“Loosely translated, he said ‘say it isn’t so,’” supplied United Kingdom representative Jacob Pierpoint, chuckling.
“If the Israeli government will, somehow, participate in implementing a plan that calls for the destruction of their nuclear arms, it will be the responsibility of this committee to formulate such a plan. And along with that plan we must include airtight arrangements to ensure the nonaggression of Israel’s neighbors. This will not be easy,” Cheng intoned.
“No, it will not. But it’s long past time humanity renounced violence as a means of settling our differences,” stated Jacob Pierpoint. “Britain gave up an empire over which the sun never set. If we could do that, and if the rest of us who represent the so-called atomic club can divest ourselves of such weapons of mass destruction, then I am convinced that we can create a binding peace plan for the Middle East. We just have to make sure it’s comprehensive and assure everyone concerned the plan protects all sides of the equation equally well.”
The committee remained in session for the rest of the day and well into the night. The introductory meeting for their two new members demonstrated the true commitment everyone had. The first steps were to gather all the national and international agreements ratified since the 1967, Six-Day War. Their decision would probably be the most significant Israel faced since the inauguration of the state. As they studied the boundaries and stipulations that governed the creation of the Jewish state, the committee worked to compare current day conditions with those when Israel came into being. But even as they worked, their deliberations were overshadowed by Peter Ambrose’s earlier recounting of the events that took place between the United States and Israel leadership over the last few years. Every member of the committee realized very early on that this was going to be a project for the ages.
* * *
In a demonstrably racist society like that of the United States of America, nonwhites are systematically denied a level playing field in life. However, the often-overlooked result of this kind of societal circumstance is that it also bred nonwhite overachievers who, in order to reap the top rewards of a biased system, outperformed most whites to great success.
A decade after the turn of the century, several members of the Florida A&M Honors Society decided to form an informal group of like-minded overachievers determined to try to duplicate the same kind of successes demonstrated by the space colonists. Unlike the colony’s original four, the graduates of FAMU dispersed into various corporate and research concerns across the country to maximize their exposure to the best of what America had to offer in science and technology.
This group numbered one short of a dozen. The eleven focused on high-tech fields of communications, particle physics, psychology, physiology, botany and nano technologies. Regardless of whether they ever left the planet, they could begin the process of community redevelopment with an eye to building technologically advanced, sustainable communities and towns, exclusively for blacks. Voting out white politicians and sheriffs in majority black towns had been the trend for over a decade with the primary goal of economic sustainability foremost in mind. Moving away from factory farming with smaller communities throughout the farm belt, making micro changes in their economies focused on living wages and supplementary assistance programs in nutrition and health; a more holistic approach to community redevelopment was sought.
In many of these communities, a trickle of Latinos and other nonwhites were welcomed into the fold, but whites were dissuaded from settling by subtle, and sometimes not so subtle, means. One such community was located halfway between Colorado Springs and Pueblo, Colorado, just a mile from Fountain Creek, a tributary of the Arkansas River.
This community was young, just sixteen-years-old, and began as a ninety-acre homestead, originally settled by a Spelman College graduate, Constance Little. Constance was the niece of Bernice Little, a resident of the space colony, the wife of Horace “Peanut” Billings. The revelation of her aunt’s living in the colony, whom Constance had never met, was an inspiration for her majoring in Science, specializing in alternative energy sources and the latest in energy storage technologies.
In a few short years, Constance grew her homestead into a community of forty. They acquired more land for housing, built a respectable solar array, several windmills, planted crops, orchards and an advanced waste management plant. In the course of developing their own hybrid crops, the group encountered a former FAMU botany research expert, even incorporating two experimental strains of corn and soybeans into the community’s fields. They named their community Harmony.
Much like the former lunar colony, a secret community of African Americans was growing right under the nose of the rest of the rest of the country. Constance and her cohorts had drilled an unprecedented twenty-thousand feet into the earth to facilitate the widespread use of geothermal power generation. The community was designed by skilled civil engineers with all signs of power and water distribution, along with the infrastructure for communications hidden below ground. They planned their community to support no more than five thousand residents. When they reached their capacity, the plan was to start another community elsewhere in the country, then another, and another.
Originally, the Colorado spread was deeded to Constance’s great, great, great grandfather right after the Civil War, although the details were lost to history. She had grown up not far away in Colorado Springs, along with two sets of cousins. The extended Little family had lived in the area since before the Civil War, and when Constance graduated, she decided to take custody of the property to try her hand at community development.
Constance had an inner circle deciding the community’s issues and membership based on consensus. The results spoke for themselves. They drew no power from the county’s electrical grid, and every residence and business had ultra-high-speed access to the Internet.
There was a knock on the porch screen door outside Constance’s home office.
“Come in,” Constance replied.
“It’s Silas. You busy?” he asked as he entered.
“Not for you. Just doing the calculations on the estimated crop yields for the coming fall. What’s up?” she inquired.
