Starship Armstrong - Season 1

Part 4 - The Serfs of Al-Qaum (IV)

The Armstrong made the run to Ceres in less than a day. Turlin Marlowe noted that this made the ship at least twice as fast as anything the Al-Qaum Empire had access to, and that's if the Armstrong had been operating at top speeds.

Ceres was a reddish gas giant orbited by a dozen moons, four of which had natural conditions on them ideally suited for terrestrial farming. This is what earned the planet it's name. All four of these agricultural worlds were controlled by the Al-Qaum Empire, and formed it's bread basket. The strategic importance of this planetary system meant that it was guarded by four Sultan-class starcruisers, one per colonized moon.

The Armstrong altered it's orbit to bring it as close as possible to Manticore, the third moon of Ceres. Marlowe had been in communication with the administration there via Ansible and had arranged for the crew to tour the agricultural facilities. This time the Captain stayed aboard, and sent Commander Gibson and Dr. Kang, along with two of Dr. Kang's assistants, to evaluate the facilities there.

The group boarded the Vostok, another of the Armstrong's shuttles, and took off for the surface. The Vostok was smaller and more spartan than the Apollo, offering only just enough room for it's four passengers.

Manticore had only one starport, which was small and half-deserted. The Vostok landed there and it's passengers disembarked. There were no civilian vessels that Gibson could see, only a few imperial shuttlecraft from one of the Sultans.

The seneschal to Count Theodaniel Wellington, Planetary Lord of Manticore, met the group at the starport's exit. Marlowe assured them that he was the man on Manticore who actually made decisions.

Marlowe introduced them.

"Seneschal, this is Commander Gibson and Dr. Kang from the Huxley Foundation. Commander Gibson, Dr. Kang, this is Seneschal Mirvor Renfield, personal assistant to the Lord of Manticore."

"You're here to upgrade our systems?" asked the seneschal.

"That's our hope. At the moment we're just here to have a look at what you've got and see if there's anything we can do for you," said Gibson.

"In that case let me show you our operation," said the seneschal.

The seneschal was dressed similarly to Marlowe, in the manner of the old imperial nobility but with a few concessions to practicality. The only exception was the seneschal was dripping with gaudy jewelry. He waved one of his bejeweled hands to indicate that the group should follow him.

The starport was atop the main administrative building which also served as the transport hub for a simple magrail system. The seneschal took them on a private train to one of the processing centers.

The processing center was factory-like building so large that it housed it's own magrail station. Massive cylindrical machines dominated the high-ceilinged building, and forced everyone to yell over their loud humming. Around them workers adjusted machines and added ingredients to large pools of liquid food.

"Each processing center is surrounded by collective farms which provide it with raw materials," explained the seneschal "We farm grains and vegetables on the land, algae in the ocean and fungus underground. Once the raw materials are brought here they're processed into seven different types of basic nutrition block, which can be flavored and texturized to reproduce any kind of food."

The processing center was about what Gibson and Kang had been expecting, the usual interplanetary-scale agricultural set up of the late empire. They could probably make a few suggestions to improve efficiency, but if they wanted to have a real impact without having to completely overall the system they'd need to focus on the farming methods.

"What about the farms? What can you tell us about them?" asked Commander Gibson.

"Not much to tell," said the seneschal "Basic collective farms, minimal automation, mostly tended to by agricultural serfs."

The seneschal had already lost Dr. Kang's attention, and Gibson was playing it cool, but one of Dr. Kang's assistants gasped.

"Agricultural serfs?" asked Gibson.

"Yes, of course," said the seneschal, a little unsettled by the reaction he was getting "They've lived on this world for as long as it's been settled by humans. This is the only way of life they know. They sort of... come with the planet."