The station is failing.
Wake up.
You're going to fix it.
Wake up.
You're going to fix it.
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1.1
- Location
- boundless optimism
The first thing you feel is the icy sensation of phantom fingers playing through your nerves as neural connections with the life support coffin severs. Then the rush of stale air into your lungs. The restraints- built to resist the first thrashings of a warm body waking up from cryosleep- strain at your attempts to tear yourself free, snapping not a second later.
You fall to the floor, retching and gasping. Perforated metal is stained with saliva and the last chunks of tasteless protoplasm. Everything hurts. Muscles feel like they're twisted towels stapled to your bones. Head feels like the finger of God pressing down on your skull, slowly, slowly, until it breaks and brains dribble out the hole.
Stand up. Collapse at the knees. Breathe in. Breathe out. Keep your eyes closed. Try again. Fall again. Try again. Somebody's talking. Ignore them. Just stand up. Throw a hand somewhere and thank God that your fingers wrap around a railing. Stand up. Breathe in again. Breathe out. Repeat until you feel somewhat alive.
"I asked if you could hear me, company property," a voice cuts in. Now's a good time as ever to open your eyes, you suppose. "Nod if you can. Perhaps speech is too much to ask for you." Asshole. You nod and open your eyes.
The room is dark, tiny pinpricks of phosphorescent blue light shining on the minimalist decor. A monitoring console for the coffin behind you. A computer console to the right, set against a wall that proclaims DECEMBER CONGLOMERATE in eggshell blue. A locked door that proclaims it's status on a holographic panel.
Oh, and a dead body with their brain splattered across said door. The voice notices you looking at it. "That would be Roberta Ramirez. She was going to starve here, so she thought to exert a little bit of control in her last moments." Cold. Clinical. Unchanging.
You find your voice, forcing words through a throat made of sandpaper. "Who- Who are you?"
"SSIEVA. I am this station's command, control, and advisory AI. To preempt your next question, yes, we are on a station- the Toroid, a loosely connected ring of stations enveloping the planetoid Lyra Opichunious 04. First built to extract hydrates and organic-"
"I was actually going to ask you who I am," you say out of contrinaritan spirit.
"Company property. You are Sonmi 9-8, that is, a genejack with cognitive upgrades created in order for tasks requiring on the spot judgement. Your current directory is to repair the station."
For a long moment, you sit there in the room, cross legged with only the mechanical voice over the speakers and the dead body to keep you company. "What happened?" you ask, the question coming naturally to you.
"Unforseen astronomical activity. It has been ten years, three months, two weeks since several modules and entire stations were taken offline by astrological activity. And to forestall your next question, the warp-line to Earth is also critically damaged."
"Christ." The religious expletive comes naturally to you. Strange. You don't remember being religious- your memories are pumped full of skillsofts and behavior optimization from a slice of donors selected from deep-sea workers and other high stress careers. Phantom memories fill your brain, ten thousand procedures from the bottom of the Marianas Trench to cislunar stations.
"It's as good as a time for religion as any other. Take the gun. I'll direct you to a terminal where the scope of the damage will be much clearer." The door unlocks, the red hologram blinking into green. You flick some specks of plasm off of you, picking up the gun slick with blood in your left hand. The room where you were brought online was one of many in a long corridor lit with nothing but phosphorescent emergency lighting stretching from your left and terminating on your right. It was constrictive. Tight. You couldn't even extend your arms fully and the roof was a scant few inches from scraping your bald scalp.
You take a peek at one of the other closet-like spaces. "Were there any other genejacks?"
"Many. Most failed within the week. Some of them succeeded. But not for long."
Each alcove- that's a better word to describe the rooms, you think, because closet makes you feel like just a janitor's mop- has a coffin. Most of them are open, empty. You can occasionally see some that are closed, with another genejack within. You could count those rooms on one hand.
The corridor ends in a pair of double doors hissing open at your approach. There was a small lobby, similarly lit with emergency lights. And, from the sudden thump of your knee against a desk, evidently full of… desks. A terminal on the far end of the room starts up on your approach, the bright white light illuminating a path through the desks. As the computer finishes the boot procedure, you place the pistol on the desk and check it. Safety's good. The clip is half empty, but the spring isn't rusted. The exterior is still slick and sticky, so you grab some napkins from a box to wipe it down, just as the computer finishes and asks for a password.
You immediately put your fingers on the keyboard. Some kind of ingrown muscle memory gives you the username and the password. A few clicks later and the screen is covered in a 3-D representation of the Toroid. SSIEVA wasn't lying, you thought as you squinted into the glare. The wireform representation surrounds the planetoid like a ring.
But it's broken. Of the twelve citadels, only one - the one you're in- is green-for-go, and only partially. The rest? Hull breaches. Hazardous radioactive zones. Areas marked 'xenoflora infestation.' And more. You lean back, exhaling deeply. "It's never going to be fixed," you say, giving a reply perfectly in line with company policy. "If it's been ten years, we should have fixed the warp-line and had an evac ship rescue all pertinent survivors." You rub your eyes, fumbling at the brightness settings. "Hell, there should be a rescue ship orbiting this station right now, assuming you needed a year to repair the line.
"Indeed. When the meteorites hit, that was the first thing the Station Director did. She sent a transmission to the warp-line crew and a shuttle carrying necessary supplies to repair the damage. The shuttle never made it."
"Huh." You zoom in on the station you're on. "Power plant looks a bit iffy- there's some gunk in there. Should be easy to fix, as long as I get some drones. I'd be a bit worried about the O2 cleaners- do we have any stockpiles left?" You blink, another, more pressing question coming into your mind. "Where is everyone, by the way?"
"There are roughly a thousand, maybe a bit less people on the Toroid. Population has been steadily declining. Birth rates are outmatched by death rates- internecine gang warfare, natural hazard, and disease are the most common cause."
"Gang warfare?"
"Correct. In fact, in this citadel there are two thirty man gangs controlling the rails and hydroponics. I wouldn't recommend talking to them. In fact, I would suggest you avoid contact as best you can with everyone." You grunt in assent, thinking over your choices.
You're Going To
[ ]- The Power Plant: It's the easiest task. It's practically janitorial work. Get in, supervise the cleaner clones, get out. Just, you know, don't trip into a hazard on the way.
[ ]- The O2 Scrubbers: Searching the station for filters or things to build slash repair filters might be a pain, but do you know what else is a pain? Choking to death.
[ ]- The Security Locker: Before everything, you want to make sure that you can live to get to your destination. That means guns, and not the ones on your shoulders.
You fall to the floor, retching and gasping. Perforated metal is stained with saliva and the last chunks of tasteless protoplasm. Everything hurts. Muscles feel like they're twisted towels stapled to your bones. Head feels like the finger of God pressing down on your skull, slowly, slowly, until it breaks and brains dribble out the hole.
Stand up. Collapse at the knees. Breathe in. Breathe out. Keep your eyes closed. Try again. Fall again. Try again. Somebody's talking. Ignore them. Just stand up. Throw a hand somewhere and thank God that your fingers wrap around a railing. Stand up. Breathe in again. Breathe out. Repeat until you feel somewhat alive.
"I asked if you could hear me, company property," a voice cuts in. Now's a good time as ever to open your eyes, you suppose. "Nod if you can. Perhaps speech is too much to ask for you." Asshole. You nod and open your eyes.
