Fallout

by Ariel Tachna

  “Hey!” one of the supply personnel shouted. “What am I supposed to do with this dog food?”

  “I’ll take it,” Sambit said, leaving Tucker to make his own way inside. “I know a very hungry pup who will be very happy to see it.” He took the huge bag from the soldier, who looked about fifteen and scared out of his mind. “Don’t worry,” he said. “There’s not enough radiation out here to hurt you.”

  “It’s not that,” the soldier admitted. “I’ve never seen anything like what we flew over to get here. There’s nothing left.”

  “Not right now,” Sambit agreed, “but people will come back and rebuild. We’ll get the power back on here. The utility companies will get the lines restrung, and the people will come back. It’ll just take time.”

  “I hope so,” the soldier said. “Thank you for what you’re doing here.”

  Sambit shook his head. “I’m just doing my part.”

  Hefting the dog food, he went back inside, leaving the soldiers to finish unloading the supplies. The new additions to the crew could help carry supplies in as well. He had more important things to do, like making friends with the man he had just decided would be his partner for the rest of the time they were here. “Derek?” Sambit called, walking into the break room. “I have Fido’s food.”

  “The supplies arrived?”

  “They’re outside unloading,” Sambit said, setting the carton down. “Why don’t you feed Fido first, and then we can go see what the suit from the NRC has managed to get done on the computers. I can tell already he’s going to be a pain.”

  “I thought you wanted help from the NRC,” Derek said.

  Sambit chuckled. “No, I wanted the passwords from the NRC. We proved what we could do earlier today. I don’t need any more convincing.”

  “Well, color me surprised,” Derek said. He opened the bag of dog food and poured some out for Fido, petting the dog’s head as he encouraged the dog to eat. Sambit stroked the silky ears as well.

  “Is Number Five ready for another trip into the reactor?” Sambit asked.

  “It should be close to fully recharged by now,” Derek replied. “We only used an hour or so of its battery life. How big of a pain in the ass is this suit going to be?”

  “I’m sure you can handle him,” Sambit said, quite confident Tucker would be no match for Derek’s sarcastic wit. “At the moment, nobody knows what’s going on in the plant as well as we do, so we have that in our favor, and we also know where the problem spots are as far as blocked corridors, and since we have the earlier readings, we can see if there’s been any change if we go back to an area we went through before. I’m not sure even the plant manager could do more right now than we can. Tucker certainly can’t.”

  “What else do we need to do?” Derek asked as he unplugged Number Five and guided the robot toward the door.

  “It’ll depend on what we find when we look at the computers,” Sambit said. “It could be the HPCI pumps did their job and all we’ll need to do is examine the reactor vessel and primary containment system to make sure they weren’t damaged by the storm. Or it could be we’ll still have heat and pressure issues in the core, at which point we’ll have to make some repairs, although we might be able to do some of that remotely if the systems are functioning.”

  “I’ll leave that to you,” Derek said. “You tell me where to send my robot, and I’ll get it there.”

  “I know you will,” Sambit said as they headed back to the main bank of computers. Sambit saw the look of surprise on Derek’s face, but now wasn’t the time to explain the realizations he’d had while waiting for the supply convoy. If they had time later, they could talk, and if not, that was fine too. Actions would do far more to win Derek’s confidence than words. Derek had obviously heard far too many meaningless words in his life.

  THE moment Derek laid eyes on Tucker, he understood Sambit’s antipathy. Everything about the man was officious, from his suit to the supercilious expression on his face. That would have been bad enough. The way Tucker dismissed him completely, speaking only to Sambit, was the nail in the other man’s coffin as far as Derek was concerned.

  “Mr. Patel, what is that?”

  “It’s Dr. Patel,” Derek replied before Sambit could reply, “and ‘that’ is my robot. The robot that is going to save our collective asses, so get out of the way and let Dr. Patel tell me where to send him and what to do with him.”

  Tucker sputtered and fumed, but Derek pushed past him, gesturing for Sambit to take a seat at the computer.

