One of the children raised his hand.

“Yes Sven?”

“We’re not moving, Ms. Ojanen. We’re staying here. Why doesn’t everyone stay here with us?”

Eila had not realised that she had a child from a ‘steader family in her class.

“Well, Sven, there are a few families that have decided not to move. But their lives are going to be very different from now on. After next month there will be no more electricity and all the roads into Oslo will be blocked. You will have to live as people did hundreds of years ago. I respect your family’s decision but it is not one that most of us are willing to adopt.”

Sven had a puzzled look on his face.

“Why are they blocking off the roads anyway? Isn’t it bad enough that they are cutting off the power?”

Eila decided to move from her desk to sit amongst the children on one of the diminutive chairs that they used.

“Sven, the government found that when they didn’t block the roads to the areas being abandoned the people left behind would quickly bring in all kinds of technology and power generation equipment. Within a short period of time they were using a lot of energy again. That broke the rule of everyone sharing equally so the government has decided that people that stay behind have to be completely isolated from those that leave. They have to live only on what the land can provide without the help of technologies that they cannot produce and maintain themselves. It seems harsh but it is for the best.”

Mareja raised her hand.

“Yes Mareja.”

“Ms. Ojanen, you said that it is fair that we move. But my mother says that Norway only uses energy that is from Norway and that it is all good energy - we don’t make any pollution – so why can’t we keep using it?”

“Your mother is right in some ways, Mareja. Norway generates electricity from Hydro-electric facilities and wind farms which are 100% green and we do not import any power from elsewhere. But it is more complicated than that. Norway cannot grow enough fruit and vegetables for our people or manufacture Solacars or the thousands of other products that we use every day. So we are dependent upon other parts of the world. In that way we are all really sharing the resources of the world. But living here in Norway we are using far more than our share of the energy available to everyone and that is the problem. So by moving south we still get to share all the other things that we need but we will not be using more energy than other people.”

“Does that answer your question?”

Mareja looked unhappy but nodded her head.

“Ok children, let’s go and see how the coil gun works.”

Eila led her class to a lab in the farthest corner of the school. In the center of the room was a long assemblage of equipment with a tube running the length of the device and bulky blue blocks running in pairs down each side. Eila flipped on a power switch and the device began to hum.

“So this is the coil gun. It uses a magnetic field, similar to the one that surrounds the earth and makes a compass point north, to accelerate this small metal cartridge.”

Eila held up an object shaped like a bullet but about 10 cm long and 4 cm in diameter.

“Does anyone know what I mean by the word accelerate?” Sven put up his hand.

“It means you want to make that bullet go real fast!”

“That’s right, Sven. Now watch. I’m going to slide the cartridge into the end of the coil gun. There. Now I am going to flip the switch which will generate the magnetic field and the cartridge will shoot out of the other end and hit the foam rubber blanket on the far wall. Are you ready?”

This time the heads were nodding, the eyes bright.