With the assistance of his coworker and an eager volunteer, Markos finally reaches the last few tasks on his reboot list. They complete the security camera reviews, and check function in each one on the list swiftly. A list of sensors reporting exceptions grows longer and longer, but with the one replacement, the rest are all able to be deferred to their backups for now.

Systems begin to come online again. The first priorities are all reporting and alerting systems. The systems that check to see if other systems are functioning need to function before it would be possible to tell if the originating system is also functioning. It is a complicated and ugly mess of spaghetti all tangled together to create the life-giving air that they breathe, the water that keeps them clean and prevents them from drying into dessicated deceased husks, and makes any life in space at all possible.

It is this tangled mess that requires double checks by a living person to verify that all is processing as it should before it declares itself ready to take control of its own processes independently again. Should they unseal the sector and open it to others without completing these processes appropriately there is a chase that they could actually be exposing the rest of the six-mile-diameter ring gate’s tenants, employees, and visitors to something horrible and dangerous that has fallen undetected.

If there were more time and no risks to health and safety, Markos would want to send a person to physically inspect every sensor. And so he makes a note of exactly that on his clipboard between checks. While he is annotating his notes, the brighter light of the hallway falls eclipsed by two people standing in the doorway.

Amina and Tiphanie have returned, but they are alone.

Markos expected this. It tracks with what he overheard on the ear wire and had such trouble not being too distracted by. By the fact that neither woman looks quite distraught enough to have witnessed a death Markos is reasonably assured that Adah is still alive at least. Amina has Adah’s clipboard held under her arm, its screen still appears to be unsecured.

Dim light in the computer control room makes it hard to tell whether the dark splashes across Amina’s coveralls are water, oil, paint, or something much more ominous. Markos chooses not to ask right this moment.

“Is everything okay,” he opts to ask instead. That seems like a safe way to ask the question he shouldn’t technically know needs to be said aloud.

“No,” Amina answers, wringing shaking hands, “but it will be.” She looks green enough that Tessa silently passes her a waste basket. Emesis is not the solution to this problem. She does not immediately turn her insides into outsides. It certainly is tempting.

Tsim is aware that there is most definitely something very wrong for their project manager to have not returned to the control room with the other two team members. Tsim is aware that there are few things that could possibly create this discrepancy in her usual habits. Tsim wants an answer.

“Where’s Adah?” he asks, probably a bit more insistently than he intended that one to come out, but if any day could possibly be a day to forgive someone their social mistakes, this is most definitely that day.

“Aboard the Something Something Light the Atmosphere on Fire,” Amina answers quietly. “There was an accident and she had to be evacuated.”

“Is that blood on your clothes?” Tessa asks, astonished. She stares openly and the dark stains.

Amina looks down, as if for the very first time noticing the mess that covers her clothing. Emesis is not the solution to this problem. Nope. It sure isn’t going to help clean anything up at all.

“Yes,” the carpenter chokes out, burying her face in her gloved hands before she recalls that there is also still blood on the gloves as well. Holding an artery closed with your elbow is not a tidy process.

“Oh honey, we’ve got to get you cleaned up,” Tessa takes her by the elbow and leads Amina out of the room entirely. It’s worth noting that she has grabbed the elbow that is not coated in a hazardous biological substance.

Out in the hallway, Tessa and Amina carefully step over the makeshift bridge across the gaping wound in the floor and head to the restroom. Amina is pleasantly surprised to find that the water works, the toilets flush, and there is an acceptable quantity of mostly usable soap available.

Sure, the soap in question is a bar that looks like it was left behind by someone passing through this place ages ago. It’s cracked and dried out and takes several minutes under the running water to begin to form suds. Amina is just thankful that it exists. She strips to her underwear and stands sweating in the overly warm bathroom, dropping the heavy blood stained leather gloves on the tile floor in disgust.

Amina’s hands are still wrapped in layers of bandages. She’s not willing to rip those scabs yet, but she still wants to get clean somehow.

Without being asked, Tessa helps run water over Amina’s arms, dabbing them clean with a fresh sponge from her oddly well equipped surgical kit.

