I never thought my job as Chief Engineer aboard the S.S. Nebulon-7 would boil down to one defining moment: fixing a toilet. Not just any toilet, but the only functioning waste disposal unit on a ship carrying 3,000 passengers and crew. And if I didn't fix it in the next hour, we'd be floating through space in what could only be described as a giant sewage balloon.
See, the ship's waste system was linked to the life support system. Some genius in ship design thought, "Hey, let's integrate everything!" because nothing ever goes wrong in space, right? If the waste tanks overflowed, the bio-recycling unit would clog, shutting down air filtration, heating, and - most importantly - gravity stabilizers. That meant in less than sixty minutes, we'd all be suffocating in a zero-G cloud of space poop.
So yeah, no pressure.
I tightened my tool belt, grabbed my hydro-wrench, and stepped into the restroom. The air was thick with a smell that violated several intergalactic treaties. The malfunctioning toilet, or as I was now calling it, "The Brown Hole," gurgled ominously. It was clear this wasn't going to be an easy fix.
I opened the control panel, and immediately, a geyser of fluorescent blue liquid shot straight into my face.
"Gah! Why is it blue?!" I sputtered.
Through my commlink, my assistant Benny chimed in. "Oh yeah, Captain wanted to make the waste system 'less disgusting,' so they added fragrance dyes. That's Space Breeze Blueberry, by the way."
I wiped my face and shuddered. "I hate blueberries."
I tried to reroute the waste pressure, but the system screamed in defiance. Suddenly, the ship lurched. Over the intercom, the Captain's voice boomed, "Uh, Chief Engineer Logan, we just lost 10% of gravity. Any updates?"
"Working on it, Captain," I said, trying to sound like I had control over the situation and not like I was about to be buried under a tsunami of ship-wide regret.
I dug deeper into the pipes. It was a clog - a massive one. A blockage so terrible, so ungodly, that I questioned what people were eating aboard this ship. I activated my scanner and gasped.
"Benny… there's something alive in here."
"What?"
"I mean, it's not moving, but it's…pulsing?"
A horrifying thought hit me. The kitchen had been serving 'Rehydrated Galactic Beans' all week. Combined with the artificial proteins from the cafeteria, I had a sinking suspicion we had accidentally created… a sentient space turd. And it was clogging the system.
The ship lurched again. 30% gravity loss.
I had two options: A) Run and let the ship become a floating nightmare, or B) do the unthinkable. I sighed, reached for my high-powered suction hose, and whispered, "Let's do this."
I fired up the hose and braced myself as the vacuum roared to life. The pipes shook violently. The toilet screamed. A monstrous, gelatinous, semi-sentient waste glob burst forth, sucked straight into containment.
Silence.
Then, the ship's systems flickered back to normal. The intercom crackled. "Logan, gravity is stabilizing. Whatever you did, it worked!"
I collapsed against the wall, drenched in Space Breeze Blueberry and the haunting knowledge of what I had just battled.
Benny chuckled in my ear. "So, what do we do with it now?"
I stared at the containment canister holding the quivering abomination and sighed. "Send it to the science lab. Let's call it an experiment and never, ever, speak of this again."
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why engineers never get the glory - but we do get the best stories.