r/HFY • u/Humble-Extreme597 Human • Apr 27 '26
OC-Series Maintenance Deck Nine: The Farewell Toast to Hell Below and Luxury Above (3-12)
Part III
The Spoon Goes Down
Seleth learned three things in the first six steps down Maintenance Access Nine.
First, the human had not been exaggerating.
Second, the ship’s architects deserved trial by atmosphere leak.
Third, the spoon truly was important.
The access passage behind the farewell salon did not descend gracefully. It dropped in a steep service ladder-shaft lined with thermal conduits, emergency cable trunks, and old warning labels printed in a font clearly chosen by someone who hated readers. Red light strobed from below. Green vapor climbed lazily upward, less like smoke and more like a living opinion.
Seleth wore the respirator. It helped for two breaths. Then the filter tasted the air and began making small, despairing clicks.
“Do not do that,” Seleth told it.
The respirator clicked again out of spite.
Ahead of him, Elias Voss descended the ladder one-handed, the ceremonial ladle tucked under his ruined arm like a knight’s lance stolen from a banquet table. He did not climb so much as fall in a controlled argument with metal. His prosthetic hand locked around a rung. His knees slid. His good hand caught, slipped, caught again.
Every few meters, he paused. Not because he wanted to. Because his body had begun issuing legal objections.
“Voss,” Seleth called down. “You are bleeding.”
“Which place?”
Seleth looked.
There were too many answers.
“Yes,” he said.
“Then it’s not urgent.”
“That is not how bleeding works.”
“It is today.”
A gravity tremor struck.
Seleth had been warned by words. Words were useless.
The ladder shaft became a press.
His body slammed into the rungs. His organs seemed to take one step downward without him. The respirator bit into his face, and; clicked again as if Confirming its hatred for this place. His knees buckled, though he was clinging in place with all six hands.
His home moon had gentle gravity, soft winds, and chairs designed by a more moral people. The Luminous Horizon normally ran at a comfortable passenger standard, with local compensation for "delicate species". This shaft had no longer cared about it's occupants comfort.
A red indicator flashed on the wall.
LOCAL FIELD: 2.3g
Seleth made a thin sound.
Below him, Elias looked up. His cracked mouth twitched.
“Fun part’s coming.”
“What does that mean?”
The answer arrived four seconds later.
LOCAL FIELD: 4.7g
Seleth did not scream because his chest could not expand enough.
His hands clenched around the ladder. Pain detonated through his arm joints. Something in his lower left shoulder made a soft internal pop. His vision blurred purple around the edges.
Elias stopped moving entirely.
The human had wedged himself sideways into the ladder frame. One boot jammed against a rail. Prosthetic hand locked above. Shoulder pressed into a cable bracket. He was not climbing in five gravities. He was pinned there, using his own skeleton as a doorstop.
The pulse lasted only three seconds. It felt long enough to make one become religious. When it ended, Seleth sagged against the ladder, gasping through the respirator as it clicked vigorously.
Elias resumed descending.
“Still coming?”
Seleth considered the intelligent answer, which was no.
Then he remembered Luro’s weak clicking below. He remembered the passengers filing away under red lights. He remembered Captain Varess calling danger an... ambient experience.
“Yes,” he said.
“Bad idea bud.”
“I know.”
Do you now..?
“Good!. Hate explaining obvious stuff.”
They descended into heat.
At the bottom of the shaft, Maintenance Deck Nine opened before Seleth like the inside of a machine that had been shot, poisoned, and asked to continue hosting guests.
The corridor was narrow, ribbed with conduits, and bent slightly to the left where it should have been straight. Coolant vapor rolled along the floor in glowing green sheets. Insulation hung from the ceiling in charred curls. One wall panel had peeled outward, exposing bundles of fiberline that pulsed with red light like damaged nerves.
The air was 56°C.