“I was a nurse,” Tessa answers the unasked question, “I’ve seen much worse.”

“How’d you end up in a sector gone dark then? Nurses are always needed.” Amina asks, just trying to keep up the conversation.

“Remember when Venkyke Eight went rogue and demanded out of the confederacy?” Tessa waits for Amina’s understanding nod before continuing, “I’m an Eight-er. They revoked citizenship rights in response to the demand. So I’m unemployable outside Venkyke Eight until the political dogfight gets resolved. Figured I could stay on the station and keep working anyway, but that went about as well as you can imagine. The Moldy Donut doesn’t want to get booted from the Venkyke Confederacy either, so they fired everyone who’d lost citizenship.”

Amina listens carefully as gentle hands remove the crust of dried blood from her arms.

“But you’re skilled labor, surely that counted for something?” the carpenter begs an answer that could make sense emotionally.

“Folks much more important than me got dropped,” the answer is not a satisfying one. “I stuck around, figured I could do some charity work for a few months and then get picked back up. But it’s been over a year now.”

Amina doesn’t know what to say to that.

“It’s okay, I guess,” Tessa tries to smooth out the conversation as gently as she cleans the gore from Amina’s torso. “Everything will work out in the end.”

“It will, won’t it?” Amina aims for a little bit of optimism, but there isn’t much left on tap at the moment. Her words come out a little less secure in their statement than they really ought to.

“This much blood loss?” Tessa wipes carefully around Amina’s face while considering her words carefully. “It’ll be touchy. I would hate to lie to you. There’s a very real chance that it won’t be enough just to have gotten her to the Something Something Light the Atmosphere on Fire while still alive. They will most definitely need to do a transfusion, with real blood of the correct type if they have it on hand. Simulated blood isn’t always as effective when the patient is in shock, and your friend will almost certainly be in shock.”

“How long will it be before we can know then?” Amina looks at the nurse with deeply felt fear.

“I can’t say,” Tessa offers with a shrug. “That will probably depend on the privacy laws Something Something Light the Atmosphere on Fire feels like obeying today.”

“Something Something Light the Atmosphere on Fire is a military ship,” Amina says with a little more hope, “I’m sure they have good medical facilities and they’ll also not have any privacy regulations for civilians, right?”

“Maybe!” Tessa pats Amina’s face dry with an ancient soy paper towel that crumbles as it’s used. Both women look into the mirror and grimace at the mess of crumbled paper sticking to Amina’s forehead. They scrub it off and permit friction to do the work.

When they return to the control room, something seems measurably different. Something in the air smells like relief. Relief and possibly cool, filtered air with a hint of air freshener from a cleverly hidden automatic dispenser.

Markos gives a winning smile. They’ve really done it. Main life support is back on line. Everyone can breathe easier now.

Tsim breaks out the better of his two ration bars - this one flavored like pure chocolate, though it is made of nothing that remotely resembles the original Earth variety that inspires the flavor. He snaps it into pieces and shares them around.

Still a few hours to go before the shift changes. They might as well find something to do with this extra unsupervised time that’s been granted to them by serendipity.

The crew chooses to indulge in the not chocolate and then abuse the unlocked clipboard at their leisure.

Markos configures Adah’s external voice communications settings, making sure to give her a pass phrase she will likely never be able to forget - “Something Something Light the Atmosphere on Fire” - and also not setting any biometric security.

It is with great joy that the team hears a familiar voice on their wires. It is with greater disappointment that the voice is that of their division director, informing them that they ought not be misusing company devices.

Tiphanie sighs, and recognizes that this is probably a positive sign. If their project manager had died in the line of duty they would certainly have been contacted already. Certainly.

An alarm fires off, ringing through all of the team members’ ear wires. Startled, Markos falls right out of his chair. Tiphanie lets out a victorious shout.

Instead of being another thing broken, burning, or otherwise catastrophically busted, this is actually the clock. There are only thirty minutes remaining in their shift.

Following their cheers, the team put their heads together to start the real business that’s left in the day. They file their work tickets, and seek out any possible justification to increase their count. It is a hard job, but someone does have to do it. And Adah is not there to fill that role today.