All the fish.

Posted on Mon 24th Feb, 2025 @ 1:46am by Lieutenant Claire Minelan

856 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: The Phoenix Gamble
Location: Romulan Farm

All it had taken to fix the issue was....fish.

Fish, from which the very building blocks of human civilization was built...for humans had been fishing since the beginning of time. Fish had solved the problem of the failing Romulan farm. There was an irony there that completely confounded Claire, for fishing was not a part of the civilization the Romulan's had built. They revered the element of water, in the form of rain, but didn't have much in the way of edible anything from the water.

Aquatic ecosystems were something that she'd found out were something that most Romulans overlooked as a matter of course. Only the poorest would grub the waterways in search of food. The Romulan native fish were not tasty, though they were edible if cooked so fully as to eliminate any flavor they had. The river fishermen were the poorest of the poor and they were almost not Romulan, to hear the uppity men that were a part of the Romulan delegation tell the tale. There were deep ocean fish that held a cultural value to certain sects namely the followers of Ihhuein the elemental water spirit, but even then they didn't eat the flesh of the fish. Nor did the upper class deign to eat the crustacea that were native to Romulus. Remans did it was said, but that was said with such a derogitory tone that Claire had not even wanted to follow up the line of questioning. She did NOT want to know why that was said like that.

It had been rather an extensive project but the Romulan farm was now benefiting from a rather extensive aquatic ecosystem. It would take her months to get all of the mud out of her hair but she'd planned and executed the entire project. It was both ridiculous and beautiful in it's simplicity. She'd needed an aquatic ecosystem that was both functional and aesthetically pleasing. So, in all her infinte wisdom she'd decided to build the Romulan Embassy Farm a koi pond.

The Japanese aesthetic seemed to compliment the embassy and she'd found several mutant species of the main set with metallic colors that felt right to her. The stone bridge had not been difficult to reproduce here, and it passed over the thinnest part of the elongated kidney bean shaped pond. The gardens surrounded the lake, and she stepped up onto the great stone platform of the bridge.

Smiling as a flicker of gold from an Ogon caught her eye, the choice was made more and more appropriate to her as there were comments that she'd used the colors representing the elementals that governed their religous beliefs. Red and Orange. Gold and a vivid yellow that would burn the eyes were it worn. White and molten mercurial silver. A vibrant electric Blue. A shimmering teal green that was indeed a throwback, an activated gene in a fish that was never intended to be there. That one even glowed in the dark just slightly if fed the proper substrate. Black. There were three solid black fish in there, that would breed in the patterns that koi were known for. Not that Claire had skimped on the patterns that were in the pond. She Loved the variety and colorfulness of the fish, and she'd seperated them into sections. They could easily interbreed, and they would she was sure...but the water was set for different species of fish to thrive in different areas. Overlap existed from all areas and soon there would not be a place in the shoreline of the lovely little pond, where fish couldn't be seen. She'd only stocked it with 75 fish, but they were breeding adults of the colors that she'd thought would suit the romulans best. While solids were prevalent. She was fond of the random splotches of color that governed the traditional koi lines. The redhead was quite fond of the calico patterns that were popular in the long ago history of the husbandry of fish. The patterns were recessive, and would breed through as the fish population waxed and waned. They might even have to harvest the population eventually, so she'd ensured that the fish could be eaten and were tasty.

Claire couldn't *wait* to see what they interbred to. Especially if the stripes or moon patterns bred through on the colors. She could imagine a scarlet fish with a black moon on its forehead, or the teal with bright silver splotches.

That would be striking, and she hoped that the investment in time and mud was worthwhile. She'd planted the base of the pond with the kelp and sand based plants that would keep the fish happy and healthy, and a healthy population of lotus flowers would bloom soon enough on the surface, with the lilypads. Soon, she would introduce crustacea, shrimp and crabs and of course amphibians to the lake, to create the exact formulation of bacteria that the hlai and the crops would need to thrive. Claire poured in a feeding substrate over the edge of the bridge and watched as it swirled through the water.

They could thrive, together.

 

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