Stepping Stones (Founding of the Federation Short Stories Book 1)

by Chris Hechtl

  One thing he had managed to compromise with the developers on was the apartments. One of his people had come up with the idea of going troglodyte in some sections of the colony. Building apartments within the ski resort, as well as under the forests and cliffs. Light pipes funneled some of the light in. Wall screens allowed the denizens within to have a less claustrophobic view. He didn't envy them for living within those cramped apartments, however. Few complained since it was better than those on Earth, but still.

  He didn't regret the near rebellion when the colonists had taken up residency, only to find out they still had to pay taxes. They had given up residency on Earth to move permanently there, or at least most of them had, but that didn't mean the colony was exempt. Someone had to pay for the upkeep, maintenance, replenishing the air, and such. It had taken a lot of time and tons of patience to get that through some rather thick and stubborn skulls, but he had done it.

  Jack had built off of his own modest industrial start-up as well as Axial's to expand them exponentially. They were continuing to expand, but over three-quarters of their output was used up in various construction projects. Another 10 percent had to be set aside for repair to the aging infrastructure.

  Selling off some of the older hardware had given his bottom line a boost, unloaded some of their repair costs onto someone else, and boosted his competition. He hadn't cared in the slightest; he actually wanted the competition. The more the merrier at this point he thought.

  Orders from various groups, nations, and rival corporations had been placed for another twelve cylinder pairs to be constructed, four in Mars orbit. Ten rings were under various stages of development, two torus colonies, and even a cylinder colony in the style of an ancient television show called Babylon 5 was in the works. Bernal spheres, old style modular space stations, space was becoming less of a void and more of a place to be. The place to be in the solar system if you wanted the best in medicine and such. They were building orbital facilities, industry, and expanding at an exponential pace. But he wanted more.

  He'd decided to build a pair of cylinder habitats for his own company employees and their families as well. That would cut down on transits up and down from Earth while doing a better job of keeping them safe. It would also save on health and other side benefits the company dished out as incentives. Preventive care alone was great, but having an unpolluted, nearly crime free environment was even better. The first two would be finished within a decade. He had plans for additional habitats but in Mars space.

  There was a small but growing fraction of the population of the human race in space and on colonial worlds or moons in comparison to the home planet. As of the last United Nations census, there were nearly sixteen billion people on Earth despite some pretty draconian population controls. The Earth was rapidly turning into a crowded, polluted, noisy place to live. Greenhouse warming was causing climate shift at an accelerated pace, adding to the misery.

  He knew what had to be done; mankind needed to expand beyond the nest. He was doing his part, despite people accusing him of only doing it for the money. At his level, money was just a tool to get things done.

  For instance, his solar spin refineries. The old method of orbital smelting was to grind the material up, sort out what you could, then feed the semi-processed material into a furnace. There it would be heated with solar mirrors or heat from a reactor or other source, then separated out. Since different materials melted at different temperatures, the process incorporated some elements of distilling. Unfortunately, in microgravity things got sticky, and the smelters tended to get gummed up with blobs.

  He had come up with the idea of breaking the material down, using massive mirrors to channel solar energy to a pin point furnace while also spinning the entire complex. Each complex was a rectangular box-like structure two hundred meters long. As the material spun, it would separate out into layers that could then be peeled off the inside of the walls and fed into storage containers on the far end of the complex to cool or be kept molten for easier transport.

  The entire design had taken a year to debug and had nearly bankrupted him, but he'd done it. He'd built hundreds of the complexes. They had allowed the space colonies to not only be completed but expanded.

  He was gunning for his next big thing though, his next big project, and he hadn't forgotten his promise to his mother to find a way to move patients to orbit easily. He pumped cash into various departments for many space-related projects while watching his competition and the public sector warily. You only stayed on top if you kept on the edge where it was very easy for someone to push you off if you weren't watching.

  Some of the projects didn't bear the fruit desired, but many came up with side projects that paid off in other ways. One of them did as it was intended, however. He used the material science division of his company to create new forms of self-repairing plastic polymer mixed with self-assembling carbon nanotube strands. The process was further refined by his mother, Mrs. Ursilla Lagroose, when she led a team of geneticists to alter a fungus to generate the materials. With it they engineered the first cable capable of being used as a lifting device to get materials in orbit.

  One of the largest problems with Earth was the inability to get people in and out of the gravity well easily and cheaply. A space elevator would solve a lot of those problems. But ever since Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, his original concept relied on compression, however; modern designs had evolved to favor tensile structure. But no one company had been brash enough to try to build a fully realized structure.

  Asteroid mining had changed the playing field however. And Lagroose Industries had a major stake in asteroid mining, rivaled only by Pavilion Industries, Deep Space Industries, Planetary Resources Inc., Schnauvel mining, and a handful of small freelance outfits.