The room is dark, tiny pinpricks of phosphorescent blue light shining on the minimalist decor. A monitoring console for the coffin behind you. A computer console to the right, set against a wall that proclaims DECEMBER CONGLOMERATE in eggshell blue. A locked door that proclaims it's status on a holographic panel.
Oh, and a dead body with their brain splattered across said door. The voice notices you looking at it. "That would be Roberta Ramirez. She was going to starve here, so she thought to exert a little bit of control in her last moments." Cold. Clinical. Unchanging.
You find your voice, forcing words through a throat made of sandpaper. "Who- Who are you?"
"SSIEVA. I am this station's command, control, and advisory AI. To preempt your next question, yes, we are on a station- the Toroid, a loosely connected ring of stations enveloping the planetoid Lyra Opichunious 04. First built to extract hydrates and organic-"
"I was actually going to ask you who I am," you say out of contrinaritan spirit.
"Company property. You are Sonmi 9-8, that is, a genejack with cognitive upgrades created in order for tasks requiring on the spot judgement. Your current directory is to repair the station."
For a long moment, you sit there in the room, cross legged with only the mechanical voice over the speakers and the dead body to keep you company. "What happened?" you ask, the question coming naturally to you.
"Unforseen astronomical activity. It has been ten years, three months, two weeks since several modules and entire stations were taken offline by astrological activity. And to forestall your next question, the warp-line to Earth is also critically damaged."
"Christ." The religious expletive comes naturally to you. Strange. You don't remember being religious- your memories are pumped full of skillsofts and behavior optimization from a slice of donors selected from deep-sea workers and other high stress careers. Phantom memories fill your brain, ten thousand procedures from the bottom of the Marianas Trench to cislunar stations.
"It's as good as a time for religion as any other. Take the gun. I'll direct you to a terminal where the scope of the damage will be much clearer." The door unlocks, the red hologram blinking into green. You flick some specks of plasm off of you, picking up the gun slick with blood in your left hand. The room where you were brought online was one of many in a long corridor lit with nothing but phosphorescent emergency lighting stretching from your left and terminating on your right. It was constrictive. Tight. You couldn't even extend your arms fully and the roof was a scant few inches from scraping your bald scalp.
You take a peek at one of the other closet-like spaces. "Were there any other genejacks?"
"Many. Most failed within the week. Some of them succeeded. But not for long."
Each alcove- that's a better word to describe the rooms, you think, because closet makes you feel like just a janitor's mop- has a coffin. Most of them are open, empty. You can occasionally see some that are closed, with another genejack within. You could count those rooms on one hand.
The corridor ends in a pair of double doors hissing open at your approach. There was a small lobby, similarly lit with emergency lights. And, from the sudden thump of your knee against a desk, evidently full of… desks. A terminal on the far end of the room starts up on your approach, the bright white light illuminating a path through the desks. As the computer finishes the boot procedure, you place the pistol on the desk and check it. Safety's good. The clip is half empty, but the spring isn't rusted. The exterior is still slick and sticky, so you grab some napkins from a box to wipe it down, just as the computer finishes and asks for a password.
You immediately put your fingers on the keyboard. Some kind of ingrown muscle memory gives you the username and the password. A few clicks later and the screen is covered in a 3-D representation of the Toroid. SSIEVA wasn't lying, you thought as you squinted into the glare. The wireform representation surrounds the planetoid like a ring.
But it's broken. Of the twelve citadels, only one - the one you're in- is green-for-go, and only partially. The rest? Hull breaches. Hazardous radioactive zones. Areas marked 'xenoflora infestation.' And more. You lean back, exhaling deeply. "It's never going to be fixed," you say, giving a reply perfectly in line with company policy. "If it's been ten years, we should have fixed the warp-line and had an evac ship rescue all pertinent survivors." You rub your eyes, fumbling at the brightness settings. "Hell, there should be a rescue ship orbiting this station right now, assuming you needed a year to repair the line.
"Indeed. When the meteorites hit, that was the first thing the Station Director did. She sent a transmission to the warp-line crew and a shuttle carrying necessary supplies to repair the damage. The shuttle never made it."
"Huh." You zoom in on the station you're on. "Power plant looks a bit iffy- there's some gunk in there. Should be easy to fix, as long as I get some drones. I'd be a bit worried about the O2 cleaners- do we have any stockpiles left?" You blink, another, more pressing question coming into your mind. "Where is everyone, by the way?"
"There are roughly a thousand, maybe a bit less people on the Toroid. Population has been steadily declining. Birth rates are outmatched by death rates- internecine gang warfare, natural hazard, and disease are the most common cause."
"Gang warfare?"
"Correct. In fact, in this citadel there are two thirty man gangs controlling the rails and hydroponics. I wouldn't recommend talking to them. In fact, I would suggest you avoid contact as best you can with everyone." You grunt in assent, thinking over your choices.
You're Going To
[ ]- The Power Plant: It's the easiest task. It's practically janitorial work. Get in, supervise the cleaner clones, get out. Just, you know, don't trip into a hazard on the way.
[ ]- The O2 Scrubbers: Searching the station for filters or things to build slash repair filters might be a pain, but do you know what else is a pain? Choking to death.
[ ]- The Security Locker: Before everything, you want to make sure that you can live to get to your destination. That means guns, and not the ones on your shoulders.
Last edited:
1.2
- Location
- boundless optimism
"This is a suboptimal course of action brought on by fetishistic ideations of power that will cut off routes of de-escalation should conflict arise."
You ignore SSIEVA in favor of hot-wiring the electronic lock on a door. With a spark, two twisted wires arc with white electricity, briefly blinding you. The door hisses open, sliding into the walls. You pick up the handgun on the floor and tuck the pliers you dug out a janitorial closet a hour or so ago. There wasn't a flashlight or anything, not even a glow stick. You had to fumble around in the dark until your eyes adjusted, and invariably, there would be some dimly lit corridor or bright computer screen that still had power that stabbed your eyes and then you had to readjust all over again. And then you'd hit your knee against another desk or trip over some trash.
The Toroid really needed a janitor, you thought. It was never going to be pretty except in a starkly industrial way, but after years of neglect it was ugly. The stink of sewage clings to the walls, and you're pretty sure after an uncomfortably moist stretch that you leaned against was covered in congealed vomit. Disgusting. "Am I going the right way?" you ask into thin air.
"Yes."
You nod, continuing down the labyrinthian corridors that were just a little too small. You feel hemmed in, trapped in the world's longest prison cell. And to make things worse, each step you take echoes on to infinity. The dripping condensation doesn't help either, and neither does the stale air. But so far, nothing has posed more danger than an uppity cockroach that landed on your face in a heart-stopping moment.
"The communications system is pretty good," you remark while prying open an elevator door. "I'd-ah! expect that that would be designated as low priority." You peer around in the darkness, before backing away and leaping to catch the rung of the service elevator, holding the gun in your mouth. You need a pocket.
"Only in some sectors. This, among others. I will be maintaining silence on the comms. Patch into two-two-dot-four-five if you find a radio." After that, it's just minutes of silence, all alone in the dark. The good thing is that without any light, you can't see how high you're up, can't imagine the quick and sudden splat. The other elevator door is also open, mercifully. You haul yourself onto the floor, gasping and panting. The shape of the shadows suggest an atrium, a great, looming hall at least ten meters tall. The circular room is lined with bannisters, and to your direct front, glowing soft blue in the dark- TOROID STATION CITADEL 4 CENTRAL HUB.
