“That is your right,” said McCrary. “Let's just make sure that it's all open and above-board. Ladies and gentlemen, I recommend that you think about the best way to re-melt the thorium salts and quickly return Mighty Thor to operation. For now, return to your previous activities.”
Marcel left the cafeteria, deep in thought. He was not so deep in thought that he didn't feel the hatred radiating from the rest of the crew like a heat lamp.
***
“I tell you, they're hiding something,” said Marcel to Irma. They were back in their spacesuits, clearing rubble in the southeast wing. “That meeting went too smoothly. Everything seems to be going well. That can't be true. A disaster this big...you just can't get past it so easily!”
“I feel it, too,” said Irma. “I know we'll be busting our ass on something, and they'll announce some kind of problem. They'll have to thin the herd in order to survive. You know who's the first on the chopping block, don't you? Us!”
“Maybe. I just think something will fail suddenly, and they will have known about it, but not tell us for fear of everyone freaking out. Hmmm. Hydroponics are dead, aren't they? So, what’s sucking up the CO2? Remember that space mission about a hundred years ago? Something exploded, and they couldn't complete their mission. They had plenty of oxygen, but the CO2 levels kept rising, and they were going to die, in spite of all the oxygen. I wonder——what's scrubbing the air now?”
“Did they brief that?”
“I don't remember if they did. I don't think so.”
“Well, why not ask them?” Irma was insistent. “I mean, I'd really rather not die just yet. Maybe they had not thought it was a problem.”
***
Frank had already discussed the situation with McCrary. “Apollo 13 almost died because of the CO2 issue,” he reminded McCrary. “The suit scrubbers need recharging, and we have to do something with the excess CO2.”
“Is there a mineral solution?” asked McCrary. “Remember how we used CO2 in the olivine-to-oxygen reaction?”
“Sure I do. But that reaction is not available to us—The Works are wrecked.”
“What, then?”
“Algae.”
“But we don't have any,” said McCrary. “Hydroponics is dead and desiccated.”
“You'll have to ask Ahmed, the chef. He had a bunch of it in liquid nitrogen, just in case the current batch went bad. I would say being stuck in vacuum for a couple of weeks counts as bad, wouldn’t you?”
***
Ahmed pushed against the ceiling to avoid bashing his head as he raced towards the Center of the Collins. He had never quite gotten the hang of bunny-hopping on the Moon, and a summons to meet with the Acting Commander made him try to hurry from the main kitchen to McCrary's temporary office near the Operations area, resulting in even more near accidents.
He arrived to find McCrary poring over some drawings on his monitor. He rapped his knuckles on the plastic sheeting in vain, finally clearing his throat to get the man's attention.
“Ahmed Zaneen, the cook, responding to your summons, sir,” he said, standing stiffly.
McCrary peered at him. “Ahmed. Thank you for coming so quickly. Do you still have that algae backup packet? I think it stays in a LOX tank or something.”
“Yes, sir, I have some algae. I checked the dewar. When the power went out, the dewar sealed automatically. The nighttime helped keep everything chilly, and the samples are just as frozen now as they were then.”
“Can you thaw them out, get them working?” asked McCrary.
“Sure. Give me a few days.”
“Can you get it done faster?” he asked. McCrary outlined the problem to Ahmed. “So, briefly, if we can get a big tank growing now, it will suck out the CO2 from the air.”
“Well, that sounds OK. Roque had been working with Engineering on making Plexiglass from that carbonaceous chrondite asteroid they found. I don't know how that went, but the idea was to make some kind of fish tank for the algae.”
McCrary smiled wistfully. He was sure Roque was dead, either on the Chaffee or on the ground on Earth. Roque was a good friend, and McCrary was sorry to lose him. “Yes, we were working on it. I know we got some stock, but I’m not sure how much.”
“All we need is a decent length of tubing and a pump. And water,” said Ahmed, peering closely at McCrary. The status of their water supply had been a popular topic around the cafeteria.
