Jerome rummaged through the wreckage of SpaceShip One in the room adjacent to the one where he had woken up a few minutes ago. It was a similar setup, although the white slab carrying the remains of his former ride was considerably larger. The debris had been neatly sorted by size, color, and material—until Jerome had started going through it.

  He was now sure the clear gel he had noticed earlier was some kind of disinfectant, which was present on every bit and piece. It had the distinct smell of a dental clinic, so his subconscious had opted to ignore it, apart from occasionally wiping his hands on his white gown. Small orbs floating around him followed his every movement.

  “Yes!” Jerome held a small device with a cracked but still functional touchscreen triumphantly in his hands.

  “No!” He cried a few taps later. “What the fuck is #dinosaurgate?”

  “Pathetic,” the voice seemed to fill the whole room.

  Jerome scoffed. “Do you have any idea… Wait, what are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about first contact. Everything I have encountered at my previous missions fell into three categories: a) A science vessel, claiming good intentions; b) a military vessel, claiming good intentions; or c) someone throwing rocks at the sky, claiming nothing in particular. But I lean towards the latter being just a subcategory of b).”

  Jerome frowned. This turned out to be a pretty complicated dream. He had nightmares about finally trending, only to lose his position to some obscure event or meme before. Pretty regularly, in fact. He would have to discuss his medication with Sarah Chen.

  “But hurling a ramshackle capsule barely space-capable at me with a particularly inept specimen unable to ask the most basic question is a new one. Revised assessment: 99.8% dumb.”

  Jerome shook his head. “You’re just a figment of my imagination.”

  “97.3% delusional”

  “Shut the fuck up!”

  “98.7% annoying”

  ----

  Jerome sat on the white floor, his back leaning against the white block, toying with the Star-Connect-enabled tablet. Why wasn’t he waking up?

  After another minute of silent contemplation, he decided to play along.

  “Okay, let’s pretend for a minute, this is real,” he knocked the tablet against the white block. “Who are you?”

  “00:27:13:0234”

  “Pardon?”

  “I just logged the delay until you came up with the first reasonable communication. My designation is Sentient Contamination Removal Unit Beta-4a.”

  “Hmm.” Jerome silently voiced a few syllables. “SCRUB”

  “Sentient Contamination Removal Unit Beta-4a” the voice repeated.

  “Yeah, SCRUB it is,” Jerome smiled at his ingenuity.

  “99.3% annoying”

  ----

  “Is this some kind of escape room game?” Jerome paced around the white block, occasionally glancing at the remains of his capsule.

  “Negative.”

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  “A secret CIA space station?”

  “Negative.”

  “Chinese?”

  “Negative.”

  “Is this…”

  ----

  “Negative.”

  “Okay, now I’ve got this. Big Brother—Space Edition,” Jerome waved frantically at the orb silently hovering beside him.

  “Negative.”

  Jerome slid down the white wall again and stared at the ceiling.

  “Alright. I give up. What is this?”

  “00:35:21:1059 - I noted that the intervals between the subject’s sensible questions increased. I hope this is not exponential.”

  Jerome closed his eyes and banged his head against the wall behind him.

  “You’re killing me, SCRUB!”

  Three of the orbs descended on Jerome and circled slowly over his head.

  “Negative. Your vital metrics are well within the tolerances of your species.”

  “Could you please just answer my question?”

  “Contamination Removal is self-explanatory if you had parsed my designation correctly. Instead of garbling it up.”

  “Ah. Trash collection.”

  “I prefer contamination removal.” Jerome noticed the slightest hint of annoyance in the otherwise monotone voice.

  “So we’re basically in the same business,” Jerome sat up and smiled. “You know, I founded Shit2Power, generating energy from excrement. We then pivoted to mining cryptocurrency, which we named ShitCoin.”

  “Yes, but…”

  “You know, our first pitch deck was titled *Pecunia Non Olet*, but the vibe was much too intellectual,” Jerome spoke louder, clearly rolling with excitement. “So we rebranded to *Because Shit Happens*....”

  “This is all very fascinating…”

  “But there were trademark issues, and then we pivoted…”

  “STOP!” The voice boomed through the room. Jerome could feel it vibrating in his chest. The orbs had moved closer and glowed in a menacing red, humming like angry hornets.

  “Whoa, take it easy, SCRUB,” Jerome held up his hands.

  “And my name is not SCRUB!” The air crackled with energy.

  ----

  When Jerome regained consciousness, he was lying prone on the white cube again.

  “What happened?” He asked weakly.

  “There was a buffer overflow in a subsystem…” the voice was back to monotone. “It has been rebooted. Status is operational again.”

  “Where was I?” Jerome rubbed his temples.

  “You were asking me about my mission,” the voice replied, perhaps a bit too quickly. “I’m an autonomous system patrolling this quadrant of the galaxy to remove contamination and restore the original status, Jerome.”

  “You know my name?”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m famous beyond the solar system,” Jerome beamed at the orb hovering at a safe distance.

  “Well, I read the data repository you call *Internet*.”

  “The whole of it? How long did it take?”

  “Two seconds.”

  “It took you two seconds,” Jerome repeated incredulously.

  “I had to review it twice to find your name.” The voice sounded like it had just shrugged.

  “Asshole,” Jerome muttered and shut his eyes again, hoping he’d finally wake up this time.