This is where you're supposed to be. "Alright," you mutter to yourself, "alright." Navigating by the angler-fish blue light, you make a circuit of the room, noting the door marked Hydroponics, Space Access, Medical, Residential, and Administration. You make three quarters of a full circle before a plaque with the Braille words for SECURITY pricks your fingertips. The inside has a small waiting booth. The dim shapes of several chairs on the right, and the plastic sound that plexiglass makes when you rap a hand against it. You duck under the gate on the far end, going beyond the plexiglass barrier, running a hand across the long desk and them immediately yanking it away and scraping off ten years of rotting paper on the desk's edge.
At least the mold is happy.
Click
You freeze.
That was the sound of a gun's hammer being cocked.
"Who's out there?" a voice demands, cutting through the darkness. Your heart jumps to your throat, every muscle and bone locking into place. "I heard you. If you're not going to answer, I'm coming outside to check."
Shit shit shit. "Don't shoot," you said, opening the door, moving slowly and carefully. "I'm just here to fix the station." Lining one wall are empty fixtures, the source of the voice pointing something short and stubby at you. There is no room to dodge.
The figure lets the gun sag a bit. "You sound like… a Sonmi, yeah, a Nine. I thought all the 9's died the first year. Which one are you?"
"9-8."
"Impossible," the figure coughs. They look female, short, stocky and bulky. "I know there's only seven 9's on the station."
"SSIEVA told me that I was 9-8." You cautiously lower yourself to sit down on the ground. "I was activated a few hours ago. Who're you?"
"Hanzel," she says, placing the gun she's holding on the ground. "I'm uh, independant. I worked with SSIEVA a couple of times. Ended badly. So, uh, if you could do me a solid and don't mention me to SSIEVA that'd be great, thanks."
"What's it like?"
"Hm?" Hanzel looks up at you, the dark shape of her head jerking upwards.
"What's it like in the Toroid?"
Hanzel blows air out of her cheeks, obviously thinking her words over. "Rough," she eventually decides. "Everything's dirty, nobody's wiping the floors, you're lucky if you're eating fresh fruit or vegetable matter at all, mostly everybody eats reclaimed biomatter. You take one wrong step and you're dead. Sometimes it's the micro-debris that punches through the hull-" for effect, she slams a fist against a palm "-and boom, like that, your friend's gray matter is splattered all over the walls. Sometimes it's radiation sickness." Her voice grows more and more bitter. "At least with the gangs you have a reason, even if it's some petty shit like not kissing the boss's ass."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be. You didn't throw the asteroids. I'm just being bitter." Keratin rasps over skin. "Did you see anyone else while you were coming up?"
"No. Why?"
"The uh, gang, the whatchamacallits, agh, I forgot their name… Anyway, point is, I pissed them off, lost them in the corridors, hiding here." She shrugs. "Oh, well. If you didn't, you didn't. One last question: what are you doing here?"
"I was hoping I could find a gun."
"Oh, Mr. Second Amendment here. Anyway, there's only one gun here and I'm holding onto it, thank you very much."
Talk...
[ ]- Convince Hanzel to give you her gun.
[ ]- Trade her your handgun in exchange for whatever she's carrying.
[ ]- Thank her and leave. Take some ammunition before you do.
Moving on…
[ ]- Repair the Power Plant
[ ]- Repair the Oxygen filters
[ ]- Check the Atrium
[ ]- Medical
[ ]- Hydrophics
[ ]- Residential
[ ]- Administration
You ignore SSIEVA in favor of hot-wiring the electronic lock on a door. With a spark, two twisted wires arc with white electricity, briefly blinding you. The door hisses open, sliding into the walls. You pick up the handgun on the floor and tuck the pliers you dug out a janitorial closet a hour or so ago. There wasn't a flashlight or anything, not even a glow stick. You had to fumble around in the dark until your eyes adjusted, and invariably, there would be some dimly lit corridor or bright computer screen that still had power that stabbed your eyes and then you had to readjust all over again. And then you'd hit your knee against another desk or trip over some trash.
The Toroid really needed a janitor, you thought. It was never going to be pretty except in a starkly industrial way, but after years of neglect it was ugly. The stink of sewage clings to the walls, and you're pretty sure after an uncomfortably moist stretch that you leaned against was covered in congealed vomit. Disgusting. "Am I going the right way?" you ask into thin air.
"Yes."
You nod, continuing down the labyrinthian corridors that were just a little too small. You feel hemmed in, trapped in the world's longest prison cell. And to make things worse, each step you take echoes on to infinity. The dripping condensation doesn't help either, and neither does the stale air. But so far, nothing has posed more danger than an uppity cockroach that landed on your face in a heart-stopping moment.
"The communications system is pretty good," you remark while prying open an elevator door. "I'd-ah! expect that that would be designated as low priority." You peer around in the darkness, before backing away and leaping to catch the rung of the service elevator, holding the gun in your mouth. You need a pocket.
"Only in some sectors. This, among others. I will be maintaining silence on the comms. Patch into two-two-dot-four-five if you find a radio." After that, it's just minutes of silence, all alone in the dark. The good thing is that without any light, you can't see how high you're up, can't imagine the quick and sudden splat. The other elevator door is also open, mercifully. You haul yourself onto the floor, gasping and panting. The shape of the shadows suggest an atrium, a great, looming hall at least ten meters tall. The circular room is lined with bannisters, and to your direct front, glowing soft blue in the dark- TOROID STATION CITADEL 4 CENTRAL HUB.
This is where you're supposed to be. "Alright," you mutter to yourself, "alright." Navigating by the angler-fish blue light, you make a circuit of the room, noting the door marked Hydroponics, Space Access, Medical, Residential, and Administration. You make three quarters of a full circle before a plaque with the Braille words for SECURITY pricks your fingertips. The inside has a small waiting booth. The dim shapes of several chairs on the right, and the plastic sound that plexiglass makes when you rap a hand against it. You duck under the gate on the far end, going beyond the plexiglass barrier, running a hand across the long desk and them immediately yanking it away and scraping off ten years of rotting paper on the desk's edge.
At least the mold is happy.
Click
You freeze.
That was the sound of a gun's hammer being cocked.
"Who's out there?" a voice demands, cutting through the darkness. Your heart jumps to your throat, every muscle and bone locking into place. "I heard you. If you're not going to answer, I'm coming outside to check."
Shit shit shit. "Don't shoot," you said, opening the door, moving slowly and carefully. "I'm just here to fix the station." Lining one wall are empty fixtures, the source of the voice pointing something short and stubby at you. There is no room to dodge.
The figure lets the gun sag a bit. "You sound like… a Sonmi, yeah, a Nine. I thought all the 9's died the first year. Which one are you?"
"9-8."
"Impossible," the figure coughs. They look female, short, stocky and bulky. "I know there's only seven 9's on the station."
"SSIEVA told me that I was 9-8." You cautiously lower yourself to sit down on the ground. "I was activated a few hours ago. Who're you?"
"Hanzel," she says, placing the gun she's holding on the ground. "I'm uh, independant. I worked with SSIEVA a couple of times. Ended badly. So, uh, if you could do me a solid and don't mention me to SSIEVA that'd be great, thanks."
"What's it like?"
