Helios: 02 - I - The Miner

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 Hills Outside the Town of Tanque Verde

Apache Junction, Ak-Chin, Republic Territory

0910 Local, February 10, 2481

Douglas Pierce shifted his weight atop his horse, relaying to the animal  he wanted it to stop. It had taken Douglas and his three horses almost  an hour to travel from Tanque Verde to a site in the foothills just  outside the town, where he was looking to stake a claim. His cabin was  about a mile from town, surrounded by nothing but sage-like brush and  cacti. Here in the foothills the climate allowed thick stands of pine  trees to grow. The heat of the Sonoran-like desert below gave way to the  cooler temperatures of the hills, and even snow during the winter  months. Few plants grew in the forest’s understory, which consisted  primarily of rust colored dirt and pebbles. Most of the pine trees  naturally shed their lower branches as they grew, allowing a view  relatively unobstructed by brush.
 

Douglas’ horse stopped not far from the stream running through his  possible claim. The stream was cold and the water was clear, clean.  Douglas dismounted his horse, letting it walk over to the stream for a  refreshing drink. He untied several packs from the backs of the other  two horses and sat them on the ground. His first task was to gather some  wood for a fire then set up his tent for later that evening. Even  though it didn’t get cold enough on a summer’s night here in the  foothills to do a person harm, it was cool enough to make one’s feet  cold.
 

Although the planet of Ak-Chin was one with no 25th Century technology,  it was much better off than worlds such as Keswick, where technology had  only advanced to that of the 15th Century. Ak-Chin’s technological  advancement was about equal to that of 19th Century Europe or the United  States, with a very few exceptions. According to historical records  found by the Republic Exploration and Science Outfit, in 2331 several  large dropcraft made emergency landings on the planet after their  jumpcraft was attacked and all but destroyed. Most of the people aboard  the dropcraft were killed, but approximately 200 survived and were  forced to start new settlements from nothing. Ak-Chin had no  electronics, motor vehicles, or aircraft; even electricity was in its  early infancy on the planet.
 

Planets usually only came to this point one of three ways: a global war  was fought and destroyed a majority of the population and almost all  technology; large groups of people were stranded when their dropcraft  crashed on a planet or couldn’t make it off, or a major disease outbreak  decimated the planet’s population. There were other circumstances under  which civilizations on planets had technological regression rather than  progression, but these were rare. The most common two were so-called  Purists who for one reason or another believed modern technology and  society were evil and left to settle unclaimed planets on the outer  fringes of known space; and dictators who effectively removed technology  from society to make it easier for them to enforce their will upon the  population. Regardless of how a civilization became this way, the end  result was one where certain technological knowledge was lost over  generations.
 

Republic law, along with various treaties, prohibited the advanced  civilizations of the 25th Century from interacting with civilizations  who may not comprehend modern technology such as aircraft and dropcraft.  Within Republic space, planets with these civilizations were claimed by  the Republic and quarantine zones set up around them. Aerospace craft  were not permitted into the quarantine zones, preventing the transfer of  people and equipment onto such planets.
 

Douglas’ normal job was as a blacksmith serving Tanque Verde and the  surrounding area. Yesterday he finished what work he had and closed shop  for two days so he could continue prospecting the site in the  foothills. During a previous trip to the area to try his hand at panning  for gold, he found almost an ounce of the shiny stuff and decided to  return later. This was his third venture into the foothills in as many  months and he was now almost certain there was a gold deposit nearby.  Taking his pick-axe, small shovel, canteen, and a small sack he set out  to survey the surrounding hills.
 

As Douglas walked he could smell the fresh scent of pine trees filling  the air of the undercover. The gentle crunch of dead pine needles  underfoot didn’t stop a bird in the forest canopy from whistling its  tune. The eerie sound of silence in a mountain forest, almost like wind  blowing through distant trees, filled his ears between each footstep and  the bird’s occasional chatter. Douglas scanned the ground for signs of  precious metal deposits, most notably the dark black sand that was  indicative of gold. He walked past several long dark streaks as he made  his way towards the hill to the north of the small dale he set up camp  in. None of the streaks gained his interest until almost ten minutes  later. An almost black streak measuring about two feet wide ran towards  the stream from the direction of the closest hill. This was exactly what  Douglas was searching for, and he followed it to the bottom of the  hill.
 

The hill’s boundary was marked by a sudden incline in the steepness of  the ground and small rock outcroppings sporadically located in the area.  The streak Douglas followed led him straight to one of these outcrops,  one worn by the flow of water from above. Rather than start the tiring  work of picking at the rocky outcrop, he decided to shovel a sample of  the sand below it into his sack and head back to camp. He would put  tonight’s dinner over the fire and pan the dirt while it cooked.
 

