Everyone's Island

by Kris Schnee

  Tess descended past Alexis with a dirty look, and Alexis followed her down to the jacks. Since Castor was exposed to ocean currents, they'd scattered spiky, chemically-treated concrete blocks on the seafloor to disrupt the flow and calm the waves a bit. There were so many details involved in such simple things! Tess wanted to understand it all. These practical things were way more interesting than school. Even if that meant hanging around with Alexis; Garrett insisted that nobody dive alone. Studying this stuff made Tess feel like there was a point to what she did, like it mattered whether she got the damn computer nodes working right.

  After a while of poking at the jacks and checking the various cables and nets, she surfaced. That meant a slow drift, or in her case a yo-yo of overcorrections, to keep the gases in her lungs from killing her. Garrett had made her learn to use old plastic charts for calculating safe dive times and depths even though a computer could do it better.

  "Having fun?" asked Alexis, surfacing too close to Tess. Alexis pulled off her goggles and fiddled with her hair.

  Tess shrugged, thinking, Some of us are here to work, not to have fun glomming onto the boss! Aloud she said, "It's all right."

  Alexis said, "Yeah, I know, he's pushing us all too hard. Don't take it personally though. We need to follow instructions and trust that he knows what he's doing."

  "Is that what they taught you in pre-med classes? Follow instructions?" Tess was already looking forward to getting a shower, then some peace and quiet.

  Alexis looked down into the water as they bobbed there. "No. That's kind of why I quit."

  Curious now, Tess said, "Huh?"

  "I was thinking, what if I make a mistake? What if I get sued, or somebody dies because I made the wrong decision? I couldn't handle that stress. Nobody should have to deal with that. So I did plants instead."

  "What, do you not actually like plants?"

  "Oh? I like them. I like working with them." Alexis shook her head and grinned. "Never mind me. I want to work on something and not have to worry about distractions. How about you?"

  Tess frowned; she didn't want to do this pointless girl-talk. At least Alexis wasn't one of her worthless classmates or teachers. "I want to make stuff."

  "Why?"

  Tess thought, then said, "I don't know. I'm tired. Let's go back."

  * * *

  Her room was a little fortress in South Tower: a set of thin walls carving out a space from the empty sea. So far they'd only built bedrooms, a bathroom, and a makeshift galley by their big freezer. Garrett tried to be optimistic, saying that the station's plainness made it flexible. Standing outside her room, Tess saw some lights, the carved-out rooms, spare Chinese-style partitions, stairs, and little else. They could play dodgeball in here. Even inside, it felt like the gleam and whisper of the sea reached everywhere.

  Tess showered, first with saltwater and then with a quick freshwater rinse. She padded back to her room, still feeling salt-tinged. Bleh. Every muscle ached and for a while she sprawled on her cot, face on the pillow. All day, every day, it seemed like there were sensors to check, plants to tend, fish to feed. As much as she was learning, there was still a lot of grunt work. There were no restaurants, either. Somehow she'd come here with the impression that teachers would be around to give her grades and bullies would whisper about her in the halls, so she could resent them both.

  She lay there in bed, blinking. Did she actually miss being resentful? Kinda, in a stupid and perverse way; those other people had given her someone to push back against. Well, it was stupid. Here, she was being judged only for whether she could make herself useful with honest work. She'd hardly uttered a word of complaint so far, since coming here, and damned if she'd start.

  Tess rolled out of bed, stretched, yawned, and felt nearly recovered. It was amazing what you could get used to. She could still get stuff done today.

  * * *

  Tess found Garrett in his office, which was in the deckhouse. The little bunker stood like a hut atop the main deck. She wore her shapeless jacket, already starting to feel sweaty and gross again from the humidity. Just as well. She was tempted sometimes to get a bikini like Alexis' and see if she could get that look from him... but the thought made her shudder too. That just wasn't her. She was the computer geek; that was all.

  She had worthwhile reasons to come here and hang around the boss. "The sensors are back up."

  "Good." Garrett hunched over, his big frame looking small and spooked.

  "What's wrong?"

