Beginnings - chapter 1 (2nd draft)

April, 2028



Monday morning got off to a pretty normal start. I woke at 6:00 AM without needing an alarm clock (the result of long years of being a slave to a clock), and lay there for a few minutes listening to the sounds of normal life drifting through the open bedroom window. A lawn maintenance crew was working somewhere nearby, as I heard the engine of the lawnmower and smelled the scent of fresh-cut grass. Living in a condo in Denver was not nearly as peaceful as living in the Midwest, but it would do.



A lot of guys my age would probably be bored. I was single, in my mid-50’s, had worked a long career as an engineer in the communications and aerospace fields, had made a killing by developing a calculation engine that everybody and his brother wanted to buy, and had been retired for several years. But I was managing to keep myself busy doing things that I really enjoyed doing. I had read dozens of books on my data tablet in the last month, and was currently working on writing a fiction novel and a couple of texts on the calculation of trajectory settings required for manifold engine jumps. Since that Russian guy published his paper on “manifold energy” and how it could be manipulated to do that “folding space-time” thing, it seemed like everybody and his brother was wanting to try manifold jumps. All of them were buying calculation engines from the company that I had started. Since some of the folks who had small budgets were trying to jump without proper calculation equipment and were getting onto serious trouble (like jumping into the middle of a star - ouch!) I had decided that a book describing the calculations needed to jump successfully was needed. The book was now close to 90% done, and I was just waiting for the latest round of edits from my publisher.



The demand for such a book was really growing. A couple years ago, someone came up with the idea of using manifold engines to jump to asteroids, mine the asteroids for valuable metals, and jump back to Earth with the goods. Enough people started making money doing this that some investors thought that a central jumpship port would be a good idea. They decided to build it in the sleepy little town of Limon, CO, about 90 miles east of Denver. They bought a few thousand acres of land, had some rail lines run in, and built jumpship servicing companies and transshipment terminals. Boeing/Douglas figured the terminal looked like a good idea so they bought a good chunk of land and build a jumpship showroom and sales yard. The transshipping companies needed to hire a lot of laborers, so local developers built a lot of low-rent housing. Before long Limon was a pretty damned big city.



Prior to this Denver had been heading steadily downhill. The economy was in the toilet all over the world, but MileHi was doing especially poorly. Big businesses had been moving offshore at a phenomenal rate, leaving a lot of empty buildings in Denver. But when Limon started growing, Denver reaped the benefits. Denver had the closest international airport, so that’s where people flew in to. And since the housing being built in Limon was all of the build-it-quick, build-it-cheap type, people who made lots of money in asteroid mining and wanted a nice home had to look somewhere else. Somewhere like Denver.



The outcome of all this was that I was in a great position. Everybody who bought or built a jumpship to use for mining needed a calculation engine to get to the asteroids, and my company, JumpBox Inc, was still the only company making them. And my comfy little condo in Denver experienced a 6-fold increase in value as Limon grew.



I was pretty well immersed in reading my latest ebook when my personal comm beeped at me. When I looked at the display I saw that it was a call from a friend from long ago, Easton Warwick. Easton and I had worked on a bunch of aerospace projects in the past, Easton as a project manager and accountant and me as an engineer. Life had taken us in different directions and we hadn’t spoken in probably 10 years.



“Easton! What’s happening, bud? Long time no see!”



“For sure! Actually, I’d like to remedy that. I just got into Denver a few minutes ago, and I was wondering if we could meet. I’ve got something that I need to talk to you about.”



“Um, sure. If you’re already in town, how about we meet at my favorite diner in half an hour or so?”



I gave him directions and got my self cleaned up a little. The diner I told him about was just a block from my condo.



The neighborhood had gentrified a bit recently. No more winos or hookers on the corners, pretentious bars replacing the down and dirty watering holes. The neighborhood Merchant’s Association had installed flower boxes on the sidewalk, so I got to look at colorful flowers as I walked. Just a few minutes after leaving the condo I walked into the Downtown Diner and found that Easton had arrived a little before me, picking out a booth in the back. The waitress was just starting to pour two cups of coffee when I reached the table, so we both ordered breakfast.



“Good to see you, bud! What’s this you need to talk to me about?”



