Jimmy slumped into the side chair and just shook his head.
“But how?” Tony asked. “We’ve got eighty thousand boats. They’re barely bringing in seven-fifty now.”
“Well, yeah,” Billy said. “But you had me calculate the yields without the summer slump and how many boats it would take to fish all season without the yield falling off. We did the calculations for the Pumpkin yesterday. Fifteen boats a day on the Pumpkin instead of thirty?”
“Something like that,” Tony said.
“Okay, with the summer slump, a boat brings in about six thousand metric tons a season. Without it, they bring in ten thousand. If you fish thirty boats on the Pumpkin, you wind up with two hundred and seventy metric tons at the end of the season. If you fish twenty boats, at the end of the season you have four hundred and thirty metric tons.” He shrugged. “The hard part is in the model. Assuming it’s right, the rest is just figuring out how much you want and how many boats it’ll take to catch ’em.”
“There has to be some theoretical limit,” Tony said.
“Oh, yeah. Eighty thousand boats works out to be just under two thousand metric megatons,” Billy said.
“That’s more than double,” Tony said.
“With the number of boats you have now, that’s what the model says, but you need the grounds to support them. The optimal limit for the existing grounds caps out at about eight hundred metric megatons.”
“What about the other fisheries, Billy?”
He shrugged again. “Depends on how accurate the model is. Coastal non-schooling fish like jace, arvol, and pintos have estimated stock populations approaching the mouta, and whitefish. The sardine, pilchard, and other oilfish are maybe ten times that, but you don’t want to over fish them. They’re primary food stock for the larger fish. Crabs and lobsters are probably the next biggest stock. Planet wide there are probably twice as many kilograms of crabs and lobsters as there are mouta and whitefish.”
Even Jimmy blinked at that. “Why aren’t we harvesting them?” he asked the room at large.
Casey grinned. “I learned this one in the game. Because they’re too hard to catch,” she said. “Where a dragger like the Sea Horse can take eighty tons of whitefish and mouta a day, crabs and lobster fishermen would be lucky to get two tons.”
Jimmy blew out his breath. “Looks like we better tell your father to stop building boats, Bill.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Callum’s Cove
March 18, 2305
The day dawned cold and crisp with the green promise of spring in the air. Otto was up with the sun, and brewed tea. His mother shuffled out of the bedroom in her night robe and slippers. She smiled and yawned at him.
“Good morning, hon, You’re up early. Couldn’t you sleep?”
He shrugged. “I have some things I want to do before we go into the village this morning. Did I wake you, thrashing around out here?”
She shook her head. “No. I was laying there awake. When I heard the tea water boiling, it sounded like something I wanted some of. Did you leave any?” She smiled at him.
In answer, he poured hot water into the cup he had prepared for her already. “A little.”
“Thanks.” She took the cup from his hands and went to her terminal. “I better see what’s been going on. It’s been a distracting couple of days.”
“Do you think they’ll let him out today?” Otto asked.
She stared at the monitor’s muddy gray screen as it warmed up. “I don’t know. I had a lot of time to think about it last night. I figure that they’ll let him out when it’s safest and not before. I think that’s what should happen, but it’s so maddeningly frustrating not to know how he is.”
Otto made a small grunt of agreement. “Well, I’m going out to the shop. I want to finish a carving this morning. I’ll come make breakfast in a bit.”
“Okay, hon.” The world behind the screen sucked Rachel in. The pull of the familiar and engaging offered a temporary escape from the reality of a disturbing present. She gratefully submerged in the data stream.
Otto took his tea and went out to the shop. Inside the door, the familiar scents of wood, herb, salt, and smoke drew him. The surroundings felt as if he’d been gone for a long time and just returned home. His eyes scanned the bundled herbs. Idly he plucked a few bits, a sprig here, a branch there. He hadn’t even bothered to put his staff down, and it rattled and clinked melodically with each small tug and bend.