  Sambit moved past the NRC representative with more grace and less aggression, but Derek could see the approval in his smirk as he sat down and began to study the display of readings on the monitor.

  “We need to go back to where we had the big blockage,” Sambit told Derek. “I’m getting inconsistent temperature readings from the core. We need to see what the situation really is, and that’s where we had the highest temperature readings before.”

  “On it,” Derek said, sending Number Five rolling out of the room and back toward the blocked corridor. Behind him, Tucker demanded explanations, but Derek ignored him. He couldn’t give them anyway—that was Sambit’s area of expertise—and he had more important things to focus on, like making sure Number Five went where he was supposed to as smoothly and efficiently as possible.

  Sambit apparently had somewhat more patience with Tucker than Derek did, because he heard the softly accented voice begin a detailed explanation that went right over Derek’s head. It didn’t matter. He didn’t need to understand the physics of nuclear reactions to guide his robot where it needed to go.

  “Dr. Patel,” he interrupted when Number Five was in place, “I have new readings for you.”

  Sambit joined him at his laptop immediately, breaking off the conversation with Tucker. His hand rested on Derek’s shoulder as he bent over to look at the temperature indicator on the laptop screen. Derek suppressed a totally inappropriate shiver as his body reacted.

  “It’s cooler than it was,” Sambit said, “but still elevated. I wish we knew what was behind that mess.”

  “The Standby Gas Treatment system.”

  Derek and Sambit both turned to see who had spoken. A tall black woman joined them at the computer. “Lyrica Johnson,” she added by way of introduction. “I’m the night shift manager. I was evacuated, but when I heard about the problems, I got in touch with the NRC and they flew me in.”

  “Should it be this hot back there?” Sambit asked, showing her the readings.

  “No, that’s not normal. Can you get a camera up there so we can see what’s going on?”

  “It’s a nearly vertical climb,” Derek said for the second time that day. “Number Five can climb steps, but it can’t defy the laws of gravity. Is there another way in?”

  “Not usually, but all that concrete came from somewhere. If it left an exterior hole, we could maybe go in that way,” Lyrica said.

  “We need a second robot,” Sambit said. “One to go outside and look for that while Number Five works inside. Derek, let’s check the gauges on the HPCI pumps. We can’t do anything about this right now so we need to see what’s going on in the core as much as we can.”

  Derek nodded and sent Number Five to the area where they had found the pumps earlier. They were all still working, although the pressure gauges continued to show high levels of pressure inside the core. “It’s not cooling down fast enough,” Sambit muttered.

  “Did you add boron to the coolant?” Lyrica asked.

  Sambit shook his head. “We didn’t even have power when we got here. Getting the generators online and the pumps working again were our first priorities.”

  “As they should have been. Okay, Derek, is it?” Derek nodded. “What can that gadget of yours do?”

  “Anything you want it to,” Derek said, “except climb straight up and survive an explosion. It has some heat shielding, but not extensive since it’s a prototype. I can add that kind of shielding, but it will d
ecrease the mobility.”

  “I’ve got containers of boron that need to be added to the coolant mix,” Lyrica said, “and the radiation readings from your little friend there suggest it wouldn’t be safe for us to do it manually.”

  Derek looked at Sambit for confirmation. He liked Lyrica’s no-nonsense attitude, but he didn’t know her well enough to trust her. For some reason, though, he trusted Sambit. Sambit nodded.

  “Tell me where they are.”

  “What about the depressurization system?” Sambit asked before Lyrica could reply. “Is it worth trying to let a little pressure out now to buy us time to get the boron solution into the core?”

  “That’s against protocol!” Tucker protested. “We have no idea what kind of radiation levels are inside the core at the moment, and if the secondary containment structure is compromised, you could be releasing dangerous levels of radiation into the air.”

  “Shut up, Tucker,” Derek said. “They’re professionals. They know the risks.”