Easton reached into his pocket and pulled out a silver device about the size of a cigarette lighter. He twisted a ring near one end and it started to make a soft hissing sound, then he placed the hissing device on the table between us. The normal sounds of the diner, the clinking of flatware against plates and coffee cups against saucers, and the sizzle of bacon on the grill, diminished noticeably.



“Anti-eavesdropping tool. So, Red, here’s the thing. I’d like you to brainstorm something for me. If you wanted to set up a colony on a new world, somewhere out of this solar system, what would it take to do it properly?”



I chuckled. “Planning to write a new space opera?”



“No, Red, seriously. Please, what would be some of the concerns you could think of?”



I thought about the question for a bit. “Well, the first concern would be people. You would have to have enough people that the colony could be self-sustaining, but not so many that the demand on consumables would wipe out the colony’s reserves. You know, sort of like Conway’s Game of Life. And you’d have to have people with a wide range of skill sets - engineers, scientists, agricultural people, mechanics, laborers, doctors - a while shitload of different skills. And you’d have to devise a way that the colony could produce it’s own food and provide a reliable source of fresh water, and provisions for sanitation, and a means of educating the children born to the colonists in skills the colony needed. The colony would have to have a means of producing hardware they didn’t bring with them, which would also imply the ability to mine and refine new raw materials. You’d have to have the resources to fund the jump ship and the initial provisions - those are the first things that pop into my head.”



Easton nodded his head. “Well, that’s a pretty decent list. A lot more detailed that what I came up with when I was asked. I guess that means that my bosses chose wisely.”



“Huh? Chose wisely on what? I’m not following you yet, bud.”



“I work for a - I guess you could call them a think tank - based in Scotland. Since the manifold engine was developed a bunch of groups have been toying with the idea of colonizing other worlds. I’m sure you heard about the Italians successfully jumping to Mars and back, and the Pakistanis making a couple of jumps to Luna and back. Well, now a bunch of really wealthy individuals from around the world have decided that with the current state of technology it appears to now be possible to really put together an expedition to form the first extrasolar human colony. These individuals - they call themselves the Colony Consortium - brought in some highly paid consultants and asked them the same question I asked you. These consultants came up with some very specific recommendations, including the number and types of people that such a colony would require. They then searched for leading experts in the most important fields to locate the initial set of personnel they wanted to form the core of the new colony. I was one of the selections − they put me in charge of recruiting the rest of the initial team. They selected you as the next candidate, since you designed the JumpBox calculation engine. So, my friend, how would you like to live on a different planet?”



Our breakfasts came before I had a change to answer, and I waited until the waitress was back behind the counter before I spoke again.



“Why me? There are a lot of old, out-of-work engineers around.”



“You had a successful career in communications engineering, and the Consortium needs good comm people. You’ve also done a lot of other types of work, most notably with power control systems, and the Consortium also needs good general engineers. You designed and built the computation engine that makes Manifold Engine travel possible. You have been hunting, fishing, hiking, and camping since you were a kid, so that gives you the skills the Consortium is looking for in it’s provisioners. You also have no family ties to hold you back, since you have never married nor had children. You aren’t opposed to organ rejuv, since you’ve had your lungs, heart, and pancreas regrown in the last decade. Add to that the fact that you have no criminal record and are very well respected by everyone we’ve been able to find who has ever worked with you, and you became a prime candidate.”



“Well, man, I’ve got say that it sounds interesting. What kind of schedule are you looking at? What exactly would your folks be expecting of me?”



“They’d like you to come to Scotland at your earliest convenience. They actually said that they wanted you on-site tomorrow, but I reminded them that this whole idea would be a surprise to you and you would likely need some time to make arrangements. But when you get there, they would want you to sit in on the selection panels that approve candidates, and make recommendations on any deficiencies you observe.”



We ate quietly while I considered what he had said. I guess I was as hungry as he was, since I actually polished off my breakfast before he did. The eggs were like they usually were, slightly tough, slightly overdone but tasty, the bacon was just sort-of crisp like usual, and the coffee was only slightly burned.



“Well, I really don’t have much happening. I’ve got a couple writing projects I’m working on, but I can do that from anywhere. I can leave today.”