“So what’s this about the food being low?” I ask Shilp, hooking on to one of his earlier comments. “When we left a week ago there was plenty.” There are people here who want to return to life in the domes, and Shilp here talks with them often enough to be considered their best representative to the council. Maybe one of them is planning a trip back, and he’s gotten wind of it.
“Yeah, it’s been getting lower. We’ve had to cut back on our ration sizes. That’s why we’re hoping maybe the Stepdaughters of Chiron can teach us to grow more food. Or maybe we can just buy some food from Morgan…” The way he sighs that out makes it sound like he is less comfortable with that idea. “Anyway, Astrid said that she checked on them a couple days ago, and they were definitely lower. And she’s kind of the quartermaster of the food…”
“I thought Chloe was in charge of food,” Cleve says. “Maybe she’s just a procurer.”
“She’s been adding to the food stocks, but she’s not in charge of the boxes of rations,” Shilp says. Half to himself, he adds, “Astrid wouldn’t take them, would she?”
He probably knows Astrid better than anyone else here. If he’s pointing a finger at her over the missing food supplies, that’s definitely worth looking into. Maybe she accused Corazon in order to direct attention away from herself. “You think your sister could be behind this?” I ask.
“I know she and I don’t always get along, but if she did take the food, she’d have a good reason for it.” Whatever assurance was in Shilp’s words immediate evaporates when he adds the tentative, “Right?”
“Do you think she would strike out on her own? Maybe to find more remnants of the crashed ship?” I suggest. “Do you think she and some of her expansionist friends are looking to scout out more potential habitats? Maybe she’s preparing for something like that?”
“Yeah, I hope so. They definitely run scouting expeditions to find more locations for us to spread into. And she… You know, she did mention recently finding another location that could be more than a garage. So maybe she is thinking about that if things here don’t go her way.”
“This is why we need a council,” Cleve says, shaking his head at the situation. “So that people don’t steal food to expand, they can be granted it.”
Shilp throws up his hands. “I have no idea what we should do about any of this, the food, the army! And no one’s going to listen to me anyway. What do you two think we should do?”
“That’s not what we heard,” Cleve tells him. “Roze says that you have respect within the community. We’re putting together a council, and we’d like you as a representative on it.”
“What, me? On the council? Are you sure?”
“Yeah! We need people to get it started. Data Haven needs a government.”
“Well, yes, I guess I can do that. But I’ll need to lean on you as an advisor.”
I swallow a snort of laughter. That’s perfect. He’s the one with the relationships in the exile community; we’ll be happy to feed him ideas. It’s plain to see why Shilp is likable, he’s easygoing without any strong opinions. It makes me wonder how long he’s been here. When he tells me it’s only been a year or so, I realize he might have useful information about Morgan Industries. “Do you know anything about the board back in the Morgan domes? You and some of the others here in Data Haven are exiles. But some of those people might wish to return there if the current leadership is destabilized—”
“Oh my gosh, yes! If I could go back, I would.” He glances down at his leg and tugs a bit at his trouser as he says this.
“Ah, you have one of those implants? Tenoch was looking at trying to figure out a way to disable them,” I share.
“Really? There’d be a way for me to go back? Though, no, I mean, they’d probably still recognize me… but maybe.” He shares that Astrid also has an implant, which she got at the same time. “Turns out you really shouldn’t set fire to a building inside a dome. Who knew! Definitely don’t do that. Yeah, we used to run a business together, but it didn’t work out. Hostile takeover, you might say.”
“So, if there was a turnover of power in the dome, who would you put in charge there? I’ve heard about Leyland Campos…” Also there’s this really great tailor… I don’t say that aloud, but just thinking it in jest makes me wonder if there’s something to it. Aside from his subversive activities as Morris, Fritz is a small business owner, one frequented by the wealthy in the domes. Just what is required to run for the board? Maybe he could get into an actual public position of power if there’s a shakedown of the current leadership. It’s worth sounding him out about.
