SILO 49: DEEP DARK

Part Two of the Silo 49 Trilogy

A Wool Universe Series

by Ann Christy

Author’s Foreword

This series has been written primarily for readers already familiar with the world of WOOL, that delicious dystopia created by Hugh Howey. While I’ve tried to make it accessible and enjoyable for readers who have not yet plunged into WOOL, much of what happens may not be understood in context unless one knows of the dark depths of the Silo world.

I’ll be honest, I was terrified when I clicked ‘okay’ and uploaded the first story, Silo 49: Going Dark. While I did disclose that I’m an amateur more comfortable with my field of science than writing fiction, that didn’t stop me from hoping like mad that you, the readers, would like it. That most of you did delights me in ways I just can’t describe.

This second book delves more deeply into the changes in our silo and the way they have evolved culturally in the generations that they’ve been on their own. And there is the story, of course. It’s a longer work. I’m not sure if that is a good or a bad thing. Let’s just say that I made it as short as I could, chopping out an “extra” 16,000+ words before calling it done.

With many thanks to Hugh Howey for his generous permission to publish this series set in his world of WOOL and the Silos and with affection for my fellow WOOLians, Ann Christy

The Ten Tenets

1) We are different. We are the good.

2) All Conduct Above the Rails

3) What those within the silo need, the silo has provided

4) Nothing Wasted, Nothing Lost

5) Life is for Giving

6) Always Be Prepared

7) Reason is always the better choice.

8) One day we will reclaim the Outside

9) The Others are still out there

10) Thoughts are the bedrock upon which the silo rests.

Prologue

Wallis tossed down the book in frustration and pointed his finger at Grace. Eyes narrowed in skepticism, he asked, “Are you getting rid of those colors because you don’t like them or do you have some actual logic here?”

“Honestly, Wallis! Why do you always have to be so contrary?” She picked up the book he had just tossed down and turned pages rapidly. She knew exactly what she was looking for so it didn’t take long. They had both been pouring through his journals since Graham died, but Grace was the one who always seemed to know where to find specifics. She found the passage she sought and turned it for Wallis to read, a finger pointed at the line.

With a sigh that told Grace she had already won, Wallis peered at the page and read.

‘Gold. Really? Gold? What’s that? And silver? What possible purpose does it serve to have the most difficult cloth to work with, repair or clean be reserved for a select few if not to set them apart? Sure, red and green and gray and all the others identify people but don’t set them apart in the same way. Silver and gold are boasting and intimidating and probably meant that way. Plus, they are ridiculously uncomfortable. I feel like I’ve got a piece of plastic stuck to my balls whenever I wear them. I’d ditch them if I could and make the colors match the rest of the work groups. Probably gray for IT and tan for the other.’

When he finished reading, Wallis sighed again. He looked at Grace, her face one that was quickly becoming essential to his daily happiness. He gave a grin of surrender when he saw her lips lift in victory. “Okay,” he said, touching her fingers as he let the book go, “I see the point. But now I have to get new coveralls.”

Grace pinched the odd fabric in her fingers and teased, “You just like wearing gold.”

“Yeah, yeah. You won already, so let’s not rub it in.” He picked up the pages full of lists they had been going down, designing and deciding as they went using Graham’s words as their guide. It would be a whole new silo once the “Great Forgetting” was started and complete. He put a careful check-mark next to Grace’s neat script. “Okay, coveralls are done. Next, it looks like we’ve got identification, communications and government.” He made a sound of disgust and asked, “Can’t we pick something less dreary for the next one?”

She gave him a level look, all her humor gone. “Whatever we do now will be what everyone after us will live with and build upon. We owe them to get the basics correct or else who knows what the silo will be like in a hundred years.” She nodded at the list and said, “Pick one.”

He hung his head a little and studied the list for a moment. “I would pick one but I think we have to settle the whole IT issue. Everything before led to IT. We should figure out where all those loose ends will go now that we don’t have the other silos and IT controlling us.”

“That does make sense.”

“So, what do we do about the whole IT thing?” Wallis asked.

“Well, I have some ideas about that, too.”

Chapter One

Marina looked up as a knock sounded at her door but made no move to answer. Instead, she looked back at the delicate work in her hands. It was at a crucial point in assembly and she sighed in annoyance. Even the act of sighing was carefully done, the stream of air directed away from the work.

“Just a moment,” she called out.

One final and almost invisibly small twist of the tool in her hand and the part was set. No matter how many times she finished any repair, these moments when some stage was complete always brought a certain sense of satisfaction. She set a tiny blue marker in place to remind her of what she had last done. Leaning back, she gave it one more measuring glance and ensured all was properly done.

The component hung snugly in a clamp above the workbench surface. The open top revealed a complicated geometry of boards and traceries of dull metal, all bristling with wires of the smallest gauges. Each wire was colorfully rendered in the coatings that identified their purpose. She tapped her magnifiers and the lenses lifted on slim metal arms to stand above her head like the antenna of some strange, human sized insect.

Marina groaned as she stood, her back giving a loud pop in the quiet room. The feeling of muscles held too long in one position stretching free was a good sort of pain and she certainly didn’t mind it. She opened the door just wide enough to frame her face and peered out, her eyes blinking myopically from too much time behind strong magnifiers. The lenses standing above the mass of her curly hair seemed to peer just as myopically.

A porter with a bulky bundle strapped to his back smiled at her from the hall and said, “Hey, Marina. Good to see you again. I’ve got the load from Level 50 for you. From the reclamation?”

It took her a moment but his wide smile was familiar and it eventually placed him in her memory. This was the same boy who had brought her the load from Level 25 just two weeks previously. She smiled then, forgetting her annoyance, and dipped her head quickly out the door to look left and right.

The lights that flashed to indicate someone was using the buffer doors were out so she eased the door open wide, grabbed her flask and slipped out into the hallway with the young man. She closed the door just as gently as she had opened it to minimize any breeze upon her small pieces and parts inside.

Turning to the boy, she saw the sheen of sweat on his face and the darker edges of sweat dampened cloth on the kerchief tied about his neck. She squinted up at him, her eyes still adjusting, and said, “You didn’t need to run, you know. How about a cup of something besides water?”

The boy licked his lips and smiled his wide, young smile, “That would be good. Porting is thirsty work.”

Marina led the way to the buffer door that brought them to the main hallway in this part of Level 99. She held the first door open for the young man, whose name still had not appeared in her mind, before she entered the buffer chamber herself and yanked down the lever that sealed them in. By habit she looked out the thick window, scratched and cloudy from countless years of use. The way was clear so she lifted the opposing lever and opened the second door. Her ears popped and she saw the porter work his jaw as his did the same.

Marina felt that pop as a relief, an indicator of the end of a work day and a signal to go home. It was much the same as the stretch of stiff muscles at her bench. The boy didn’t seem to enjoy it as much given the way he screwed up his face.

Again, she held the door for him and closed it behind them, slamming the lever home. The clank of metal on metal echoed along the deserted hallway, featureless save for more closed doors, worn tile and scuffed walls.

Marina walked briskly down the hall till she reached the Reclamation Room hastily converted for this project. Her project. It was one she didn’t relish doing but it was necessary. She was glad that she had brought the problem Up-Silo but that didn’t change the fact that this was a burden she’d rather not have now that the doing was required.

There was no need for caution against the ever present hallway breezes here so she opened the door without hesitation. She motioned for the porter to enter and gave a general wave toward the workbench so he would know where to put his load. He grunted a little as he eased the burden from his back and onto the cleared workbench. He withdrew some papers from the front pocket of his coveralls and smoothed the folds before handing them to her.

She glanced at the sheets, a little limp from the heat and sweat of the porter’s body, and set them aside to take two cups from a deep shelf. She poured him a cup and said, “Tea, fresh from this morning. Drink up. Have a seat.”

The boy took the cup eagerly and plopped into the only available chair. Marina suddenly remembered his name was Jason. She also remembered he was twenty or somewhere thereabouts and in love with a girl in Mechanical, which was why he always wanted to take loads to the Down Deep.

She did try to remember these details about people. Her husband had an uncanny knack for it but she found that it just wasn’t natural to her. She was more of a machine person, if she was honest about it, but she’d seen the reactions he got when he addressed people in personal ways. So she tried.

She sipped her tea as he gulped his down. He smacked his lips and accepted a refill, this time matching her sip with one of his own.

“That’s good. Nice and sweet. Thank you,” Jason said.

Marina could see he meant it sincerely. She wondered, not for the first time, if the porters liked her because of these little niceties. Not everyone showed the same courtesy. She knew some of her co-workers grumbled over the need to pay chits for far too little news or the way the porters always seemed to have more to tell than they did. Marina liked things to be regular and predictable so she never indulged in the news-for-money game. All news came around eventually. So, she always gave a modest tip, a cup of tea and a few moments rest whether they had news to share or not.

“You’re very welcome,” she said and returned his smile. She pulled the lens contraption from her head and laid it on the workbench with a relieved sigh. Her curly hair, once dark and now beginning to show a bit of gray, held a pronounced dent all the way around her head that she knew looked rather comical. When Jason looked up and made a face very close to a laugh, she patted it down and tucked the strays into the band of her ponytail.

The big pack full of boxes on her workbench kept luring her gaze away from the business at hand. She rubbed at the two irritated spots on either side of her forehead before she asked, “How did the collection go?”

He looked confused for a moment until Marina’s eye flicked toward the bundle. Then he shrugged. “I wasn’t there for that. It’s not my floor, but one of the porter shadows I know lives there. He said his mom cried when she gave up her ring.” He shrugged again. “I think that’s about it, though. It will make people sad but what can you do?”

Marina nodded, relieved that the only obvious impact was a few tears. She had feared worse. What might be included in this ‘worse’ option had even been discussed during the planning stages of the reclamation. A recurring discussion surrounding the possible consequences had almost toppled the effort. In the end, the council had decided the risk was worth it and passed the Reclamation Resolution. The alternative had been unacceptable and therefore, almost any risk was worth it.

“That’s good. I mean, it’s not good to make anyone cry, of course,” she clarified as she picked up her tea again and sipped. “But it’s good that people understand and are going along with it.”

Jason studied his cup and replied, “What else can they do? It’s not like we don’t all know the reason and the need.”

Marina reached over the workbench and patted the side of the bulky package, “And this will go a long way to filling that need, I hope.”

“Thank you again for the tea. I’ve got two more small deliveries to 120 and 135, so I’ve got to hit the treads,” Jason said, patting a bulging pocket on his thigh. “I like picking up and delivering to this level, though. The air, you know.” He said this as if Marina would understand his reference.

Marina’s brow crinkled and she sniffed without thinking about it. “The air? What about it?”

“Well,” he said, drawing the word out as he considered his response. “It’s very still. It smells of very few things and the air is quiet, like it can’t carry sounds very well or something.” He spread his hands in surrender, apparently giving up on the description.

“Huh,” she grunted and then leaned back a little on her stool to listen and test the air. She thought she felt what he was describing. “I think I know what you mean. It is sort of like that. But it’s not hard to figure out why.”

“Then why is it like that?” he asked, genuinely interested. Many porters went into that line of work because it was physical. It was a job full of motion and not a lot of thought. Others went into it because their curiosity spanned the silo and the idea of settling on one profession was simply too much to commit to. Jason seemed like one of the latter sort to Marina.

She thought he was a rather bright young man. The image of her daughter flashed through her mind and she couldn’t help but wonder if he was still in love. He was quite good looking. Tall, too. She brushed the thought away and answered him. “The buffer doors are probably the main reason. It keeps the breeze that flows throughout the silo at bay and the way the air is passed through means there is different pressure on each side of the buffer doors. That’s because of fire and gasses. Safety, you know. We use a lot of heat and chemicals on this level.”

She paused and tasted the air, recognizing for the first time in a long time the peculiar absence of life in it. “Also, there’s not much evidence of people in the air here. It is very clean.”

Jason nodded. “It’s a nice change once in a while for me. I get to smell everything.” His nose wrinkled at some remembered smell she guessed was not at all to his liking.

Marina laughed and tried to remember what it was like to be so young and full of life.

Adjusting his kerchief, Jason rose and handed Marina his cup. “One more for the stairs?”

Chapter Two

After the business was done and Jason had drunk his fill of tea, Marina bid him goodbye. His bulky pack had been replaced with just the wrapping and cords and he seemed far less burdened as he hurried down the hall. No doubt he was hurrying to catch some time with his girl while he could.

She closed and twisted the latch on the door, knowing the “In Use” label would roll into sight on the other side as the deadbolt spun home. She stretched her arms and neck out, taking the time to enjoy the sensation before she pulled the first of the larger boxes toward her and perched on her stool to work. She brought out the log book, pen and ink pot to record the contents and then gently broke the seal on the first of the four large boxes. She put each fragment of the broken seal into a cup to be melted and used again.

Inside the large box, smaller boxes were fitted like concrete blocks into a wall. It was a perfect bit of order, rows of squares inside another square — orderly. Even things like that were soothing to her and she ran her hand across the tops of the boxes, liking the feeling of so many straight lines.

These little boxes were used inside stronger boxes so delicate parts that would tolerate no undue jostling would arrive intact at their destination. They were generally hated by the porters. The first rule of porting was to reduce weight and the second to reduce bulk. This method of packing broke both the rules but was often necessary for the type of work done down here in Fabrication, Reclamation and Repair.

Once the resolution had passed and the details hammered out, Marina had argued to the council that it would be better not to treat the treasures silo residents sacrificed to the reclamation poorly.  She had argued that showing respect for what these things were and keeping them orderly so that the gift could be recorded was a key element to a successful reclamation.

She selected one of the small boxes and opened it to find a simple silver ring inside. It had the smooth, worn look of a wedding band worn for a long time, perhaps generations. The slip of paper that provided information about the item so that it could be recorded was folded neatly beneath it. She pulled out the ring, weighed and then tested it for purity so that it could be sorted to the correct bin.

Marina recorded the facts in the log book, with specifics on the weight and purity as well as the previous owner. She dropped it with a musical plink into one of the small bins arranged neatly along the back of the bench. It was an excellent quality ring and would bring a good yield of pure silver by weight.

That was good and made for an auspicious start. That ring alone could provide a few dozen contact points for simple switches or enough silver to trace a couple of average sized boards. Given that there were 144 levels in the silo and each level had hundreds, or even thousands, of such boards and switches, one ring seemed a small thing. Still, it was silver and that was good.

It didn’t take much silver, but it did take some silver for almost anything that dealt with electricity. IT used the bulk of it for their parts and contacts and mysterious IT things. She supposed her people, the Fabricators, used the next largest amount.

Her work group filled the gap between exclusive IT things and bulky mechanical things. Though Marina made many things for IT, mostly generic things that could go into any computer, she also made the smallest of switches, contacts and control boards for Mechanical and every other floor of the silo. These were used in everything from air handling to pumps to the timers for the lights in the dirt farms. Fabbers, as those in Marina’s profession were called, were essential to everyone. So when Marina had brought the problem she discovered Up-Silo, they had listened.

The problem was the disappearance of silver. The tiny amounts of silver that were used in each connection added up when taken altogether. Unlike most other things, silver was often lost rather than recycled. No one had seemed to understand the problem at first and no amount of explaining seemed make the problem sink in for them. Instead, she had received rather extensive lectures on the importance of properly recycling the metal.

Eventually, frustrated at their lack of understanding, she had found a way to demonstrate it for them using the paint on the walls of the little conference room they sat in. It was dim and drab and hadn’t been refreshed in a long time. Where countless rubs of chair backs had worn away the paint, faint traces of older paint could be seen. She had pointed to a spot nearby and asked them, “Where did the paint go? Can you reclaim it?”

She’d gone on, telling them that each flick of a switch, each turn of a knob or rotation on a timer took off the barest bit of silver. It was invisible and insignificant when taken alone, but eventually the silver was worn away and gone forever. And there was no silver coming up from the mines. It just wasn’t there for anyone to mine out. And to top it off, the ingots preserved in the vaults beneath Supply were running dangerously low.

Her thoughts returned to the present as she slipped a delicate chain out of a box. She grimaced at the destruction of such beauty for such a slight gain of silver. Sighing, she looked over the table, now littered with reclaimed goods, and murmured, “Well, I guess this is the silo mine now.”

She went on opening box after box until the first of the transport boxes was empty and then rose up on her toes to look into the bins. She was sorely disappointed to see the bins reserved for the highest silver content contained the least number of items. Items with just a silver coating seemed to make up the bulk of the goods and many of those were worn down to bare metal in places. The last pile, made up of items replaced into the original boxes and set aside, was disappointingly large. These items should have never been turned in at all, obviously made of steel or base metal or even copper.

The unsuitable items would be returned to the original owners, just as she had done during the first delivery from Level 25. Marina wondered what the yield would be from Level 75, which was next on the reclamation list, or Level 100 and 125.

She hoped these slim pickings weren’t a sign of things to come. She needed to build up a large stock of silver so they could plan for the future and pack the silver vault with a few more layers of the metal.

She finished up the items that would be returned. In each box, the slip of paper now bore her signature and a line explaining the reason for her rejection of the item. Perhaps she should ensure that word was put out at the next reclamation for people to try to only send silver and to have no fear if they have nothing to offer. It was a waste of resources to port these boxes down and then back up, sorting them again and again before finally returning them to their starting point.

She broke for lunch, heading toward the workroom where she’d left her satchel, her stomach rumbling loudly in the quiet hallway. A shadow might have run on young and strong legs and brought her back a nice hot lunch, but she had none to do that at the moment. There had been a few eager youngsters who wanted to shadow for her in recent years but so far none had seemed like the right fit.

In the years since her last shadow had been deemed qualified and taken his place in a fabrication room just doors away from her own, there hadn’t been one that struck Marina in the same way he had. And shadows were needed so badly everywhere that she passed each up and recommended them to someone she thought a good match.

She continued to wait for the right girl or boy as each month went by and more children grew up and chose their professions.  But on days like today, when each of her forty years of life made themselves known in her joints, she wished she wasn’t quite so picky. A shadow just right for her was no doubt even now playing in a schoolroom somewhere.

For today, it was a shadowless Marina and a room temperature meal packed for her at breakfast that would have to do. Even her tea was almost gone and all she had other than the last dregs in her flask was an old water bottle. She couldn’t even remember when it had last been filled. After an experimental sniff and hesitant taste, she drank. It was stale and flat but drinkable.

She chewed thoughtfully on a sandwich, wide wedges of flat amaranth bread smeared with peanut butter, and thought about the boxes and their varied contents. She considered how many more of these deliveries she would have. At least one for every level and probably more than one load for levels thick with residences could be counted on.

Levels dedicated primarily to an activity and having few living spaces would bring scant hauls, she supposed. She hoped it was less scant that what she had unpacked so far from Level 50. Even so, every scrap counted.

While she munched on a small cucumber she’d managed to wrangle from the cafeteria worker, Marina wondered why the mines didn’t provide silver and where the silver they used now originally came from. Did the mines once provide it?

When she first realized there might be a problem she had taken a full week of time for a special project and gone to the main administration offices of the Down Deep to research. She then trekked back up to confirm her findings with Supply and finally, to the mids for a last confirmation at the Comptroller’s office.

No one at any of the places she’d visited knew where the silver originated. It was a silo mystery but the answer she’d received at all three places was the same one used to explain all such questions. What those within the silo need, the silo has provided. It also happened to be the third tenet and an easy answer rather than, perhaps, the correct one.

It could mean the item was brought in by the First People when the silo called them inside from the wilderness and away from the dangers of the Others outside. It could mean that the silo provided it once in some other fashion and expected it to last. It could mean anything depending on who you asked.

Lunch finished, Marina reigned in her wandering thoughts and directed them back toward the unfinished project on her bench. She purposefully focused on the detailed work that needed to be done and the hours passed swiftly. The comforting hum of her work lamp kept her company. The even tone was punctuated only by the tiny sounds of a snipped wire or the brief hiss of a soldering iron. She loved this part of her work.

When she had finally completed the repairs she snapped the lid closed, rubbed out the initials of the last person to repair the piece and marked her own in their stead. As she rubbed the ink from her fingers she realized she didn’t know the person those initials belonged to. She mused that one day someone who wouldn’t know her name would do the same until she too had disappeared from the silo, one set of initials at a time.

She gathered her things and left, locking the door behind her. The work room was hers alone and would be untouched till she returned. It was not shared between a day and a night shift as it might have been long ago. Some of the rooms were empty all the time or were used as an extra room for special projects by senior Fabbers. If one simply counted the name slots next to each workroom door it could probably have provided jobs for three times their current number. But having that many people was in the long past, if it had even been so. Marina had her doubts about that.

One of the oldest of the fabbers actually lived in the room across from his workroom, but he was the only one who did such a thing. It had been more than once that she encountered him returning from his pre-shift ablutions in the bathroom meant to serve this entire section of workers. He was no longer capable of making much progress on the stairs and the shadows on this level took turns bringing his meals and taking his laundry.

He seemed very happy with his living situation and had the break room all to himself most of the time. He wrote poetry when it was quiet during the dim time, though he had yet to show it to anyone that Marina was aware of. He didn’t look like a poet to Marina. Weren’t all poets young, earnest and in love or freshly heartbroken from having been in love?

Would she do that at some point in her future? Would she one day just decide she could not take the stairs up to her compartment and send for a bed instead? She still had a husband and a teenager at home for now, but who knew what the future might hold. She very much doubted there would be poetry though. That bored her. It was strange to feel so old that this could be contemplated yet still be young enough to have a sixteen year old girl who needed her parents.

Marina pocketed her keys and checked the time on the clock in the hallway. She was surprised to find it was not as late as it felt. It was, in fact, more than an hour until her regular shift should end. Her sense of time was normally quite good and she usually stepped out of her workspace each day within a small fifteen minute window of time. She considered turning around and starting the next project on her work list but that would mean leaving it barely started.

She tapped her foot in annoyance, the sound echoing through the hallway and bouncing back from the metal buffer doors at either end. She decided instead to catalog a bit more of the delivery before going home. Her husband and daughter were working their own shift for another two hours and then they would have to make the descent from the deputy station to their compartment twenty-five levels below unless they happened to be on a call somewhere closer. She could easily travel up four levels and still have a meal prepared for them by the time they got to the compartment, even if she worked late.

The Reclamation Room was cool and comfortable. The air smelled clean and vaguely like cardboard. It was far more noticeable after the hours breathing solder fumes in her workroom. After what the porter had said earlier, she appreciated it anew.

She dumped her things on the chair, opened the second of the large boxes and began to work. It was a better haul than the previous box even after completing only the first layer of smaller boxes. Nothing needed to be returned and a few pieces would provide excellent yields of pure silver. One was a heavy bracelet worked with exquisite flowers and another was a heavy silver chain that had completely filled the smaller box to the rim.

When she pulled up the first box of the second layer she thought she had found another chain because of the weight. When she opened it, she looked down and had no idea what the object was. It was so beautiful that she sucked in a short loud breath that broke the quiet of the room. Hesitant about touching the object, she instead pulled out the slip of paper tucked in beside it and read the neat and very precise writing.

Genevieve Hardi

Floor 50 — Section 3 — Compartment 4

Pocket Watch (It belonged to my husband, now deceased. It belonged to one of his parents before him and a parent before and so on, I think. It doesn’t work but I know it is silver.)

“Pocket watch,” Marina said softly into the empty room.

She had no idea what that might mean. Watches were timepieces that could be worn, though she knew of none other than those displayed in the Memoriam. And she certainly didn’t know of any that might be owned by an individual.

She assumed a pocket watch must be a time piece made just for pockets. She eased the heavy piece out of the box and examined it carefully under the task light. It didn’t appear to be a clock at first glance but then she saw a tiny button protruding from the side and pressed it with a fingertip. One side of the round object flew open in her hand and inside she saw the face of a clock, beautifully rendered with Xs, Vs and Is instead of numbers.

In fancy script on the face she read the word ‘Waltham’. Perhaps that is who the object belonged to or perhaps it was like the names she found in obscure places on many of the parts she worked on. Names like General Dynamic, Westinghouse and Intel she found on parts for no apparent reason.

Whatever the purpose of the fancy script on this clock, the effect was beautiful. She clicked the silver lid closed again and examined the watch case. On the side facing her was an animal in raised silver of such detail that Marina could not imagine how it was done. Being a worker in fine metals she knew that it had to have been poured into a mold but the detail was staggering. How could one create a mold like this? How much time would it take to carefully sculpt it from wax and then lose nothing in the series of transfers required before ending up with something like this?

She ran her fingers over the animal. It was familiar. It looked a bit like the animals from the children’s books she remembered from her own childhood as well as that of her daughter. It had a similar shape but instead of a round head like a puppy it had stern eyes. Great protrusions came up from the head, forked and then curved into the air above. With the chest thrust forward and a leg raised it looked as if it were about to charge at some foe.

She turned over the watch and found another scene, or perhaps it was a continuation of the scene on the other side. In the foreground was a man and over his arm he had a club of some sort, though it was clearly not a club. The thick end was closest to the man, the opposite of how one might hold a tool. There were tiny nubbins and details on the stick that had purposes invisible to Marina but she could see, even without knowing those details, that it was a weapon. She opened the watch again and turned it around, so that she could see both scenes on the watch together. The man was pointing the stick at the animal and now, with this added detail to consider, she saw how the two scenes came together.

The man was indeed pointing his stick at the animal but Marina saw a small bloom of cloud just above the end of the stick. She frowned at it. To her it looked like smoke from a small fire or that which rose from the end of a soldering iron. She could almost smell the sharp and acrid tang of metal and flux as it met the heat at the end of her iron. Following the line of the club toward the animal, she also saw that something disturbed the even lines of the outthrust chest of the animal. Like the ripples made when dropping a dollop of honey into a cup of tea, there was a tiny depression and small dots of raised silver arrayed around it.

Marina may have been a fabricator and not a medic but she knew a wound when she saw one. She looked at the man again, then back to the animal and saw the whole scene with fresh eyes. That animal wasn’t thrust forward to engage the man but rather it was being killed by him.

She peered at the man’s face. His expression seemed strangely empty. It made the scene darker, more ominous. Whereas before it had seemed strange and beautiful, now it was a cruel representation of one thing taking the life of another. It was no less beautiful, it was just beautiful in a way that made Marina feel bereft.

She put the watch down and rubbed her hands along the thighs of her coveralls, unconsciously wiping away her contact with the violence even as she considered the object. It was also at that moment she noted the small and perfectly round dark spot on the side of the watch opposite the clasp.

Instantly forgetting the dark scene, she took up the watch, peered at it closely under the strong light and found the dark spot to be a tiny hole. Such holes were usually ways to open things for repair. Reaching up, she found that she wasn’t wearing her magnifiers and uttered a mild curse.

She rummaged around in a drawer, loose tools and other debris rattling around on the metal bottom, until she found a handheld magnifier and the small container she sought. Getting a better look at the hole, she tried to see if there was a catch inside but no amount of twisting and turning brought the interior into view.

Abandoning the magnifier, she opened the case and selected one of the smallest of the probes within. Delicate yet quite strong, the probes were able to apply more pressure than their slender tips suggested when applied with exacting precision. They were handy tools but ones that required a deft hand.

