Overlap: The Other Side

<12/09/112,119 {Avion 111} - 14:00 | Purifier 370, Karnak, Genosis>

"Thank you for helping us out Lumina. With your team here, our group can take a long needed break from this station." After bowing her gratitude towards me and my aggressor group team, Pyre prepared to depart from the station with her hidden friends in tow.

"It isn't a big deal Pyre. Look at it this way. It's been far too long since any of us have volunteered for a single shift outside of the military." In truth, I've long been bored out of my mind. While it isn't ordinary for members of the Altiri military to come down to the surface only to work a specific job, there is no rule against it either if permission is requested in advance.

I and the rest of the Cy-Stars are here today, at purification station 370, all to help in teams to essentially run the purifier plant. We're not the only volunteers of course, but today, a majority of the work load shall fall on us. The whole purpose of our job today, is to ensure the next quota is met for the production and processing of unfiltrated Karnak ice into purified drinking water.

As I stood on the elevated platform dug deep into the surface of our world, I waited for Pyre to take her leave of us, pondering all I would be doing today, and wondering if my sisters were going to enjoy the experience, or not enjoy it. Here in Genosis, we have no economy; no direct currency exists within The Unity, nor has it ever among our people. All of us can grow up to do whatever we want for as long as we want, even if that something turns out to be a lot of nothing. Those who don't work still get the bare minimum supply levels of water as handouts, while those of us who contribute more are rewarded with additional supplies of water, and sometimes additional accolades used for further authorizations through our scryer society. It's a relatively simply system, one that has worked for us always.

There is always going to be a demand for certain workers, especially for critical jobs such as this massive purification plant. Despite how it might sound to others, there will never be a shortage of capable workers either, for the benefit of having the experience alone is more than enough motivation, ample compensation for people like us, who normally don't get to do this as often. For myself and the Cy-Stars, a shift like this is more fun than it usually would be to another who is used to working here, because our experience for the day has thus been changed in a world that never changes.

Mere boredom is all it can take to drive an Altiri to do more than the bare minimum for contributions to our society, especially for us in the military, who seldom get to journey back onto Karnak given lack of opportunities. Some don't need to fight boredom, capable of daily entertainment at our many social hubs scattered throughout the world, but then not everyone is going to be a social butterfly. Resulted from this, for every single job position in our world, no matter the field, all of it is voluntary work. Not one soul is forced to work in a particular shift or study a particular science; we all choose to do this willingly, some knowing they benefit our whole society in doing so, and others for the sake of bringing our unity to higher ascension. Plus, with the extra benefit of being down here to breathe this fresh Karnak air, darkening our view of the star ever so slightly, I couldn't think of a more serene environment; I really missed this place.

"Shall we get started then?" With the same enthusiasm, Junko waited on me to begin the job. The rest of us were separated somewhat, scattered into different zones of the facility, since we had to conduct certain operations in specific orders. With all of us linked in telepathy, it was still as if we were all together, the eleven of us.

"Yes we shall. As soon as Fionne starts the primary drill, I will launch the conveyors and the crusher." The purifier has many small substations that all perform a set of functions, and the machine is actually a drill as well as a purifier. All of the ice we start with comes directly from the ground, allowable for up to a mile before the surface needs to be surveyed again for structural stability. All forbid anyone ever digs directly into a cave again like that one time...

As we got started, I made my way over to the controls for the crusher, while Junko went to the controls for the conveyor. The station was built in such a manner that there were connecting bridges of flooring going from one area to another, a network of metal grating, created out of thin layers of ion steel. We of course knew where we were going, and held all knowledge of every function of the entire station, as any volunteer is required to know before starting. The operation was so simple for me, and the experience was all I was hoping for, being so different from an ordinary day of entropy.

"This is Fionne. Primary drills are running. Standing by for phase two."

"Roger that Fionne. Junko and I are turning on the next controls now." I had to fiddle a lot between some switches, levers, and buttons, while waiting to check and see if the system was responding to all the input I was giving it. Most of this entire station runs on mechanical design, since the use of terminals would be difficult to implement, given the average air temperature here of nearly -340oN.

Like any routine moment, all of the systems worked out normally, and it was then a wait for Lulu and Derria to start the smelter, after enough time has buffered for the crusher to deliver its broken ice into the smelting machine. The crushed ice from our world is frozen too well, stuck in a solid state with temperatures too low for ordinary heat sources to melt it. Our smelter uses stored electricity brought down from orbital reactor stations to heat coils in a perfectly contained room, producing more than enough heat to liquefy the material. Previous designs of these stations relied on some form of supersonic disruption waves to change the state of water, though this was something I understood far less.

Once they turn the smelter on, I will then have to travel once more to the injector substation. The injector system does as it sounds, injecting the melted water with a rarely understood non-radioactive isotope solution, dramatically increasing its natural freezing point to about -90oN. This treated water is then stored in portable containers that are transported to a room where this temperature is maintained, and later distributed.

The purification process happens inside of the smelter too, before the injection takes place, separating anything that isn't water from the fluid, mostly. All of that aside, the process really is not complicated. The entire station purifies and prepares our drinking water on such a massive scale, and there are hundreds of more stations just like this scattered around our planet, all doing the same thing. Since our world is made out of frozen water and many other crystals, it isn't like we ever have to worry about running out of this resource any time soon.

Before long, it was our turn to activate the next subsystem, while Ashiela and the others would head to the core monitoring station to ensure everything was running properly. We would also have to backtrack later on and shut down each substation, one by one, in the exact order we've been turning them on, all to ensure we don't overload the plant or too far exceed any quotas.

All in all, the experience was more fun than I thought it would be. Yeah, it was all basic work that we could not become distracted from, but it was also so different from sitting around on a starship day in and day out with nothing else to do. All things considered, I should come down to Karnak and conduct even more volunteer work. I think countless other aggressor groups are all of the same mind too. The best part is, I can decide when I want to come here and do it over again anytime I want, or leave for something else any time I want. That is how our job system works in The Unity, and so, everyone is happy with the arrangement.

Since I can't afford to make any mistakes in the process, I shall continue concentrating my focus onto the task at hand, until my shift finally runs to its end.