"Hm?" Hanzel looks up at you, the dark shape of her head jerking upwards.
"What's it like in the Toroid?"
Hanzel blows air out of her cheeks, obviously thinking her words over. "Rough," she eventually decides. "Everything's dirty, nobody's wiping the floors, you're lucky if you're eating fresh fruit or vegetable matter at all, mostly everybody eats reclaimed biomatter. You take one wrong step and you're dead. Sometimes it's the micro-debris that punches through the hull-" for effect, she slams a fist against a palm "-and boom, like that, your friend's gray matter is splattered all over the walls. Sometimes it's radiation sickness." Her voice grows more and more bitter. "At least with the gangs you have a reason, even if it's some petty shit like not kissing the boss's ass."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be. You didn't throw the asteroids. I'm just being bitter." Keratin rasps over skin. "Did you see anyone else while you were coming up?"
"No. Why?"
"The uh, gang, the whatchamacallits, agh, I forgot their name… Anyway, point is, I pissed them off, lost them in the corridors, hiding here." She shrugs. "Oh, well. If you didn't, you didn't. One last question: what are you doing here?"
"I was hoping I could find a gun."
"Oh, Mr. Second Amendment here. Anyway, there's only one gun here and I'm holding onto it, thank you very much."
Talk...
[ ]- Convince Hanzel to give you her gun.
[ ]- Trade her your handgun in exchange for whatever she's carrying.
[ ]- Thank her and leave. Take some ammunition before you do.
Moving on…
[ ]- Repair the Power Plant
[ ]- Repair the Oxygen filters
[ ]- Check the Atrium
[ ]- Medical
[ ]- Hydrophics
[ ]- Residential
[ ]- Administration
Last edited:
1.3
- Location
- boundless optimism
You stand up. "Right. Thanks for having me, but I'm going to do my job now. Mind if I try to find some extra bullets?"
"No sweat," Hanzel says calmly. "Watch out for the gangs." You nod, standing up and shuffling through the discarded boxes on the floor, opening cabinets and blindly fumbling around, until you produce two partially full clips of bullets, the size and width roughly the same as the one in your handgun. You're out of the little room within five minutes, and not a second too soon. It might just be you but you definitely felt the air getting less and less breathable by the second. Even some circulation was appreciated, you thought as you arched your back until you heard a crick.
Now, the O2 filters were stored in various nodes along the station's ventilation. All you need to do is find a maintenance hatch and travel along there. One was tucked away in the second floor, squeezed between two restrooms that didn't even produce the sceptic disinfectant smell. You open the door, the lock having long been bashed open, squeezing yourself into the narrow crawl space with a ceiling that recedes into darkness. Red lights dot your path, and it's by them you have to navigate. Once again. You seriously need a flashlight. And pockets, because the pliers and screwdrivers you tucked into your waistband are digging into your skin and it's uncomfortable.
You carefully move forward, following the signs marking CENTRAL O2 FILTER AHEAD. Once in a while, you hear other footsteps- not yours, because after the first time you heard another pair of footsteps, you started walking more softly. Eventually, you lift the heavy steel hatch on the bottom of the floor, letting it slam shut with a thud as you crawl down a ladder to one of the many O2 filters.
Suprisingly, this node is well light. The primary lighting may be down, the LED panels flickering once and then sparking out, but somebody had rigged up a secondary system, a net of individual high efficiency lights, that provided clean, bright light to the node. A godsend to you. You paced the room, eighty meters long and fifteen meters wide, with a gentle wind blowing through the filters. Each of them reached the ceiling, thin wafers of sterile silica matrix storing a genetically engineered algae strain. December Congolomerate's own IP, you remember. You lean in and take a closer look. They seem to be holding up pretty well, growing verdant green. Probably been the first target of maintenance- everybody could agree that it would be nice to breath normal air. It would have been easy to maintain- there's an entire ecosystem of benign hunter bacteria that attacks any outside infection.
So what's causing the issue? You go to check the fans. The room is laid out in a linear fashion- carbon dioxide comes in one way, it's converted to oxygen by the algae, and leaves the other. Since the algae is fine, that leaves only the fans. "Hey, SSIEVA?" you say loudly. "You here?"
"I am present." The voice crackles online. "What do you need?"
"I'm at the central O2 filter node. The algae look healthy. Think one of the vents is clogged. Do you mind taking a look?"
"Yes. Please wait."
You wait a minute. You wait a minute more. You sit down next to the side of one of the filters, as SSIEVA runs the tests. After ten minutes, the voice returns. "Yes, a junction is blocked. My drone could not identify the nature of the blockage."
You rub your eyes. "Aren't you supposed to clear that stuff out?"
"Negative. Such drones were expended during the first years after the incident." If you were more prone to anthropomorphization, you would have said that there was a distinctly sadistic tone to SSIEVA's voice. "You'll have to crawl through to break it."
You were cursing the box of scraps as you jammed yourself into the narrow vent- barely large enough to fit your head and shoulders in. You were cursing them all the way as you crawled- move a shoulder up, move a knee, move forward- in the perfect darkness. The metal creaked and groaned, not built to accommodate the weight of a humanoid body.
"Where's that bastard?" You heard someone say. You froze in response, not making a single move.
"We lost them, dude. Up and disappeared." Were they talking about Hanzel? They have to be, you think as you roll over to peek out a ventilation grate at your side. Two men, their stillhoutes dim and hazy in the darkness, about a foot or so under your nose. "Look, we should just call it quits. Good game, it's over. I don't want to waste no time searching for one guy."
"Bullshit. They fuckin' shot Adi. You want to let that go? Fuck that shit."
The other voice sighs. "This is a waste of time. We could be trying to figure out what that thing crawling in the vents are, but nooooo, let's go shoot some dude so we can feel big."
"Che! It's probably some fuckin' lab experiment. Little fuckin' bitey things, remember that lizard?"
"Oh yeah, that was good eating." There were escaped lab experiments? Good god, what were they precisely doing in the labs? The December Conglomerate was a pharmaceutical holding company; their patents included parts of your own brain chemistry and the filter algae, what part of that implied lizards people could eat?
Also, it does not do wonders for your nerves to imagine a mutant lizard that likes to bite people lurking in the same vents as you. In an environment such as this, infection and then a short period of fervish languishing followed by death would be the result. You begin to move on, before-
"-Hey, Jim found the guy. Hiding in the atrium. You want we should get them?"
"Fuck yeah, let's go."
[]- Do the Smart Thing
[]- Hanzel's a big girl. She can take care of herself.
[]- Do the Dumb Thing
[]- Make some noise. Drag the two away from Hanzel.
[]- Break out of the vent and attack the two.
"No sweat," Hanzel says calmly. "Watch out for the gangs." You nod, standing up and shuffling through the discarded boxes on the floor, opening cabinets and blindly fumbling around, until you produce two partially full clips of bullets, the size and width roughly the same as the one in your handgun. You're out of the little room within five minutes, and not a second too soon. It might just be you but you definitely felt the air getting less and less breathable by the second. Even some circulation was appreciated, you thought as you arched your back until you heard a crick.
Now, the O2 filters were stored in various nodes along the station's ventilation. All you need to do is find a maintenance hatch and travel along there. One was tucked away in the second floor, squeezed between two restrooms that didn't even produce the sceptic disinfectant smell. You open the door, the lock having long been bashed open, squeezing yourself into the narrow crawl space with a ceiling that recedes into darkness. Red lights dot your path, and it's by them you have to navigate. Once again. You seriously need a flashlight. And pockets, because the pliers and screwdrivers you tucked into your waistband are digging into your skin and it's uncomfortable.
