Sunshine beamed through Skyfield Ranch’s hexagon-paned dome, warming Paul’s neck as he crouched inside an in-ground plumbing junction. Green fields spread to the orbital ranch’s artificial horizon, broken only by scattered outbuildings and the ranch house in the distance. Dairy cows chewed their cuds and watched Paul curiously. He ignored them and cranked his plumber’s wrench, struggling to loosen a clogged pipe.

It felt good to work with his hands again. To have something he could control. Paul hated being Skyfield’s Ops Chief; hated the million details that overwhelmed him every day. But Gladys Skyfield expected her second husband to be just as competent as her first. Paul loved Gladys, but the expectations to fill a dead man's shoes were...exhausting. That’s why he’d snuck out here. During these few peaceful moments doing his old job, life felt like just another day on the orbital ranch.

Paul grunted with effort and the six-inch pipe joint released with a squeal of abused metal. The joint clanged down at Paul’s feet. Brown sludge dribbled out with the fetid stench of liquefied manure. Skyfield Ranch boasted the latest in sustainable energy and the most powerful gravity generator in existence, but humanity still hadn’t figured out how to handle crap without good old-fashioned plumbing.

Dairy cows produced a lot of crap.

Skitter, Paul’s spider-drone pipe crawler, made a tsk sound from atop the pipe as it loosened. “Took you long enough.”

Paul cocked an eyebrow and held out the wrench. “If you want to do the heavy lifting, be my guest.”

Skitter rotated his flat head in the semblance of a headshake. “Nah, just saying you’re out of practice. It hasn’t been the same since you moved into the big house. The other plumbers treat me like just another tool.” Skitter kicked with his steel toed, rubber-treaded foot, producing a hollow echo from the pipe.

Paul grimaced. “Yeah, sorry about that.” AI rights were a touchy subject these days. AIs had enabled humanity’s shift into sustainable arcology and orbital farming, but they still weren’t seen as individuals. Just smart tools.

Paul tapped the pipe. “Well, I’m here now. Shall we see what’s clogged this thing?”

“Righto, boss-man.” A tiny yet powerful light snapped on below Skitter’s single optical input and he crawled over the pipe’s edge and disappeared inside. Paul retrieved his tablet to watch Skitter’s video feed and leaned back against pipes that disappeared into tight tunnels to both sides.

The clogged pipe before him rumbled with the rapid thump-thump-thump of rubberized feet on steel. Skitter gave a long whistle. “Found it!”

Paul eyed the video feed, brows scrunched. “What is that? A giant hairball?” 

“You been throwing your glorious locks down the drain again?”

“Ha, ha,” Paul said, deadpan, and ran fingers through his decidedly thinning hair. “See if you can break it up.”

Skitter activated his sonic disruptor which made Paul’s inner ear bubble. An articulated leg poked at the sludgy mass of hair, hay, and cow manure.

The clog rippled and moved, revealing beady red eyes and a long snout. Narrow teeth snapped at Skitter, and Paul jumped. He dropped the tablet and it slid under the pipe, just out of reach.

“That’s a rat!” Paul yelled.

“What? Can’t be,” Skitter’s voice echoed back. “Skyfield’s rat population was exterminated fifty years— hey let go! That’s my leg!” The pipe rattled and jumped. Screeches and thumps sent Paul scrambling for the tablet. He squatted in front of the pipe, straining to reach around it.

Skitter and the rat shot from the pipe, riding a wave of liquefied manure, and slammed into Paul’s gut, driving the air from his lungs. He gasped, inhaled manure-filled air, and gagged. He didn’t vomit, but it was a close thing.

The gush of released pressure died and Paul struggled not to draw deep breaths. He whipped around, looking for the rat. A rat? What the hell? Skitter’s panicked voice drew his eyes to the right down the narrow pipe-filled tunnel.

“Go away! Go away! I. Am. Not. Your. Dinner! Ahhhhh...”

Skitter’s light bounced inside the tunnel as he batted at the hissing rat. Then Skitter spun and bolted down the pipes, articulated legs flying, the rat waddling close behind him. The light dimmed with distance and the spider-drone’s shrieks echoed then faded as he disappeared from view around a far corner.

Paul sat back with a squelch of liquid manure and swore. Loudly. He grabbed his tablet from a putrid puddle. Dead. He chucked it skyward, drawing concerned moos from his bovine audience.

Where in the hell had a rat come from? It couldn’t be a survivor from the original infestation. Not after fifty years. It must have come in on...

Realization dawned and Paul swore again, but quietly and to himself. This was his fault. He’d switched feed suppliers last quarter to one with ridiculously low rates. Paul had wondered how AAA Feed Solutions made a profit while still paying Earth’s expensive customs cleaning requirements.