  "Got a message from my uncle. Words of encouragement."

  Tess leaned against the door, seeing how well the encouragement had worked. "Your uncle is weird."

  Garrett said, "He told me there was another reason he pushed me to do this, to come here. He'd been up in the sky, looking down on the Earth. You know those maps of the planet at night, lights in the blackness?" Tess nodded. "Haskell said" -- Garrett's voice took on an odd accent -- "'In those days I saw the light of the world starting to dim'."

  Tess thought. "Creepy, but it doesn't mean anything, does it? We've got more efficient lighting now, so the planet's not a giant disco ball."

  There was an edge to Garrett's voice. "I don't know quite what he's afraid of. I can't name it. That bothers me."

  "Then what do we do about it?"

  "That's what Alexis said."

  Oh, so you told her first. "Getting more energy isn't our department. We've barely got power for ourselves even with the pneumatic generators."

  He glanced at a computer screen. "Well, there is one specific problem to worry about besides our work. Been following the secession news?"

  On the screen, a headline proclaimed, "3 Killed As Texas Independence Rally Clashes With Vigilantes". To Tess that was just typical noise. She'd grown up hearing about assorted shootings, bombings, racially charged riots, and so on, leading to repeated calls for some US states to up and leave -- and which ones, depended on who was in charge lately. She said, "Nothing's coming of it. Same junk, different day."

  Garrett stared into his charts and notes as though he could find the future there. "It spooks me, but it's not my business. I'm focused on Castor; I can't change the world."

  16. Garrett

  Many parts of the platform and its farming operation still didn't work right, but the scope of what did work was expanding. Today Garrett stood on the deck in a breeze that whipped at his jacket. The farm-squares were looking good. Staring down, he saw how they tiled a patch of ocean with their netting and the green, red and brown of the young seaweed. So far the green seemed best. A few days ago Tess had pulled up the latest satellite image. From overhead it all looked insignificant, but things were growing. They had more sensor data now than any pre-21st-century farmer could've dreamed of.

  "Martin is late," Zephyr said behind him.

  Garrett turned to find the robot carrying a bag of plastic screws. "Your snack?" asked Garrett.

  "These are for the bubble net." The fish operation involved setting up lines of sunken hoses that would leak bubbles, hopefully encouraging fish to stay within the virtual walls they created. "We can't contact him either. The computer network's outside connection is down. The cause appears to be: Cuban ISP problems. Not Tess."

  "What would you like me to do?"

  "We don't have enough access to information. We should fix that."

  Garrett gave a quick bark of a laugh. "Ah, a fellow Net addict. I'm feeling isolated too, but it's refreshing in a way. The most important thing right now is to improve productivity. Grid Two-One looks best so far, so we'll be transplanting from there."

  "The success is because of the current," Zephyr said, "not the kelp strain itself. If you take current flow into account, then Grid One-Four is more successful."

  Garrett stared at the bot, blinked, then looked over the deck to count the grid squares. One-Four had a haze of green, hard to judge without looking at the sensor data again. Tess had done some neat things with measuring water statistics and could even show the pla
nts growing in sped-up video. "What makes you think it's the current?"

  "I was talking with Alexis. The topics were: current patterns and growth. I also read about hydroponics on my own. I think there's a correlation between: water speed when current hits each square, and crop growth rate. So, rearranging the grid might help. I could be wrong."

  "Alexis suggested this?"

  "She suggested part of it. She let me use her books."

  "So you came up with an original, testable idea based on books and data?"

  "The idea is partly original," the robot said.

  "Huh," said Garrett. Tools didn't offer more than the most inane suggestions. He stuck out his hand and said, "Good idea, crewman. We'll try it."

  Zephyr shook his hand with his own plastic, four-fingered one. "Thank you, Captain!"

  As Zephyr descended into South Tower, Garrett thought he heard the bot whistling.