Silas Washington was a Morehouse College graduate in Computer Science and Psychology. He looked the part of the stereotypical computer nerd, right down to the glasses. He was tall, six foot, three inches, and had a nearly endless supply of jokes and stories. Silas was one of the earliest members of the community and began as the information technologies specialist who started out designing the community’s network and maintained their server farm.
“I wanted to let you know that the waste treatment plant is not only extracting and storing methane from our solid waste, but it’s now completely computer controlled. We can switch from the gas company to our own supply any time. Except for the network, we’re completely off the grid. Althea and Ruben are closing the main feeder shunt. So, we should see zero usage next month. We should be able to completely disconnect in the next ninety days,” he said.
“Why so long?” asked Constance.
“I guess they want to hedge their bet. You know, in case something goes wrong. Although, when I think about winter coming, maybe we should keep connected, just in case.”
“Let Althea know that whatever she decides, I’ll back her. What else is going on?”
“The second fiber optic cable should be connected some time over the next week. We’ll have feeds from both Colorado Springs and Pueblo up and running. The chances of both being taken out at the same time are slim. I was amazed when we got the Springs one completely buried. That one’s never going to be knocked out in a storm from some tree falling on it,” he chuckled.
“This is great news, Silas. Be ready to report on your progress at the town meeting Wednesday,” she said, getting up from her chair to give him a hug.
“You know I will. Lunch?”
Constance shook her head and pulled away, “I can’t. I must nail
down these crop yield estimates for the fall. I’m hoping we end up having a fifty percent surplus this year. But I’ll take a rain check, okay?
“Deal. I’ll catch you later,” Silas said, as he turned to leave.
Once Silas was gone, Constance turned her attention back to the agricultural data. Her goal for Harmony was to be as self-sufficient as possible. That wasn’t to say that they didn’t accept deliveries from the outside, but they were focused on creating an environment that could stand on its own should there be a breakdown in normal society. Silas called it their “zombie apocalypse” preparedness drill.
The latest installation to their community was a methanol-producing, garbage treatment plant converting everyone’s organic trash into fuel for their municipal vehicles: snow and field plows, garbage trucks and various sundry official cars and trucks.
Constance and her group’s efforts at community development were like those started in the 1950s and 1960s, but owing to further advances in technology, and the single-minded purpose of their segregated group, their achievements marked a level of success unrivaled by most other communities in the country.
Reflections
The crew members of the colony’s L4 space station were getting acquainted with Peanut and Roger’s upgrades. Most of the equipment Peanut installed was easy to figure out, and with the Genesis clone supervising, they had the perfect trainer to drill them with simulated attacks from Earth. The new shields protected the station from protracted laser attack, something that, so far, no one from Earth had tried before.
Roger’s upgraded the optical and radar sensors G2 used to monitor Earth and surrounding space. He also installed a much more sensitive wideband antenna to listen to transmissions from Earth and the colony, also to enable G2 to better connect to Earth’s communications satellites, ground stations, and computer networks.
Cheryl was on the operations deck, working on the defense console when her crewmates walked in, having just finished their mid-day meal.
“Man! If we had this technology when I was in the Navy, our destroyer would have been invulnerable!” she announced to the others.
“Yeah? Was it worth skipping lunch?” Larry replied, putting a plate and a bottle of water at Cheryl’s elbow.
“Thanks, and yes it was,” she replied. “If we need to use the station in any way to interdict an attack from the surface, it’s going to be damn near invulnerable.”
“Peanut said we could land this thing and whatever they threw at us would be repelled,” Larry reminded her.
“Even a nuke?”
“Especially a nuke, Jon!”
Jonathan shook his head, “I’m not too anxious to be around to try it. I’d definitely bug out before the damn thing blew up.”
“That’s easy. Given the upgrades to the G-waves, we can tear a hole in the atmosphere getting away, leaving behind a sonic boom busting windows ten miles away,” Cheryl assured him. “Bottom line, we’re as safe here as we would be back home.”
“These new sensors are incredible. The infrared band shows even the smallest heat differentials on Earth. G2?”
“Yes, Cheryl. How may I be of assistance?” replied the station’s A.I.
“How have the sensor upgrades improved your monitoring capabilities?” she asked.
“I can now detect missile and rocket launches before they leave the pad. The flare of ignition will be visible to the upgraded sensors. And though launches from the side of the planet facing away from this station will not be visible, the upgraded radar will detect any object leaving Earth orbit on its way toward this location once they appear over the horizon.”
“And can you calculate the new shield’s capabilities in protecting the station from nuclear detonation?” Jonathan asked.
“Based on the latest calculations supplied by Peanut, the attenuation of light and gamma rays, along with internal tests I have performed on the new sensor array, a nuclear explosion of a fifty kiloton yield would do no harm, including ionizing radiation, as close as two kilometers away.”