“Water you can have. Hmmm. Might solve our solid-waste problem as well. Go ahead and thaw them out,” he murmured, indicating the door.
Marcel and Irma were at the door when Ahmed walked out. They entered as soon as practical, and started off immediately.
“You have a problem, McCrary, and it's carbon dioxide.”
McCrary looked at them, closely. “You've given this a lot of thought,” he said.
“You bet I have, we both have, and we think you're hiding the truth from us. We know the scrubbers are at their limits, and the CO2 will soon start rising. We'll be dead in a few days after that. When were you going to tell us?”
“After the solution works. Remember that man you passed at the door? His name is Ahmed.”
“Yes, we know. Mr. Coffee.”
“He's much more than that. I think you will owe him a big fat apology when you see him again, if that's all you think of him. For he, quite possibly, has saved all of our lives.”
“How? How is he, a simple cook, going to solve the carbon dioxide problem?”
“He is far more than a simple cook. He is our biology guy, too. Because of his foresight, we have algae to reseed a carbon dioxide absorber. He's off building us one now. We'll know how well it works in a day or so. The CO2 issue isn't going to be a major problem for at least a week. Good enough?”
“No. What happens if his algae all come out dead?”
“Then we'll throw the question out to the whole crew to solve,” said McCrary. “I know I don't have all of the answers. In fact, it was Frank and Ahmed who brought the CO2 problem to my attention, just like you two did. The only difference is that he had an answer. I want you to work out an answer to the problem, but without relying on algae. Is there some other way we can create a carbon dioxide sink?”
“I have no idea! I'm no engineer,” said Marcel. “I'm one of the administrative staff—I work on the budgets for the UN. The UN sent you here to solve all these kinds of problems. I'm here to keep the books straight.”
McCrary nodded. He turned to Irma. “And you, miss? Would you agree to solve the problem?”
“Don't answer!” said Marcel. “McCrary, you're trying to solve your incompetence by spreading the issue around. That way, you can claim later that you were doing everything you could, but your people let you down.”
McCrary sighed. Every population had not only dissidents, but people who took it as their highest calling to dump on others, from as high a position as possible. He had tried co-opting this parasite, but Marcel would have none of it. Worse, he was able to cow others into refusing their help to the common cause. Sooner or later, he and Marcel would have to have it out. For now, though, the problems were too immediate and real to waste time on this person.
“Well, everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I will not address your charges, Mr. Bossenhagen, at this time. However, if you will not help with the CO2 problem, and you certainly cannot work on the budgets as long as the computers remain down, I would appreciate it if you would resume your work assignments. Is there anything else?”
“What else are you hiding?” asked Marcel.
“Nothing. As I stated, the CO2 buildup has not been on our radar at all until Zaneen and Maleski brought it to our attention. Now that they have, it is being addressed. All known problems are being addressed in order of their severity. Unknown problems are, well, unknown. I can't work on them if we don't know about them. If you think of a problem, even if you don't have an answer or can't work on it, I appreciate you bringing it to our attention.
“I only want
to add, thank you for your work on behalf of us all. If you have nothing else, I would appreciate it if I could get back to my work.”
Irma headed to the door, happy to be out of there. Marcel would get them spaced someday, she was sure. Suddenly, she was not entirely happy about being associated with Marcel.
Marcel glared at McCrary for a moment, then walked out, head held high.
Horst was just coming in. McCrary looked up, a small smile on his face. “Ah, Nygaard. Welcome.”
Horst closed the door behind him. “Problems?”
“Remember Apollo 13?” McCrary asked. “Service module exploded, they had to abort the mission?”
“Yeah. It was touch and go the entire way. They...oh no! The CO2 problem!” He started to rush back out, only to have McCrary call him back.
“Whoa there!” he called. “We might have the answer to that, as well as our solid waste issue. Ahmed had an algae culture squirreled away in a liquid oxygen dewar. It might have come through, but we'll know more tonight. Remember the Plexiglass tubes that Roque devised for us?”