  * * *

  Garrett slumped in the deckhouse after a long shift. He sipped a beer (thinking of it as headache medicine) and stared at a computer scroll that he'd spread on a desk. The Castor design and scads of data were there for his inspection. Come to think of it, maybe they could move the concrete jacks to get a more favorable current flow, loosely based on Zephyr's idea. He'd have to ask Alexis about how that would affect the biological aspect. He felt roasted from the heat and humidity and work, so that he could hardly move a muscle. It'd be nice to get Martin back, to get reassurance that the sales contracts were still there. Judging from the wind noise outside, they could benefit from more windvanes too.

  He noticed that the Net connection icon had reappeared on the screen. What, had some wire jiggled into the right place in Havana? He'd been planning to wait for replacement parts, but the outage had lasted for days now and they didn't have satellite Net access yet. Before the stroke of good luck could go away, Garrett had the computer fetch his mail and the news.

  "Oh, hell," he said. A storm they'd heard about in the Atlantic had strengthened unexpectedly, by a lot, and changed direction. He got on the radio to the others. "Remember how the barometer was low this morning? We've got a hurricane headed our way. Start the lockdown plan."

  Tess, Alexis and Zephyr acknowledged. Garrett stood and stretched, then groaned, light-headed.

  Alexis opened the office door. "Are you all right? You look terrible."

  "I'm okay," said Garrett. "Let's start with you getting Constellation secured, then reeling in what we can of the growing platforms. I'll inspect the float cylinders, and then --"

  "C'mon, sit," she said, nudging him back into his chair. "You've earned a break, and the three of us know what to do."

  Garrett looked up at her, feeling conflicted and weary. He guessed it was a compliment, meaning that he'd trained them well, but her words still made him feel useless. "I guess I can rest a bit. I'll be out there as soon as I can."

  She hugged him. "Leave everything to us." He stayed behind to sit there, looking at weather updates and sensor data. While waiting for the others to get the work done, he fell into a fevered sleep. At some point he staggered out of bed, skull pounding. He managed only to find the bathroom, drink some water, and get back onto the bed before collapsing again.

  He woke when the world lurched.

  17. Tess

  Tess was getting annoyed at Alexis' dawdling. Despite their practice Tess was still having trouble with buoyancy, wasting air, and now there was a weird current pushing her around too. "C'mon, c'mon," she signaled, as Alexis fiddled with the seaweed platforms. There wasn't much they could do without killing the crops. It was up to the plants' glue-like holdfasts to keep them anchored to the seabed or the platforms.

  Alexis glanced at her with goggled eyes. Yeah, yeah, they needed to get this done, but Tess was useless for this specific task and they'd been working for hours, making dives and stowing stuff. Tess sighed with a stream of bubbles. She didn't know how worried to be. At least they had a big concrete building to hunker down in.

  Maybe it was later in the day than she'd thought; it seemed dark. Didn't they still have plenty of time? She checked her air tank's pressure gauge. Getting low. She fiddled with her vest again. Finally Alexis signaled and they rose, emerging in a jagged grey sea. "Let's get inside," she said. "We've earned a break." The growing wind competed with her voice. Tess was glad to follow her this time. They hauled their gear inside the station and flopped on the cold floor. Tess called Garrett by intercom.

  "He's still out cold," said Alexis.

  Tess sighed. "Bad time for flu."

  "No need to worry. Everything's taken care of. I'll check on him."

  Tess trudged upstairs and sat on her bed, unable to make herself lie down. After sitting there for a while, she felt the room shudder. She hopped to her feet and saw the floor looking tilted. It gave her a queasy sensation that gravity was pointing the wrong way. The lights snapped off, so that when she opened the door she was in a black cave, shivering and calling out. She fumbled for the nearest intercom panel, but that didn't work either. "Hello? Anyone?"

  "Zephyr here." A blue glow from the robot's eyes showed him descending the stairs. With a clatter he tumbled the rest of the way and lay in a heap at the bottom.

  Tess yelped and helped him up. "What's going on?"

  Zephyr tested his limbs and nodded. "Thanks. I don't know. Something strange is happening."

  Alexis was next down the stairs, wielding a flashlight. "Tess! There you are. What do we do?"

  "How should I know?" said Tess. The flashlight dazzled her. "Where's Garrett?"

  "Still sick in his room."

