Chapter 416

The Prison Planet

... Since Morales couldn’t leave to get the last of the potatoes with the fish still drying, he went for his shovel and mattock. Finding a place that looked reasonably soft not far from the cave, he marked out the outline with the pick end of his mattock and started digging. It was time he tried firing his clay pots and bowls.

He had watched several videos of people firing pottery, and most of them used different techniques with varying percentages of breakage. The video of African women doing this was different in that their pottery was much bigger and their firing process seemed much simpler. Basically, all they did was place a layer of dry grass in a shallow depression, put the pottery in from the whole village – fifty or more big pieces – then covered everything with a big pile of the thick-stemmed grass, and set the whole thing on fire. The fire was re-supplied with fuel and kept burning, but they threw water on it from time to time to keep the temperature moderate, gradually diminishing the intensity over several hours.

When the pottery had cooled somewhat, it was fished out and partially dunked in a hot water bath with some kind of seeds in it to make the fired clay turn black. And presto, they had perfect pottery that would withstand cooking and would store liquids. If any of their pottery broke, the video didn’t show it.

He had watched other videos where various backyard potters fired their ware with a very high percentage of breakage. But in watching the several videos, he had begun to learn. First of all, the clay bowls, jugs, etc. had to be dry before they could be fired successfully. Any moisture left in the clay would expand and break the piece as it heated in the fire. There were generally two ways of drying it: let it sit in the sun as the African women did, or put it near a small fire for a prolonged period of time. Right or wrong, he decided that the use of the hot, almost desert sun in that part of Africa did a superb job of drying the clay before it went into the fire pit, and this was a major reason they had little or no loss from breakage. In addition, they worked sand and ground-up pottery shards into their clay, and this was supposed to make the pottery resistant to breakage during firing – the reason he had worked what he hoped was the correct amount of powdered sand into his clay.

The hole was dug and he almost put in a layer of materials to fire and preheat the ground, but he stopped. Something kept bugging him.

Back inside the cave, he looked at his pottery lined up along one wall. “It’s not dry enough,” he told no one. “If I fire this now, I’m going to cause most of it to break.” Taking everything outside, he grouped it together but not touching in the wide hole. Well away from the pottery, he circled it with small limbs, rotten wood and grass, and set a small fire. This, he hoped, would finish drying the clay pots and bowls and give him better results when he fired everything for real. “I’ve spent too many hours making this stuff to break it by exposing it to a firing when there is probably still moisture in the clay, particularly in my last – and best – pieces.”

From time to time throughout the day, he kept the border fire going around his attempts at pottery. “All I have is time,” he told Lobo. “I’m going to do this right – if I can.”

Knowing that the dried fish would present another problem, he began digging out more shelves. When he thought he had enough space prepared, he sawed out more boards and constructed long, shallow boxes to fit his new shelves. I really need to make more boards for covers for the boxes, but damn, I’m tired of sawing. Another thing I can catch up on this winter when it’s too cold to get out much is to saw out a supply of lumber to have on hand when I need it. I’m building with green lumber which, according to what I have read, is probably going to warp as it dries, and will look like shit. Maybe I can saw out enough lumber during the winter to have sufficient dried lumber one of these days. Shit. Always something that I need to do.

Finally, about midday, the fish was dry, and he began bringing it in and storing it in his boxed shelves.

He had two lanterns, but other than testing it, he just kept the second lantern for a spare, should something happen to the one he used all the time. But he was expanding farther into the cave and had to keep the lantern close to give him sufficient light to work by. Taking time out, he bored several holes in the walls and drove long pegs in so there would always have a convenient place to hang the lantern as he moved from one work area to another.

As he finished storing the last of the dried fish, he stood looking into the darkness of the cave. “I have to take time out and thoroughly explore this place. That draft isn’t strong, but it’s coming from somewhere. No telling what I missed when I went back there with what was basically just a large candle. With one of these big ass lanterns, I won’t be as creeped out by the cave going on and on seemingly forever,” he said aloud as he tried to convince himself.

Lobo stood looking at the fish until Morales grinned and handed him a piece. “Boy, you have even more appetite than I do.”

Back at the front of the cave, he checked the position of the sun. “We have time for a quick trip, Lobo. Get your gear and let’s go check out how many potatoes we can find.”

Of course, Lobo’s armament was part of him, so he was ready long before his friend. Whether the wolf understood Morales’ humor or not, he was waiting by the bars when the man was ready. As he pulled the last of the bars into place and started down the entranceway with the case, he wondered how long he should wait before putting the two new hens in the fenced-in area. If I clip their wings and another badger shows up, they might not be able to get in the tree fast enough, and besides that, that article about badgers said those fuckers can climb. But if I don’t clip the hens’ wings, they could fly over the fence and haul ass for the valley. Chances of getting them back would be zero to none. Fuck. Guess I’ll just keep fattening them up and see what happens.

