Battling On Board - Chapter 1


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Battling On Board - Chapter 1

Posted By: WellTemperedClavier Date: 4/22/25 8:24 p.m.

Quick note: I realized that the attached link in my earlier post was easy to miss and, honestly, looked really suspicious. So I'm going to go ahead and start posting the fanfic here.
The first few chapters deal with daily life on the Marathon itself. Things are calm for now, but you'll soon see signs of trouble.
Chapter 1
Owen had recently read about the airplanes his distant ancestors had used back on Earth; specifically, how badly they stank after being used. It made sense. Dozens of people cramped together in a fragile, narrow fuselage for hours at a time—filling it up with their BO, their sweat, their farts, and worse—would make a stench that no amount of technology could completely prevent.
He'd read about that and then thought about The UESC Marathon, his home and a generation starship that had hosted tens of thousands for 322 years, 6 months, and 7 days, and how much catastrophically worse than anything else it must stink.
"Oh, now I get why the colonists never visit us BOBs: we stink too damn much," Nyx said, after he told her.
It was 2345 hours, just before the start of First Shift, and they dutifully trudged to assignment office. Conurb 5's ringway was packed like it always was at the beginning or end of a shift, crewmembers in unicolor coveralls headed to work or headed home, their convos bouncing off the gunmetal gray walls. Someone had set the skylight to the puffy clouds and bright blue of "Mediterranean Morning".
"Don't get so enthusiastic. I'm sure they think we're useless, too," Owen said.
Nyx sighed in mock disappointment as if to conceal her real disappointment. "I shoulda known. Speaking of uselessness, you ready for the review?"
Owen grimaced. He'd been trying not to think of the review, a yearly ritual that'd determine how each cadet could best use their scant free time for Marathon's betterment.
"I'm trying not to think too much about it."
Nyx shook her head. "Come on, Owen; you gotta embrace the slack. You're still trying to impress people, deep down."
"It's not that I want approval, it's that they keep pestering me—"
"I get it," Nyx said, her voice soft. "You want to be left the hell alone."
"Yeah, basically."
"But, you know, if you start making yourself useful they'll want you to do more and more. Right now? All they can do is nag."
"Or cut my privileges until I'm so bored out of my mind that I start volunteering to scrub air ducts."
Nyx chuckled. "Or, you know, do what I do."
God, part of him wanted to. That maybe if he just spat in the face of the Marathon's stupid rules he'd stop caring so much about things and be something other than the well-behaved little BOB who only had rebellious thoughts, never actually pushed back the way Nyx did.
That maybe then, Nyx would see him as more than just a drone with pretensions of rebellion.
"Thanks for leaving the door open," he said. He already knew he'd never commit himself like that. Deep down, he wanted to hide.
She grabbed his shoulder and squeezed. "Sure, what are friends for?"
They reached the elevator to the assignment office and took position. Age-old machinery beneath their feet groaned as it pushed the platform up to the lobby. As always, they were greeted by the big mural showing the Marathon's history. On the left, Earth in all its tarnished blue glory, Mars next to it but off to the side (to make sure that even people over a dozen light years and three centuries away knew which planet was in charge). The ghostly visage of long-dead President Buendia loomed from behind the worlds, pointing with lofty authority to the right side of the mural where lay Tau Ceti and its cluster of four super-Earths and five more reasonably sized planets and moons.
The only thing on the mural that changed was the position of the Marathon. It had once been painted in Martian orbit as the tiny moonlet of Deimos that it had once been. That had long since been covered up, the Marathon painted in new positions on the mural as it made its journey. Now the Marathon drifted among the bodies of Tau Ceti, finally part of a distant future that had gone the way of all futures and become a mundane present.
Owen and Nyx filed into a big, bare room with rows of computer desks. Most days, Owen spent First Shift proofreading computer code that his supervisor had copied from work some other supervisor had done a century or more ago. Then came Second Shift where his "volunteer" assignment usually consisted of latrine duty.
They kept telling him he'd get something better if he showed more enthusiasm.
The place was already packed with their peers. Cadets like them received faded gray coveralls, but most of them covered the drab garments in bold neon and florescent designs that they could purchase and replace (as fashion dictated) with a few crew creds.
Owen didn't go that route: he kept his coveralls unadorned, a bit too loose for his skinny frame. It matched the rest of his appearance: coarse black hair trimmed close to his scalp for ease of maintenance; skin brown, and complexion blotchy. He hated fiddling with his appearance more than necessary, and he'd rather spend crew creds on books.
Nyx took a different approach, detailing her outfits with complex patterns and designs that she'd applied with dye and paint and bleach. Her coveralls that day boasted interlinking green vines that sprouted leering skulls. Not the sort of design you could buy anywhere on-board. It fit with her own looks, her black hair thick and lustrous even tied back in a bun, and those twinkling dark eyes that refused to look at the world the way everyone else did.
Owen sat down at the nearest desk, the built-in terminal displaying the connected and concentric circles of the Marathon logo in bright green on a black background.
"Hey, Owen," came a familiar voice.
Owen looked to his right as Tanya sat down next to him. Merit decals festooned the sleeves of Tanya's coveralls in testament to the endless assignments she volunteered for. She was about as put together as anyone could be on the Marathon, her brown skin almost managing to look healthy and her reddish-brown hair tied into cornrows that slowly drifted back down to her shoulders.
"Did you study for the review?" Tanya asked.
"Some," Owen said. "I'm mostly looking forward to getting it over with."
Tanya nodded. She was a model cadet but didn't usually hold that over anyone. Not on purpose, anyway. She'd even used her authority to keep some of the more aggressive cadets from venting on Owen. He didn't like hiding behind her… but he knew never to turn help away.
"I'm looking forward to the Labor Committee redesigns. Should reflect our strengths better now," Tanya said.
"Yeah, but I've heard that sort of thing before. When's the last time the Labor Committee made a big improvement?"
