by Kate Rauner
Fynn dragged his flier behind one of the depot's cargo containers and crouched by Rica. Repeated shuttle landings had blown loose ice gravel away, but he'd be a butterfly in a storm if the Poseidon's engine wash hit him. The roar pounded his helmet and then subsided. He stuck a hand out past the container's corner and felt no resistance.
"Rica, it's safe," he said.
They leaned into the thick atmosphere to walk a few steps and watch a decapod drag hoses as thick as an arm to the shuttle's external tanks. This trip, there was something new. The bot attached a second O2 hose to a new connector through the shuttle's hull, a fourth hose to a similar connector, and the rattling throb of compressors kicked on.
"Liam?" Fynn said. "Are you in there?"
The commander's voice rang cheerfully in Fynn's ear. "I'm onboard for this run. Orpheus handles the night shift. Working twenty-four hours a day."
"What pressure do the shuttle's interior tanks hold?"
"A hundred atmospheres. Have the ring pressurized in a month."
"Can't wait. See you as soon as the station's spinning."
A grunted agreement ended the conversation.
Fynn tapped Rica's shoulder. "You say I can talk to the bots now?"
Rica bobbed inside her helmet. "They monitor all our suit channels. Say hello."
"Decapod One, can you hear me?"
"Loud and clear, Fynn." The bot's voice was melodic.
"Hey, the bot's voice sounds familiar."
"It should," Rica said. "That's the lead from your favorite band back on Earth."
Fynn cocked his head. The voice entered his left ear through a gel like all comms, and the bot never shifted its attention from the shuttle. "Are you sure that's the bot? Say something else. How many fingers am I holding up?"
The bot's column didn't shift, but one of its cameras twisted on its stalk. "You're holding up your fist, so no fingers. I chose the voice you've listened to the most over the past day based on your cybernet records."
"The cybernet never speaks to me."
"Of course not. It's nothing but a huge database. I'm linked with Orpheus and have my own machine-learning algorithms as well. My partner and I are intelligent."
Hairs prickled on Fynn's scalp. "I thought it would have a more robotic voice."
"You can change the personality setting," Rica said.
"Decapod, what's your setting now?"
"Seven out of ten. I'm sparkling without being overbearing."
"Change setting to two. Now talk to me."
"Setting revised."
Fynn twisted to face Rica helmet-to-helmet and grinned at her crooked frown. "Set at two, it sounds properly mechanical."
"You'd set everyone at two if you could," she said, teasing. "Get rid of personality and concentrate on work."
"Get rid of drama. This shuttle trip is a big step toward that." He waved a glove at the bot that sat immobile at the shuttle's side, waiting for the tanks to fill. "Nitrogen and oxygen to pressurize the station ring. I'll get my new parts, everyone will get vacations in gravity, and people will get back to normal. Soon."
"You keep saying things like that, but it's never true."
Chap ter 13
D rew sucked in a breath as the cold raised goosebumps on his arms, but before fear could turn his stomach to stone, he remembered. Liam was venting nitrogen and oxygen from the shuttle, so the draft was expected. He was bleeding the deeply cold gases in slowly so they'd warm in the Herschel's core, but despite his caution, the ventilation system delivered a frigid slap to crew quarters. Drew rubbed his arms and rolled the coverall sleeves down. Ever-Clean fabric was slick and clammy, so that didn't actually help.
Rutger swung around the lip of the ceiling opening and drifted over Drew's head with a storage tube held in both hands. "It's colder down here than I expected. Knut says I can go aft and start pressurizing a spoke. Wanna come?"
"Sure. It's too cold to hang here."
The middle of the tank farm was wide open now, and they rocketed down the center of the core. Crewmates had removed pods during reconfiguration and shifted them aft. On the hull, ovals of opalescent discoloration outlined where spokes were attached, an artifact of welding.
Rutger tapped his wrist-comm. "Knut, I'm ready."
Drew snorted at the lack of a response in his own ear gel. They were using a private channel. Knut made a show of studying all the dome recordings of Tanaka's speeches, but he hadn't opened his own comms to the entire crew.