Easing the tiny probe tip into the hole, Marina let her eyes lose focus so she could feel anything that might be a catch through the questing tip. At first there was nothing but as she withdrew and then reinserted it she felt something. A bit more adjustment and a tentative test convinced Marina it was the catch she wanted and she held her breath as she applied a steadily increasing pressure.

Just as she was about to give up she felt it give and the seam widened. Probe removed, she eased the back cover open. Something slipped out of the watch and onto the workbench. Marina glanced down at it, a simple round piece of paper and another folded paper, before she returned her focus to the watch.

The entire interior of the watch was revealed and she marveled at its beauty and detail. Tiny gears and springs filled the space with an elegance Marina found entrancing. Some of the works were covered by a plate of brass but what she could see was a marvel of mechanics.

At the top, the misalignment of a single spring drew her eyes and she realized that she could fix that single part if she wanted to. Perhaps that would even make this watch work again. “Huh,” she murmured and laid the watch down carefully to turn to the papers that had fallen from it.

The round paper was shaped like a shallow bowl from being mounted into the depression on the watch’s back cover. She turned it over and nearly dropped it in surprise. It was a mechanical image but unlike any other she had ever seen. All the photographic images she had seen were just arrays of black dots, the size of the dots and their spacing defining the image. For any good picture, one needed an artist to draw it. This image was nothing like that.

The colors were glorious and some of them she had no name for. Two smiling faces peered out at her, both of them young and happy. A third face, that of a puppy, gazed up at the man from the space between the two people.

They were flushed with color, perhaps a bit like Jason’s earlier that day. It reminded Marina of how the children in her class had looked after a field trip to the dirt farms when she was young. The lights there had put red and pink burns on their foreheads, noses and cheeks. Marina’s had peeled later, revealing new and even pinker skin underneath. Other children had not peeled but had burnished gold for a while. Some had sported dark freckles while others had a brownish look similar to what the people in the photo had.

But it wasn’t the people, or even the very strange looking puppy with big sad eyes and floppy ears that truly baffled Marina. It was all that was behind and around them. From the level of their ears to the top of the image was a shade of blue she had never seen before. It was strange and beautiful.

Wisps of white seemed to float through the blue. Marina wasn’t originally from the Down Deep and she knew, even though it had been years since she had stood in front of the view on Level 1, that what she was seeing was the sky. Just like the screen Up Top showed the brown and grey and black of the world outside the silo, this image showed a beautiful blue sky with people smiling beneath it.

There was more, though. Much more. Marina knew what a tree was. There were trees for fruit and other foods at different levels of the silo. In the background of the image and under that blue sky were trees beyond counting and if the size of the people were any judge, they looked as if they were much bigger than any tree in the silo.

And they were outside! This strange image was obviously made outside.

The sudden thought made Marina slap the image down on the bench and look around. That feeling of the silo watching or listening came over her just as it had in her childhood. She sat, stiff and still, on her stool and tried desperately not to think of the outside like that again.

She wondered if she had just said that aloud. If she had, then certainly the silo had heard her already if it really was alive and listening. She waited in silence, half expecting some resonant boom from the walls or a knock on the door by turquoise wearing people ready to take her directly to Remediation. Nothing happened though and the only sound was her breathing and the pounding of her heart in her ears.

She turned the picture over and read the faded lines of script there. ‘Bob and Marilyn Hardicourt, D.C. Honeymoon 2035’. She laid the image down carefully and picked up the folded piece of paper. It was also bent slightly into a bowl shape from being squeezed into the compartment. The paper was very thin and crinkled noisily as she unfolded it. She smoothed the paper cautiously and read the faded blue script.

“Bobby — The one watch you were missing is now yours.

Happy Anniversary.

You remind me, every time I see your face, of the beautiful man who stole my heart when you caught my hat on the hills that windy spring day.

— Marilyn”

Below that and in the border spaces, tiny and cramped writing ran in a circle around the page. It was harder to read and less neat, as if it had been written in a hurry. The ink was black instead of blue and written in a different hand. It was very hard to make out the small words but she rotated the paper around as she read:

‘I’m hiding this for you, Thomas, in hopes that you will find it someday. I don’t know what has happened or where you are, but I can’t find you, my son. Your mother couldn’t last this way. I’m sorry I couldn’t keep her here with us but she was never meant to be underground. There is no sunshine in these silos and this isn’t the way people are meant to live. She jumped. So many have that I hardly know how so many people can still be left inside.  I don’t know what happened save that there was a nuke but now the details are getting away from me. There’s more than that out there. You can watch the world getting eaten away. Nukes don’t do that. I was injured and in the hospital for a time. When I came out, everything had changed and everyone was different. Your mother started to forget things. Everyone did, except me. I ran out of my asthma medicine a few days ago and now I’m forgetting too. I can feel it slipping away. So I’m writing this now, before it’s all gone. Your brother, Garrod, is with me and safe. He doesn’t remember anything now except that I’m his father. He doesn’t even remember his mother and she’s only been gone a week.  I love you. I have always loved you. I will always love you. — Dad (Bob Hardicourt)’

Marina almost stopped breathing as she parsed out the cramped words. Her hands were shaking so badly that the paper crackled, dangerously close to tearing, and she let it go to drift the rest of the way to the surface of the bench.

Chapter Three

The words buzzed around in her head and a sense of unreality surrounded her. Now and then she glanced at the two papers, one face up and the other face down, to ensure they were really there. The fog lifted for a moment at some point and she suddenly realized she had no idea how much time had passed as she sat there absorbed by this inconceivable mystery.

Having no desire to explain anything about her find, she folded the paper carefully and inserted it and the image back into the watch. She closed it tightly, listening to be sure she heard the tiny click of the catch. She put the watch back into its box and put that back into the larger box so it wouldn’t look opened at all. If something happened or someone else came to find the object and the hidden contents, she certainly didn’t want that person to know that she had already seen it.

She put her things away and left the space, operating almost robotically as she made her way out of the fabber sector and toward the main stairwell. She made the trip four levels up without really noticing her surroundings or taking note of those she greeted out of habit along the way. She arrived at her compartment to find that she had very little time before she might expect her family to return home.

Dinner was put together in a hurry but was presentable nonetheless. Working just one level above the Bazaar and within a few levels of other shopping meant that her family enjoyed a varied diet and spent more than they probably should on food. Their assigned cafeterias provided a good breakfast and always packed her take away lunch, a privilege of her work, but she couldn’t remember the last time they ate dinner there aside from fish day. That only came about once every month or two. The family always made a point of being there on time for fish day and ready to feast.

The rest of the time the fresh produce, grains and oils of the market made up the bulk of their meals. The sticky sweetness of thick jams or tart fruits were pleasures they felt worth the expense. Today she made a salad topped with some of the herbed goat cheese her favorite seller set aside for her at the bazaar. To provide some warmth and substance, she quickly warmed a bit of leftover root vegetable stew and corn cakes. She was filling cups with a fresh batch of tea when the door opened and the chatting duo made up of her husband and daughter breezed into the compartment.

Neither of them seemed to notice that Marina was distracted. Sela recited every detail of her day while they ate dinner with only the occasional interruption by Joseph to tone down the stories or add some point of clarification. Marina knew that she smiled in the right places, encouraged at the correct times and asked the appropriate questions, but she couldn’t have recounted even a single thing that was said once the meal was over.

She escaped to their small sitting area and pretended to read a book about learning to knit. As her family washed up the dinner dishes and planned their next day, Marina delved back into her thoughts and the dangerous find she had made.

Part of her was angry that this discovery had been foisted upon her. Though she had no frame of reference, she could only imagine that having such a letter and image would be enough to send her to remediation. It would have to be if expressing curiosity about the outside was enough to be sent for an evaluation at least.

In all her years she had never even heard of such a thing as that image. She knew and remembered the endless array of stories that kids told to each other as they grew up, each one a lesson of consequences or morality. Many of them were entirely fantastical and unbelievable but even those didn’t come close to this horrifying find of hers. It was evidence any eye could see. It was as logical and objective as a Historian’s viewpoint. She turned a page in her knitting book unread as she considered all that she had heard in her life, whether from children’s tales or classes or history.

One of the most commonly whispered stories of the schoolroom was the scary story about the ghostly figure seen wandering across the screen Up Top, forever trying to get back into the silo. There were more about naughty children being squeezed out by the silo walls and into some frightening netherworld. That one had kept Marina from walking too close to a wall for a long time for fear of it happening to her.

There were others but one in particular, from a time when she was old enough to understand the way the world around her operated, tickled at her mind. Someone had jumped from the stairwell and those occurrences, while rare, were a fact of life. It happened. It was sad but people moved on.

After one such jumper had made a particularly bad mess on a section of the stairs any child leaving the mid-level school rooms would encounter, they had been kept after school for what seemed like hours while the remains were dealt with. With nothing to do but wait, the telling of jumper stories was inevitable. Most dealt with a particularly gory jump or a jumper who had survived or some variation on that theme.

One of the stories was different and it told the story of jumpers who fell like water drops sprayed from pipes in hydroponics, one after another. As each jumper passed the levels, the compulsion that made them jump passed from person to person like a disease and more came down from all the levels. To stop the spread, parents had braved the danger and dragged their children, screaming with the need to jump, back to their compartments and tied them down. They had stayed there, some of them starving to death for fear of opening their doors, rather than risk their children wanting to return to the railings and plunge to their deaths.

It was a suitably gory story to satisfy children and Marina had sighed along with the rest as the hidden moral of the story unfolded. The moral was a simple one. When someone jumps, the sadness can spread to others so one must be careful. If you felt the great sadness, you went to remediation so you didn’t hurt others.

Marina had always thought the story was just a story but the note inside the watch made it seem that this story sprang from some past misery. Did that story come from that time? Did jumpers really fall like that? It was a horrible thought. But how long ago that happened was the real question and one she didn’t have any clue to. What she did know was that note was not a part of silo history and that made it far more frightening than any childhood tale.

Silo history was simple and logical. In the time before the silo there were no true humans. Instead, there were violent creatures that looked human but could not think like humans. Those were the Others.

They could not reason and did not have the tenets to guide their actions and wouldn’t have understood them even if they did. As humans came to be in that world, the silo called to them and they made the trek, each one alone and hunted, to the safety of the silo. And for each human that came, the silo bade them bring one thing. For some it was a seed and for others it was an animal and for still others it was knowledge.

Each thing was a part of Silo’s plan and the plan was perfect and when the last human had been made, completed their travels and finally entered the airlock, the silo had closed itself off and the creatures that roamed outside had destroyed each other until nothing alive was left.

Except that it was thought that there might yet be Others hidden in much the same way the humans were hidden. They merely waited for their chance to destroy the humans once again. It was said that when the last Other died, the world would be reborn and humans would emerge from the safe embrace of the silo to reclaim it.

This she had accepted as fact in childhood. It made sense. She had seen the screen Up Top and would never have wanted to endure what she saw beyond the safety of the silo. To go outside was to die. But she had seen for herself, or at least she had seen in the image, that this had not always been the case.

People from this image had once been outside and it had been beautiful. And if they hadn’t lived there, but perhaps only visited it from the safety of the silo, why had the woman jumped? What had made being in the silo so unbearable that people jumped when denied that beautiful world?

The only possibility she could think of was that those people in the image were First People, the ones who were born among the Others and called by the silo. But if that were true, why were they happy? In her imagination, the First People had traveled through a landscape blasted by dust and terrible to see. Her mind’s eye saw them struggling against that landscape and arriving at the airlock thankful and knowing they were saved.

She had certainly never imagined a beautiful world with clear skies spread wide and blue over a world of rich, abundant green. That image didn’t look like it showed people trying desperately to escape from Others. It looked more like the world promised to humanity once the Others were gone.

But the tenets of the silo were clear in terms of truth. All Conduct Above The Rails was more than just an edict on conducting honest business. It meant being truthful and honest with everyone and to not hurt others. It meant to consider the effects of one’s actions. It was more than a simple saying. It was a way of life. And if the silo history wasn’t truthful, was it because it was mistaken or because it was a lie? One was hard to imagine and the other impossible to accept.

She turned another page and realized that she knew deep in her heart the evidence she’d seen wasn’t wrong. She had no idea what a nuke was but clearly it was something devastating and it had made all the people from outside come into the silo so it could take care of them. She also knew in her heart that it had been a terrible change for some of them which meant that the silo had not been a perfect ideal place after all.

She snuck a glance at her family. Her husband and daughter were engaged in a game at the table as they chatted and didn’t seem to notice her preoccupied state. She returned to her book and then broached with herself the only real topic she needed to consider. What was she was going to do about her find? She couldn’t return the object and say it wasn’t usable because it would be far too easy to be caught in such a lie. Anyone finding the hidden catch would open it and know exactly why she had returned it.

She could destroy the image and the note by burning them in her work room. She could shred the paper and a touch of her soldering iron at the highest setting would set it ablaze. That was surely the safest thing to do, and probably the smartest, but she shrunk from the idea of actually doing it. It might be the only such letter and image in existence and she could not be the one to snuff them away forever.

What she really wanted to do was to find out the truth. She knew exactly where she might start too. A visit to the person who sent it in for reclamation would be a good place to start. She wasn’t sure how she might go about making the visit seem practical and not raise too much attention, but she was sure she could come up with something.

She might say that some of the things sent in still had use in them or even that she wanted to ensure she was not ruining something of importance. That was thin but it might work. She didn’t think she could resist doing this, even as she knew she should do exactly that.

If she closed her eyes she could see that image again. She had to know if the world in that image had really existed, that it really was once a place where people had lived happily and not just run from to get here.

And if that was the truth, what had happened?

Chapter Four

Less than a seven-day had passed when Marina, accompanied by her family, found herself climbing the stairs upward at the start of their holiday. It had been surprisingly easy to get started on her secret investigation of the hidden contents of the watch. As she unpacked and catalogued the rest of the items from Level 50, she found other curious objects, some of which had no purpose she could fathom. What had been clear is that they were fashioned with some purpose other than decoration in mind.

Three of the items were alike in form though different in design.  They were an odd sort of clamp with one edge curled, yet without a hinge and made of a single piece of silver. Each was decorated differently. She had experimented with them and found that if she shoved a sheaf of papers into one from the curved edge it would hold them nicely together. She doubted very much such an elaborate item would be made to act as a large paper clip.

From another box she drew forth a handful of things that looked a bit like alligator clips used in electrical work, yet they were made of silver and each one had a small chain attached to it. On some the chain simply ended but on most there was some fantastically decorated bauble dangling from the end.

The paper inside had noted the items were unknown and had been in hotel storage for a long time. The box in hotel storage had been marked such that removal of items was forbidden but no one knew why anymore. The management considered reclamation a more urgent directive. These she felt must also have some important purpose and she was loathe to simply toss them into a bin for melting without knowing what that purpose might be.

There were other things too, mostly from those hotel boxes but also from the residents, many of whom had lived there for generations. There were more watches of creative designs but other things she was baffled at. It seemed she had been very much mistaken when she assumed that the Hospitality level would have little in the way of heirlooms to sacrifice.

Fanciful objects with posts attached to them with ends that rotated about like a fastener were in great number. Similar items in pairs but with a screw between them instead of a rotating bit. There were things with bands that looked like those for a watch but showing nothing but a blank face. The compartments were filled with tiny electronic components when she pried open cases to look inside.

One ring had fascinated her when the stone changed color as she held it in her hand. She slipped it on a finger and it went from brown all the way through yellow and green to brilliant blue. It was only plated in silver, much of that worn away. She hated to ruin such an object for the thin layer of silver that remained.

In the end, she had been left with a box full of things she questioned. She had sent a wire up to the Mayor’s office and explained the problem. She received a return reply not from the Mayor, but from the Council.

She was invited to bring the items up for consultation in IT where a representative of the Mayor’s office experienced in such matters would provide guidance along with other necessary personnel in council service.

When she told her husband that she needed to plan for another trip Up Top and that she would be away for several days, he countered with a suggestion for a vacation. It was true that they hadn’t been on one as a family for many years. It was equally true that both of them had a surfeit of vacation chits rattling around and waiting to be used. With Sela now her father’s shadow, they were free to go if they chose.

Like all shadows, Sela was neither penalized nor rewarded based on her caster’s absence or presence. She was paid a stipend based on her shadow status and how many of the qualifications for the desired job were complete. She earned no vacation chits but she had the days off her caster did and so was utterly free to go. Marina had been dubious about Joseph taking off so much time as a deputy, though when she was truthful with herself, she was more concerned with her ability to investigate if her family came along. She felt bad about that.

In the end, there was no way to avoid pretending to be delighted without arousing suspicion. Marina knew herself well enough to know that she was quite capable of hiding minor things from her husband but would certainly be caught if she began outright lying. Since his sixteenth year he had been either a deputy or a deputy’s shadow and he could smell a lie a level away.

Instead of risking him sniffing her out, she had busied herself with making plans for their trip. She parceled out the work already in her queue to other willing Fabber hands. By the time she woke the morning their vacation started, she was honestly excited by the prospect of a family trip.

She had opened her eyes and looked up at the worn paint on her ceiling with a smile. A wonderful fluttery feeling in her stomach signified something new and exciting coming her way. When she made breakfast and bellowed for Sela to hurry up, she knew she would make the most of this unexpected treat.

Their trip up was to be broken by visits and stops along the way, including a stop to visit Joseph’s mother. She was still alive and nearing her 63rd year of life, a venerable age. She lived in the same compartment where she had lived since moving in with her own husband and his father as a bride. She was a powerhouse of a woman, with more energy than all of mechanical combined. And she was beloved by so many that she was unintentionally intimidating in her confidence. She had earned that position, though, and had not always had it easy.

Marina knew all the stories. Tales of the discomfort she had felt first moving into a home not her own. Joseph’s grouchy grandfather sent such disapproving looks her way she had felt as if she might never fit in. The stories ended well, however, because all that disapproval had fallen away when Joseph’s mother had presented her father-in-law with a grandson promptly ten months after her marriage. It was with some pride that Joseph said that his parents hadn’t wasted the automatic permit of newlyweds to have a baby. His grandfather and father were long dead, but his mother endured.

They were starting out after an early breakfast to make the climb from 95 to 82 and get a good visit in with his mother. As a deputy working nearby, Joseph saw her frequently but Marina hadn’t been up to see her in many months. She was a bit ashamed of that. Trudging so far wasn’t something that could be done on a single day off and still get done what needed doing. She was excited to see her now that the time had come. She pressed her coveralls flat in front once more as they set their feet to the stairs.

It was early in the day but nearing the end of the first shift peak commute. People hurrying to make up for their tardiness shot past them a couple of times. A group of kids nearing the age where they would choose their profession went past in a gaggle, deep in discussion over the merits of whichever job they had just finished touring. Marina smiled at them as they passed, remembering the heady experience of being young and coming of age in a world that seemed filled with endless possibilities.

Rounding the last spiral below Level 92, Marina got her first whiff of the Animal Farms. Or at least she smelled what got transported from the farm to the composting stations or dirt farms. Her nose wrinkled against the smell automatically and Sela laughed at the look on her face. Joseph’s mother worked in Animal Farm Support so it wasn’t a new smell or an unfamiliar place to Marina. Despite previous exposure, there was no question that the thick smell of animal droppings was a shock after an absence.

Joseph’s mother, now called Mother Patrick by most people, still worked at the Animal Farms though she worked less as she grew older. Mostly she provided the skilled guidance that only someone with very long experience could give rather than hard physical work. She liked to tell people that she worked in the life side of the business of life and death, bringing new life into the world and caring for injuries and illnesses so the cycle could continue.

Marina thought it was all very poetic but knew she would never be able to handle knowing that the other side of that business meant death for those same animals. She liked eating her occasional meal of meat too much to think about the specifics of how it got to her meal tray.

As she trailed her family past the landing on Level 90, Marina felt a tug at her sleeve and turned to see a girl trying to wave her back down. She didn’t speak and barely raised her eyes, but there was no mistaking that she wanted Marina to return to the landing. Joseph and Sela kept moving up the stairs, but he turned when Marina hollered for him to wait. Both he and Sela climbed back down, creating a tangle in the traffic.

They were forced to dodge when two lift workers replacing the normal lift bucket with a sealed canvas bag of dung almost dropped the bag from the hook. The family eventually unsnarled themselves but the girl seemed even more flustered by the chaos and still hadn’t spoken.

Their respective professions had taught Marina and her husband a great deal about patience but Sela was still young and lacked the nuances. She sighed loudly and asked, somewhat rudely, “What? We’re never going to get to Grandma’s if we keep stopping!”

Marina was embarrassed at her daughter’s lack of manners but she knew it was the constant pauses so people could speak to her father that had been trying her patience. For the moment, she settled for sending a stern look her daughter’s way that clearly conveyed they would be speaking of this later. It worked and Sela dropped her gaze and took the nasty look off her face.

The girl blushed at the harsh words, two vivid red spots spreading quickly from her cheeks and down her slender neck to disappear into the neck of her baggy coveralls. She was slightly built and her posture made her seem even smaller.

Very gently, taking all the edges out of her voice, Marina asked, “Did you need me or the deputy?” She gestured toward her husband at the last word.

The girl’s eyes flicked briefly toward Joseph and then back toward Marina before she replied, “Mother Patrick sent me to wait for you. She’s back there.” She pointed toward the entrance to the Animal Farms without turning and again very quickly glanced at the two adults before her eyes slid down and away from them.

“What’s your name, young lady?” Marina asked. She kept her voice friendly and as quiet as she could make it and still be heard over the sound of feet on the metal stairs. A quick glance at the patch on the girl’s green coveralls showed the familiar stylized profile of a chicken and a rabbit with an egg between them. Below it, the simple dark circle patch that indicated the wearer was a shadow was roughly sewn to the pocket.

“Sarah,” came her almost inaudible reply.

“And you’re a shadow at the Farm?”

Sarah nodded without making eye contact and said, “I’ll take you to her. Will you follow me?”

“Of course. Lead the way, Sarah.”

The girl’s blush deepened further at the use of her name but she turned and walked rapidly toward the other end of the landing where two big doors separated the wider silo world from the domain of the animals and the mysterious business of animal husbandry. Marina watched the girl as they followed. She walked stiffly, like her goal was to remain unnoticed. Her long hair hung free, strangely enough, though by the way she leaned her head forward as she walked, Marina suspected it was more to hide her face rather than as a statement of beauty.

They didn’t really need a guide, especially not Joseph, but they followed obediently enough. He had spent a good part of his childhood roaming this floor and had helped out for many years before he had any thought to a future profession. It was the nature of childhood for most of the silo that they would spend time with their parents at work discovering their own thoughts on that career. That might not be the case for a child whose parent worked with sewage or in composting but for Joseph it had been a joy.

As the girl held one of the big doors open for the group to pass through, the rich smell enveloped Marina, replacing the singular smell of dung from the lift, and she couldn’t help but take a deep breath. It wasn’t that it was such a good smell because it was, if one were completely objective about it, a little stinky.

No matter how much cleaning the crews might do or how well the big circulating fans worked, there was no escaping the scent of animal droppings. But it wasn’t just that smell that made up the unique olfactory signature of this level. There were the smells of the animals themselves.

There was the distinct powdery scent of the poultry, especially the young chicks. The goats had always been Marina’s personal favorite and she picked out their scent right away. It was them she spent the most time with when Joseph had courted her, and again when they visited his mother in the early days of their marriage.

The young goats played and frolicked in such a carefree way that they couldn’t help but lift even the most determined downcast mood. They smelled of something that was both familiar to Marina in a deep way and yet utterly strange to any other thing within the silo. It was a nice smell when they were young and then different, but still nice, in the adult female goats.

Rabbits too had a smell, but theirs was harder to describe. It was a bit like dust in a hot duct, yet also warm and inviting. Pigs, on the other hand, were by far Marina’s least favored. Their droppings were horrendous and the smell lingered around them like a nasty fog. The young ones were fun and smelled a bit like babies when they were clean, but the old sows that bred the babies were dangerous as well as formidably rank.

All these aromas and the memories that went with them washed over her and Marina smiled. Her gaze was drawn immediately to the ‘Playpens’ near the entrance to the Farms. In pens filled with toys and other enrichment items, young animals spent some portion of their youth.

Visitors, tour groups and vacationing families could interact with the animals under careful supervision. The animals, in turn, became accustomed to the presence of many different people. It was an important part of the life of any animal that would be kept for breeding or the dairy or for their eggs.

A young goat at the stage Marina had always thought the pinnacle of the adorable spectrum thrust its dark nose out of the pen and bleated at her plaintively. Both she and Joseph reached out to stroke the finely shaped head through the bars. It wiggled and pressed its head toward the stroking hands as it gave a quieter bleat, as if to both acknowledge the affection and request more of the same.

She laughed at the pleasure the goat conveyed and saw the same happiness on Joseph’s face. “Do you miss this?” she asked him, enjoying the softening of his expression.

He gave one final vigorous scratch behind the little goat’s ears and then pulled his hand away quickly lest it give him a nip, but the dreamy smile remained on his face for a moment longer. He drew her away from the pen and back toward their patiently waiting guide and less patiently waiting daughter. He whispered in her ear, “I miss that, but I don’t miss knowing what will happen to them.”

They exchanged a look and Marina snuck one more glance back at the kid, pressed against the pen with eyes unwavering upon her, trying to compel her to return and provide additional scritches. If she hadn’t been required elsewhere, the gaze would have worked and she felt her heart give the same little tug she got from the presence of any baby. The kid gave a more excited little bleat, turned and romped toward a group of squealing children arriving at the other end of the pen.

Sarah said nothing as she led them through the various pens and larger livestock areas and toward the ramp at the back. A large section of the back of the farm was walled off for delivery pens to provide the greatest level of security for mothers and their offspring. As they passed into those quiet areas the noise from the main farms faded. The veterinary areas were also here and they too were walled off to prevent any animal that might get loose from wandering about inside.

They made their way up the ramp, past rooms cut from the thick concrete that made up the many yards between levels, and into the Animal Farm Support area tucked into this small section of Level 89. It could be accessed only from the ramp, probably to the relief of all those who had to live and work on 89, and made up just the smallest portion of the level.

The quietest offices for the support staff were tucked tightly together on one side of the ramp and above it, with a safety railing preventing a fall onto the lower portions of the ramp. A tight left at the top of the ramp led down an identical hallway where large bays for any animal requiring extended treatment under supervision were housed.

Sarah motioned for them to take the right walkway. She still had not spoken and Marina wasn’t sure if the girl had even raised her head during the entire walk. She was about to thank her, perhaps put her a bit more at ease, when one of the office doors slid open and the round face of Mother Patrick poked out.

“I’ll be stuffed! You finally made it. Where’s my grandbaby?” she called out in a strong, musical voice.

Sela stepped around her father with a big grin on her face and walked directly into the arms of her Grandma. As they hugged and Mother Patrick rocked her grand-daughter back and forth, words of love passed between them. Marina felt her own eyes prick with tears. She remembered the particular joy that came from seeing her Ba-Ma and she was glad her own daughter still had that as an almost grown woman.

