Under Pressure
Morning shift. 0730 hours. Monday, March 15, 2230.
I know the date jackass.
All workers report to mess hall by 0800 hours. All workers must be at their stations by 0830 hours.
Yeah yeah.
Work will cease at 1830 hours.
Nah, really?
You will be advised of any further developments.
Such as?
That is all.
Good.
"Good" wasn't a word that Langston Furman could honestly use to describe his state of being over the past seven years, but it was a state of affairs that he'd become used to. He'd gotten used to the bunk on which he'd slept, to being woken up at 7:30 every morning by an automated voice, the only exceptions being Sunday and company-approved holidays. He'd become used to working in a DredgerCorp complex in the Gulf of Mexico. And after all these years, he'd gotten used to that facility being over 2,000 metres below sea level.
He'd gotten used to it all. That didn't mean he liked it.
Yawning, the convict swung his legs across his bunk, sitting on the edge. He looked out over the habitation ward through his bleary eyes. All members of the facility got Sundays off, and like every sensible person in this facility, he'd made the most of it. Cards, games, flatscreen TV, and as much alcohol as he was permitted. So while he hadn't woken up with a headache, a mere five hours of sleep hadn't done him any favours. And judging by the snoring coming from the bunk below his, it hadn't done Tche any favours either.
"Rise and shine pal," Langston said, leaning over the bunk's side and bringing his head down to Tche's level.
His fellow convict kept snoring.
"Hey, let's go," Langston said, poking his co-worker. "We've got the whole day ahead of us."
"Enojar," the man murmured.
"Yeah, I don't know what that means," Langston said, poking his friend even harder. "Just get up. It's Monday. Bacon at breakfast if we're lucky."
Tche turned to look at him through his bloodshot eyes. He looked like shit, Langston thought. Like someone who'd forgotten what the word "hygiene" meant.
"Had good dream," the man murmured. "I…free, yes? Free."
"Si, si," Langston said, using what little Spanish he knew. "Just…se levantó, okay?"
Se levantó. Get up. Something Langston had found himself saying more and more to his friend over the last few months. Working here crushed one's spirits just as the water outside would crush an unprotected human. But they had to work. To pay off their debts to society for whatever crimes they'd done. And after their sentence, they'd be free. Free to head back to the surface. To head home. Even head off-planet if they chose. DredgerCorp was a harsh master, but it was still fair to those who did their time.
Langston remembered that. He just hoped Tche would remember that as well.
"Hey, come on," he said, helping the Mexican slide out of his bunk onto the floor. "Three…tres years, okay pal? Only three. Then we'll be free. Heh, that rhymes."
Tche didn't laugh.
And looking around the room, at the sullen throngs of humanity that went about changing into their work clothes, Langston doubted that any of them would have.
There wasn't any bacon left by the time the pair entered the mess hall.
Langston wasn't surprised. The mess hall operated on a first come, first served basis, and the lack of deviation from the norm didn't surprise him any more than the sight of a pair of security guards hauling one of the convicts away to isolation. The complex couldn't go a day without a fight breaking out. Partly because tensions inevitably arose in such close quarters, partly because isolation effectively gave you a day off work. It meant another day added to your term of service, but when you were facing years of that service, it was hard to think that far ahead.
"Hey guys."
For Rutland, it always seemed quite easy.
"Hey," Langston murmured, waving half-heartedly as the convict took his seat opposite him and Tche. "I see you're still willing to talk to me after last night."
"Just wait until next Sunday. I'll have your number then."
"Yeah, sure. If there was a joker in the card deck, your face would be on it."
Rutland smirked and tucked into his porridge. Langston scowled. Rutland only had two years of labour to go through. He'd been arrested for a failed bank robbery. He hadn't spent five years of his life as a hacker, trading everything from credit to corporate secrets. He hadn't been sentenced to a decade of servitude.
"And how about you, Tche?" Rutland asked. "How you holding up amigo?"
Tche didn't answer. He just ate his toast. Toast with nothing on it, Langston saw.
"You okay?" Langston asked, poking his friend. "Hanging in there?"
"Free."
"Um, okay…"
"Free."
Rutland glanced at Langston. "He alright?"
"Bad day," the former hacker murmured. "Trust me kid, by the time you get out, you'll have had your share of them."
Silence descended between the men. Not in the hall in general, but as far as Langston was concerned, he might as well have been the only being in the room. There were no windows, so he couldn't see the darkness of the sea outside or any marine species that had somehow survived centuries of overfishing. He could see the flatscreen flickering away on silent mode, the images and text reporting on everything from the latest Altman Protests to the latest mining FUBAR on Mimas. It was as if DredgerCorp controlled the news, Langston thought. An attempt to portray the world and stars above as being equally grim as life down here.
Which it was, he reflected. But at least up there he could be free.
