Atlas Abandoned

Pallas' Dream - The Mammoth (13 months since the crash)

Pallas sat on his dad's shoulders. Atlas was Holding Demeter's hand and the 4 of them strolled down an outer hallway on their space station. The huge windows afforded them a great view of the Earth. Their dad was telling them different random facts about the design of the space station since he was an engineer and helped maintain it all. Pallas was only 7, but he loved hearing his dad talk about how things worked.

"Okay kids, quiz time!" their father set Pallas down next to the others and squatted down to their level.

"How many colonies are there?"

"Six!" blurted Pallas. He was ready for this quiz. It was his favorite thing to hear his dad talk about.

"And which one do we live on?"

"The Phoenix!" the three answered together in classroom-like unison. Their dad laughed and smiled.

"That's right! We live on the Phoenix- It's the newest and prettiest of the space colonies! We're pretty lucky to live here. Now...do you know which colony is the oldest?"

"The Southerner?" Atlas and Demeter both guessed wrong.

"The Northerner?" Pallas guessed next.

"Good job, Pallas! Yeah! The Northerner was the very first space colony- it's over 200 years older than The Phoenix and takes the most work to keep safe. It's very crowded and very dangerous because they send a lot of mean people to live there! The Southerner is just like it and was built right after The Northerner. It's on the opposite side of the Earth from The Phoenix, so we'd never see it from here."

"Why do they do that? What about the nice people that live there?" Atlas expressed his concern.

"Well, Atlas, the nice people that live there usually don't have enough money to leave, but if they work hard and save money, that's what they do. When some people are bad, but not bad enough to go to jail, the grownups try to move them there because it's not as fun to live there. They have older systems and it's cheaper to run them and hold more people. They think if they live on The Northerner for long enough mean people will decide to stop being so mean. Sometimes it works!" Their father could tell he wasn't making much sense to the kids, so he moved on. "Okay, which colony has the coolest science equipment and research labs-"

"Tesla!" Demeter was waiting for this question. She interrupted her dad with excitement. He laughed again.

"That's right, Deemy, The Tesla! That's where your mom worked for a long time, and that's where you'll go when you become a scientist!" He ruffled Demeter's hair. Atlas and Pallas laughed at her playfully. "Okay, you know we have cafeterias and farms here, but do you remember when I told that one of the colonies has a huuuge," their father made exaggerated gestures with his arms while he stretched out the word 'huge' until they all laughed at him, "gigafarm and water collection hub where they make all of the extra food and water that gets sent to the other colonies?" The kids all thought for a moment.

"The Wellspring?" Atlas guessed, unsure.

"You're absolutely right!" their father said.

"But," Atlas continued, "What does Wellspring mean?"

"Good question! Wellspring is just a nice word that the people who paid for that space colony thought would make a good name. It means is a source for something, or a supply of something."

"Like food and water?" Pallas asked.

"Exactly, son!" their father beamed at his boys' curiosity, "But, you know, I think they were thinking of more than that when they named it. You see, kids, when they were finishing The Wellspring, The Northerner and The Southerner were already finished with lots of humans living on them. They were still figuring out the best way to get everyone food and water and were barely able to keep up with how hungry and thirsty everyone was! There was no extra in case something happened. Then something did happen- big fires broke out in cafeterias on both of the colonies in the same year!"