The Things We Repair
Copyright© 2026 by Flubu
Chapter 32: The Last Protocol
The last requirement had nothing to do with propulsion. Daniel would have preferred propulsion. Something pushed, something resisted, something broke. You found the weak point and repaired it.
Instead, the kitchen tablet displayed:
POST-DEPARTURE COMMUNICATION PROTOCOL: REQUIRED
Daniel read it again. Neris sat across from him with both paws around a mug of coffee she had forgotten to drink. Claire had already found a pencil.
ER spoke through the kitchen speaker. “The protocol must define what communication Daniel should expect after transit begins.”
“We know what happens,” Daniel said. “You leave. I wait.”
“That is accurate but insufficient.”
“Feels pretty complete from here.”
Claire turned the pencil between her fingers. “What’s missing?”
ER projected the request above the table.
TRANSIT ENTRY CONFIRMATION
EXPECTED EMERGENCE WINDOW
POST-EMERGENCE SIGNAL OPTIONS
ROUTING AND REPAIR DELAYS
ARRIVAL CONFIRMATION
FAILURE THRESHOLDS
Daniel looked at the last item. “No.” Neris’s ears lowered.
ER said, “Which part are you rejecting?”
“You know which.”
“A failure threshold is required.”
“Put unknown.”
“That would not establish a useful protocol.”
Daniel leaned back. His pelvis complained less than it would have a week before, which only made it easier to forget that it was still healing. “We’re deciding how long I’m supposed to hope.” The room quieted.
ER answered him plainly. “Yes.” Claire’s pencil stopped. Daniel wished, briefly and without much conviction, that ER would lie to him. Something gentle. Something useless. Instead, ER said, “Leaving the uncertainty undefined would create avoidable harm.”
Daniel looked toward the speaker. “To who?”
“You.”
“I’m not the one going through the corridor.”
“You are still affected by what happens there.”
Neris’s tail found Daniel’s ankle beneath the table. He looked down at it, then at the tablet. “Fine.”
Claire pulled a clean page from the ledger. Daniel sighed. “Another chart.”
“You like my charts.”
“I survive your charts.”
“You use them.”
“Under duress.”
She drew a line down the page. “This isn’t one event.”
Daniel knew what she meant before she wrote anything. Departure. Transit. Emergence. Contact. The words made the separation look manageable. He disliked them for that.
“The crossing is approximately two weeks,” Claire said.
“Approximately,” Neris repeated.
Daniel looked at her. “Meaning?”
“Transit duration can vary. We cannot communicate while Takuhai is inside the full vessel envelope. After emergence, ER may need time to establish our position and verify the ship before we transmit.”
“Silence for that period is normal?”
“Yes.”
“And after?”
Neris glanced toward ER’s speaker.
“Still potentially normal.”
Daniel rubbed a hand over his face. “Excellent.”
Claire wrote something on the page: “There is a distinction between expected silence and delayed contact.”
“That sounds like the same silence with better stationery.”
“It isn’t.”
Unfortunately, Daniel knew she was right. ER projected a model of the transit. Daniel understood little of the field geometry and did not try. What mattered was the small representation of Takuhai disappearing inside overlapping layers of light and emerging again in a monitored region near Veyra station.
ER highlighted the far side. “I recommend allocating power for a minimal identification beacon.”
Neris looked up immediately. “From reserve?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
ER said: “one-point-four percent.”
Her ears shifted. Daniel recognized the expression. “Too much?”
“Not too much. More than I would prefer.”
“What does the beacon do?”
“If primary communications are unavailable after emergence, the burst can identify Takuhai to the monitored network and provide basic vessel and crew status.” Daniel looked at the projection. “This helps them find you.”
“Yes.”
“And if it gets routed back here, I know you got out.”
“If the relay path succeeds.” Neris put a paw over his hand before he could answer.
Daniel looked at her. “I’m not asking you to spend survival margin so I feel better.”