Still silent, the convict finished his breakfast, before taking a slip of paper from a passing guard, handing out work assignments. As usual, Langston saw he was working in the command centre. His past had made him as proficient with computers as the few company regulars stationed on the base. Individuals who rotated on weekly shifts, spending one week on the seafloor and the other with families up above. It allowed him to play it safe and not perform the hazardous and sometimes lethal work of maintaining the rig. Work that he saw Tche had got.
"Same shit?" Langston asked.
"Si," his friend murmured, the note in one hand and uneaten toast in the other. "Si…"
It made sense. Tche had worked as a mechanic for drug runners in the Central American Sector, having chosen the line of work because there was no other work to be found. It was a set of skills DredgerCorp had transferred to an even more hazardous line of work.
"Yeah, well, hang in there, okay?" Langston said, patting his friend on the shoulder. "It'll all be over eventually, okay? Then we'll be out of here. Free."
"Si…" Tche said, not meeting Langston's gaze. "Free…"
It didn't sound like Tche believed it.
Langston couldn't blame him.
"You're late."
That was how these shifts began. Langston would arrive at the command centre between 0830 and 0835 hours. It would prompt Commander Ekavuri to say "you're late," "late again," or on some occasions, something a bit more creative.
"What can I say?" the convict asked, taking his chair at his terminal. "Breakfast kept me."
It was here that the conversation usually ended. Ekavuri would turn away, begin delegating, or, if there was no work to be done, talk with her co-workers about how life was treating them. Langston had listened in long enough to know that Ekavuri lived in the Indian/Pakistani Sector, and that living so far away meant that she had less time to spend with her family due to travel time. It was something that she complained about often. And having no family to speak of himself, Langston didn't give a damn.
"Okay, Marlin, this is Swordfish," the convict said, activating his headset. "La parece bien?"
"Si."
"Well, say it like you mean it."
Tche didn't respond. He just swam through the gloom. Headed for one of the rig's structural supports to perform maintenance, as per his job description.
"Come on amigo," Langston said over the comms. "It's gonna be a long shift if you just give me the silent treatment."
Tche presumably heard him. Yet he still didn't say anything. He just swam. And swam. And looking at the map displayed on his terminal, showing the rig, the underwater complex, and every human and drone out in the field, Langston noticed that he was swimming very slowly.
"Problem, Langston?"
And it seemed that Ekavuri had noticed it as well.
"Nothing I can't handle," he murmured.
"Like hell. Why's Marlin moving so slowly?"
"Bad day. We all have them."
"Well, make it less bad and tell him to hurry up."
Could just do it yourself you stuck up- "Yes ma'am. I'll do that ma'am."
Ekavuri just stood there. She clearly didn't believe him. But she seemed willing to give Tche the benefit of the doubt that he'd get the job done.
Lying back in his chair, Langston closed his eyes. His job was monotonous, but he supposed it couldn't be compared to the poor sods that went outside in aquatic pressure suits. Even the most advanced suit in the world couldn't completely shield a human from the pressure of 2,000m of seawater. The operators of the suits ran the risk of everything from muscular pain to circulatory collapse. Langston had seen it happen. It wasn't pretty. But drones couldn't do everything, and the sad fact was that human lives were a lot cheaper.
"Alright Langston, that's enough."
The convict looked up at the commander.
"Get him moving," she said. "Tell him that he's not coming back inside unless he gets the strut damage fixed."
Langston sighed, but activated his comms unit. "Marlin…Tche…you read me?"
"Si." Tche sounded more dejected than Langston could remember.
"You've got to get moving pal. Get it done. Sooner you do it, the sooner you come back inside."
"No."
"Tche, come on, I've got the commander breathing down my neck. You've got to think of me too you know."
"No!"
"Tche, what are you-"
"No more! Free!"
"Tche, what…what are you doing?!"
There was no answer. The comms went dead. But looking at the readout on his terminal, Langston saw something that made his heart skip a beat.
"Suit integrity compromised, helmet," Ekavuri whispered. "Shiva, what's he doing?!"
"Tche, you okay?!" Langston yelled. "Tche!"
"Free…"
Langston stared - one second the screen was warning him of a breach in the helmet. The next, it showed that the helmet had been removed from the rest of the suit. And at almost the same moment, Tche's vitals flatlined.
Langston laid back in his chair. He took off his headset. He closed his hands into fists and closed his eyes as well.
"Why?" Ekavuri whispered. "Why would he do that?"
Langston remained silent. He knew why. He could understand.
"Langston?" the commander asked. "Why?"
He sighed. He opened his eyes. He looked up at her. And he spoke.
"He wanted to be free…"
A/N
This was based on a writing prompt/challenge, namely the writing prompt "what it's like to be underwater." I'm assuming the prompt referred more to the feeling of being under water (say, in a pool) rather than being in an installation that separates one from the water around them, but hey, no-one specified otherwise. Figure if I'm going to write in the era of Dead Space's backstory rather than the games themselves (though Martyr is set in the same time period), I can get away with quite a bit.
Update (25/08/13): Made alterations based on external feedback.