"Since it replaced Pro-Social Promotion in 2691," Tanya responded, without missing a beat.
Which, Owen realized, was a fair point. Better for his fate to depend on a test than on his community's whims. Especially for someone like him.
"You got me there," he admitted.
Director Adam was stepping up to the podium, his watery eyes looking out from a face made flabby by years of easy living.
"Good day, cadets," he rumbled. "You all know why you're here, so I won't waste time. Remember: this is a privilege. Our shipboard community deems you useful, and will use you in ways that will help everyone. Including yourselves."
His lips stretched to make a short-lived smile, though his eyes were a million miles away.
"As always, you'll have 0100 hours to complete the review. If you have questions about the results, you'll have 0030 hours in which to speak with me before reporting to your regular work assignments."
Owen sighed and wished he could just finish the damn test already.
*********
Owen hadn't gone into the test with high expectations, but the results still disappointed him. Actually no, they hadn't disappointed him.
They'd pissed him off.
"CREWMEMBER: Owen-Conurb5 IS ASSIGNED TO MORALE DEPARTMENT FOR VOLUNTARY OBLIGATIONS," it read.
Owen hadn't expected to get anything he wanted. But it didn't get much worse than the Morale Department, the Marathon's glorified propaganda arm.
He lingered as the rest of his cohort left at 0100. Adam still sat at his podium, fiddling at his terminal with shoulders squared and face solemn, like it was the most important fiddling in the world. His eyes looked up from the screen as he approached.
"Owen," he acknowledged.
"Director Adam. I wanted to talk about my annual review results."
Owen knew he was taking a bit of a risk even asking the man. Sure, anyone could challenge their results, but that always seemed to carry a cost in the form of tougher assignments. Again, he wished he was like Nyx.
"What seems to be the issue?"
Owen took a moment to collect himself. The one thing he could not afford to do was be honest.
"I'm honored that they think I'd be a good fit for Morale Department. But I, uh, wanted to explore some other options. So as to be sure I'm doing the most for our community."
Adam frowned. "Well, those other options were already tabulated and it was determined that Morale was ideal."
"And I'm sure I'd be good for it," Owen said. "But I had high academic scores back in school. Maybe I could help out in R&D?"
Actually, he wasn't at all sure he'd be good for that. But people said he was pretty smart, and at least R&D did something useful. Sometimes.
"Let's see, school finished two years ago for you."
"One, actually," Owen corrected.
The lines around Adam's eyes crinkled. "Yes, well, that's still a while ago. Maybe if you'd pushed yourself a bit more during the intervening year you'd be a good fit. But no, you no longer meet R&D's requirements."
Okay, maybe he'd overstepped. "Fine. But what about something like Horticulture? I love working the community garden."
No lie there. He loved it.
"Horticulture's a popular volunteer assignment and we can't possibly give it out to everyone who wants it. Thus, it goes to those who contribute the most which, I'm sorry to say, is not you.
"Owen, you hardly ever interact with other crew. Those you do interact with, like Natalie, tend not to display the best attitudes."
By Natalie, he meant Nyx. She hated the name assigned to her at the creche, but it was still on the official record.
"But I do my work!" he protested, his face suddenly warm. They had so damn many rules and most of them weren't even written out.
"That's only part of it. The Marathon's a community. The only reason we survived for hundreds of years is because we learned to, well, enjoy each other's company. You aren't doing that. Let's look at your DREAMS score, shall we?"
He tapped away at the keyboard for a few moments, and then a holographic display popped up with Owen's DREAMS scores.
(D)iscipline – 62
(R)eciprocity – 65
(E)mpathy – 47
(A)ccomplishment – 42
(M)erit – 49
(S)ociability – 33
"Now any DREAMS score can be improved," Adam continued. "Certainly mine wasn't the best at your age. But you need to do more. This is why the algorithm chose a more socially oriented assignment: so you could put those DREAMS skills to some much-needed practice."
Okay, that did it. "I mean, if my empathy and sociability are that low, do you really want me in charge of other people's morale? Since I know this is all just a bunch of propaganda and I'm not going to pretend otherwise." Owen heard the challenge in his own voice and knew that might bite him in the ass, but he no longer cared.
Adam sniffed. "You won't be in an important enough position to do any harm. Perhaps I should bring in a higher authority."
He pressed a button, and a digital chirp sounded out from the terminal to announce the intervention of Leela, one of the Marathon's three AIs and the only one most crew ever interacted with.
"Owen, Director Adam is giving you good advice," Leela said, her digitally produced voice as patient and as cold as always. "Both the Marathon and the colony are highly social environments, and you will need to navigate that in order to best contribute. Referring to the Morale Department's work as propaganda displays a poor attitude."
His situation was hopeless now that Leela was involved. He didn't relish confrontations the way Nyx did. But if he'd learned one thing, it was to go down swinging.
"But am I wrong about it being propaganda?" Owen asked.
"That's not relevant. The aptitude algorithm ran through thousands of possible scenarios. You going to the Morale Department was clearly the best option for the Marathon based on the available data. Speaking of data, you've taken far more resources than you've contributed."
Owen boiled in silence. It's not that he didn't want to help. He just didn't want to lie.
"Our hope is that Morale will have a positive effect on you. Perhaps by being more involved in the Marathon's story—and in helping relay it to others—you will find yourself more invested. At any rate, the results are final. You will begin tomorrow at 0800. A 30-minute mandatory psych evaluation has been added to your schedule, next Tuesday at 1300. I am also deducting ten crew credits from your account."
"That's not fair," Owen protested.
"Necessity is the ultimate fairness. If you want to be treated as a valuable member of society, you must contribute something of value."
Leela disengaged with another cheerful digital chirp. Not that she truly disengaged; she existed in all places and all times, a ghost in the machine that let the crew pretend they weren't being monitored.
"I believe that settles it," Adam said.