Mother Patrick saved some surprisingly strong hugs for her son and daughter-in-law, but eventually led them into her office and waved for them to sit. She only then seemed to notice that her couch was covered by a couple of blankets and a crushed pillow left over from having been used as a bed.

She chattered about how well they looked and gave them no chance to answer as she swept the items up into her arms and tossed them onto her desk. When she did so, the battered metal top went from littered to completely buried, the books and papers now covered by a messy pile of fabric.

She twisted the knob on a single burner stove perched on a table and checked the teapot water level with a clatter of the metal lid. Marina’s count now stood at five questions they had been asked but not yet answered and her smile widened. The pleasant chaos that was Joseph’s mother always did that to her.

The older woman, who Marina could never quite bring herself to describe as actually old, grabbed her desk chair with surprising agility, gave it a twirl so that it faced the couch then plopped down into it. It was all one smooth economical movement and Marina almost envied her that kind of physical ability. Her hair was twisted in the same figure eight bun on the back of her head that Marina had seen her wearing since the day Joseph first brought her home. Frizzy strands of shorter hair escaped the bun and framed her face like a halo of wispy whiteness. Her face was remarkably unlined except when she smiled. Then her eyes all but disappeared in the many wrinkles that appeared.

It was said that life was divided into thirds. The first was childhood and it was supposed to be the happiest. The second was adulthood and it was to be the most rewarding. The third was being old and that, alas, went by the fastest. Marina and Joseph were almost to that final stage and Mother Patrick was already older than many people could expect to ever be, but she was more vital and vigorous than many a youngster. She was certainly happier than most. Perhaps the maxim simply didn’t apply to some people.

“So, my babies,” she began, clearly meaning all three of them. At some point during the years Joseph and Marina had joined the group loosely lumped as ‘babies’ in Mother Patrick’s eyes. Her bright brown eyes flicked from one to the next. “What brings you to see me? The message just said a vacation. Are you vacationing with me or on your way somewhere?”

Chapter Five

Their visit was a good one, though shorter than any of them might have liked. Joseph put a small crimp on things when he asked if she was sleeping in her office, his tone disapproving. Mother Patrick quickly reminded him that she only worked the hours she could handle but that the trip back up to 82 was more than she liked to do after coming down.

She made it very clear she was comfortable here overnight and was able to take days off between her shifts if she stayed on call overnight. Joseph didn’t respond with acquiescence, instead voicing argument about how much she worked overall. The tension was lifted before it could really build when Mother Patrick chucked her son under the chin and reminded him of many nights they had spent on that couch or floor when the birthing times of the animals came too quickly for them to go home. He smiled an honest smile at that and admitted how much he had liked those days. He did elicit a promise from her to ask for a comfortable bed, perhaps a real folding bed rather than a cot, if the couch became too much to bear.

They drank tea and heard the stories of the Animal Farm, at least this side of it where the animals lived rather than where they went to be processed. They discussed the family’s plans for this vacation and dutifully wrote down the requests for items that Mother Patrick had a particular want for.

It was a short list of simple things. Some bright cloth from the Garment district for a few new kerchiefs, some strawberry jam if they could find some because she had a hankering for it. Odds and ends that made life a little easier for a woman who found it difficult to make long journeys up the stairs were added. Marina would be sure to find every one of the items, and a few gifts besides, before they stopped on their way home.

Mother Patrick showed Sela a set of newborn twin goats with their mother in one of the pens across the hall. The delight on her face at the sight was gratifying. The mother was still too newly delivered to feel comfortable with Sela’s excited squeals and quick hands around her kids, but Mother Patrick calmed her so Sela could pet the newborns.

Down the ramp, Mother Patrick took them to see the laying room where chickens lived in groups inside smaller coops. Each held about twenty hens and each coop had things called nesting boxes along the back wall. The visitors giggled at the argumentative cackling different groups seemed to engage in and the bright, greedy interest many of the chickens showed when they noted humans in the vast room.

Mother Patrick also showed the family the dim walkway that ran behind the coops that allowed the workers to collect the eggs. They walked a short distance down one of them and Sela clapped her hands over her mouth to contain her squeal when she saw a dirty egg resting inside one of the nesting boxes.

As the visit wound down and Mother Patrick escorted them through the farm toward the entrance, Marina looked around in hopes of seeing Sarah and thanking her. It was only as they were leaving the main animal area toward the visitor pens that Marina finally spotted the slim girl with the long dark hair again.

She was bent over and leaning her head against the side of a heavily pregnant goat. Her cheek rested against the goat’s distended side and her hand moved with gentle expertise along the great bulge of her belly, pausing now and again as she felt for whatever it was she sought. Her eyes were closed and a slight smile, a smile that was genuine, content and completely relaxed, transformed her features from pinched to almost beautiful. Instead of painful shyness, Marina saw a girl at peace with her work and happy.

Mother Patrick must have seen something on her face because she touched Marina’s arm and said, “Sarah belongs more with animals than with people. Animals don’t hurt others without reason.”

She said it a bit sadly and Marina thought there must be more to the story of Sarah. She knew it was not her place to ask, though. She was in good hands here.

The goodbyes at the landing were short as the family would be reunited once again on the return trip. The morning had slipped away during their visit and the family needed to move along if they were to reach the hotel on Level 50 in time to enjoy a dinner out as planned. They had 40 levels to go and Marina was anxious not to fall too far behind schedule.

They climbed, but Marina couldn’t seem to settle into the rhythm of the stairs. Unlike so many others she only had to traverse four levels down and four levels up in her daily life and the muscles used most in climbing were more than happy to forget the skill quickly if not used. She felt herself pulling on the rail rather than simply resting a hand there in short order.

It took only a few levels before she started looking longingly at the big bags on the lifts as they passed by in a puff of wind on their way up or down. She wished she could use those but use of the baskets by living people was not permitted except under the direst of circumstances. There had been accidents in the past, when the rules were a little more lax, and it was considered too risky for regular use.

Dire medical emergencies were the only exceptions and then the yellow flags would begin lifting at the transfer stations, levels raising their own banner as the one below or above was raised. But Marina had no broken legs or head injury to buy her that trip. By the time they had twisted up the spiral toward Level 80, the front of her thighs twinged sharply with each step.

Joseph and Sela spent most of their daily lives on the stairs, going up and down to address whatever concern required a deputy’s presence. They were chatting easily with each other as they moved ever upward, neither of them even seeming to notice that they were climbing. It seemed to Marina that they expended no more effort doing this than they did playing a game of cards.

Marina adjusted the small pack on her back for a better ride. She promised herself she would stop to greet whoever was on duty at the deputy’s office and enjoy a nice drink of water if she could only make it there without complaint. If she did it without her family noticing the strain, she’d allow herself a visit to the restroom and a few minutes of seated rest at the station.

As they passed 72, she looked with regret at the entrance to the Memoriam and the small crowd of young students being greeted by a Historian. Above the big doors the words, “We are Different. We are the Good,” were painted in bold proud letters, the paint fresh and un-chipped.

Out of the ten, this was the first tenet and it was the only one that had no accompanying explanation anywhere to be studied. It didn’t need one. Unlike the other tenets, which could be twisted or diminished over time if the intent were not made clear, this was something understood at a deep and instinctive level by every person old enough to form thoughts. The other nine all had explanations and discussions posted on the walls of the Memoriam so that people might come and study the words and understand for themselves the simple rules that made for a good life.

The first one was easy. Those inside the silo were different from the not-quite-human Others that were not called to the safety of the silo. The First People were good, each one called to life instead of death, and so must we be also. It was a simple saying, but profoundly beautiful and true in its simplicity.

The Historians, with their coveralls stitched from fabric in every color of the silo professions, were like bright patchwork spots standing out in a crowd. There were only a few Historians and each was selected only after a long and demanding shadowing process. Even after a decade of dedicated work, a Historian’s shadow might be re-assigned elsewhere to start a new career path. The reward was a profession respected more than any other.

It wasn’t just a good memory that was required for Historians, it was an objective one. It was said that one could never win an argument with a Historian because if they were wrong about something they would admit it before anyone else knew they were wrong. And if they were right they would never engage in the argument, only inform the other what was correct and walk away.

They were trained to be logical and to look at every single instance from multiple perspectives, yet be swayed by none of those different perspectives. It was a basic truth that what became history was decided by the ones that remained to report it. It was the goal of the Historians to ensure that this was done as truthfully as possible. Part of that was to help everyone else in the silo understand whatever it was they sought in the light of that objective truth. Marina would have liked to stop there and spend some time trying to figure out the objective truth of her own little mystery.

As they cleared the little crowd, Marina caught her husband’s eye and adopted the most casual tone she could. “I’d like to say hello to the deputy on 70 and take a bathroom break. That okay?”

Joseph smiled and told her that was a great idea. He wanted to check in before they left the area completely anyway. Sela gave him a little sidelong glance at that, perhaps worried that her diligent father would get caught up in whatever might be going on that day. She gnawed at her lip as they crested the next level and Marina smoothed her daughter’s hair back when she came within arm’s reach.

Stepping off the stairs and onto the landing of 70 brought almost immediate relief to Marina’s legs. She thought it was probably more mental relief than a truly physical one since she was still standing and walking. She welcomed it nonetheless. It was just a few short steps to the deputy station, both Joseph and Sela greeting people along the way.

Marina exchanged greetings with Sander, the deputy on duty, and spent a few moments on the mandatory pleasantries before she excused herself. After a bathroom break and a splash of cool water on her face and neck, she made her way back.

On the landing there were just enough people to make it feel inhabited and busy. Most people on first shift were long at work but there were others from odd shifts dawdling home and talking with friends. A couple, clearly in the excited courtship phase of a new relationship, were sneaking shy glances at each other as they walked. She could almost feel the electricity crackle in the air as they passed her by.

It was a good morning in the silo. Friends in the fabber sector said she was silly for thinking that the silo had moods, but Joseph agreed with her. Whether it was the people or the silo itself or some other factor she couldn’t quite see, there were moods that she could feel in her very flesh. Today, that mood was a good one, a tingly one. She smiled into the mood as she pushed open the door to the deputy station to grab a chair for a few precious minutes.

Sela hurried into the station while Marina was resting and snatched up a radio that had begun to crackle with noise. Marina didn’t know how they understood what came through all that warbling and static, but both Joseph and Sela told her they simply got used to it. She supposed it must be so because Sela listened intently while she fished about for a piece of chalk and a blank slate. She scribbled something down and then responded with code letters and numbers that meant something to her but sounded like impressive gibberish to Marina. Sela scooted back out where the men talked and then bounced on her toes waiting for either deputy to acknowledge her desire to speak with them.

It was Sander who turned to her, holding a polite hand up for Joseph to pause him. He told her to go ahead before she jumped out of her coveralls, his voice gruff but his face showing a good natured smile. It spoke to their close working relationship but Marina wasn’t at all sure about her daughter’s choice of profession and the rough nature of such work. She seemed so small and young compared with the two men towering over her.

After Sela relayed her message, she handed it to Sander rather than her off-duty father. She stepped back and the two deputies came together for a whispered conversation. They broke apart and Joseph turned back to his family and asked, his voice full of false cheer, “Are we ready? We need to hit the treads if we’re going to get any shopping done.”

Marina smiled an acknowledgement and stood, bracing herself should her thighs protest, but they felt fine and fully rested. She cast surreptitious glances at both deputies to see if there was anything she should worry about as she re-shouldered her pack. Nothing seemed amiss now that they were getting ready to go so she shrugged off her husband’s perpetually busy job, checked the straps on Sela’s pack and linked her arm with her husband’s.

“Ready when you are, sweetie,” she said, a grin on her face.

He patted her hand and they walked at a comfortable pace across the landing, Sela trailing a few steps behind. They waited for a gap in the traffic before merging with the upward flow. It was past the midpoint in the first shift now and nearing the height of business traffic. It would just get worse near the end of the shift when all those returning to their compartments and all those going on shift clogged the stairs going both ways.

Joseph let go of her arm and urged her ahead of him on the stairs. When she looked back at him with a questioning look, he winked and said, “I know this is harder for you. You work with your brain, not your legs. You set the pace.”

She flushed, both embarrassed and edified at his understanding and his kind acceptance. She glanced back at Sela, who smiled too, and then turned her eyes toward the upward path. Marina realized she was far worse at hiding things from her family than she thought and her thoughts went automatically back to the image and note she had hidden under a loose tile in her workroom. She would either need to become a much more skilled fabricator of moods and words or she would surely be caught out.

She had realized, long before she tucked those two small bits of paper, now wrapped in thin plastic for protection, under the loose tile that what she was doing…what she had already done…would probably mean a lifetime of remediation if she was caught. It wouldn’t matter if every other facet of her life was tenet perfect. This wasn’t just asking too many questions about outside or breaking tenets.

No, this was far more severe.  She had hidden proof of a past that didn’t match silo history and she had done it without going to the Historians. She possessed it and she meant to keep it if she could.

Marina didn’t want to be sent to remediation. She just wanted to know and the moment she thought there might be someone who would find out her secret, she would burn those relics of the past and be done with it. She wanted to know but not bad enough to lose her position and her family when it came right down to it. No, definitely not enough for that. Still, even the thought of destroying them made her stomach roil and feel queasy.

If she did go to remediation, she would have to stay there until she was back to normal, talking about her feelings with strangers. Who knew how long that would take? Or she would be released a changed person like those vacant people one occasionally heard about that required the most drastic form of remediation. She didn’t feel like she was going crazy or being dangerous. Well, that last wasn’t quite true because it probably was dangerous to possess what she had found.

As they climbed up, she tried to lose herself in her thoughts as the burn returned to her legs. Something that Mother Patrick had said to Sela when she explained how the Animal Farms worked came back to her and it kept prickling in the recesses of her mind. It reminded her of something from childhood that she couldn’t quite bring into focus.

Mother Patrick had explained to Sela that animals followed very strict schedules of light and dark and that they were like humans in many respects. Just like we needed to ensure we spent some time each day under the special lights of the landings to stay healthy, the animals needed the same. That is why so many of those special lights were placed around the ceilings of the pens. They also needed a period of darkness, or near darkness, every single day or else they got sick. For that reason the red lights used after lights out in residential areas were also used in the Animal Farm.

As she thought about that, and why humans and animals should both be like that and have those requirements, it came to her like a slap on the face. The memory was an old one but it returned as clear and bright as the lights of the landing ahead of her. She had been young. She didn’t know how young but it must have been very young because both of her parents were alive in the memory. It was from before she was orphaned by the accident that claimed the parents of three other children as well as her own.

She remembered the feel of her father, sweeping her up in an arc and into the crook of his arm as he carried her up the stairs. He had pointed at different things on the Up-Top screen and named them for her. She remembered that as she had watched the screen, a fierce red glow burned at the edge and she had asked what it was.

He had explained that it was the sun and that it rotated around the land each day, disappearing at the end and leaving it dark until it came up again somewhere off the screen the next day. She remembered being fascinated by the idea of a light rotating around like that.

Now it clicked together for her. Was that why both humans and animals needed both light and dark? Was it because outside the sun rotated around and was hidden each day, creating a regular period of darkness so that we had gotten used to it? Perhaps the animals and the humans had come to need it over time and still did even here, under the ground.

Those thoughts were interrupted by another strong and sudden memory. She had a clear memory of her mother, the expression on her face one that had frightened her. Her mother crushed her small frame in a hug and whispered, “Remember that I love you.”

Then she was pushed away, other children crying around her, and into a dark space. As she had been shut in she remembered the tear stained face of her mother through the narrowing band of light and the door slamming the darkness all the way home.

Marina didn’t realize she had stopped climbing until her husband’s voice broke through the haze. “Marina? Honey? Are you alright?” His face swam into focus just below her. He stood on the step below her own, his hand lifted to touch to her cheek.

She shook her head to clear the fog and saw the faces of all the people behind them who had also been stopped. She blurted out, “Oh, I’m so sorry!”

She faced upward again and started climbing, this time counting the steps to be sure to maintain pace. A few people, mostly young ones or porters with express packages, called out “Passing Up!” and rushed past her. Most of the people she had caused to stop were not in such a hurry. Eventually they spread out again, a few steps between groups as people began to peel off from the traffic.

A small group left them on Level 61 and that opened up a good area around the family. Marina glanced back now and again. Each time she met her husband’s eyes, his were looking steadily up at her with a worried expression. Great, she thought. Now he’s watching me and he knows something is wrong.

Her mind’s eye, now that this old memory had surfaced, kept trying to replay it and expand it for her. Each time she found herself remembering she pushed it away and focused on counting the steps. A good climb might seem like a good time to think, but only if one is capable of thinking and climbing at the same time. That was something the woman who had raised her and the three other orphans used to say to her charges when they dawdled on the stairs.

Now she used the same trick she did then to avoid daydreaming. She counted stairs. No matter what she did or how studiously she counted, the image of the fear filled face of her mother whispering that she loved her kept flashing in front of her eyes. It was a harder climb that she had ever imagined any climb could be.

Chapter Six

Joseph stopped the family briefly at Level 56 to do a little shopping, returning quickly to the place Marina and Sela sat on the landing. He stuffed a parcel that smelled of herbs, sweet peppers and tangy tomatoes into the top of Sela’s backpack. He patted her shoulder after he tied off the top and urged her to be gentle with it.

She laughed and asked if he thought she was looking to wear a jacket made of tomato goo. Her cheeky laugh cut through the thoughtful silence Marina had fallen into while she sat, not having steps to count and keep it at bay. She stood and shook the tightness out her legs, trying not to think too carefully about anything. She smiled at the easy banter between the two just as she would normally do, but it felt stiff and unnatural on her face. At her husband’s inquiry she assured him she was well before once again taking the lead for the final six floors to the hotel.

Those last stairs flew by as they dodged the increasing traffic. The first of the staggered early shift personnel were getting relieved and the second wave of those coming on duty took to the stairs. Families urged along children dragging their feet and protesting that they wanted to be carried. Workers attired in coveralls of every color wove around slower walkers or simply trudged up at the pace of the traffic depending on their schedules.

Marina watched it all and thought it was lively and so much more beautiful than just walking to work. It was a parade full of life. Her own life circled around so few levels that she saw little of what happened in the rest of the silo. As it was now, the only people she recognized were the two who traveled with her. It was a curious sensation to be among so many strangers.

The family bunched together again as traffic intensified, Joseph apologizing as he bumped into her pack after he himself was jostled by others leaving the stairs. On the landing of Level 50, a wide fan of people funneled down to a single moving thread that crept forward slowly as each person joined the flow on the stairs.

Marina wondered where they were all coming from as she wended her way through them toward the doors leading to the hotel. It was a mass of color, gray and blue, red and green and even a few wearing the faded pink of services. So many faces at once were confusing. She hurried through them, muttering her excuses as she pressed past and only feeling comfortable once she reached the doors. Once inside, there was an immediate surcease of noise. It was only then that she realized exactly how loud the sound of so many feet on metal had become.

They approached a counter directly in front of the entrance. Though it was open to either side where hallways led away at angles, it provided an effective mental barrier. Joseph pushed the button for service as the battered and faded placard instructed. He was about to push it again when they spied a woman hurrying down the hallway on the left.

She waved and held up a finger to indicate it would be just a moment and then began drying her hands on a towel she plucked from the belt of her coveralls. She rushed up to the desk, bringing with her a waft of air tinged with the scent of disinfecting cleaner. She smiled at the group, one after the other, and asked how she could help them.

Their check-in went quickly. They were handed a combination card and told, with another high voltage smile, that their room was near the outer edge of the hotel. It was one of their largest rooms.

The attendant, now revealed as Wendy, beamed at them and strode with a no-nonsense gait down the hallway to escort them to their room. Her voice lowered as if to avoid disturbing occupants, she gave them a brief rundown of the hotel and the services available.

“Wendy, what’s with all the traffic outside? The landing was packed. I didn’t realize this floor was so busy,” Joseph asked as he accepted the key card from her.

Wendy gave a little shake of her head, “You got here just as all the meetings are breaking up. There’s a big one going on at the conference center about the aquaculture re-fit. You know, the one on 30? We’ll finally get fish on a more regular basis again!”

At the confused looks on her guests’ faces, she elaborated, “Oh, well, you may not know since you live so far away but two of the aquaculture tanks in hydroponics on 30 had to be shut down over the past couple of years. The whole thing needs repairs and now they’re having problems on 49 too.” She pointed up to the ceiling. “That’s right above this hotel!”

All three of them joined Wendy in looking up, as if expecting to see a crack form and water come pouring out.

“Anyway, the council decided that a refit has to be done to get things back up to the mark and there’s a big meeting there with dozens of people working on the planning for it. It’s going to be a big deal.”

Joseph eyed the ceiling suspiciously and asked, “It’s safe, right?”

Wendy straightened up and said, her tone a bit aggrieved, “Absolutely. You can be sure of that. It wouldn’t matter if every one of those tanks burst, the concrete between us and them is sound. I assure you.”

Joseph nodded but Marina could tell he was looking at her with a lawman’s gaze, looking for the truth behind her words. He was apparently satisfied because he said, “Well, thank you, Wendy. We probably need to get cleaned up before dinner.”

“Do you need me to arrange that for you?”

Joseph answered, a broad smile cracking his face, “Nope. Not today. We’re eating in the Wardroom.”

Wendy’s eyebrows crept up and she turned up the wattage on her smile a few clicks, “Then I certainly won’t detain you further. You’re in for a treat!” She took a practiced step backward, bringing her neatly out of their way and then turned to leave. She gave one quick little wave and wished them a good evening before striding away.

The room turned out to be quite nice. Sela rushed past, gave the smaller bed an experimental bounce and pronounced it suitable. Marina stood at the threshold and took it in for a moment. She had always been less comfortable with change than the rest of her family and she needed these moments. The room smelled vaguely of the cleaning solution recently used to ready it and the floor was swept and mopped to perfection. The dust that plagued so much of the silo was entirely absent here, each surface gleaming and clean. Marina liked it, right down to the soft beige paint on the walls.

The other side of the partition from Sela’s bed held a larger bed, meant for two. It was neatly made and covered in a cotton blanket that had faded and softened to a pale shade of green Marina found lovely. That part of the room could be completely shut off from the rest of the compartment by means of a curtain, now pushed to the side for maximum space. It wasn’t the kind of privacy they enjoyed in their own compartment but far more than she had expected in a temporary room.

Aside from the two beds and the thin partition wall that stood between them, there were few furnishings. Metal shelves jutted from the walls above the beds, most of them empty but one holding a neatly folded blanket, this one a less faded yellow color. Lamps attached to movable arms protruded from bases screwed into the wall above each bed.

The space between the door and the smaller bed was taken up by a round table just big enough for three people to eat from if they were careful with their elbows, and three straight backed chairs. Those were tucked tightly to the table to leave the illusion of space but Marina guessed that anyone actually sitting at that table would be no more than an arm’s reach from the foot of the bed or the wall or the door, depending on which chair they chose.

On the other side of the door, most of the space opposite the larger bed area and the metal doors of the shallow closet next to it had been walled off for a very small bathroom. She supposed that having a bathroom is what made it a better room.

She opened the door to take a peek inside and found it tiny, but very nicely appointed. The floor and walls were tiled top to bottom, and only a few of the tiles were cracked. Each cracked one stood out, the bright white bead of sealant breaking the symmetry of the regular squares.

The shower was small and had a door that folded rather than slid like those she had in her own residence because of the limited space. The metal sink and toilet were crammed in such close proximity that one might almost wash their hands in the one while still taking care of business on the other. She lifted a small jar of dark soap from the sink and caught the sweet, astringent scent of rosemary.

“Well, they have really nice soap. Mind if I go first?” she asked as she poked her head back out.

Joseph was lining up the vegetables he had taken from Sela’s pack on one of the shelves, carefully inspecting each for damage first. He didn’t turn from his task but said, “Go ahead.”

Sela was deeply involved in smoothing wrinkles from a long tunic and a pair of beige cotton pants. She stroked the fabric, already spread out as flat as possible on the bed, but it didn’t seem to be doing much to fix the problem. It was a rare occasion that brought out anything other than coveralls and Sela appeared both nervous and excited as she examined the wrinkled cotton.

The tunic was colorfully dyed in staggered bands of color from bright yellow at the top down to orange and finally to a deep red at the hem. It had been a gift from her father when she began to shadow for him and in the time since, she had never worn it outside their compartment.

“Sela, you might get those wrinkles out a little easier if you hang it in the bathroom while I shower. Hot showers work wonders for more than just getting clean.”

She stopped smoothing the fabric and looked up uncertainly. “Are you sure I should wear this? In public?”

“Absolutely,” Marina answered with conviction. “Lots of people wear them on special occasions. You just don’t see it that much because you always see people on business or going to work. Even Grandy wore clothes other than coveralls. She wore them almost every day when I was young.”

A skeptical look appeared on Sela’s face and she crossed her arms, a sure sign of disbelief. “Grandy? No way.”

Marina nodded, “Yes, way. She absolutely did. It was only when we traveled the stairs that she wore coveralls. When she got older and us kids grew up and moved out, she went back to work. That is why you saw her in coveralls all the time.”

Grandy was what Marina and the other orphans, and eventually their children, had called the woman who raised them. Sela had especially admired her and spent weeks in her company when she was little, learning how to draw and dance and play all the games that Grandy had taught her mother. If Grandy had worn paper wrappings and liked it, Sela would probably think it must be good to wear them too.

Sela turned away to consider the tunic again, then she snatched it up as if she might change her mind if she didn’t hurry and thrust it at her mother. “Okay. I will, but if anyone laughs at me I’m coming straight back here and changing. Deal?”

Marina took the cloth solemnly and agreed, “Deal.”

By the time Marina left the bathroom wrapped in a soft towel and carrying a much less wrinkled garment, Joseph and Sela were playing cards. It was apparently a fierce competition with much slapping of cards on the table required for participation. Sela hopped up, loudly victorious, and examined the tunic even as her mother laid it out on the bed.

Marina would also be wearing something other than coveralls this evening, the first time she had done so in front of strangers for many a year. She would never have admitted it, but she was quite nervous about it too. It was expected when dining in the Wardroom, though. She figured she would survive the ordeal.

It wasn’t as if wearing clothing other than coveralls weren’t allowed or anything. In many cases, such as this one, it was expected or even required. After all, they had about half an entire level dedicated to the manufacture and sale of fabrics and things made of fabric. Of that, only a portion was related to coveralls or patches for coveralls.

In the case of the Wardroom, very long tradition held that one did not eat there in coveralls unless one was a resident of the Wardroom residences and actually on duty. No one knew why but there it was.

By the time all three of the family members were ready to leave, Marina felt a bit like she was walking out of the door in her underwear. She had to work to restrain herself from crossing her arms in front of her chest. That would have probably sent Sela running back for the door.

