent not far from the hastily thrown-together Star Bridge. Fortunately, the winter was five months away.
“Come in.” Sergey Vladimirovich opened the heavy metal door and let the pilot go in first. The dim light switched on overhead, reacting to movement. “I’m sorry, it’s so dark here, but I can’t violate the electricity use restrictions. Have to set a good example.”
Kosygin stepped forward and stilled, listening to dull humming from the far corner.
“Sergey Vladimirovich, you have…”
“Yes, I had to take it off the second shuttle. It’s the navigational computer, the most powerful computer on the planet. Because of this monster I have to pretend that I prefer to sit in drafts and enjoy the landscape. I was born on a space station, for god’s sakes! So, you can say goodbye to your geosynoptics stuff and work with familiar equipment and up-to-date software. It malfunctions sometimes on discriminant mapping, but estimates the alternatives much faster. I’m not even sorry that I had to break that server that was researching the disaster. Too many people knew about social dynamics, letting the information circulate wasn’t an option, even to people like you and me.”
“This means that you knew everything before I came, didn’t you?” Kosygin asked.
Sergey Vladimirovich looked at the ex-pilot (who, without knowing it, had just become the colony’s main expert in social dynamics) sharply.
“Your plan has been in action since our second shuttle crash landed.” The governor winced remembering how he was carved out of the carcass. “The administration, with the aid from local authorities, has stolen the equipment and living essentials on a regular basis for the last two months. When the winter comes the supply of contraceptives will end. Sensory deprivation will do its job, we are expecting a small population explosion the next fall. By the way, today’s accident was a set-up. The shuttle landed on the alternate pad and will be preserved until an emergency. The state of its running gear means it can make two or three more trips at best, and we can’t predict what we’ll need out of the cargo that’s flying above us – as you’ve already noted.”
“But if you know about everything already, why do you need me?” Kosygin came to his senses fairly fast, it was the pilot’s training probably. “Are you just preventing information leakage?”
“That too.” Sergey Vladimirovich locked the door and switched on the sensor display. “Your talent is much more important. The situation is quite unstable. There is a need to make life-changing decisions fast, to govern the colony and to do things that many of our fellow settlers could call sabotage. Any of a hundred minor factors can spoil our plan. I needed a talented operator from among the initiates, the one familiar with the equipment and the software for a long time. I think you fill those requirements.”
It looked like Kosygin didn’t hear the last sentence. He was frantically scrolling through the reports on Sultanov’s computer, running into the differences between this model and his own from time to time. The oncoming work immersed him completely.
“I wonder what would our descendants say about this whole affair?” Piotr murmured in fifteen minutes after flipping through the all the reports.
“If we succeed, and the colony survives for us to have descendents, and they learn about all of this…” Sergey Vladimirovich answered, happy to have such a new colleague. “They’ll say that “thief” has a nice ring to it.”