Knowing he was beaten, Owen just nodded. But already he was wondering if he could subvert this in some way.
*********
The cadet barracks where Owen made his home was scheduled to wake up at 2200 each day. Owen woke up a little earlier, at 2115.
Sleep offered escape, of course. But it wasn't escape he could truly experience. So instead, he'd give himself 45 minutes each morning to just be alone. He'd lie there on his bunk, listening to the snoring of his fellow cadets and imagine himself somewhere far away from this tomb of stone and metal.
He'd read, too. That morning, he read a black market copy of East of Eden by the light of the window, the pages practically falling out of the binding. He could've read it online, but doing that meant people would notice and start asking about his sleep schedule. Why was Owen getting up so early? Didn't Owen know that every BOB needed a good night's sleep to usher in a glorious future for the Marathon, the Tau Ceti colony, and humanity itself? And if they complained, Leela would revoke his reading privileges and that'd be it.
But they couldn't track paper and ink, so that was the medium he used. He lay on his side, eyes going from side to side as he read, imagining the feel of grass beneath his feet and the sun shining on his face. Context turned the beauty of the old prose into something cruelly abstract, but that only made him want more.
Too soon, he heard the tinny chime announcing the start of the day. He quickly slid his book into the tiny locker at the head of his bunk as the rest of the cadets woke up.
He followed along with the morning exercises, and then took a quick sponge bath in one of the coffin-like cleaning rooms next to the barracks. Then he smoothed his hair, slipped into a clean set of coveralls, and decided "good enough".
He stepped out of the barracks and into the habitat that hosted it, a big hemisphere called Cast Iron Cozy. Dwellings were stacked two to three high around the perimeter. The skylight dome overhead glowed a bright pink, with sunlit violet clouds on the horizon. Someone (probably Giovanni) had set it to "Arizona Sunrise". In the center stood the pride of the unit, a big square plot filled with synthetic black soil and bursting with green life: carrots, beansprouts, onions, and more.
The garden was the one thing he consistently liked about Cast Iron Cozy. It was the closest he'd ever get to Earth. The Cast Iron Cozies had taken care of it, too; the crops were bigger and better than the ones in the resident unit he'd grown up in, Home Sweet Hole over in Conurb 3.
The rest of the community (at least those assigned to work in First and Second Shift) already sat at the tables for a meal. Engineers sat with engineers, scientists with scientists, and so forth, professional families linked by clothing color and skill set.
He didn't look forward to joining any of them.
Owen grabbed a bowl and filled it at the nutripaste extruder, tensing up as he took a seat at the edge of the table. Already he could feel it: harsh eyes swiveling his way, sharp tongues just behind.
How would Nyx handle this?
"So, Owen, how the hell did you get assigned to Morale Department?" The question came from Juanita, who'd never found a volunteer opportunity she couldn't wring for a few extra crew creds.
Owen shrugged. "Same algorithms that assigned you all to whatever."
"'Cause you lower our morale just by being here," snickered Ali, a burly cadet who'd just arrived in Cast Iron Cozy and was already throwing his weight around.
But Tanya noticed, and fixed Ali in her sights. "And with comments like that, you're actively undercutting morale," she warned.
A hot little pulse of shame ran through Owen's chest. Spindly, useless Owen, not obedient enough to rise up the ranks but not tough enough to rebel.
He gave Tanya a look that he hoped was grateful. But the other cadets had smelled blood and wanted more.
"Owen needs to step up. I could be earning way more crew creds if he didn't keep hurting our score," Juanita complained.
"I'm trying," Owen said. "I just don't—"
"He doesn't need you undercutting him, Juanita," Tanya said.
Owen's cheeks burned at the interruption, but all he could do was nod and then force a spoonful of paste into his mouth.
This was going to be Hell.

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: Quick note: I realized that the attached link in my earlier post was easy to : miss and, honestly, looked really suspicious. So I'm going to go ahead and : start posting the fanfic here. : The first few chapters deal with daily life on the Marathon itself. Things : are calm for now, but you'll soon see signs of trouble. : Chapter 1 : Owen had recently read about the airplanes his distant ancestors had used : back on Earth; specifically, how badly they stank after being used. It : made sense. Dozens of people cramped together in a fragile, narrow : fuselage for hours at a time—filling it up with their BO, their sweat, : their farts, and worse—would make a stench that no amount of technology : could completely prevent. : He'd read about that and then thought about The UESC Marathon, his home and a : generation starship that had hosted tens of thousands for 322 years, 6 : months, and 7 days, and how much catastrophically worse than anything else : it must stink. : "Oh, now I get why the colonists never visit us BOBs: we stink too damn : much," Nyx said, after he told her. : It was 2345 hours, just before the start of First Shift, and they dutifully : trudged to assignment office. Conurb 5's ringway was packed like it always : was at the beginning or end of a shift, crewmembers in unicolor coveralls : headed to work or headed home, their convos bouncing off the gunmetal gray : walls. Someone had set the skylight to the puffy clouds and bright blue of : "Mediterranean Morning". : "Don't get so enthusiastic. I'm sure they think we're useless, : too," Owen said. : Nyx sighed in mock disappointment as if to conceal her real disappointment. : "I shoulda known. Speaking of uselessness, you ready for the : review?" : Owen grimaced. He'd been trying not to think of the review, a yearly ritual : that'd determine how each cadet could best use their scant free time for : Marathon's betterment. : "I'm trying not to think too much about it." : Nyx shook her head. "Come on, Owen; you gotta embrace the slack. You're : still trying to impress people, deep down." : "It's not that I want approval, it's that they keep pestering me—" : "I get it," Nyx said, her voice soft. "You want to be left the : hell alone." : "Yeah, basically." : "But, you know, if you start making yourself useful they'll want you to : do more and more. Right now? All they can do is nag." : "Or cut my privileges until I'm so bored out of my mind that I start : volunteering to scrub air ducts." : Nyx chuckled. "Or, you know, do what I do." : God, part