The corridors of the Roosa Barracks were almost painfully quiet. Normally they would’ve been crowded with people coming and going through Slayton Field, but all that traffic had been disrupted, first with the diablovirus, and now with the solar storm watch, which had pretty much shut down all space traffic.
Which meant a very lonely walk back to the BOQ for Drew Reinholt. It didn’t help that there wasn’t that much to do in here. Because of the risk of contagion, gatherings were being discouraged — and what was the point in watching a movie or listening to a lecture on your computer in your private quarters? Maybe it would’ve been different with the family, but Brenda and the kids were at Shepardsport.
And maybe it’s just as well that way. If someone does bring the virus to the Moon, it’s far more likely to hit here. With luck, we can catch it quickly enough that it stops here.
On the other hand, the closing of space traffic was also meaning that freight wasn’t coming up, including essential items. As Drew walked past the Caudells’ apartment, he recalled a conversation he’d had with Peter Caudell earlier in the day.
Most essential parts could be fabricated up here, thanks to two decades of determined development of in-situ resource utilization. Everything that could be produced locally was that much that didn’t have to be lifted out of Earth’s substantial gravity well — which meant that even astronaut meals for the lunar ferry and stations in Earth orbit were grown and prepared in lunar greenhouse-farms.
However, there were still a few things that still needed to be brought up from Earth — some because there just wasn’t enough demand to justify the duplication of specialized equipment, and some biologicals because the relevant organisms required very particular environments. Most of them were medicinals, and there had been ongoing efforts to synthesize their active ingredients.
Which means that we’re depending on how long those things remain in stock. At least most of them aren’t life-or-death, but there are a few specialized seals and filters that we still don’t have the ability to fabricate up here.
Something we need to work on changing, ASAP.