"Which department are you from? How did you get here?" The portly man turned around, squinting his eyes, and looked at Shiller with a disdainful gaze.
"I'm from the medical department." Shiller kept his composure and lied. He needed to know what role this man was playing in the chaos at Aux and, more precisely, whether the pressure he exerted could indeed drive Aux to such madness.
Now, most people interpreted the incident as a disaster caused by a technician who went mad from too much pressure. But in Shiller's view, though Aux certainly felt pressure during his time on the Space Station, it wouldn't be enough to make him this insane. Something must have catalyzed the process, and the fat man before him was a prime suspect.
Shiller wasn't attacking the man for no reason. There were high standards for recruiting staff for the Space Station—after all, it was a global selection with many candidates, so only the best were chosen. Not only were there demands for professional skills but also for appearance and physique.
After all, they were space workers. The better their physical condition, the less medical and other resources they would need. Given that there were ample candidates to choose from, naturally, preference was given to those who were healthy and well-proportioned.
Even setting that aside, the people in charge of selection wouldn't want to send a fat person up there who might be inconvenient to move around. If obesity-related diseases couldn't be treated on the Space Station, it would waste a trip to send them back to Earth. It made more sense not to select them at all.
For the Deputy Chief Engineer before Shiller to be fat, there could only be two reasons. First, he didn't go through the selection process but pulled strings to get up here. Second, he became fat after arriving. Either way, it proved he was up to no good.
Considering that he managed to turn the well-ordered situation left by Ben Parker into such a mess in such a short time, Shiller was beginning to suspect he was a mole.
"Medical department? I haven't seen you in the medical department, and I'm quite familiar with those doctors." The Deputy Chief Engineer stubbed out his cigarette, exhaled a puff of smoke, and then asked, "What do you want with me?"
"I just wanted to ask about Aux's situation," Shiller said, "and why you didn't organize the staff properly when the disaster struck, and why the emergency portal didn't start up as it should have."
Shiller was curious about the former, but he also wanted to know the answer to the latter question. When the staff entered the Space Station, they used the portal. Although not everyone could use it, there was a part of the population with strong magical affinity who entered directly through the portal.
The Space Station had an emergency portal, and there was enough reserve magical energy to start it. But of course, it couldn't be used now because the reserve energy was in the other half of the Space Station that had fallen away.
Before that half fell away, the person in charge had the ability to react and start the portal to send at least a fraction of the people away, ensuring at least five or six more hours of oxygen.
"Why didn't anyone react in time?"
"What nonsense are you spouting?!" The man glared at Shiller fiercely and said, "With such a short amount of time, how could I have possibly reacted?!"
"So you're confirming there's indeed a problem with Aux, right?"
The man's expression froze, but he quickly started cursing loudly, waving his thick, short arms and demanding Shiller get out. Shiller looked at him as one might observe a beast in a zoo, confirming that this guy was just plainly stupid.
He was likely a nepotism case and thus clueless about emergency procedures. He might not even know there was such a thing as an emergency portal. Carrying the title of Deputy Chief Engineer was just to enjoy the privileges without the responsibilities, which explained his behavior today.
But here was the problem: Could such a fool really push Aux to that state?
Shiller knew very well that stupid people can make one angry, but not for very long; eventually, the anger turns to helplessness and amusement—the so-called laughing it off.
People quickly realize that stupid people can't change, so they don't feel much pressure from their words and actions, akin to 'why bother with him when he's like that?'
Those who truly exert unparalleled psychological pressure are always the bad ones, and such a person must be very crafty, beyond criticism by others, making you feel isolated in the environment. That's the key to generating great pressure.
If it's a fool everyone complains about, then others will stand by your side when he makes a mistake, and you'll just feel unlucky, not incompetent.
This Deputy Chief Engineer was very unpleasant, and that was the key reason he couldn't be the one who drove Aux to such extremes. Because he was so unpleasant, people would have sympathized with Aux as the victim and wouldn't have isolated him, so there must be another key figure.
Ben Parker and Natasha soon arrived at the energy core. Natasha took a deep breath and said, "I don't feel that the oxygen is thin here, do you?"
Ben Parker shook his head and said, "I haven't noticed anything special either. Could that hole have been an optical illusion?"
The two of them continued along the corridor, and the lights gradually went out as they walked into the power outage area. Natasha turned on her flashlight, and the dark, long tunnel was still like the gaping maw of the Abyss.
They quickly found the door to the energy core room. Parker pulled out his employee card but found the lock unlit and unresponsive. Natasha asked, "Could the power outage have caused the lock to be without power?"
