Almost everyone has a collection of some sort. Some collect books, some do baseball cards, and others like stamps. Me? I love seeds. Every planet I've been to, and every ship I've been assigned to, one of the things I've always insisted upon as part of my contract as a bodyguard, or whatever, is this. In addition to my pay, I get ten packages of seeds. And they must be diverse packages, no duplicates. To ensure this, I give them a list of my collection so they know what not to give me. I started doing this when I was 18, and now, as I hit my late 30's? I'm finding there's a lot of interest by some botanical scientists who want to know more about my collection, it's gotten really big now. I don't mind sharing a few here and here, but they can't take all of any one type of seed. It's my favorite hobby after all. -- DaniAndShali
They call me Svalbard when they don't want to call me Human Liam. I don't know - nicknames are weird. They call me that longer nickname because I collect seeds. I usually have five of each, ten at the most; each set in little baggies inside a stasis box for storage. When I started, it was a suitcase. Now? Well... there's a reason I have my own ship, and why it's called The Iceberg.
If you need me to explain it... my living quarters are like ten percent of the total mass. The rest of it? Cabinets and closets and drawers of stasis containers full-to-nearly-overflowing with seeds. For every planet I visit, for every culture I do a favour for... I get myself a seed sampler to add to the collection. No doubles, it must be unique to my collection, it must be self-sustaining -no 'self-terminating' seeds- and it must be something from either where I visited or where they're from. As a Human Companion to many, many Havenworlders, you might guess that I've got quite the interesting collection.
What shouldn't be shocking is how many civilisations I've saved with these things. Which leads to my corollary: You must replace that which you take by growing the seeds to fruition. No, you are not allowed to tweak my seeds 'just a little' before you grow them. I insist that my seeds genes are unadulterated by interference when they're replaced. No gmods, only g-variance.
Yes, I test the seeds that come back to me, yes, I have sued people over this for breach of contract. Yes, it's been shockingly profitable.
So what am I going to do with all these genetic archives? I'm already doing it. Because some borrowers are those arseholes, I've got quite a few secure terrariums on assorted rocks I've stitched together. I grow my own backups, in careful ecologies best suited to all. There's teams of volunteers who look after them when I'm away. In fact, there's been some stitching of the ecologies and rocks into something of a little station, out there.
They call it Rushes-o Station, and I have the honour of holding the record for the largest ecological archive in Galactic Space. Which also means I'm the go-to when someone's gmod fails and they have to go back to heritage seeds.
When will they ever learn?
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / Rixie]
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