Vyyda Book 1: The Haver Problem (19 page)

             
“You’re wrong,” Caroline said.

             
“Well, maybe not weekly.  Not literally every week.”

             
“You’re wrong about the Salginian.”

             
“No.”

             
“How can you say that?”

             
“You claim they’re all dead, right?”

             
“Right.”

             
“Because Earth saw to it, right?”

             
“Earth defended itself.”

             
“The mighty Earth against a settlement of perhaps thirty thousand people?”

             
“I think I know more about it than -- ”

             
“Fountains,” Dorsey said firmly.

             
“What?  Fountains?”

             
“The word ‘fountain’ translates into Salginian as
coprea-shue
.  But
coprea-shue
has a double meaning in Salginian depending on the context.  It can also mean ‘consequences’.  That’s what the writer was trying to say.  If somebody wanted to make it look like it was written by a Salginian, that’s a mistake that would confuse the meaning of their message without having the desired effect, except to an expert in the Salginian language.  And how many of those are there?  How far did you have to come?”

             
Caroline leaned forward in her seat, listening intently.

             
“An impostor would have been better off using choppy language and some other term more easily identified with Salginian.  ‘Fountain’ is wasted effort for a non-Salginian trying to confuse you.”

             
“We assumed it meant fountain of blood or something.  That they’d kill their captives in a bloody fashion.”

             
"A figure of speech?  Is that what you're reaching for?" Dorsey asked.

             
"Exactly."

             
"Do you see any other hint of figurative language in the message?  Any other descriptive flourishes?  No.  It struggles just to make its point.  They confine themselves to basic elements of English.  And then suddenly they’re going to add a vague little thing like ‘fountain’ to make you think it’s Salginian?  Not likely, is it?”

11.

Why Would Anyone?

The very first time Dorsey Jefferson had heard of Haver, it was not considered a pit of misery, depravity and human weakness.  Far from it.  He’d still been on Hyland at the time.  Cargo joks brought the news (just as the
y would several years later for the Nohbuer Four) of a new settlement opening.  A world unlike any that had preceded it.  A destination.  A jewel of promise.

It seemed
that among the short-sighted, greedy and petty souls in U-Space, there was also a visionary.

The visionary in question, Oren Shangh,
had assumed control of a dwarf planet, previously undeveloped, among a cluster of larger worlds in what was known as the iron belt.  The speck of a property offered little to most collectives interested in building a settlement – it was too damn small to offer much potential.

But Oren Shangh saw a blank slate just perfect for a brainstorm that had consumed him and drove his every move.

He'd gained and lost several fortunes before embarking on the project – a fool's pursuit in the minds of most who heard of it. Nevertheless, Shangh envisioned a settlement devoted to escape and indulgence for the average U-Spacer of moderate means.  A place in which to experience the comforts that occurred infrequently in most of uncontrolled space.

He named his planet
Haver.

The facility that sprung from Shangh’s vision and doggedness could accommodate up to four hundred guests at once.  While there had been places constructed for the comfort and sensory stimulation of men and women in U-Space before, they always catered to a highly limited set.  In addition, Shangh had seen many of these “privileged playgrounds” (in his wealthier days) and was determined to make Haver eclipse them all.

              Guest rooms would be spacious – unlike living quarters for most of the U-Space population.  Top food preparers, employed by those who could afford to pay them well, were lured away with the promise of finer working conditions, a pleasant place in which to live
and
an increase in wages.  These culinary specialists had all the current secrets for creating meals affording genuine pleasure out of the synthetic foodstuffs produced in the uncontrolled region.

             
Shangh wouldn’t risk raising the ire of Earth by paying smugglers to obtain certain organic delicacies for him.  No.  Haver would be a much deserved respite for U-Spacers, but not at the cost of possible attack from the powers-that-be in C-Space.

             
All of these fine touches would add to the enjoyment of Shangh’s guests, but the pièce de résistance?
 
Shangh’s favorite part of Haver:  a central atrium which offered waterfalls, artificial trees and plant life (the likes of which had rarely been seen in U-Space).  Paths and walkways that wound through landscapes that appeared to go on forever and the most intoxicatingly aromatic air that Shangh and his technical people could concoct.  It was, in the estimation of those who saw it for themselves, what they swore Earth must be like.

             
And, at the end of each day, as an artificial setting of the sun was created for entranced guests, Oren Shangh’s “magicians” initiated a steady sprinkling of rain for any guests inclined to wander out from under the covered regions of the atrium and be gently caressed by the drops falling from well above the ground, out of the collection of wispy, soft gray clouds formed near the atrium ceiling.  Particularly brave souls opened their mouths and allowed drops to find their tongues.  It was a subtly sweet taste, the Shangh rain, and almost inevitably brought a smile to the face of the recipient.

             
Guests who held back from stepping into direct contact with the light rainstorm, watching from protected regions of the surrounding area, were eventually coaxed out by one or another of the staff members, explaining what rain was, what it meant to Earth and how it would do them absolutely no harm.

             
Shangh would stand off to one side, watch these uninitiated guests take hesitant steps away from their protective cover and very gradually relax, spreading their arms to feel more of the falling drops, a slight shiver of pleasure signaling that they, too, were converts to the experience.