Of the three, only Joseph seemed at ease. He wore a pair of blue pants just a few shades darker than the paint used to mark pipes for potable water. His tunic was longer than Marina’s, ending just above the knee and dyed a yellow almost as pale as the spare blanket in their hotel room. It was decorated with a line of spots of many colors, all of them blurred at the edges like someone had shaken wet hands covered in many different dyes at the yellow cloth and then liked the effect. Perhaps that is what happened. Whatever the case, it was a bold pattern and Marina liked it a great deal. It made his brown eyes and the slight curl in his short, dark hair somehow more handsome. The easy expression on his face made her want to reach out and touch him possessively.

What Sela and Marina wore was similar in concept to Joseph’s but Marina marveled at how different the final effect was. Both of their tunics stopped at mid-thigh and were slightly longer in back than in front. The sleeves were long, just as his were, but rather than being straight and ending without flourish, theirs ended wider and again longer in back than in front. They would need to be careful when eating or both would wind up dragging those sleeves through their meals.

In front, the neckline was squared rather than cut into the standard V-neck that Joseph wore. That square also dipped a bit lower than a coverall and Marina felt uncomfortable knowing the ridges of her clavicles were out for all to see. She felt even more uncomfortable knowing Sela’s clavicles were displayed.

The pants were somewhat safe, at least. Cut more trimly than the loose comfort of coveralls, they clung to the leg and ended above the ankle. Rather than boots, they all wore soft slippers most often worn while at home to keep feet off of chilly floor tiles.

Overall, the effect was certainly eye-catching and Joseph’s eyes had widened in pleased surprise and then narrowed suggestively when he saw her. “I like that color green on you. It’s much prettier than gray.”

She gave him a mock glare and he quickly added, “Of course, you’re pretty in any color.”

Sela rolled her eyes at them and then linked her own arm to her father’s on one side while Marina did the same from the other. They set out across the landing, now quieter and with far less traffic, and followed the curved walkway toward the Wardroom. The few people they passed nodded and smiled and pretended not to stare at their outfits but Marina could feel their eyes. A quick glance at Sela told her that she felt them too. Two bright spots of pink stood out high on her cheeks but she didn’t stop or bolt back to the hotel. Marina counted it a victory.

The Wardroom was tucked inside a part of Level 50 where residences that held specific purpose were. Most were tied to some post or another and only inhabited by the holder of that post. Families could and did live with those post holders on occasion, but in general the posts were temporary ones. Most people wouldn’t risk the loss of good quarters more convenient to the rest of their lives in order to move to these awkwardly situated small ones.

In some cases, they were used only as offices for the post holder or left entirely vacant by the person who should live there. Marina had checked the residence location for the Hardi that had sent the watch in for reclamation. It was a part of the residences somewhere inside Wardroom territory not tied to a post.

She had been keeping her ears pricked for any mention of the name and would keep on doing so, though she wouldn’t approach the woman if she found her. Marina wanted to interview her about the watch but she didn’t want that information until after she had spoken with officials. In the off chance she had something really interesting or revealing to tell, Marina didn’t want to be put into the position of having to lie more than necessary.

Marina and Joseph were vaguely familiar with the Wardroom quarters because Joseph had been very close to being chosen to hold such quarters at one time. Another deputy had been the council’s final choice and he had been a good choice. Older than Joseph and with experience in both the Down-Deep and Mids stations, his selection as the Law Enforcement Liaison to the Emergency Management Council freed Joseph up from consideration for the length of the selectee’s term, which stood at seven years.

The Emergency Management Council, or EMC, had told Joseph that the age of his child had been a factor in his not being chosen, for which they were both grateful. By the time the next selection came about that would not help him. In the future, he might very well spend many of his nights far from her bed and in the rooms of the Wardroom.

On the upside, those who lived in these residences were allotted any and all meals in the Wardroom at no charge as it was assigned as their primary cafeteria. For everyone else the price was fixed at one half of a vacation day chit per meal, no matter which meal. Marina had never eaten there before and Sela had never even heard of it prior to her parents informing her of their plans. Joseph had been hosted there, along with the other final candidate, during that last round of selections. He seemed so excited to share this experience with his family, despite the cost, that his feelings had spread to Marina.

Joseph opened the door for them and then handed the attendant, a slight man attired in the pink coveralls of the service industry, three half-day vacation chits and a slip of paper that confirmed their reservation. The man gave the slip only the barest glance and the chits no attention at all as he deftly deposited them into a slot on the podium.

He led them to their table inside the Wardroom proper and Marina found herself resisting the urge to gape as they wound their way through the tables. One wall of the room was covered with a huge screen that was further divided into many smaller rectangular screens. On each of these rectangular portions, a view of some part of the silo appeared. It occurred to her that her childhood bouts of virtue in front of the cameras were seen by someone after all and she had to stifle a nervous giggle at the thought.

Their table, once Marina found herself capable of tearing her eyes from the screen to pay attention to it, was meant for four guests but one place setting had been left off. In the empty place sat a basket of fresh corn rolls and a small dish of perfectly round balls of herbed goat cheese to spread on the rolls. In front of each of the three chairs lay a cotton napkin folded into an elaborate shape.

As they sat and the attendant took his leave, murmuring something about taking their orders, all three couldn’t help but run their hands over the table itself. Though the base was metal and bolted to the floor, the top was made of actual wood. It was banded around the sides with metal to protect the precious edges and polished so smooth the surface gleamed. She let her hand hover over the top and marveled to see the reflection of her palm in the shining surface. Marina had never seen so much wood in all her life and never of such size. The boards that made the top were a hand wide and perhaps two inches thick.

Joseph looked at her, a gleam in his eye, and whispered, “I told you it was special. I’m told that there used to be tables like this all over the place, but these are the only ones left. And what do you think of the screens?”

She looked at the screens again. Their table was situated so that both she and Joseph had an excellent view.  Sela had to turn a bit to see it but she twisted in her chair willingly enough. Marina saw her eyes darting about the views as if cataloging all that she could identify.

“I’m amazed, Joseph. Truly. What do we do with this? Can we use it or is it just for show?” she asked, indicating the complex structure made of her napkin.

“Ah,” he replied. “Just shake it out like so.” He demonstrated for them by flicking the cloth sharply down at his side. He then spread it across his lap the same way they did at home.

Sela twisted back around in her chair and eyed the basket of corn rolls. “Umm…I like it too, but I’m hungry. Can I?”

She had the good manners to wait for an assenting nod, but wasted no time after that, grabbing one and splitting it wide. She speared a ball of the soft cheese with her fork and mashed it onto half of the roll, smearing it with a token swipe of the utensil before taking a huge bite. She chewed hungrily and her cheek distended enough to be comical. She grinned at her mother, small crumbs dotting her lips.

Marina shook her head with half-serious disgust and said, “You could try to eat like we feed you more than once a day, you know. People will think we didn’t raise you right.”

She looked around at the other tables. Another couple was being escorted in and there were four other tables with guests already seated. There were only twelve tables in all and Marina was glad it was not yet full so her daughter’s actions might go unnoticed.

Joseph wisely kept silent but Marina saw the wink he directed at his daughter and the widening of her answering grin. She swallowed loud enough to be heard a few feet away and took a swig of the cold water the attendant had poured into their cups as they were seated. Another stern look directed at Sela seemed to work and she settled down after that. Marina thought perhaps it was merely nervousness that caused her to act out. Whatever it was, it seemed to pass and for that, Marina was grateful.

Their dinner was to come out to them rather than require them to get into a line. While it would be an interesting change, Marina liked to see food before she made choices on what to eat. The family’s habit of eating their evening meal in their quarters rather than slogging it to one of the cafeterias had made her a bit pickier than she would easily admit to. The attendant, introducing himself as Davis, read them their choices and told them that their early dinner reservation meant that all the choices were still available to them.

Of the three choices for their main meal, two included meat, something Marina had never heard of in her life. Instead of responding with a choice, she asked, “How can that possibly not be wasteful?” There was a hint of accusation in her voice that she regretted, that she tried to bite back, but she also wanted to know the answer to her question.

Davis didn’t appear to mind the question, or perhaps he was simply used to it, because his voice didn’t change from the same smooth tones he’d been using. “The Wardroom prides itself on its careful management as well as the quality of its food. There is a strict cut-off for reservations and our menus are planned using those numbers. Early diners, like you, have the widest choices but when it is gone,” he raised his shoulders in a small shrug, “it’s gone. There are no exceptions.”

“What about the residents? The ones who can eat here any time?” she countered.

“They must make the same arrangements as anyone else if they choose one of the two main meal services. Those few that do live here most often eat from what remains or eat elsewhere. Everyone has the same limitation of two meats per week, of course. We have very few people in residence permanently. If there is anything left at the end of a meal, it is used for another meal.” Again, the little shrug came through and she wondered how he did that. How does one shrug without actually shrugging?

Marina felt a bit sorry for the man, considering how often he probably got these questions. She smiled at him, trying to put a little extra warmth into it, and said, “I appreciate your very helpful explanation. I think I can enjoy this meal a great deal more now, thanks to your patience.”

It was perhaps a bit over the top and she saw Joseph’s eyebrows tick upward from the corner of her eye, but it worked and Davis’ expression relaxed. He was no less formal but the chill was gone and there was a decidedly friendly tone as he advised them on their choices and took orders.

He brought them a metal pitcher sweating with condensation and filled three more cups with tea. It smelled like green heaven and had nasturtium blossoms floating in it. Davis plucked a pair of slender sticks from a pocket and deftly deposited one of the flowers into Sela’s cup. He winked at her surprised expression and left without a word. Joseph chortled under his breath at her while Sela just stared at Davis’ retreating back. Marina was delighted with the whole experience.

It was a matter of moments before he returned with three trays perfectly balanced using just one hand and arm. He set each meal down with a flourish and left them to eat in peace, this time without any flirtatious flower dropping.

Marina looked at her own tray and then the two others in wonder and took note of how each thing was arranged to be pleasing to the eye. It was something she had never once considered but it definitely did something to her belly. It was like a good taste that hit her stomach through her eyes instead of her mouth.

Joseph had chosen fish. His explanation that it was pre-emptive revenge should they rain down on them during the night had sent both women into giggles not entirely suppressed by the hands they pressed to their faces. Now that he had his tray, he merely grinned at the expression on both of the women’s faces and took up a fork and knife to begin his meal.

Sela poked suspiciously at a few items she didn’t recognize only to discover that they were familiar items cut into fantastic shapes, a radish cut like a flower and green onions made into strands so thin they looked like green hair. After that, she too dug in to her meal though Marina was glad to see that she remembered her manners. Sela’s eggplant, fried crisp in a thick coating of herbed cornbread and amaranth crumbs then smothered in tomato sauce, began to disappear at a steady rate.

Marina had chosen rabbit, not because she had a particular desire for it but because it was the third choice and her family had chosen the other two. Once she tasted it she realized she had made the perfect choice. It was cooked in a way that Marina had never seen before and so juicy that she had to be careful not to let it run down her chin. It wasn’t fried and it wasn’t boiled and it was like nothing else she could imagine.

They all tasted each other’s food and pronounced each delicious but Marina secretly decided that her own was the most flavorful. It rested on a bed of parsnip puree. She liked parsnips well enough but couldn’t imagine how they managed to get the tough roots to turn into this smooth and delicious pudding like substance.

There was no conversation during the meal. The only sounds were of people enjoying a meal around them in the dining room. As Marina chased the last green bean around on her tray, she felt a little embarrassed at the sounds she knew she had made. A quick glance around the dining room showed her that others were experiencing the exact same thing and she relaxed.

Joseph was the last to finish, taking the time to clean the bones of his fish of any tiny flakes of flesh that clung there. By the time he rested his fork and knife on the tray, the clock announced the approaching end of service. Marina heard the sigh in response from all over the dining room and the polite soft laughs that came directly after. A shared experience gave the room’s temporary inhabitants a warm camaraderie.

Five minutes later the bell sounded again and it was time to leave. There was just an additional five minutes of time before anyone lingering would be taking up time meant for cleaning between seatings. In this respect the Wardroom was apparently no different than any other cafeteria in the silo and that pleased her. While she could not deny that she had enjoyed the new experience and the food, she felt uncomfortable with the idea that any place could be set apart. Sticking to a schedule made it seem more appropriate somehow.

As they left they nodded their thanks to Davis, who was again stationed at the reception podium. They passed by a line of people waiting for the next seating to begin. Only one group of three people in the line wore coveralls and they were clearly residents. They were deep in conversation and a passing listen told Marina that their topic was the aquaculture tank re-fit.

She forgot about them almost immediately as the family discussed the evening. Marina wanted to know about the view screens but Joseph only knew what he had been told when being considered for a position on the EMC. The same cameras people could view in the Memoriam and at any deputy station were also viewable in the Wardroom. Since that is where the EMC congregated if there was an emergency that needed extended response, it made sense.

Marina couldn’t imagine any emergency so dire. Life was a series of small and not so small emergencies with gifts of calm between. Sometimes it was a fire someplace or a leak in a pipe. Other times it was blight on the crops or a sickness spreading in the animals. Other times it was the illness of a loved one or friend and sometimes their gift of cleaning on their way to death.  She considered it a moment and realized that she had no memory of the EMC ever having been prominent in any situation.

Sela asked about the vacation chits. Marina had noted the little grimace she made when her father handed over the precious chits. She may not be earning them yet but she appreciated their value. One day’s worth of vacation chits were earned for every fourteen days once one passed from shadow status. There was one mandatory day off that still counted as a work day on the 7th day of each 14 day cycle but some people regularly took additional days off, while others saved the chits up like their family did or just took them randomly as needed.

There were an almost infinite number of approaches an individual might take with respect to time off but one thing was certain; a day of vacation was valuable and non-transferrable. Giving away a vacation chit did not mean the new holder got to use that chit. It was simply not usable by anyone and gone forever.

Joseph considered his answer and as the family reached the little lounge area this particular landing had, he asked her a question. “What do your pay chits mean to you?”

Sela wrinkled her brow at the question, but she was her father’s shadow and was familiar with his methods of teaching. He would lead her to her own answer. She appeared to think about it as they settled onto a bench. Finally she replied, “It means I can buy things and not ask you or Mom for chits. I guess it means I have more freedom. That’s what it feels like.”

He nodded as if this was the answer he expected and asked, “And what would it mean to you if you didn’t live with us?”

“Well, it would mean that I had obligations for the chits and couldn’t spend them just on things that I wanted. I would have to pay for the food I didn’t get in the cafeteria. I would have to pay for things I needed for my compartment. I might have to pay for repairs and stuff like that, too. I guess that would mean I had less freedom than I do now when it comes to pay chits.”

He added an encouraging smile to his nod this time and Marina could see the pride he held in his daughter writ large. “Very true. So, let’s consider that. Let’s say you’re a person who lives right next to a cafeteria and works a shift that allows you to have every meal there. All things being the same otherwise, does that person have more freedom than you would with respect to their pay?”

Sela thought about it for a long moment, eyes toward the ceiling. “I think that would depend on lots of small things, but overall, I would say yes.”

“Yes, I agree that there are many other considerations but I’m glad you’re going with the general idea. And now I’ll get to the point. If the Wardroom charged pay then some people would be able to enjoy it with much less sacrifice than others simply because of random circumstances. Even the value of pay chits is relative depending on the situation we find ourselves in. The only thing that has the exact same value to every single person in the silo is a vacation day chit. That’s it. No matter who you are or where you are in the silo or how you live, a meal in the Wardroom will cost you a half day off. Make sense?”

Marina had watched the answer come over Sela as her father spoke. She understood before he finished speaking and looked down at her folded hands. The view of her face was obscured by her hair, let down from her tight braids for this special occasion. It was a long moment before she spoke and then she said, “So you just worked for six and a half days to give me that meal, Dad?”

He laughed and reached over to pat her knee. “You bet I did. But, on the upside, I got to work those six and a half days with you, didn’t I?”

Chapter Seven

Marina’s legs felt like they were about to fall off. She was pretty sure the painfully burning straps under the skin of her thighs that might have once been muscles were about to actually spring out of her body. They would fly out and over the rails and straight to the Down Deep where they would be swept up by maintenance and never return.

What made it even worse was that a quick glance behind her told her that the easy stride and pace of conversation between her two family members meant this climb was no big deal for them. It sucked.

In truth, it shouldn’t have been such an ordeal. Yesterday they had climbed almost 50 levels. It was more than 50 if she counted the trip up and down the ramp at the Animal Farm. And now they were just taking a so-called short trip up to IT on 34. With each level being more than forty feet of distance, it was not a short climb and Marina should have realized there would be a price to pay.

It hadn’t started out that way an hour ago. She had done all that Joseph suggested, performing some stretches that hurt like crazy to loosen her overworked muscles. She had a glass of water as well as juice and tea for breakfast at the hotel breakfast bar. When she took that first step on 50 she thought it would be fine.

It wasn’t fine though. By the time they breasted the landing on Level 48, every step felt like balls of metal had been inserted under her skin and were rolling painfully across the surfaces of her muscles. There was a terrible pain in her left foot too, but not like a normal pain. Instead it was in the arch of her foot, horrible and sharp, each step bringing it forward and then pushing it back as the other foot took the lead.

She finally hobbled off onto the landing at Level 40 with tears in her eyes. Her embarrassment added more to the tears than just her pain. The concern on the faces of her husband and child as they followed her off the stairs made it worse still. They were actually confused by her discomfort and couldn’t quite grasp the situation.

She shuffled off to the side of the landing and out of the way of the people who passed by. She eased herself down the wall with a groan till she was seated flat on the grating. She put her feet out in front of her and sighed as that sharp pain in her foot immediately began to subside and the strain on her leg muscles fell away.

It took her a moment to speak. “I’m sorry, guys. I really am. I feel like such a weakling compared to you two.”

Joseph waved off her words and crouched next to her. He set down his pack and held his hands above her thigh, giving her a look that requested permission.

Marina grimaced but nodded and then bit down on her lip as his hands ran along the exact line in her leg that was causing her so much pain. Tears sprang to her eyes. He saw it, gave a decisive nod and rocked back on his heels.

“Well? What is it?” Marina asked, wiping away tears.

“Basically, it’s just very overworked muscles. It happens,” he spread his hands in a helpless motion, his expression sympathetic and also a little guilty. “I’ve seen it a few times when I brought someone up to the clinic or to the mediators and they weren’t used to going so many levels at once.” His eyes flicked away from hers with even more guilt and he added, “Tourists, too. I should have known this would happen to you.”

Sela watched the interaction and the look she gave her mother seemed a mix of embarrassment at their situation as well as simply feeling sorry for her pain. She knelt on the other side of her mother and whispered, “What do we do? She’s supposed to be at Level 34 soon.”

Marina gave a tentative flex in her feet and felt the sharp pulling pain in her arch respond immediately. She let the flex go and stuck with rubbing her sore thighs gently. She looked at Joseph, who was in turn watching her. “My feet, too. But that feels different. It’s mostly my left foot.”

Joseph gently removed her left boot. Sela looked around, red faced with embarrassment, as he did so. He shifted to a better position and lifted her foot to his knee. “I’m going to press on it to see if I can figure out what it is. It might hurt so get ready. Okay?”

She nodded and set her jaw, hoping that whatever he did didn’t bring back that sharp pain. In this matter, she wasn’t going to get what she wanted. His fingers seemed to find the exact spot to press to bring it on. She lifted a hand to stifle the yelp she could hear bubbling out of her.

Her husband gently lowered her foot again and shook his head. He gave a deep sigh and said, “It’s Stair Foot.”

Marina looked alarmed but Sela merely sunk to a sitting position and groaned. “What is that? It sounds terrible.”

Joseph gave her a sideways smile and said, “No, it’s not serious but it is painful and the only real treatment is to stay off your feet. I should have checked to be sure your boots had enough support in them.” He motioned toward her feet and continued, “It’s basically overstretching that gets out of hand. I’m hoping yours isn’t the kind that lasts for long. For the moment, you’re not going anywhere.”

He stood and looked around. He found the directory for this level and walked away to consult it, Marina following him with her eyes. Sela shifted from her kneeling position to sit next to her mother but the silence between them was awkward. Marina felt awful about the situation and understood all too well that staying off of her feet equaled ruining their vacation. For a teenager like Sela, it must seem terribly unfair.

She turned her head to look at her daughter and saw that she was trying hard not to show her disappointment. “We’ll figure this out. I promise not to ruin your vacation.”

Sela dropped her head and Marina realized she was about to cry. That particular catch in her breath and the defeated slump of her shoulders was familiar from her younger days but Sela had grown into a pragmatic and strong young woman. It had been a long time since Marina had last seen her cry. She was unsure how exactly she should approach it. The methods that worked on a ten year old probably weren’t the right ones for a young deputy shadow.

“If I put you on my lap and tickle you to make you happy, I think that might cause a scene,” Marina said, trying to put a cheery note in her voice.

Sela looked at her in alarm, her eyelashes dark and wet but her cheeks unmarked by tears, “Please, please don’t even try that. I’ll die of humiliation.” Her eyes darted about, as if trying to gauge exactly how many of the people on this level would notice such a fiasco occurring in their midst.

Marina laughed and said, “Okay, I won’t do that. But it seems to have worked just to say it.”

“Hmph,” Sela grunted as she wiped roughly at her eyes. “I wasn’t crying.”

“Of course not.”

Joseph returned just then and squatted next to Marina, his knees popping loudly. He gave her an encouraging smile and said, “I think everything is going to be fine. There’s an office with a couple of couches just inside where people often rest so I can take you there. Also, I got them to send up for a medical tech who will meet us there. They’ll know what your problem is and will bring what you need. We’ll be okay and then we’ll figure out the rest.”

“This is a zero floor. Shouldn’t there be a med station here?” Marina asked, checking for herself that the large numbers four and zero were, in fact, painted on the landing wall.

“Yeah, but only every other one is manned. Personnel shortages still,” he patted her arm to reassure her. “It’s getting better though. More shadows coming up every year. Oh, and I wired up to IT about your meeting.”

“I actually feel a little better now…”

Joseph interrupted her. “Until you stand up, you probably will. First things first. Let’s get you in there and onto a couch for a proper rest. This landing can’t be comfortable.”

With each of them supporting one of her arms she stood up carefully. The pain in her foot those first few steps was so bad that she shuffled along like an old woman. She didn’t want to but couldn’t stop herself. They slowly crossed the landing and by the time they had entered the main doors, they were bearing almost all of her weight. She dropped to the couch like a sack.

Sela let out a puff of air with the release of her weight and said, “Mom, I’m sorry. I guess you really are hurting.” For the first time, she looked concerned and she turned to her father, “Is she really going to be okay? You’re sure this isn’t serious?”

He shook his head, poured a cup of water from a pitcher considerately left for them and passed it to his wife. He helped her lift her legs onto the couch since the groans that came from her trying to lift them on her own were pitiful. When she sighed in relief at being still and lying down he answered his daughter.

“No, not serious as in permanent or crippling, but it really is painful. Anyway, they can do some things that will get her back on her feet if we’re careful and she limits herself. You’re just lucky you’re young.”

“Why? I don’t remember you ever having anything like this.”

“No, not yet.” He looked at her, grinned a little and said, “But you’re looking at your future if you stay a deputy long enough. It happens to us all eventually. Some sooner than others. Porters too, now that I think about it. That’s how they know it’s getting time to look at when they’ll transfer to Maintenance.”

Sela blanched and looked at her mother again. “You’re just saying that, right? Joking?”

He shook his head slowly and a bit mischievously, “Nope. Not even a little bit joking. You can’t stay on your feet forever.”

From below them on the couch, Marina said, her eyes closed and her voice droll, “It’s so nice that I can be an object lesson for others regarding their future degradation and how they’ll fall apart.”

All three of them laughed a little at that but it was a short lived respite. A young man wearing Turquoise and not wearing a shadow patch, much to Marina’s secret relief, came in a few minutes later. He gave her an injection for inflammation and pain that worked to send it to the background quickly.

He examined her feet and her boots and tsked at the deputy for not doing this prior to a climb with someone who didn’t normally spend much time on the stairs. From his pack he pulled out some felted pads and stuck those in her boots. He also gave her two small vials of pills to keep her pain and swelling at bay.

Once she had her boots on her feet, now including the wonderful pads, and confirmed she could walk, he demonstrated how she should climb the stairs for the time being. It was embarrassing to think of walking like that, flat footed and so careful, in front of all the people that would travel the stairs around them.

He must have seen this on her face because he became stern then, the look incongruous on his smooth young face. He advised her of exactly how bad it could get if she didn’t take great care now. She had no desire to be trapped anywhere for a week without the ability to walk back home. Better embarrassed than stuck, she figured.

The final instruction from the medic made Sela’s face fall in disappointment. Marina was to climb only one level at a time upward and 3 downward. That was for her thighs as well as her feet and she must rest and sit before taking the next bit of stairs. Even she couldn’t hide her disappointment at these words. At that rate it would take far too long to do all that they had planned. There was also no way she was going to be able to investigate her find.

The medic saw this. He must have been all too aware of her predicament because he said in a more gentle tone, “I see this more than you think. People who go a few levels at a time each day, at most, suddenly have to pack in as much as possible in a few days. Some I see after trying to make it seventy levels or more. You should see what shape I find them in!”

Marina could only imagine and said nothing.

“The point I’m trying to make is that it’s not the end of your vacation. These two are doing fine,” he stopped speaking and looked them both over, a quick appraisal in the look and asked, “You are fine, right?”

Both of them nodded and he returned his kindly gaze to Marina, “Since they are in good shape, they can do some of the running around. What you need to do is figure out what’s most important for you to do and then plan a way to get that done. If you want to see the Up-Top Screen, you still can. You just won’t see it today and you may have to skip something else. You want to shop in the Garment District? You can do that too, so long as you plan correctly. Okay?” The last he said with a paternal pat on her shoulder, the action again at odds with his boyish face.

She gave him a faint, disappointed nod but said nothing and he removed his hand from her shoulder to pull a little clipboard full of papers out. He scribbled on one and then another before handing both to Marina.

“One of those is a Rest Chit. I made it for a week but if you need it longer you can go see any medic. It will give you access to one of the rooms at the way stations on every third level so you can rest and put your feet up.” He turned to Joseph and said, “And I really recommend you make sure that happens.”

Marina smiled at the guilty look on Joseph’s face and was about to tease him about making her do anything but the medic continued.

“The other one is a Berth chit. I don’t know all your plans but that will get you a bunk for the night at any Medic Station. That’s also for a week. There aren’t many, some just have two fold down bunks, so try to get a message to whatever level you’re going to need well ahead of time. You certainly can’t traipse about back and forth to the hotel if you go too far up or down.”

When the medic finally left and the family was left alone in the room with only the whisper of the ventilation to break the silence, Marina tried to re-work their plans in her head. It was no use and no matter which way she figured it, she wound up costing her family important vacation time. Joseph and Sela were seated on the other couch in the room and both seemed to be thinking gloomy thoughts as well. Finally, Marina broke the silence.

“Okay. This stinks and I’m sorry. Let’s figure out how to fix this or at least not let it mess up too much of our vacation.”

After an extended bout of negotiation and comparing notes, the family wound up with a list and a workable plan. The list was messy, some things crossed out and others cramped in between those lines, but everything that was really important would happen, even if it was without Marina.

