by Paul James
“We will ensure separate schools, accommodation, and workplaces for girls and single women,” Dean said, anxious to support Alexander. “We will maintain the integrity of the institute’s way of life at all costs. We will lay it out clearly in our constitution.”
Shane was about to respond, but others now had questions and the discussion once again became loud and heated. After a time, Dean held up his hand to signal silence.
“Believe me,” he said, “Alexander and I both share your concerns and will instruct the women’s committee and the security projects to develop plans that safeguard what we have. We can make final decisions at that time. Right now, we’re just asking for a plan that might allow us to be a lifeboat to others without being sunk ourselves.”
The assembly broke up in considerable agitation, opinions being strongly held on both sides. Many of the men had families back in Europe who they were growing concerned for, while others wanted to hold fast to the way of life they’d come here to enjoy.
Chapter 23: Underwater World Underway
Shane left the assembly in a fury. Needing time and space to subdue his anger at the unwelcome development in the institute’s life, he ordered the Manta Ray to proceed to the bubble city.
When he first began learning to drive Manta Rays, he’d refused all help from the robot assistant and the Ray’s own controller. But now, he let them take him where he directed. In only a few short months he’d gone from hands-on boy racer to jaded commuter. The transition was so fast he hardly understood how it happened. Looking back, he wondered if he’d been briefly mad. Was that what love felt like? He’d never felt that either, though he heard so much about it now that the boys—who were almost men—were spending vacation time at the institute’s resorts where they met girls.
He shook his head and returned to the problem at hand. The Western world’s growing difficulties after the 2021 recession were a serious problem that, in Shane’s mind, the institute and the Founders were not addressing correctly. It was as things were when he lived at home all those years ago: Everything he did made people unhappy, and each incident fed into another one. What cured the problem was his move to the Institute’s first island school. Without him, his parents and sisters back home recovered. They were even happy to see him the one time he’d returned, which was to see his dying father. He, in turn, was happy to be out of a world where he couldn’t fit in. In Shane’s mind, the Institute and the world needed to put greater distance between themselves—not get closer.
Alexis’s suggestion of increasing the project fees had been accepted and a six percent fee was agreed upon. The extra money was to be channeled into the undersea cities and Alexis’s Moon City. However, in the race between the institute’s escape and the Western world’s growing poverty, the speed of Europe’s collapse was winning hands down. North America and the other Western nations dotted around the globe were holding up better, but they were being drawn into Asia’s gravitational pull. As China and India outgrew everyone, Asia was once again the economic hub of the world, with all that meant. The “Western” countries in Asia—Australia, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and others—were aligning more and more to China and looking less and less favorably on Europe and North America. They particularly despised small, strange offshoots of those far-off places such as the Modest Proposal Institute. The rest of the world wasn’t nearly as bad as Europe, but it was growing ominously dark.
Shane had increased his own personal spending on the new bubble city, the one he was visiting today, to be sure he had a place to live if the end came suddenly. He’d hoped to have a fully functioning city in place before the end came, but that looked less and less likely.
An hour’s travel brought the Manta Ray to the newest, deepest city yet. Its existence was a secret that only his own bubble city project team shared with the Founders, and its actual location was not even shared with them. That way, he joked, he wouldn’t have to kill the Founders if they fell into enemy hands. It seemed crazy to talk of “enemy hands,” yet that was how he saw it. The institute’s top people may feel they could manage what was happening, but Shane had no confidence in their plan—even less now he saw they were planning to bring the West’s destructive decadence right into the institute. He hoped the leaders might be proven right, but his own experience as a child told him they would not be. Once bullies give up on getting things from you for “free,” it was only a matter of time before they attacked you in earnest.
The Ray slowed and light from its headlights reflected off the bubble. The city guided the vessel into an open docking port. Once it was settled on a cradle, the port was pumped dry and Shane stepped out into the airlock. He made his way to the door, preparing his diving suit for release. When he was inside the city, he completed the removal of his suit and turned to greet the delegation that had come to meet him.
“It’s good to be back,” Shane said to the head of the city’s construction crew.
“You’ll see a lot of progress this time,” the leader said.
“Are we still okay for full occupation next month?” Shane asked.
“We are. The farm units are already running and so are the 3-D factories. We’re practically self-sufficient in our intended purpose. Are the new pioneers ready?”
“They are. Their situation up top is growing desperate, so they’re finding it hard to wait. I’m happy to hear we’re on schedule.”
“I know they’ve practiced and acclimatized,” the leader said as they walked from the arrivals airlock toward Shane’s residence in the city, “but can they really understand what their life here will be like after having farmed the land under the sun and stars?”
“They are being murdered in increasing numbers where they live now, so their culture shock will be offset by their relief at being safe, I expect,” Shane replied.
“I hope you’re right,” the leader said. “I know how hard it’s been for some of the guys working here, and they already loved the undersea world. I love it here too, but even I hadn’t understood how much the earth and sky meant to me. The simulated stars on the dome at night just don’t quite satisfy, somehow.”