"We need to wait." Rutger gripped a rung with both hands. "Orpheus is taking the Demeter to monitor the process from space. We can slap a patch on if it detects a leak."
That was Tyra's shuttle, but she was in quarters. Milk runs, she called the atmosphere project. I'd be nothing but a passenger. None of the pilots glued themselves to dock consoles, studying every readout, these days. Only Liam occupied his shuttle's command cabin on the trips. He said he liked riding in the Poseidon.
Drew slipped into old barracks habits around Rutger and scrunched his nose into his intentionally cute expression. "Keeping the air inside the ship. What a fine idea."
Rutger pried the lid off his storage tube and, with a snap, released something like a short spear with a thumb-sized valve in the middle. "Hang onto these, will you?" Lifting the tube as dramatically as a magician, he revealed a floating hammer. He let the tube drift away, slipped his feet under the nearest rungs, and told Drew to press the pointed end of the spear against the hull. It took some practice swings before Rutger was landing strong blows on the spear, but it began to dig in. He pounded until a sealing ring spread out around the shaft.
"Next, twist off the end guard. And, Drew, open the valve."
Drew rotated the handle a quarter turn, and a squeal announced air flowing into the spoke. He opened the valve all the way and felt the rush suck at his hand. "What's next?"
"Tomorrow we can cut the spoke open and repeat the procedure at the other end to pressurize the lab segment."
"What's the plan for the pods?"
"Store them for salvage. Eventually scavenge the electronics and cut up the metal to feed into our 3-D printers. You can view the most efficient stacking configuration..."
"... in a video." Drew wrinkled his nose. Rutger had gotten ahead of him with the videos. He needed to spend more time studying. "This has to be the biggest some-assembly-required project in history."
Rutger seemed pleased at the idea. "I've studied the entire reconfiguration. We're supposed to move the rest of the pods aft. In a few weeks, Orpheus will spin the station up to fifty percent of Earth's gravitational force, measured at the outer edge of the ring."
"Do the endless videos say why fifty percent and not a hundred?"
"Material limitations. Even with tensioning cables, that's the highest rotational rate the station can tolerate without tearing itself apart. Supposed to be plenty to keep a human being healthy."
"Is that in a video too?"
Rutger cocked his head. "In the health and safety directory, yeah."
Despite his snarky comments, Drew carefully noted the directory so he could watch that video later. He'd been studying lab operations instead. In a month or so, he'd finally be doing the job he'd trained for. No more fifth wheel. He'd be valuable, and no one could dispute that.
***
Drew paddled down the spoke, shivering in the cold, damp air. Ventilation in the spokes would rely on systems in the core at one end and the ring at the other, neither of which were running right now, so once pressure had equalized, air movement stopped.
He kept close to the conduit chases where pre-installed power cables were about to come to life. Crewmates stood by behind him, poised at switchgear in the Herschel's core.
Four of the station spokes were too narrow to allow more than a couple people to pass each other going back and forth to the ring, but this spoke to a lab segment was sized to move large equipment. Drew easily dodged someone ferrying a wide strip of metal bulkhead inward for storage.
He brushed handholds, slowing down as he approached the round opening. Knut hovered over a pilot clamping covers on more switchgear boxes.
Rutger floated at the edge of the opening. A reinforcing band sheathed the cut-away edge where the spoke connected to the ring.
Drew pulled up next to him. "Did I miss anything?" He reached an arm into the ring to pat some piece of paraphernalia mummified in plastic wrappings.
Plastic, gack. Its heavy smell loitered in the stagnant air.
Cargo had been stowed back a ways, so cutting through the bulkhead didn't nick anything valuable. Except for that gap, the ring was packed full. Panels to construct living quarters, plumbing components, kitchen equipment, and other mundane necessities. Drew was more interested in whatever laboratory equipment was buried inside.
"This segment contains the biology lab, right?" Drew knew the answer. He'd checked the manifests, but they were about to get their hands on some nifty cargo and the excitement made him babble.