of him wanted to. That maybe if he just spat in the face of the : Marathon's stupid rules he'd stop caring so much about things and be : something other than the well-behaved little BOB who only had rebellious : thoughts, never actually pushed back the way Nyx did. : That maybe then, Nyx would see him as more than just a drone with pretensions : of rebellion. : "Thanks for leaving the door open," he said. He already knew he'd : never commit himself like that. Deep down, he wanted to hide. : She grabbed his shoulder and squeezed. "Sure, what are friends : for?" : They reached the elevator to the assignment office and took position. Age-old : machinery beneath their feet groaned as it pushed the platform up to the : lobby. As always, they were greeted by the big mural showing the : Marathon's history. On the left, Earth in all its tarnished blue glory, : Mars next to it but off to the side (to make sure that even people over a : dozen light years and three centuries away knew which planet was in : charge). The ghostly visage of long-dead President Buendia loomed from : behind the worlds, pointing with lofty authority to the right side of the : mural where lay Tau Ceti and its cluster of four super-Earths and five : more reasonably sized planets and moons. : The only thing on the mural that changed was the position of the Marathon. It : had once been painted in Martian orbit as the tiny moonlet of Deimos that : it had once been. That had long since been covered up, the Marathon : painted in new positions on the mural as it made its journey. Now the : Marathon drifted among the bodies of Tau Ceti, finally part of a distant : future that had gone the way of all futures and become a mundane present. : Owen and Nyx filed into a big, bare room with rows of computer desks. Most : days, Owen spent First Shift proofreading computer code that his : supervisor had copied from work some other supervisor had done a century : or more ago. Then came Second Shift where his "volunteer" : assignment usually consisted of latrine duty. : They kept telling him he'd get something better if he showed more enthusiasm. : The place was already packed with their peers. Cadets like them received : faded gray coveralls, but most of them covered the drab garments in bold : neon and florescent designs that they could purchase and replace (as : fashion dictated) with a few crew creds. : Owen didn't go that route: he kept his coveralls unadorned, a bit too loose : for his skinny frame. It matched the rest of his appearance: coarse black : hair trimmed close to his scalp for ease of maintenance; skin brown, and : complexion blotchy. He hated fiddling with his appearance more than : necessary, and he'd rather spend crew creds on books. : Nyx took a different approach, detailing her outfits with complex patterns : and designs that she'd applied with dye and paint and bleach. Her : coveralls that day boasted interlinking green vines that sprouted leering : skulls. Not the sort of design you could buy anywhere on-board. It fit : with her own looks, her black hair thick and lustrous even tied back in a : bun, and those twinkling dark eyes that refused to look at the world the : way everyone else did. : Owen sat down at the nearest desk, the built-in terminal displaying the : connected and concentric circles of the Marathon logo in bright green on a : black background. : "Hey, Owen," came a familiar voice. : Owen looked to his right as Tanya sat down next to him. Merit decals : festooned the sleeves of Tanya's coveralls in testament to the endless : assignments she volunteered for. She was about as put together as anyone : could be on the Marathon, her brown skin almost managing to look healthy : and her reddish-brown hair tied into cornrows that slowly drifted back : down to her shoulders. : "Did you study for the review?" Tanya asked. : "Some," Owen said. "I'm mostly looking forward to getting it : over with." : Tanya nodded. She was a model cadet but didn't usually hold that over anyone. : Not on purpose, anyway. She'd even used her authority to keep some of the : more aggressive cadets from venting on Owen. He didn't like hiding behind : her… but he knew never to turn help away. : "I'm looking forward to the Labor Committee redesigns. Should reflect : our strengths better now," Tanya said. : "Yeah, but I've heard that sort of thing before. When's the last time : the Labor Committee made a big improvement?" : "Since it replaced Pro-Social Promotion in 2691," Tanya responded, : without missing a beat. : Which, Owen realized, was a fair point. Better for his fate to depend on a : test than on his community's whims. Especially for someone like him. : "You got me there," he admitted. : Director Adam was stepping up to the podium, his watery eyes looking out from : a face made flabby by years of easy living. : "Good day, cadets," he rumbled. "You all know why you're here, : so I won't waste time. Remember: this is a privilege. Our shipboard : community deems you useful, and will use you in ways that will help : everyone. Including yourselves." : His lips stretched to make a short-lived smile, though his eyes were a : million miles away. : "As always, you'll have 0100 hours to complete the review. If you have : questions about the results, you'll have 0030 hours in which to speak with : me before reporting to your regular work assignments." : Owen sighed and wished he could just finish the damn test already. : ********* : Owen hadn't gone into the test with high expectations, but the results still : disappointed him. Actually no, they hadn't disappointed him. : They'd pissed him off. : "CREWMEMBER: Owen-Conurb5 IS ASSIGNED TO MORALE DEPARTMENT FOR VOLUNTARY : OBLIGATIONS," it read. : Owen hadn't expected to get anything he wanted. But it didn't get much worse : than the Morale Department, the Marathon's glorified propaganda arm. : He lingered as the rest of his cohort left at 0100. Adam still sat at his : podium, fiddling at his terminal with shoulders squared and face solemn, : like it was the most important fiddling in the world. His eyes looked up : from the screen as he approached. : "Owen," he acknowledged. : "Director Adam. I wanted to talk about my annual review results." : Owen knew he was taking a bit of a risk even asking the man. Sure, anyone : could challenge their results, but that always seemed to carry a cost in : the form of tougher assignments. Again, he wished he was like Nyx. : "What seems to be the issue?" : Owen took a moment to collect himself. The one thing he could not afford to : do was be honest. : "I'm honored that they think I'd be a good fit for Morale Department. : But I, uh, wanted to explore some other options. So as to be sure I'm : doing the most for our community." : Adam frowned. "Well, those other options were already tabulated and it : was determined