At the valley, he set about digging up the potatoes he had left to mature. This time, he got everything, culling nothing no matter how small. When he had exhausted the plot, he had a little more than a half case full. “Enough to last us for weeks,” he told the wolf. “But let’s look around and see if there are more carrots that have matured since we got the others.”

However, instead of turning left toward the carrots when he got back to the stream, curiosity got him and he turned right, which is to say, away from the direction of the cave. Going was rough for a couple of hundred yards until he worked his way clear of a thicket of small trees to stop and stare.

“What in the hell is that?”

After he got a little closer, he decided that it must be a field of bamboo, but it just didn’t look quite like the other cane that was nearer to the cave. That cane seemed to grow from small stalks to what could be considered trees, and had a much more substantial look to it. But this looks almost like some type of food crop, his mind kept telling him.

Whatever it was must have once been planted in rows, but was now pretty much random growth almost impossible to penetrate without pushing the plants over. Those stretched from obvious new growth in the rich, soft soil beside the stream to twenty foot tall stalks jointed every foot or so similar to bamboo

He didn’t know what made him do it, but he cut one down with his knife, then cut out one of the foot-long sections. The whole center of the stalk was made up of a porous, pithy-like substance and it was moist. He didn’t know why he did it, but he bit into the substance, then froze for a moment while a grin spread across his face.

“Well, I’ll be damned, Lobo. This is fucking sweet as sugar.” And ... his mind woke up. “This must be fucking sugar cane.” Cutting off another piece, he put it into his mouth and bit down hard. Sweet exploded across receptors that had not tasted anything of that nature for a time.

Taking his larger knife from its sheath, he cut a dozen of the biggest canes, then cut them in half and bound the bundle with rawhide so he could take it in his case.

“I need to do some reading, Boy. But even if I can’t figure out how to make sugar, this stuff is sure as hell good to chew on, and there’s a whole damn field of it.”

As he started to turn away from the cane, he noticed another field just past a thin border of trees on the side of the cane field. What the fuck? he thought as he watched the light wind ripple through the golden stalks. “That isn’t wheat,” he said aloud, “but ... it must be oats. That has to be what that is. I’ve seen fields of it on a commercial.” Racking his brain, he tried to think of the advertisement. Some kind of cereal, he decided. Yeah. That’s it – cereal. Then with a laugh, he dismissed the thought. What good is cereal without milk and sugar? His eyes locked on the sugar cane in his case. “There’s sugar in that cane, Lobo. Now if I can just figure out how to get it out, I could have ... What? Water over oat cereal? Oh, yeah, water over sweet oat cereal. That sounds appetizing – not.

“Fuck it. Let’s go home, Lobo.”

Back in the cave, he sorted the potatoes and stored them, being careful to cover them properly in his potato storage area well back in the pitch-blackness, all the while making sure that none of the potatoes touched its neighbor.

There was a small pile left that he had accidentally cut with his digging fork or otherwise had blemishes. These he would use in the next few days, long before they spoiled.

He had dug the hole for his pottery roughly two and a half feet deep and, in addition, had piled the extracted dirt around the edges – reasoning that the extra height would reflect back the heat even more as the pottery was fired. Throughout the afternoon, he continued to keep the small fire burning around the outer edge of the bottom of the hole in an attempt to keep his creations hot enough to dry all the water out of the clay, but not cause the water to convert to steam and explosively destroy the pottery.

As night neared, he had to make a decision. Should he keep the border fire going all night, or should he stop it now and bring everything in for the night? Thunderstorms in the wee hours seemed to come on a devilishly regular basis, but lately, the fall weather appeared to have turned dry. As he stood looking toward the distant mountains with the slanting evening sunlight striking and enhancing the autumn colors of the trees, he decided to risk it. “The worst that can happen is it will get wet and maybe break. I’ve spent a lot of hours making it, but if I don’t have it dry when I fire it, it will self-destruct, anyway. And besides, with the small fire, the pottery isn’t very hot – just uncomfortable to the touch. Maybe it won’t break even if it does rain.”

After eating his meal and playing with the chickens by throwing them corn and calling their names to come get each grain, he spent the rest of the evening sawing out more boards. When he had used up the last of the log he had been sawing into planks, he was covered in sweat and sawdust. A quick sponge bath in warm water and he was ready to join Junior in bed.

A couple of hours later, he awoke, dressed and went out with his lantern to replenish his drying fire around his pottery. Cautious at going out at night, he held the lantern high with his left hand while his crossbow was ready in his right. Lobo, of course, came out with him to circle the area and stand guard for his master. Replenishing the wood for the small fire was simple and he was back inside a few minutes later.

A couple of hours later, he did the same thing again, much to Junior’s disgruntlement for disturbing his, or her, sleep.

Sometime later, deep in dreamland, he was jarred awake to sit bolt upright as Gertrude let loose with the loudest, most discordant racket he had ever heard – and she kept on making it.

One hand fumbled for his crossbow as the other snapped the lantern on to accompany Lobo’s belated growls that added to the cacophony of sounds.