Fish of the Sea

[Mel Rose]

It was the first time she had set foot on the planet. The campus of the faculty of agricultural sciences of Kyushu University was genuinely impressive. No wonder, she thought, that a nation so dependent on traditional methods of feeding its population put so much money and power behind its education in that area.

She looked for directions on her PAD to the labs where she was supposed to meet with Honda. Hano was not here this time, but she hoped the young scientist would stutter less when he was on his home turf.

In the meantime, she had been reading more about the plight of Kusari fish. The situation was exactly as it had been described to her by the two Kusarians the month before in Nobuyuki’s office. Samura had hit the jackpot with the Kurile plankton, which adapted itself immediately to the new environment, but had made itself — and whole of Kusari — calamitiously dependent on the alien organisms from the Sigma planet. The GMG takeover was actually far more disastrous than what anyone expected.

“Rose-sama,” she heard from behind her. She turned around. Honda bowed as was Kusarian custom. She didn’t bow back. She couldn’t find the custom anything but pretentious.

“Good morning. Hope the second round of research ended up being promising.”

“I’m happy to say that it was a great success,” he raised his head. “We have confirmed our previous findings and found a species of algae that would be a perfect source of food for forage fish on Junyo. I have the results with me,” he passed her a file from a messenger bag that he carried. “I was just walking back to the faculty building, I can give you the summary on the way.”

“Let’s go then. I can hardly be bothered to read jargon-dense research notes and I’m eager to hear what you found.” The pair directed their steps towards one of the taller buildings of the campus.

“Well,” the researcher began, “we stated with a chemical analysis of the Junyo water. It is much more sterile than typical ocean water on other planets, there are very few organisms other than the Kurile plankton. When we introduced various species of algae directly into the water, just to see what would happen, the alien organisms consumed it almost entirely in a very short period of time. We ended up having to grow the seaweed in separate tanks and replant them when they reached maturity. That would be a serious setback — the cost of replanting the seaweeds on the deep Junyo sea floor would be gigantic.”

“How gigantic?” Rose asked with a hint of worry in her voice.

“Too large to be feasible at scale. Thankfully, one of my assistants suggested that we pass through the water from the separate tanks through the chemical lab as a control group. In one of the tanks there was a slightly higher concentration of silver. We started adding HydroGro to the water, just to see what would happen. After a few days the number of silver particles increased dramatically and the water was visibly more pure. We moved the plant to the tank with the Kurile organisms and not only did it not get consumed but actually the antibacterial properties of silver resulted in killing off much of the alien plankton.”

“Interesting. So you think these weeds could clear out the Kurile bacteria entirely from Junyo?”

Honda shook his head. “Unlikely, not in the short term. The introduction of the bacteria took fifty years and that was a ‘quick process.’ However, perhaps if we could convince at least one of the fisheries to let us plant the grown seaweeds on the seabed, I am fairly certain we could sterilise an area of the sea from microorganisms. Once that’s done, maybe we could begin rebuilding something of a regular ecosystem there.”

“I see," Rose replied matter-of-factly. The entire endeavour genuinely started to pique her interest. "I’ll talk to Hano about this. And I’ll read your notes. We’ll be in touch.”

* * *

Three days after visiting the Kyushu University campus Rose sat once again in Nobuyuki’s office sipping coffee.

“These research notes, have you found anything interesting in them?” she asked looking at the ceiling.

“Not really. Everything confirmed what you’d told me. I did get in touch with the fisheries. The manager of only one responded. He had some curious stories.” Hano spoke slowly, multitasking the response with typing on his desktop console.

“I don’t care about his stories, I want to know if he wants to make a deal,” Rose’s eyes didn’t leave the ceiling for a moment.

The accountant tapped the console a few more times. The printer started spitting out some pages while he sat back and looked at Rose. “He wants to sell the fishery, actually, convinced that Samura isn’t taking Kurile back. When I explained the situation, he didn’t even want that much, far below market value in my view. But—”

“Excellent,” she interrupted him and moved her gaze from the ceiling to the door. “I don’t need anything else then, I’m gonna get out of here.”

“Wait, wait,” he slapped the desk. “There’s a bit more to it. And I think it’s a pretty big deal. Apparently some of his workers, especially those who worked closest with the fish and the water, have recently started getting quite sick. Some of the people working on those platforms, especially the blue-collars who stay there for months, and eat nothing but the products of those fisheries, have been showing symptoms. He seemed convinced that this stuff is somehow toxic.”

Rose glanced at him and raised an eyebrow. “Seriously? Haven’t you considered that it might just be cosmic radiation or microwaves or other assorted esoteric xenoepiphenomena?”

The printer stopped. “You don’t sound convinced,” Hano stood up and took the papers.

“I’m not. But if he’s willing to let us make money for free I’m going to indulge him.”

“Fair enough. The papers are ready for you to sign, then,” he put the stack in front of her, “and and a new one is going to be under your belt.”

Rose read through the first page. “AgInfusion?”

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Jennifer Haze Does Not Exist :: Filing Cabinet :: Swords into Plowshares
Liminality :: Good in Red :: Past to Present :: Fish of the Sea