(Another) new idea. Welcome to Pollen.

Purity is Strength.

I was at a loss to know what to write this week, then it occurred to me that you might be interested in a new idea that I’ve had.

As all of them do, it’s been slowly encroaching into my consciousness over the past few weeks. I can see flashes of the action and setting, unconnected fragments that will merge and coalesce over the coming days or weeks. Until I have enough to begin.

This story will be all about ecology and the environment, not Earth’s specifically, the scope is much wider than that.

I’ve used the idea of transplanting endangered species to new planets in a few of my stories. I can’t claim credit for the idea, Alan Dean Foster did it in Cachalot and the idea of transporting extinct species was also featured in the movie Star Trek 4. I’m sure there have been many others, too.

Anyhow, I was playing with the thought that a benign and barren alien planet could be transformed into the repository for all the species that are important to man and a safe space for all those that he has tried to destroy. A bit like an insurance policy, in case any new planets that were discovered harboured pathogens that could damage the things we needed to survive. Or set off a plague that could destroy us.

As usual, I designed a cover, to focus my thoughts,

I came up with the name Pollen for this world and saw it in my mind as a sort of new Eden, with a population of scientists employed by some sort of galactic government agency. All engaged in the task of keeping bio-diversity alive and countering threats to the eco-systems of the populated parts of the galaxy.

I suppose you could call it a sort of guilt trip overkill, after the wanton extinction of so much on Earth. In my mind, Pollen was set up with the determination that it would never happen again.

At this time, I have no idea what I can do with Pollen, I don’t yet see how it will make a story.

I definitely don’t want a Jurassic Park style place, with mad professors breaking the rules, after all, it wouldn’t be practical. What was on Pollen wasn’t supposed to be a threat, it was an important part of the survival of the human race. Pollen was a place of purity, where any problems that man, plants or animal species encountered on new worlds could be solved by the latest in genetic engineering and whatever new technology had been developed.

Which was where I got the slogan, Purity is Strength.

Right now, my mind is full of ideas, but not about the plot, just the place. Pollen is the planet where species are studied, where potentially dangerous crossbreeding or mutation is investigated. In my mind, I see glimpses of its development and the work it does. I can imagine its veterinary surgeons as they work on the planet’s surface and patrol the galaxy, on call to deal with problems, advising on the terraforming process and protecting newly discovered species.

Doing all the things that we had failed to do on Earth; until it was almost too late.

And then, I wondered about a newly qualified member of the Pollen team, how they might begin their working life. They would be keen, idealistic and enthusiastic. They were about to find the truth about Pollen, that it was like nowhere else in the explored galaxy.

What would they be involved in?

Perhaps it will be a case of not one story but many?

Because we just don’t know what we might find out there, what we will have to deal with as we survive and adapt to new worlds.

My character is about to find out what that means. The story begins with his arrival, hence the title,

Welcome to Pollen.

What do you think?

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