“Then we’ll get more engineers working on updating the visuals until they do satisfy,” Shane said. “When we’re living here for real, it’s got to feel right.”
Chapter 24: Unlikely and Unstable Alliance
The underwater city leader’s misgivings weren’t wrong. In the weeks that followed, Institute men and their families arrived from Britain, many of whom became panic-stricken and unable to stay. For some it was the darkness of the deep that scared them; for others it was the thought of the weight of water piled on top of the dome. As the city leader had said, they were used to the wind in their hair and the sun on their faces. No matter how closely the inside climate of the underwater city was made to match that of the outside world, they could not acclimatize to life on the ocean floor. Many left Shane’s world to farm the institute’s desert areas around the African and South American spaceports.
Slowly, however, the new cities below the sea began to take on life. For every pioneer who came and went, there were two who stayed. Within a year, the food factories of the new city were providing much-needed food to the institute’s properties—a convenient circumstance since by then the institute’s properties in Europe were shrinking quickly.
The undersea cities were designed to be as self-sufficient in food production as they were in almost everything else. Agriculture was highly intensive, using the most modern techniques available. Battery farms for animals were no longer acceptable to anyone, but no one minded battery farms for vegetables or artificial meat protein. Attached to the main city were satellite domes for living quarters, factories, and the other services necessary for a growing population.
Shane had begun spending more and more of his time at his new headquarters of “Shaneville.” He’d named it in jest, only to find that the name came into common use as the months passed. When he wasn’t there
, he was at the institute’s new headquarters at the African spaceport where the Founders and council had set up residence. He needed to be near the center of power to keep pressure on the Founders. Alexis, too, was spending all his time flitting between the Moon City and the new headquarters, and Tomas was almost eternally on the headquarters hologram device from his robot island.” All three demanded more support, putting pressure on the Founders and council that often led to acrimonious meetings.
“Our Moon City is almost complete,” Alexis said angrily, “but we need the final dome and then more people and funding to get us through the next months. Once we can open it up to pioneers, we’ll stop being a drain on the institute’s resources, but until then we need more funding.”
“And we need more people and funding for the institute’s new underwater capital city,” Shane demanded.
“And I need more support from the security projects!” Tomas yelled. He never seemed to get the volume right on the hologram.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” Dean said. “We’re an organization for educating young people, not a bank or a military machine. We develop the minds and you, the developed minds, develop the future.”
“I’m blowing through my fortune developing the future faster than the money is coming in,” Alexis replied caustically. “There won’t be a future if we can’t get these projects finished in time.”
“That’s true for me too,” Shane added. “Much of the money I’ve made over the past seven years has been spent in the past two, and it will be all gone in another two. The institute won’t have a place to retreat to—not in space or under the sea—unless we get more money and people now.”
“Well, I’m not prepared to go down without a fight,” Tomas said. “Alexis and Shane have fortunes to spend on their ventures; I don’t. I never had much commercial revenue from my robots because you don’t allow me to sell them to the outside world. If I don’t get the support I need, I’ll have to use the robots to destroy the people who are causing me trouble.”
“That would only make things worse for everyone, Tomas,” Alexander said.
“But I can’t wait,” Tomas snapped. “I’m telling you, I’m out of money and the island’s security system is low on ammunition.”
“Gentlemen, you have put your cases forward with energy and passion. We need to discuss what can be done. We will inform you of our decision very shortly.”
Shane and Alexis left the room, still agitated by the calm—and in their opinion comatose—responses from the Founders and council. They found it hard to believe that the people in charge of the day-to-day running of the institute could be so unconcerned after what they’d heard.
The three leaders agreed to reconvene in a nearby conference room so that Tomas could join them by hologram. He was already waiting on the device when they arrived.
“Can we do anything for each other if they decide to focus on only one or two of our problems?” Tomas asked as Shane and Alexis entered the room. For him, the situation was becoming unsupportable. One of the difficulties of sinking pirate vessels without trace, as he was frequently doing now, was that there seemed to be no deterrent effect. Would-be looters on the mainland didn’t know what had happened to those who’d gone before and so weren’t dissuaded from chancing their lives on what they imagined was a soft target. The institute, through Nadia’s PR company, had broadcast far and wide the abandonment of the island and the removal of everything of value from it, to no apparent effect.
“I’m not making my circumstances up,” Alexis said. “I will be out of personal funds before Moon City is developed enough for regular pioneers.”
“Same for me,” Shane said. “And underwater cities are as expensive as moon cities.”
“We have to do something,” Tomas said. “You know they won’t increase the tithe again because of the trouble it caused last time, and the institute has enough expense defending its own borders around the world. Bringing in the women from Europe is costing a fortune too. They’ll cut one or two of us off, you see if they don’t.”
Alexis nodded. “I remember Dean and Alexander arguing right at the beginning about the dangers of having land-based properties. Dean didn’t want to have them and I see now that he was right. Even the spaceports are being attacked regularly, and those are miles from population centers.”