“Yeah. Did they make it?”
“We'll find out soon. I recommend that we have two arrays of tubes, one that can hit sunlight and the other that we can shine lights on inside. The algae will circulate around either loop, get its light, and suck up the CO2. We'll get O2, and even a place to dump our poop.”
“If it works,” said Horst.
“If it works. What I want you to do is figure out another solution to try if the algae doesn't work. We're going to have to do something with the CO2, otherwise, it will kill us, even if we went on pure oxygen.”
“OK. I'm thinking either calcium precipitation or something to like regenerating the lithium hydroxide. Hey, we can get calcium from the olivine reaction—that should work.”
“Make it bulletproof. Speaking of bullets,” McCrary said, his eyes flicking towards the closed door.
“Want the two of them taken out?” Horst asked. “We're low on manpower as it is.”
“No. I will not descend to lynching my detractors. It only breeds more. He's my problem. I have to figure out some way to short-circuit him before he infects others.”
“We could put him out in Sandy,” said Horst. “Hard to build a rebel army when you're stuck at an outpost.”
“Tempting. Very tempting,” said McCrary. He sighed and stood up, the action lifting him in the air in that eerie, slow-motion way that one-sixth gravity did. “But no. Any change in his status or work assignments will just work to strengthen his paranoia, and be used as evidence to convince others. Also, Sandy is just too important to us to leave to his tender mercies.” McCrary tapped a note into his commpad. “We just kill him with kindness instead.”
“Kill him? I thought you just said...”
“It was an expression, Horst. His problem is that he believes he is vital to this enterprise. Back when he did budgets, he probably was. Without money, Moonbase Collins would grind to a halt. Now, without his job to give him meaning, he has seized on this end-of-all-things obsession as something to give himself purpose. His new mission, as he sees it, is to unmask me as some kind of dictatorial menace, knowing all but lying to the peons so they don't revolt until we die of something I know about but they don't.”
“Uh, but if we all die, where does that leave you?”
“In charge, all the way to the end. Conspiracy theories don't have to be rational, only logical. That's how delusions work. Now, what we're going to do is feed that ego, until we're so far along from the here-and-now that we can safely ignore his ravings. If we're out of these damned suits, walking around a restored Collins in shirtsleeves and eating salads, it will be tough for anyone to believe we're about to die tomorrow.”
“OK, so how do we do it?” asked Horst. “I tell you, I hate this mollycoddling. There's nothing wrong with this guy that a good beatdown won't cure.”
“True. On Earth. Here, everyone is way too close to everyone else. So, here's what we do. We run everything past him. As we see a problem on the way, we let him know. When a solution is discovered, we let him know. We ask him every day if he's thought of any problems we should know about.”
“We? You mean I have to go look up this clown and ask his opinion, like he's smart enough to have one?”
“No. And don't run Mr. Bossenhagen down. He almost beat Frank and Ahmed here with the problem. Thank God Zaneen had saved out the algae, because it gave me a solution to offer Bossenhagen. If the situation were reversed, Bossenhagen would be five times as dangerous.”
“So how do we do this?”
“Through the woman he had with him. Irma someone or other. I got the distinct impression she didn't want to be linked with Bossenhagen anymore. Have Brinker look her up and let her know the deal. She'll run to him with the info, and the reason we don't dare talk to him directly.”
“What is that reason?” asked Horst. McCrary just stared at him. Horst thought. Nothing seemed to be a good reason. “I give up, McCrary, and I've had a hard day. I can deal with machines. People make me all mixed up.”
“The reason is...frankly, I have no good reason. The only one that is plausible is that I want to punch out the little punk each time I see him, and if I had to conduct a lesson in engineering every time I saw the little parasite, I'd eventually pound him. Don't tell her that, of course, but it's true nonetheless.”
