Spruance Del Curtin had just finished breakfast and was intending to head over to Science to do some preparations before his teaching responsibility. As he headed down the escalator from the dining commons, his phone chimed incoming text.
Surprised, he reached for his phone, then realized the last thing he wanted was to be engrossed in reading when he reached the bottom of the escalator and needed to step off smoothly. Surely it was something that could wait the minute or so to make sure he didn’t fall. While it was true one didn’t fall nearly as hard here on the Moon as on Earth, falling onto a running escalator could still be a very dangerous thing.
Safely on a stationary surface again, Sprue pulled out his phone. To his astonishment, the message was from Colonel Hearne down in Flight Ops. My office, ASAP. I need to talk to you.
Sprue’s guts went cold. Why was the head of Flight Ops contacting him? Not to mention the choice of words, which suggested a bawling-out, not a conversation.
Which meant there was no telling how long he might be tied up. Better to give Training a heads-up, let them know he might be late.
He hadn’t even gotten to the inter-sector airlock before the response came: we have it under control.
Not exactly the most reassuring response right now. It suggested Colonel Hearne had gone to Deena ahead of time to arrange things.
By the time Sprue got to Innsmouth Sector and Flight Ops, he was sick with dread. At least Colonel Hearne wasn’t busy, and wasn’t the sort of person who kept people waiting as a power play.
The older man was brusque and direct. “Sit down.”
As soon as Sprue was seated, Colonel Hearne launched straight into business, without any small talk or other preliminaries. “Since you don’t seem to understand a polite request to stop nosing into matters that we have very good reasons not to want publicly discussed, Captain Waite asked me to make some things plain to you. Number one: we have a very good reason to keep specific numbers relating to the pandemic quiet. This is not just to thwart your curiosity for the pleasure of exercising authority. Right now, we are looking at the very real possibility that the diablovirus will keep spreading until it runs out of susceptible individuals. To put it in very plain terms, we’re talking about losing thirty to forty percent of the global population on Earth. Depending upon exactly what parts of the population those losses are concentrated in, that’s dangerously close to the level at which it becomes difficult to maintain a technological civilization. At the moment we have hope that there will be enough to rebuild.
“However, if these sorts of figures get out in the general population, or worse, a distorted version of them gets out, we have the very real possibility of a panic. Frightened people do irrational things, and that could very well include destroying the very things they will need to sustain and rebuild technological civilization on Earth. Or worse, lead to a panic in one or more lunar settlements, if enough of the population comes to believe that Earth is effectively lost.”
He paused, letting those words sink in. “Have you even considered that your determined efforts to gain access to this sort of information might have such consequences?”
Sprue swallowed hard against the lump forming in his throat. He’d never considered that this sort of information could be dangerous. “No, sir.”
“And that brings us to Number Two. We thought that by bringing you into a privileged position and allowing you to work with some of the data, you would come to an understanding of the significance of what you were working with. Since this clearly is not the case, we are going to have to take a second look at the responsibilities with which you are entrusted, and evaluate where we may need to reduce or remove them.
“In particular, your work as a DJ with Shepardsport Pirate Radio puts you in a position that enables you to present information to the general public. As a result, we have decided to remove you from your air shift until we see clear indications that you understand the importance of these restrictions. In the meantime, Payton Shaw will be covering your air shifts. Therefore, you will be taking over some of his responsibilities to compensate. Do you understand?”
Sprue’s guts clenched, making him feel nauseous. But there was no satisfactory answer except a meek and subdued, “Yes, sir.”
“Good. Then the third and final point should come as no surprise. Because we need to be confident that you are truly taking responsibility, and not just giving us surface obedience to game the system, you will be working under very close supervision during this period. Yes, it will involve some adjustments, but given the current situation, we cannot take any further chances on you until we are confident that you understand the importance of this situation.”
This is gonna suck, hard.