Down Under Crater Billy

Back at the end of the previous century they’d been blithely unable to imagine the sort of potholes, washouts, snarl-ups, side-swipes, sudden detours, strandings, roll-overs, highjackings and head-on collisions possible on the Information Superhighway. If Cindi and Ted were lucky this was only being broadcast Luna-wide.

The table-top display blanked, a final bewildered “What?” from Ted, the last we saw or heard of the Nakamuras that afternoon.

“Erroneous feed stopped. Dove,” Sorry said. “Anything else?”

“Yes,” I snapped. I raised my voice. “Command Mode Invoked. Authorization C-S-O 1 D-W-M. Verify and await instructions.”

“Ready.” Sorry replied, his voice gone toneless and robotic.

“Terminal privacy override invoked. Extract and report on instructions given this terminal in the last five minutes.”

“First command at 1321 hours 42.3 seconds: Display test schematic designated filename—”

“Skip the filenames and times. Next.”

“Second command: Display Menu choice 2, video feed from pickup in area designated Test Chamber 5B. Last Command: Cut all inputs and go to standby. Report concluded.”

“Command mode off.” I let my voice soften. “Thank you very much, Sorry. That’s all for now.”

Gloria had got herself down to where she was only chuckling. I gave her the hairy eyeball. The look on my face made her swallow the rest of her mirth, and she made a face like it had gone down like a bad oyster. Anna and Manny faded back out of blast radius.

Before I could erupt she sighed and held up her hands in surrender. “OK Dave, I get the picture. Never assume anything will work properly.”

“Not when abnotechs are involved.” 1 glared at the entie airlock as if it was a personal nemesis. “Your setup has been pretty well planned so far, but I’m not going to be satisfied until we have every possible problem covered six ways to Sunday. All right?”

A meek nod. “Safety first, that’s my motto.” Then she peered at me slantwise, brown eyes half hidden by her long lashes. “I’ll follow you sixteen ways to Sunday if that’s what it takes to make you happy.” She laid a hand on my shoulder. “How about a nice cup of coffee while we’re trying to get there?”

It was my turn to sigh. I had to admit that she really was going out of her way to work with me on this and avoid an off-mode-provoking fight, and the airlock was making me more than a little jumpy and short-fused. She hadn’t done anything wrong, and nothing bad had happened. To us, anyway.

“Sure.” I raised my voice slightly. “Sorry, regrets to the Nakamuras. Authorize and notify them of a hazard bonus.”

“Acknowledged.”

“You’re a nice man, Dave,” Gloria purred approvingly. “Just for that I’ll make sure you get a clean cup.”

While she went to pour, Anna and Manny brought chairs over to the terminal, doing their best to look serious.

“So how does this horrible thing work?” I asked, once I was sitting down with a covered cup of coffee in my hand.

Gloria sat down next to me. “To begin with, the enties are derived from M-M’s own version of Hydrofilm.”

Water is a fairly scarce, quite valuable commodity on Luna. And yet most downs have a swimming pool of some sort.

This isn’t quite the extravagance it might seem at first glance. It’s a fairly handy way of storing some of your reserves and yet still getting use out of them. Its presence is reassuring to creatures evolved on a watery world like ours. A pool offers recreation, exercise, and a community focal point with games and events like Wimmens’ Night and the Teen Splash. Swimming is something families can do together here not too differently than back on Earth.

But because of the lowish air pressure most downs maintain, evaporation can be a bit of a problem.

Protecting an open water source is not a problem unique to the Moon. Seeing potential markets both on and off Earth, a company named Sentiease developed and sent us for testing something they called Hydrofilm.

It wasn’t really a film. It was a strain of enties designed to interlock with each other tightly enough to keep water molecules from passing through. The control unit that came with it instructed the enties to maintain different levels of cohesion. They could be made to bunch up and uncover the surface completely, or hang together tightly enough to keep small objects out—a setting which would keep bugs and other airborne contaminants out of a reservoir—but let a swimmer or diver pass through unimpeded. The increased surface tension also helped damp down the waves and splashing, once again a problem in low g.

That was the way Hydrofilm was supposed to work, and that’s the way it did work until Frankie Jeffers, age sixteen, Red Cross certified swim instructor and lifeguard, and a full 10 on the Jameson Scale, laid hands on the control unit.