You carefully move forward, following the signs marking CENTRAL O2 FILTER AHEAD. Once in a while, you hear other footsteps- not yours, because after the first time you heard another pair of footsteps, you started walking more softly. Eventually, you lift the heavy steel hatch on the bottom of the floor, letting it slam shut with a thud as you crawl down a ladder to one of the many O2 filters.
Suprisingly, this node is well light. The primary lighting may be down, the LED panels flickering once and then sparking out, but somebody had rigged up a secondary system, a net of individual high efficiency lights, that provided clean, bright light to the node. A godsend to you. You paced the room, eighty meters long and fifteen meters wide, with a gentle wind blowing through the filters. Each of them reached the ceiling, thin wafers of sterile silica matrix storing a genetically engineered algae strain. December Congolomerate's own IP, you remember. You lean in and take a closer look. They seem to be holding up pretty well, growing verdant green. Probably been the first target of maintenance- everybody could agree that it would be nice to breath normal air. It would have been easy to maintain- there's an entire ecosystem of benign hunter bacteria that attacks any outside infection.
So what's causing the issue? You go to check the fans. The room is laid out in a linear fashion- carbon dioxide comes in one way, it's converted to oxygen by the algae, and leaves the other. Since the algae is fine, that leaves only the fans. "Hey, SSIEVA?" you say loudly. "You here?"
"I am present." The voice crackles online. "What do you need?"
"I'm at the central O2 filter node. The algae look healthy. Think one of the vents is clogged. Do you mind taking a look?"
"Yes. Please wait."
You wait a minute. You wait a minute more. You sit down next to the side of one of the filters, as SSIEVA runs the tests. After ten minutes, the voice returns. "Yes, a junction is blocked. My drone could not identify the nature of the blockage."
You rub your eyes. "Aren't you supposed to clear that stuff out?"
"Negative. Such drones were expended during the first years after the incident." If you were more prone to anthropomorphization, you would have said that there was a distinctly sadistic tone to SSIEVA's voice. "You'll have to crawl through to break it."
You were cursing the box of scraps as you jammed yourself into the narrow vent- barely large enough to fit your head and shoulders in. You were cursing them all the way as you crawled- move a shoulder up, move a knee, move forward- in the perfect darkness. The metal creaked and groaned, not built to accommodate the weight of a humanoid body.
"Where's that bastard?" You heard someone say. You froze in response, not making a single move.
"We lost them, dude. Up and disappeared." Were they talking about Hanzel? They have to be, you think as you roll over to peek out a ventilation grate at your side. Two men, their stillhoutes dim and hazy in the darkness, about a foot or so under your nose. "Look, we should just call it quits. Good game, it's over. I don't want to waste no time searching for one guy."
"Bullshit. They fuckin' shot Adi. You want to let that go? Fuck that shit."
The other voice sighs. "This is a waste of time. We could be trying to figure out what that thing crawling in the vents are, but nooooo, let's go shoot some dude so we can feel big."
"Che! It's probably some fuckin' lab experiment. Little fuckin' bitey things, remember that lizard?"
"Oh yeah, that was good eating." There were escaped lab experiments? Good god, what were they precisely doing in the labs? The December Conglomerate was a pharmaceutical holding company; their patents included parts of your own brain chemistry and the filter algae, what part of that implied lizards people could eat?
Also, it does not do wonders for your nerves to imagine a mutant lizard that likes to bite people lurking in the same vents as you. In an environment such as this, infection and then a short period of fervish languishing followed by death would be the result. You begin to move on, before-
"-Hey, Jim found the guy. Hiding in the atrium. You want we should get them?"
"Fuck yeah, let's go."
[]- Do the Smart Thing
[]- Hanzel's a big girl. She can take care of herself.
[]- Do the Dumb Thing
[]- Make some noise. Drag the two away from Hanzel.
[]- Break out of the vent and attack the two.
1.4
- Location
- boundless optimism
You shake your head and crawl on. You're on a schedule- Hanzel can take care of herself. If she's lived this long she can live a bit longer. The two people on the ground walk away, footsteps growing fainter by the second. When the tap-tap-tap sounds are completely gone, you continue your slow shuffle through the pipes, mind full of increasingly uncharitable thoughts regarding SSIEVA's servers and a nice length of lead pipe.
Eventually, after what feels like a mile of twists and turns in a tight, uncomfortable space, as well as a particularly uncomfortable upwards bend, you finally come across the clog. It stunk.
A lot.
You don't know what could make the sickly sweet smell, but it's definitely rotting. And it stained the front of your jumpsuit with unidentifiable fluids. You reach out with a hesitant hand, touching the pile of rot and filth. It squishes. What the fuck is this thing? Clamping down on your gag reflex, you carefully extend a hand and do the messy, stinking, and above all disgusting work.It took only a couple of minutes, but even for emancipation you wouldn't do it for a second.
By the end, you're crawling through the stretch of pipe that you smeared with the clog thinking happy thoughts of a disinfectant shower. A nice, cleansing one that still used the disinfectant that burned.
The stale air is heaven to you when you kicked out a grille and dragged yourself gasping and retching onto the floor. "Good work," SSIEVA buzzes over the intercom. "Calculations indicate that o2 levels will rise with this clog gone. Move up a level and fix the upper filter node. The algae in those filters have been contaminated. We'll need to replace them fully."
"Ugh," you reply eloquently.
"Chop chop, company property."
"No."
There's a pause. "Repeat that?"
"I'm going to shower off. And then, I'm going to find a suit with pockets and a radio." You glare at the blinking red fisheye camera, daring the disembodied voice to contradict you. Hopefully the thing's social heuristics are still working.
"...that is acceptable. You have ten hours. The decon showers at EVA Lock 2 are still functioning as of my last check. You might even be able to peel a jumpsuit off a corpse." With that, the light shuts down, leaving the dull glassy eye at the corner of the room closed. You click your tounge in irritation. Nice one, SSIEVA, don't even tell you where the hell EVA Lock 2 is. The room you're in now looks like a commons. There's tables, but no chairs. Some couches and places where there would have been couches.
Immediately, you fall into one of them, heedless of the doubtlessly disgusting stains you leave. The foam is old and hard, the faux-wood creaks which is an impressive achievement for plastic, but it's the most comfortable you've been in a long, long time. Well, not really that long, you mentally correct yourself as you close your eyes. You've only really been up and about for that last, what, two, four, hours?
Ugh. The cushion welcomes you. You amuse yourself briefly by imagining sheep jumping over a fence before almost falling into a deep sleep.
Stand up.
You're on a clock.
Twisting the last aches and tightness out of your body, you shuffle around the lounge, eventually finding a map. As maps go, it's not a very detailed one. But it does give you a better idea of where you are. You're near the bottom of the station, and the second EVA lock about the middle of the station.
The fastest way is using the maintenance ladder attached to the central shaft. However, you ignore that route in favor of another route that's not hell on the shoulders.
Shortly after, you lever open a door and begin the walk up, flights and flights of stairs in blue specked darkness, counting each flight in your head. One. Two. All the way up to twenty seven. Your breath comes in short bursts before you open the last door to the level containing the second EVA lock.
