Humble Beginnings

Thirst The fly danced across R.O. Smith’s face. Catatonic, her mind raced to think of something to make the fly leave her in peace. Her body still unresponsive, the fly crept towards her wide-open eye, drawn to the moisture. All her senses exploding, she tried to force her body to move, shedding a single tear for the effort. Meanwhile, the fly did a little stroll on her cornea, depositing who knew what as it went. She screamed, if only in her head, for it to leave her alone. When she thought it couldn’t get any worse, the cold steel of a blade sliced into the back of her scalp. Jets of pain erupted over her nerve endings as she endured the tug at the first of her implants. She thankfully lost consciousness when the rough hands jerked the small sliver of silicone from her brain tissue, severing the connections to her perception. The last thing she remembered was a loud thud, her neurons and synapses firing overtime trying to comprehend what was happening to her body. Twelve hours earlier, R.O. Smith waited impatiently in her supervisor’s waiting room. A hydrologist by trade, the Saravipian Traders hired her to operate their section of the station's water system. Her primary task involved finding waste. Water, the universal solvent, even more precious in space than for the surface bound. R.O. was good at her job, damn good. She checked her heads-up display on her retinal implant and found her supervisor thirty minutes late for their meeting. R.O. shouldn’t be surprised; the Saravipians were notorious for tardiness. She understood this going in. It was the one thing that almost broke the deal, but the money was too good to pass up. R.O. worked with military precision, and she hated delay. She smoothed the legs of her already wrinkle-free uniform jumpsuit, trying to control her growing irritation. “Finally,” R.O. whispered to herself as the door to the magistrate’s office slid open. She stepped into the office and found four female Saravipians waiting for her. They had been in here the whole time making me wait, she thought. “Good morning, Magistrate. Thank you for agreeing to meet with me.” She bowed slightly, years of shipboard training drilled into her psyche. The woman behind the desk said, “Miss Smith, I hope the morning is finding you well.” The translator implant worked perfectly, instantly relaying the words in R.O.’s native language. Stoic, the Magistrate’s mood was hidden well. Her head crest remained gray, concealing her real emotions. R.O. snuck a peek at the three women sitting to the side of the room, all influential. Their rank was displayed by their crest jewelry. R.O. had taken the time to learn part of their hierarchy insignia before accepting the job. Better to know how powerful the women were you were talking to. R.O. did her best to hide her irritation at being made to wait. “I think I’ve found one of the major problems with the water system.” “So soon? Your reputation as an outstanding engineer has been well earned.” “As you know, maintaining the station’s water system is one of the most important jobs for an engineer. I take my job very seriously.” “I am sure you do, as we take our positions very earnestly as well. Why don’t you tell me what you have found, I will decide how serious the problem is.” “Very well.” With a thought, R.O. connected her ocular implant HUD to the wall screen in the room. “You will see the Saravipian section of the water system has been experiencing recalibration issues for the past six months.” She advanced the slide with her mind. “This section of the station’s water supply has been experiencing a continual point-zero-one percent deficit each month.” One of the previously silent women scoffed quietly, “Such a small amount. Might be an accounting error.” “Perhaps, but I doubt it.” Trying to be political and failing, R.O. looked directly at the higher up. “The other sections of the station rigorously keep their accounting errors to under point-zero-zero-zero-one percent. Surely you don’t suggest the Saravipians are one hundred percent worse at accounting than the other races?” The female’s crest turned bright blue in embarrassment. Score one for me, R.O. thought. “This is outstanding work. Thank you for bringing this… accounting error to my attention. I will speak with the personnel responsible at once and have this taken care of.” The female behind the desk tried to end the uncomfortable meeting. Attempting to save face for her blushing superior. R.O. turned to face the woman behind the desk. “Magistrate, if that were all, I would’ve simply sent you a memo. Even though we are talking about the possibility of millions of merits, there is a much larger problem.” She mentally advanced the screen to the next slide, displaying a box and a few lines of computer code. “And what is this?” the oldest and obviously most commanding of the women asked from the side. “This is how someone has been stealing water from almost every person in the section. Roughly twenty thousand residences of this section are being shorted every time they use water. The code in the meters has been tampered with, allowing an even greater amount of water to be siphoned off.” R.O. stopped for a moment, letting the news sink in, watching those in the room for any kind of reaction. If they did know about it, R.O. found it difficult to tell. Damn, they did an outstanding job of hiding their emotions. Good poker players. It seemed like hours, but in reality only a few painful seconds of silence passed, the magistrate cleared her throat before speaking. “You have done outstanding work. We will investigate this to the highest level as soon as possible.” “Magistrate, I don’t think you understand the seriousness of this problem. First, someone is stealing billions of merits of water, but more importantly, if the calculations of our water supply are off too much, the station will