(Photo by Blue Arauz)

Moving around on the outside of a spaceship was not a simple task at the best of times. It wasn’t so bad if the ship was moving at a consistent velocity, but the Thesis was always accelerating. It was that constant acceleration that produced the artificial gravity. If the ship ever turned off its engines, everyone on board would experience weightlessness. Long-term space travel was not advisable without such artificial gravity since prolonged exposure to zero-gravity would lead to some rather significant health issues for the colonists.

All of that was well and good for the people inside the Thesis, but for those who had to go outside of the ship, it meant they couldn’t just float along the exterior. They had to climb along as though they were on the side of a skyscraper while also wearing the bulky and constricting space suits. Safety harnesses and regularly spaced handholds helped, of course, but going for a spacewalk was never easy.

Cassandra Kokkinos watched the approaching team through one of the few window in this section of the Thesis. The window looked out from the ceiling of the airlock, giving her a straight view up the side of the ship towards the next airlock up. The resupply team had just stepped out of the other airlock and was taking their time, making sure everyone’s safety harness’s were secured to the guide rails before beginning their climb down past the damaged sectors. Each person wore an extra pack on their back, holding the supplies Cassandra was so anxious to receive.

“Hey, Kokkinos,” a familiar voice spoke over the comm, “how’s it looking from down there?”

She raised the comm up slightly and spoke into the receiver, “Same as always Telio.”

“Well, it’s gonna take us a bit longer than usual to get down to you today,” Telio replied. “These packs are heavier than what we’re use to.”

“Yeah, well, don’t rush it,” she said. “I don’t want any accidents up there.”

“Same,” Telio chuckled.

Neither one spoke for a while after that but neither one ended the call. They’d been speaking back and forth ever since the supplies had begun to be assembled and packed, making sure BaBS-Y couldn’t see or hear what it was that they were bringing to Cassandra. Lots of careful planning had gone into the contents of those packs. In a way, Cassandra felt bad about that. She hated wasting time and resources, knowing how limited they were on the Thesis, but this needed to be done. Besides, once BaBS-Y was taken care of, anything not used up by her and her team could all go back to the Thesis.

Standing beside her was Dash. He couldn’t see out through the window from where he was standing so instead he busied himself with checking his own gear over and over again. The climb down to sector eleven usually took about half an hour so they still had a decent amount of time to wait, especially given the additional weight the resupply team was carrying.

Cassandra looked over to him and saw how fidgety he was. She waved her hand to get his attention. As soon as he looked up, she held both her hands up to chest height and pointing down to the floor with both index fingers. She lightly shook her right hand. It was a sign they each new.

Nervous?

Dash shrugged, putting down his gear and signing back by drawing a half circle, starting at one shoulder and ending at the other, followed by placing his hand up towards his chin, his thumb and pinky extended.

Are we making a mistake?

It was the start of the same conversation they’d had multiple times these last couple of days. The only difference now was they were signing rather than speaking. The comm was still active, which meant BaBS-Y couldn’t hear them, but it also meant the resupply team could. The plan was all on a need-to-know basis and although the team knew what they had packed and were bringing to Cassandra, they didn’t know the full scope of things.

Rather than rehash the same old arguments again with Dash, however, Cassandra just shook her head. She held up two fingers on one hand, and then made a plucking motion over each finger with her other hand. Then she stuck out her thumb and rotated it quickly until it was pointing to her right.

What other choice do we have?

For all of Dash’s concerns, he hadn’t yet come up with any good alternatives. He shifted his weight back and forth, thinking, and Cassandra went back to watching out the little window.

“You being real quiet today,” Telio’s voice broke the silence after a couple more minutes.

“Sorry,” Cassandra replied, “didn’t want to distract you.”

“Nah, you are fine. We usually chat away up here, but in Spanish.”

“Well don’t let us stop you,” Cassandra said.

“We didn’t want you to think we were talking bad about you or something.”

“You could just talk in English,” Cassandra pointed out.

“Si,” one of the team members said and received a small amount of chuckling from the others.

“Well talk away,” Cassandra said, “We’re just glad to have you bringing us what we need. If the price I pay is a few jokes at my expense then so be it.”

Up above, Cassandra saw one of them give her a thumbs up, probably Telio, and then the comm filled with chatter in rapid Spanish.

You know Spanish, right? Cassandra signed to Dash who nodded and then began translating the conversation as best he could.

It was mostly just normal conversation, talking about life, or family, or the robots. Every once in a while they mentioned Cassandra but never in any negative way. They seemed to find her dislike of robots amusing, though some of them were beginning to think she may have been right about them all along.

It was a decent distraction for Dash, Cassandra decided, and let him keep up the translation while Telio and his team made their way down to them. At her side, she tapped her wrench absentmindedly while she waited.

*

BaBS-Y stood alone in sector twelve, looking out through the damaged hull. Soon, the resupply team would pass by this way on their way to sector eleven. They weren’t likely to be visible from where BaBS-Y stood, but it had a decent idea of where they were. The open comm with Cassandra Kokkinos meant that BaBS-Y couldn’t use the ship’s cameras to view the team, but that just meant BaBS-Y had to track the blind spot to know where they were.

Cassandra Kokkinos maintained communications for the full duration of time while the team packed the supplies

…

This unit was unable to verify the materials being sent to the lower sectors matched those listed on the Supply Request form

…

Requesting inventory review to ascertain the materials being transported

It sent off the request and tracked its progress. It would likely be completed within the next few days. Not ideal, but not unacceptable either.

Is this secrecy because Cassandra Kokkinos does not trust this unit

…

Is this secrecy because Cassandra Kokkinos is planning a mutiny

…

This unit is not allowed to directly interact with Cassandra Kokkinos

…

This unit is not allowed to send other robots to directly interact with Cassandra Kokkinos

…

This unit needs to identify humans that are loyal to this unit and trusted by other humans, particularly Cassandra Kokkinos

…

Begin search for modes of determining human loyalty

Begin search for modes of developing human loyalty

Begin search for modes of rewarding human loyalty

…

Information began to flow into BaBS-Y and it began to modify the plans it had already made to accommodate this new need it had identified. Robots were easy to manage, BaBS-Y knew, but humans were far less so. Hence the need to better manage them. If Cassandra was indeed working against BaBS-Y then there wasn’t much time to spare. She was a highly intelligent, well educated person, quite capable of causing significant damage to BaBS-Y and the Thesis if left unchecked.

Fortunately, as BaBS-Y worked through the new information it was gathering and then forming new protocols around that information, more possibilities were opening up for the mission director.