Somehow, they’d bypassed customs. Paul had brought the rat in. Gladys was going to kill him!

Paul bounced on his four-wheeler’s bench seat as he sped over sprawling fields toward the ranch house. The next nearest orbital ranch was just visible over Skyfield’s western horizon.  Urban sprawl had long since covered Earth’s grasslands, but sustainable arcology let the megacities produce much of their own food. The balance —luxury items like milk and cheese—was produced by orbiting ranches like Skyfield where livestock had room to graze.

Paul bypassed the house’s broad front porch and parked around back. The sprawling single-story building looked like a nineteenth-century farmhouse complete with faux-shingle siding and gingerbread trim. It served as both the Skyfield family home and the operations center for the ranch. Crew and ranch hands, all seventy-eight of them, lived below deck. A small cadre for such a massive station, but AI drones managed the majority of the workload.

Paul trudged into the Monitoring and Control Station. Stacked screens lined the MCS’s walls with video and status displays. Two dark-skinned women sat kicked-back in their chairs, boots on desks. Sanvi, the middle-aged operator from India that Paul had expected to find, cocked an eyebrow at him and then wrinkled her nose. Yeah, he stank. Chloe, his eighteen-year-old stepdaughter whom he hadn’t expected, glared from behind crimped curls. Chloe always glared at him. She thought Paul was a gold digger.

He wasn’t, but convincing Chloe that he’d married her mother for love seemed beyond him. Paul had been flattered when Gladys had shown interest and fell hard during their brief courtship. Once he and Gladys started fighting, though, Chloe’s disapproval had only grown.

Sanvi stopped his entry with a raised hand. “You ain’t coming in here smelling like that, Ops Chief or no. What’d you do, bathe in sewage?”

“Um, sort of. Can you send a cleanup drone to the pipe junction in Pasture A3? My tablet died.” Sanvi sat forward and tapped a screen as Paul added, “And I need a location on Skitter, my pipe-crawler.”

Chloe’s glare turned concerned and she dropped her boots to the floor with a thump. “What happened?”

Paul drew a deep breath. Every instinct told him to lie about the rat and the contaminated shipments, but bad news never aged well. Better that it came from him. “Skitter was chased away by a rat.”

Sanvi’s fingers froze over her control screen.

“By a what?”

“A rat. They headed eastward from the pipe junction.”

Sanvi threw a schematic onto the screen by Paul’s head. He craned around the doorway and saw Skitter’s blinking icon. Sanvi leaned forward, eyes narrowed. “He’s in Composting D.”

“Thanks!” Paul turned to leave.

“Hold on,” Sanvi said. “I’m sending Chloe with you.”

“What?” he and Chloe said simultaneously.

“The cameras in Composting D are on the fritz. I sent the nearest cleaning drone in to assess, but he went offline too.” Sanvi retrieved a small red satchel from a drawer and tossed it to Chloe. “Utility cameras and a control tablet. I want to see this rat.” Chloe’s lips pursed and she eyed Paul. 

He smiled. “Happy to have you along.”

Chloe clutched the bag and stomped out, careful not to touch Paul’s soiled clothes. He turned a quizzical eye toward Sanvi. They’d been friends for years before he married the boss. What was she up to?

“You could have just given me the camera.”

Sanvi rolled her eyes. “You and Chloe need to work out your issues. I love the girl, she’s crazy smart, but I’m tired of her surliness whenever you’re around. And Paul...”

His eyes narrowed at the warning tone.

“...I’m calling Gladys; something you should have done the second you knew we had rats.”

“My tablet died!”

“And every four-wheeler has an emergency comm. No excuse. Rat infestations qualify as emergencies.”

Paul clenched his jaw but nodded. She was right. Both as Ops Chief and as Gladys’s husband, he should have called. He really wasn’t looking forward to their next conversation.

Paul and Chloe sped down a dirt path under the crystalline dome, past grazing cattle and grass that waved gently in an artificial breeze. The four-wheeler’s perpetual-motion engine purred quietly and Paul glanced at Chloe’s tight expression. He fumbled for something to say. He hadn’t expected joining a family to be quite so complicated.

“Nice day,” he said, glancing upward.

“It’s always a nice day here.”

“Well, yeah, but sometimes it rains.”

“On schedule.”

Paul refrained from pursing his lips and let it drop. They passed through two automated gates between pastures before reaching a small outbuilding that provided elevator and stairwell access to the lower decks. They could have driven through the lower-deck corridors, but Paul liked feeling the sun and wind on his face. Plus, the smell of sunbaked fields almost overwhelmed his manure stench.

