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 plants 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.