Eren's Challenge, Pilot, Episode E001, 'Blue Collar Monday'

Blue Collar Monday

Eren’s Challenge

By Kenneth Shumaker

Episode 001

With InUPress

July 10, 2017

Eren’s Challenge

In Kenneth Shumaker’s Eren’s Challenge, we enter the world of the robotics research technician, a mature human male, Eren. During Eren’s 5th Galaxy Palcard sector journey, Eren encounters hazards with his friend, Esmelda, the mature human female who is an ambassador’s administrator. The pair struggle with adventures and dramatic developments while in the metropolitan industrial trade city of Goral, on the planet of the Krenar. Here, they fight with bureaucrats and the Hean priestly hierarchy.

We continue with episode 001, ‘Blue Collar Monday’ on …

Lezmor 01 of RD 78

“Damn it, shut up!” shouts the tall handsome male as his subordinate tries to fill him in on how their latest experiment won’t work.

Jill has spent ten minutes telling Eren that the circuits on board twelve will melt from the heat of the fusion pack located under the torso of this model. There isn’t enough shielding she explained.

…..

But damn it, I checked the stats twice, the extra three millimetres of the Durium shielding exceeds the necessary heat shielding to keep everything outside of the fusion pack cool at 32 degrees C.

Jill insists no it won’t.

But Trontal management told me to shed twenty-kilos from the robot at their last meeting, so I can’t add more shielding for Jill’s comfort. Taking the Boron Bull by the horns, I tell her, “I’ll take the shit when it melts, Jill. We can’t add more mass, we still have to shed eight more kilos to meet the boards qualifications. Sorry partner. No more shielding. Now if we could figure out how to wrap the fusion pack in higher density Heran Cage shielding, we’d accomplish both, better heat shielding and ten kilos less mass. Can you do that? We’d block another thirty degrees C using that shit. But the test run for the managers is in three days, I’ve never seen anyone forge a Heran Cage in less than twelve-day, never mind forge, then cut it.”

Mopping with the sullen expression of a sad dog, Jill relents, “IT might operate long enough for a test run, then we’ll figure out the Heran Cage shielding with a new location for board twelve.”

Patting Jill’s shoulder, I light up with my mischievous grin, saying, “That’s the ‘tude, but stop calling Archy, IT. His name is Archy, you remember, right?”

…..

Walking out of the Trontal research building in the Goral west industrial district, I signal the ever-present Quickie cab and climbs in, speaking half-hearted I give the mic my destination – home. “2412 Justicare Street, Dezdren district”, then I insert my ID card paying the twelve credits for the forty-eight-block ride. Leaning back in my seat, I watch the industrial research complexes whiz by, then the manicured lots of the middle-middle-class pop into view as the district changes.

This is the vast city of Goral in Earl Ferent’s Gtret Shireward. All stinking 4.97 million of us on the eastern sea board’s central coast. A huge cesspool of the folks who supply the space exploration research arms of several multiplanetary corporations.

The damned experimental robot, Archy melted board twelve. Shutting down mid operation, failing the test. The corp may lose this project. I have to draw up a revised proposal tomorrow for presentation in four days to the project determination committee.

It’s odd, when I left Quivern University I expected more with having a Master’s degree in robotics research, but designing and building space exploration habitat robots was the best I came up with seven years ago, and I’m still with these goons. Not that I’m complaining, I’m two promotions away from mid-level management now, not that that’s a goal of mine. I’m more comfortable designing and building the beasties like Archy, who is being built for habitation emergency repairing.

But really Trontal? Their reputation as a clean corp politically and socially is questionable at best. I’ve heard, that huge bribes go into their acquiring government contracts. The barons and their litigants look the other way, as long as their pockets are sufficiently lined.

Me, I do what I can to balance out that shit. I support building better robots for the explorers and colonists, as work. But for my off time, I dig into the underground of society and root out wrong shit, fixing it, helping folks get justice or simple retribution. It doesn’t always go well and I sometimes have to call upon my nere-to-do friends, as I’m not exactly squeaky clean in society myself. Just ask Esmeralda, Earl Ferent’s ambassador’s assistant, if she had loose lips she might tell you, and I’d sink below the Goal’s of Westeraern. But I haven’t heard one tale come back that can be traced back to her.

If you have time to listen, these are my stories of my journeys in the underworld of Goral.

Peace be yours my friend and may the bogeyman not see you!

By, Kenneth Shumaker

To be continued in the next episode 002, ‘Yellow Dog’s Year’ …

Lezmor is a tough time of year, most things are growing, including the Yellow Dog tribal Gornel.

www.inupress.ca inupress@inupress.ca www.kennethshumaker.ca

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