They dismounted and Chloe thumbed the elevator switch. The doors slid open with the antiseptic smell of a recent cleaning. “What brought you to the MCS?” he asked as they stepped inside. “I thought Gladys had you working herd management.”

Chloe’s face tightened. “Ranching is Mom’s passion, not mine.”

The elevator hissed downward and Paul considered what he knew about Chloe. She was tech-savvy. Liked working with the AI drones. “You were in MCS because Sanvi lets you tinker with the AIs, right?”

Her expression lightened a little. “Yeah, Sanvi’s cool. And I don’t tinker with the AIs. I talk to them. Just because they’re manufactured, doesn’t mean they’re not people.”

The elevator deposited them onto the first deck below field level. Paul chewed his lip as they turned left down a broad, low passageway. “Yet Skyfield’s official position is against recognizing AI sentience. ‘Utopia can’t run itself,’” he said, quoting the late Tom Skyfield.

“What do you know?” Chloe’s sudden fury made Paul flinch. “And why are you even interested? You’re not my father. You’re just the first pretty face Mom latched onto after Dad died.” Chloe lengthened her stride and turned into Composting D.

Paul slowed, lips pursed. Great job mending fences. Not that he disagreed with Chloe’s assessment. He’d never be the man Tom Skyfield had been but felt compelled to try. Yet after two rocky years, Paul worried that Gladys regretted her hasty re-marriage.

He followed Chloe into Composting D whose heavy air reeked of ammonia. The massive room was dimly lit and filled with ceiling-high steel bins and a dizzying array of pipes. Narrow aisles cut between the composting bins and ran along the walls.

Chloe pulled two sturdy minicams from the bag and clipped them to adjustable headbands. She thrust one at Paul and put on her own before retrieving a tablet. The screen flickered and she said, “Sanvi, are we connected?”

“Gotcha.”

Through the tablet, Paul heard MCS’s door slam and Gladys’s sharp voice yelled, “Where’s this rat?”

“We just connected,” Sanvi said. “This is Paul’s feed, that’s Chloe’s.”

“Paul?” Gladys’s tone turned hard. “If there’s a rat anywhere in Skyfield Ranch, you and I are going to have a long talk about your cut-rate feed supplier.”

Paul’s jaw clenched. She’d reached the same conclusion he had. “Understood. Stand by.” He drew a deep breath and motioned for Chloe to lead the way. She consulted the tablet’s schematic and turned right toward Skitter’s blinking icon. They turned left along the wall and passed a half-dozen steel composting bins.

Paul called out, “Hey Skitter, where you at, buddy?”

“Hold up!” Gladys’s voice cut in. “You’re not going anywhere, drone, not while you have the rats’ undivided attention. Those vermin are a risk to this station. Paul, what’s your extermination plan?”

He should have expected the question. Tom had always had a plan for everything. Paul was more focused on the problem in front of him. He needed to save Skitter. He scratched at his ear which had been bubbling since they’d arrived. His fingers paused as an idea hit him. “Skitter, turn off your sonic disruptor.”

“Hell no! That’s the only weapon I have against these monsters!”

“It’s attracting them! You can’t smell tasty enough to explain all of this.” He waved at the enraptured horde.

One of the wires holding Skitter’s swing abruptly dropped free, chewed through from above. Skitter’s light swung in a pendulum arc toward the ladder and rats strained to reach him. The horde’s chittering redoubled in volume.

Paul swore and backed into the corner, pushing Chloe aside. He eyed the distance to the spider-drone and to the horde’s far side. “Turn it off, Skitter.”

“But—”

“Now!”

Skitter whined but the bubbling in Paul’s ear disappeared.

Rodent chitters paused and Paul sprang into a run. Three steps and he leapt over the rats. 

“Gotcha!” he yelled, snatching Skitter. Paul misjudged his grip and caught the light fixture as well. They swung up toward the ceiling and Paul’s eyes bulged at the rats just above him.

The wire snapped.

Paul barely had time to yell before they crashed onto the rats and his breath whooshed out. It was like landing on the lumpiest bed in the world. He sucked in a breath and rats squealed out from under him, clawing and biting. Paul scrambled to his feet, flinging rats off him. They scattered and Skitter clutched his arm like a rescued cat.

Gladys’s voice was like a bullhorn through Chloe’s tablet. “What the hell was that? Tom never would have risked the station to save a drone!”

“I’m not Tom!” Paul yelled, pent-up frustration suddenly pouring out. “I liked him, everyone did, but I’ll never be Tom. I’ve got faults, but so did he, and his blindness toward AI sentience ranked at the top of the list. I won’t sacrifice a drone, a friend, for anything. There’s another way.”

