A Larger Universe (14 page)

Neither man responded as they turned toward the elevator
door.  They continued to ignore Tommy and exited when the elevator again
lurched to a stop a few decks later.   Except for the faint stink of stale
sweat mixed with the odor of leather and a tension that seemed to hang in the
air, they might never have existed.

"Were those warriors?" Tommy asked, rubbing the
crease in his back from the box he had fallen against.  "Will I be seeing
more of them?"

He turned to see his assistants pressed between the boxes
and the side walls.  "From your reaction, I take it you don't know,
either."

#   #   #

The one difficulty with installing the computer in Tillie's
dead hydroponics section proved to be pulling the network connection up the
central column over fifty decks plus the height of the Commons.  After building
the computer in the hydroponics control room, Tommy had informed Tillie they
couldn't continue until the wires linking the computers were installed.  The
electricians hadn't questioned Tommy's request, but they admitted that they’d
never installed a cable over that height.  The main electrical and
communication conduits were as old as the ship.  No living artisan had
installed a wire of even half that length.

Each time Tommy and his team were in Tillie's section,
Tillie stood in the entrance to the next compartment, as if guarding it.  When
Tommy informed him of the delay before they could connect to the sensors and
begin testing, he fumed. 

"I was unhappy to discover," Tillie said in the
lords' language, "that a farm below the Commons was repaired first--not
that I want my farm to be the subject of experiment--but I find it, well,
almost obscene that the two farms will be touching, even indirectly and over
that distance.  Must you do this?" 

Tommy made an effort to remain expressionless while he
searched for a suitable answer.  He finally replied, also in the lords'
language.  "I would not, sir, if I had another way.  We reserved the best
computers for the lords' part of the ship, and the device we installed below is
of inferior quality, as you might expect.  Unless the subordinate computer is
frequently reminded of its duty, it will fail.  Your computer will be
supervising that computer and all of the hydroponics computers below the
Commons."

Tillie sniffed and tilted his head backward so that he was
peering down his nose at Tommy.  "I see.  Yes.  Perfectly understandable,
and as it should be.  The electricians can be made to work faster.  I will see
to it."

"You never told us Tillie's computer would be
supervising Moder's.  How does that work?" Vent asked during the trip down
in the elevator.

"I was hoping you two would keep quiet.  Thanks.  I
couldn't think of another way to get him to accept the connection.  Actually,
it won't be supervising.  The two computers, and all the other computers
eventually, will be cooperating and helping each other perform their tasks.  I
want to connect every computer on the ship, and, when this cable is installed,
we'll get the first benefit.  I'll show you how to transfer the programs I
wrote for the lower deck farm to the upper deck computer over this first
segment of what will be a network."  He smiled at them.  "Untouched
by human hands."

In spite of Tillie's protestations, Tommy found little
difference between Tillie's hydroponics farm and the one below the Commons.  A
few of the tables were arranged differently, but the lights, pumps, fans, and
other process control devices were much the same.  The entire section was
connected and ready for fresh water and nutrients by the end of the fourth
day.  A week later, Tommy noticed a stubble of green on the starter mats, and
the smell of living plants replaced the dead odor of dust and mold.

Tommy wanted to declare success and go on to another dead
farm section.  Instead he had to deal with Tillie's refusal to read
instructions, whether on paper or on a computer screen, in anything except the
lords' language.  He spent the next week translating the menus, dialog boxes,
help files, and message strings into an acceptable format and testing the
programs again.  Since the system was live, he had visions of a program error
causing one of the tanks to flush, but the worst that happened during the
testing was a stopped fan.  He had that fixed before anyone else noticed the
air in that part of the section wasn't moving.

The next trouble with Tillie came after Tommy gave him and
his staff a presentation about their new "device." 

Tommy had found several pallets of large plasma and LCD
displays in the inventory.  The day before the class, he temporarily set up one
of the 50-inch displays in front of chairs for the thirty-seven artisans in the
section.  Before leaving, he booted the system with a screen saver he liked--a
series of pictures of snow-covered woods in Vermont.  When Tommy arrived for
the class, the artisans were standing in front of the display, nervously
touching the screen, and looking for the window behind by tipping its base out
from the wall.  He tried to calm them by explaining that this was just another
technology from Earth, but that seemed to make them even more agitated. 

Tillie seemed affected most of all.  He interrupted Tommy
several times through the presentation, expressing his unhappiness with what he
saw on the monitor.  The top half of the new monitor screen duplicated the
pattern of lights from the original control device.  The lower part of the
screen instructed the operator in what key to press to simulate the switches on
the system, and asked for and received responses.  To Tommy, the display looked
like a flashing fruit salad, but Moder wanted it that way.  Tillie wanted the
old lights and switches to be part of the new system.

At the end of the class, Tillie waited until all of his
subordinates had left the room, and blocked the door.  "You and your staff
must stay.  One can be here one-third of each day to operate this thing."

At first Tommy didn't know how to respond.  Finally, he
said, politely in the lords' language, "Master Tillie, Lord Ull assigned
me the task of fixing the dead section devices.  Until I have completed the
tasks she has given me, I am, unfortunately, not available for anything else,
nor is my staff.  You must understand I have no choice.  My assistants and I
will always be available to help you through any problem, but we cannot always
be here."

Tillie pursed his lips as if he had bitten off something
sour.  "Even Lord Ull cannot expect us to..."  He paused.  "You
are certain you will return if this does not work for us?"

"Of course we will," Tommy said.  "Your
success is even more important to me than it is to you.  If the computer fails,
one of your farm sections will die again, and you will be no worse off than
before.  I, however, will be subject to Lord Ull's wrath for my failure."