"How could that be? These locks have their own independent power source; there's a battery inside." Parker resisted explaining the mechanics and simply said, "Otherwise, how would we perform maintenance during a minor power outage?"
"Oh, right," Natasha realized and said, "If the power went out and the locks didn't work, they'd never be fixed."
Parker tried his employee card for a long time to no avail. He shoved the card back into his pocket, set the toolbox down, and began to take apart the door lock with his tools.
After removing the outer casing, he discovered that a section was blackened, suggesting that some crucial component had burned out. Parker shined his flashlight over it again and again before standing upright and saying, "Something is off, the door lock has been tampered with."
Natasha followed the direction he was pointing and looked inside as Parker said, "See that? Above the black marks is the battery. It looks like there might have been a severe short circuit, which damaged the battery, and, naturally, the door lock no longer works."
"Can the battery be replaced?"
"Let me think, the space station uses different security levels for its doors, which means different locks and battery specifications. There definitely should be spare batteries in the storeroom, but it requires someone to fetch them."
After mulling it over, Natasha said, "Aren't they heading to the storage area to ask about the pilot's whereabouts? They could look for a battery on the way."
Parker nodded. He picked up his phone and began to search through his contacts for his colleagues. There was still a signal on the space station, although it was somewhat weak due to a partial power outage, but calls could be made out just barely.
After explaining his situation, he learned that they had found a candidate for the pilot, and they were about to set out for the hangar. Upon hearing Parker's request, they decided to look for a battery before dispatching someone to deliver it on their way.
Soon, the black scientist showed up at the end of the corridor. He called out from inside, and Natasha went over to meet him.
With the battery in hand, Parker replaced it as quickly as possible, and soon the door lock light came on. He reached for his employee card to unlock the door, but just as it was about to unlock, Natasha's expression changed dramatically.
She took a deep breath, then covered the door and said, "No, don't open the door. Oxygen is leaking."
The black scientist said, "I'm also finding it difficult to catch my breath. Is anyone wearing a life-sustaining collar?"
Parker shook his head, but Natasha removed a small lanyard from her belt, explaining, "I'm physically stronger than you guys, and I can last a while even in a vacuum. I took a cosmic environment adaptation wristband from the gear storeroom before coming."
They exchanged glances, finding no better option, and so they nodded in agreement. Both held their breath and gently opened a small crack in the door for Natasha to slip through before immediately sealing it shut again.
Once inside, Natasha turned on her flashlight, but what first caught her attention was not the ruined energy core, but rather the sticky substance smeared across the door frame on the side she had entered through.
She didn't know what it was, so she scraped a bit into the palm of her hand, intending to take it out for them to see later, then circled the energy core and peered at the hole above.
All the oxygen in the room had now been depleted, but the environment was not entirely a vacuum. A vent fan on the other side of the room appeared to still be working hard, and the room beyond the fan seemed to have oxygen, hence a portion of it was spilling out.
Natasha's professional device on her wrist didn't detect any special radiation in the area, and the surroundings outside the three windows were pitch black, with nothing to be seen. Looking up through the hole, she could see a corner of the burned Photovoltaic Integrated Device.
As Natasha was about to take another look around the hole, she suddenly caught sight of a shadow flitting past. If she was not mistaken, it seemed to be a human foot.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
In less than a second, Natasha drew her gun, took aim, and fired three shots. One bullet hit the ceiling, another struck the remains of the Photovoltaic Integrated Device outside, and a third seemed to hit its mark. However, Natasha only heard a muffled groan.
Lucky him, Natasha thought. Her gun wasn't specially made for use in space, so its accuracy and power were reduced, and moreover, it couldn't penetrate the space station's ceiling. Otherwise, by now she would have heard the sound of a humanoid collapsing.
As Natasha peeked over the top with the wreckage of the energy core in her grasp, she didn't see the figure of whoever was shot, but she was certain the last bullet must have hit the ankle.
After some thought, she refrained from rash actions. She holstered her gun, went back to the door, knocked on it, and soon a small opening appeared. She squeezed out, then took a deep breath.
"Is it my imagination, or did I hear gunshots?" asked the black scientist.
"Yes, I saw someone slip past the side of the Photovoltaic Integrated Device. I fired three shots, but only one hit, and he got away," she said.
"How could there be someone?" Parker sounded surprised. "Who would be up there at this time?"
"We'll know when we see who's injured. Gun wounds are easy to identify, you can't just bluff your way past them," Natasha said, looking back inside the door. "Also, I found this stuff. Take a look at what this might be."
The agent opened her palm towards them, showing the sticky gunk she had scraped off the door frame.