They both nodded. Kinnis remembered his radio. “Yes.”
“Kinnis, you stay here and reprogram the rakes for removal of reeds. Cel, I want you to start hosing down the troughs. The two of you will coordinate pumping out the tainted swill.” The members of the emergency-response team were probably only just arriving and climbing into their gear. “Kinnis, keep an eye on this number at all times.” I pointed to the vinyl-chloride readout. “If it gets above two-fifty, evacuate immediately. Stay on this radio frequency-” I glanced down. “-frequency A. Magyar and I will be on B.”
“Where are you going?”
“The holding area. At the emergency station.”
The emergency station was set up like the readout station. Magyar and I ran through the checks. Amber numerals at the top of the console ticked from 14:04 to 14:05.
It was hard to believe it had only been fourteen minutes.
“All strains online,” Magyar said.
“Check.”
“The emergency-response crews will be arriving about now. Lights flashing, lots of shouting.”
“Decon zones being set up,” I agreed. “No one knowing what they’re doing.” A zoo. But we were here, on the spot, and if we did everything right we could keep the system from real shutdown time.
“Everything reads fine except the PCE. Still climbing.”
What a mess. I didn’t envy whoever had the job of explaining what had happened to the press. “Who’s the designated media liaison?”
“Who do you think?”
“Not Hepple…” It was funny, really. I wondered if he even knew that some of this was his fault. “How’s the PCE doing now?”
“Still climbing.”
“Vinyl chlorides”
“Steady.”
I swore.
“I take it that’s not good.”
“It should be rising rapidly as the bacteria process the PCE. How’s the dichloroethylene?”
“Steady.”
We had a problem. I queried the system: the bugs being fed into the tanks were viable. That wasn’t it.
16:04.
I began working the board.
17:16. 17:18. 17:19.
There. “It’s the substrate. Conditions are too anoxic—probably electron deficient. The bugs need electrons to fuel their metabolism. Without them they don’t reproduce. But that should have been compensated for by… Ah.”
I stared at the numbers.
“What? Tell me what it is, Bird!”
“The system should have automatically delivered glucose to enrich the mixture. It didn’t.” I showed her the screen trace I had run.
She followed the green and blue lines carefully to the red bar. “Looks like the drum is blocked.”
“Yes. But I’ve never heard of a glucose drum clogging before.”
Silence. “Are you saying this was deliberate?”
“It’s very possible.” I would bet on it, especially given the filled air tanks, the greased pumps.
Silence again. It was hard to tell what she was thinking in the bulky suit. “I’m going to unplug that drum.” The radio flattened her voice. “Keep me informed of changing conditions.”
I switched to Kinnis and Cel’s frequency. “You’re going to have longer than we thought. How are the troughs?”
“Give us another twenty minutes and we’ll have four troughs cleaned out and ready for restocking,” Cel said.
“More now that I’ve finished the reprogramming and can help,” Kinnis added.
“Keep the channel open, and keep me informed. Out.” Back to B frequency. “Magyar?”
“Here. I’ve found the problem.”
“What is it?”
“A closed-head drum lock.” Locks, always locks. She grunted. “Damn gloves are so clumsy.”
“Be careful, there’s-”
“Sparks, I know. But whoever did this was smart enough to use a nonsparking lock bar and what looks like a bronze alloy lock body. Polyethylene gaskets.” Another grunt, then a sigh of satisfaction. “Electronic locks might be fancy, but not much stands up to a simple crowbar.”
But monsters don’t use force. They don’t dare. Gray Greta. What would she have done in this situation?
There was more noise over the suit speakers. On my board, figures began to move.
“Glucose should be running now,” she said.
“It is.”
“You know, Bird, you’re going to have to get over this impression you have that I’m dumb.”
“I know.”
I switched frequencies. “Cel, Kinnis—with any luck you can stay there a while longer. The next strain of bugs should kick in and metabolize the chlorinated aliphatics well before they reach a dangerous concentration.”
“If you say so.” Cel sounded impatient, as though she just wanted to get on with what she was doing and leave the thinking to someone else. I wondered how it would be to trust like that.
The vinyl chloride and dichloroethylene concentrations climbed steadily. I waited for the methanotrophes to start working. The numbers kept going up. Something was going wrong.
“Cel, Kinnis, I want you out of there, now. The concentrations are getting too high. There’s danger of a fireball.”
“We only need another minute or-”
“Now. Acknowledge that.”
“Acknowledged.”
Magyar came back, still hefting the crowbar. She watched while I checked one readout after another.
Nothing was responding the way it should. The readout kept climbing. In desperation, I turned up the thermostat. Maybe heat would kick start the methanotrophes.
“What’s going on?”
“No methane monoxygenase.”
“This one time, assume I’m dumb.”
“Methane monoxygenase, MMO, is the enzyme secreted by the methanotrophes as they metabolize the vinyl chloride. No MMO means something’s wrong.” The nutrient lines were clear and open, feeding steadily. “I don’t understand it. They got their food, they’ve…” Except they might not have the right food. Hepple had replaced the correct, van de Oest nutrients. Time for desperate measures. I knew, in the final analysis, what methanotrophes ate. “Cel, Kinnis. Are you out?” No reply. “Cel-”
Click. “This is Decon One. Be advised that your team has been taken to Decon-”
They were safe. That was all I needed. I switched back to Magyar’s channel. “Brace yourself. I’m bringing on line methane.”
Magyar froze. Her gloved fist tightened on the crowbar. If she dropped it, there might be sparks. I imagined a hiss as the methane started to jet down the lines.
“What’s happening now?” Magyar asked after a minute.
The MMO numbers were not moving. “Nothing.”
“Talk to me, Bird. What should happen?”
“The methanotrophes will use the methane as their primary substrate, the vinyl chloride as secondary…” Still nothing.
“Come on,” Magyar muttered.
The amber numerals ticked. 41:33. 41:34.
“There!” It was a slight change, and sluggish. “Yes!” The MMO counter was climbing faster now. The vinyl chloride stopped. Began to decrease. “It’s working.” I watched for a while, just to be sure.
52:07. 52:08.
Everything was working. Running perfectly. “I’m going to reduce the methane.” I did, slowly, cautiously. The numbers remained steady. I nudged it down further. Fine. I stretched, inside my suit. “You can put that crowbar down now.”
She laid it flat on the floor. Always careful. She leaned over the readouts. Her head moved inside her hood, which I interpreted as a nod of satisfaction. I watched the incident clock for a while, feeling drained.
“Now what do we do?”
“Now we wait.”