For herself, she became far less interested in shopping when the whole purpose of this trip, her investigation, would be in jeopardy. She had no idea how she would ever arrange such an opportunity again and her priorities had changed.

She tried, despite her own desires, to keep the needs of her family at the top of her mind, but she also realized that she had been given a little gift in this unexpected injury in some ways. Her family would need to do some things on their own and leave her behind. She could then follow the trail of her investigation without much interference. She tried not to smile as she carefully copied out the final list so that both Joseph and she could have a reference for where the other was.

They got ready to separate for the rest of the day, with Joseph and Sela set to make the long haul up to the Garment District as planned. They each recited back to Marina the instructions on what kind of additional gifts for his mother to be on the lookout for.

Marina would rest a while and then make her slow and laborious way up to IT. A second wire had been sent letting them know the situation but no response came and Marina didn’t know what to think. She would do her best to go up, however late she might arrive.

Before they could say their goodbyes there was a sharp rap on the door. Joseph popped up to answer and two porters, well-muscled and hulking young men, entered.

“We’re here for the transport.” He consulted the slip of paper in his hand and said, “For Marina Patrick.”

Marina lifted a hand tentatively. “That’s me. But I didn’t wire for a transport.” She turned to Joseph. “I didn’t. Did you?”

He shook his head and turned to the porters, a small frown creasing the space between his eyes, “Who sent you?”

The porter who had spoken slipped the paper back into his pocket. His shock of very dark hair, shadow of an even darker beard and thick eyebrows made him seem older than he probably was. “IT ordered a person transport. We’re supposed to get you there express, so if you’re ready…” The sentence trailed off since it was obvious that Marina, lying on a couch with her legs elevated by couch cushions, wasn’t ready.

“Uh, okay, well…”, Marina began.

Joseph stepped in, much to her relief. “Great. Can you gentlemen just give her a couple of minutes to get her things together? We’ll meet you on the landing. Will that do?” His hand reached out to herd the two porters from the room but his expression was all deputy, soothing and calm and authoritative. It worked because they shuffled out, polite nods to Sela and Marina as they left.

“Well,” Joseph said as he closed the door. “That I didn’t expect. What kind of meeting is this again?”

“Yeah, Mom, you’re getting carried like an old person. What’s up?”

Marina threw a little glare toward her daughter for the age reference as she sat and started gathering the things she needed to take with her. Most of their belongings were in the hotel but Marina had brought everything she would need for her business today.

She tied the top of her pack closed, pulling the loop tight as she did so. Joseph gave her a hand standing up. The stiffness was there and she could feel some echo of the pain just waiting for the injection she had received to wear off. She grabbed the vials of pills off the low table and jammed them into the protected pocket on her chest, hoping the feeling of them there would remind her to take them on time.

Marina felt guilty about leaving those men to wait for her so she turned to her family and talked quickly, checking the folded chits in her front pocket and all the other assorted things she carried as she spoke. “This is actually good. I mean, good once I get over the humiliation of being ported, that is. Anyway, you two do what we talked about and I’ll go get the business out of the way. That means we can keep our schedule. Tomorrow, I’ll already be halfway up to our next stop and all will be well.” She ended that last with a smile she hoped looked confident and shouldered her pack. She leaned in to give each of them a quick kiss on the cheek.

“Good? Okay?” she asked when she got no verbal response from either of them. She hadn’t answered Joseph’s question and she knew that he was aware of it. The question he was probably considering was whether or not she knew that he knew or if it was an accident brought on by her need to hurry. She wanted to nudge him toward thinking the latter.

He nodded, apparently satisfied that it wasn’t intentional and the duo saw Marina to the landing. Sela let out a laugh when her mother settled into the porting chair and then grabbed the sides in alarm as it rocked free when lifted. The frame was such that the two porters, one in front and another behind, could hold the handles even when angled by being on different stairs while the person seated swung free and remained level. The seat constantly adjusted no matter the angle of the carry. It was an ingenious design but a little shocking to a new rider. Joseph nudged Sela into silence and waved as Marina began to disappear up the first spiral up of the stair well.

Marina felt her face redden repeatedly as people peered at her, some discreetly and others not, during the first few levels of her portage. It was just as she had told her family, utterly humiliating. If she were very old, ill or in some other way infirm then this wouldn’t be an issue for her. That is really what the transport chair was for. One couldn’t even get the service without medical authorization and she hadn’t gotten one from the medic. She assumed that IT had gotten one and that embarrassed her even more.

A young family passed by, the couple not older than their mid-twenties and very fortunate in their fertility as they had two children in tow. They were young to have already met their quota of two children and were, no doubt, in the lottery for any extra births that might be permitted. The little girl, perhaps five years old, Marina guessed, pulled her thumb from her mouth and asked in a loud voice, “Is she going to clean too?”

The mother mouthed an apology, her face a horrified mask at her child’s rudeness, but Marina just laughed. The mother moved the child to ride on her hip, whispering scolds at her as they passed the chair. Before they spiraled out of sight, Marina called back to them, “No, little one. I just hurt my foot by not being careful on the stairs.”

The little girl looked back at Marina and she saw the thumb slip back into her mouth before they disappeared around the curve. It was sad that a girl so young even knew what cleaning was. Perhaps it had been explained when someone in her own family took ill, a grandparent perhaps. It was possible that little girl had already faced the peculiar mixture of honor and sadness that came from the gift of cleaning. Marina doubted anyone so young could truly understand the relief of knowing someone beloved would be spared the terrible pain of a lingering death and give the gift of knowledge in the doing of it.

It took a surprisingly short time to travel the six levels and neither of the porters seemed even remotely out of breath as they lowered the chair to the landing, well away from the traffic of the stair well and near the open entrance to IT. When Marina felt the braces that kept the chair from swinging free click home she let out a sigh of relief and caught the porter who secured the lever giving a little grin.

She braced herself to try to rise but the porters, experienced with transports for the decrepit, each held out a hand for her. She gripped their calloused yet gentle hands and stifled a groan as she rose to her feet. She assured the young men that she was fine going alone from there but they informed her that they were to wait for her and return her to her lodgings for the night.

She flushed a little at that, relieved that they would do so yet feeling as if she should be capable of doing that herself and not tie up two people who were probably much needed elsewhere. When she reached for her small pack, one of the porters grabbed it and then held out an arm for her. It was just the same way as her husband had for her the night before as they went to the Wardroom for a meal, yet the intention so completely different she almost laughed.

Before she could protest the porter said, “Sorry, but it’s required for transports. You don’t have to take my arm but I have to walk with you. Just in case.”

She didn’t take the proffered arm, but she did let him carry her pack and they walked slowly toward the open doors of IT. As was tradition, the doors were held wide with metal loops wrapped around the door handles at the end of a long bar. The other end of the bar hooked through another loop of metal screwed into the concrete of the wall. There had been various times throughout the years when the suggestion was put forward that the doors should simply be removed to open more space, but the fire codes wouldn’t permit such a thing. There was actually a breaking link in the bar of metal, a band that was more brittle by design, and a sledge hammer mounted to the wall nearby. If a fire should happen, someone would grab the hammer and break those links and then those fire doors would close for the first time in living memory.

At the entrance to IT, a young man stood wearing the same grey coveralls that Marina wore but with the badge of IT. It depicted the outline of a box with the graphic of a hand, fingers spread wide, within the box.  Also according to tradition, he held a platter with tiny round biscuits upon it.

As Marina and the porter approached, the man said the ritual words that were said to everyone who approached the doors of IT and he offered the platter of biscuits, “Life is for Giving.”

Marina took one of the offered biscuits and returned the words, also dictated by ritual. “I forgive.”

She stepped aside while the porter took his biscuit and the words were exchanged. Marina had no idea what the ritual really meant, no one did that she was aware of, save that there was some great wrong done in the past and IT had been involved. Some thought they might have betrayed the silo to the Others at some point, possibly even during the time of the First Heroes. Historians weren’t positive about the answer and so, of course, they gave none and the tradition continued.

When he was done with his words, they entered the wide entrance to IT. Most of IT was freely open to any visitor. The only exceptions were the labs where delicate work was done, the server room, the suit labs and a couple of other spaces. Even in IT, where transparency in all things was strictly adhered to, private concerns such as performance evaluations or personal matters between people required some semblance of privacy. Yet even in those cases, windows cut into the doors to all such spaces were covered only from the exterior so that anything done there would be done under the eye of any person that wished to observe it.

Here in the lobby, this same open attitude prevailed. Turnstiles, long since relieved of the turning arms that might halt entry, formed simple columns of metal that impeded nothing. A conference room walled with glass contained a table and chairs to one side of the lobby and though no one was in there, a pitcher and a few cups awaited anyone who might need to stop and rest or be refreshed.

Marina walked to the other side of the foyer toward the service desk and smiled at the clerk, then quickly corrected herself and added a touch of her fingers to the center of her chest. It was meant as a gesture of sympathy and respect. The young woman wore the badge of IT but also the Badge of Honor. She seemed so young to have experienced the loss of someone from the circle of her primary relations to a cleaning.

The badge, a simple embroidered symbol of the three entwined circles with an X woven through it, was unmistakable and reserved only for those whose parent, spouse or child had performed the ultimate service to the silo that can be done; clean. Given that only one volunteer was selected every few years for cleaning, there weren’t a lot of people who wore that particular badge.

The young woman returned the gesture and the smile and then asked them what she might do for them. Marina’s appointment was confirmed and soon the intercom in IT crackled as her contact was called to the foyer.

Marina turned to the porter, “What’s your name? I’m so sorry that I didn’t ask before.”

He ducked his head, looking a bit bashful now that he was no longer in his comfort zone of the stairwell, “I’m Roddy, Ma’am. Don’t worry about it.”

“Well, I’m where I need to be and I think this will take a while. Why don’t you two go and have something to eat or relax.” She waved toward the empty conference room and said, “I’ll be very happy to rest and put my feet up for a bit if it ends early. Just check in with the clerk when you return and we’ll link up.”

He looked a little dubious but agreed and they parted, him handing her the sack of treasures carefully, as if she might fall down by accepting the slight weight of it.

He left and she saw the IT head’s shadow, the same man who had been sharing such significant and private looks with the head during discussions leading up to the Reclamation Resolution. She thought his name was Tyler or Taylor or something like that, but of course, she couldn’t remember which. He approached and offered his hand. They exchanged banal greetings and Marina noticed how his eyes strayed to the bag in her hand.

She lifted it a little and said, “These are the items. Shall we?”

He inclined his head and motioned for her to proceed down the hall with him. Falling into step next to her, he matched the slow speed of her awkwardly careful gait. “We’re just going to one of the interior conference rooms. Everyone is here since we’re running a bit late.”

Though he said the words without any hint of accusation or blame, Marina cringed inside all the same. “I’m terribly sorry about that. I seem to have overdone it.”

The man smiled a little ruefully and waved the apology away. “It happens more than you think. Especially on the way down when it doesn’t feel like it should be difficult.”

Marina nodded and tucked that small snippet away for when the family make the trip downward again. She peeked into the server room as they passed and marveled at the beautiful simplicity of the towers that contained so much complexity within. Things she had made or repaired lay within those towers and it was nice to see where some of her hard work wound up. She didn’t want to hold up the proceedings any further so she looked for just a few seconds and continued on, the pleasant smell of warm electronics lingering in her nostrils.

They arrived at the end of the hallway at one of the conference rooms, the room number placard no longer remotely legible and the lines incised in it rubbed almost flat. The man opened the door and motioned her in before shutting it behind them. Inside, six people surrounded the small conference table, leaving two chairs empty, presumably for the man and her.

The head of IT, seated next to one of the empty chairs, called out, “Taylor, excellent. Thank you for escorting our guest. And Marina, it’s good to see you. I hope the transport wasn’t too uncomfortable.”

Marina eyed the man, but she read only sincerity and friendliness in his eyes. She nodded slowly and replied, “Yes, thank you for sending it. I do apologize for the delay.” This last she said to the whole group and hoped they could simply let the subject drop.

Introductions were made around the table and though Marina remembered most of them by face she was glad to have their names. The Historian, Greta, exuded an aura of calm but seemed friendly enough when introduced. She was an older woman and had held her seat on the council the longest of any member. Their terms were set at fifteen years. It took Historians such a great length of time to master their craft and they were so few in number that a long term limit was required. Her face was also familiar from the resolution work but Marina had not worked with her directly prior to this moment.

The Resident Affairs member of the council, Darren, was already known to her given their work at creating the resolution in the first place. Piotr, the head of IT, was a non-voting member of the council whose role was to provide information to assist decision making. His presence here today was a bit confusing, as was the presence of his shadow since he had no role whatsoever in this matter. Of the three others, two were voting members and one was a proxy, standing in for the Mayor.

Introductions made, refreshments offered and refused and seats resumed, the group got right down to business. It was Greta who broached the subject of this hurried conference, “We are given to understand that you have discovered interesting items during the reclamation and wish to consult us about them before they are destroyed. Is this correct?”

Marina nodded, throat suddenly dry and feeling like a child in the presence of a much more experienced adult, “Yes, quite a few items actually. And since this is just the second level to be submitted, I’m not sure what else I might get in the future. I’d like some guidance so I can deal with future loads more confidently.”

Greta dipped her head in a sort of quasi-nod, like a teacher receiving an exceptionally good answer to a test question. She looked at the bag still clutched in Marina’s hands on top of the table. “Please, show us.”

Marina cleared her throat and opened the bag. She began to withdraw items from envelopes and laid them on top, then slid each toward the center of the table where all might get a better view. She had about a dozen on the table before anyone spoke, each person either eyeing the items from their seat or picking individual things up and examining them more closely. She was arranging the bands with things that looked like blank faced watches on their envelope when the Historian gave an “ah” of recognition. Marina started, not realizing how tense she had become under the watchful gazes of these silent people.

Greta held up one of the curved clamp things and said, “This, I believe, is called a chit clip. Chits used to be much larger and when a person was going to shop, like at the bazaar where there are many places to buy, the chits could be held in good order in one of these. Efficient, but rather extravagant.”

Marina nodded, thinking of her experiment with the sheaf of papers, and they passed the clip around the table so that everyone could get a good look at it.

“What about the decorations on them? Each one is different and I don’t know their significance, if there is any,” Marina shrugged and ran her fingers over the strange symbol on the one she had been passed as it made its way around the table.

She could make out the letters, U.S.A.F. but the rest didn’t make sense to her. She could only see that it was both detailed and beautiful. It must have meant something to someone. She rubbed her fingers across the engraving once more and then passed it back to Greta.

“Hmm. I’m not familiar with any specifically like this but it does remind me of the kind of symbols we run across now and then.” She looked up, clicked a short nail against the face of the clip she held and said, “This one I would like to keep back. Anything with symbols of this kind might have some importance and I would like to examine any such before reclamation is finalized and the piece is destroyed.”

“And they might not be important,” Darren replied. “We need good and compelling reasons to keep back the silver. We all know the seriousness of our situation.”

Greta nodded, all eyes upon her. “Of course. We all do know it and I am keeping it well in mind.” It was a kind of rebuke, though Marina was quite sure the Historian didn’t mean it to be belittling in any way. Darren went pink about the ears and looked annoyed.

“I’m just saying that if we hold back everything that might be interesting or might have some symbol someone might identify at some undefinable future point, then we’ll have more held back than we melt down,” he replied, the splotches of pink on his ears growing towards his cheeks as he spoke.

Again Greta nodded. “You’re correct in the assessment that there is potential for a great imbalance in what is sent for reclamation and what is actually reclaimed if everything of interest is held back. Hence, I do not suggest that. I only suggest that symbols such as this one be examined by the Historians prior to destruction. There is much we don’t know about the past. Our history is incomplete.”

Darren went from pink to the full blown blotchy red of embarrassment. Marina felt sorry for him and understood where his concern was. He had been the first to see the value of her proposition when she brought it up and had supported the passing of the resolution. She decided that she had to come to his aid, at least obliquely.

“I understand what you’re saying and I think I can arrange it so that any delay won’t impact our supply.” She faced Darren, holding eye contact with him as she spoke, “Your concern for the supply is valid and it is my fault that I haven’t updated you. The load from Level 25 wasn’t big, but it was enough to ensure we have stock for the immediate future. We won’t have to touch what remains in the vaults. We’ve also begun fabricating more manual switches in places where such can be done to decrease some demand. And IT…,” she trailed off, looking at Piotr to fill in the gap.

Piotr took up the thread quickly and spoke, also directing it toward Darren as if the others were not in the room, “In IT we’re consolidating the remaining servers as much as we can. It should save some wear and tear on the components. We’re also working on some of the other automated processes, like climate control, to see where we can consolidate and reduce precious metal use.” He glanced at Marina, confirming his next words and offering her the opportunity to add to or counter them, “We’re in much better shape than we were.”

Marina nodded gratefully and looked at the others around the room. Greta was observing the exchange with an inscrutable look on her face. Others either jotted notes or continued to handle the objects on the table while listening.

Darren’s color receded some and he took a sip of water before carefully laying down one of the strange alligator clips. His fingers brushed against the little decoration that danged from the chain on the clip. This decoration depicted a strange shield shape with lines running down one part of it and stars across another. An animal of some sort with terrible clawed feet seemed to float over it while gripping wicked pointed objects in one foot and unidentifiable things in the other.

“What about this one?” he asked.

Greta held out her hand and Darren gently placed the object in her hand. All was forgiven and they could move along now. Marina immediately felt less tense and sensed that others felt the same.

She watched as Greta peered at the clip closely. Marina remembered that particular alligator clip. The work on the bauble was detailed and tiny, but exquisitely precise. Finally she pronounced her opinion and laid it carefully on the table. “I do not know the purpose of this item but the symbol is very familiar. We have found it in many locations and on a variety of objects, both small and large. It appeared to have some great importance or wider meaning that we have not ascertained. We have even found this printed on the upper portions of papers and on folders in our archives. Sadly, both of those were found in new condition, with no historical content. They contain no data other than this preprinted symbol. I don’t think we need to reserve it permanently, but I would like to get a drawing of it. Compare it with the others too, perhaps. Sometimes there are slight differences.”

The Mayor’s proxy nodded, scribbling a quick note. “I think we should probably get a drawing or image of anything like that before destruction. Can we agree on that?” She looked around the table for affirmation or assent.

“Perhaps not everything,” answered Greta. “Creating drawings of this detail takes a great deal of time and there are only so many artists who can do it.”

The proxy just nodded and pushed the object she had been handling, one of the items with the rotating posts that had a black stone set in its larger side, to the center of the table.

Marina took out the rest of the objects, reserving only the pocket watch. That envelope she kept encircled by her hands. The move was noticed by Taylor, who raised an eyebrow at her. Marina ignored the gesture.

There was silence for a while and the only sounds were the whisper of envelopes sliding along the surface of the table and the tiny clinks of metal as each item was examined. While others took their time looking at them, it seemed to Marina that the only one who was doing so with an opinion that mattered was the Historian. Eventually, she completed her examination and looked at the others around the table.

“I can’t identify the purpose of many of these objects.” She gestured toward the bracelet bands that looked like watches but with blank faces. “Others I have an idea of the uses. But what puzzles me is how these are being sent to reclamation. Who had them?”

Marina took out the list and slid it across the table toward Greta. “The objects I brought today are marked by a tick mark at their entry line. You can see that most of them were provided by the Hotel.”

She had the attention of everyone now. Piotr’s eyebrows drew together in a frown and she hurried on, “These weren’t in use. Apparently, there is some sort of storage in the hotel and these were in boxes marked to be left alone. No one there had any idea of how long they’ve been there or for what purpose they were stored, but it’s been at least as long as we have history. They brought them out and sent them down since no one knows anything about them.”

Greta and Piotr gave each other a look so she added, “The resolution did mandate the turn in. They made a correct decision based on their information.”

Taylor pointed toward the envelope still tucked behind the encircling protection of her arms and asked, “And that?”

Marina withdrew the pocket watch carefully and unfolded the cloth tucked around it. She laid it carefully on the little nest and slid it slowly toward the historian. “This was turned in by a resident. Aside from its beauty, it is also a timepiece and I think I might be able to repair it. I thought it might be significant enough to be of interest to the Historians. Only the case is silver…”

Greta picked up the piece with careful fingers, immediately found the tiny button and popped open the cover. She turned it over to look at the face of it and ran her finger over the unmarred glass. “It is exquisite.”

Piotr held out a hand and asked, “May I?”

The historian seemed reluctant to hand over the treasure but did so, her free hand beneath his during the transition in case the watch fell. He, too, looked over the details of the case and frowned when he looked at the scene as it was revealed when both sides faced him. “I’m not sure this is something we need to keep. It’s violent.”

Greta tilted her head to the side, as if considering her next words carefully, “You are correct in that it is in essence, if not in exactitude, against the tenets. However, we do kill animals to provide food and materials we need and that is what is being done there.”

Piotr laid the object down and pushed the envelope to the next person as if to get it away from his person as quickly as possible, an expression of distaste on his face. He replied, “Not humanely.”

“No,” Greta agreed, “not in the way we might choose to do it now, but I think that is a very old piece. From long before our history begins. Perhaps that is what they considered humane then.”

“I think it is from…” he stopped there, going no further with his thoughts. Marina thought she knew what he was going to say because she had thought it herself when she first examined the watch. Even before she found the hidden image and letter inside, it hinted of outside to her.

“You think it is from the First People or before them,” Greta said. It wasn’t a question.

He nodded stiffly and stopped himself from looking again at the watch as it made its way from hand to hand around the table. “I do.”

Marina wondered what Greta would say to that and watched her closely. She also watched the others. Would their faces give away their thoughts about the object? Her secret knowledge of the image and the letter gave her curiosity an edge.

“I think that you may be correct in that, however I have nothing that can prove that as a certainty.” Greta’s response was suitably noncommittal for a Historian and frustrating for Marina. Apparently, it was the same for Piotr.

“And exactly how could one ever possibly prove it? What do you want to do with it?”

“As to your first question, I can’t think of a scenario in which I would be able to prove this. The presence of an animal in such surroundings does hint of…and please excuse my choice of words…well, it hints of outside in a time before the First People. That could mean that this object was made by one of them after reaching the silo as a reminder of what once was.”

She paused a moment, either gathering her thoughts or trying to choose her words carefully. “If that is the case, then this item is of a value that can’t be ignored. That being said, it could just as easily have been made generations later based solely on fantastical ideas passed down from the First People.”

Greta turned back to Marina and asked, “What do you know of the object? What did you call it?”

“A pocket watch. It came from a resident on Level 50. The turn in slip didn’t have much more on it.”

“And did you go speak with the resident?” Greta asked and Marina was suddenly very glad she didn’t stop and try to speak with Genevieve Hardi before.

“No. I came here with it.”

The watch had made its way around the table again and back once more to Greta. She wrapped it in the cloth and tucked it back into the envelope, this time protecting it under her folded arms. Marina felt a pang as it disappeared from view and she wondered if she would see it again.

“I’ll see to the investigation on this piece,” she informed the group. “And the Historians will also visit the hotel and find out about this storage.”

It was said with finality and everyone else seemed to take it the same way Marina did. She immediately began turning over in her mind how she would go about speaking to Genevieve Hardi. She was probably going to have to make it look like an accidental meeting. She knew without a shadow of a doubt that if she didn’t find out what she could for herself, she would never know the answers.

It would be found out by the Historians and then ‘studied’ by them for decades, never being shared until every possible avenue was thought about over a lifetime or two. That wouldn’t do. She had the picture and the letter and knew more than the historian who had just taken the watch and the responsibility away from her.

A few of the pieces were selected for tentative inclusion into the holdings of the Memoriam and a good many others were selected for imaging and then reclamation. The other items sat, looking rather forlorn on their envelopes. They were neither important nor interesting enough and would be immediately reclaimed, their designs destroyed forever.

The ring that changed color when worn by the wearer was selected to be saved and Marina was very happy about that. They had each tried it on and gotten a slightly different color, with Piotr getting a yellowish green that was very pretty and Greta getting a blue that almost looked purple. She wondered if they would let others try it on or if it would simply go on display.

The group tried to be social for a few minutes, following the tradition of ending all discussions on friendly terms, but it faltered as each of them thought their own thoughts. With assurances that the objects to be drawn would be ported back to her very soon, Piotr left.

Everyone aside from Marina, Greta and Taylor made their way out shortly afterward. Taylor was waiting for Marina to finish re-packing her satchel so he could escort her out when Greta told him that she would do it. She told him she wanted to have a few words with her. Marina tried not to react.

Marina cinched up the cord on her little sack, now much lighter, and stood. The pain in her foot and thighs was still at bay, but slowly coming back. She hoped she wouldn’t embarrass herself in front of the older woman.

Greta appeared to be examining her for something and Marina looked right back at her. Her colorful coveralls were at odds with her serious and quiet expression. She was taller than Marina and possessed an angular frame of such spare flesh that the planes of her face were sharp and bold.  Though she knew Greta was at least a decade older than herself, to Marina the woman looked ageless, both old and young at once. It was perhaps that she kept her expression so carefully neutral that this was so. The lines she saw on her own face and that of her husband, the ones that showed a lifetime of laughter and smiles, were entirely absent from Greta’s.

When the historian didn’t speak, Marina cocked her head and asked, “What is it?”

Still Greta didn’t speak. Instead, she reached out and closed the door again. The little noises of IT disappeared behind the thick door once more and Greta drove her point home by leaning back against the door. Marina knew that she wouldn’t be leaving until whatever Greta wanted was obtained. Her stomach tightened nervously and she had to purposely loosen her grip on her satchel to avoid white knuckles that would give her away.

Greta crossed her arms in front of her chest and said, “You have something more to tell me about the watch, don’t you?”

It seemed to Marina as if the room grew very cool and she suddenly had a strong need to pee. The historian was gazing at her with that level look and she knew she would never be able to convincingly lie about anything. She could only hope to avoid it and she thought her odds at success in that were very close to zero. She had been taken off guard. No doubt that was Greta’s intent and that made it hard to hold back.

To gain a few moments of time, she turned away from Greta and shuffled back toward the chair she just rose from. She said, “If you don’t mind, I really can’t stand for long.”

That seemed to take Greta aback, perhaps because it showed rudeness on her part by allowing someone injured to stand only to be waylaid. Either way, Marina was gratified to see a tick of expression on the Historian’s still face and her arms uncross.

Greta paused and then strode around the table to regain her own seat directly across from Marina at the table. Marina thought the choice interesting. Either she did it because she sees this as an adversarial situation or because she naturally avoids change. After all, she could have easily chosen either seat to the side of Marina and not had to go as far in the doing.

Marina knew she would need to answer the question quickly so that Greta wouldn’t get the impression that this was a delaying tactic, though it certainly was, so she answered, “It’s about the objects, of course.”

Greta nodded and motioned for her to continue.

“Well,” she paused and considered her next words carefully, “these objects depict things differently than here in the silo, at least some of them do, yet they are recognizable. Would you mind bringing out the objects you kept back for a moment?”

The older woman seemed a little hesitant now but she reached for the envelope she had tucked into the largest pocket of her coveralls and withdrew it. She had used her kerchief as a cushion for the objects and now she carefully unrolled it, laying the objects onto the envelope. The watch came last.

