CHAPTER 2
Trillions of miles from Earth, on the largest and most advanced spacecraft ever constructed, a shit filter was clogged. Not “evacuate the people spaces and don HazMat suits!” clogged, but “might cause a slight stench once-in-a-while” clogged.
Data Technician 1st Class Theo Muahe sighed as he scanned the display monitors and past the abnormal readings on the console in the cramped Sewage and Water Control station. If he had been claustrophobic, this particular watch would have been a nightmare, but First Muahe was used to the tight quarters in many of Aotea’s watch stations and machinery spaces. Numbers for gas partial pressures, particulates, acidity, bacteria, and dozens of other details of the complexities of maintaining the potable water systems for every shower, kitchen, and head for the twenty thousand souls onboard the colony ship Aotea danced cleanly over the crystalline display. Technically, everything’s green. But Muahe wasn’t the type to pass off a problem, however minor it might be, to the next watchstander. He looked again at the first few log readings, confirming his suspicions. All the numbers were in the normal ranges, but bacterial and particulate logs had jumped a few ticks, after several hours of nearly identical values.
“Damn shit filters…” he mumbled.
A chirping interrupted his log reading, and Muahe turned his attention to his wearable, projecting it onto his lens. The multi-purpose device displayed a simple alert from the NetBug tracer he had started before reporting for his proficiency Sewage and Water Systems watch. Shouldn’t be full yet, he thought as he read the alert. The tracer had noted that hard drive 271w, one of thousands of identical data storage drives, was prematurely full. A black spot took his attention for a moment. Gonna have to re-lens the damn thing. His heart sped up when he realized there were no spare lenses in the watch station; he’d have to wait until he was back in his quarters. S’okay, Theo, you can still see it just fine. A little speck is no big deal… He took a deep breath, recognizing that he sometimes had trouble differentiating between trivial issues and major problems. A half minute of concentration told him that this one was the former.
He shifted his attention back to the Tracer he had started immediately before he took the sewage watch. The data sponge he was tracking down was just the latest nuisance in his primary duty as part of the team that managed the data systems and automated programming of the massive colony ship Aotea.
With practiced fingers dancing in the air, DT1 Muahe quickly navigated to the hard drive in question, and found to his surprise that it was mostly empty. “Huh,” he grunted. He queried the NetBug again, and after a few seconds, the tracer returned with the same result as before — hard drive 271w was full. Commands through his wearable simply queried the hard drive’s own logs. But the NetBug tracer was much more thorough, actually trawling the quantum-molecular data net itself. So who’s lying? My tracer or the hard drive? He groaned as he realized he wouldn’t be able to go right to sleep when he got off watch; his own nagging sense of duty would compel him to solve this little mystery. His primary responsibility would have to wait, though; as a fully qualified crewmember of Aotea, DT1 Muahe was required to periodically stand watch at most of the major ship’s systems to maintain proficiency. He returned to the sewage system logs.
“Damn filter clogs,” he grunted. Accumulating debris in the water would occasionally gum up the works of the chemical cleaners that maintained bacterial levels near zero.
“Where’s the RoverBot?” he muttered to himself as he scrolled through menus on the console as fast as the eye could follow. The sewage station shared a roving maintenance robot with some of the neighboring systems; minor maintenance like cleaning filters was usually left to the Rover. Atmospherics plant? Damn it!
“Voice: get me the Atmo watch.” Unlike most Aoteans, Muahe routinely switched between voice, ocular, and tactile control of his wearable, finding each method to be more useful for different tasks.
“Atmo, MT2 Taki,” answered a musical, feminine voice.
Taki? Oh yeah, that little MedTech. I like the way her hips move… DT1 Muahe cleared his throat. “Atmo, Sewage. Where do you have the Rover?”
“With a TechBot. Joint servo broke.”
Jacks-of-all-trades in electronics and delicate machinery, TechBots served as general practitioners and surgeons for other Bots, though it was unusual for a RoverBot to require unscheduled repairs. “How much longer?”