that Morale was ideal." : "And I'm sure I'd be good for it," Owen said. "But I had high : academic scores back in school. Maybe I could help out in R&D?" : Actually, he wasn't at all sure he'd be good for that. But people said he was : pretty smart, and at least R&D did something useful. Sometimes. : "Let's see, school finished two years ago for you." : "One, actually," Owen corrected. : The lines around Adam's eyes crinkled. "Yes, well, that's still a while : ago. Maybe if you'd pushed yourself a bit more during the intervening year : you'd be a good fit. But no, you no longer meet R&D's requirements." : Okay, maybe he'd overstepped. "Fine. But what about something like : Horticulture? I love working the community garden." : No lie there. He loved it. : "Horticulture's a popular volunteer assignment and we can't possibly : give it out to everyone who wants it. Thus, it goes to those who : contribute the most which, I'm sorry to say, is not you. : "Owen, you hardly ever interact with other crew. Those you do interact : with, like Natalie, tend not to display the best attitudes." : By Natalie, he meant Nyx. She hated the name assigned to her at the creche, : but it was still on the official record. : "But I do my work!" he protested, his face suddenly warm. They had : so damn many rules and most of them weren't even written out. : "That's only part of it. The Marathon's a community. The only reason we : survived for hundreds of years is because we learned to, well, enjoy each : other's company. You aren't doing that. Let's look at your DREAMS score, : shall we?" : He tapped away at the keyboard for a few moments, and then a holographic : display popped up with Owen's DREAMS scores. : (D)iscipline – 62 : (R)eciprocity – 65 : (E)mpathy – 47 : (A)ccomplishment – 42 : (M)erit – 49 : (S)ociability – 33 : "Now any DREAMS score can be improved," Adam continued. : "Certainly mine wasn't the best at your age. But you need to do more. : This is why the algorithm chose a more socially oriented assignment: so : you could put those DREAMS skills to some much-needed practice." : Okay, that did it. "I mean, if my empathy and sociability are that low, : do you really want me in charge of other people's morale? Since I know : this is all just a bunch of propaganda and I'm not going to pretend : otherwise." Owen heard the challenge in his own voice and knew that : might bite him in the ass, but he no longer cared. : Adam sniffed. "You won't be in an important enough position to do any : harm. Perhaps I should bring in a higher authority." : He pressed a button, and a digital chirp sounded out from the terminal to : announce the intervention of Leela, one of the Marathon's three AIs and : the only one most crew ever interacted with. : "Owen, Director Adam is giving you good advice," Leela said, her : digitally produced voice as patient and as cold as always. "Both the : Marathon and the colony are highly social environments, and you will need : to navigate that in order to best contribute. Referring to the Morale : Department's work as propaganda displays a poor attitude." : His situation was hopeless now that Leela was involved. He didn't relish : confrontations the way Nyx did. But if he'd learned one thing, it was to : go down swinging. : "But am I wrong about it being propaganda?" Owen asked. : "That's not relevant. The aptitude algorithm ran through thousands of : possible scenarios. You going to the Morale Department was clearly the : best option for the Marathon based on the available data. Speaking of : data, you've taken far more resources than you've contributed." : Owen boiled in silence. It's not that he didn't want to help. He just didn't : want to lie. : "Our hope is that Morale will have a positive effect on you. Perhaps by : being more involved in the Marathon's story—and in helping relay it to : others—you will find yourself more invested. At any rate, the results are : final. You will begin tomorrow at 0800. A 30-minute mandatory psych : evaluation has been added to your schedule, next Tuesday at 1300. I am : also deducting ten crew credits from your account." : "That's not fair," Owen protested. : "Necessity is the ultimate fairness. If you want to be treated as a : valuable member of society, you must contribute something of value." : Leela disengaged with another cheerful digital chirp. Not that she truly : disengaged; she existed in all places and all times, a ghost in the : machine that let the crew pretend they weren't being monitored. : "I believe that settles it," Adam said. : Knowing he was beaten, Owen just nodded. But already he was wondering if he : could subvert this in some way. : ********* : The cadet barracks where Owen made his home was scheduled to wake up at 2200 : each day. Owen woke up a little earlier, at 2115. : Sleep offered escape, of course. But it wasn't escape he could truly : experience. So instead, he'd give himself 45 minutes each morning to just : be alone. He'd lie there on his bunk, listening to the snoring of his : fellow cadets and imagine himself somewhere far away from this tomb of : stone and metal. : He'd read, too. That morning, he read a black market copy of East of Eden by : the light of the window, the pages practically falling out of the binding. : He could've read it online, but doing that meant people would notice and : start asking about his sleep schedule. Why was Owen getting up so early? : Didn't Owen know that every BOB needed a good night's sleep to usher in a : glorious future for the Marathon, the Tau Ceti colony, and humanity : itself? And if they complained, Leela would revoke his reading privileges : and that'd be it. : But they couldn't track paper and ink, so that was the medium he used. He lay : on his side, eyes going from side to side as he read, imagining the feel : of grass beneath his feet and the sun shining on his face. Context turned : the beauty of the old prose into something cruelly abstract, but that only : made him want more. : Too soon, he heard the tinny chime announcing the start of the day. He : quickly slid his book into the tiny locker at the head of his bunk as the : rest of the cadets woke up. : He followed along with the morning exercises, and then took a quick sponge : bath in one of the coffin-like cleaning rooms next to the barracks. Then : he smoothed his hair, slipped into a clean set of coveralls, and decided : "good enough". : He stepped out of the barracks and into the habitat that hosted it, a big : hemisphere called Cast Iron Cozy. Dwellings were stacked two to three high : around the perimeter. The skylight dome overhead glowed a bright pink, : with sunlit violet clouds on the horizon. Someone (probably Giovanni) had : set it to "Arizona Sunrise". In the center stood the pride of : the unit, a big square plot filled with synthetic black soil and bursting : with green life: carrots, beansprouts, onions, and more. : The garden was the one thing he consistently liked about Cast Iron Cozy. It : was the closest he'd ever get to Earth. The Cast Iron Cozies had taken : care of it, too; the crops were bigger and better than the ones in the : resident unit he'd grown up in, Home Sweet Hole over in Conurb 3. : The rest of the community (at least those assigned to work in First and : Second Shift) already sat at the tables for a meal. Engineers sat with : engineers, scientists with scientists, and so forth, professional families : linked by clothing color and skill set. : He didn't look forward to joining any of them. : Owen grabbed a bowl and filled it at the nutripaste extruder, tensing up as : he took a seat at the edge of the table. Already he could feel it: harsh : eyes swiveling his way, sharp tongues just behind. : How would Nyx handle this? : "So, Owen, how the hell did you get assigned to Morale Department?" : The question came from Juanita, who'd never found a volunteer opportunity : she couldn't wring for a few extra crew creds. : Owen shrugged. "Same algorithms that assigned you all to whatever." : "'Cause you lower our morale just by being here," snickered Ali, a : burly cadet who'd just arrived in Cast Iron Cozy and was already throwing : his weight around. : But Tanya noticed, and fixed Ali in her sights. "And with comments like : that, you're actively undercutting morale," she warned. : A hot little pulse of shame ran through Owen's chest. Spindly, useless Owen, : not obedient enough to rise up the ranks but not tough enough to rebel. : He gave Tanya a look that he hoped was grateful. But the other cadets had : smelled blood and wanted more. : "Owen needs to step up. I could be earning way more crew creds if he : didn't keep hurting our score," Juanita complained. : "I'm trying," Owen said. "I just don't—" : "He doesn't need you undercutting him, Juanita," Tanya said. : Owen's cheeks burned at the interruption, but all he could do was nod and : then force a spoonful of paste into his mouth. : This was going to be Hell.

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	Message: : Quick note: I realized that the attached link in my earlier post was easy to : miss and, honestly, looked really suspicious. So I'm going to go ahead and : start posting the fanfic here. : The first few chapters deal with daily life on the Marathon itself. Things : are calm for now, but you'll soon see signs of trouble. : Chapter 1 : Owen had recently read about the airplanes his distant ancestors had used : back on Earth; specifically, how badly they stank after being used. It : made sense. Dozens of people cramped together in a fragile, narrow : fuselage for hours at a time—filling it up with their BO, their sweat, : their farts, and worse—would make a stench that no amount of technology : could completely prevent. : He'd read about that and then thought about The UESC Marathon, his home and a : generation starship that had hosted tens of thousands for 322 years, 6 : months, and 7 days, and how much catastrophically worse than anything else : it must stink. : "Oh, now I get why the colonists never visit us BOBs: we stink too damn : much," Nyx said, after he told her. : It was 2345 hours, just before the start of First Shift, and they dutifully : trudged to assignment office. Conurb 5's ringway was packed like it always : was at the beginning or end of a shift, crewmembers in unicolor coveralls : headed to work or headed home, their convos bouncing off the gunmetal gray : walls. Someone had set the skylight to the puffy clouds and bright blue of : "Mediterranean Morning". : "Don't get so enthusiastic. I'm sure they think we're useless, : too," Owen said. : Nyx sighed in mock disappointment as if to conceal her real disappointment. : "I shoulda known. Speaking of uselessness, you ready for the : review?" : Owen grimaced. He'd been trying not to think of the review, a yearly ritual : that'd determine how each cadet could best use their scant free time for : Marathon's betterment. : "I'm trying not to think too much about it." : Nyx shook her head. "Come on, Owen; you gotta embrace the slack. You're : still trying to impress people, deep down." : "It's not that I want approval, it's that they keep pestering me—" : "I get it," Nyx said, her voice soft. "You want to be left the : hell alone." : "Yeah, basically." : "But, you know, if you start making yourself useful they'll want you to : do more and more. Right now? All they can do is nag." : "Or cut my privileges until I'm so bored out of my mind that I start : volunteering to scrub air ducts." : Nyx chuckled. "Or, you know, do what I do." : God, part of him wanted to. That maybe if he just spat in the face of the : Marathon's stupid rules he'd stop caring so much about things and be : something other than the well-behaved little BOB who only had rebellious : thoughts, never actually pushed back the way Nyx did. : That maybe then, Nyx would see him as more than just a drone with pretensions : of rebellion. : "Thanks for leaving the door open," he said. He already knew he'd : never commit himself like that. Deep down, he wanted to hide. : She grabbed his shoulder and squeezed. "Sure, what are friends : for?" : They reached the elevator to the assignment office and took position. Age-old : machinery beneath their feet groaned as it pushed the platform up to the : lobby. As always, they were greeted by the big mural showing the : Marathon's history. On the left, Earth in all its tarnished blue glory, : Mars next to it but off to the side (to make sure that even people over a : dozen light years and three centuries away knew which planet was in : charge). The ghostly visage of long-dead President Buendia loomed from : behind the worlds, pointing with lofty authority to the right side of the : mural where lay Tau Ceti and its cluster of four super-Earths and five : more reasonably sized planets and moons. : The only thing on the mural that changed was the position of the Marathon. It : had once been painted in Martian orbit as the tiny moonlet of Deimos that : it had once been. That had long since been covered up, the Marathon : painted in new positions on the mural as it made its journey. Now the : Marathon drifted among the bodies of Tau Ceti, finally part of a distant : future that had gone the way of all futures and become a mundane present. : Owen and Nyx filed into a big, bare room with rows of computer desks. Most : days, Owen spent First Shift proofreading computer code that his : supervisor had copied from work some other supervisor had done a century : or more ago. Then came Second Shift where his "volunteer" : assignment usually consisted of latrine duty. : They kept telling him he'd get something better if he showed more enthusiasm. : The place was already