He opened the firebox, and found some glowing embers. He propped his staff against the bench and blew gently on the embers, hearing the small crackle and smiling at the colors flaring from red to white. The heat built against his cheeks and forehead with each gentle puff. He put in a few scrapes of drift wood, and they burst into flame instantly. The bundle of herbs followed and a few small puffs of aromatic smoke slipped out of the firebox as the buildup momentarily overwhelmed the dampers.
Otto smiled, thinking of his father, almost painfully aware of him in his epoxy and steel cocoon, not two kilometers that way. His mind knew the direction, even without opening his eyes. “Come home, Father,” he whispered, and the accumulated terror of what had happened nearly overwhelmed him. Tears drooled from his eyes and his nose started to run.
The chimney’s draw finally won out over the smoke and pulled it out of the firebox. The ashy residues fell into a non-descript pile around the glowing embers. Otto let go of his anger and fear, letting it drift up with the smoke. He rubbed the salty water from his face with the palms of his hands, sniffed valiantly while he adjusted the dampers and loaded the stove with a few bits of aromatic driftwood. Finally, unable to contain the flood any longer, he pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and blew his nose noisily. The sudden, raucous noise touched something in him and he began to chuckle. A knot he’d been carrying for days loosened and he felt like, suddenly, he could breath.
He got out his knife and unfinished carving from the night before and, in the light of the firebox, finished releasing the figure in the wood. He took care with the heart, searching through a handful of shells and selecting the richest purple bit, shaping it slightly with a small file, and placing it just so in the heart of the beast. He held it up to the watered light now beginning to flow from the brightening morning sky and smiled.
Tucking it into the pocket beside the gull, he folded his knife, re-stoked the fire, and adjusted the dampers for a good draw. His eyes skipped across the litter of shavings and chips, the bits of leaf and litter that had come in on his boots. In the light of the new day, he swept and straightened up the shop—replacing the tools, scooping the swept up chips and litter into the stove, and adjusting the hanging bundles in the rafters. It was a small shop, after all, and took less than half a stan, during which his stomach growled more and more insistently.
He chuckled to himself, banked the fire once more, and took his staff to stand beside the kitchen door as he went in to fix breakfast. At just the thought of fresh tea, crisp toast, and a mound of oatmeal with raisins, his stomach rumbled approval just as he stepped into the kitchen.
“Bet I know what’s on your mind,” his mother said from her chair on the other side of the kitchen. Faintly, Otto heard an echo from her direction and she looked down in surprise and giggled. “Guess I’m thinking the same thing.”
Otto just slipped his jacket onto one of the pegs beside the door and set to work making breakfast for them. Rachel went back to her fishing in the data streams while he worked.
After a large, but relatively quiet breakfast, Rachel helped Otto put the kitchen back in order, each of them wondering when the word would come from the clinic, neither wanting to fret out loud and both of them feeling the tension in the other. At nine, Rachel’s comm beeped. She acknowledged the message. “They’ve started the process. He’ll be surfacing in two stans.”
Otto could sense the sudden spike in her anxiety. It was answered by a lesser spike of his own. “Go ahead. I need to check the fire and clean up. I’
ll be right behind you.”
She grabbed her coat and boots, and headed for the clinic, still buttoning her jacket against the midmorning chill as she all but trotted down the lane toward the village.
Otto grinned and headed for the shower. He felt grubby after the morning’s work and wanted a shower before he got too close to people. His mother may have been used to his smell, but he was getting disagreeable whiffs of himself. Never a good sign.
In moments he was in the shower, luxuriating in the hot stream and letting the accumulated soot, grime, and sweat sluice from his body. When he got out and reached for the towel, he found only a small hand towel, and chuckled to himself. He swiped as much water off as he could with his bare hands and the bit of cloth, but still left drips on the hall floor as he padded naked out into the hall. It felt a bit decadent to be naked in the relative open hallway and the chilly air gave him a bit of a shiver as he opened the linen closet and grabbed the first bath towel he saw. He wrapped it around himself and, as he did, a brightly colored bit of fabric caught his eye on the topmost shelf. It was crushed into a vacuum bag, flattened and protected by the heavy plastic. He looked at it for a few ticks while he dried himself off standing there in the hallway, then smiled as he realized what it was.