“The beacon has rescue value,” ER said.
“Then use it for that.”
“It also reduces Earthside uncertainty.”
“That’s not a reason to risk the ship.”
“Your condition after our departure remains a relevant consideration.”
Daniel stared toward the speaker. “No, it doesn’t.”
“Yes.”
“I’m not going to die because I don’t get a message.”
“That is not the only harm I am considering.” Daniel stopped. ER continued. “Sleep disruption, reduced food intake, impaired concentration, social withdrawal, and compulsive monitoring are foreseeable responses to prolonged, unresolved uncertainty.”
Claire slowly turned toward Daniel.
He pointed at her. “Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“I was thinking.”
“Same face.”
Neris’s ears tilted. ER said, “The beacon improves the possibility of locating Takuhai after emergence. The fact that it may also tell Daniel we survived the crossing does not make that benefit irrelevant.”
Daniel looked back at the power allocation. “Does using it materially reduce your chances?”
“Marginally.”
“Neris?”
She considered the figure before answering. “I would rather have the reserve. I would still authorize the beacon.” That was enough.
“Enable it.”
ER changed the display.
IDENTIFICATION BEACON: ALLOCATED
Daniel looked away. “Don’t make it cheerful.”
“I had not planned to.”
“Good.”
Claire wrote beacon beside emergence. “What does it send?”
ER displayed the packet.
TRANSIT EXIT CONFIRMED
VESSEL STATUS: NOMINAL / DEGRADED / CRITICAL
CREW STATUS: STABLE / UNKNOWN / CRITICAL
ROUTING IDENTIFIER
Daniel read it twice. No voice. No explanation. No Neris. Still, STABLE was a word.
“If that arrives, how quickly could I get it?”
“Potentially within hours of emergence. Routing delays may extend that.”
“And if it doesn’t arrive?”
“It does not establish failure.”
“Of course it doesn’t.”
Claire tapped the pencil against the page. “Then we decide when silence starts meaning something different.”
Neris looked at Daniel. “We decide together.”
He knew she was talking about more than numbers. “All right.”
They started with the expected crossing. For approximately two weeks, Daniel should expect no live call, message or proof that Takuhai was still there. After the projected emergence window, the possibilities multiplied. A beacon might arrive first. A conventional message might reach Earth instead. Damage could delay transmission. An emergence farther from the monitored region could slow routing. ER might decide that stabilizing the ship mattered more than telling Daniel immediately.
Daniel understood every reason. He hated all of them.
Claire wrote a short set of thresholds instead of a page of possibilities. During the expected corridor transit, silence meant nothing. For the first day after expected emergence, silence remained within normal uncertainty. After three days, they would begin actively seeking confirmation through the protected-contact network. After a week without a beacon, routing acknowledgement or arrival message, the situation would be treated as serious.
Daniel stared at the page. “And when does it become failure?”
Neris’s tail tightened around his ankle. ER answered. “Three weeks after departure, when prolonged silence exceeds plausible transit, repair and routing delays, serious failure should be presumed.”
“Presumed.”
“Yes.”
“What does that actually mean?”
ER paused. “It means you stop organizing every hour around the expectation that the next minute will bring contact.”
Daniel’s jaw tightened. “That isn’t the same as giving up.”
“No.”
“It doesn’t mean you’re dead.”
“No.”
“I keep waiting.”
“Yes,” ER said. “Differently.”
Daniel looked at the paper. Neris covered his hand with hers. “You may hope as long as you choose.”
He looked at her. “For how long?”
“As long as you choose,” she repeated. That answer he could live with.
Claire added one final rule, less about Takuhai than Daniel: after the expected arrival period, he was not allowed to spend the day sitting beside the receiver. They were quiet for a while. Snow moved past the kitchen window.
Claire checked the calendar on her phone, then the departure countdown. Her expression changed. “Christmas.”
Daniel looked up. “What?”
“If you leave as soon as the Veyra beacon activates, Christmas is eight days later.”