packed with their peers. Cadets like them received : faded gray coveralls, but most of them covered the drab garments in bold : neon and florescent designs that they could purchase and replace (as : fashion dictated) with a few crew creds. : Owen didn't go that route: he kept his coveralls unadorned, a bit too loose : for his skinny frame. It matched the rest of his appearance: coarse black : hair trimmed close to his scalp for ease of maintenance; skin brown, and : complexion blotchy. He hated fiddling with his appearance more than : necessary, and he'd rather spend crew creds on books. : Nyx took a different approach, detailing her outfits with complex patterns : and designs that she'd applied with dye and paint and bleach. Her : coveralls that day boasted interlinking green vines that sprouted leering : skulls. Not the sort of design you could buy anywhere on-board. It fit : with her own looks, her black hair thick and lustrous even tied back in a : bun, and those twinkling dark eyes that refused to look at the world the : way everyone else did. : Owen sat down at the nearest desk, the built-in terminal displaying the : connected and concentric circles of the Marathon logo in bright green on a : black background. : "Hey, Owen," came a familiar voice. : Owen looked to his right as Tanya sat down next to him. Merit decals : festooned the sleeves of Tanya's coveralls in testament to the endless : assignments she volunteered for. She was about as put together as anyone : could be on the Marathon, her brown skin almost managing to look healthy : and her reddish-brown hair tied into cornrows that slowly drifted back : down to her shoulders. : "Did you study for the review?" Tanya asked. : "Some," Owen said. "I'm mostly looking forward to getting it : over with." : Tanya nodded. She was a model cadet but didn't usually hold that over anyone. : Not on purpose, anyway. She'd even used her authority to keep some of the : more aggressive cadets from venting on Owen. He didn't like hiding behind : her… but he knew never to turn help away. : "I'm looking forward to the Labor Committee redesigns. Should reflect : our strengths better now," Tanya said. : "Yeah, but I've heard that sort of thing before. When's the last time : the Labor Committee made a big improvement?" : "Since it replaced Pro-Social Promotion in 2691," Tanya responded, : without missing a beat. : Which, Owen realized, was a fair point. Better for his fate to depend on a : test than on his community's whims. Especially for someone like him. : "You got me there," he admitted. : Director Adam was stepping up to the podium, his watery eyes looking out from : a face made flabby by years of easy living. : "Good day, cadets," he rumbled. "You all know why you're here, : so I won't waste time. Remember: this is a privilege. Our shipboard : community deems you useful, and will use you in ways that will help : everyone. Including yourselves." : His lips stretched to make a short-lived smile, though his eyes were a : million miles away. : "As always, you'll have 0100 hours to complete the review. If you have : questions about the results, you'll have 0030 hours in which to speak with : me before reporting to your regular work assignments." : Owen sighed and wished he could just finish the damn test already. : ******* : Owen hadn't gone into the test with high expectations, but the results still : disappointed him. Actually no, they hadn't disappointed him. : They'd pissed him off. : "CREWMEMBER: Owen-Conurb5 IS ASSIGNED TO MORALE DEPARTMENT FOR VOLUNTARY : OBLIGATIONS," it read. : Owen hadn't expected to get anything he wanted. But it didn't get much worse : than the Morale Department, the Marathon's glorified propaganda arm. : He lingered as the rest of his cohort left at 0100. Adam still sat at his : podium, fiddling at his terminal with shoulders squared and face solemn, : like it was the most important fiddling in the world. His eyes looked up : from the screen as he approached. : "Owen," he acknowledged. : "Director Adam. I wanted to talk about my annual review results." : Owen knew he was taking a bit of a risk even asking the man. Sure, anyone : could challenge their results, but that always seemed to carry a cost in : the form of tougher assignments. Again, he wished he was like Nyx. : "What seems to be the issue?" : Owen took a moment to collect himself. The one thing he could not afford to : do was be honest. : "I'm honored that they think I'd be a good fit for Morale Department. : But I, uh, wanted to explore some other options. So as to be sure I'm : doing the most for our community." : Adam frowned. "Well, those other options were already tabulated and it : was determined that Morale was ideal." : "And I'm sure I'd be good for it," Owen said. "But I had high : academic scores back in school. Maybe I could help out in R&D?" : Actually, he wasn't at all sure he'd be good for that. But people said he was : pretty smart, and at least R&D did something useful. Sometimes. : "Let's see, school finished two years ago for you." : "One, actually," Owen corrected. : The lines around Adam's eyes crinkled. "Yes, well, that's still a while : ago. Maybe if you'd pushed yourself a bit more during the intervening year : you'd be a good fit. But no, you no longer meet R&D's requirements." : Okay, maybe he'd overstepped. "Fine. But what about something like : Horticulture? I love working the community garden." : No lie there. He loved it. : "Horticulture's a popular volunteer assignment and we can't possibly : give it out to everyone who wants it. Thus, it goes to those who : contribute the most which, I'm sorry to say, is not you. : "Owen, you hardly ever interact with other crew. Those you do interact : with, like Natalie, tend not to display the best attitudes." : By Natalie, he meant Nyx. She hated the name assigned to her at the creche, : but it was still on the official record. : "But I do my work!" he protested, his face suddenly warm. They had : so damn many rules and most of them weren't even written out. : "That's only part of it. The Marathon's a community. The only reason we : survived for hundreds of years is because we learned to, well, enjoy each : other's company. You aren't doing that. Let's look at your DREAMS score, : shall we?" : He tapped away at the keyboard for a few moments, and then a holographic : display popped up with Owen's DREAMS scores. : (D)iscipline – 62 : (R)eciprocity – 65 : (E)mpathy – 47 : (A)ccomplishment – 42 : (M)erit – 49 : (S)ociability – 33 : "Now any DREAMS score can be improved," Adam continued. : "Certainly mine wasn't the best at your age. But you need to do more. : This is why the algorithm chose a more socially oriented assignment: so : you could put those DREAMS skills to some much-needed practice." : Okay, that did it. "I mean, if my empathy and sociability