  Tess cursed. "Zephyr, get him up, okay?"

  "Aye aye!" The robot made for the stairs again, more slowly.

  Before he could get anywhere, the platform rumbled again and tilted farther. Tess fell sideways and hit the concrete, yelping and cursing. Alexis was on the floor too. Both of them were shaking in the dark. Tess' thoughts flashed through all the things that could go wrong and she realized: "The float cylinders!" The big concrete tubes beneath the platform gave it stability and power. Now the platform shuddered with each wave, making it hard to stand. Tess braced herself against a wall and froze. The platform was breaking; they were going to sink and drown. Alexis seemed terrified. Tess looked at her and at Zephyr, who struggled up the stairs. "Someone's gotta look at the cylinders," she said.

  Tess shivered. She had to do it. She knew the machinery better than the others, and Garrett wasn't ready. She grabbed Alexis' arm and pulled her up, saying, "Come on -- we've got work to do!"

  No time to change back into wetsuits. Tess grabbed her floating toolbox, and she and Alexis helped each other into scuba gear. Tess tapped buttons on a computer to get what clues she could to the problem, and narrowed it down to a quarter or so of the stabilizers. Then they hurried outside.

  The floor was tilted and slippery enough that they fell into the water. Pushing cold, dry air through her lungs like a bellows, Tess sank to where she could see the cylinders, and swam between them. Now she was in a forest of concrete trunks, or beneath a jaw whose teeth gnawed the water. The ceiling waved up and down. Tess tried to steady herself against a pillar and spot the machinery against their roof, the bottom of the platform. Alexis pointed. Tess nodded and made for one of the machinery junctions linking the pillars. This one looked fine, at least as seen through goggles. She tried to avoid getting bashed in the head by the platform's bobbing. Dark down here. She pulled out a flashlight and swam, inspecting hardware. Alexis tried to get a second flashlight shining where she needed it. The waves and platform smacked both of them around, making Tess' air tank clang.

  There! Tess spotted a segment of pipes that had broken loose and had pieces wedging a crucial vent shut. Stupid design, she thought, figuring out in hindsight how it should have been built. Water yanked her away from the pipes. She was surprised to find Alexis supporting her, helping to whack the beams back into position and try to keep them there. The platform was bouncing less now, maybe. She
turned, trying to find the way out, and got slammed against the ceiling. Her mask jabbed her in the face and she was tumbling, kicking at something that caught her leg and was going to trap her down there, but it was only Alexis. Tess tried to slow her breathing. Over there was the way out, and at worst any path through the forest of pillars would lead them out eventually.

  Waves separated them. The water washed down and threw Tess into blackness somewhere, then bruised her leg against concrete. She scrambled for her flashlight but it was gone. She was inside one of the cylinders, and it was flooding. As she shivered, she couldn't get a good breath from her mouthpiece. Eyes wide, she slapped at it and only hurt her teeth. She and Alexis hadn't refilled the air tanks. They weren't prepared. Now there was nothing she could do.

  The water pulled her down again, leaving air in the float cylinder like there was supposed to be. Tess coughed and breathed and there came a moment when she could use the current to escape, maybe dying on the way out, or stay in the refuge of the concrete cage. She found herself clawing at the walls, shoving herself out to the open water. Fighting to see the sky again. She burst up through the ocean and yanked her mouthpiece out, gasping and coughing miserably.

  "Tess!" Zephyr was bobbing in the water. "What are you doing? Garrett's out looking for you!"

  The storm was on them now, pelting them with rain and whipping their voices away, blowing hair in her eyes. The day seemed darker than any she'd ever seen at home. "Huh?" Tess said when she had air in her lungs again. Waves slashed at her face. "Where's Alexis?"

  "I don't know. We need to take shelter!"

  Alexis could be trapped down there. Tess looked around wildly and saw Alexis splashing towards them, thrown back and forth by waves. Tess called out and met her partway, then threw one arm around her. "Come on!"

  They swam for the platform. Tess spotted the double lamps of the dock entrance and Zephyr helped as a floating thing to lean on. They were going to make it.