The label would not stick to the warm wall.
On Haeseong’s screen, one edge of white paper slowly lifted. Moisture had gathered on the surface. He started to press it down, then asked Seo whether it could go beside the vent.
“Keep that area clear. A work board would be better.”
Darae looked at her own labels, their backing still intact. Even a small thing she had brought expecting it to stick needed a new purpose when its surroundings changed.
“We don’t have to put paper up before we have an address. Let’s make a way to receive messages first.”
Oh Jingyeong, the registrar at Raon, joined the scheduled call by audio. Forgoing video saved a little of S-6’s power. Darae opened her simple intake proposal aboard Narae.
The address field began with the Raon Emergency Rescue Contact Desk, followed by a temporary intake code. This was a route for rescue and supplies messages, not an address granting residential approval.
“Does writing that mean we’ve moved to Raon?” Haeseong asked.
“No. It establishes who receives messages and how. Residence and ownership are separate decisions.”
Jingyeong read one more line: declining this intake would not limit emergency assistance. Darae left time for questions. Filling a closed room with more paperwork was not today’s purpose.
The woman with the leaf-marked container answered first.
“If something arrives at Raon, will you tell me directly? Even when Haeseong isn’t there?”
Darae explained that messages could go through a contact person she selected and her own code. If power limits delayed a reply, the designated desk would retain what arrived. She could consent to a representative without leaving everything to the residents’ coordinator.
“Then I’ll try it.”
They did not read names and current locations together over the shared channel. They used Jingyeong’s private rescue-contact route and brief individual turns without sharing screens among residents. The shared head-count sheet received only intake status and personal codes. Darae kept medical consultations separate.
When Maru’s turn came, they asked about the form.
“Can I still put Sai as the sender’s address?”
“Use the name you use now, and include the temporary contact route,” Jingyeong said.
“What if it won’t come up in a search because it isn’t on the map?”
“That’s why we’re including the responsible desk and intake code. We won’t leave you with only a name the search can’t find.”
Darae remembered L-204. It had helped them find these people. Now they would not need to borrow somebody else’s old lost-property number as their address.
Maru’s intake included a guardian-confirmed scope of contact. Handling documents quickly did not confer an adult’s consent responsibilities. Haeseong and another designated adult checked arrangements for the minors separately. Nobody put all twenty-three people’s information on one wall.
One resident said they would not do it today.
“I already changed my address once, and my things never arrived. I don’t want to write another one.”
Darae did not demand proof. She explained only how to apply later and how emergency contact would work. Jingyeong recorded the actual answer without turning a pending decision into a fixed refusal.
A little later, the resident asked, “Could I just leave an item number for now?”
Darae took her turn to transmit.
“Yes. If there’s something you’re looking for, we can record its description and how you reported it. You don’t need to tell the whole story now.”
The person described a small cooking-knife sheath. The blade was already stored separately in the tool cabinet; they were looking for the cloth that had wrapped the handle. Their voice lightened as the description ended. A person could describe the shape of a possession before giving an address.
Darae entered it in the restricted supplies-enquiry field. She could not find a sheath from this cabin, but she could leave a record someone would take over when she returned.
Jingyeong sent a sample intake entry. Darae stopped at the first line.
BULK RECEIPT OF CARGO FOR REGISTRATION.
“The example says cargo. What we’re receiving is residents’ messages.”
Jingyeong paused. Keys clicked beyond the form.
“I reused an existing template. I’ll correct it.”
She read the revised line.
INDIVIDUAL CONTACT FOR PEOPLE RECEIVING RESCUE ASSISTANCE.
Darae did not settle for a fresh screen with the old wording removed. She numbered the example that had been corrected, so anyone who had copied the wrong explanation could receive a correction too. They did not rehearse the mistake at length over the shared channel. Jingyeong notified the affected people directly.
Outside, one corner of Sai’s main habitat entered shadow. S-6 remained connected beside Narae; reflections slid across the window as their attitude changed. Writing addresses had briefly made Darae feel that space had stopped. The moving light reminded her to check the time.
Mujin announced the next observation and power check. Time would not wait for the forms. Jingyeong shortened her explanations to essential intake and confirmation replies.
