羊毛战记 Part 3 Casting Off 21

　　21,　　The next morning, Juliette arrived early at her desk having stolen little more than four hours of sleep.,　　Beside her computer, she saw a package waiting for her: a small bundle wrapped in recycled pulppaper and encircled with white electrical ties. She smiled at this last touch and reached into heroveralls for her multi-tool. Pulling out the smallest pick from the tool, she stuck it into the clasp ofone of the electrical ties and slowly pulled the ratcheting device apart, keeping it intact for future use.,　　She remembered the trouble she’d gotten into as a mechanic’s shadow the day she’d been caughtcutting a plastic tie from an electrical board. Walker, already an old crank those decades ago, hadyelled at her for the waste and then shown her how to tease the little clasp loose to preserve the tie forlater use.,　　Years had passed, and when she was much older, she had found herself passing this lesson on toanother shadow named Scottie. He had been a young lad at the time, but she had had a go at himwhen he had made the same careless mistake she once had. She remembered frightening the poor boywhite as a cinder ² block, and he had remained nervous around her for months after. Maybe because ofthat outburst, she had paid him more attention as he continued his training, and eventually, the twohad grown close. He quickly grew up to become a capable young man, a whiz with electronics, ableto program a pump’s timing ³ chip in less time than it took her to break one down and put it backtogether.,　　She loosened the other tie crossing the package and knew the bundle was from him. Several yearsago, Scottie had been recruited by IT and had moved up to the thirties. He had become “too smart forMechanical,” as Knox had put it. Juliette set the two electrical straps ⁴ aside and pictured the youngman preparing this package for her. The request she’d wired down to Mechanical the night beforemust’ve bounced back up to him, and he had spent the night dutifully doing this favor for her.,　　She opened the lid and saw that the package wasn’t just from Scottie—it must’ve been hurried upto him along with a copy of her request. Tears came to her eyes as the smell of Mama Jean’s oatmealand cornflour cookies drifted out. She plucked one, held it to her nose, and breathed deeply. Maybeshe imagined it, but she swore she noted ⁷ a hint of oil or grease emanating ⁸ from the old box—thesmells of home.,　　Juliette folded the wrapping paper carefully and placed the cookies on top. She thought of thepeople she would have to share them with. Marnes, of course, but also Pam in the cafeteria, who hadbeen so nice in helping ⁹ her settle into her new apartment. And Alice, Jahns’s young secretary, whoseeyes had been red with grief for over a week. She pulled the last cookie out and finally spotted ¹⁰ thesmall data drive rattling ¹¹ around in the bottom of the container, a little morsel ¹² baked special by Scottieand hidden among the crumbs ¹³.,　　Juliette grabbed it and set the plastic case aside. She blew into the little metal end of the drive,getting any debris ¹⁴ out, before slotting it into the front of her computer. She wasn’t great withcomputers, but she could navigate ¹⁵ them. You couldn’t do anything in Mechanical without submittinga claim, a report, a request, or some other piece of nonsense. And they were handy for logging in topumps and relays remotely to shut them on or off, see their diagnostics, all of that.,　　Once the light on the drive winked ¹⁶ on, she navigated ¹⁷ to it on her screen. Inside, she found a hostof folders ¹⁹ and files; the little drive must’ve been stuffed to the brim with them. She wondered ifScottie had gotten any sleep at all the night before.,　　At the top of a list of primary folders was a file named “Jules. ” She clicked this one, and uppopped a short text file obviously from Scottie, but noticeably unsigned:,He changed his overalls for a suit.他脱下工装裤，换上了一套西服。,The new technology for the preparation of superfine ferric oxide from pyrite cinder is studied.研究了用硫铁矿烧渣为原料 ，制取超细氧化铁红的新工艺 。