are that low, : do you really want me in charge of other people's morale? Since I know : this is all just a bunch of propaganda and I'm not going to pretend : otherwise." Owen heard the challenge in his own voice and knew that : might bite him in the ass, but he no longer cared. : Adam sniffed. "You won't be in an important enough position to do any : harm. Perhaps I should bring in a higher authority." : He pressed a button, and a digital chirp sounded out from the terminal to : announce the intervention of Leela, one of the Marathon's three AIs and : the only one most crew ever interacted with. : "Owen, Director Adam is giving you good advice," Leela said, her : digitally produced voice as patient and as cold as always. "Both the : Marathon and the colony are highly social environments, and you will need : to navigate that in order to best contribute. Referring to the Morale : Department's work as propaganda displays a poor attitude." : His situation was hopeless now that Leela was involved. He didn't relish : confrontations the way Nyx did. But if he'd learned one thing, it was to : go down swinging. : "But am I wrong about it being propaganda?" Owen asked. : "That's not relevant. The aptitude algorithm ran through thousands of : possible scenarios. You going to the Morale Department was clearly the : best option for the Marathon based on the available data. Speaking of : data, you've taken far more resources than you've contributed." : Owen boiled in silence. It's not that he didn't want to help. He just didn't : want to lie. : "Our hope is that Morale will have a positive effect on you. Perhaps by : being more involved in the Marathon's story—and in helping relay it to : others—you will find yourself more invested. At any rate, the results are : final. You will begin tomorrow at 0800. A 30-minute mandatory psych : evaluation has been added to your schedule, next Tuesday at 1300. I am : also deducting ten crew credits from your account." : "That's not fair," Owen protested. : "Necessity is the ultimate fairness. If you want to be treated as a : valuable member of society, you must contribute something of value." : Leela disengaged with another cheerful digital chirp. Not that she truly : disengaged; she existed in all places and all times, a ghost in the : machine that let the crew pretend they weren't being monitored. : "I believe that settles it," Adam said. : Knowing he was beaten, Owen just nodded. But already he was wondering if he : could subvert this in some way. : ******* : The cadet barracks where Owen made his home was scheduled to wake up at 2200 : each day. Owen woke up a little earlier, at 2115. : Sleep offered escape, of course. But it wasn't escape he could truly : experience. So instead, he'd give himself 45 minutes each morning to just : be alone. He'd lie there on his bunk, listening to the snoring of his : fellow cadets and imagine himself somewhere far away from this tomb of : stone and metal. : He'd read, too. That morning, he read a black market copy of East of Eden by : the light of the window, the pages practically falling out of the binding. : He could've read it online, but doing that meant people would notice and : start asking about his sleep schedule. Why was Owen getting up so early? : Didn't Owen know that every BOB needed a good night's sleep to usher in a : glorious future for the Marathon, the Tau Ceti colony, and humanity : itself? And if they complained, Leela would revoke his reading privileges : and that'd be it. : But they couldn't track paper and ink, so that was the medium he used. He lay : on his side, eyes going from side to side as he read, imagining the feel : of grass beneath his feet and the sun shining on his face. Context turned : the beauty of the old prose into something cruelly abstract, but that only : made him want more. : Too soon, he heard the tinny chime announcing the start of the day. He : quickly slid his book into the tiny locker at the head of his bunk as the : rest of the cadets woke up. : He followed along with the morning exercises, and then took a quick sponge : bath in one of the coffin-like cleaning rooms next to the barracks. Then : he smoothed his hair, slipped into a clean set of coveralls, and decided : "good enough". : He stepped out of the barracks and into the habitat that hosted it, a big : hemisphere called Cast Iron Cozy. Dwellings were stacked two to three high : around the perimeter. The skylight dome overhead glowed a bright pink, : with sunlit violet clouds on the horizon. Someone (probably Giovanni) had : set it to "Arizona Sunrise". In the center stood the pride of : the unit, a big square plot filled with synthetic black soil and bursting : with green life: carrots, beansprouts, onions, and more. : The garden was the one thing he consistently liked about Cast Iron Cozy. It : was the closest he'd ever get to Earth. The Cast Iron Cozies had taken : care of it, too; the crops were bigger and better than the ones in the : resident unit he'd grown up in, Home Sweet Hole over in Conurb 3. : The rest of the community (at least those assigned to work in First and : Second Shift) already sat at the tables for a meal. Engineers sat with : engineers, scientists with scientists, and so forth, professional families : linked by clothing color and skill set. : He didn't look forward to joining any of them. : Owen grabbed a bowl and filled it at the nutripaste extruder, tensing up as : he took a seat at the edge of the table. Already he could feel it: harsh : eyes swiveling his way, sharp tongues just behind. : How would Nyx handle this? : "So, Owen, how the hell did you get assigned to Morale Department?" : The question came from Juanita, who'd never found a volunteer opportunity : she couldn't wring for a few extra crew creds. : Owen shrugged. "Same algorithms that assigned you all to whatever." : "'Cause you lower our morale just by being here," snickered Ali, a : burly cadet who'd just arrived in Cast Iron Cozy and was already throwing : his weight around. : But Tanya noticed, and fixed Ali in her sights. "And with comments like : that, you're actively undercutting morale," she warned. : A hot little pulse of shame ran through Owen's chest. Spindly, useless Owen, : not obedient enough to rise up the ranks but not tough enough to rebel. : He gave Tanya a look that he hoped was grateful. But the other cadets had : smelled blood and wanted more. : "Owen needs to step up. I could be earning way more crew creds if he : didn't keep hurting our score," Juanita complained. : "I'm trying," Owen said. "I just don't—" : "He doesn't need you undercutting him, Juanita," Tanya said. : Owen's cheeks burned at the interruption, but all he could do was nod and : then force a spoonful of paste into his mouth. : This was going to be Hell.
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