Neris looked between them. “What changes on Christmas?”
Daniel quietly said. “Usually, people try not to be alone.”
Her ears lowered. Claire answered before he could say anything else. “You won’t be.”
Daniel looked at her. “That wasn’t a request.”
“I know.”
“I can manage Christmas.”
“I know that too.”
“You don’t sound convinced.”
“I believe you can manage it. I don’t think you should have to.”
Neris’s tail curled more firmly around Daniel’s ankle. She understood the shape of it now, even if the holiday itself remained partly beyond her: a day meant for gathering while she was somewhere unreachable between worlds. “You will not be alone,” she said.
Daniel gave her a faint smile. “You giving Claire instructions now?”
“I already have.”
Claire nodded. “Several.”
Daniel closed his eyes. “I’m surrounded.”
“Yes,” Neris said.
They spent most of the afternoon on the receiver. Protected-contact restrictions ruled out leaving sophisticated Xianglume communications equipment behind. The approved device could receive authenticated packets, verify where they came from, store them and signal when new data arrived. It could not transmit without separate authorization, connect to Earth networks or reveal anything particularly useful about Xianglume communications technology.
The internal module came from Takuhai. The housing did not. Daniel stood in the workshop doorway while Neris laid the components on the bench. He was allowed twenty minutes upright. ER had specified twenty. Daniel maintained that negotiations had raised the limit to twenty-two. Neris disagreed. The maple came from an offcut left after they built the resonator cradle. Daniel ran his fingers over the grain. “We’re using that?”
“Yes.”
“We have stronger materials.”
“We do.”
“But you want maple.” Neris met his eyes. “Yes.” He sat down. They worked together. Daniel marked the cuts and cleaned the edges with a block plane from his chair. Neris handled the saw. Claire held pieces when needed and questioned tolerances until Daniel threatened to classify her as a building inspector. ER checked the internal dimensions. The finished receiver was a small maple box with rounded corners, a dark display, one indicator light and one button.
Daniel turned it over in his hands. “This is what I stare at for twelve days.”
“You are not permitted to stare at it continuously,” Neris said.
“Who enforces that?”
Claire looked up. “I have a schedule.”
“Of course you do.”
“After expected emergence, four checks per day.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Three.”
“Still ridiculous.”
“Two.”
Neris looked at Daniel. “Morning and evening.”
He frowned. “You negotiated fast.”
“I know you.”
ER said, “Checking manually does not influence message arrival.”
“I understand causality.”
“Your behaviour suggests that understanding and practical application are not always identical.”
Daniel ignored all of them and ran his thumb over the maple. The receiver looked as though it belonged in the farmhouse. That felt right. Neris rested her paw over his hand.
ER interrupted. “Personal-effects appeal processed.”
Daniel looked up. “The mug?”
“And the carving.”
Daniel frowned. “What carving?”
“The practice piece.”
Neris looked at him. “It is not merely practice.”
“It isn’t anything. It’s barely a carving.”
“It remains a carving.”
ER displayed the authorization.
EARTH-ORIGIN PERSONAL EFFECTS REVIEW
ITEM 1: CHIPPED CERAMIC DRINKING VESSEL
ITEM 2: HAND-CARVED MAPLE OBJECT
Daniel frowned. “They make them sound awful.”
“The descriptions are accurate.”
Claire stepped closer. “Why did they need approval?”
“Earth-origin material requires review before protected transit,” ER said. “The restrictions address contamination, undeclared samples and uncontrolled transfer of material.”
Daniel looked at Neris. “And you appealed.”
“Yes.”
“What did you tell them?”
Her ears shifted. “The truth.”
ER opened the supporting statement. Daniel read the explanation twice.
ITEMS POSSESS NO MATERIAL TECHNICAL VALUE.
ITEMS ARE REQUESTED AS PERSONAL EFFECTS DUE TO EMOTIONAL SIGNIFICANCE TO COURIER VAEL.
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