Tillie gave Tommy a shrewd glance.  "You are right, of
course.  We will attempt to follow your instructions, but expect me to call you
when I need you." 

When they had packed the plasma display and were safely in
the elevator, Vent said, "I have two questions."

"Yes?"

"The first is, I thought you'd never met Lord
Ull?"

"I never have.  But Tillie wasn't going to give up on
just my say so, was he?"

"I suppose not."

"And your second question?"

"Since you translated all the screens to the lords'
language, now we have two versions of the hydroponics program.  What are we
going to do about that?"

"We're going to replace the program in Moder's computer
with the version in Tillie's computer as soon as we get the chance."

"But Moder and his staff are used to the English
version.  They won't like having to change now."

"I didn't replace the text and screens; I set up
alternative text and screens.  To switch back and forth between English and the
lords' language, just press the 'F12' key."

"Is it true you are just sixteen years old?" 
Sanos interjected into the conversation.

Tommy became pensive.  "That sounds about right, but
how would I tell in this place?”  Tommy quickly changed the subject.  “But that
has nothing to do with this.  A good programmer never wants to maintain two
versions of the same program.  It was a no-brainer to merge both
versions."

"A no brainer?" Sanos asked.

"I'll explain later," Tommy said as the elevator
door opened.  "Are you ready to fix the rest of the hydroponics farms? 
Providing we can do that and answer trouble calls from Tillie.  We'll be
getting a lot of those, I think."

#   #   #

With the success of the first two
installations, and the promise of doing something new, Valin had no problem
providing Tommy with more assistants.  As Valin explained it, all of the work
groups among the artisans--and the farmers--were hierarchical guilds, for the
most part organized by age, from oldest to youngest:  guildmaster, senior
master, master, journeyman, and apprentice, following the social pattern of the
time their village had been taken.  The computers were something new, and the
masters wanted no part of them.  The masters had too much vested in a lifetime
of advancement.  A few of the journeymen were intrigued but cautious of losing
their seniority.  But for the apprentices, who had talked with Sanos and Vent,
the computers were a release from the years of menial toil required before they
would be allowed meaningful work.  If Tommy accepted all who volunteered, he
would have spent his time teaching, not installing new computers.  Instead, he
picked six, with Valin's approval, and, finding it difficult to meet their
disappointed gazes, told the crestfallen remainder that they might be chosen
later.

Tommy split the group into three teams of three, with Sanos
and Vent as the other two leaders.  He checked the hardware, but otherwise held
each team responsible for one of the three dead hydroponics farms.  As before,
Tommy had the electricians pull cable between the decks to connect the
computers, and then he installed some extra equipment himself before declaring
the tasks done.  Even with all that necessary work, and with training the new
people, all the farms had new growth by the end of the fourth week.

When they were done, Tommy had everyone organizing the
warehouse while he went to Moder's farm to turn on the extra equipment he had
installed.  If something went wrong, he wanted the lords' anger to fall on him,
not on those he had lured into helping him. 
Not that I could do anything
,
he thought,
about either the luring or the consequences if something goes
wrong.
 

He hadn't seen radio transmission or receiving equipment on
this ship, and he was about to turn some on, even if it was low powered.  He had
no idea what the consequences would be.  Even with the short range his
transmitters would have in this warren of passageways, he couldn't predict the
repercussions.  He was ready with a plausible explanation for what he was
doing, as long as he didn't shut down the whole starship.  The airlines on
earth had rules concerning computer equipment and cell phones operation on
takeoff and landing.  Whatever their reason, maybe it also applied here.

He decided to stop fretting and started the wireless access
point attached to the network.  When he heard no sudden noises, he opened one
of the two laptops he had brought with him and displayed a duplicate of the
main monitor control screen.  Using the laptop keyboard, he adjusted the water
flow, slightly, through one of the pumps and then returned it to its original
setting.  He then waited for someone in authority to tell him to stop doing
what he was doing.

When no one had come to arrest him after an hour, he used
the laptop to wirelessly access Tillie's farm through the network and perform
the same small changes to a pump there, and waited again. 

The day was almost over when he took the second laptop to
Moder to give a demonstration.  Moder’s eyes widened, betraying his fascination
with his new ability to monitor the tanks from outside the control room.  Tommy
didn't tell him he could monitor and control the tanks in Tillie's farm, too. 
He also didn't share that information with Tillie the next day when he gave
each of the other hydroponics masters his own laptop and turned on the wireless
access point in his section.  And he didn't share with anyone that the wireless-capable
handheld he had programmed could control the hydroponics farms from anywhere a
wireless connection was available.  For now, he had access to the network in
parts of five decks and, sometimes, a small area in the levels just above and
below the hydroponics control rooms.  The coverage had to be improved.

#   #   #

The next day was a rest day, and Tommy decided to skip
services and make the trek to one of the observation rooms.  He hadn't looked
outside the ship in months.  Even if all he saw was blackness, somewhere out
there his home and family waited. 

This time, traffic rushed in both directions in the usually
deserted radial tunnel.  People on foot, pulling carts piled high with
unidentifiable objects, and small trucks, battery powered he supposed, filled
with canisters and boxes, traveled on the left side of the tunnel toward the
center of the ship.  On the other side of the tunnel, empty carts and trucks
moved toward the hull.

He joined the line of empties, and had to hurry to keep up. 
He fell back until he was even with a farmer pulling an empty cart at a near
run.  "What's going on?  I thought no one worked on a rest day," he
panted.

"Emergency cargo loading.  If that happens on a rest
day, everyone works until the job is done."  He looked at Tommy's artisan
clothes.  "Even an artisan should have an assigned duty.  Where should you
be?"

"I'm not sure," Tommy said, and dropped behind to
cut off the conversation.