"Permaculture Mission to Earth 2.X" – New Myth #74 for Kids by Willi Paul, Planetshifter.com Media +PDF

Earth 2.x soil is dark grey, cruncky and spongey like a dirty old marshmallow mattress. Deep purple plant-like stuff is growing in shouts here and there. Everyone agrees that the solar green house for the baby veggies can't wait! No one thinks this will be like Bill Mollison's Eden.

NASA maintains that the water table is a mere 3 feet under their boots but water from Earth remains bountiful , leftover from their brief space journey, and there are more immediate tasks to tackle just now.

Prying and morphing the potential out of the spent space ship is proving easier than expected. Pulling aluminum! The first mission cartoon on the sister planet.

Think air stream trailer with wing extensions and weirder angles, the barracks is shaping up like a Frank Gehry dream on 16 wheels.

* * * * * * *

Back on Mother Earth, Mission Control is getting huge PR and laughs out of the new recycled and re-use-based mini station (RRMS) on Earth 2.X. The irony is that the price tag for this "bag of pop cans" and small array of solar panels is in the zillions of dollars. For many years to come, if the ship didn't bring it, they would be out of it. In steadfast transition, they dismantle, use, save, or label and store everything from the original ship in their LAN-drive tablets and cloud computers.

Permaculture Specialist Sara Wright has a fairly flat topography to grid and build a few berms, swales - and a path – maybe a 2.X pond?

Heather Newberry, IT and Green Building Project Manager, is raising antennae and tracing the billions of cables into the new station control center as the communication black-out period approaches between the two planets.

Alec Dupree, a French National, hurriedly transfers the tender vegetable shoots into the green house, plainly concerned about time to harvest and lack of seasonings!

There is no down time on Earth 2.X. Just work and sleep and wonder.

* * * * * * *

"What is that thing?" NASA is always online, awake. "Move your trowel, please Sara!"

"Sure thing. Looks like,- a,- fossil."

"Copy that."

Can you photo measure it and send your data back to Mission Control asap."

"Don't disturb it any more than you have."

Heather screams over to the dig site with shock and awe with her 5'-2" frame.

"Looks like a bone alright but not from Earth."

"There must be others, yes?"

"Could this fragment be herbaceous?" pries Sara.

"Only one way to find out. We need a small sample for VAM-01.

* * * * * * *

Sara sets up a simple experiment in the new solar-powered greenhouse. She carefully prepares the following soil types:

100% Earth 2.X soil

100% Mother Earth soil

100% Mother Earth compost

75% Earth 2.X soil with 25% Mother Earth compost

75% Mother Earth soil with 25% Mother Earth compost

50% - 50% Earth 2.X soil and Mother Earth soil

Light, water, temperature and seedlings constants, "What about the air chemistry and atmosphere here, she asks to no one."

* * * * * * *

NASA calling: "We did a macro-LifeScan for living tissues and structures on that planet, guys."

"Well?" shouts Alec and Heather.

"At this point we think Earth 2.X has an internal neural net."

"Can you define that, Captain?"

"It's like a big brain, processing stimuli and physical data."

"So that so-called bone fragment is part of this neural net?"

"Yes, tread softly."

* * * * * * *

[ four months later ]

Permaculturnauts Sara and Alec figured-out how to connect the green house support system (water, light, soil) to Earth 2.X's neural net. There is a cellular membrane that allows the crew to tap into the support of the net while maintaining ultimate control over growing processes and the yield.

Heather is running out of materials to re-use from the first ship so the NASA's plan is to send a second Earth 2.X mission to the planet that can add additional living space and energy support systems. Importantly, the original batch of Earth soil has been morphed into super soil with the compost and local soil.

The crew has requested that some farm animals be sent up as well to continue their experiments and have a steak once in a while.

The Earth 2.X web site has gotten so much attention that NASA has hired 70 more techies to keep the chats and reports going. People consistently want to know if Earth 2.X has a brain? A soul?

What is deep in the planet's core?

* * * * * * *

"Control, we have a local area network issue, copy?" screamed Alec.

"Copy that, Earth 2.X. Go ahead."

"We are being code bombed! I think the planet has infiltrated our computer systems. All I see are thousands of code-like symbols cascading down my green house monitor! Don't you see this on your screens there?"

"No - We are sharing this incident at this time."

"Help!" pleads Alec.

* * * * * * *

[ three years later ]

A rescue ship lands on Earth 2.X but finds no trace of the first crew or their barracks, greenhouse or control center.