Free Planets Falling by James G. Scotson Page B

charted galaxy called themselves, was quite light.
    Most of the creatures - both organic and artificial- bustling throughout the structure was there to tend to the needs of the Platform and its small group of scientists, engineers, and soldiers.  One-third of the structure was dedicated to power generation.  Nearly the remainder of the cube was composed of experimental decks.  These were vast environmental chambers isolated in cold, empty space, allowing for secure terraforming experiments with no risk of contamination to inhabited planets.  If it were sliced in half, it would resemble a busy ant farm in a child's study.
    Stepping into Verat's vacant position in the remote observatory was Grey Commons.  Grey was a year older than Verat and wiry, with the forward stoop of a dedicated runner.  He enjoyed spending hours jogging throughout the many passageways and portals of the Platform.  Stretching his back, he scanned his surroundings.  As expected, the data logs were a mess and the observation area was unkempt - typical style for Verat.  Crumbs littered the control panels.  Grey muttered under his breath as he began sifting through the night's paperwork and, of course, spilling a cup of cold tea on a data pad.
    "Hello Dr. Commons, additional data streams arriving from deployed probes.  Would you like to open a new case file?"
    Grey was confused.  "HM.  You scared the crap out of me. What are you talking about?  I don't know anything about a case?  What happened with Verat?"
    "Anomalous data stream confirmed with replicate probes. Planetary activity recorded.  Energy source unknown but coherent."
    Grey's eyes widened as he began compiling the terrabytes of data accumulating in the central console.  "Yeah, HM, you're right.  Open a new case file.  Call it unknown activity.  Dammit, Verat is dropping the ball again.  I am going to wring him like a sponge."  He tapped on the flashing blue light and it dimmed.
    Like Verat, Grey descended from a long line of exoecologists within the Founding Family Collective of the Terra Institute.  The thought made him feel queasy most of the time, as if the weight of his lineage would create a critical mass, eventually causing him to collapse in a fury of dense, unfulfilled obligations.
    Boy, that would be a great fireworks display he thought.
    Still, he had a genuine passion for biology in his gut and he desperately wanted to understand the processes of biotransformation at a planetary scale.  And to see the first colonists breath deeply of bioengineered air, experience their first spring on a new planet, would fill him with such satisfaction.  Sweet closure - an opportunity to fondly savor the memory of his father and feel his dreaded familial burden lift into space.
    The Platform, perched in its position in deep, cold, lifeless space, may have seemed to be a strange place for scientists so thoughtful and entranced by the wonders of organisms and their relationships.  In many ways, though, it offered a much more diverse set of opportunities than a single planet for the biologically inclined.
    The experimental decks were vast in scale and terrain.  With the aid of a nearly limitless power source, the energy pumped into these levels was solar-like.  The photosynthetic potential was considerable and with that came the opportunity for the researchers to tinker endlessly.
    Of course, each deck required a set of key autotrophic organisms - creatures that could capture the artificial sunlight, transforming the energy into useful molecules, rich with potential.  The plants required to get things cooking in a new deck were not the broad-leaved, veined and barked trees and bushes reaching for the sky in forests on so many worlds.  Rather, the key to terraforming was in the realm of the microscopic.  In this miniature world, tiny organisms held the capacity to do miraculous things with sunshine, making all the building blocks necessary for bulkier and needier life forms in a