Douglas took to the task of setting up the fire and starting it quickly  as he wanted to find out how much gold, if any, was in the sample he  brought back. He lit a handful of dry pine needles and set small sticks  in a pyramid fashion on top of them. He wanted to keep the smoke to a  minimum so he didn’t give away the fact that anyone was here. Once he  had the fire going well, he prepared the food he brought along with him  and hung it in a pot over the fire.
 

With dinner cooking he now turned to the dirt sample, taking it down to  the stream with his gold pan. He squatted down by the edge of the  stream, dipped the pan into the water, and sloshed it around in a  circular motion. A golden nugget, which looked to be several ounces in  weight, clunked around in the bottom of the pan seconds after he began.  Douglas smiled when he heard it in the pan, then something vibrated in  his left pants pocket.
 

“Oh not now,” he said to himself as he set the pan on the ground.
 

He stood up and reached into his pocket, pulling out a small plastic  device resembling a box of chewing tobacco. He flipped the box’s lid  open and looked up at the tiny screen concealed within it. Scrolling  across the screen was “Priority 5 Contact AKN CTL 15.5MHz”. He sighed  angrily, closed the box, and slid it back into his left pocket. Barely  three hours into his current quest for gold and he was interrupted just  as he came across a good sample.
 

Douglas quickly kicked sand onto the fire to extinguish it. While the  embers were cooling, he gathered up his camp and began to put the packs  onto the backs of his horses. By the time the fire’s embers were cool  enough so they didn’t set anything else alight, Douglas had all his  equipment packed, on the horses, and ready to go. The only task  remaining was to get rid of any evidence someone had set up camp here as  well as he could. After that was finished, he mounted his horse and  began the ride down the hills, back to his cabin.
 

As he descended towards the El Tablazon plain, he could catch glimpses  of its rust colored expanse through breaks in the forest canopy. The  area he was surveying to make a possible claim only lay around 5,000  feet above the plain, but that was high enough to see the snow covered  top of Mount Taylor poking above the distant horizon.
  
Almost five years ago Douglas constructed a hidden room on the side of  his cabin in which he set up a low power radio system he could use to  covertly communicate off-planet. He didn’t use the system often, perhaps  only once every two months, but even so he'd grown to dislike it.  Another 45 minutes would pass before Douglas got back to his cabin, and  he wondered what was in store for him once he got settled in to his  secret room.
 

- - -
Douglas closed the gate of the small corral in which he kept his 10  horses and walked towards his cabin. The temperature was already into  the low 100’s on the El Tablazon plain, where Douglas’ cabin and  workshop were located. A warm breeze, just barely noticeable, blew in  from the west but didn’t do much to ease the oven-like temperatures. The  horses thought better of standing in the blistering sun and had moved  into the shade provided by a small pole-barn at the far end of the  corral.
 

The cabin was far from luxurious but it was large for only a single  person. Douglas built it when he first came to Tanque Verde, and added  onto it three times since then.
 

Douglas grabbed the door handle of the cabin's back door and pushed it  open as he walked into the kitchen. Latching the door shut, he continued  on making sure the other doors and windows were also latched. He didn't  want anyone walking in on him while he checked in with his superiors.
 

Electricity was very new on Ak-Chin, and Douglas' cabin was too far from  town for the local power company to run power lines to it. By day, the  interior of his home was lit primarily by sunlight coming in through the  windows. By night, candles and oil lamps illuminated the cabin's cozy  rooms.
 

Entering the larder, Douglas pulled on the hidden release mechanism that  allowed the false wall to swing open. His secret radio room was as dark  as night, the small oil lamp he held providing little illumination. He  checked the fuel and oil levels in the tiny generator then started it.  Once it spooled up to speed he flicked the light switch in the wall to  his right.
 

The room was miniscule, just wide enough to fit a small table at the far  end, and long enough for the generator and table, along with some space  to move the chair a bit. A radio set that looked like something from  hundreds of years ago sat atop the table flanked by a small printer,  scanner, and palmtop computer. Several pencils and a tablet of paper,  which he used to take important notes, lay on the table in front of the  radio.
 

Douglas flipped the radio's power switch then sat down and powered on  the computer. He tore the used top page from the pad of paper and  discarded it as the equipment started and became ready for use. Tapping  the on-screen email icon, Douglas hoped whatever instructions awaited  him would be something quick so he could return to his claim.
 

A single new message sat in his inbox waiting to be read. As he reviewed  it he wrote a few short notes and ideas on how to implement the  instructions on the pad. Two of the things he would need to do were  moving his horses to another corral and planting some TNT near town. He  sent an autoresponse then powered down the equipment.
 

"I've a busy couple days," he thought to himself, "Better get to work."
 

Douglas exited the radio room and ensured the false wall was shut and  looked like a normal wall. He extinguished all the lamps then set off  for the corral to get a horse for the ride into town.