             
The rain shower – initially an idea of Shangh’s that he thought might garner mild interest – had to be repeated thrice each evening to allow all guests to experience it.

             
Haver was wonderland.

             
Within a year of its opening, business was so strong (drawing people from all portions of U-Space) that Shangh was approached to build more Havers.  He reportedly told interested parties that he would think about it, content to bask in the glow of what he’d accomplished already.

             
Why not?  Every indication suggested that Haver would go on for years and years – likely well after Oren Shangh was gone – as a most desirable destination for the masses of U-Space.  Unfortunately, a single, unforeseen peculiarity prevented that from happening.

The tragic oddity first made itself known in the laundry.

Oren Shangh couldn't be everywhere during construction of his dream, and in places that were beyond his direct inspection, shoddy workmanship occurred.  The plumbing in service areas, badly done, disintegrated over the first several months and allowed water, flowing through the facility’s plumbing system, to come in contact with portions of the planet's crust on its way to the kitchen, custodial sectors and the laundry. 

It was the very slightly tainted
water coming in contact with a cheap soap compound employed in the laundry that rendered a reaction:  a gas byproduct, invisible and only very barely perceptible through smell.

             
Workers in the laundry began to become inexplicably giddy in the middle of shifts.  They giggled incessantly and their efficiency dropped precipitously, in the midst of an oddly euphoric state.  (One employee, a quiet young man, became emboldened and took his clothes off, repeating the same thing over and over:  "Can any of you improve on this?  Can you?") 

             
Supervisors in the area initially assumed that the staff was secretly drinking or ingesting some other kind of stimulant to help get them through tedious work.  When the supervisors themselves, one by one, also took on the characteristics of intoxication, it was concluded that something else was to blame.

             
Only after one of the low-level laundry staff noticed that when water piped into the facility came in contact with soap, a brief, but noticeable, crackle occurred did the workers understand what was happening.

             
They should have alerted management as to the occurrence, but they’d come to like the easy feeling that they experienced when passing through the laundry, close to the action of water and soap. 

             
“What’s the harm, really?” one had asked the others.

             
Employees experiencing constant contact to the gas were protected from overexposure by small fans installed to displace most of the rising fumes.  It helped keep them from getting too high to perform their jobs.  Everyone in laundry marched ahead, a little happier, a little sillier.

             
Word spread. 

             
Human nature suggests that a secret is a near-impossible thing to keep.  First it was maintenance workers, then housekeeping that learned of the chemical reaction.  Finally, lower-tier employees from all over Haver began making periodic trips to the laundry.

             
In retrospect, no one could recall which of the employees first brought a guest to the laundry, pocketing a small fee in exchange.  Nevertheless, it soon became common to see half a dozen guests lounging near the gas exposure (those who wanted something a little different and completely memorable from their Haver experience).  Some staff members developed the ability to figure out, from minimal observation, which visitors were most likely to be amenable to the “encounter”.

             
Haver’s unskilled labor was getting high
and
rich.

             
Little more than a month after the guests began finding their way to the laundry for a taste of what had become dubbed
Ives
(after the laundry worker who first noticed what was happening when water made contact with Haver’s soap), a particularly unctuous guest, an engineer, visiting from a nearby industrial settlements, anxious to indulge, didn’t know when to say when.

             
No reason to think that Ives could do harm, as not so much as a single individual had mentioned lingering ill-effects of any kind.  Still, the balding, overbearing man with an air of superiority, was determined to get as high as he could.  Half an hour after beginning repeated, deep inhalations, he keeled over and died.

             
That was all it took.

             
As news got out, a decline in attendance began.  Oren Shangh’s dream was dashed and traveling to Haver soon became forbidden for the citizens from dozens upon dozens of settlements across U-Space.

             
Some guests still came, but only for a taste of Ives, regardless of the risk – that is, until Oren Shangh shut down any means of extracting the gas.

             
“That isn’t what we’re about,” he reportedly told angry visitors who had expected a chance at experiencing the “wave of pleasure” from Haver’s sole natural resource.

             
Few options remained for Shangh.  He had no revenues to speak of and eventually gave in to a stingy offer originating from a group with absolutely no scruples.  They converted the facility almost overnight:  partitioning the comfortable rooms into much smaller ones, each with Ives pumped in through gauged dispensers that allowed visitors to sail away in privacy.

             
Upkeep was minimal, staff reduced dramatically (mostly comprised of roughnecks who could control unpredictable situations).

             
It had been, by far, the worst of Oren Shangh’s disappointments.  Haver was supposed to serve as his crowning achievement – the one he “got right” and for which he would be remembered.  Six months after selling it off, he killed himself.

             
Just as well that Oren Shangh didn’t survive long.  Word would have eventually filtered back to him about what Haver had become.  Unclean, uncivil, inhumane.  Those with a gambling game sure to fleece the masses showed up and took residence, either leaving after a time with immense profits or murdered by an angry loser.  Food was reduced to the most horrid dehydrated tins of flavored syntho-grains.  The problem of deceased (whether from an overdose of Ives or other means) wasn't really a problem on the new Haver; incinerators ran around the clock.