Ad Astra :: Star Trek Fanfiction Archive ^{Beam me up, Scotty.}

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The Star Beagle Adventures                                                
Episode 7: The Roundabout
Scene 4: Roofing

7.4
Roofing

“I thought you said we could cause an economic tsunami,” Spike mused.

“I’m really pleased you were listening,” Pel responded. “Sakura’s engineers will need to be very careful that none of the natives see what they’re doing to those elevators. We won’t be giving them any technology they don’t already have. In 20 years, they could take those elevators apart and not find any evidence of advanced technology. What is revolutionary is how fast those improvements will be made. Nakamura Enterprises will be using advanced technology, well, radically advanced as far as these people are concerned, to make those upgrades. So the contamination danger comes not with the improvements themselves, but with any chance that the natives might see how those improvements are being accomplished…”

Spike and Pel were in the U.S.S. Puppy, which was towing Pel’s new shuttle. It was a large vehicle, designed for carrying mining supplies and even small payloads. It was neither the best nor the worst shuttle available, but was not currently spaceworthy and had been left derelict for decades. Spike and the other marines were surprised the mining director had been willing to part with even a non-functional shuttle just to get the elevator project started. Pel had explained to them the relative economics from the director’s point of view, but the economics went well over everyone’s head. Which Pel, frankly, found astonishing - ferengi children would understand these concepts intuitively. He sometimes found himself wondering  how humans had managed to make it into space at all.

Not only had Abelind provided a shuttle, but he also, in return for a taste of several exotic foods, had thrown in a small shipment of raw ghoal.

“I actually understood all that,” said Spike. “So how are Sakura’s engineers going to make sure the locals don’t find out about all the advanced tech they’re using to fix those elevators?”

Pel laughed. “They’re Nakamura Enterprises engineers. Corporate secrets, ultra-high tech espionage, and general skulduggery are their stock in trade. Star Fleet could learn a trick from them.” Pel made an amused noise. “The Ferengi Commerce Authority could learn a trick from them. But they’re not sharing. That’s the one thing they don’t do.”

“So what is the value of all that nasty smelling tar in the back of your new shuttle?” asked Spike. 

“Not very much to the vast majority of people in this system,” Pel rejoined. “Ghoal has to be refined and it takes a lot of that stuff to make an amount of either fuel or building plastics to be of economically significant value. No merchant is going to purchase that payload - it’s an insignificant amount. Which is why there’s no effort to provide security at these mines.”

“I know you have a plan for that stuff, though,” said Spike.

Pel laughed. “I can see why Skip Howard likes you. Yes, that ghoal is very valuable to us. I’m giving a quarter ton of it to Sakura and her engineers to study. If we get in trouble and need to leverage some serious economic power, it could be very helpful to have a new refining technique to barter with.”

“I thought you were worried about creating an economic tsunami…” Spike prodded.

“Backup planning only,” Pel rejoined. “In a pinch it would be better to leverage economic power than military power. I’m far from certain which would be more dangerous to them in the long run. But it’s always best to have some soft power options in case things go horribly wrong. And with these people, especially given the nature of their society I’ve been able to discern so far, there are a lot of ways that first contact with them can go horribly wrong both for them and for us.”

“Okay,” said Spike. “So what do you plan to do with the other ton and a half or so of that stuff?”

The minuscule ferengi smiled. “When I was researching the coin of this realm, it became obvious that their entire economy runs on ghoal. So I became a ghoal expert - I studied everything about it that I could find in their radio traffic. And there is a lot to be found. The substance was created by an unusual stellar event - a sort of failed super-nova well over 2 billion years ago. The stellar explosion created the chemical and sent billions of tons of it into the local systems.”

Pel gestured toward the port and stern of the craft. “That moon we just left is almost entirely made of the stuff. But ghoal was first discovered on a planet colonized almost exclusively by the heethed. The local farmers used it for a roofing material. They made the mistake of trading a small amount of it to interstellar merchants, who discovered it was a powerful fuel source and within 20 years, millions of miners pretty much destroyed the local ecology and removed almost the entire planetary store of it. Even taking the roofs off of the houses and barns of the local farmers.”

“Which means?” Spike asked.

“Which means there are a large number of farmers on the planet Gheethal who would really like to have a few tons of ghoal for roofing. There are better materials, but they can no longer afford those materials. The merchants who sell those materials don’t think it’s worth their while to drag a shipment of refined ghoal to a remote planet to trade for a pile of agricultural products from a grumbly lot of suspicious farmers.”

“Not worth their while, but worth yours?” Spike asked.

“It’s an old ferengi business strategy,” Pel replied. “Build a network of customers and business partners and leverage those relationships. Economic diversity within such a network is a strength. Especially if you are the one and only person that those disparate economic actors have in common.”

“Which is why your shuttle is going to Gheethal,” Spike concluded.

“We’ll dock with Beagle first, to offload some cargo, make the ship operational, and pick up a few other items that might be helpful in developing a relationship with the farmers of Gheethal,” said Pel.

7.4