  “The risk is minimal,” Lyrica said. “The vents open into the wetwell. It might be flooded, but it’s underground so it shouldn’t have been damaged by the tornado or hurricane winds. It’s certainly less of a risk than a core meltdown or breach would be.”

  “Tell me where to go,” Derek said, turning his back on Turner.

  Lyrica gave him directions to the ADS override, not even bothering to see if the computerized system would work. Derek followed her instructions to the letter.

  “It’s working,” Sambit said from the main computer station. “The pressure is going down in the core.”

  “Good,” Lyrica said. “Let’s leave it for another minute, and then we’ll turn it back off. We don’t know the condition of the wetwell, and until we do, we shouldn’t put too much stress on the system.”

  They waited out the allotted time, and Derek guided Number Five to shut the valves again.

  “This is all highly unusual,” Tucker said again.

  “Mr. Tucker,” Sambit said from the computer, “it occurs to me that we’ve all focused on this reactor because we knew it was damaged, but no one has checked on units one and two. Perhaps you should take a couple of people and make sure they shut down correctly and that the backup systems are dealing with the decay heat appropriately. It would be a shame to work so hard over here only to have a disaster over there because we didn’t realize there was a problem.”

  Tucker blanched and bustled out of the room, calling names for people to accompany him.

  “Thank God,” Lyrica said when Tucker was out of earshot. “Now if we can just keep him out of our hair.”

  “I knew there was a reason I liked you,” Derek said. “Sam, I think she’s okay.”

  “Sambit,” Sambit corrected, but his smile was indulgent. “Welcome to the team, Lyrica.”

  “I think I’m the one who should be welcoming you,” Lyrica countered, “but either way, it’s good to work with people who can think on their feet. Okay, let’s get the boron in the coolant and see where we are. I don’t suppose you have a second one of those robots stashed away somewhere?”

  “No,” Derek said. “It’s a prototype. I plan to patent it eventually, but I’m not done tweaking it yet.”

  “Damn. Well, I guess we’ll just have to make do with one, then.”

  “If we have another robot of any kind, I can make adjustments to it,” Derek offered. “That’s what I do at NASA. Take other people’s robots and make them do what NASA needs them to do instead of what they were designed to do.”

  “Which would be faster?” Sambit asked. “Tweaking an existing robot or building another one like Number Five?”

  “With the right parts, it’s just as easy to build a new one from scratch,” Derek replied, “because part of tweaking an existing robot is working on its programming and interface with the controls, and that’s what takes the longest. If I simply install my programming to begin with, that could save hours of work.”

  “Then we’ll have to persuade Tucker to get you the parts you need,” Lyrica declared.

  “And make sure there’s someone else who can operate it,” Sambit added. “I’ve watched him with those controls. It’s not just something you pick up and can immediately do. They brought Derek here for more reasons than one.”

  The comment surprised Derek. He hadn’t realized Sambit thought so highly of him. Derek certainly hadn’t given him any reason to. Silently he resolved to be nicer to the other man. He’d need an ally against Tucker if he had any hope of saving his sanity. “I brought some parts with me, more as replacement parts for Number Five than to build a second robot, but it’s a start, although the time I take to construct a second robot is time I’m not operating the first one. Once the second one is built, I can teach someone how to operate it even if they can’t maintain it,” Derek said. “It takes practice, like anything else, but it’s a lot like playing video games. Once you get the hang of it, it’s not so hard.”

  “Tell that to someone who’s good at video games,” Sambit said with a short laugh. “I’ll leave the operating to you and concentrate on figuring out what needs to be done.”

  Chapter 4

  IT TOOK another hour to transfer enough boron into the coolant to satisfy Lyrica and Sambit, and by then, Derek’s stomach was demanding food.

  “Break time,” he declared when they didn’t immediately assign him another task. “I fed Fido, but I haven’t eaten since this morning.”

  “Fido?” Lyrica asked.

