made out of solid rock."
Wendy smiled grimly. "Angel isn't quite that bad… but itcomes pretty close. Up until roughlyone hundred thousand years ago, Angel was a perfectly ordinary Earth-type planet similar to HiHo, but wetter. Then a nickel-iron asteroid came along, hit the planet, and bounced into space.
"Our scientists say that the asteroid was about fifty miles across, weighed in at a couple of quadrillion tons, and was moving at roughly thirty miles a second when it hit. You can still see the scar along Angel's equator. It's two hundred miles wide and a thousand miles long.
"Needless to say, the collision threw a tremendous amount of matter into the atmosphere. Enough to drastically reduce the amount of sunlight that reached the planet's surface, kill off most of the vegetation, and the animals that fed on it.
"In the meantime the impact triggered major volcanic eruptions, creating even more dust and smoke, not to mention rivers of molten lava."
Wendy put down her fork. "There wasn't much left by the time the whole thing was over."
Lando tried to imagine what it would look like as an asteroid hit a planet, caromed off, and disappeared into space. The scale was so huge, so awesome, that he couldn't quite grasp it.
"So what's Angel like now?"
Wendy's eyes lit up. "It's beautiful, not in the ordinary sense perhaps, but beautiful nonetheless.
"The impact scar filled with lava soon after the collision, and with water after that. From space it looks like a long, narrow canal. We call it the Finger of God, because for reasons known only to her, that's where she touched our planet. There's no life in it, due to the sulfur compounds which bubble up from below. It's beautiful, though. The water is always warm, and the beaches are made of black sand…."
Wendy paused for a moment, as if remembering something long past. She was back a few seconds later.
"I should also mention that there's some primitive plant life in the oceans that cover about eighty percent of Angel's surface. That, along with some pre-collision ground cover that managed to survive the long twilight, provides us with plenty of oxygen. Our volcanos outgas enough CO 2 to keep the biosphere in balance.
"The continents are rugged, extremely mountainous, and largely barren. There's very little soil along the ridge tops,
or on the slopes for that matter, because wind and rain push most of it downhill. That's where we live, in the valleys, or on small plateaus."
Wendy pushed her plate away and took another sip of tea. "What soil we have tends to be dry and sterile. We want to bring in Earth-type plants, but that requires chemicals, and bacteria."
"Which brings us back to the fertilizer," Lando said thoughtfully. "You need fertilizer to grow crops. So what's the problem? Since when does fertilizer qualify as a 'controlled substance'? And why hire me? A tramp freighter would cost a lot less."
Troon cleared his throat. Lando noticed that his salad was still untouched.
"First you must understand that the settlers own fifty percent of Angel. The rest belongs to a corporation called Mega-Metals."
"That's right," Wendy put in. "The elders couldn't afford to purchase the entire planet. So when Angel came on the market, they bought half of it, hoping to raise the rest of the money before another buyer came along."
Troon shrugged. "But time went by, the colonists were unable to raise the money, and Mega-Metals bought the other half. Angel has some good iron and nickel deposits, which when combined with mineral-rich asteroidal debris, makes the planet well worth mining."
"Not just any mines," Wendy said heatedly, "but open pit mines, huge ugly things that look like skin ulcers."
"Yes," Troon agreed evenly. "And because those mines are rather profitable… the company offered to buy the rest of the planet from the colonists."
"An offer that we refused," Wendy said indignantly. "It's our world and we plan to stay."
"Unless they're forced out," Troon continued
Wendy smiled grimly. "Angel isn't quite that bad… but itcomes pretty close. Up until roughlyone hundred thousand years ago, Angel was a perfectly ordinary Earth-type planet similar to HiHo, but wetter. Then a nickel-iron asteroid came along, hit the planet, and bounced into space.
"Our scientists say that the asteroid was about fifty miles across, weighed in at a couple of quadrillion tons, and was moving at roughly thirty miles a second when it hit. You can still see the scar along Angel's equator. It's two hundred miles wide and a thousand miles long.
"Needless to say, the collision threw a tremendous amount of matter into the atmosphere. Enough to drastically reduce the amount of sunlight that reached the planet's surface, kill off most of the vegetation, and the animals that fed on it.
"In the meantime the impact triggered major volcanic eruptions, creating even more dust and smoke, not to mention rivers of molten lava."
Wendy put down her fork. "There wasn't much left by the time the whole thing was over."
Lando tried to imagine what it would look like as an asteroid hit a planet, caromed off, and disappeared into space. The scale was so huge, so awesome, that he couldn't quite grasp it.
"So what's Angel like now?"
Wendy's eyes lit up. "It's beautiful, not in the ordinary sense perhaps, but beautiful nonetheless.
"The impact scar filled with lava soon after the collision, and with water after that. From space it looks like a long, narrow canal. We call it the Finger of God, because for reasons known only to her, that's where she touched our planet. There's no life in it, due to the sulfur compounds which bubble up from below. It's beautiful, though. The water is always warm, and the beaches are made of black sand…."
Wendy paused for a moment, as if remembering something long past. She was back a few seconds later.
"I should also mention that there's some primitive plant life in the oceans that cover about eighty percent of Angel's surface. That, along with some pre-collision ground cover that managed to survive the long twilight, provides us with plenty of oxygen. Our volcanos outgas enough CO 2 to keep the biosphere in balance.
"The continents are rugged, extremely mountainous, and largely barren. There's very little soil along the ridge tops,
or on the slopes for that matter, because wind and rain push most of it downhill. That's where we live, in the valleys, or on small plateaus."
Wendy pushed her plate away and took another sip of tea. "What soil we have tends to be dry and sterile. We want to bring in Earth-type plants, but that requires chemicals, and bacteria."
"Which brings us back to the fertilizer," Lando said thoughtfully. "You need fertilizer to grow crops. So what's the problem? Since when does fertilizer qualify as a 'controlled substance'? And why hire me? A tramp freighter would cost a lot less."
Troon cleared his throat. Lando noticed that his salad was still untouched.
"First you must understand that the settlers own fifty percent of Angel. The rest belongs to a corporation called Mega-Metals."
"That's right," Wendy put in. "The elders couldn't afford to purchase the entire planet. So when Angel came on the market, they bought half of it, hoping to raise the rest of the money before another buyer came along."
Troon shrugged. "But time went by, the colonists were unable to raise the money, and Mega-Metals bought the other half. Angel has some good iron and nickel deposits, which when combined with mineral-rich asteroidal debris, makes the planet well worth mining."
"Not just any mines," Wendy said heatedly, "but open pit mines, huge ugly things that look like skin ulcers."
"Yes," Troon agreed evenly. "And because those mines are rather profitable… the company offered to buy the rest of the planet from the colonists."
"An offer that we refused," Wendy said indignantly. "It's our world and we plan to stay."
"Unless they're forced out," Troon continued
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