I. Minutes

It had been fourteen minutes since the feed had stopped. To Lester, the silence was a gift—a memento of better days. Common courtesy invited pretend relief at the quiet, but a queasy uneasiness was already permeating the titanium bones of Strelka station, and grew with every discernable creak and with every audible draft of air. For, finally, after two years into its mission, the fly had curled into the corner: the background buzzing of the 24-hour news streams, iconic and inescapable throughout every common area of the station, had silently faded away.

Lester approached the maintenance door, hands unconsciously struggling to budge the stuck zipper of his jumpsuit. It was once Nina's jumpsuit, and it was the only Engineering suit that fit Lester's generally shorter stature. Still, it was a little loose about the sleeves.

Hendrix was already suited up and on the scene. He was cranking the wheeled latch of the door and giving Lester a thumbs up. The only other engineer on the station, Hendrix was the type to keep prepared on a moment's notice, and his jumpsuit was always on.

On the counter beside the door was perched a broken server box in a nest of wire. Above this was a dead wall monitor. The reflection of ceiling LEDs across the black of its screen made strange work of imitating stars out a station port-window.

“Swatted at last,” Hendrix said, his attention also on the monitor. He pulled hard on the latch and swung the door open before bidding Lester step through.

The wire frame glasses. The bulging lenses. The thick mustache. Hendrix was the epitome of clueless dad. But Hendrix had never mentioned family, and to Lester's knowledge, he had none. Maybe there had been something between Hendrix and Nina. Lester had watched them, sometimes, from Command. It had been his job to watch people, sitting for eight hours each shift in his small room like a member of Ingsoc's Inner Party, watching camera screens on the monitor wall, a checkerboard of rooms, faces, and lives.

“We even sure we want to find the problem?” Hendrix asked.

As he pushed into the maintenance shaft, Lester tried to distance himself from the warbly voice behind him, and the insecure hands, constantly moving to punctuate words, overcompensating concern for charisma.

“We'll figure it out, Hendrix.” Lester said over his shoulder. “Things will be back to normal soon enough.”