“It’s not that you’re wrong,” I said. “I just thought you might have a little more awe at being on an entirely new world.”
“I live in a tent and pee in a bucket,” Savitri said. “And then I have to carry the bucket across the entire camp to a processing tank so we can extract the urea for fertilizer. Maybe I’d have more awe for the planet if I didn’t spend a fair portion of my day hauling my own waste across it.”
“Try not to pee so much,” I said.
“Oh, thanks,” Savitri said. “You’ve just sliced through the Gordian knot with that solution. No wonder you’re in charge.”
“The bucket thing is only temporary, anyway,” I said.
“That’s what you told me two weeks ago,” Savitri said.
“Well, I apologize, Savitri,” I said. “I should have realized that two weeks is more than enough time for an entire colony to go from founding to baroque indolence.”
“Not having to pee in a bucket is not indolence,” Savitri said. “It’s one of the hallmarks of civilization, along with having solid walls. And taking baths, which everyone in this colony has taken too few of recently, I’ll tell you that.”
“Now you know why the planet smells like an armpit,” I said.
“It smelled like an armpit to start,” Savitri said. “We’re just adding to the funk.”
I stood there and inhaled greatly through my nostrils, making a show of enjoying the air. Rather unfortunately for me, however, Savitri was right; Roanoke did, in fact, smell all too much like an armpit, so it was all that I could do not to gag after filling my lungs. That being said, I was enjoying the sour look on Savitri’s face too much to admit to swooning from the smell.
“Aah,” I said, exhaling. I managed not to cough.
“I hope you choke,” Savitri said.
“Speaking of which,” I said, and ducked back into the tent to retrieve my own nightpail, “I’ve got some business of my own to take care of. Walk with me to dump this?”
“I’d prefer not to,” Savitri said.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I made that sound like a question. Come on.” Savitri sighed and walked with me down the avenue of our little village of Croatoan, toward the waste digester, Babar tagging along at our heels, except when he broke off to say hello to kids. Babar was the only dog in the colony who was a herding dog; he had the time to make friends. This made him both popular and chunky.
“Manfred Trujillo told me that our little village is based on a Roman legion camp,” Savitri said, as we walked.
“It’s true,” I said. “It was his idea, actually.” And a good one. The village was rectangular, with three avenues running the length of the camp parallel to each other and a fourth avenue (Dare Avenue) bisecting them. In the center was a communal mess hall (in which our carefully monitored food supply was doled out in shifts), a small square where the kids and teens tried to keep themselves occupied and the administrative tent that doubled as home for me, Jane and Zo?.
On either side of Dare Avenue were rows of tents, each housing up to ten people, usually a pair of families plus any additional singles or couples we could stick in. Sure, it was inconvenient, but it was also crowded. Savitri had been bunked in a tent with three families of three, all of whom had infant and toddler-aged children; part of the reason for her sour disposition was that she was running on about three hours of sleep a night. Since the days on Roanoke were twenty-five hours, eight minutes long, this wasn’t a good thing.
Savitri pointed to the edge of the village. “I guess the Roman legions didn’t use storage containers as a perimeter barrier,” she said.