Marina reached over and took up the watch, clicked it open and turned it around so that Greta could see the whole scene. “What do you see here other than the killing of an animal?”

Greta apparently knew precisely where Marina was going with this and gave one short and sharp nod of her head. “I realize the animals are different and the scene is, well, less ordered than we might expect.”

She was referring to the precise lines of crops and the grids of trees where such existed within the silo. In the watch there was a scene of wild abundance, as if an entire farming level had been let go and seeds flung everywhere.

Marina picked up the funny clip that had star shapes and stripes with the fierce animal above. She pointed to the animal and said, “And this?”

“We don’t know what that is exactly. We’ve been able to find no actual description of it anywhere, but we see the same animal in different postures on many such items as you’ve brought here.” She shrugged. “It is a type of bird, such as that depicted in some of the children’s books and on the puzzle boards. The appearance is certainly different in character but it has many similarities. It must have existed at some point in the past here and then died out.”

The thudding in Marina’s heart increased in pace and she knew the time was now or never. If she admitted what she found and explained that she wanted to talk to a historian about it she might be able to live a life after remediation.

Until the words came out of her mouth she wasn’t sure what she would say. It was her mouth more than her brain that decided for her and she would never know if it was cowardice or bravery that made her say what she did, “I think these objects are trying to tell us a story. I think that we might melt down the story before anyone realizes we should be listening.”

Greta’s eyebrows rose a little and the action put a few wrinkles in her brow. It was the most movement Marina had seen in her face thus far. “You sound a bit like a Historian.” She leaned forward now, elbows on the table, “What makes you think that?”

“There is more here than meets the eye,” she replied and waved her hand over the collection of items on the envelope. “Take the watches for example. I brought you a selection of them, but one entire box of items I received from that hotel storage was watches and those bands with blank screens that look like watchbands. I looked in the back of two and they are both filled with electronics. I think they are watches too.”

“And…?”

“And, ask yourself this question. Why would so many people in the silo need watches? I’ve received all this from just one level. There are probably a lot more of them out there and I’m very curious to see how many. But why? There are clocks everywhere. Why would so many people need watches? Can you tell me?” Marina’s voice remained quiet as she asked each question.

“I think that you might have already decided on a reasonable answer. Let me tell you if I agree with your assessment,” Greta replied, her voice as even and enigmatic as ever.

Greta’s response meant that she was correct, or close to it. “I think these come from outside, from the First People,” at this Greta blinked once, and gave a nod so tiny it might not have been a nod at all, or might be denied to be one.

She said nothing so Marina forged on, “But you said that was possible of all these artifacts so that is no shocking revelation. It is the implication of that no one else seemed to recognize that I think is most important.”

“And that is?”

“That they were capable of doing this on the outside, before the silo called them. If there were only the few humans being randomly born into bands of Others and they were trying to survive to get to the silo, how did they stop and create the specialized tools and develop the infrastructure necessary to create just this one thing?”

She held the watch up now, its terrible beauty and ominous meaning only truly clear to one person in the room it seemed to Marina. “There was more to the outside than I know of and I have to wonder, do you know what that more is? Are you keeping it from us? What more is there to know?”

At these final words, the Historian began to frown and sat straighter in her chair. She held up a hand to stem the flow of words from Marina’s mouth and said, “We are straying toward territory that is not ours to discuss, or at least not mine to discuss with you outside specific situations. Before we talk further I will need to consult with the other Historians. Let me just say this on the subject. We are the first to admit that our history is incomplete.”

She got up then and moved to the chair next to Marina. She took the watch from her hands and laid it down, then grasped each of Marina’s hands, her thumbs pressing on the fine bones on the back of her hands. It wasn’t painful, but it was firm. That pressure told Marina that whatever would be said next was important for her to hear, to really listen to.

“But some of what we have found is confusing. Because we can’t know that we understand the context and are only sure that these bits are not complete, they are not shared. There remain things that we must keep aside not out of dishonesty, but out of ignorance of the truth.”

She spoke with such sincerity and seemed so intent on Marina understanding her words that the lingering feeling of not knowing who to trust seemed to fade. Marina felt sure that should she now speak of the image and letter that this woman would not only refrain from turning her in, she would help her. It was with actual physical effort that Marina held back her desire to speak the words and instead said, “I think I can understand that. But I have seen something more now. I’ve seen those things and that watch.”

It was a challenge as much as it was a statement. What Greta said next would help her know the truth of things, of how much was hidden and why.

“And I’m sorry you did.” Greta released her hands and sighed, leaning back in her chair as if exhausted. Perhaps she was. Marina knew little of the daily life of a Historian. Perhaps they worked long hours. She went on, “If I could redo this, I would have asked instead that we be trained in the testing process and had the reclaimed items sent to us instead. You should not have so much uncertainty in your life. That isn’t fair.”

Marina’s gut tightened at the thought of anyone taking this duty from her. What more might she see? What more clues might arrive in future boxes?

“But,” Greta sighed again, this time it sounded to Marina as if she had made some decision and did not like the decision she had made, “the damage is done and changing now will not undo this. And in truth, we do not have the labor hours this would require of us. We are only four, you know.”

Marina nodded. This she knew. Only four Historians existed because the population numbers allowed for only that number. More people would need to be born and come to adulthood before another Historian could be made.

“So, I propose this solution and I will persuade the rest of the council that this is the best solution. You will continue the work but you will consult on any further questionable items directly with me. You will speak with no one else on your findings or your thoughts on those findings.” This last bit she said with particular emphasis. She meant there would be no more talking about First People making things outside. It also meant that what she had said here would go no further. The sense of relief was immense.

“I can do that,” Marina replied, keeping her tone as even as possible so as to not betray the excitement she felt.

“I further propose that you speak freely to me, when it is appropriate, on these same thoughts. Don’t harbor them or let them fester. Come to me. Do you understand?”

Marina nodded, glad there would be a safe outlet where she might say these things. Her window to share was rapidly closing and she knew it. This moment of grace was being extended to her and her instincts told her it was being done because the other woman already knew she was still hiding something. She pursed her lips to stop the words from coming out but she seemed unable to control her own mouth.

She said, “If I find something interesting, like that watch, I would like to be included in the research about it. Or if I find something more.”

The look on Greta’s face told Marina that she had said too much and that the other woman’s suspicions were confirmed. Yet Marina saw no victory or maliciousness in her face, only a sort of smoothing of her features as if she had averted some unpleasantness.

“Tell me,” she said.

“Could I be included in such research? Even though you said there may be no absolute answer and only muddles of confusion, I want to know. I don’t want to be shut out,” Marina said instead of answering the question.

Greta looked off to the side for a moment, as if looking to another person for an answer. She said nothing but as the silence lengthened Marina grew nervous. She jumped when the silence was broken by the crackle of paper being shoved underneath the door. It lay there, a dull cream colored square on the dark floor and Marina’s heart took a tumble in her chest.

She looked in the direction Greta had and saw the tiny reflection of the lens. Cameras were in so many places that she did not even think to look. She felt sure that the paper held some directive to bring her to remediation and for a moment, she longed desperately to see her husband and child, just one last time before she came out some bland shadow of herself.

She wondered if her hands would retain their dexterity afterwards and if she would be able to work amongst her tiny wires and tools with the smell of hot solder in her nostrils ever again. She had heard about the shaking of some and the dull clumsiness of others afterward. She wondered if the image and the letter would ever be found in the place where she had hidden them.

By the time Greta had risen and stooped to pick up the paper, tears stood in Marina’s eyes and she thought of everything she would miss. She watched, eyes blurred, as the tall and angular woman opened the fold and read the paper. It took her but a glance and then she folded the paper again.

She met Marina’s eyes and said, “Come with me.”

The tears that were standing in her eyes slipped over the edges of her lids and fell like sad jumpers off the rails. She felt the two fat drops hit her legs and wondered if she would be able to do this without succumbing to the urge to struggle. Everyone had seen something like that at least once in their life, some wriggling form wrapped tightly with the arms of their coveralls crossed and strapped down so that they could be carried along the stairs. Porters grunting and sweating under a bucking and heaving form, crowds being drawn by the strangled squeaks of a person trying to scream behind a gag were a rare but terrible sight.

Marina didn’t want to be that. Even more she didn’t want to be the person who was ported like a dead body, limp and seemingly lifeless, after being chemically subdued for the trip. That would be worse. Most tried to go with dignity, slipping past the landings with no one the wiser as to their destination. She would try that too.

She bolstered herself, remembered the state of her legs and feet, and then stood carefully. She reached for a cup of water left on the table and slipped two of the round balls of compressed powder from the vials, one from each, and tossed them back. They were chalky but the water washed the taste away almost immediately. She wanted to do this on her own two feet if she had to do it.

“I’m ready,” she said, her tone quiet and calm, her posture resolute.

Greta looked confused for a moment and then she laughed a sad little laugh and touched Marina’s arm. “You’re not going there! What must you think of me to assume that? You’re going to get your answers and then you can tell me what you’re holding back. We are going to exchange truths, or whatever we can call truth at this point.”

Marina remained suspicious. Wouldn’t that be an effective way to get someone to go willingly? Simply lie about the destination until it was too late to lie any further? Would they stoop to lying and use a Historian to do it? The thoughts must have been written across her face because the other woman’s mouth set in a thin line.

“I’m not misleading you. Come.”

She held out her hand for Marina to take and she did. The first few steps made her left foot and thighs feel like something brittle and tight were being strained to breaking, but it wasn’t actual pain. That was driven back for the moment and would be further if these tablets worked. It was merely enough to remind her to be cautious.

They left the room and found that almost all of those who had been in the room were now lined up in the hallway. Marina wondered where they had been watching from to have returned. She nodded at each, confused by their solemn looks. Their expressions were complex and not easily decipherable. The head of IT, now missing his assistant, seemed sadder than ever where he stood at the end of the line of people. As she passed he fell into step next to her.

They didn’t walk far, only to the server room, and he pushed open the door for them to enter without a word. Inside, the faint hum that traveled throughout the hallways grew much louder and the air moved with currents from the large fans that kept the heat at bay. He took the lead and they wove their way through the servers, some quiet and still, others covered with frantically blinking lights and stopped them at one of the servers. Looking behind her, Marina realized this small area wasn’t visible from the window set into the big doors. The alignment of the servers along the path effectively blocked that view.

As the trio rounded the server and came to the rear of it, Marina saw that it was hollow and barely a server at all. She peered inside and saw boards and lights that probably once lit with dummy lights pressed against the front of the case, safe from discovery behind the securely locked doors of the cabinet. At the bottom of the server a black gap filled the space at the bottom.

The head of IT flicked a switch and the black square blazed with light. A set of steep metal stairs, treads ridged for a better grip, led downward.

She looked up at the two other people and asked, “What’s going on? What is this place?”

Greta answered for the pair, “It’s hard to explain and we were close by so we decided it would be just easier to show you.” She paused a moment and then asked, “Do you think you can get down that? With your legs, I mean.”

“Oh,” Marina peered down the hole again and her eyes took in the many treads she would need to climb, for it was a climb that was needed and not simple steps. “There’s only one way to find out.”

With that, she turned around, grabbed some sloppily welded handles set into the server cabinet and lowered herself into the bright light below IT.

Chapter Eight

Hours had passed and Marina felt a deep weariness in her body and mind. The porters, once she had remembered they were waiting, had been sent away long ago. She had made her laborious way up the ladder just once in the time she had been here. Her husband and daughter had asked to see her as they made their way back down to the hotel.

He had taken the news that she would need to spend additional time working out details of the reclamation with a confused good grace. Marina had tried to work up some excitement when Sela showed her all that they had purchased as gifts to take back, but they could sense her unease.

When Joseph asked her quietly what was wrong, his face growing grim, she had been able to convince him it was just the discomfort of her legs and foot that gnawed at her good humor. It wasn’t a lie, only a lesser truth. She had been so absorbed that she had completely forgotten to take the next dose. It wasn’t until the throbbing pain in her legs began to distract her that she remembered. Now it was taking a long time for the pain to recede again.

Once their minds were eased and they took their leave, Marina returned to the bright rooms below IT. She had needed assistance getting down the steep treads this time, Greta bracing her as she approached from above while Taylor paid out line on a harness and accepted some of her weight.

A meal was brought almost as soon as she came back and Piotr apologized for forgetting about it. Marina was surprised to find out that they had missed two meals already and that knowledge woke her stomach up. They said little as they ate stew and rounds of flat bread. They had even remembered her liking for tea over water and a steaming flask of strong tea was passed down with their tray of food.

Marina looked about her as she ate, still absorbing all she had been told. She had not revealed the presence of her hidden treasure but there was no hurry now. Piotr and Greta had made it clear that they were disclosing. It was their turn to reveal things to her. And reveal they had.

The rooms here were deep and private and were a closely guarded secret in the time before history, they surmised. They showed her the last charred remains of what had once been books. There must have been hundreds of them given the number of tins that were stacked in the back of a less burned room. Small portions of a few books had been salvaged, sometimes only a spine. For some there were wedges of partial pages, melded together into one chunk by either the fire, or the water used to try to put out the fire, in a time long past.

In another room, they had shown her bunks, now stripped, where they strongly suspected the holders of these secrets hid away. In yet another room she saw supplies, now mostly emptied with only the strange containers remaining stacked on the shelves.

There were the makings of a small portable kitchen created in a design she had never seen before. The stove and basin were smoother, somehow more attuned to pleasing the eye with their shape and form, than the boxes of metal with rough welds that were made now. The word ‘Coleman’ was written on the side and she wondered who Coleman was. Had he hidden down here once?

In yet another space in this warren of rooms, they had shown her hangers on a wall scarred by scorch marks. It was exactly the sort of arrangement they used in Fabrication when a diagram needed to be hung so it could be referred to by the worker. She had one in her workroom. In each clip was still secured the corner of a sheaf of thick papers, yellow with smoke and age.

She had asked permission with her eyes, received a nod in return and then touched the sheaf. Her hand was gently drawn back only when she tried to fold back the top sheet to see what lay underneath. Her quick glance showed her a thick clear border with notes scribbled in tiny handwriting above the tear. There was also what looked like a part of a circle bisected raggedly at the place where the sheets were ripped away.

Where they sat now eating their simple meal, Marina saw many other interesting things. Something like a small office or perhaps a schoolroom meant only for a few was in the next area in a room shaped like an L. Just above her head was a long row of jacks, exactly the kind she rebuilt for mechanical, hanging askew and destroyed. The important parts of it behind the jacks were ripped and burned into a forest of bristling wires and melted conduit.

A pair of headphones, broken and covered with residue ages old, had been flung into the corner at some point and now had a small barrier, made up of plastic rods tied into a lattice, around it to protect it. Nearby, just a few arms lengths away, another barrier protected a messy pile of blackened ashes molded by water into a haphazard solid lump at tall as her knees.

Protruding from one side of the lump was a stick of wood. A round metal disk stuck firmly to the end of the stick shone dully in the light. The piece had been finely worked, its grain clearly visible even now and a curve in the wood that made her think of a chair leg. Another shape showed in the pile, a book this time, but bigger than any other she had ever seen. That huge book was a single mass of once soaked ash not salvageable according to the Historian.

Marina tore a small piece of the bread, dunked it into her stew and chewed thoughtfully, trying to draw out the meal as long as she could. She needed time to integrate what she had been told and what she had seen.

Piotr and Greta seemed to understand this and also ate slowly, not speaking but not closed off. Should she ask them anything, she knew they would be ready to answer. Piotr’s sadness was a bit more understandable now, given what he had already told her. He was living with this half-knowledge and a burden of guilt passed from one IT head to another that he couldn’t fully comprehend but took on as his own. It must be terrible.

When there were no more bits of bread to dunk and the last drops of the stew were gone and she had no more reasons to delay she asked, “And all this happened at the time of the Memoriam? During the start of history?”

Greta pushed her bowl away and wiped her hands on a dampened napkin as she spoke, “We can’t be entirely sure if it didn’t precede it by some period of time. The early records of that time write of this place as if it were some part of the events leading up to the Memoriam and the battle between the Others and ourselves.” She shrugged then, as if it was a puzzle she had spent too much energy on and was ready to move on from.

Marina nodded and sipped her tea. “And the burning itself?”

Piotr answered her this time. He said, “The Memoriam credits Graham with warning our people of the attack and actually physically stopping it. Some part of that battle was here,” he waved an arm at their surroundings, “hence the fire. Or, at least, that is what we think.”

Greta made a small sound at his last word and Piotr responded with a wry smile, but when she didn’t interrupt, he went on. “Well, nothing is known specifically so I doubt you could get our friend here,” he jerked a thumb toward Greta, “to include this in any telling, but it is unlikely that this suite of rooms could be hidden from the head of IT. It is a reasonable assumption that these rooms were his for some secret purpose. Those jacks, for example. Who do they communicate with?”

“Can’t you just trace the lines?” Marina asked, again looking up at the mess that remained.

“Hah! We tried that, of course. That was long before my time but the conduits run through feet of concrete and there is no way to know for certain where they go. We only know that there does not appear to be any communication jack that matches them anywhere else in the silo. Every other circuit is accounted for. Every one.”

“That means…”

Piotr nodded, the lines on his sad face easing as he spoke. “That’s right. It goes outside or somewhere other than the silo. But where? That is the question.”

Greta cleared her throat and looked uncomfortable with all the speculation going on. Piotr gave Marina a look that might have been amusement, though it was hard to tell.

“Those are certainly possibilities but they are not certainties and so must be left aside for study,” she said, her tone that of a teacher who has repeated a lesson many times.

Marina veered the topic a little and asked, “But why burn the books? You said those books were not like the children’s books but were thick and full of all kinds of information. And those diagrams from the wall. Why those?”

The historian held up a hand to stop Piotr as he began to speak and said, “We don’t know. What we can surmise, but not prove, is that this knowledge was somehow part of the conflict of that time. It is just as likely that someone else burned this afterward or that it happened by accident. We can’t know. The writings never mention this fire at all.”

The answer was unsatisfactory and Piotr must have seen that in her face because he quickly added, “Whatever happened, we do know that Graham risked everything in order to save the silo, that he found some pervasive dishonesty that almost destroyed us and that Grace and someone named Wallis had to fight again to start history. We just don’t know what each of those events precisely consisted of.”

Greta inclined her head, obviously unwilling to give tacit approval to such speculation but finding nothing specific to disagree with.

Marina felt the time to reveal her own secret was looming closer. There was much more she would like to know, including why such information, however tentative, was being kept from the people. No matter the reason, it seemed to Marina that it was against the very tenets of the silo to keep such knowledge a secret.

But that would be a process over time and her truth was knocking at the door. As with all things, a truth held back can become a lie and regardless of the possible untruths these others must deal with, she would not harbor hers. The others seemed to sense her gathering her courage for something and remained quiet.

Marina took a deep breath and said, “That watch had a whole lot more than silver inside it.”

Chapter Nine

Unfortunately for Taylor, he was the youngest and strongest of the people who could be permitted to know about the secret contents of the watch at that moment. He had come down into the room when summoned so that he could also hear her story. Of the three watching her, she sensed from him an almost shivery excitement. He may work in IT, but he clearly had a streak of Historian inside him, just a more passionate version.

When the little group realized that the papers were more than sixty levels down and hidden beneath a floor tile and that they couldn’t simply ask anyone to get it because of the contents, they had all looked at Taylor. His groan was loud enough to make even Piotr smile.

There was no question of getting someone else to fetch it, since the plastic she had folded over the papers was transparent. It was equally clear that the others had no intention of waiting until Marina was well enough to go back to her home and return. While she was resigned to the loss of her vacation at this point, she was not about to spend the rest of it being ported up and down the stairs.

Going down sixty levels was do-able for someone like Taylor, but coming back would need to be broken up and they decided that he would leave early the next day and then stay overnight in a room at the bazaar. That brightened him a little. Marina thought that Taylor was probably considering a very late night of entertainment, sampling the delights of the bazaar once the lights went from white to red in the dim time.

He was young and unwed so such enticements were probably something he dreamed of on a regular basis but had little chance to enjoy at such a distance. Those delights were legendary and she stifled a grin at the look in his eyes. The day after he would start back and drop the items off at the Memoriam on Level 72.

Taylor excused himself so he could get his things together and find someone to feed his cat while he was gone and the three were left alone again in that old scene of destruction. Despite the evidence of burning and smashed things, it was not an unpleasant place. It had the air of a place whose time had come and gone.  A place truly empty and waiting for the next time it was needed was what it felt like to her. Marina rather liked it, moldering heaps of ash and all.

Greta, of course, absolutely refused to speculate on what the contents of the letter and picture might mean and was rather firm with Piotr when he started to do so. Once she reached the point of actually tsking him, he stopped although Marina could see he was almost itching to talk more on the subject.

The historian did admit that they had almost nothing that paralleled what Marina reported, though they did have a few partial entries from the corners of the pages in those volumes that weren’t completely consumed by fire.

As for her, Piotr and Greta assured her that remediation was not in her future. Remediation was to prevent damage to self and others, not for thinking about things. Marina remained a bit leery of simply accepting that. There was nothing she could do about it if they were misleading her so she decided she would gain nothing by worrying about it. Given that she had at least two days until they would reconvene, three if she allowed them a day to examine the articles for any initial findings, they recommended she continue her vacation.

It seemed too easy. Could she really find and then attempt to hide something so contradictory to all that they knew and then just go on vacation? It was absurd. But, then again, what about this entire situation wasn’t completely absurd? Porters were called again for a person transport, much to her chagrin, and she began her long trip back down to the hotel.

It was late, the landing lights dimmed with only the red lights to provide some scant illumination. There was hardly any traffic at all now, third shift being the lightest manned. Every step sounded louder on the metal of the stairs than it did during the bustle of the day.

Marina took the time to think about her situation and how she should best handle it. She was under strict instructions—ones that she had agreed to abide by—to keep all the information she had to herself. She had found it difficult to agree at first, bristling at the thought of so much being hidden from the rest of the silo.

Greta and Piotr had understood her reservations and had patiently explained it all to her. In the end, it made too much sense for her not to agree with them. And they both hinted at more to be revealed. That was the problem with secrets. They were delicious and gave a certain pleasure when one shared in one, but that also encouraged more secrets. That bred dishonesty in its turn.

The Historian had been forthright and Marina sensed nothing at all dishonest in either her intent or her actions, merely caution. The secret rooms, the evidence within clearly pointing toward a deliberate destruction of some vast knowledge, were a source of disorder and insecurity for as long as the reason for the destruction was not known.

History was made of facts and it should remain as objective as possible. In the case of the burned books and maps one was led to two very different possibilities. Either the First Heroes that were the basis of their way of life had destroyed it purposely because it was dangerous to them or it was destroyed by the Others that tried to destroy humanity within the silo during the battle.

One could pick either scenario and make a case for it with a multitude of variations. But one could not be sure either was correct. What might occur if one chose wrongly in the deep future? If people decided that the enemies had destroyed the things and worked to repair them, but the truth was the reverse, what would the people unleash? And to add even more uncertainty, what if one part of this was destroyed by the Heroes and another part destroyed by Others?

These arguments, and others besides, had come from Greta with an earnestness that won Marina over and made it impossible for her to disagree. She evaluated her own motives and found that curiosity, an entirely personal curiosity that thought nothing of the well-being of others, was her true motive. She felt ashamed and had agreed to the condition.

When the porters lowered her chair to the floor of the hotel lobby, she gave them each her gratitude and a generous tip, took her bag and allowed one of them to escort her to her room. She was bone tired as she opened the door quietly. Inside, the room was dark save for the small sleep light that cast more shadows than light. Her husband and daughter were in their respective beds and it felt so good to be in their presence again she wanted to cuddle with them both and sleep for days.

In the dim recesses of the sleeping cubby that cradled her daughter, Marina could just make out the pale gleam of an out flung arm and the dark pool of her hair against the white pillow. On the other side of the partition, Joseph lay only on one side the bed, the side he had always taken in their years together. He, too, was fast asleep and the noise of his breathing, though not quite a snore, came across in the silence.

She stepped into the bathroom and got ready for bed. When she emerged in her undershirt with freshly brushed teeth and another dose of her pills swallowed, she saw that her husband was sitting up in bed, though he hadn’t turned on any lights. She put a finger to her lips, pointed to where Sela slept and crept on tiptoes to slide in next to her husband.

He kissed her quickly on the lips, the kind of kiss that is more a reassurance than a true kiss, and asked, “What was all that? Don’t tell me it was the reclamation either.”

“I’m glad to see you, too,” she whispered back with a bit of sarcasm in her tone.

“Oh, don’t get me wrong. I’m very glad to see you, but when I saw you last the mood was so thick you could bottle it for sauce. What happened?”

Marina smiled at him and brushed his cheek with her palm. “It really was about the reclamation and some of the items that are getting sent down. It seems a good many have historical value beyond their metal. But they must be chosen carefully so we don’t wind up saving it all rather than melting it down. It just took a while and not everyone agreed on what to do.” It was a sort of truth. Strangely enough, Marina didn’t feel at all bad about what she said so she knew it must be right.

They were silent for a moment while Marina enjoyed the warmth of the bed and her sleep heated husband. She considered how different her next few days would be from their plan and how best to get that news out of the way. She turned to look at him in the dim light and gave him a kiss just a little better than one he had given her.

She said, “Instead of all the other things, I’m going down to the Memoriam. I’m going to get a quick lesson on what is important and what isn’t so I’ll be able to manage the deliveries. I’ll be able to meet you by the time you get to your mother’s again.”

“Hmph,” came his quiet reply after a few beats. He slid down into the bed and got comfortable. He held out his arm so she might snuggle into him and when she did, he wrapped his arm around her. They were quiet for a moment. “Well, if that is what you’re sticking with there must be a reason so I’ll ask you no more about it.”

She kissed his shoulder where her head lay and whispered, “Thank you. I love you.”

Chapter Ten

She woke to Sela shaking her bed with a big smile on her face. “Mom! You’re back! Wakey wakey!”

Marina groaned, turned over and pulled the pillow over her head to drown out the light and noise but it was no use. Joseph wasn’t in bed, his spot cold as she reached for him. She could hear the shower going. That meant he had been up long enough to have already had his morning tea. He was useless without that and wouldn’t have even entertained the notion of a shower before having a cup. Sela was dressed and her hair was neatly braided into two long ropes. It was not yet pinned up around her head in the fashion she favored but she had surely been awake for a while given her general state of near readiness.

In response to more shakes of the bed, Marina tossed the pillow at her daughter and said, “I got in late. Can’t I have more sleep? Just a little while? Have pity on your poor old mother!”

Sela just laughed and said, “Sleep is for after vacation. Today we’re supposed to go Up Top, to see the view!”

“Oh, really. Don’t you mean you and your Dad?”

Her face lost that excited expression and she slumped in the exaggerated fashion only teens seem to be able to pull off, “I forgot. Aww.” She flopped down onto the bed, bouncing her mother in the process.