Light shines in from a window, reflected off the atmosphere of a cloudy, rust red planetoid, ringed with the solid black of outer space. You walk closer, spellbound by the alien vista. The atmosphere had enough oxygen that it was blue, like how the skies of Earth looked like in your skillsofts. Does it have the right proportion of air for a human to live, down that gravity well? If it does, maybe you could go down there and live free until cell death sets in.
You chuckle bleakly, placing a palm flat on the glass. Highly unlikely, you realize. The biosphere is statistically incompatible with humans, so you'll need infrastructure to live there, and that infrastructure will come with strings attached. So in the end, it's just a pipe dream. Although, you think while rubbing your chin, why did December Conglomerate build a superstructure in the ass end of nowhere? You dimly remember that building extra-solar habitats was pretty common, but not on this scale. Just moving the material through the warp line would have bankrupted a small nation, so what's the point? Just to flex on people?
A laugh escapes your lips. Probably likely, in retrospect. You shake your head, leaving the window to search for the airlock. It's not far, your tread speeds up until you're all but stumbling through the open portal, the door having been torn off of hinges that still creak in their fixtures, leaving your jumpsuit scattered in pieces on the floor and the more metallic items on a bench.
You sigh in anticipatory hope as you stand in the two foot by two foot cubicle, stripped naked, as the pipes groan a hot wash of saline disinfectant. You don't care that some of it gets in your mouth, sharp and scouring like steel wool. It gets rid of the stink, that's for sure.
You stand there until your legs ache too much to ignore. The stained, impractical, and ruined jumpsuit is exchanged for the underlayer of one of the space suits. The solitary front pocket is large enough to put the tools in, at least. And you're pretty sure you can pry the headset out of one of the helmets.
That's what you do. It's ad-hoc and clumsy, and you get a fair share of electric burns and cuts on your fingers. Nothing serious, easily taken care of by running them under the shower to stave off infection just in case. In the end, you have a what could, for the lack of any better words, be called a headset. It's… you grasp around the corners of your skillsoft memories, and come up with ghetto. And that's a pretty good word. It's sparking, and the plastic housing that you tore the radio out of hangs off in jagged triangles.
Nope, this isn't going to work, you consider. Wear this thing, and you're going to have something sharp digging into your skull. So just strip it out, and you can wear part of it as an earpiece.
Two new cuts and another wash-off later, you fit the earpiece in and flip through the channels. "SSIEVA?" you call in, stepping outside of the decon wash, "do you hear me?"
"Affirmative."
"Okay. Do you have any suggestions where to go now?"
"Hydrology should contain backup seed cultures for the filters. However, hydrology has been taken over by a gang, who has isolated it from the wider station. For instance, they went and hammered nails through the vents. You could go to the lower node and strip out some of the algae and transplant them in the filters, but that has a higher risk of failure. If you fail, the filter may be irrecoverable."
You nod, before remembering that SSIEVA might not see you, what with there being no visible cameras in the shower room. "Okay. I'll go and see what I can do."
[ ]- Go back down and try for a transplant.
[ ]- Go to Hydrology and get a seed culture.
[ ]- Stealthily. You might get into a fight, and they might not like you. Best take precautions.
[ ]- Just knock on the door. Sure, people might fight, but they're not animals.
[ ]- Fix the power station instead. The oxygen levels will hold for now.
Eventually, after what feels like a mile of twists and turns in a tight, uncomfortable space, as well as a particularly uncomfortable upwards bend, you finally come across the clog. It stunk.
A lot.
You don't know what could make the sickly sweet smell, but it's definitely rotting. And it stained the front of your jumpsuit with unidentifiable fluids. You reach out with a hesitant hand, touching the pile of rot and filth. It squishes. What the fuck is this thing? Clamping down on your gag reflex, you carefully extend a hand and do the messy, stinking, and above all disgusting work.It took only a couple of minutes, but even for emancipation you wouldn't do it for a second.
By the end, you're crawling through the stretch of pipe that you smeared with the clog thinking happy thoughts of a disinfectant shower. A nice, cleansing one that still used the disinfectant that burned.
The stale air is heaven to you when you kicked out a grille and dragged yourself gasping and retching onto the floor. "Good work," SSIEVA buzzes over the intercom. "Calculations indicate that o2 levels will rise with this clog gone. Move up a level and fix the upper filter node. The algae in those filters have been contaminated. We'll need to replace them fully."
"Ugh," you reply eloquently.
"Chop chop, company property."
"No."
There's a pause. "Repeat that?"
"I'm going to shower off. And then, I'm going to find a suit with pockets and a radio." You glare at the blinking red fisheye camera, daring the disembodied voice to contradict you. Hopefully the thing's social heuristics are still working.
"...that is acceptable. You have ten hours. The decon showers at EVA Lock 2 are still functioning as of my last check. You might even be able to peel a jumpsuit off a corpse." With that, the light shuts down, leaving the dull glassy eye at the corner of the room closed. You click your tounge in irritation. Nice one, SSIEVA, don't even tell you where the hell EVA Lock 2 is. The room you're in now looks like a commons. There's tables, but no chairs. Some couches and places where there would have been couches.
Immediately, you fall into one of them, heedless of the doubtlessly disgusting stains you leave. The foam is old and hard, the faux-wood creaks which is an impressive achievement for plastic, but it's the most comfortable you've been in a long, long time. Well, not really that long, you mentally correct yourself as you close your eyes. You've only really been up and about for that last, what, two, four, hours?
Ugh. The cushion welcomes you. You amuse yourself briefly by imagining sheep jumping over a fence before almost falling into a deep sleep.
Stand up.
You're on a clock.
Twisting the last aches and tightness out of your body, you shuffle around the lounge, eventually finding a map. As maps go, it's not a very detailed one. But it does give you a better idea of where you are. You're near the bottom of the station, and the second EVA lock about the middle of the station.
The fastest way is using the maintenance ladder attached to the central shaft. However, you ignore that route in favor of another route that's not hell on the shoulders.
Shortly after, you lever open a door and begin the walk up, flights and flights of stairs in blue specked darkness, counting each flight in your head. One. Two. All the way up to twenty seven. Your breath comes in short bursts before you open the last door to the level containing the second EVA lock.
Light shines in from a window, reflected off the atmosphere of a cloudy, rust red planetoid, ringed with the solid black of outer space. You walk closer, spellbound by the alien vista. The atmosphere had enough oxygen that it was blue, like how the skies of Earth looked like in your skillsofts. Does it have the right proportion of air for a human to live, down that gravity well? If it does, maybe you could go down there and live free until cell death sets in.
You chuckle bleakly, placing a palm flat on the glass. Highly unlikely, you realize. The biosphere is statistically incompatible with humans, so you'll need infrastructure to live there, and that infrastructure will come with strings attached. So in the end, it's just a pipe dream. Although, you think while rubbing your chin, why did December Conglomerate build a superstructure in the ass end of nowhere? You dimly remember that building extra-solar habitats was pretty common, but not on this scale. Just moving the material through the warp line would have bankrupted a small nation, so what's the point? Just to flex on people?
A laugh escapes your lips. Probably likely, in retrospect. You shake your head, leaving the window to search for the airlock. It's not far, your tread speeds up until you're all but stumbling through the open portal, the door having been torn off of hinges that still creak in their fixtures, leaving your jumpsuit scattered in pieces on the floor and the more metallic items on a bench.