He dressed in fresh clothing, and hung the damp towel on the shower rod to dry. He scampered out to the shop to check the stove once more before running back to the house to fetch the bag from the top of the closet. He released the seal and pulled the heavy wool out of the bag. He shook it out to make sure it was in good shape and the dry wool gave out an oddly comforting smell. He grinned once more, stashed the bag back in the closet, and draped the heavy fabric over his arm.
When he got to the clinic, his mother stood just outside the cubicle, looking in at the covey of clinicians working on the terminals. Beyond her, he saw that the last red strobe had turned amber and all the previously amber lights had turned green. There was still a stan or so before the medtechs released the lid, but it felt good to be there.
His mother glanced at him. She held her arms crossed tightly across her stomach, as if holding in some ghastly wound. She started to smile, but her eyes snagged on the fabric draped over his arm and confusion scudded across her eyes for a moment before she recognized it. The smile that burst from her dazzled him and Otto found himself returning it.
Together they stood and watched as the medtechs slowly and carefully awakened the village shaman.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Aram’s Inlet
March 18, 2305
By mid-morning, the first stage of the firestorm was finally winding down. After going over Billy’s numbers for most of the afternoon, Jimmy had sent out new operational orders to the nearly three thousand fishing operations along the South Coast. It always shocked him when he stopped to consider the actual numbers, but there were tens of thousands of kilometers along the South Coast, just on the Western Reaches. By longstanding tradition, no fishing operations were on the Eastern Reaches, but perhaps that was due for a change.
“Tradition has bitten me in the butt once or twice too often in the last week,” he muttered to himself as he sent out yet another calming message to a panicky company rep.
Billy Samson had done his work well and, when Jimmy finally accepted that what he needed was fewer boats fishing the banks on any given day, he moved quickly to create a schedule for the remaining days of the season, and a scheme for identifying which day a boat would be tied up. Since each boat had a hull number, even numbered hulls fished on even numbered days. Odd numbered boats fished on odd numbered days. The simple expedient effectively cut the number of fishermen on the banks in half on any given day and completely removed the need for additional construction.
That part had been easy, simple, and logical. It was the implementation that created the firestorm. The processing units along the South Coast were the first to blow gaskets. Billy had overlooked one important reality that put a serious crimp in the plan when it met reality. The processing units were on a six day schedule, not seven. They probably heard the screams from plant operators about additional management requirements, overtime costs, and maintenance issues all the way over on the Eastern Reaches.
Billy asked, “What? They’d rather forfeit the quota and lose their jobs?”
Tony and Jimmy chuckled.
“They haven’t really thought it through, Bill,” Jimmy said.
“How are you going to deal with that?” Billy asked.
Jimmy sighed. “We’ll have to make an omelet.”
Jimmy accepted the resignations of the first ten plant superintendents who complained, promoting their assistants, and announcing the promotions on the PlanetNet. The squeaking from that set of wheels died down quickly after that. There’s something terribly sobering about realizing that, whatever your own opinion, your boss didn’t think you were irreplaceable.
“Isn’t that kinda hard on the plants?” Billy asked.
Tony shrugged. “If the number two person wasn’t up to managing the task, he’d probably not be there. And it’s not like these folks are going to have black marks on their records. They only resigned. Assuming they get jobs again in the next ninety days, shouldn’t be a major burden. They’re mostly good people and the plants will trade them around like sports stars, I’m betting.”
