A Major Change, A Reasonable Demand, Patience Needed…
It would take several days for all the lords to gather in Amaurot, so the men joined Sarita and Julie in the document room. Megal was greeted by two of the scholars as he had been taught by them. Blackie was especially interested in the maps of the islands of Port.
“You can see how long it has been since the survey from how much smaller the atolls and volcanoes are. There’s a new one off to the west of Port that has been building a new island. We get a good dusting of ash if the wind is just right.”
“Do the scans identify mineral deposits?” Megal asked.
“Most of what is shown so far, we have already found, like the oil shale and the tar pits. Unfortunately, there does not seem to be some of the rarer metals needed for the electronic, but that is to be expected on a newer planet.”
“One of the more important minerals we need is lithium for batteries. Is there any indication we can find that?” Megal asked.
“Ser Megal, remember what I taught you. That is one of the most available next to hydrogen, remember we can get it from sea water, but we need to build a lot of machines and other things first,” one of Megal’s former teachers said. “That needs some very sophisticated equipment and other chemicals. Right now, we need to concentrate on keeping all of us alive.”
“He is correct, Megal, keeping everyone alive and healthy is the most important for now,” Simon said. “We can locate and keep safe some of these other minerals but food production on that third land mass will be a great help. Our numbers are lower than is needed to be a successful colony.”
“We might concentrate on lumber or charcoal to begin with,” Julie said. “From what we saw, it is covered with thick vegetation. Not old growth, it looks like regrowth because most of the trees were the same size.”
“I wonder if that is the way those fast-burning trees grow back?” Megal explained to the Refugio visitor what they had been told about the trees in the north. Consulting the maps and reading the reports kept all of them occupied for several days. Megal kept notes on what could be found on the land mass Refugio had been granted. It was not well situated for growing crops like the bread grain but had been rated highly for generating electricity with the many hot springs. He mentioned this to the scholars.
“There are plans on how to set up the plants, Ser Morales,” one of the Refugio scholars said. “Unfortunately, we need to figure out how to do it without these parts from Terra.”
“There are places where it is already being done, ” Megal said. “I have seen small plants on several haciendas and ceramics is the answer. It is another thing my father has wanted to encourage.”
“Excellent, concentrating on ceramic food storage is good, but if we can adapt to other uses,” the teacher sighed. “We have needed this information for so long. Thank you, Lord Kearney, for getting the prince to invite us. This is the opportunity of a lifetime.” Megal decided to join the team working on the maps and reports. If nothing else, he was able to take notes from what the scholars said. The Refugio scholars had been his teachers after all.
***
Sean was certain that the discontent would be solved by the news of the expedition to catch the raiders. At least that was successful.
“Megal, I think you need to come with Papa and me for the Assembly meeting,” Sarita said as they finished first meal. “You don’t have a vote, but it will be easier for us to send news to Blackie and Tio Tony. Because of who you are, they should not stop you. Some of them might be angry about you attending, but we need to let the others know how it goes.”
“If it is like a Council meeting, it will be hot, noisy, and dull,” Megal sighed, “but you are right. Lot of psy power will be sailing around the room so it will be harder to send. I really want to see if it is different.”
He joined his wife and her foster father as they walked to the main hall. A crowd was gathering outside, and the large windows had been opened. Higgins’ summer was not kind to large gatherings. Whatever had been gossiped about the vote today had attracted many of the younger people of Utopia. Megal suspected they were anxious to be free of the conformity demanded by the country. His conversations with the renegades at the camp had shown him some of the unrest.
No one questioned him as he accompanied Sarita and Lord Kearney into the chamber. He had predicted correctly. It was crowded, noisy, and already hot. Large fans were hung above the seats, but the ceiling was not high enough to disperse the heat. All they did was spread the heat around. Healers were ready with water and smaller fans. An elderly man loudly complained that back on Terra, all the indoors was climate controlled according to his father. Why didn’t they have that here? His accompanying adult children hushed him as the meeting began.
The usual custom of seats by seniority had broken down with so many substitutes and other family members. One of the prince’s assistants saw them and directed them to reserved seats on the aisle. Simon muttered that was not a good sign. “Sean is up to something,” he whispered.
***
“The Assembly will come to order,” Sean called out much to the surprise of many of the older members. The call to order was usually done by one of the staff who then announced the prince who entered with ceremony. He had walked in, stepped to the dais, and stopped behind a plain table with plain chairs. A ripple of comment was noticeable across the crowded room. Sean sat down at the table. The chair of state was not even in the room. Tyrone’s comment had hit home. Sean hated the diffidence given to the office. He wanted to earn the respect of the people.
“This meeting was originally called to address the raids on the new farms on the east coast. Captain Murphy, aided by forces from Port, was able to capture a bandit from Refugio who was leading attacks on Port and our farms. During that action, it was discovered that many of the renegades exiled from our settlement were alive and living in the fire tree area near the ice plains. Those who were willing to cooperate are now aiding Lord Muldoon in the construction of his new farm. Those who were uncooperative are now stranded on a remote island near the frozen plains.” Sean message brought gasps from many of the audience. He also noticed that some of the audience did not register surprise. He suspected that the renegades had some support from the settlement. Their relatives knew where they were and helped when they could.