become unbalanced, ending with its destruction!” R.O. raised the stress level in her voice as she continued her speech, effecting little response from the woman behind the desk. “I am fully aware of the risks involved here. I have been doing this for much longer than you. Please don’t be overcome by your emotions. We understand you are only Human, but you are still a female. Try to behave like one.” “Oh, I will behave how I see fit, I only wish you would!” The older woman with the rank of section leader openly displayed on her head crest began to speak smoothly for the first time. “Miss Smith, thank you for your hard work. Please rest assured we understand the seriousness of your charges and the risk they pose to the station. We are not as quick to show our emotions as Humans are. I will personally consider your report. Now I think you have earned some time off, and a good copulation. We can provide a male for you, if you are in need.” Trying like crazy not to sputter her words, she managed to say, “No, thank you. I can find my own… male. I would rather keep working than take time off.” “I don’t think you understand, that was not a request. You will take time off with pay while we consider your report.” The section leader made her point completely clear. R.O. had been warned what to expect, and now she became confident they all recognized what was happening and knew the responsible parties. It would be swept under the rug. “Very well.” She disconnected her HUD from the display, turning to storm out of the office but finding her escape stopped by the closed door. The magistrate said, “Please remember your nondisclosure agreement.” R.O. nodded agreement before the door opened. She rushed straight for the elevator, feeling desperately in need of a shower, wanting with her entire being to be out of the inner-rings and down in engineering decks where she felt more comfortable. The implication she couldn’t find a man infuriated her even more. The statement hit too close to home for her to admit to herself. If she wanted a man, she should be able to find one on her own. Currently, the last thing she wanted or needed was a Human male. She had shut off that part of her existence ages ago. She had an implant for when she truly needed to seek release. “It didn’t go well?” R.O. heard a voice from above. Looking up, she found the face of an old earth sloth, adorned with a magnificent parrot’s beak bent into a permanent smile, poking its head through the access panel in the elevator ceiling. “You told me it wouldn’t go well. I should’ve listened to you,” R.O. said. “Sometimes people need to see for themselves before changing their mind. Faith in others can be a hard thing to shake,” the Nof-Tro male said, before using its furry tentacles to ease himself into the elevator car. “Where to now?” “Phanboi, I’m not sure. They made a veiled threat about my nondisclosure agreement. I think we should head to the outer rings, the engineering levels to think through our next steps.” “Blech! You know what I think about the lower levels. The Nof-Tro are not made for high gravity.” R.O. canceled the trip to her floor and pressed five, the lowest level of the station, taking them to the outer ring, the engineering decks. “Yeah, but they won’t think about finding me there. They told me to take some time off and get laid. Maybe we take a walkabout over the lower levels for a few days. See what we can find.” Phanboi covered his small black eyes with his right tentacle. “You know higher gravity is painful to my kind. We much prefer the highest levels with lower gravity.” “Yes, but the Saravipians are spacefarers, they hate high gravity even more than the Nof-Tro. We will be safer down there.” As the elevator descended, R.O. watched Phanboi deflate, the higher gravity affecting his body and personality. When the car stopped at the outer ring, Phanboi had to walk on all four tentacles instead of the standard lower two. “This is disgusting, it feels so primitive. We left the ground for the trees millennia ago.” “Better than if the Saravipians find us. If they are stealing billions of merits, I think they would do anything to stop us.” R.O. led Phanboi through the larger vats and tanks of the engineering level. The station, as designed, functioned with remarkable efficiency with the recycling and distribution of all materials. The common thread in most needed substances became water. The molecule, once cracked, provided oxygen for breathing—many creatures breathed some mixture of oxygen. The hydrogen was fuel for fusion reactors, providing power. And the liquid itself had many uses. Some of the most important: shielding from cosmic rays and ballast. Far Reach Station rotated at a speed of about 2000 kilometers per hour. A certain amount of imbalance would be compensated for with retro jets, but the station needed to maintain as close to perfect equilibrium as possible. If the torus ever became too unbalanced, the spokes would fail. If that happened, chances were the station would be lost. They continued to walk, breath hanging in a fog before their faces. R.O. was lost in thought as they trudged around the unnamed equipment. She wanted to put some distance between herself and anyone that might be following them. A growing feeling of dread washed over her. She knew there were few cameras down here. The only ones allowed access were those that worked on the level. In many ways, it was the safest and most dangerous place on the station. “Please, for the love of the gods, can we stop and take a break?” Phanboi pleaded from behind R.O. She turned to find his belly scraping the floor as he dramatically tried to keep her pace. She looked down over her heaving jumpsuit and, despite the cold, noticed her clothing soaked with sweat. The sloth had to be much worse off since he wasn’t accustomed to the extra gravity and his body was covered in fur.