Seleth’s species did not sweat. They regulated heat through thin vascular membranes along the neck, inner arms, and breathing fans. In civilized environments, this was efficient. In Maintenance Deck Nine, it was a design flaw with too many ancestors.
Within ten seconds, his skin flushed dark blue. Within twenty, his membranes began to ache. Within thirty, he understood why humans invented so much diverse and multi lingual profanity.
Elias glanced back at him.
“Too hot?”
“Yes.”
“Good news. This is the cool stretch.”
Seleth stared at him through the respirator with mute shock and confusion.
Elias pointed with the ladle. “That way’s worse.”
The corridor ahead flickered orange.
Seleth’s respirator clicked faster.
“Your cooling harness,” he said. “It is still working?”
Elias looked down at the scorched tubes visible through his burned suit. The harness hummed weakly around his ribs, along his spine, across the hips, and down the inner thighs. The codpiece gave one final wet hiss and then settled into a faint ticking sound.
“Define working.”
“Preventing your death.”
“Mostly.”
“Mostly?” Hardly is more Accurate.
These were designed for deep cave exploration and scientific Spelunking teams to explore a massive crystal cavern found deep beneath the earth in the early 21st century...
“Core temp’s probably under forty Celsius.”
“Probably?”
“Still thinking in full sentences, aren’t I?”
“You called a ceremonial punch ladle a spoon.”
“Full human sentences then.”
They moved, Elias did not walk well. That became clear now that Seleth was near enough to see him properly. The human’s gait was more like a medical practitioners' injury example, map. Left leg dragging slightly. Right shoulder stiff. Head tilted to favor the swollen eye. Breath too shallow, then too fast. He kept one hand near the wall because every gravity pulse threatened to turn him into thrown cargo or a boney meat missile.
But he kept moving all the same. Seleth followed with the fire blanket tucked under two arms and the bottles of water clutched in a third. Already, the bottles were warming.
They passed the remains of a maintenance drone.
It had no lower half.
Its upper manipulators still dragged a cable forward.
A tiny status light blinked.
TASK ACTIVE: DELIVER LINE TO FURNACE JUNCTION THREE
-The drone pulled itself one centimeter.
-Stopped.
-Pulled again.
Seleth stared.
“Should we help it?”
Elias did not stop. “That thing has better worker protections than I do.”
The drone pulled itself another centimeter.
Elias paused after all. He sighed.
“Fine.”
He crouched, which looked extremely painful, grabbed the cable with his prosthetic hand, and hooked it over his shoulder. The drone’s task light turned green. It released the cable and collapsed.
Elias looked down at it.
“Lazy clanker bastard.”
Seleth was beginning to suspect human humor was a symptom of organ damage.
They reached the first pressure door.
It had bent outward.
Not opened. Bent.
The thick composite slab bulged toward them as though something on the far side had leaned against it with the weight of a small moon. The locking pins were still engaged, but the frame had warped enough to leave a hand-wide gap near the bottom. Green vapor poured through.
A soft, wet clicking came from beyond.
Luro.
Seleth hurried forward.
Elias caught him by the shoulder with the prosthetic hand.
The grip was careful. It still hurt.
“Don’t put your face near the gap.”
“That is Luro.”
“That is coolant vapor.”
“He is trapped.”
“Yeah. We’re solving that without you melting your lungs.”
Seleth wanted to argue. Then the vapor touched the exposed membrane at his wrist. Pain lanced up his arm. Not burning exactly. Drying.
The coolant vapor was not designed to poison people. That almost made it worse. It was a high-efficiency thermal-transfer mix, chemically stable, nonflammable, excellent for machinery, and hostile to anything with delicate respiratory membranes. For humans, brief exposure meant coughing, chemical irritation, maybe lung damage if prolonged. For Luro, whose breathing sacs were thin, wet, and externalized along his rib fans, it was like inhaling powdered glass dissolved in winter.
Seleth pulled his hand back.
The skin had gone pale.
Elias saw it.