Shilp doesn’t know about any of the other board members, but he does know a little about Leyland Campos, who he used to work for. He gives Campos the stunning review of, “He seems fine, I guess.”
“Have you heard any rumors about a Morgan sleeper agent? You’ve got your fingers on the pulse of the exile subcommunity here… Has anybody been muttering about things being better back at the dome?”
“There’s certainly people who complain about the food. And about other things. But I’ve never heard anyone among the exiles regret their decision to come here. We all got pushed out. If I could get accepted back, I would go, but we all know that’s not going to happen. I don’t put any stock in that rumor. And anyway, it doesn’t seem like Morgan’s style. He runs repo squads, but he wouldn’t spend all the money it would take for intelligence agents to maintain elaborate dossiers. I don’t think he even knows where Data Haven is.” I believe that. After all, Fritz only knows the vague directions he gave Corazon. “The repo squads just chase you out of the dome, and then they assume you’re going to die. And usually that’s true.”
“What are the complaints about Data Haven?” Cleve asks, backing up the conversation a bit.
“The food is bad.” Cleve nods. “The people are weird.” Cleve tilts his head, unsure how to take that. “The floors are dirty. It’s dark. In the dome you get natural light.”
“We did recently rectify that, Tenoch and I,” I point out.
“I mean, that helps but it’s not quite the same,” Shilp says, which is true. Small patches of daylight getting funneled in is indeed not the same as walking around in broad daylight. He continues, “It’s not necessarily crowded—there are empty rooms—but every space is cramped. The ship just didn’t have a lot of open space. And there’s always a certain level of chaos. Like, is it okay to be doing this or that? And all these people are doing all these other things…”
I still don’t have a good handle on how society functions here in Data Haven, so I ask Shilp about how he fills his time. He helps out with mechanical repairs, but he doesn’t think he’s very good at them, just serviceable. He and Astrid worked construction, first on their own and then under Leyland Campos. But with Data Haven hidden away in old ship modules underground, there hasn’t been much call for those skills.
“Have you been out in the land above Data Haven much to survey what kind of useful local materials are around here?” I ask. “Did you ever work with any of the native chitin-like lumber?”
“I haven’t gone exploring, no, but I have worked with that material once or twice before.” Shilp tells me it comes from a type of mushroom called shelftop. They are bluish-brown in color with narrow stalks but flat, wide caps. Although they can’t bear a lot of weight, they withstand erosion well, so they make good roofing and wall panels, like we saw at the network node. Using it for this purpose was actually Shilp’s idea. Perhaps the fact that Campos Transportation & Construction uses this technique is a result of the hostile takeover mentioned earlier. Leyland Campos might be the best lead we have right now for overthrowing Morgan, but that doesn’t mean he’s actually good.
Shilp goes on, “But people get edgy, they get concerned about using native Chiron materials in buildings. They don’t want their houses made out of that. They’re worried that they’re going to catch an infection or it’ll bring in miasma or something. But I don’t think shelftop has any connection to miasma or xenofungus.”
Cleve’s been jotting down notes in his journal. He closes it with a snap and thanks Shilp for his ideas. “Looks like we’ve got some things to address as a council. Though I’m not sure what to do about the people being weird.”
Shilp mumbles, “Look, I don’t mean that in a bad way…”
“But I do think we could be more organized,” Cleve goes on. “And we can work on getting light and more efficient space. Maybe even expanding.”
“If you can find a way to get people to expand without being aggressive, that would be great!” Shilp says. Cleve pumps him for ideas on expanding the facilities Data Haven already has. This would require tunneling, and as a construction worker, that’s something Shilp knows about. But the trick is to still keep the module sealed so that the air filtration functions effectively. Shilps suspects the system can handle more space than it operates on right now or at least could be made to do so with some additional parts. But you’d still need to worry about removing all the dirt and sealing the new caves.
Once Cleve and Shilp are deep into discussion of Data Haven improvements, I excuse myself to go track down Astrid. If she really is planning something significant without taking into account the approaching Planetary Security Force, that could be disastrous.