  “His dog,” Sambit explained, standing and stretching, the arch of his back drawing Derek’s attention to his body. Derek swallowed hard. Not my type, he told himself firmly. So not my type. That didn’t stop his eyes from lingering as Sambit bent forward, touching his toes and highlighting his ass.

  “I rescued him from the house down the street,” Derek said, forcing his eyes away from Sambit and toward Lyrica. “I couldn’t turn around and leave him again, and there wasn’t exactly time to find a place for him.”

  “So you brought him with you?” Lyrica asked, her eyes bright with amusement. “Oh, that’ll make Tucker’s day. Well done, Derek.”

  Derek and Sambit both chuckled.

  “Wait until Tucker sees Derek’s other additions to the break room,” Sambit added. “He’ll never recover.”

  “Oh?” Lyrica said. “Do tell.”

  Derek shrugged. “I just hung a couple of pictures on the wall. We’re going to be living here so I wanted to make it feel a little more like home.”

  Sambit snorted. “So your room at home is decorated with pinups too?”

  Lyrica rolled her eyes. “What is it with men and their fascination with tits?”

  “I wouldn’t know,” Sambit replied primly, making Derek do a double take as he wondered exactly how to interpret that, “and neither would Derek.” He grabbed Derek’s arm and pulled his sleeve back to reveal the rainbow bracelet.

  Lyrica’s face brightened. “Now that’s the kind of pinup I can appreciate!”

  “I’m sure Tucker won’t,” Sambit said.

  “Tucker can go stuff himself,” Lyrica said, looping one arm through Derek’s and the other through Sambit’s. “In the absence of the regular plant manager, I’m the senior employee here. He can write all the reports he wants. We’re the ones running this show.”

  They walked back into the break room. Three other people, two men and another woman, milled about, unpacking supplies, spreading out army issue cots and blankets, and generally making far more noise than necessary as far as Derek was concerned.

  “Come here, Fido,” he called, seeing the dog cowering in the corner. Immediately the dog bounded over to him. “Do you want to go outside, boy?”

  “Don’t go out without a Geiger counter and dosimeter,” Sambit said immediately. “The control area is shielded so we shouldn’t get high levels of radiation here unless that’s damaged, but we have no idea what the conditions outside are.”

  “I get that, but the dog has
to have a break, and I don’t figure people want him shitting in the corner,” Derek said. “So unless you have a better suggestion, we’re going outside.”

  “Stay as close to the building as possible,” Lyrica said. “It should provide some protection from radiation even outside, and come back inside as soon as he’s done. If he needs exercise, we’ll have to make sure he gets it inside until we’re sure we don’t have a radiation leak outside. We’ll see about some dinner while you’re taking care of your dog. Is there anything you don’t eat?”

  “Nope, omnivore here,” Derek said. “Okay, Fido, let’s go outside, but stay close to me, all right? I don’t have a leash for you, and I don’t want you running off and getting lost or hurt.”

  He had no idea if the dog could understand him, but it trotted along next to him as he walked toward the exit. He stayed in the doorway while Fido sniffed around a little, picking his way over the flooded grass. He stopped and did his business before running back to Derek’s side. “Good boy. Let’s go back inside.”

  When they’d returned to the break room, Fido curled up in his corner again. Derek took one of the cots and moved it over to the same corner, giving Fido somewhere to hide if he wanted.

  “There you go,” Derek said, bending down and patting Fido’s head. “You can keep an eye on my bag and my boys. How does that sound?”

  Fido closed his eyes and leaned into Derek’s hand. Derek smiled. He’d never wanted a dog, but now that he had one, he wondered why he’d resisted. He could get used to true unconditional affection.

  “Are you the one who hung those up?” one of the other men whom Derek had not yet met asked.

  “Yes,” Derek said. “What of it? There’s nothing wrong with a bare chest.”

  The man’s lips curled, but before he could say anything, Lyrica was at Derek’s side. “Nothing wrong at all,” she agreed, “although I wouldn’t complain if the jeans on that one cowboy slid a little lower down. He’s something else.”