“Don’t worry, sweetie. You’re still going to do it. I just won’t be going with you. I’ll survive without seeing it. If I really wanted to see a bunch of dirt blowing around I’d go watch when they do fan maintenance,” Marina replied, retrieving her pillow and plumping it up behind her head.

Joseph squeezed his tall frame through the door of the tiny bathroom. He was wearing a pair of shorts and his undershirt. With him he brought a cloud of steam and the delicious smells of good soap and clean man. Marina smiled at him.

“Finally,” Sela said, exasperated with all the waiting. “Mom is still broken so she isn’t coming with us.”

“Broken? Sela, since when are you reverting to baby speech?” Marina asked her.

“What else can I call it? Seriously.”

“She’s got a point,” Joseph broke in. He took out his clean set of coveralls from the bag left by the hotel laundry service. He held out the bag for Sela so she could get her things out. They were all checking out today. She took it and went around the partition, leaving her parents some semblance of privacy.

“You can come if you want. We’ll get porters,” he offered as he toweled off his hair.

Marina snorted. “That would be more chits than we’ll spend for the entire vacation. No, forget about that. I don’t need to see it that bad. If you can, find one of those artists that draw the view with colors. Find a nice one and just bring me that, if you like.” She thought for a moment and added, “But only if the cost is reasonable.”

Joseph hung the towel to dry on the rod their privacy curtain hung from and then hopped onto the bed and bumped his cold wet head into her neck, eliciting a shocked combination of giggle and squeal. He laughed at her but it faded quickly and he asked, “How are you this morning. Any better?”

“I’m doing much better. Sore, but better. I’ve got my pills and I’ll be fit soon enough.”

“Well,” he said, giving her a quick peck on the cheek and standing up to dress, “I think a picture is a good idea anyway. A memento. I’ll find something nice for the compartment. Are you still going to the Memoriam?”

She nodded. “I am. I’ve actually got a room there waiting.”

He wiggled his eyebrows at her. “So you’ll be sleeping with Historians tonight?”

She made a sound of disgust and heard a remarkably similar sound emanate from the area beyond the partition.

“I’m only joking!” Joseph exclaimed, his eyes round with mock innocence.

“Anyway, I’ll get to spend some time piddling around the area and see the kind of artifacts they are looking for.” At his expression, Marina explained, “If I know what they already have, then I’ll know when I see something that looks new.”

“Ah, I see.” The look on his face told Marina he didn’t really see at all but was letting it slide.

“Anyway, I’ll enjoy it. Getting a personal tour and all of that. I’ll do some shopping at a couple of places and then go to your mother’s. It will be fine,” she promised him.

“Hmm,” he murmured, not entirely convinced and certainly not pleased to have a family vacation become a split adventure.

“Kiss me, you idiot, and then go get your daughter and wife some breakfast. Tea, too.”

He kissed her, taking the opportunity for a squeeze which she giggled at, and left the room.  Marina sighed in contentment and considered whether it was time to get up and take a shower and more pills. Her pain was significantly less and she wanted to keep it that way.

Sela poked her head around the partition and said, “You guys are just disgusting, you know. I’m standing right over here.” She held out her arm as if to demonstrate that it was merely an arm length or two.

Joseph returned balancing a meal tray piled high with food and two cups of tea. Hot corn muffins, fruit wedges, vegetable spread and jam made Marina’s mouth water. She decided breakfast was more important than a shower for the moment. She wasn’t leaving at the same time as her family so there was no real reason to rush. She got out of bed and fished the vials of pills from the coveralls she had draped over a chair the night before. From each of the vials she took one pill and washed them down with a little water. The family met at the table and they feasted.

Later, she saw her family out the door and watched as they strode away. Before they exited the double doors from the hotel lobby to the landing and the stairs beyond, both turned and waved one last time. Sela blew her a kiss and she returned it. Her daughter turned around smartly, her hair shining and neat with her braids coiled around her head and her part ruler straight. She was so obviously eager for the day’s adventures that it gave Marina a warm feeling inside. She didn’t go back into her room until the big doors shut behind them just in case they looked back again.

It was strangely still in the room once they were gone. It wasn’t like when they left the compartment for work on the rare day that Marina was staying home. Then it was still home and it was only blessedly quiet and ready for her to have some alone time. This was a different kind of empty. The room seemed almost forlorn. Marina shook off the feeling and made ready for her own departure.

A shower so long it could only be called decadent left the room steamy and moist, but it revived her and made her muscles feel better. She packed her things after putting on her spare coveralls and then searched the room for odds and ends that might have been left behind. She found hair pins left by Sela and the vegetables left on the shelf by Joseph and she tucked those away.

Joseph had lightened her load by taking her tunic, pants and slippers as well as her spare canteen and a few other items. The package of metal objects she would have liked to have given him, and he did offer, but she was responsible for those items and didn’t feel she could let them go, even to her husband. It weighed almost as much as all the things he had relieved her of but was only a fraction of the size. After she checked them out of the hotel, using the chits she had gotten from Joseph and some of her own, she made her way to the landing and immediately wanted to go back and stay another night in the hotel.

There was plenty of traffic since another conference was in session and the stairs in this area were busy, if not actually crowded. She hated the idea of slowing others down. She took a steadying breath and then made her way toward the stairs, waiting for a decent gap in the downward traffic. She could feel the pull in her foot as it bent during each step but it wasn’t bad. She kept her pace slow and ignored, as best she could, those who grumbled when they passed her. When she heard the call, “Passing down!”, she squeezed to the side as much as possible and avoided eye contact. It was embarrassing.

She dutifully exited at the third level down and sat on the bench near the wall for a few minutes. It was boring even with people to watch and it would take a long time to get all the way to 72 if she kept it up. She was tempted but she did exactly as she was directed to and when she finally reached Level 70 she stopped for a late lunch at the deputy station. No one was there except the dispatcher and he was busy so she had no one to talk to and pass the time.

Deputies didn’t just enforce actual laws. They also helped with other matters that just needed a third party. Noise complaints were most common on residential floors where children often used hallways for their complicated made-up games. Reports of messes were also common and those could range from leak reports that deputies would then record and report, to trails of debris left unwittingly by someone passing by. Medical reports, accident reports and a whole host of things that would be considered outside the norm came first to the deputies. It kept them very busy, indeed.

Two children, perhaps eleven or twelve years old, were brought into the station for fighting while she rested. One sported the beginnings of a respectable black eye while the other had a split lip that made it seem as if she were pouting rather dramatically on one side of her mouth. Both were crying miserably. Marina made her exit as the deputy began lecturing them on the myriad of ways such fighting broke the tenets.

Once on Level 72, she stood to the side of those waiting their turn for entry into the Memoriam. It wasn’t always this busy but there were only so many people the Memoriam spaces could safely accommodate and still be open enough so that everyone could see the exhibits to full effect. When the historian shadow that was at the door dutifully handing out number plaques caught her eye, Marina held up the slip of paper Greta had given her. The shadow waved her over and accepted the paper, flicking it open and reading while still keeping an eye out for any newcomers to the line.

She folded the paper and returned it to Marina. “You can come on through. Greta isn’t here yet but we expect her later in the day. Until then you’re welcome to go through the Memoriam at your leisure,” she said with a smile.

She turned to the people standing behind the line that marked where those awaiting entry should be and said in a clear voice, “I’ll be right back. Who would like to count those who leave for me and keep track of anyone new that comes?”

Several hands shot up and the shadow, a very pretty young woman with unusually light brown hair, smiled at a young boy about the same age as the kids brought in for fighting.

“Thank you, young man,” she said to the boy and his face lit up. “Why don’t you come up here?”

She gave him the little stack of number cards and unfolded a stool for him to stand on, making it easier for him to see, and then helped him up onto it. She ruffled his hair, reminded him to hold the rail on the stool so that he wouldn’t fall and then beckoned Marina to follow her inside.

Marina looked back at the boy and almost laughed at his dazed expression. She remembered too well how easy it was to develop a crush at that age and how sensitive one was to any mention of such. Once they entered the big doors and stood in the vestibule of the Memoriam proper, she told the shadow, “You’ve made his day! He’ll dream of you for years.”

The shadow laughed a musical and light laugh that matched her appearance and held out a hand, “I’m Florine. And you’re Marina, the great finder of lost things! Nice to meet you.”

Marina flushed at her words and sidestepped the praise, “I assure you I’m not. I just stumbled on it by chance.”

“Ah, well,” Florine said as she opened the vestibule door and motioned for Marina to enter, “however it happened, I’m very glad it did.”

The hush that fell once the doors closed was unique to the Memoriam. There were lots of places that were quiet, but this was a different quiet. It was reverent. The ceilings here didn’t have sound dampening tiles or anything else to lower them and the spaces soared up to the concrete ceiling above. Pipes and conduits crossed everywhere but here they were painted to match the lower side of the concrete ceiling in a blinding white. The pipes were given only discreet stripes of the color they should be painted.

The floors, which were tiled like most spaces, were further covered in rugs woven from various plant materials. Only the edges of the rugs, each shaped to match the space they were in, had any real color in them and each bore the color of one of the categories of workers. Even the walls were painted blinding white. The displays were meant to be the focus of this space and it had been scaled back in distracting ornamentation to ensure that was so.

Marina looked around and inhaled the fragrance of old paper and that strange plant-like aroma the rugs gave off. When she stepped onto the rug from the tile, she felt odd and a bit guilty. One didn’t tread upon material like that. It would make it wear and that was a waste. In this place, however, the muffling of footsteps was more important and she took another tentative step forward.

Florine smiled an understanding smile. She wrapped an arm around Marina’s own and led her forward, toward the hallway with the first displays. As they walked she said, “I’ll just take you to your room so you’ll know where it is. That way, you can take a rest now, or whenever you like, while you wait.”

Marina glanced at a wall with black and white portraits hung equally spaced along its length, each one mounted against a square of colorful fabric over some kind of backing material. Each was rendered with such detail that Marina thought they looked like softer versions of the image she had found in the watch. Each also had a small label below the portrait with a name and their age when they went to clean. Almost all of the people were older, though a few were heartbreakingly young. As she passed, Marina placed her hand on her chest, fingers extended toward her heart in remembrance. As they came to the end of the hall, she put a halting hand on Florine’s, which was still around her arm. She stood beneath the portrait of the only person on this wall she knew.

Grandy had been drawn just as she looked when she first requested her name be added to the lottery for cleaning. She had still looked healthy then and it had been very hard for Marina to accept that she was gravely ill. Though the woman had been like a mother to her for more of her childhood than not, Marina wore no Badge of Honor because Grandy hadn’t been in any way related to her.

She had volunteered and been selected for the raising of the orphans. She had been unable to bear a live child herself and even the assistance provided when she went for annual renewals of her Birth Lottery had been ineffective. Eventually, they had stopped renewing it and she had released her husband to join with another. He had been tested and deemed a healthy man, ripe for reproduction, so it was only fair.

Still, Grandy had ended up with four children and had, to Marina’s eyes, been a very happy woman. She enjoyed her own version of motherhood for the dozen years or so that Marina lived with her. And when she was diagnosed with breast cancer she had confided to Marina that she was very glad she had been unable to bear any children for fear that she would simply pass on the affliction.

Marina understood this sentiment well. To ensure one recorded every deviation from the norm in their medical files and have any potential mate cleared as a good match before making commitments was a duty for everyone. This Memoriam stood as a testament to the survival of their people when they were poisoned by those bad Others, those monsters who were less than human. They were beating the poison with every new life but they would only continue if they were diligent.

Marina gazed at the portrait for another long moment. She wanted to reach up and touch the cheek drawn there and see if it was as soft as the cheek of the gentle woman it represented. Instead, she dashed away a tear. Florine patted her arm and urged her forward without words. They wended their way through the halls and past display rooms until they finally reached a door marked as private. A number combination lock stood above the latch on the door and Florine let go of Marina’s arm and entered a few numbers. The latch clicked and she held the door for Marina to pass in.

Before Marina could ask the question, Florine answered it. “I’ll give you a card you can use in the slot instead of a combination. Since these are our private quarters and also the entrance to the archives, we have to have some sort of lock. In the past people just came right in, not paying a bit of attention to the sign. That’s quite awkward when you’re trying to sleep or take a shower.”

“I’ll bet it is. Thanks.”

“Ah, everyone asks that. We get enough guests for it to be standard.” She winked at Marina and led her down even more twisting hallways and past the communal spaces. Historians did marry and did have children, but not often. It was a passionate calling that sometimes left room for very little else in a person’s life. Instead, they mostly lived here in the rooms behind the Memoriam and all shadows were required to live there. It was another reason many of them couldn’t make it through the long and arduous shadowing process. Those that simply couldn’t live their lives back here in the company of other historians eventually left.

Most historians were women, which was a bit odd in Marina’s view, but Joseph had a theory about that. He had declared that no man worth his boots would walk about wearing that many colors at once. It was a funny thought but now that Marina could watch Historians from close proximity, she couldn’t help but see his point. The way the stripes of color were sewn together with the arms and legs of different colors did seem very feminine. She decided to keep that thought to herself. She would have to evaluate some of the male shadows and the one male Historian closely and see if she got a different impression from them.

They arrived at the head of a hallway with a neat “Guest Quarters” painted in bright blue at the juncture. The first door was propped open with a wedge on the floor and it was to this room Florine led her. She showed her the location of the bathroom, gave her instructions on places to get snacks and when meals were served and then hurried away to return to her post.

Alone, Marina realized how tired she was. Her foot was starting to hurt again and the tightness in her thighs was making it known to her that they were less than healed. She took her pills with a few swigs from her canteen and tucked her few clothes into the drawers under the bed. Though she wanted to spend some time in the Memoriam, to refresh her memory of the artifacts and read the writings, she knew she needed rest instead. It was a long distance she had walked despite the fact that it was just twenty-two levels. And she was hungry.

She peeked outside at the clock at the head of the hallway and found that she had a long time before the next meal was served. She took one of the peppers from the bag Joseph had left and snacked on that. She wrapped the remains in a cloth napkin to bring to the compost bin in the dining hall later and laid down for a nap. She thought about how long she wanted to sleep to try to ensure she woke up but before she could even finish the thought, she was out.

Chapter Eleven

Soft raps on her door woke Marina from a sound sleep and she was confused by her surroundings for a moment. She croaked out a hoarse, “Come in,” once she realized where she was.

The door opened slowly and Greta peeked in, as if regretful of disturbing her rest, and said, “I’m sorry to wake you. I didn’t want you to miss dinner.”

Marina struggled to sit up and wiped an unfortunate smear of drool from her cheek. She felt simultaneously like she had been asleep for days and had just fallen asleep a moment before.

“What time is it?” she asked Greta.

“Dinner seating is about halfway through.”

“Yikes,” Marina said and immediately reached for her boots. “I only meant to sleep for an hour or so. I’ve been out for a while. Just give me a second and I’ll be ready.”

Greta opened the door a little wider and motioned toward the chair, “May I?”

“Of course. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be rude. I think I’m still half asleep.”

The older woman seated herself, perching very precisely on the end of the chair, her back ramrod straight, “I don’t think you’re rude. Don’t concern yourself with that. We’ve all had those weird wake-ups before.”

Marina finished tying her boots and stood up, happily surprised to find no significant pain at the motion, and ran hands down her coveralls to smooth them some. When she looked at Greta, the woman pointed toward Marina’s hair and gave a little expression she couldn’t decipher. Marina turned to look into the polished metal mirror and then laughed at her reflection and the giant wedge of wild hair pushed up on the side of her head.

She dug her comb from the drawer in the nightstand and dragged it through the curly mess, finally securing it all with a twist and a few hair pins. She turned to Greta and said, “Yeah, that was attractive.”

Greta almost laughed but not quite. Her smile was a friendly one and the two women made their way to the little dining hall the Historians shared. Places that had to service many people ran with an unwavering dedication to a schedule. However, this small group took turns making food and doing the washing up and could be a bit more relaxed about the timing of meals.

Three shadows were sitting at a larger table with benches on either side, deep in discussion over some point or another. At a smaller round table, the only male Historian was sitting with two more shadows listening to them talk as he sipped a cup of something hot enough to steam. Florine was scraping her tray but she waved and smiled at Marina before hurrying out the door.

The food was set out on a counter, still in the pots or pans they were cooked in, along with a few empty trays and utensils at one end. Marina followed Greta’s lead as she grabbed a tray and her utensils and strolled along the counter, inspecting the offerings and dishing up what caught her fancy.

The food was formed of plain ingredients but, like the Wardroom, arranged in such a way that the eye was pleased. Marina took a circle of pale cheese, topped with a tomato slice and a perfect basil leaf drizzled with some delightfully spicy smelling sauce. She took a spoonful from a dish that Greta indicated was a spicy eggplant stew and a wedge of flat bread that had been baked with a sprinkle of herbs on it and smelled of roasted garlic. A fresh mix of beet greens, various lettuces, onions and tomatoes and topped with a dressing made from the rare and valuable Honey Vinegar was the only decadent thing on the line. Marina’s mouth watered at the thought of the sweet and tangy flavor.

They made their way to a table, conveniently near the male Historian and his charges, and were largely silent while they ate. Their desired topic of conversation wasn’t one that could be indulged in, even in this place as long as there were other ears around to hear them. Marina listened as best she could to the historian and his shadows as they discussed the importance of understanding the way another person thought about a subject and how to listen to more than just the words a person spoke. She smiled as she listened to him have the two shadows practice on each other by speaking a sentence and then try to figure out the full context of what the other shadow said.

He was patient and very insightful. Marina could tell this even with her back to him. His voice was both calming and strangely electrifying. She found herself blushing at the thoughts in her head and then blushing more furiously when Greta looked up and gave her a crooked smile that said she knew exactly what Marina was thinking. It was embarrassing but Greta smoothed it over with a quiet word and good humor.

She was relieved when the man and his shadows left but she noted that the bright patchwork of the coveralls did nothing to diminish his dark good looks and purely masculine physique. Marina doubted every man could pull those off in quite the same way and she sighed, eliciting an abrupt bark of laughter from Greta.

Soon enough they were finished. Marina felt strange about just leaving her dishes for someone else to clean up. Greta said that she would be joining her when it was her turn and that would be lunch the next day. They scraped their plates into the compost bucket and put them into the soaking water, filled their flasks with tea, and departed the common room.

Greta led Marina away from the private rooms and back toward the Memoriam proper, but they passed by that door and continued toward the archives, conveniently labeled on the wall with a stern warning that only authorized personnel should continue. Greta turned to her and handed her a badge to clip onto her coveralls. It was a plastic card bordered in the colors of the historians with the word ‘Guest’ in bold black letters.

She clipped it on and felt strange in the doing. She was a Fabber, a worker of small objects and fixer of broken things. In her wildest dreams she never would have imagined what was happening now. She could never have imagined going into the archives of the Memoriam, a place she had been only dimly aware of and not at all interested in until she opened the back of that watch. She knew there was more. She knew there were answers to all the puzzles of this life and she couldn’t help but be eager to dig and reach the down deep.

When Greta punched in the combination at a big metal door, much like the one that she had seen in IT, but without windows, Marina couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed in what she saw inside. She wasn’t quite sure what she expected but rows of shelves with neatly labeled boxes filling them wasn’t quite the picture she had made for herself. Maybe dramatically lit rows of books or enigmatic and mysterious locked boxes at the very least. This looked more like the Small Parts counter down at Supply.

Greta must have seen her disappointment because she said, “Boxes can hold many wondrous things, Marina.” She smiled her small smile at Marina then, the one that bowed her lips the smallest bit but lit up her expression with meaning.

Marina stepped into the row of shelves just in front of her and looked at Greta, who nodded toward a box just above her head with that still, small smile. Marina carefully extracted the box and placed it on a rolling cart that was left conveniently nearby. At another nod from Greta, she lifted the lid and saw that it was filled with objects carefully wrapped in cloth or clean paper.

Greta reached in and extracted one seemingly at random then unwrapped it for Marina. Inside, a beautiful symbol almost just like the one she had found rested on a round disk of metal. The strange animal with the claws outstretched over the shield that held stars at the top and stripes at the bottom was rendered in metal and colors. To that symbol was also added a round background with star shapes circling the round portion.

Greta placed it gently in Marina’s cupped palm and she examined it. On the back were knobby bits and Greta reached over and twisted one of them off, revealing a pointed post. Marina looked up, her brow creased in question and Greta took it back, twisted off the remaining knobs and then attached the object to Marina’s coveralls near the neck opening. She affixed one of the knobs and Marina felt the prick of the remaining sharp points as she laid her hand over it, her confusion deepening and clearing at the same time.

She said, “This is like their version of badges, isn’t it.”

Greta nodded but made no reply. She merely watched Marina and she could sense the woman was waiting to see what she would ask or say next.

“They used them to identify something in themselves, but what was it that they were identifying? What could it possibly identify to have this animal on a badge?”

Greta’s smiled widened a little and she said, “And now you’re asking the same questions that Historians have been trying to answer for generations.”

She gave a wry laugh and reached out to take off the heavy metal badge from Marina’s coverall, leaving her with a feeling of loss she couldn’t truly explain. She felt as if there had been something connecting her, for just those few seconds, with all those that came before her. It was more complex than that but she couldn’t even explain it to herself. She merely felt the loss and had to resist the urge to reach out and snatch the badge back from Greta.

When it was nestled in with the objects inside the box Greta rested her hand, with gentleness and reverence, on the top of the massed paper and cloth before meeting Marina’s eyes and saying, “I know what you must be feeling. This box is filled with such things.” She waved her hand along the shelves and to all those beyond this row, shelves that filled this immense series of rooms, and continued, “This whole place is filled with such curious things that offer glimpses but no certainties. We might never know what it all means.”

Marina saw just a hint of sadness in Greta’s eyes and realized that she wasn’t strict about speculation because she wanted to be. She was as curious and awed by all this as anyone would be. Her strictness must be because it really was a necessity. This much uncertainty would wreak havoc on a mind not dedicated to controlling it. She realized she was being given a rare and surpassingly valuable gift just by being here and she felt the immensity of her good fortune.

When that overwhelming feeling passed, she turned back to the Historian and asked, “Is all of this like that? Objects, I mean?”

Greta motioned for Marina to follow and she walked down the row as she answered, “No, not at all. Most of it isn’t like that, in fact. A lot of it consists of drawings of objects or the results of testing or other things that relate, in one way or another, to the study of our past. Most of what’s in this room is really current history though. It’s pretty much all we can do to keep up with adding new things. There’s just no time to research the old stuff.”

She stopped and then began scanning the boxes along the rows where they stood as if searching for something specific. She finally let out a little ‘ah’ of discovery, took down a box that was almost too high up to reach and placed it on the cart she had rolled after them. She opened it up, all efficiency now, and Marina peeked inside as a smell like old fire wafted up. Inside was a corner of a book, pages spread wide by something. Greta plucked a pair of cotton gloves from her pocket and slipped them on before she gently lifted out the book to put it gently on the cart.

She stepped back, exhaling as if she had done something of great effort, and motioned Marina forward for a better look. She said, “This is the remains of a book from below IT.” She ran a finger along the ragged burned edge of the cover, close to it but not quite touching it, before continuing, “As you can see it is in a fragile condition and we have only this portion left. But we were still able to find out a lot of from just this bit.”

Marina looked at the wedge of book, a roughly burnt triangle several inches in length along the side and along the top. The pages were fanned out with slips of white paper stuck between the pages, making the book even thicker than it had been originally, and impossible to close. She bent down to try to peer in at the pages but Greta touched her shoulder to halt her progress when she got too close.

“Not so close. We try not to breathe directly on the pages. The moisture in our breath can damage the pages.”

Marina nodded, understanding that from her own work and remembering her own carefully directed sighs or sneezes away from the delicate components. She said, “What’s in it?”

Greta shook out her hands like she was about to undertake a heavy burden, then tightened the gloves on her hands before reaching out and gently pressing open the pages very slightly. The creak the binding made from even that light touch was alarming. Greta looked as if she knew exactly how to handle the artifact so Marina just bit her lip and watched her every move. She landed on one of the slips of paper between some of the pages and lifted it out. With her gloved finger to hold the page open, she said, “Go ahead and look, just don’t breathe on it.”

Marina bent her head and peered at the tiny and perfect writing. Only on some blueprints and instructions and labels had she seen such perfectly formed script in her life. All copies of books were done by hand, as was anything newly developed. This was printed, as in the old printing of the past that no one could do anymore. And though the paper was yellowed even at its most undamaged inner edge and a brown so deep it was almost black near the burnt edges, it was clear that this paper had once been something special. It had a gloss to it and looked somehow different. She adjusted her view so she could read the words and for a moment, they were silent. When she realized what she was reading she drew back in shock and looked at Greta, who nodded and told her to keep reading.

It was a partial description of something called an ocean. It was missing most of it, but the partial lines she read were wonders to her and there was nothing that she could marry the words with in her own mind. She saw the words, ‘covers more than 70% of the Earth’s surface’ and shook her head, not understanding how that could be. There was no water outside and surely if there was that much she would see it. The rest was too fragmentary to make sense of. It was just words to Marina and she straightened with a look of confusion on her face. Greta carefully placed the paper back inside the book and let it close before she spoke.

“This one is, we think, from a series of books that described all manner of things and this one is for things that begin with the letter O.” She made a gesture as if to qualify that statement and added, “We think it is. We don’t know for sure. It is just a fragment and much of it makes no sense. There is no context.” She ran a finger along the edge where all the white slips of paper came out and said, “These papers keep apart the pages we were able to separate. The rest are melded together and so far, most pages are destroyed in any attempt to separate them.” She sighed and withdrew her hand, her eyes sad as she looked at the book.

Marina asked, “What is an ocean?”

Greta turned that sad gaze toward her and said, “We don’t speculate, remember?”

“Right, right,” she gestured as if to both surrender to and dismiss the notion of speculating, “but if you did. And based on whatever else you must know from all of this. What is an ocean?”

The older woman examined her, trying to decide the correct approach, but instead of answering she turned and said, “Follow me.”

They wended their way down the long rows until they reached the one Greta apparently sought. She smiled over her shoulder at Marina as she bent to take out a huge flat box from a bottom shelf and laid it with great care on the floor. “Prepare to be amazed.”

She lifted the edge of the box, revealing a picture of some kind. It was in many colors but the lines were so precise and beautifully drawn that it couldn’t have been made by human hands. The paper was big, much bigger than anything she had ever seen even though it had clearly been torn apart, making Marina wonder how much more of this there was. It was mounted with on a larger piece of cardboard. Marina had no idea what it was and looked at Greta, her confusion showing on her face.

Greta knelt next to her and pointed with her gloved finger toward a single spot, a dark mark of green, on the large outline. She said, “That is us. Supposedly.”

Marina looked again and then fell back onto her rump when she realized what she was seeing. It was land. And the blue off to the edge had words in it. The words were Atlantic Ocean. She took in the scope of it compared with the land and then with the tiny pinprick that was their silo and felt the world around her spin. Her head felt filled with cotton and it was Greta’s alarmed voice that kept her from fainting. She felt Greta grab her arm and the sensation retreated almost as fast as it came on. She said, “I’m okay.”