  What all the various plans for elevators had lacked over the years, other than the material problem, was the actual anchor—the asteroid that would sit in geosynchronous orbit over the planet and keep the cable taut. Various people had discussed the concept, but Jack was ready to pull the trigger. He instantly saw the potential for profit, not just financial, but also for civilization.

  Lagroose Industries laid the groundwork for the space elevator, also known as a skyhook, space tether, or beanstalk over the following six months carefully before the project was outed. Critics lampooned the project as Jack's Beanstalk but Jack actually liked the tagline and adopted it for himself.

  The public affairs department announced that the company was in the process of launching into the endeavor to create the first beanstalk. For many it was an engineering nightmare made real. Some were skeptical that it would ever happen at all; after all, dozens of start-ups and even major aerospace companies had such pie-in-the-sky dream projects going. None had gotten to the point of actually producing anything.

  Getting funding, getting it finished scared away many initial investors. Google and Obiyashi had publicly stated they wanted to build their own beanstalk but hadn't gotten far in their own independent attempts. Both negotiated stakes in the project. It wasn't enough, but their technical involvement and seed capital went a long way to assure investors that Jack Lagroose meant business.

  When Luigi Irons publicly signed on board though, a drove of investors followed in his coattails. Everyone knew Luigi was a gambler, but he bet on things that panned out. And for those who invested early, it could pan out very well indeed.

  With initial funding in hand, Jack turned his people loose on the next step. Just capturing an asteroid to use as the orbital anchor was tricky. They had to have just the right asteroid, with the right composition. Getting it into the right orbit with the world government and population watching even more so. It took two years for Schnauvel Mining to get the right rock and get it delivered in the proper orbit for a cool five billion credits.

  While the Schnauvel family were at work with that, Marketing had to prove the concept was viable. That it wouldn't fall as the hysterics claimed, nor alter the world's weather o
r snap dropping the cable into the ocean to cause tsunamis. No matter how many simulations and tests they showed, the skeptics remained stubbornly unconvinced. Jack decided to proceed anyway.

  The design of the beanstalk underwent various stages of refinement. They took the best lessons from those who had attempted the project and failed before into account. Cluster super computers were used to model how the cable would react to the winds at various altitudes, the possibility of storms, and the possibility of terrorism or strikes by an aircraft. Even bird strikes and lightning strikes were modeled.

  Processes were set up and a genetic algorithm was written for the computer to learn from the simulations to create a process to deal with each crisis, and sometimes more than one crisis at the same time. In the process a dumb AI was created to manage the structure's various engineering components. Solar panels on the asteroid would help power it as would the regenerative braking system engineered into each car. A moderate fusion reactor on the asteroid would be kept in reserve and would act as the initial start-up power to get the whole process in motion.

  While the material science division was working out the kinks in the manufacturing process, the engineers were working out the final design plus the design of the equipment to build the cars and various segments while the space division worked on their end. Even the business department was hard at work on the project. Lagroose Industries made a deal with the government of Ethiopia to build a beanstalk on the top of Mount Chilalo.

  In return for the lease of land around the mountain, the harbor in nearby Somalia, roads, and a flat tax on all of Lagroose Industries for two centuries, the company agreed to build schools, modernize, and extend two of their airports, build a modern hospital, much needed irrigation for a third of the country, as well as the construction industry to support the construction of the base and each of the projects. Jack threw in greenhouse farms, a solar panel farm, wind farm, and a modest fusion reactor to power it all. Paying for replacement parts and the personnel would be their problem once it was phased over to the government's control.

  When his people came back to him and pointed out that there were problems with the transportation, they threw in additional roads and highways in exchange for a deeper cut of the tax revenue until the projects were paid off. There was a bit of resentment from Alazar and Tewolde, the two Ethiopian representatives tasked with brokering the deal.

  Mister Kiyani, the representative from Somalia was eager for the deal to go through. Jack was a little leery of dealing with Somalia but didn't have much of a choice. The shortest route to where he needed to go was through the Awdal district of the country. Since the district had United Nations peace keepers to keep the autonomous state from breaking out into further civil war, he was fairly certain it would keep the peace. And with the harbor project in the works, many in that country would be eager for the jobs and side businesses that would come from it.

  They had to employ a quarter of the native population for the first three years, then half of the employees working on the various projects had to be native citizens by the end of five years. That meant they had to hit the ground running with health, welfare, and education right away.

  The very first project to be set up was the port in Somalia. They had to get the materials into the country, flying them in would be prohibitively expensive. But Jack found a problem; he had overlooked the various warlords in the area. Twice tense situations erupted when a cargo was stolen or held hostage. Fed up with the problem, Roman hired mercenaries when the government did little to insure the company's security.

  “You see what we have to deal with?” Mister Kiyani said, shaking his head in despair. “If you pay them off, they will go away, for a while.”