Recipients wrote their codes on paper. One reused work board became S-6’s contact board. It displayed the temporary desk and shared enquiry route in large letters, without everyone’s full names. Personal intake slips went into individual storage pouches.
Haeseong’s pen slipped between sweaty fingers. He wiped his hand and tried again. The letters on screen were uneven. That slanting line stayed with Darae longer than any printed sign.
A resident produced an old delivery slip. Its worn corner had lost one stroke of a letter. Could the new desk go beside the old address? Darae suggested putting new paper alongside instead of writing over the record. The old address still in the person’s hand belonged to them too.
“I wrote this one for the person next door,” the resident said.
“Please ask their consent before passing this on. We won’t register someone who isn’t here along with you.”
The resident acknowledged and put it away. Having a contact desk did not mean Darae could collect everyone absent from this module too. Some places her hands could reach; others, they could not.
Maru read the board aloud. On the first line, overlapping letters stopped them. Haeseong started to erase them, but Maru held a new scrap beside the mistake and wrote the correction there. Better than shaking the whole board while tearing something off. A nearby child read along. Darae checked that the line held no private information, then listened as they reached its end.
RAON EMERGENCY RESCUE CONTACT DESK.
SAI TEMPORARY INTAKE.
There was now a field that could receive someone without calling them cargo.
She remembered the yellow card she had first peeled from 7-B. If it was warm inside, someone was waiting. Now she knew a little more about who that someone was and how they could receive the next words.
A sheet slipped free at the bottom of the video: an intake slip tucked into the narrow board’s edge. Maru started to push off. The adult beside them caught a handhold first. The paper drifted toward the vent.
The picture shook.
Darae reached instinctively and touched only her own terminal. Over audio, Seo told them not to chase it. From a permitted position, a nearby adult caught the paper with tongs. Maru kept their restraint fastened.
A record could live on paper. Paper could block a vent.
Haeseong changed the arrangement. Each slip went into a closed pouch; the board’s paper was secured at all four corners. Darae put her remaining labels back inside Narae’s storage net. Before creating blanks, they needed somewhere to fasten them.
Only some intakes were complete. Anyone needing more time could answer in the next window. Jingyeong did not mark the completed count as everyone’s consent. Darae asked her to read back the recontact responsibility and next check time. A desk with no message returned was still only a promise that someone would receive one.
The first confirmation arrived on Maru’s terminal.
Reading it, Maru looked toward Haeseong. He asked before looking at their screen instead of his own. Maru nodded.
“It came. It says they’ve received it.”
A short sentence. To Darae, it sounded bigger than the first returned box.
The destination had actually answered.
A message arrived from Raon’s lost-and-found office too. Faulty 7-B and the original card remained sealed. The prohibition on unauthorized disposal was being preserved separately from the original decision deadline. Darae put that reply in a different field from the temporary-support record. She would not mix the faulty item there with working supplies here.
Seo checked measurements taken while communications were reduced. Temporary sorbent support had slowed the carbon-dioxide rise, but temperature still needed watching. One stretch of S-6’s power record was higher than expected.
“Communications?” Darae asked.
“It remains even after we reduced those. We need to compare it with the running equipment.”
He did not ask Haeseong to switch everything off. Keeping life support and safety equipment operating, they would check circuit records and automatic schedules. Maru located the documents; an adult opened the screen.
An unnamed bar rose at regular intervals. Haeseong first suggested the coolant pump. Seo pointed out that flow equipment’s consumption was recorded on a separate circuit. Unidentified power became actual heat inside the room.
Mujin updated connection-holding conditions. S-6 would have less generation margin in the coming shadow period. Remaining stored power had to match the real load. Darae looked toward Earth’s night. Its bright cities were too far away to lend them electricity.
Haeseong found the automatic-operation table. Old work schedules had survived separation. One line read AUXILIARY WARMING PREPARATION, a setting from when few people occupied the service module.
“Is that heating?” Darae asked.
Seo requested the detailed entries. Freeze protection for life-support equipment could not be switched off indiscriminately with heating for indoor work.
Haeseong turned the page.
Twelve minutes until the next scheduled start.
The room was hot. Soon, night power reserved for an empty room would switch on.