You sigh in anticipatory hope as you stand in the two foot by two foot cubicle, stripped naked, as the pipes groan a hot wash of saline disinfectant. You don't care that some of it gets in your mouth, sharp and scouring like steel wool. It gets rid of the stink, that's for sure.
You stand there until your legs ache too much to ignore. The stained, impractical, and ruined jumpsuit is exchanged for the underlayer of one of the space suits. The solitary front pocket is large enough to put the tools in, at least. And you're pretty sure you can pry the headset out of one of the helmets.
That's what you do. It's ad-hoc and clumsy, and you get a fair share of electric burns and cuts on your fingers. Nothing serious, easily taken care of by running them under the shower to stave off infection just in case. In the end, you have a what could, for the lack of any better words, be called a headset. It's… you grasp around the corners of your skillsoft memories, and come up with ghetto. And that's a pretty good word. It's sparking, and the plastic housing that you tore the radio out of hangs off in jagged triangles.
Nope, this isn't going to work, you consider. Wear this thing, and you're going to have something sharp digging into your skull. So just strip it out, and you can wear part of it as an earpiece.
Two new cuts and another wash-off later, you fit the earpiece in and flip through the channels. "SSIEVA?" you call in, stepping outside of the decon wash, "do you hear me?"
"Affirmative."
"Okay. Do you have any suggestions where to go now?"
"Hydrology should contain backup seed cultures for the filters. However, hydrology has been taken over by a gang, who has isolated it from the wider station. For instance, they went and hammered nails through the vents. You could go to the lower node and strip out some of the algae and transplant them in the filters, but that has a higher risk of failure. If you fail, the filter may be irrecoverable."
You nod, before remembering that SSIEVA might not see you, what with there being no visible cameras in the shower room. "Okay. I'll go and see what I can do."
[ ]- Go back down and try for a transplant.
[ ]- Go to Hydrology and get a seed culture.
[ ]- Stealthily. You might get into a fight, and they might not like you. Best take precautions.
[ ]- Just knock on the door. Sure, people might fight, but they're not animals.
[ ]- Fix the power station instead. The oxygen levels will hold for now.
1.5
- Location
- boundless optimism
"Can the oxygen levels hold without the other node?"
"For a few weeks, at the most. Due to several sections of the stations being offline or non-responsive, I can only give you a general estimate."
"Hmm. Okay, I'm going to clear out the turbines before I make a move on the other filter node. Can I get directions?"
"You know that putting things off won't make it easier for you, yes?" Asshole. "You'll want to go into the maintenance corridors. There's an entryway to them at the north side of the-"
"Where's north?"
SSIEVA probably couldn't feel anything but you're pretty sure the static in your earpiece is a hiss of displeasure. "You should turn left at the first intersection. Follow the signs from there. Expect a minor xenoflora infestation in the corridors three floors down. They're not poisonous, but I wouldn't recommend eating them."
"I understand." You open the door to the corridors and begin the descent downwards. Darkness, blinking lights, et cetera. If you get lights out of this job it'll all be worth it. Course, some of the lights would be broken, so somebody had to get replacements, and they'd be in terrible condition. Maybe there'd be a machine shop still intact, and you could fab up some primitive filament light bulbs to replace the broken ones. While you're at that, you might as well look at what widgets they use for the filter to get a head start on that job. You could also fab up an actual case for the earpiece, wouldn't that be nice.
Halfway through, you notice that the ground becomes… springy. Like you were walking on a thick lawn instead of a metal catwalk. A closer inspection reveals that this is indeed the case- the corridor in front and under you is covered with a blanket of stalks, or whatever you call that part of a plant. You have no idea. Maybe you'll go find a botany manuel later.
The xenoflora looks pretty simple in structure. No leaves as far as you could tell, merely a black stalk sprouting off from the ground. Some of them have faint blue, bioluminescent bulbs sprouting for the top. Each of them are long enough to be wound across your hand, something you quickly put into the test as you idly fiddle with a stalk. "SSIEVA, I'm at a xenoflora infestation. They're not contact toxic, are they?"
"No. You don't want to eat them. Not only are they generally incompatible with H. Sapiens biochemistry, the xenoflora also contains a retrovirus that may lead to rampant cell death or mutation. You're entering a dead zone. Radio contact may be limited."
"Understood." Perhaps that's why December Conglomerate showed up here. Maybe that retrovirus was the key to some big pharma-aug that could pull in trillions of dollars from contracting. Cancer, or maybe even slowing down telomere shortening. You frown. Was that even medically possible. Eh, hell with it, it's not like December Conglomerate could freeze you for incompetence for getting terminology wrong in your head.
Really, it'd be beautiful if you could get some lights here. It might even be a vista.
You hear a snuffling. At first, you disregard it, after all, it might just be a clogged pipe. But as you draw closer to the noise, you hear scuttling. Something's alive. You carefully raise the fully loaded handgun, disengaging the safety with a click!
The snuffling stops. The thing in the tangle of corridors with you is growling, and you hear it coming closer with each thumping step. Decisions race through your brain, accelerated by the sudden rush of adrenaline. Stay? No. Run?
Yes.
You break out into a dead sprint, the sound of your footsteps mingling with the ones of your pursuer. You duck left and-
Something heavy and fast impacts you side, puncturing through your skin and drawing blood. A loud, ear piercing shriek fills the corridors. The thing sends you sprawling, the layer of xenoflora cushioning your fall. The thing has its own little flecks of bioluminescent, making it almost invisible in the dimness. You immediately bring your gun upwards, aiming at the moving silhouette of moving lights, pulling the trigger- once, twice, thrice. The report defeans you, blinds you, but all three bullets hit, that much you can make out. The thing jerks back, recoiling with each shot, a spray of sticky, congealed blood(?) flecking your face. Each flash shows a snapshot of what the thing is, a twisted human with tumorous growths sprouting like horns from its skull.
It has no eyes.
You turn and run, as the thing- mutant?- falls to the ground, spasming. You hope it's dead, but that hope is gone when you hear another shriek. You don't look back. You run blindly through the maze, trying to remember where the hell the power plant is- there! Right in front of you, a heavy sliding door with a latch. Your hands fumble around it, desperately pulling the heavy door open as the pounding drew closer and closer. Bright light washes across your face, hurrying into the station, sliding the metal door close.
An arm slashes through the closing gasp, covered in a torn EVA undersuit, scrabbling wildly for something. You shoot at it two more times, before it retracts, letting you shut the door with a bang.
The thing beats at the door, shaking it in it's frames, at the same rate your heart beats. Quickly, that's what you're trying to get at. You throw your entire weight behind it, feeling each blow, each pushing the door inwards. What the hell is this thing made out of?
When the door stops rattling, you lean against the door for a while, holding your breath as you try to listen through the thick steel of the door. Your legs go limp when you're sure that that thing's gone. You sat against the door as you contemplated the power station, an industrial pipe organ puffing steam, filling the air with a hum that sets teeth buzzing.
It's a fairly basic fusion power plant- rated for long endurance to the tune of centuries. This thing probably powered the initial haul from Sol to Lyra Opichunious. Well, the tokamak is, being a magnetic trap for a star, but the turbines? Well, no. You lift yourself up, looking for the command station. It's up against the roof, so you climb some ladders, higher and higher. The tokamak is set under the first 'floor,' and the stuff above it is the steam turbine.