“Not likely they will launch a direct attack on the station,” Rachel observed. “Not after the spanking Chris handed the president hovering right over the White House lawn when none of their rockets or bullets made a mark!”
“Yeah, but the best part was one of the Genesis clones uploading the entire conversation between them to the Internet. That was cold-blooded,” said Larry, laughing.
“Chris said it was necessary to show that any act against us, no matter where, will not be tolerated, no matter the provocation. The world had to know that grabbing one of us off the street just for living off the planet was suicide and the dumbest thing the U.S. could have done. To grab an eighty-year-old man, and a civil rights attorney at that, without cause was entirely fucked up, even though Lucius played it off as no big deal,” Jonathan added.
“Well, if they decide to try to come out and get us, they’ll be just as successful as they’ve been trying to get a satellite into orbit,” Rachel said, taking the seat next to Cheryl and slaving her console to Cheryl’s. “Okay, show me what you’ve learned so far.”
* * *
When the colony detached itself from the bedrock of the moon, its population occupied little more than two thirds of the available living space. In the intervening twenty-five years the population growth, though slow, was steadily encroaching on that remaining space. One of the goals of the colony’s council was the construction of several additional space habitats in which to spread its growing population.
Peanut and his engineering team had constructed several smaller stations, like the one orbiting Earth, but the details covered the construction of a habitat capable of housing several thousand residents. The biggest issues on the table were food production, water recycling, and resident selection.
“The latest update from Peanut and Chuck’s departments show about fifteen months to shell, interior floors, and partitions completion. It was brilliant to start with the central decks and build out. Two decks have full atmosphere, the installation of the air systems, and much of the water recycling system, is complete. We should be sending a mission into the asteroid belt in twelve months to retrieve an asteroid that’s predominately ice. What I’d like to discuss today is how we might select those who will relocate to the new habitat,” said Margaret, the council’s current chair. “I’m not looking for any single or definitive answer, just some ideas to toss around.”
There was a brief pause, then Phillip, the colony’s resident ethicist, spoke.
“Obviously no one should be made to go against their will, that goes without saying. But I suspect that we may be seeing many of the younger members of the community deciding to relocate.”
“Why is that?” asked Margaret.
“Wanderlust, perhaps. Maybe wanting to start something new?” Phillip replied.
“I can see that,” Rosie, originally a mechanical engineer, added. “Maybe they’ll decide to relocate somewhere else in the solar system.”
“I don’t know if I see that as such a good idea. The whole reason we’re constructing the second habitat is to provide redundancy should something happen here,” environmental specialist June Temple reminded them. “I’m not comfortable with the idea that were some mishap to occur with one or the other habitat, rescue would be hours or days away. We certainly don’t have enough ships to hold but a fraction of our entire population.”
“That discussion is putting the cart before the horse, but it should definitely be explored soon,” said Margaret.
“Is it something someone should call the question on when the time comes?” Botanist William Thurber asked.
“Perhaps, but let’s just see what the consensus of the community is as we get closer to completion. Chuck told me some of his team were willing to stay over and sleep in the part of the new station with atmosphere and heat to avoid commuting every day. So I guess it’s already habitable,” William said.
“It may b
e a few years before we can build several more similar habitats, until we have a community in space that ensures we will never become extinct. It won’t be long, even with our increased life span, before we live through generational time. What we’re doing now is laying the groundwork for the continuation and growth of our community,” Margaret said.
“What about the space station in orbit around Earth? Surely it won’t be there forever, or am I wrong?” Rosie inquired.
“The plan is to keep it stationed there until we lift the embargo. Once they comply with our demand, and it’s verified, we’ll have no reason to have the station remain in the L4 location,” Phillip replied. “When we called the question on whether to deny the countries of Earth access to space until they destroyed their entire nuclear stockpile, we took on a responsibility to steward the planet out of its most destructive tendencies. Perhaps we would have let them be, but when they fired nuclear missiles at Chris’ mission, he said it was the last straw, and rightly so. But not keeping our space station there once they have satisfied our demand is not really an option. However, that size habitat’s life support can only manage a crew of twenty, at most. Also, there’s not enough cubic to grow enough food to support that many.”
“What if they rearm once we’re gone, Phillip?”
Phillip chuckled, “I hope for their sake they’re not that stupid.”
“We have half a dozen space stations, which would help in an emergency. And Peanut’s department is always coming up with new ideas all the time,” Margaret said. “I think we should discuss the process we’re going to use to divide our population when the time comes.”
“I agree. Inevitably we’re going to have to float the proposal to the entire community, so best we have several contingencies, just in case,” Phillip said. “Surprisingly we have not fallen to the kind of factionalism that many other communities have had in the past. I think the care Christopher took in setting up this community and the skills and judgment of Lucius and Sydney in their selection criteria in choosing who made it here, are the principle reasons we have done well. It’s really been quite extraordinary. I think our efforts here on this issue are going to go much easier than we are all expecting.”
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