Like most Superintendents, Udall was not from Earth. Running a Block Farm was too important a job to give to an Earther, except in very special, almost legendary cases.

The Block Farms were almost exclusively responsible for feeding the human race. Their only competition was Mars, which had proved capable of growing potatoes. But even this wasn’t real competition. You couldn’t feed an entire species on potatoes, and Earth potatoes were noticeably superior to the Martian ones. A delicacy, they were shipped exclusively to Lunar. Udall had two whole floors devoted to Potatoes: one for growing, the other for stockpiling. He didn’t want to flood the market and lower the price of his most profitable crop.

The key to Udall’s whole operation – indeed, his life – was efficiency. Humans needed food from Earth. But humans didn’t live on Earth. They lived on Mars, on Venus, on the moon, and on various other outposts in the solar system. Most of them lived on the Planetary Orbital Space Station, Udall’s original home, which cast its great shadow on the surface of the Earth in an orbit that matched that of the planet’s original satellite, and usually prevented Earthers and Lunars alike from viewing each other’s homes.

The extant human habitats varied widely in environment and in population size, but the one thing they all had in common was they could not produce their own food, water, or oxygen, apart from cheap Martian potatoes and the flat-tasting, manufactured Venutian water. Three of the four things all humans needed to survive still mostly came from Earth. If that production or line of supply ever ceased or slackened, people would die. But that wasn’t why efficiency was so important to Parven Udall.

See, you couldn’t trust a braindead Earther, who probably didn’t even know there were other planets and settlements, to manage food production. It was too important. You had to trust a human. The problem was, humans didn’t want to go to Earth. Earth sucked. The rain never stopped, except over the dead oceans. Everything was old and falling apart. It stank of damp and mold and the unburied dead. Who had known the dead even had a smell? Civilized humans ejected their dead into space, and there were no odors in space. But down in this dark, gray, sodden hellhole, everything had a smell, and every smell was bad. Especially the Earthers themselves: acrid like sweat, but musty and stale like fungus and old dirt. All things Udall hadn’t even known existed until he was sent down here.

Because that was the only way to get humans to come to a place like this: to force them. It wasn’t an actual punishment, not by any official statute or law. But it was well known that if you Fucked Up, you got sent down here: “promoted” to “managing” a “lucrative food production concern.” And the only way to get home again was to do really well. And that was why Udall was obsessed with efficiency. Udall would make Block 73925 the most profitable Farm in Xochimilco. Maybe in the whole Mesamerican Isthmus. Or the Continent. Or the whole damn planet. Whatever it took. Udall would never stop until he got off this floating turd of a planet. He wouldn’t die here.

Udall picked up one of his many “screens” – these antique plastic things with dim lights and cracked displays that barely responded to touch anymore – just to confirm that the connection was out. The wedge of concentric curves that indicated a signal from one of the myriad communication satellites carpeting the thermosphere was still visible, and for a few moments Udall muttered several phrases suggesting Warburton and the other Earthers had various forms of genetic intellectual disability. But when he tried to launch any apps which relied on cloud data, they all timed out and indicated the connection was unavailable. Even the unrestricted browser which it was Udall’s privilege as Superintendent to use would not connect.

Frustrated, he walked over to his desk and picked up the heavy black plastic brick that was built into the artificial formica table, perpendicular to what otherwise passed for a mirror (though strangely clear, bright, and unsmudged for an Earth mirror). He pressed his thumb to the sensor and waited with the brick pressed to his head, one end touching his left ear and the other his mouth. He felt like an idiot.

The irritating tonal sound droned on and on, each recurrence adding exponentially to his aggravation, though he knew he’d only have to bottle it if and when someone picked up. Eventually his own face and the glowing letters of the call destination disappeared, replaced by a grainy and drab image of a woman of indeterminate age. Her hair was probably auburn, but it glistened a deep brown with the heavy gel that was required to keep it from wafting and hanging in the zero gravity, and the muted colors of the poor image quality made her almost certainly lurid makeup look dark, severe, and strangely austere. Her expression, however, was the familiar and unmistakable “wall”, cultivated by secretaries to prevent calls from reaching the Men of Power. She spoke no words: it was protocol for secretaries to remain silent unless directly addressed. Their appearance on screen was indication enough that the call had been received. To speak first would merely invite interlocution, whereas remaining silent caused many calls to end almost as soon as they were connected.

Udall, however, was undeterred, and took the initiative. 

               “Parven Udall, 319-87-2208, Superintendent of Farm Block 73925, Shochee Milko, reporting a fault in satellite communication - ”

He knew the secretary’s Virtual Assistant was running his words as search terms as fast as he could speak them, so it did not surprise him that the woman responded so rapidly that she cut him off.

               “The Incident has already been logged,” she replied, somewhat more flatly than most AIs. “A replacement Freighter is scheduled to dispatch at the next available window. T minus 10 hours, 39 minutes, 33 seconds. Sign-off in five, four,…”

               “Not so fast,” Udall interrupted automatically. He had seen this coming. Again, it was protocol for secretaries to give callers five seconds to prolong the conversation. Otherwise they hung up, and if you had other business, you had to call again. And wait on hold. Again. Udall sometimes wondered if they did this for everyone, or just the unlucky bastards who got busted down to Earth.

               “I want to request an A/V with a Grade 2, Grade 3 minimum, Red Flag… Wait, Freighter?”

               “Repeat: replacement freight dispatch scheduled for next available window, T minus–”

               “Who said anything about a Freighter?”

As if on cue, all nine of Udall’s Screens vibrated and pinged with a Calendar notification: Freighter Due. Then his smallest Screen, the one he kept in the breast pocket of his thick, waterproof coat (which was, unfortunately, a stinking antique, as they no longer made such garments for humans), began to buzz with the regular pattern of an incoming call: an Earth call.

               “Sign-off in five, four…”

               “Wait!” Udall shouted, answering the call from Juan, who handled Off-World Traffic to the Block. “Please process A/V request. Addendum: in person if possible. Red flag: production threat, LERTCON 3.”

An uncharacteristic flash of emotion came from the grainy visage. By declaring an alert condition to food production, Udall’s call would be cc’d to the CEO and all the VPs of Allied Nutritional Services, and the mid-level flunkies who actually did the work. There would be a mandatory investigation, and if the alert was found to be unwarranted, Udall would be in deep shit. It was a bold risk for someone who was already on such an assignment. But it was also the best bet for getting someone Important to actually come down here, and once that poor schmuck, whoever he was, was here, Udall had an ace up his sleeve.

               “Request processed. Sign-off in five, four...”

               Udall tapped a red x and ended the call before the flesh mannequin could finish her stupid counting. Then he spoken into the handheld Screen.

               “What?” he growled.

               “Boss, I think we have a problem.”

Next Chapter: The Cave