“The island doesn’t have a land border and it’s still being attacked,” Tomas reminded him. “When people can’t get food, they get nasty. I don’t blame them—I’d feel the same way—but we can’t help them. We will have to fight sometime, and I say we fight now before we grow weaker.”
“They’re still too strong, Tomas, and we’re too small,” Shane argued. “When we have the moon and ocean floor to fall back on, then we have a chance. We have to have secure bases to fall back on or we’ll just be overrun.”
Tomas shook his head in disbelief. “You guys are as useless as the Founders,” he said. “Don’t you understand what I’m saying? The next bunch of pirates that approach the island will use up all its non-lethal defenses, and then we’ve lost—unless I fight. For me, the fight-or-flight moment is now, and I’m not going to leave.” He vanished in an angry swirl of gray light.
“He might bring on the end even sooner than we’d imagined,” Shane said to Alexis as they watched Tomas leave.
“He can’t be allowed to do that,” Alexis said. “I only need a month or so until we’ll be viable at Moon City, followed by another month getting the settlers up there.” He paused, seeming to debate with himself, then continued. “Look, you know that I think your bubble cities are too vulnerable to attack. I’ve said it often enough—even the oldest navies on the planet have depth charges and torpedoes. But if the security system can keep attacking ships away, maybe your cities could be a temporary refuge while we finalize Moon City.”
“The security systems do keep us safe,” Shane said. “I have no doubts about the safety of our people in the underwater cities. Also, the locations of my latest city and the soon-to-be satellite cities aren’t known to anyone, so they are unlikely to be attacked. What’s more, if the institute’s land-based properties are overrun, we will stop talking to the outside world, so they will have even less chance of discovering our whereabouts in the future. As I’ve said before, doing those media interviews keeps our success in the faces of people who are experiencing only failure. It’s like red rag to a bull. If we stop talking to them, they’ll forget we exist and fight each other.”
“They’re already fighting each other,” Alexis said. “I take your point about not speaking to them anymore, but we think there’s always a chance we could convert people back to living their lives sensibly in their own lands. Or, like Tomas says, we could get more involved, provide more assistance, stuff like that. Then we might get some better engagement with them.”
“The only ‘engagement’ they’re looking for is our money and it’s practically gone,” Shane said angrily.
Alexis nodded. “Look,” he said, “if we have to choose, I’m okay diverting the institute’s funds to your underwater cities for the next three months if that will get them secure and inhabited. After that, I expect you to support focusing the funds on Moon City.”
“Agreed,” Shane said, and shook Alexis’s hand. “But we need to do something about Tomas before he gets us all killed.”
“Such as?”
“We have to get control of the NuMen,” Shane said. “He can start a war with those things before we even know it’s happening. And I still think he has something else, something that made Leon disappear.”
“You say that, but you never show how or why, and nothing like it has happened again. I agree with the investigating team; it was a bizarre and unexplained accident.”
“It hasn’t happened again,” Shane said, “because it was tested and proved. The investigation said ‘accident,’ so for Tomas to use it again would destroy his good fortune in having such a set of numbskulls investigating.”
“We do
n’t have numbskulls here,” Alexis reminded him, “and, I repeat, you haven’t found any evidence to back up your theory.” He continued. “While I like your idea of getting control of the NuMen, I don’t see how that can happen. I suggest that if the Founders don’t provide Tomas with the reinforcements he needs, we should. That way, he won’t need to start a war when he’s attacked.”
Shane said nothing. Alexis’s advice was true. Despite listening in on Tomas’s every waking minute, he had nothing to show. Even when Tomas was put under enormous stress, like when his island was being attacked, he never gave any indication he had a weapon other than the NuMen and their conventional weapons.
“Okay,” he said at last, “we’ll get Tomas the support he needs. Then we put everything into the undersea cities, and finally Moon City.”
The moment he spoke, Shane remembered Alexis’s earlier words about Tomas and supporting the world. He shivered. Were Alexis and Tomas coming together in their ideas? And, if so, did that put him at risk?
Chapter 25: Pirate Games
However, events were moving quicker than any of them could foresee. Before the institute had begun reinforcing the island’s defenses, it was attacked again.
Shane watched Tomas from Shaneville, while Tomas watched the approaching fleet of pirate boats on the island’s Control Room monitor. Even across the miles, Shane could see there were too many boats to sink using the island’s usual defenses. The security system’s Bubblers could only sink about half of them. If the rest continued to advance, they would land and Tomas and the robots would have to fight. The question now was, would Tomas get the Founders and council involved or not? There was still time to decide. The boats were the usual collection of slow, small fishing boats and they were almost a hundred miles away.
Tomas had no excuse not to alert the institute, but he would know that if he did, they would insist he evacuate the island. Evacuation was straightforward; the institute had already provided a Manta Ray capable of carrying all the complex equipment and most of the robots. It lay waiting, underwater, attached to a submarine loading dock.
