The Storyteller's World: Book Two of The Promised Land Trilogy by Jason Lambright

The Storyteller's World: Book Two of The Promised Land Trilogy by Jason Lambright

Author:Jason Lambright [Lambright, Jason]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-01-17T00:00:00+00:00


20

Lakeesha wiped her brow. “Damn, Joe. This has been a lot of bullshit, but look!”

Joe looked over the factory-sized grow fields; the inflatable greenhouse protected the plots. She was right, he thought. It had been a lot of bullshit, the prep and now the planting. Outside, it was summer day, but the winter would come too soon. Without the grow lights and the heat, their Earth crops would die before they even had a chance to germinate.

But here, they might thrive. It was a chance, and they had done their best. Now, it was a matter of waiting. He smelled the dirt, the sheer fertility of this place. He had run his hands through the dirt. He had personally planted cucumbers and zucchini.

Never in his life had he lusted fresh zucchini as he did now. Rations were tight, and the local supplements were few.

His mouth turned down a bit. Don’t bother, he thought, to come to Diana if you don’t like mushrooms. A lot. Just this morning, he had eaten a small toadstool for breakfast, along with a sliver of mudfish. The mushroom was OK, but he had choked down the carp-like fish. The repast kept him going, but his mouth watered at the thought of a real tomato. Or lettuce. Something, anything but the meager fare discovered so far.

He surveyed the fields. They were planted with quick-growing hybrids, from sweet corn to beans. God, could he go for a bowl of beans. Corn on the cob served with a salad. A glass of raw corn whisky. Cornbread. A thick steak.

He shook his head. Unless some large, edible animal were found, there would be no steak. The best so far had been mudfish, which weren’t great. The nursery was busy with raising goat clones. They would decant pretty soon. But Joe feared that the goats would die immediately when they ate something poisonous, as goats tended to do.

Joe thought the problem over. Goats would also add to the food burden of the settlement; they needed grains of some sort, and Diana’s flora mostly used spores as opposed to seeds. Few seeds, few grains, and an enduring dependence on Earth crops, which needed the greenhouse for their too-long growth cycle. He spoke.

“Yeah, Lakeesha, it’s impressive.” He waved at the long beds. “But for a couple of thousand people, we need local crops. And so far, we are fucked.”

She wiped her brow. “I know. But don’t rain on my parade, Johnstone.”

Joe shrugged. “I’m not. Just sayin’.”

“Our variety of Golden Bantam takes sixty-one days to grow. Sixty-one fucking days.” It was her turn to shake her head. “Gonna be a long sixty-one days.”

“Yeah. But if it works, we’ll have a feast of corn on the cob.”

“Shee-it. Corn on the fucking cob and a side of beans.”

“Provider?”

“Yeah, that’s one. Bush beans. But we’re using Rattlesnake planted with the corn, too.”

Joe vaguely remembered something. He spoke. “You’re using a Three-Sisters Garden?”

She nodded. “Maximum grow density for the crops. That’s why we only have an experimental seed crop of wheat.



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