“One of the reasons the Port security was involved is a request from the settlement in Port for permission to move some of their people to the third land mass to the east. They are becoming overcrowded on the islands and need more room to grow food.” He went on to explain how Port had reached an agreement with Refugio for trade rather than raiding but had come to Utopia asking for permission to settle the third land mass. It necessitated a new trade agreement between Refugio and Utopia. “I will expect some discussion of the requests.” Sean sat down. Projecting his voice to this large group was exhausting.
“Your highness, the founders provided a schedule of populating each of these land masses. The tragic circumstances that caused us to cede land to the other travelers disrupted that,” Lord Ludden had his voice augmented by one of his grandchildren, but it was still tremulous and faint. “We must maintain our dedication to what the founders intended.” His comment was met with cries from the crowd. Sean augmented his voice and called for quiet.
“Lord Ludden, what the founders planned did not work and won’t work. We have years of experience that has shown us that. The Muldoon family welcomed the renegades because they don’t have enough people to run their farm and build a new one. Both Refugio and Port are viable settlements and are not going away no matter how badly you want them to.”
“I demand you stop this violation of our charter.” Lord Murphy shouted. He had arrived on the arm of one of his grandsons, walking with the aid of a cane. He hadn’t recovered from the riots he had caused.
“We voted for these changes, Grandfather and your family supports them,” the oldest Murphy grandson who had aided him spoke up. “I speak for others of my age group. We must have more freedom. I have read the whole book Thomas More wrote and it is not a plan for a government. Lord Kearney was correct.”
“You ungrateful cur, Utopia was founded to protect you from the oppression of the machines,” Lord Murphy said. “Your privileges can be revoked if this continues.”
“Exactly,” his grandson said. “I am not your slave. I am an adult, a human being, a citizen of Utopia. I voted to change the Charter like many others my age. Your way has failed, Grandfather. It has failed.” A cheer arose from the people crowding the back of the room. Sean realized that the windows were open and the people outside were also cheering. Lord Murphy turned and stared at his grandson and then the crowd.
***
Megal realized that most of these people had no idea what life was like in the time of Thomas More. What he had witnessed at the renegade camp showed exactly how they might be living if they were set on following the Charter to the letter. He looked around the room but none of the people who had returned were in the crowd. He sent a quick message to Sean and asked to speak. He told him he thought it would help. Sean was not happy giving him more notice, but the unrest in the room convinced him to agree. Megal walked to the front of the room.
“I have news of what these men want to impose on all of you.” Megal projected his voice and the crowd quieted down. He introduced himself and told of the expedition to stop the attacks on the coastal farms. He told of finding the camp of the renegades. He described squalor of the camp, the deaths from the cold, the starving children, the primitive shelters. “They have no electricity. They have few metal tools. They wore fish skins and poorly tanned animal skins. They spend so much time just finding food they have not been able to teach their children to read. Is this what you want for yourselves and your children?
“You do not have to believe me. I am from Refugio, but Captain Murphy of your own ranger force and his team were part of this expedition. Ask any of those who went with us. Ask what living without the machines is actually like.”
“We do well without electricity when our family rotates to a farm,” One of Lord Ludden’s sons spoke up. “We shut down the machines so we are not dominated by them and use our human strength and ingenuity. What you describe will never happen here.”
“And the dysentery out break from the backup of the sewage plant is just to be lived with, Jacob Ludden?” A healer spoke up. “Three people died and had the parents not rebelled and brought them to us, you’d lost several children to the disease. The healers insisted you be forced to turn the power back on for the pumps. It will take weeks to get the water well free of contamination.”
“There is no need to have these pumps,” young Ludden shouted. “I have researched it. We only need to have pits under the toilets for the waste. The water will stay clean if we move the waste pits away from the water wells.” Megal saw that this was not helping the discussion, so he interrupted.
“The people of Thomas More’s time did understand about the danger of waste and when the concentrations of people grew large, they had carts that collected the waste each morning from the homes, but they still dumped it in the rivers. After a time, that too caused contamination,” Megal said. “History shows us that as soon as the technology was available, they built systems as we have. The machines and technologies were not the masters of the people, they were the products of need and ingenuity. They were the tools used to serve the people.”
“What More described is a fairy tale,” Simon Kearney called out. “He never meant it to be a way to run a country. He was more worried about what mattered to the people of his own time. Our founders did not understand what Thomas More wrote.” Calls both of condemnation and support were yelled out from the crowd in the room and from those gathered outside the open windows. Sean gave the crowd time to express themselves and began pounding on the dais. Once the crowd had calmed down, he spoke.
“I instructed all families to read the full translation of the book on which our settlement and its Charter were based. I want Lord Kearney, who translated the book, to explain the root of our problem.” Simon hissed something rude to Sarita. She looked at him shocked and then fought to keep from laughing. She had never seen him so disgusted.
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