You open the computer, checking the status of the reactor. No problems there. Thank god. "SSIEVA?" You ask. "Can you hear me?"
"With… difficulty."
"Did you know that there was… something in the corridors? Humanoid, cancerous growths. It was eating the xenoflora."
"Not important. I suggested you take the gun for this eventuality."
Insane. But you don't have the will to argue with them. "Okay, whatever." You tap the computer, opening up the Maintenance folder. "Some mineral residue- where did that come from?"
"Erosion?" SSIEVA suggests. You grunt. You're going to have to pop open the turbine, temporarily shut the power station down while you go warm up the drones.
Mantainence, assistance, no you don't want to alert Central, there's the drones. With a hiss, a crablike thing scuttles to life, filling the air with a high pitched whine. "SSIEVA, I'm turning off the power station temporarily."
"Understood. You are green, backup is in some supply."
"Three. Two. One." You press the button. The light flickers, but holds. The crablike drone descends to do its job. You have some time to think now. And talk, over the shaky connection.
Ask about…
[]- The Xenoflora
[]- The Station
[]- The Company
"For a few weeks, at the most. Due to several sections of the stations being offline or non-responsive, I can only give you a general estimate."
"Hmm. Okay, I'm going to clear out the turbines before I make a move on the other filter node. Can I get directions?"
"You know that putting things off won't make it easier for you, yes?" Asshole. "You'll want to go into the maintenance corridors. There's an entryway to them at the north side of the-"
"Where's north?"
SSIEVA probably couldn't feel anything but you're pretty sure the static in your earpiece is a hiss of displeasure. "You should turn left at the first intersection. Follow the signs from there. Expect a minor xenoflora infestation in the corridors three floors down. They're not poisonous, but I wouldn't recommend eating them."
"I understand." You open the door to the corridors and begin the descent downwards. Darkness, blinking lights, et cetera. If you get lights out of this job it'll all be worth it. Course, some of the lights would be broken, so somebody had to get replacements, and they'd be in terrible condition. Maybe there'd be a machine shop still intact, and you could fab up some primitive filament light bulbs to replace the broken ones. While you're at that, you might as well look at what widgets they use for the filter to get a head start on that job. You could also fab up an actual case for the earpiece, wouldn't that be nice.
Halfway through, you notice that the ground becomes… springy. Like you were walking on a thick lawn instead of a metal catwalk. A closer inspection reveals that this is indeed the case- the corridor in front and under you is covered with a blanket of stalks, or whatever you call that part of a plant. You have no idea. Maybe you'll go find a botany manuel later.
The xenoflora looks pretty simple in structure. No leaves as far as you could tell, merely a black stalk sprouting off from the ground. Some of them have faint blue, bioluminescent bulbs sprouting for the top. Each of them are long enough to be wound across your hand, something you quickly put into the test as you idly fiddle with a stalk. "SSIEVA, I'm at a xenoflora infestation. They're not contact toxic, are they?"
"No. You don't want to eat them. Not only are they generally incompatible with H. Sapiens biochemistry, the xenoflora also contains a retrovirus that may lead to rampant cell death or mutation. You're entering a dead zone. Radio contact may be limited."
"Understood." Perhaps that's why December Conglomerate showed up here. Maybe that retrovirus was the key to some big pharma-aug that could pull in trillions of dollars from contracting. Cancer, or maybe even slowing down telomere shortening. You frown. Was that even medically possible. Eh, hell with it, it's not like December Conglomerate could freeze you for incompetence for getting terminology wrong in your head.
Really, it'd be beautiful if you could get some lights here. It might even be a vista.
You hear a snuffling. At first, you disregard it, after all, it might just be a clogged pipe. But as you draw closer to the noise, you hear scuttling. Something's alive. You carefully raise the fully loaded handgun, disengaging the safety with a click!
The snuffling stops. The thing in the tangle of corridors with you is growling, and you hear it coming closer with each thumping step. Decisions race through your brain, accelerated by the sudden rush of adrenaline. Stay? No. Run?
Yes.
You break out into a dead sprint, the sound of your footsteps mingling with the ones of your pursuer. You duck left and-
Something heavy and fast impacts you side, puncturing through your skin and drawing blood. A loud, ear piercing shriek fills the corridors. The thing sends you sprawling, the layer of xenoflora cushioning your fall. The thing has its own little flecks of bioluminescent, making it almost invisible in the dimness. You immediately bring your gun upwards, aiming at the moving silhouette of moving lights, pulling the trigger- once, twice, thrice. The report defeans you, blinds you, but all three bullets hit, that much you can make out. The thing jerks back, recoiling with each shot, a spray of sticky, congealed blood(?) flecking your face. Each flash shows a snapshot of what the thing is, a twisted human with tumorous growths sprouting like horns from its skull.
It has no eyes.
You turn and run, as the thing- mutant?- falls to the ground, spasming. You hope it's dead, but that hope is gone when you hear another shriek. You don't look back. You run blindly through the maze, trying to remember where the hell the power plant is- there! Right in front of you, a heavy sliding door with a latch. Your hands fumble around it, desperately pulling the heavy door open as the pounding drew closer and closer. Bright light washes across your face, hurrying into the station, sliding the metal door close.
An arm slashes through the closing gasp, covered in a torn EVA undersuit, scrabbling wildly for something. You shoot at it two more times, before it retracts, letting you shut the door with a bang.
The thing beats at the door, shaking it in it's frames, at the same rate your heart beats. Quickly, that's what you're trying to get at. You throw your entire weight behind it, feeling each blow, each pushing the door inwards. What the hell is this thing made out of?
When the door stops rattling, you lean against the door for a while, holding your breath as you try to listen through the thick steel of the door. Your legs go limp when you're sure that that thing's gone. You sat against the door as you contemplated the power station, an industrial pipe organ puffing steam, filling the air with a hum that sets teeth buzzing.
It's a fairly basic fusion power plant- rated for long endurance to the tune of centuries. This thing probably powered the initial haul from Sol to Lyra Opichunious. Well, the tokamak is, being a magnetic trap for a star, but the turbines? Well, no. You lift yourself up, looking for the command station. It's up against the roof, so you climb some ladders, higher and higher. The tokamak is set under the first 'floor,' and the stuff above it is the steam turbine.
You open the computer, checking the status of the reactor. No problems there. Thank god. "SSIEVA?" You ask. "Can you hear me?"
"With… difficulty."
"Did you know that there was… something in the corridors? Humanoid, cancerous growths. It was eating the xenoflora."
"Not important. I suggested you take the gun for this eventuality."
Insane. But you don't have the will to argue with them. "Okay, whatever." You tap the computer, opening up the Maintenance folder. "Some mineral residue- where did that come from?"
"Erosion?" SSIEVA suggests. You grunt. You're going to have to pop open the turbine, temporarily shut the power station down while you go warm up the drones.
Mantainence, assistance, no you don't want to alert Central, there's the drones. With a hiss, a crablike thing scuttles to life, filling the air with a high pitched whine. "SSIEVA, I'm turning off the power station temporarily."
"Understood. You are green, backup is in some supply."
"Three. Two. One." You press the button. The light flickers, but holds. The crablike drone descends to do its job. You have some time to think now. And talk, over the shaky connection.
Ask about…
[]- The Xenoflora
[]- The Station
[]- The Company