Horst smiled. “Then we have the exact same reason. I want to pound him all the time, too. I'll make sure the information gets forwarded to him. Now, about the compartment pressurization schedule...”
...With Kindness
UNSOC Lunar Colony Michael Collins, July 10 2082, 0718 EDT
Marcel was pleased to be 'consulted' with every new problem that came up, as well as being the first in the know amongst the crew. It created envy, but Marcel was too blind to see how his 'special treatment' was leading to resentment in the team.
As the weeks passed, most of the central cavern was repaired and pressurized, and the Collins transitioned to a shirtsleeve environment to save wear and tear on the limited amount of skintight garments available. Doctor Kumar allowed the walking wounded from Sick Bay into the rest of the cavern, where they were put to work on some of the less physical tasks so that the relatively healthy could be released for more arduous work items. The food situation was not much improved, with the continued use of the iron rations one of the touchier points among the crew. Most of the special food items the OTV pilots has smuggled up to the Collins were either ruined by vacuum exposure or blown out of the ruptures in the walls when the internal atmosphere was lost. There was a joke about a tin of brownies out on the maria that made the rounds.
The algae proved to be alive, wildly fertile, and voracious in consuming all the organic fertilizer the crew produced. Soon the problem of sludge in the algae tubes became a cause for concern. Indigestible organics, dead algae, mineral remains and inorganic precipitates produced a sticky brownish-green coating on the bottom of the tubes that was thickening week by week.
Marcel could not think of a solution, and Ahmed didn't have much experience in bioreactor systems like this. The algal system was too important to the Collins' internal gas regulation to be shut down for cleaning, so the obvious solution was the only solution: build a second system and always have one in operation while the second one was out of service for manual cleaning. It was highly unpopular duty, so much so that it had to be assigned by a rotating duty roster, one of several that Horst was maintaining.
***
“It's your turn, you know,” Irma said. “It's not some conspiracy against you.”
“Yes it is, like that beating I got yesterday,” Marcel said, testily. He had a black eye and a bump on the back of his head.
“The beating came about because you pissed off Vito VonShaick, not on the orders of McCrary. Besides, if McCrary hates you so much, shouldn't you have gotten whacked much earlier and a lot more often?
“Ah, that's where you are wrong! McCrary is th
e kind of guy that will get you when you least expect it. Bam! You're down. It's been, what, three weeks since The Event? That's about the right timeframe for a revenge hit.”
Irma shook her head, then plunged her hand into the half-empty tube for another clump of green slime. “I don't know why you think McCrary is this master tactician. If McCrary had you whacked right after that first group meeting, would you have been surprised?”
“No. He's a man of direct action.”
“And now? You haven't been in his office in days.”
“It has to be him. He's one of those 'revenge is a dish served cold' kinds of guys.”
“See, that's what I mean. No matter what happens, it has to be some kind of hit from McCrary.”
“Of course it is!”
“But what about those times when you piss someone off?” She scooped some more green slime out of the tube and spread it on the tray to dry.
“Oh, they all love me! I can tell just because they seem so sorry to have to hit me, like it's orders from on high.”
She shook her head and let the topic drop. Frankly, she was tired of being in the middle of the two men. She was also changing her mind about the whole 'Collins is doomed' scenario. As far as she could see, life was progressively getting better on the station, and she could see where life could in fact be worth living again, even if she would never get back to Earth.
“Irma?” asked Marcel. “Are you mad at me?”
She sighed, and wiped her face with the back of her shirtsleeve. “I'm not mad. I just don't know anymore. I don't know what you have against McCrary. I used to think he was some kind of evil genius, twisting knobs in that office of his. What he did to those scientists, I thought, was just cruel and dangerous. They could have been killed! But ever since they got back, they've been some of the hardest workers.”
“That was Horst, not McCrary. He was still hanging out in that cave of his, plotting his takeover.”
She paused and looked blank for a moment. “You're right. Still, he seems to have everyone on his side.”
Come In, Collins (Riddled Space Book 2) Page 7