"Yes, but you mean the manufacturing lab," Rutger said.
Drew snorted. "Without bioreactors to produce plastics, there'll be no manufacturing. Not once we use up all this packing material that, I will admit, looks like excellent feedstock for 3-D printing. And, I also admit, whoever planned the labs did a bang-up job. The selection of microbes in our cryochambers is stunning."
"I wish I'd been part of the planning team on Earth," Rutger said with a sigh. Like Drew, he'd been kept in the dark about Titan. Unlike Drew, he seemed happy to be here.
Knut waved a hand signal, and people dispersed to the switch boxes, each gripping a main switch with one hand and maneuvering off to the side with the other, turning their faces away in case of a short circuit.
Drew closed his eyes too. Just to be safe. Switches clunked and nothing exploded. The installation videos had gotten it right. He opened his eyes and raised his brows in a silent question.
Rutger held out his flat pad. "This diagram shows the power conduits. Those icons at either end against the bulkheads... Those are robots charging up. You did view the robotics videos, right?"
"Of course. Robots, at last. It was a pain assembling everything in the domes by hand." Drew's fingers tingled and, despite his grin, a nubbin of worry tightened inside. He didn't want Rutger to think he was stupid, so he had prepared. He held out his sleeve and tapped a manifest video queued up and ready to play.
"Weird bots, all snaky arms and built-in winches. They'll cut a port into the next segment to pressurize the ring. Once there's enough atmosphere, they'll cut out bulkheads, lay crane tracks, and assemble our new home." He crinkled his nose in the cute smile that served him so well.
"I thought you'd be more interested in these." Rutger leaned through the opening and pointed to a circle of disks, each as big around as a beach ball. Each one was packed with stacks of janitorial units and a small army of multi-purpose bots.
Drew flipped upside down, planted both feet against adjacent cargo, held his breath against the thick plastic smell, and tugged a recessed handle. One slick plastic cylinder slid out easily and Drew rode it away until Rutger snagged the other end.
They had the end cap off when Knut drifted over. "Will you boys take those bots to quarters and plug them in to charge?"
"Yes, sir," Drew said.
Knut's eyes narrowed, but his words seemed innocent enough. "It's good of you to help, Drew. But, then, you don't really have a job onboard, do you?"
"I do. My assignment's in the manufacturing lab when the station is spinning. And I can't wait, so here I am." Drew had noticed that Rutger called the lab manufacturing, so Knut probably did too.
Playing a good little crewmate apparently soothed the psychologist. Knut's expression relaxed. He even smiled a bit. "Well, off you two go."
Drew used conduit brackets as hand holds and towed the packaged bot through the spoke. He called to Rutger, who was right behind him, ready to become a brake if the big cylinder got loose. "I've definitely watched all the videos about these guys. They'll vacuum the ventilation filters, scrub walls and decks, even tidy up the toilets."
"They'll do a lot more than cleaning."
Drew grinned. "Civilization at last."
***
The Mechanics gathered at the furnace platform so the guys on duty could participate. There were some advantages to being a cohort. Once Fynn created permanent crews, he'd be free to explore Titan's surface.
While they waited for a few stragglers, Ben waved for Fynn's attention. "That was weird tonight, Tanaka's little speech."
Rica huffed out a laugh. "Seeing his holo standing on the kitchen counter is always weird."
"But tonight he said, don't take a break - carry your lunch to your work assignment. Wasn't it yesterday that the adjuncts threw people into a prison bin for removing food from the mess hall?"
Rica huffed again.
Fynn was tired of the daily disruptions caused by the Tanaka holos. "Ben, when can we harvest our own algae?"
"Any time, really. The varieties Max brought reproduce quickly. Even better with the CO2 boost we give them, and they'll grow faster if they're not crowded."
Fynn caught sight of Mika's bright yellow coveralls and called to her. "What about those potatoes you're growing?"
She folded her arms across her chest. "At least another month."
Fynn ran a hand through his hair. People seemed to enjoy raiding the greenhouse two or three times a week. They'd avoided detection, but if any Blue Kin suspected, troubles would escalate. He'd have to trust to luck for a while longer. He had important things to discuss right now.