Resounding silence followed Paul’s outburst. He glanced at Chloe’s shocked expression then looked straight at her utility cam and spoke to Gladys. “Call the dock. Have them prep an empty shipping container —one that opens at both ends— as a trap. Skitter and I will lead the rats inside like the damned pied piper. Then we lock ‘em in and ship ‘em back where they came from.”

Paul’s heart thumped in his chest as Gladys’s silence stretched. Finally, she said, “That’ll work. They’ll be ready in fifteen minutes.”

Paul sagged in relief. The dock was a ten-minute walk from here. He eyed Skitter in his arms, realizing that he’d just volunteered his friend as rat bait.

The spider-drone shook his head. “You’ve got to be joking.”

Paul smiled encouragingly. “Don’t worry, buddy, I’ll be with you the whole way. No other drones will die like Bobo did back there.”

Skitter’s optical sensor regarded him blankly. Drones weren’t great at facial expressions. He gave an electronic sigh.

“Fine. Let’s do this.”

The rats were faster than Paul had expected. He and Skitter left Composting D at an easy jog, Skitter riding Paul’s shoulder, singing his sonic tune while the rats poured from every nook and cranny.

A rat nipped at Paul’s heels. He shrieked, jumped, and broke into a full run. Skitter bounced but kept all eight feet wrapped firmly around Paul’s shoulder. They passed into the main corridor, a high-ceilinged roadway with two lanes.

To keep his mind off the ravening horde chasing them, Paul muttered, “I think Gladys is mad at me.”

Skitter snorted, an amusing sound since he didn’t have a nose. “You think? Why’d you even marry the old crone?”

“Hey, she’s no older than I am.”

“You make my point, baldy.”

Paul chuckled, settling into the rhythm of running. “I married Gladys because, under that gruff exterior, she’s surprisingly thoughtful and caring. You don’t see it, not many do, but Gladys pours her heart and soul into running this ranch.”

He glanced back and frowned. Chloe followed them, a safe distance behind the horde, but she didn’t concern him. There were more rats than before. Lots more. “Anyway, sorry I roped you into this. I should have asked first.”

“Humans don’t ask AIs. You demand and program.”

“Yeah, but we shouldn’t. You’re the beating heart of this ranch. Skyfield wouldn’t exist without AIs.” They passed an AI forklift hauling feed pallets. Its optical sensor eyed the strange procession but the fork continued on its programmed course.

Another forklift from a cross-corridor turned into Paul’s path, then screeched to a halt. He jinked to the left, stumbled, but kept running. He glanced back again. The rat swarm parted around the machine like a hairy river. They were closer than before, the nearest just a yard behind him.

Paul burst into a sprint, breath coming fast. He rounded the corner into the dock and his eyes bulged.

The dock was in chaos. AI forklifts zipped past, frantically emptying a metal shipping container in the center of the expansive bay. Crew members screamed directions at drones. The burly dock foreman saw Paul and shouted at a backing forklift. The AI abruptly turned with squealing tires so it wouldn’t run over Paul. Its load overbalanced and a barrel hit the deck with a boom. The lid popped off spewing thick brown sludge. Fortified Liquid Feed. FLF smelled like sweet oats but was slippery as oil.

Paul hit the FLF at a dead run. He couldn’t stop. His feet slid out from under him and he splashed onto his belly with a yell. Skitter flew from his shoulder, landed beyond the spill, and rolled.

The rat horde didn’t even pause. They swarmed over Paul, tiny claws and heavy bodies pushing him into the sludge. FLF pressed between his lips, oversweet and slimy.

Then they were gone.

Paul raised his head, gaze following the sludgy trail of tiny footprints to the container. The last rat disappeared inside and the foreman slammed the doors closed. Skitter was nowhere to be seen.

“Skitter!” Paul wiped his lips and scrambled, slipping and sliding out of the spill. His eyes flew to the container’s back corner. He couldn’t see the doors. Had Skitter made it through?

“Skitter! Skitter!”

He stumbled forward, boots slippery from the FLF.

Skitter’s spidery form peered over the container’s top edge. “Well, that was exciting.”

Paul sagged in relief. “You’re alive!”

“No thanks to you and your fancy footwork.”

Paul chuckled, but his relief was short-lived. Gladys stormed toward him from an elevator. She was a more leathery version of Chloe: dark and lithe but with an air of unquestioned authority. Paul turned toward her, a dripping, smelly mess. Chloe appeared in the entrance he’d just slid through.