“Hour or two.”
Goddamnit. He tried not to let his frustration show through the comms system. “Thanks, Atmo, Sewage out.” Muahe closed the connection and shut his eyes, for some reason feeling a tad more energized. At least we get off watch at the same time. Maybe she’d like to get a drink or a dip in the Pond… Then he recalled the anomaly the NetBug found. Damn.
The bacterial and particulate readings were still technically within specification, so he was not bound by the regulations to do anything but note it in the logs and mention it to the next person on duty. But nothing was more irritating then relieving a watch only to have to solve a problem the last guy was too lazy to fix. If only I had a UI today… Periodically all watchstanders would be accompanied by an Under Instruction watch, usually a youngster still working on their ship’s qualification. And this would be an excellent job for a UI — he vaguely recalled that the Sewage qualification card had a Practical Factor requirement for manual clearance of a filter clog. He shook his head unconsciously. Guess it’s all on me, damn it. He didn’t look forward to squeezing his bulky frame into the maintenance crawlway, and dreaded even more the too-snug feeling of the thinsuit and breather he would need to wear to open up the purifiers.
“Might as well get it over with,” he mumbled as he made his way through the cramped passageways, instinctively ducking his head under various pipes and other obstacles for the tall. He was so busy minding the head-level obstructions that he nearly tripped on an insectile DustBot, and cursed at the indignant squeal from the little fist-sized cleaning robot, ubiquitous throughout Aotea.
The thinsuit locker was unhelpfully placed next to a bulky suction pump, leaving him little room to actually don it. And to add insult to injury, the breather seal was broken, eliciting an involuntary growl of frustration. He projected onto a bulkhead and navigated to the logs for this locker. It was signed by MRT2 Gustafson, dating about three weeks ago. Gustafson, damn it! Every time a breather was used, the regulations said the user had to replace the filter, recharge the tank, and apply a new tamper seal. The seal helpfully turned red if there was any leakage. Cursing, DT1 Muahe hooked the breather up to the pressure test device, only calming slightly when the readout came up clean. Okay Gustafson, you charged it and put the filter in, so that earns you a reprieve… but if you forget the fucking seal again, the brotherhood of the watch be damned, you’re getting reported!
The maintenance crawlway was even more confined than he remembered; he hadn’t had to traverse it for several months. Every step required a contortion — around a pipe, or an electrical box, or a data conduit, or one of hundreds of other components. By the time he reached the purifier lockout space, he was massaging a cramp in his hamstring. As soon as he shut the hatch behind him, he spent a full, luxurious minute stretching his muscles. He pawed through a few choices on the tiny display and temporarily shut off the flow through these filters. It took another minute for the purifier bank to drain with a telltale glug-glug. He took a deep breath and thumbed the release for the purifier bank entryway. Under the thinsuit hood, he barely heard the hiss of equalizing pressure as the narrow hatch opened.
He had to get on his knees once again to access the filters, with nothing but a porous grate between him and the innards of each device. At least this damn breather takes away the stink. The hatch shut automatically behind him. A small click from somewhere nearby took his attention, but nothing seemed out of place when he glanced around. He disconnected the power for the first machine in the bank and removed the grate, then reached in with a snake-like brush, guiding it through to scour every surface of the interior filter, carefully feeling for any lumps or snags. There was only a hint of dust on the brush head when he pulled it back. No clog here. He paused, for barely an instant smelling the fetid odor of the sludge that passed through these filters by the gallon. He took a deep breath as he replaced the grate, but all of a sudden his lungs were on fire. He jerked back involuntarily, slamming his head into the back panel of the next bank of purifiers. Dazed, he tried to stand, gulping the air in great gasps despite the burn. Hand over hand, he tried to pull himself back into the lockout space. The seal… the fucking seal… His left arm began to shake uncontrollably. He awkwardly slurred the voice control for an emergency call. “Sewage… purification bank 7. Can’t… breathe…” he managed to croak, vision blurring. And the blackness took over.