The next bit of grit came in the form of the skippers complaining that they wouldn’t be able to make quota if they couldn’t fish. Jimmy was a bit more understanding toward them. It had taken a lot of persuasion to convince him and he’d been there in the room when they’d figured it out. Having the skippers set off was only to be expected, given the high levels of anxiety over the quotas to begin with.
Between Casey, Tony, and Billy, they’d crafted an explanation–without mentioning Billy’s game–that showed how fishing fewer days resulted in more landings because it avoided the summer slump. There was a lot of skepticism drifting through the ’Net, but after the example made of the plant superintendents, the skippers were a bit more willing to give Jimmy the benefit of the doubt. The season was almost four weeks in, and the slumps were already beginning to show in the landings numbers. Small, but there. A week or two of trying the plan would give them confirmation, or disprove the scheme, so the noise from the skippers subsided.
The last firestorm had come in overnight when the distant villages had finally caught up on the news from Aram’s Inlet. It was inevitable that at least a few villages have a preponderance of boats in one category or another. New Armagh had sixteen of their eighteen boats with even hull numbers. Statistically, it wasn’t even a blip on the line, but politically, it was important to resolve it.
Jimmy got on the horn with New Armagh. It was late in the day there, even though it was early at the Inlet, and he caught the company supervisor just before turning in for the night.
The red haired woman on the line looked surprised to be facing Jimmy Pirano himself, but she composed herself well enough.
“Catherine. Thanks for taking my call so late.”
“Hello, Jimmy. I’m guessing you got the note about the hull numbers?”
“How did you get so many even numbered ones?”
“Aberdrony was turning out two boats at a time when we started setting up here. We got the even ones and New Hebrie got the odd. One went east, one went west.”
“Why doesn’t New Hebrie have the same problem but with odd numbered boats?”
“They grew a lot faster than we did. They got a lot of new boats and that’s set them up pretty well.”
“I see. Well, as I see it, you got two options. One, you start trading even boats for odd ones around the area.” Jimmy paused to see how she’d take it.
“That’s a mess. What’s the other?”
“Draw lots for who goes. I don’t really care whether or not it’s an even or odd numbered boat, Catherine. The key point is to pull half the boats back each day to relieve the pressure on the banks. According to the model, we can stay ahe
ad of the summer slump and everybody makes quota.”
“I saw your proposal. I’m willing to give it a shot. I’ll ask them to draw lots in the morning.”
“Thanks, Catherine. I don’t know if we can really get this increase in landings, but we’re working hard here to try to get ahead of it.”
“Okay, Jimmy. You’re the boss. Keep us posted.”
Jimmy broke the connection.
Billy asked, “Why didn’t you just tell ’em to draw lots to begin with?”
Tony grinned. “He did. He just made it look like they had a choice.”
Billy looked confused.
Casey explained while Jimmy grinned. “Would you wanna be the one to tell your spouse that you have to move down the coast leaving all your friends and family behind?”
“Not a chance,” Billy said, quickly thinking of all the people he’d have to leave behind if he were transferred to Cheapskate or Callum’s Cove.
Tony shrugged as if to say, “There’s your answer.”
By mid-morning, the objections tapered off and Jimmy began to hope that it might work.
Casey asked, “So? What’s the upper limit on landings?”
“Upper limit?” Jimmy asked. “I’m having enough trouble trying to reach the lower.”
“Yeah, but we’ve already talked about some new fisheries and we’ve got extra boats and crews already. When the new contracts are announced, there’s going to be more interest in working here and I can see us getting a lot more applications than we have been.”
The logical conclusion of where she was going smacked Jimmy in the face.
Tony filleted the obvious and laid it on the table. “If we had fisheries they could exploit without digging into the quotas and overfishing the banks, that’s all extra.”
Carruthers stuck his head in the door. “They’re decanting Richard Krugg today. He’ll be in clinic for a few more days probably, but they’re bringing him out of the pod. Alan just messaged.”
South Coast (Shaman's Tales From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Book 1) Page 20