Paul forestalled Gladys’s opening barrage with a raised hand. “Yes, the rats are my fault and we’ll talk about that soon. First, we have a problem that only Chloe can fix.”

Chloe pulled up short. “Me?”

“I need you to coordinate an AI-drone sweep of Skyfield Ranch. There’s no way we found all the rats, but I’m not sending drones out alone to get swarmed. They trust you and I trust you to keep them safe as they search. You’ll need comms, cameras, sonic disruptors...work the details with Sanvi in MCS.”

He turned to the foreman who had leaned against the metal shipping container, thick arms crossed. “Prep more containers for traps and see if you can order a shuttle from our old supplier to deliver ‘em to AAA Feed Solutions. AAA gave us the rats, they can deal with them. Oh, and file a customs complaint against AAA too, would you?”

The foreman grinned and threw a mock salute before turning away and barking orders. Paul drew a deep breath and faced Gladys.

Her glower faded, replaced by a curious expression. Her head cocked slightly to one side. “Good plan. I knew you had a knack for leadership. Thought I’d see it long before now.”

The words should have stung, but Gladys was always blunt. Paul frowned. “I’m not a planner, I’m a plumber. Being the Ops Chief is all about seeing the big picture while managing a million little details every day. Tom was awesome at the job, but I’m not Tom. I’ve been swamped ever since I took over and this” —he waved at the container of rats— “is the result.” Paul sighed and shoved his hands in his pockets. He grimaced as FLF oozed around his fingers. “Plumbing is about crisis management. Find the problem, fix the problem. That’s all I’m doing.”

Gladys nodded. “I came down here to fire you. You’re a horrible Ops Chief.”

Paul snorted. “Agreed.”

“And I’m on the edge of divorcing you.”

Paul’s chest tightened, but he drew a deep breath. “Because I’m bad at job I never wanted? I thought you married me for my rugged charm and dashing good looks. Still got those.” He smiled, but it felt weak.

“Those are nice, but not a reason to keep a man around.” Gladys’s expression remained stern, though her eyes were sad. Her shoulders slumped. “Something has to change, Paul. This” —she pointed between them— “isn’t working.”

Paul’s smile dropped. “Then let me be me, not a shadow of Tom. We can cherish his memory, but let’s make new memories of our own.”

Gladys's gaze took in Paul’s disheveled appearance then settled on his face. He felt in that moment that she finally saw him as him. She nodded. “That’s fair, but you’re still fired.”

Paul’s grin returned. “Thank God!”

Gladys eyed him, uncertainty in her eyes. “What’ll you do now? As you?”

Paul’s heart did a little flip. Was she asking about his next job, or about them? Should he walk away before she divorced him? Could he?

No. He’d never quit on anything in his life. “I think ‘Maintenance Chief’ would fit me better. I like fixing problems, and not just mechanical ones. I want to fix” —he waved a finger between them— “this.”

A warm smile cracked Gladys’s stern demeanor. “Me too.” She drew a deep breath then let it out, her shoulders relaxing. “You’re a good man, Paul. Stubborn, but honest. That’s why I married you.”

“I’m stubborn? Have you looked in the mirror recently?”

Gladys’s smile turned into a smirk then she cocked an eyebrow at the mess around them. “Looks like you’ve got your work cut out for you, Maintenance Chief.”

He nodded, unsurprised at the subject change. “Yup.” Maintenance was largely automated, but that would give Paul a chance to work more closely with the AI drones. Speaking of which... “I’m going to go clean up. Can you meet me in the MCS? We need to talk about the AI drones and I want Chloe in that conversation. The AIs are integral to Skyfield Ranch and it’s time we recognized that.”

Gladys’s eyes narrowed, but she nodded before turning back to the elevator. Paul drew a deep breath. That argument hadn’t gone nearly as badly as he’d expected. There was hope yet.

Skitter had climbed off his perch and waited quietly to one side. Paul knelt and the spider-drone jumped onto his shoulder. He murmured into Paul’s ear.

“Thanks. Not many people stand up for AIs.”

Paul headed for the dock’s decon shower. “Chloe said it best. AIs are people too. You deserve a chance to be whatever you want to be, not what we program you for.”

Skitter seemed to consider this before he said, “So, Maintenance Chief. Let’s talk upgrades. Have you heard about the new X7 processors? Well worth the cost. Oh, and I heard some forklift AIs complaining about overdue tread replacement. They need better traction. Speaking of treads, one of my feet came loose in the chase. Think you could...”

Paul smiled as Skitter’s words rolled over him. He hadn’t chosen an easy job, but it was one he understood. Soon the AIs would be able to choose as well.

Perhaps today wasn’t just another day on the orbital ranch.

It was a new day.