  “Yeah, for a while. Then they'll come back wanting more and more—protection money. I know that game; my dad was a cop. He told me the stories of the mob and gangs, how they'd lean on small businesses, threaten them, even resort to robbery or arson to get 'protection money.' Well, I'm not playing that game. If they cause trouble, we'll hunt them down.”

  The liaison grimaced in distaste. “You do not have police powers in my country, Mister Lagroose.”

  “We do have clauses to protect Lagroose personnel and property. And there are clauses in our contract that state your government is supposed to protect them as well. You haven't lived up to your end.”

  “You have yet to deliver on your promises,” the representative said.

  “Which we can't do if they keep getting in the way. So figure something out. Or get out of the way and let my people do it for you.”

  “I will take your statement to my government.”

  “Yeah, you do that,” Jack muttered as the tall, mahogany skin man cut the channel. He shook his head. Adult schools had been set up in rented buildings and even tents to start to educate the population in Ethiopia, laying the ground work for the coming construction boom. Men and women were flocking to them from all over the country, even from neighboring countries. Getting the language situation sorted out alone was a pain in the ass. Some resented that those with English language skills were being fast tracked. Tough. He needed native interpreters badly.

  One thing he wouldn't put up with was famine and disease. He brought in the World Health Organization and other groups to help with a national vaccination program coupled with a health and welfare program. Education was also instituted while water filtration and waste handling practices were overhauled.

  |[{}]|

  Over the course of a year their efforts brought prosperity to the destitute and war ravaged countries. The port alone brought billions of credits flowing into the region. But without a safe means to transport it to other locations inland, it was useless. Which was why they didn't take a breather but immediately went into the other supporting projects even before the harbor's opening ceremony.

  Jack wasn't happy about those who got a graft cut, but he understood how the process worked. If he wanted to get the project moving, he had to put up with it to some degree. What he refused to tolerate were the short cuts and corruption that interfered with the process, slowed it down, or threatened the safety of his people. If a company such as the construction subcontractor Sai industries got caught doing shoddy work, they were blackballed. Since billions of credits were at stake, they had to be careful on what they thought they could get away with. He wouldn't tolerate another Halliburton.

  Jack on the other hand had the opposite problem. Not only minimizing pay out but also making sure they did the job right. Not just to code, but exceeding it if possible, he had to keep safety ever in mind. And he couldn't just accept the lowest bidder either. Many companies underbid their contract to get it, then went through the various stalling stages during construction to get more out of him. If he wanted it done, he had to play that game. But if they consistently underbid, they too found themselves getting passed over or even blackballed.

  His people were everywhere managing and overseeing the process while also performing inspections of the work. The various subcontractors quickly learned to not pull stunts and cut corners. They also learned that if they bribed an inspector another might catch the oversight. And Lagroose Security was watching everyone for signs of corruption.

  Piracy off the coast of Somalia reared its head twice before the mercenaries got a handle on the situation. Tyron Roman, head of Lagroose security personally led a team of handpicked security and mercenaries to take down the warlords responsible for the attacks.

  Some citizens in the West as well as European countries complained; they saw American tax dollars used to fund the space program going to other countries. They also flatly refused to insure the waters around the harbor were free of pirates. Not one American life would be lost for corporate greed was their motto. Jack found that hilarious. “Europe, the West, even Asia has things going for them. Now Africa will as well. Scientists said that Africa is where mankind first started to evolve, where we learned to walk and look up at the stars. Now we are building the ne
xt step, the path to those stars for many here on Earth.”

  “The work and money my company and others who are interested in the project or its surrounding infrastructure will provide jobs and training to the impoverished citizens here. They in turn will pay for goods as well as taxes for goods that will stimulate their economy as well as the economy of the surrounding region and eventually the world. Yes, Lagroose has a two-hundred-year contract with Ethiopia. It is a part of our payment for the use of their lands. Like the British when they held the title of Hong Kong, we will do our best to treat the lands and people there with respect.”

  |[{}]|

  The project's infrastructure and base took six years to build and cost nearly four hundred billion credits before the anchor was completed. Lagroose Industries had to sell its controlling interest in the L-5 Axial 1 and 2 projects five years early to help finance the project. Companies like Genetek, Biogen, and others eagerly snapped up some of the shares so they could move their facilities out of the jurisdiction of the nosy Earth government. Jack wasn't keen about that. Where they were going the rules were loose and flexible, but there was time to address that at a later date.

  As the ground workers wrapped up the building of the base and support infrastructure, Lagroose Industries finished stabilizing the counterweight asteroid and then inserted the infrastructure into its surface. All the while robots had been set loose on the surface to mine the asteroid for carbon and other raw materials for the growing chambers.

  The fungus, a modified version of Penicillium, grew in chambers embedded in the rock. They digested the nutrients from the robots and converted them into micromillimeter thin strands of polymers. These were extracted and then spun into small braided cables. These were woven with cables made from boron nitride nanotubes as well as diamond nanotube cables into much larger cables. Then the process was repeated until they had a final cable a meter in diameter.