Page 174 of Project Hail Mary

I remember the emotions. I remember that feeling of panic. I remember it all now. Sheer, unadulterated terror. Not for Earth or humanity or the children. For myself. Utter panic.

“God damn you, Stratt,” I mumble.

What ticks me off the most is that she was right. Her plan worked perfectly. I got my memory back, and now I’m so committed to the mission I’m still going to give it my all. Plus, come on, of course I was going to give it my all. What else would I do? Let 7 billion people die to spite Stratt?

At some point, Rocky came through his tunnel to the lab. I don’t know how long he’s been there. He didn’t have to come—he could “see” everything going on from the control room with his sonar sense. Still, there he is.

“You are very sad,”he says.

“Yeah.”

“I am sad also. But we not be sad for long. You are scientist. I am engineer. Together we solve.”

I throw up my arms in frustration. “How?!”

He clicked along the tunnel to the closest point above me.“Taumoeba eat all your fuel. Therefore Taumoeba survive and breed in fuel-tank environment.”

“So?”

“Most life no can live outside its air. I die if not in Erid air. You die if not in Earth air. But Taumoeba survive when not in Adrian air. Taumoeba stronger than Erid life—stronger than Earth life.”

I crane my neck to look up at him. “True. And Astrophage are also pretty tough. They can live in vacuum and on the surface of stars.”

He tapped two claws together.“Yes yes. Astrophage and Taumoeba from same biosphere. Probably evolve from common ancestor. Adrian life is very strong.”

I sit up. “Yeah. Okay.”

“You have idea already. Not question. I know you. You have idea already. Tell idea.”

I sigh. “Well…Venus, Threeworld, and Adrian all have a bunch of carbon dioxide. The Astrophage breeding zone in all three is where pressure is 0.02 atmospheres. So maybe I’ll start with a chamber full of pure carbon dioxide at 0.02 atmospheres and see if Taumoeba survives that. Then add in more gases one at a time to see what the problem is.”

“Understand,”says Rocky.

I get to my feet and dust off my jumpsuit. “I need you to make me a test chamber. Clear xenonite with valves so I can let air in and out. Also, I need to be able to set temperature to minus 100 degrees Celsius, minus 50 degrees Celsius, or minus 82 degrees Celsius.”

I could use my own equipment, but why not take advantage of superior material and craftsmanship?

“Yes yes. I make now. We are team. We fix this. No be sad.”He skitters down the tunnel toward the dormitory.

I check my watch. “The main thrust ends in thirty-four minutes. After that’s done, let’s use the beetles to put ourselves in centrifuge mode.”

Rocky pauses.“Dangerous.”

“Yeah, I know. But we need gravity for the lab and I don’t want to wait eleven days. I want to make good use of time.”

“Beetles arranged for thrust, not rotation.”

It’s true. Our propulsion right now is, to say the least, rudimentary. We don’t have servos or gimbals to vector our thrust. We’re like a sixteenth-century nautical ship, but we’re using beetles for sails. Actually, scratch that. The nautical ship could at least control the angle of their sails. We’re more like a paddlewheel boat with a broken rudder.

It’s not all bad, though. We have some slight attitude control by deciding how much each engine thrusts. It’s how Rocky zeroed out our rotation before. “It’s worth the risk.”

He skitters back up the tunnel to face me.“Ship will rotate off-axis. No can unspool centrifuge cables. Would tangle.”

“We’ll create the needed rotation first, then shut off beetles, then unspool cables.”

He draws back.“If ship not unspooled, force is too much for human.”

That does present a problem. I want 1 g of gravity for the lab when the ship is fully unspooled in two halves. To get that much rotational inertia with the ship in one piece means spinning itveryfast. Last time we did that, I passed out in the control room and Rocky almost died saving me.