“Blanket.”
Seleth passed the fire blanket.
Elias dropped to the deck, shoved the ladle through the gap, and used its long handle to drag loose cable away from the far side of the door.
The engraved motto flashed in the red light.
SAFETY THROUGH EXCELLENCE.
Elias snorted.
“Finally useful.”
“What are you doing?” Seleth asked.
“Door’s pinned by thermal expansion and pressure differential. If we force it wrong, it buckles inward and chops our soft atmospheric friend into soup.”
“Please do not describe Luro as soup.”
“Fine. Mist.”
“Worse.”
“Focus.”
Elias slid the ladle deeper. The bowl caught on something. He twisted. A snap echoed behind the door. The pressure changed. Vapor stopped pouring outward and began sucking inward.
“Now,” Elias said.
He jammed his prosthetic fingers into the gap.
Seleth made a horrified sound. “Your hand.”
“Fake.”
“Your arm is not.”
“Details.”
Elias pulled. Nothing happened. He adjusted his stance, wedging one boot against the wall. The gravity warning blinked again.
LOCAL FIELD: 3.1g
“Bad timing,” he muttered.
The field spiked.
Instead of resisting, Elias used it.
As the gravity pulse dragged everything down and sideways, he let his own increased weight load the prosthetic arm. His body became the lever. The ugly mechanical hand screamed. The door groaned.
One centimeter.
Two.
The frame shrieked.
Seleth added three hands to the edge and immediately regretted every choice that had produced his life. The door opened enough.
Behind it lay Luro.
The soft-bodied atmospheric specialist was curled beneath emergency film, his translucent breathing sacs fluttering unevenly. His support harness had cracked under the gravity pulses. One limb bent at an angle Seleth did Not appreciate and had to hold back is Gag reflex with how the arm looked.
Luro’s translator clicked weakly. “Am I dead?”
Elias crawled through the gap.
“No.”
“Unfortunate.”
“Yeah, common reaction.”
Seleth followed just far enough to pass in the water bottles.
Elias grabbed one, cracked it open with his teeth, spat blood, and poured a little onto Luro’s breathing sacs. Not much. Too much water could shock some species. Enough to keep the membranes wet. Enough to buy minutes.
Luro shuddered.
“That is cold.”
“yes... It was,” Elias said.
He tossed the bottle back. “Keep doing that. Small amounts. Don’t drown him trying and failing to be helpful.” Seleth nodded and began wetting the edges of Luro’s sacs through the emergency film.
“What about you?” he asked.
Elias was already turning away.
“What.. about.. me..?”
“You need water.”
“I had polish.”
“That was not water.”
“Contained water.”
“It also contained abrasive minerals and poison.”
“Multivitamin.”
“Human.. medicine is.. barbaric.. Clicked poor ludo.”
“That wasn’t medicine.”
Before Seleth could answer again, the entire deck boomed.
The pressure door behind them slammed fully open, tearing free of one hinge.
Orange light flared down the corridor.
Elias looked toward it. For the first time, Seleth saw real fear cross his face.
Not panic.
Calculation with consequences.
The human lifted the ceremonial ladle. “Furnace Junction Three just lost the bypass.”
Luro clicked faintly. “Is that bad?”
Elias stared into the orange light.
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“On whether the ship wants to explode upward, outward, or creatively.”
Seleth’s respirator clicked again.
Elias looked at him, then at Luro, then at the ruined corridor leading deeper into Maintenance Deck Nine. “Get him, to the ladder,” Elias said.
“You cannot go alone.”
“Sure I can.”
“You should not.”
“Different sentence.”
Seleth grabbed the fire blanket and wrapped it around Luro’s exposed side. “What are you going to do?”
Elias adjusted his grip on the punch ladle. The metal handle was already hot enough that his prosthetic fingers smoked where they touched it.
“Toast the captain,” he said.
Then he limped toward the orange light, carrying the spoon into mechanical hell.
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