After an awkward beat, Henry returns the hug and pats the fitter’s back. Marina dips her pen and scribbles a description of the scene as quickly as she can, giving a quick nod to one of the artists standing by to do the same in pictures. He goes straight to work and Marina can confidently forget the artist for the moment.
All the artists present are all in the employ of the Historians for today and look to her for guidance. She has to remind herself not to put them too far out of her mind. It is her responsibility to make sure this important event is recorded for posterity.
She makes a quick note to find out the story of the fitter. How does he know Henry and what is their relationship? They look about the same age or thereabouts, so perhaps they went to school together or were playmates in childhood. When she looks up again, the two have disengaged and are performing the same manly postures all men do after moments of emotion. Marina suppresses a smile since a woman smiling knowingly during such moments is never much of a help.
The last bits of the suit are hooked up and Henry tests the transmitter key on his leg beneath the suits. The click, click on his leg sounds out as beeps on the control console across the room. The code is slow and cumbersome, requiring long and short taps of the key to create letters, but it is a safe backup should anything go wrong with the suit communications in his helmet.
At a nod from the operator, Henry stops keying and flexes his hands inside the constricting gloves. Marina jots down those first signs of nervousness in her book. The tight lines of Henry’s face are a shade paler than they had been only moments before. She gives another directive look toward the line of artists, all of them glancing her way at her movement, and the next one in line immediately bends to put a few broad sweeps on his paper and board. Each of them has been selected for their ability to capture ephemeral moments quickly, to imply detail without actually putting it to paper. She hopes they will perform as well as they need to. There are no do-overs.
Two of the suit mechanics lift the backpack to Henry’s frame and began the process of connecting it to him. It is only the frame for now to keep the weight down while they can. The entire system has been designed and built just for Henry’s weight, stride and strengths and it is a marvel to Marina. The gaps within the framework fit perfectly around the bumps and bulges of his tanks and all the rest beneath his suit.
The cage that will hold the glass balls, glass being one of the few things that isn’t structurally affected by whatever it is outside, is handy to one side so that each new ball will roll down the slide and be exactly within reach when he needs it.
On the other side are the two springy bits of steel where two other glass balls will be held. They are different and special, though. Each will hold a precious camera pried from one of the thousands of derelict computers within the silo on a gimbal. This mean that it can be tossed but the camera inside will always turn to face the side when rolls to a stop. They won’t work for long but that doesn’t matter. The batteries inside will wear down quickly under the drain of the transmitter and the camera, but while they do they will provide vital information to those inside and watching.
One of the electrical engineers brings the two precious balls forward and Henry taps a key on his other leg. A green light glows briefly inside one of the balls and then goes out just as quickly with a second tap. Another couple of taps, on another key presumably, and the same happens inside the other ball. A grave but satisfied nod from the engineer is his only reply before he walks away with cautious steps.
The most important part of suiting up is still to come. It is also the most frightening part of the process. It will separate Henry from the silo in every way until he returns, if he returns. The helmet rests inside a cushioned box and Henry glances that way, knowing that will be next. But that won’t happen until he is in the airlock proper to conserve his air.
At a nod, Henry’s mother and father are let inside the space. They must have been waiting outside the door the whole time because they rush in and head directly for their son. Both give him careful but slightly desperate hugs and his mother touches his face all over. Marina can see that she is doing her best to be brave but the tremors of emotion that flit across her face are heartbreaking in their intensity.
She gives another nod toward the artists and another of them sets to work. The first artist has removed the paper from his board and is already smoothing down a new sheet in readiness. Their speed is impressive.
When the hugs are done, it is Henry that tells them to go rather than the control room personnel. Marina watches him tell them that he will be fine with utmost confidence and give them both a jaunty smile. He keeps the smile on until the door closes behind them and then it falls away in swift stages.
The mood in the room has shifted somehow in the small moment between them opening the door and it closing behind them. It has become all business and tense but not in a way that feels bad. It’s more like the tension that comes from focusing on a job so that it will be well done and that is, paradoxically, a tension that feels good and full of purpose. Marina notes it in her book because it seems like something very easy to forget when recalling the scene later.
The whole production now moves toward the airlocks and the rest of the operation crew file in the outer door and proceed directly toward their stations. Someone comes and helps Marina up so she can follow the smaller group. By the time she is lowered into a chair close by the first airlock, Henry is already inside with the helmet fitter.
The helmet, though much like the original in general shape, is a very different affair in almost every way. Before being lowered over his head, the wire harness is hooked up and there is a sudden burst of sound behind them as two of the screens blaze to life with color and sound. Henry’s breathing is amplified painfully into the room and the operator scrambles to lower the sound to a more useful level.
After a thumbs-up, the system is shut down to conserve battery power and Marina watches as the screen darkens once more. Once the helmet is lowered, time becomes the enemy so the speed of everything has to pick up considerably. The first ring from the suit is clamped in place around the helmet, then the second and finally the outer suit ring. This will keep Henry safer because all three suits have to breech before contaminated air gets into his helmet.
The mouthpiece is awkward. The face piece looks a bit like a cone and keeps the lower half of his face out of view even when not engaged, but he can still speak. In order to seal it, he will have to shove his head forward inside the helmet, grab the mouthpiece with his mouth and clamp down on it. If that happens, and they are hoping it won’t, then he will no longer be able to speak and will be forced to use his leg key. The only reason for him to use that face piece would be in the case of a suit breech all the way into the inner layer.
They have found through terrible experience that getting whatever it is out there inside of the body is a sure path to death. Survival after topical exposure, at least for some period of time, is much more likely. Marina knows without looking that somewhere amongst the equipment at the various stations are irons which can be heated quickly and used against skin that is exposed. It is painful and not guaranteed, but it worked the only time they had tried it previous to this.
The last cleaner had worn through one knee of his suit quickly after a fall. It seems that anyplace there is friction, or where the suit faces the wind, the process of disintegration is faster. That cleaner’s breech had been very small, an area no more than a couple of inches across. The idea of using heat had come from a suit designer. His logic was that fire had once been used to cleanse the airlock of toxin so why wouldn’t it do the same when directly applied.