"Guys, you've done a great job, and we've got enough people now to set up shifts. Three to cover the furnaces and two for morning and afternoon Gravitron maintenance. I've got to allow time for each of you to take your own Gravitron treatments while you're in the domes, which isn't hard, but the situation gets complex soon. Once the space station is spinning, you'll spend one week every month onboard, healing more thoroughly."
"What will we do during a week on the station?" someone asked.
That was a good question. These schedules would be their routine now, for the rest of their lives. For a while, they'd be designing improved automation for the domes, but then what?
Fynn ignored the flutters in his stomach, tilted his chin up, and hoped he sounded more confident than he felt. "Personal studies. Hobbies. Whatever you'd do on vacation with whoever you'd like, so add any constraints apply. Orpheus will calculate the best fit for each person's schedule. I've created templates for you to volunteer for a permanent crew assignment. Then you can vote for your leaders.
"Oh, and no crew assignments for the barracks unit leaders and me. We'll be on-call."
A man in red raised his hand. "What about between shifts now? I can't read all the time and there's not much in the way of hobby supplies."
"Exploration." This sort of leisure was exactly what his father must have envisioned as a way to reach for paradise. "We've flown around the domes, but the colony needs a systematic survey of our peninsula. Record images of the terrain so we can watch for changes and locate any resources that might be useful. Exploration teams sound like something the barracks should organize."
The Mechanics pulled out their pads and chattered happily. They could handle this on their own. It was better if they chose crew leaders without a cohort staring at them.
Rica slipped her hand into Fynn's. "Very clever of you. You and I have no set schedule, so we can do what we want."
She bounced her curls and smiled, and Fynn warmed inside. Maybe her manipulations weren't so bad after all. "That's not what on-call means, exactly, but I do have an excursion in mind. Kin have flown along the shore and across land to the Black and White Hill. I'd like to explore the interior. Interested in coming along?"
She grinned at him, and they dashed around the furnaces to the airlock. In a few minutes, they were outside with fliers.
Fynn led the way straight up.
&n
bsp; Through comms, Rica's voice was edged with excitement. "I've never flown this high. Can we get above the haze?"
"Not with fliers. Can't even get above the methane clouds without losing half the atmosphere's density. We might be able to spot some fog banks, though."
"It sounds like you've been talking to Lukas."
Fynn leveled out and caught his breath. They were very high. Below, the colony's peninsula was a mountain range, a wrinkled landscape of brown valleys and ocher ridges edged with smooth, black lakes. He'd looked up Titan's terminal velocity, so he should be able to survive a fall if he spread out like a flying squirrel, but his pulse pounded. He wouldn't want to try it.
"There's what I'm looking for." Fynn dipped toward a crown of steep, sharp orange columns like a giant handful of spears. They encircled smooth brown sand that tumbled down one side through a break in the columns.
"You found an avalanche slope." Rica drifted lower. "A better black diamond trail than anything in the Alps."
"You ski?" Fynn asked.
"Never like this." Rica landed in the flattest part of the bowl and walked to the break. "Skiing on hydrocarbon sand. This'll be a first."
Fynn dropped his flier next to hers. "Probably takes millions of years to build up, so you might only get one good run."
Rica's boots slipped in the sand, but she steadied herself and leaned forward to peer over the edge. "My first request from the 3D printers will be a pair of skies."
Fynn shifted a foot forward and his other foot slid back half a step. "Careful. Sky glow doesn't cast shadows very well, and that ruins my depth perception."
With a yelp, Rica disappeared over the edge.
Fynn tried a leap and fell flat on his face. Maybe that was lucky because it left him crawling to the edge, which crumbled under his fingers.
He spotted Rica's helmet and shoulders. She'd sprawled out and brought her slide to a halt. "I'm alright. Stay there. I'm coming back up."
She rolled loose, scrambled, but only slid farther down the slope. A frustrated curse came over comms and Fynn laughed. This didn't look dangerous anymore despite the steep incline.