“Sure you are,” Greta replied with a hint of amusement in her voice, “if fainting is considered okay. Just breathe and get yourself together. Do you need a medic?”

Marina took an inventory of her body but didn’t think she felt anything seriously wrong other than finding out the world is much more than you thought it was. She shook her head. When she felt herself again she got up on her haunches and looked at the picture again. Greta warned her not to faint and fall into the map since it was the only one they had and Marina gave her a look.

“Why wouldn’t you let something like this be known to everyone? This is certain, right?”

Greta sighed and gazed down at the map. She said, “Only if you consider a single unsupported partial picture that isn’t mentioned in any other artifact and which, I might add, we have no way of knowing wasn’t drawn from someone’s imagination.”

“Oh,” Marina said and frowned. “But the book. It mentions oceans and here is an ocean right here.” She pointed to the Atlantic Ocean again. “That seems like support.”

“Not really. We have no idea if this might have been made by someone who read those books or for another reason. Just because something is old doesn’t make it the truth.”

“Well then, how did you know that this spot was us?” Marina asked.

“Because it says so. Look closer.”

Marina leaned over and peered at the tiny words next to the green spot. Sure enough, it read ‘Silo Field’. She grunted and said, “That seems like evidence.”

Greta sighed again and reached out to close the lid of the box as she said, “Not really. Not when you consider the entirety of the question and the rules for historical evidence. We don’t speculate. Our job is to provide truth to posterity. This,” she gestured to the box, “is not evidence. It is merely another question that we can add to the list that grows every day.”

The two women slid the box back into the slender opening for it and stood. Marina sensed that Greta had something to say so she stood, trying to give the impression of patience and openness.

It worked because Greta finally turned to her, slipping her gloves into her pocket as she did and said, “I like to imagine what it might mean, though.”

Marina thought she sounded a little guilty, as if sharing that was a confession to some wrongdoing. She considered her answer carefully.

“Greta, if you never formulate a question then you can never find an answer. Is that not correct?”

The other woman nodded.

“Well, perhaps I’m just a simple Fabber, but it seems to me that the only way to come up with a good question is to do a whole lot of wondering and imagining.”

Greta smiled, a genuine smile this time, and said, “You really should have been a Historian, you know.”

Chapter Twelve

After their tour of the shelves in that room, they went further in to a place called the Deep Archives where items that hadn’t been examined in generations were kept. Marina was amazed that anyone could resist going through every single holding of the entire Memoriam and said so. Greta explained that it was hard enough to keep up with ensuring that current history got recorded properly and attending to the myriad other duties that Historians had. If they wanted a constant and current knowledge of the archives, they would need more Historians. Since they couldn’t do that, the archives were less examined than perhaps they should be. She admitted that she wished she could spend more time doing just that.

“Why don’t you?” asked Marina. “I mean, you have more shadows than you can cast for. Why not get them to take on more duties or get more shadows to go through the archives. Something!”

Greta smiled but it was regretful. “We can’t do that. Our numbers are strictly controlled for a reason. How many electricians or farmers would you give up to have someone to go through old boxes?”

The question was rhetorical so Marina just made a face and that made Greta laugh.  “Okay, so asking you that question may not get the same answer as from someone else. But there’s more to it than that. No shadow can come into the archives unsupervised and never into the deep archives. With so many shadows not completing their shadowing it would be an unforgivable breech.”

“But they could do other things so you all could come in here,” Marina protested.

“And how well can a Caster cast when their shadow is not with them?”

The question was a reasonable one and Marina was not in favor of the practice of letting shadows do work they weren’t ready for. It happened sometimes but it usually didn’t speak well for the Caster. “Okay, I’ll give you that. But there must be a way.”

“You’re speaking like an overeager shadow yourself now.” She stopped and turned to Marina, a hand on her shoulder to ensure her attention was with her before continuing. “We have a history and it is what we know as truth. Is it perfect? Probably not. But it is what we know and it works.”

Marina sighed, wishing there was an easier way to find out what she wanted to know.

Greta patted her arm and urged her along. “Let me get you familiar with the Deep Archives. You have access to everything so I’d like to show you where everything is so you can go on your own as you like.” Greta pushed open the heavy door and ushered Marina inside.

There was a feeling of disuse in these crowded rooms, though it was as clean as the rest of the archives. Here, oddly shaped boxes of different colors and designs were stacked to fill every available bit of shelf space. File boxes with labels erased and re-written many times were stacked along the back walls. They contained obvious overflow from the long rows of filing cabinets, many of which had drawers that would no longer close completely from wear and age.

Greta waved an arm to take in the entire set of rooms and said, “This is it. It’s got a lot of stuff that hasn’t been examined in a hundred years or more. Probably a lot more. We have an inventory but I’d hesitate to call it accurate since it is signed by a Historian who signed it as ‘Silo Historian’. I’m guessing that is a very old inventory.”

Marina was amazed and disappointed. How could it be that this much went unexamined? It seemed almost criminal. She considered how much four Historians had to do. They ran the Memoriam, mediated certain types of disputes, recorded history, taught certain lessons in the classrooms and provided insight to the Council for decision making. She realized that she should be more surprised that they got any new, or in this case old, work done at all.

“We need more Historians,” she said.

Greta laughed and said, “Please, do recommend that.”

“I’m serious. Bring the council down here and show them this room. They won’t be able to say no,” Marina urged.

Greta went toward a file cabinet, grey and rust spotted. One drawer was not fully closed and that one she yanked open. It gave an ear splitting shriek as it came free and both women grimaced. They both put on gloves and thumbed through the tightly packed papers and generalized stuff inside the drawer. It appeared to consist of population charts and medical records and the like. They both had to put effort into getting it shut.

“If you’re looking to just get lost in some really interesting old shopping lists, this would be the place to go.” Greta pointed toward the far end of the row of cabinets. “Down there are old council minutes and official stuff like that.” She paused and then pointed at the end of one row of shelves, “And down there are some of the old supply records, compartment allocations and the like.”

Marina nodded and looked around, breathing in the musty smell of old paper and disuse. “I think I’m going to go with my original idea and try to track down the owner by history. See if I can find those names anywhere. I’d like to take a look for any other hidden things tucked away in objects you’ve already got, too.”

“You can find the census records mixed in with the compartment allocations. There was a lot of discontinuity for a while, I think. I would start over there,” she finished by pointing to the end of another row.

Marina said nothing. She was eager to start looking. She had a stack of scrap paper to record locations for general records and her time here was too limited to waste.

“Well, you’d best get started then.” Greta said as she stripped off her gloves and shoved them into a pocket. She gave Marina a level look and then said, “I know you’re eager and probably still not entirely clear on why we do the things we do but please take my advice. Go slow. These records may not all be important to your search but each is irreplaceable. We’ll go through special collections after we’ve gotten your artifacts back up here and taken a look at those. If you don’t find what you seek here, don’t think you won’t find it at all.”

Marina could see the questioning looking on Greta’s face and knew she wanted more than just an acknowledgement and a goodbye. She gave her the best answer she could, “I’ll be cautious of these things and I’ll keep things in perspective.”

That must have been a good answer because she made her departure directly afterward. They were expecting Taylor at any time and Greta needed to be the one to take the object from him and keep it secure. Marina lost sight of her as she strode away but heard the door slam loudly, metal on metal, when she left the Deep Archives.

Greta had been speaking mildly when she said it wasn’t organized. It was a mess. The first file box Marina pulled down listed compartments and census information on the same form and were in no particular order. Level 5 was listed on the page before Level 120 and that was listed before Level 2.

She flipped through the sheets until she found a listing for Level 50. Marina turned the paper before it sideways so that it stood above the rest and removed the sheet. Scanning down the list she found Hardi within a moment or two. That did nothing for her though because it didn’t even list the individual names. The whole entry consisted of just a few words:

Hardi, female 28/male 9/female 3 – No assist / Rep+ – Match

The first part seemed clear enough. A 28 year old female Hardi with a nine year old son and a three year old daughter lived in the residence. Or perhaps they were siblings. Or perhaps she was an aunt or something. They could be orphans like she had been. Maybe it wasn’t so clear after all, she decided, and stopped trying to figure it out.

She noted it was the same compartment that the Hardi that sent down the watch lived in and that was a positive sign. She had no idea what No assist might mean or what the rep was all about. It seemed those things must go together though so whatever it was might be parsed out at some future point.

The word match was certainly familiar and she wondered if it was being used in the same context on this old record. To be matched was to have found a mate, a wife or husband and the one you would spend your life with. But it was more than that because no matter the intentions of the couple or their families, one was not matched until the match was approved.

Usually that wasn’t a problem. Everyone knew their relationship to every other person in their life for the most part. Marina could recite off exactly how many generations separated two lines for almost every eligible male on two levels because she had a daughter to consider. Some women made very tidy sums keeping track of vast numbers of such girls and boys and made matches between people who might not otherwise meet. It was a serious business.

The use of the word match instead of matched was interesting though, so she scanned the rest of the document and looked at other names. There was a fair distribution of the word in multiple forms and even a few ‘no match’ entries. Matched was almost always used behind entries in which there was both a male and female of near age, though there were a couple of ages that raised Marina’s eyebrows. One had the female listed as 39 and the male at 22. Marina couldn’t help but grin at that one. She checked the name out of curiosity but it didn’t sound familiar.

She surmised that this meant the Hardi woman was ready to be matched and that made Marina wonder what had happened to the one who gave her two children, if those were her children. She couldn’t find a year anywhere on the paper that made sense to her.

Years were counted using rotating years between one and fifty. To refer to something more than fifty years ago, she might say ten years past fifty or she could say sixty years ago. But on paper it was always in the rotating years and that could cause some confusion. Here there were the numbers ninety-nine but she had no idea if that referred to a year or what.

She copied down what she needed and put the paper back, moving along the different boxes to search for Level 50 in each one. Most of the time she came up empty and in others what remained made no sense. One list that went by level, just like the census, had only the words compliant or non-compliant and nothing else after the compartment numbers.

When Greta came to get her, she had gotten through only a single row from one shelf. She realized with disappointment that she would not be able to do this in the limited amount of time she had. Marina consoled herself by telling herself that in spending this time with these records she had at least satisfied her need to know if she could even find the information. She knew that without a lifetime she probably wouldn’t.

As the two women left the Deep Archives, Greta carefully locked the doors and listened as Marina recounted what she found and didn’t find. Greta sighed and said, “I didn’t think you would find much. These archives weren’t even archives at one point. It was actually a hiding place for a bunch of records but no one knows why it was hidden or when. It was pre-history. But I’d like to see that entry you just told me about.”

Marina handed her the slip of paper on which she had copied the Hardi entry and Greta frowned at the format. “Hmm,” she murmured and then looked up at the ceiling in thought. When she looked back down at the slip she said, “I’m not sure, but I think this might be when they first started assisting in reproduction. The phrase ‘no assist/rep+’ might actually mean that there was no reproductive assistance required because she had successfully reproduced. We could check with the medics but I’m fairly certain that is the case. I’m actually impressed that you found that.”

She handed the slip back and they walked down the hallways and away from the Archives. They were quiet and their boots made the only sounds. Here in these parts not meant for the public, there was no need for the rugs and the tiles did nothing to dampen the sound of the sturdy heels.

Greta stopped almost directly across from the doorway to the public part of the Memoriam and let them into a conference room. Its door was thick and without windows and it seemed to hush all the noises of the silo when the door closed behind them. Taylor was sitting at the table along with Piotr. A slender package rested on the surface. Marina looked at Greta and saw that the woman’s eyes were glued to the package, a look that was almost greedy. There was no question she wanted to see what treasure Marina had unearthed.

“Taylor, do you mind not drinking at the table?” Greta asked, whipping out a cloth and wiping the surface of the table with vigor when he lifted his cup in response.

“Sorry about that. I didn’t think,” he said, getting up and putting his sweating metal cup onto the side table where a tray held more cups and pitcher of water.

“It’s not a problem, Taylor. We’ll just be working with paper now so better to be safe than sorry,” she said and gave him a smile meant to take any sting out of her words.

Marina decided a show of solidarity was needed. Poor Taylor just seemed to do the wrong things when it was most obvious. Not even a welcome back or a thank you for him. She went to the tray, poured and then downed a glass of the cold water in a single long drink. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and said, “Ah. I really needed that.”

By the time Marina sat down, Piotr had handed the package over to Greta and she was in the process of opening it with extreme care. She thought back to how roughly she had handled the objects and felt a twinge of guilt. Greta was wearing her gloves again and she shook the packet very gently so that the papers would slide out.

When the plastic wrapped bits of paper hit the tabletop, Greta winced a little. Marina looked and thought they looked exactly as she had left them, which meant that Taylor had not succumbed to curiosity and opened it. She noted that he was peering as intently as the others. Marina had packed the two bits of paper as tightly as possible, with the face of the image pressed toward the other paper. The clear plastic around them showed nothing more than the round backside of the image with its fading script and the blank side of the letter.

Marina watched Greta as she flexed her fingers in preparation to open the plastic. It was all that she could do not to just reach out and yank open the sleeve she had put it in and sealed closed. It was nothing that should require such care. These artifacts had survived for an uncounted number of years tucked away and neglected just fine. Paper they might be, but they were sturdier than they appeared. She sighed.

Greta looked up at the sigh, fingers poised over the sleeve. She asked, “Something wrong?”

Marina shifted in her seat. She hadn’t actually meant to sigh that loudly or quite so expressively. There was no backing off from the impatience in that sigh so she said, “They won’t fall apart. I can open that pretty quickly if you like.” At Greta’s look, she quickly added, “So you don’t have to try to puzzle out my method and all.”

The other woman lifted her hands and waved for Marina to proceed though she was clearly reluctant. Marina felt a little bad about that. It was probably like a gift to open such a rare thing and here she was, taking the gift away.

That didn’t matter now. It was too late to retract and let things proceed. She slipped her tiny work knife out of her pocket and clicked it open but halted when Greta gave a little gasp.

“You’re not going to use a knife, are you?” asked Greta, her voice a little hushed and disbelieving.

“I know what I’m doing. I promise it will be fine,” she answered and hoped she didn’t slip with the point of that knife.

Greta and Piotr exchanged a look. Piotr gave a resigned sort of nod to some unspoken question and Greta said, “Go ahead.”

Marina slipped the knife into the little gap created when she folded the sealing plastic over. The adhesive wasn’t a permanent one because these little sleeves had to be reused over and over. She had, out of habit, used only the thinnest of swipes of the adhesive and as she lifted the edge of her knife against the sealed edge, it popped free with a tiny sound. She heard Greta let out a held breath and smiled a little. With a practiced swipe, she slid the knife down the free edge until the entire sleeve was unsealed without even the smallest amount of damage to the contents or the sleeve.

She put the knife down on the table and picked up the sleeve. She squeezed the edges to widen the opening and let the contents slide out. Greta’s hand shot out and caught the papers in her gloved hand rather than let them fall into Marina’s bare one. Marina thought back once more to how much she had handled these objects in her work room with fumes from her electrical work filling the air. She decided to keep that part to herself.

Greta and Piotr leaned toward each other as Greta brought the objects closer, both of them seeming to forget the others in the room. Taylor, seated as he was, could see little now no matter how much he craned his neck. Greta placed each paper object carefully down on a cloth she had spread on the table and then brought out a pair of tongs with the ends wrapped in something. She used those to turn over the image and Marina grinned at the simultaneous gasps that filled the air.

That was too much for Taylor, apparently, because he left the table and stood behind the pair, almost pushing them apart as he inserted himself between their heads to get a look. He didn’t gasp but his sharply indrawn breath was loud enough to almost qualify as one.

The Historian looked up at Marina, her eyes shining, and said, “I understand why you said what you did now. About the First People, I mean.” She looked back down at the image and, in a very soft voice, added, “It’s beautiful.”

Taylor’s hands had crept up to the back of Piotr’s chair and he gripped the edges of it with enough force to whiten his knuckles. He said nothing but Marina saw his jaw clenching rhythmically.

The silence was unbroken for a few moments by any words but filled with the little sounds the trio made while they looked at the image. Greta straightened in her chair and laid down her tongs slowly and very precisely. She adjusted them a few times on the surface of the table, her eyes darting toward the tongs momentarily but always away and back to the image again.

She cleared her throat and said, “I’m having a hard time taking in what I’m seeing there. I can’t help but compare that with what we know of our history.”

Taylor’s hands finally returned to his sides. The white knuckles were gone from sight but Marina could see the stark white patches on his face where the color had drained away. He seemed hesitant when he said, “I’m not sure what I should even think of it. It’s… it’s… unprecedented.”

Piotr seemed the least perturbed by what he was seeing. Perhaps it was his nature or that he was not yet fully entrenched in any idea but he seemed to be enjoying the image rather than simply being shocked by it.

Piotr glanced up at Taylor, clearly excited to be sharing this with his shadow but the look on the younger man’s face made some of the happiness drop out of Piotr’s expression. Taylor’s strained face didn’t show any delight, only shock. Taylor stepped back, aware that he was crowding in on them and took his seat again without a word.

“Read the letter before you think too much about it. It adds a lot to the story. Based on the names, I’m pretty sure it was written by the person in that image,” Marina said and nodded toward the folded letter, as yet untouched.

Greta reached for the tongs again but Marina stopped her by saying, “It’s very sturdy. You’re more likely to rip it with those than if you just unfolded it.”

It took just a moment for Greta to get the letter open, the paper crinkling loudly. They read, turning the paper as they went to follow the path of the words. Taylor almost managed to keep his seat, settling for leaning forward across the table and reading upside down. When the paper stopped turning, Marina watched their faces and wondered if she had looked like that. Dazed and saddened and confused in turns.

“This seems very clear to me,” said Piotr. “I don’t think you’d be accused of speculating on history if you simply accepted the obvious.”

Greta nodded her head absently, eyes still affixed to the letter. She let go of the paper and it immediately came up at the edges as if it wanted to return to the folded bowl shape it had enjoyed for so many years.

Taylor looked from face to face and finally asked, “Well? What does it mean? Really mean?”

“I think that what Marina told me when she explained what she had found is probably very close to the truth,” she paused and gave Marina an evaluating look. To Marina she said, “You have some talent for this work.”

Before Marina could answer Greta continued, “It seems clear that whoever these people were, they once lived outside when it was a very different place. It is equally clear that this move didn’t go well for them and that a lot of people came with them for whatever reason. And,“ she paused, her voice catching a little as the emotion of what she had found caught up with her, “that these were people just like us.”

Taylor had listened, his head bobbing in silent agreement with each point as it was made. He reached and tapped the letter once with a fingertip sharply and said, “This paper is intact and in good condition. It can’t be that old. What do you make of that?”

“I’m not sure exactly. Based on what Marina said about how it was stored, I can only surmise that it may have been protected by the watch.” She held up a hand to forestall the interruption that Taylor was about to make and said, “We’ve got a whole archive full of paper, as you well know, and some of it we have no way to determine the age of. And this is high quality paper like I’ve never seen before. It may simply wear better for that reason alone.”

“So there is no way to figure out when this happened?” asked Taylor.

Greta shook her head. “I wish there was. It would tell us how long we’ve been down here.”

“Who cares about how long? I want to know why,” Marina said, leaning forward with her chest pressed against the edge of the table. She folded her hands in front of her on its surface, more to keep from clenching her hands than anything else. She looked at Piotr and Greta, trying to see behind their eyes to what they were thinking.

A gloomy quiet settled over the room. It was a lot to take in and Marina had the advantage of having been able to spend days absorbing it while the people in front of her were newly confronted with it. She wanted to be patient and let their minds finish churning, but she was limited by the few short days she had left before she returned to her old life and left this behind forever. Whatever knowledge she could glean from it, she wanted.

“Shake it off, everyone. This isn’t the end of the world. They already went through that,” she said and emphasized it by pointing at the people smiling out of the image on the table. “Does anyone know what a nuke is? That is what the letter said drove them inside but I have no clue what that is.”

A short chorus of three negative responses came in reply. Marina chuffed disappointment and asked, “No idea whatsoever?”

Piotr’s head shake wasn’t quite as firm as the one before and Marina noticed it. She directed her next question directly to him, “You know something, don’t you?”

“Not exactly and not directly, no,” he answered but it was clear he was working on what he would say next. After a moment and a pursing of his lips he continued, “The Head of IT passes most of their knowledge in a direct line to their shadow and so on. Oral history leads to some inaccuracy. I, for one, didn’t think that it could be true in exactly the way it was told. Do you know what I’m talking about?” He asked and searched Marina’s face for an answer or understanding.

“Sure,” Marina said. “It’s like the stories with a moral or scary stories for kids.”

Piotr nodded and smiled in relief. “Exactly so. Well, we have one that says that the Others launched a terrible weapon that was meant to scour the world of all human life so that they could have it. It wasn’t supposed to do what happened outside, only make it perfect for the Others. Except in our story it went terribly wrong and destroyed the world while humanity was safe inside our silo.”

Greta, who had been listening intently, replied for them all, “It’s almost the same as our known history. There is nothing there that relates to this nuke thing that is mentioned.”

“There is more, of course, but it isn’t relevant to this. What is important is that both of our histories, the silo’s and our own IT version, say something about a weapon going wrong. What if that weapon was this nuke thing? Or maybe what the letter mentions as whatever was eating the world.”

Marina broke in. “I suppose it doesn’t matter since we know what the effect was. We can see that from the screen Up-Top all we like. It does support the story though and, in a way, supports the very idea that there were Others. That means the rest of the story may be true, too. They could still be out there.”

Piotr and Greta shared a private look, full of information and that rankled Marina. “What is that all about? You two keep giving each other all these significant looks. What aren’t you saying?”

“It isn’t ours to share but suffice it to say that we have good reason when we say the Others are certainly still out there,” Greta said.

Marina was shocked. Everyone knew that the history said there were Others that may still be out there but like most people, she had relegated that to an almost mythic status. She had never seen one and had never heard of anyone else seeing one. “You’re sure?” she asked.

“Quite sure,” Piotr confirmed.

“If you’re sure, then everyone should know. Keeping secrets like that is not above the rails,” Marina replied, her tone full of disapproval and a hint of outrage.

“It isn’t a secret. You know it,” Greta responded, unperturbed.

“Not like know, know,” she said, trying to search for a way to say what she meant. “It’s just a story. We assume it is true but probably something in the past. Not a real threat.” Before they could descend into another argument about this she waved any responses away and said, “It doesn’t matter. Can we find anything on how long this nuke or the eating thing lasts? Does it ever go away? Or is there anything in the archives that will help us find out how long ago this was? Anything helpful?”

“There could be,” Greta said, drawing out the words, “but you’ve seen the deep archives.”

That was explanation enough for Marina. She had seen them and she knew what a mess they were. She also knew that one Historian would not be enough to get through those archives. She had a sudden thought. “Then let me help you with it. You won’t have to tell anyone else any secrets or break any rules by letting shadows in. Maybe Piotr and Taylor can help too.”

Greta gave her a doubtful look and her glances toward the two men were equally doubtful. She asked Piotr, “What do you think?”

“I think we don’t have much in the way of choices. You can’t train a new Historian quickly and you can’t shut down the Memoriam to use the others. Piotr and I can look through files as well as the next person,” he answered but added, “probably.”

“Same for me. I’ve already been down there so I know what I’m up against,” Marina added.

Greta considered their words for only the briefest of moments. She included them all when she answered, “Let’s tell the council and get started then.”

Chapter Thirteen

Telling her family had been the most difficult part of the whole process. Joseph didn’t even bother trying to pretend that he accepted her explanation for why she was staying in the Memoriam. He demanded to know what was going on and finally put a hand over her pack so that she couldn’t continue packing and avoid his gaze. She sighed and dropped a stack of undershirts to their bed in resignation. Joseph let go of the pack and crossed his arms, waiting for whatever she might say.

She gave him a look, one that made it clear that she was not at all happy to be having this conversation. She did understand his position. His wife was packing up and leaving on some pretext to go live more than twenty levels away for an undetermined period of time. She wouldn’t have accepted it either.

“I can’t tell you everything. Let’s just get that clear right now, okay?”

He nodded. It was just one sharp nod that spoke volumes.

She sighed again and said, “I found some objects during the reclamation that turned out to be really significant. You knew I found things that needed evaluation by someone with some knowledge, but it turned out to be a whole lot more than I thought.”

Joseph dropped his arms to the side, a sign that he wasn’t quite as ready for an argument as before.

“Well, as it happens, extra people are needed to go through a bunch of other objects and records to try to place these items and I volunteered. Two other people are too,” she said, hoping that would be enough. It wasn’t.

“Hold on there. You’re trying to tell me that you’re packing up and leaving us so you can look through stuff that belongs to Historians? How is that more important than your job or your family?” he asked, incredulous.

“It depends on what you mean by important. I told you I can’t share everything!”

He narrowed his eyes at her but it wasn’t all anger she saw in them. It was also curiosity and confusion.

She took one quick step toward him and looked up at him. She ran her hands along his arms and then cupped his face in her hands. She said, “I have a chance to change what we know of history. I want to do this.”

His own hands came up and wrapped gently around her wrists. He pulled her hands away from his face slowly and she let her arms come down. There was hurt on his face.

“We’ve never had secrets between us. Never. Secrets never help anyone. I should know,” he said, referring to his job. “Is this really something you can’t tell me?”

She nodded. It hurt her to do this to him. “You’ll understand. I promise you that. I gave my word not to tell.”

It was his turn to sigh then. He stepped back from her and picked up the stack of undershirts she had tossed to the bed. He ran a hand across them and then placed them with care inside her pack. It was a kind of acceptance and Marina was grateful for it.

* * *

In the Memoriam archives, the four workers were busy and getting increasingly frustrated and exhausted. They took few breaks and none of them were getting enough sleep. Meals were rushed affairs they escaped from quickly since they couldn’t speak of their joint effort in the dining hall. The dimming was usually long past by the time they broke and sought out their beds.

Dust filled the air as they dragged through box after box and cabinet after cabinet. Marina sneezed regularly and Taylor’s eyes were perpetually watering and red. It didn’t help that Greta, in whose domain they were, kept correcting them or shoving gloves at them or chirping about Piotr licking the end of a finger before he turned pages. It had been a seven-day of solid work and they had next to nothing to show for it.

Marina slammed shut a giant tome filled with numbers about farm produce during a time long past and undefinable. It earned her a sharp look from Greta, who squatted on the floor at the other end of their current row. She was organizing a box of loose papers into neat and very precise stacks in an array on the floor.

As she reached for the next book on the shelf, this one equally big and probably filled with yet more numbers for squash and beans and olives, she let out a loud sigh. She heard a faint, “I hear ya!”, of agreement from Piotr a few rows away and gave a wry smile.

She called out, “There has got to be a better way.”

“You’ve said that a hundred times and for the hundredth time I’ll tell you there isn’t,” Greta said from the other end of the row. She didn’t even bother looking up. Instead she added another crinkled paper to one of her stacks with delicate precision.

They had made progress and Marina, despite her impatience, was proud of that. Greta had started their project by directing each of them to get a random sampling of what records or objects they found in the deep stacks and cabinets beyond the few well organized ones at the entrance. With that information, she put a label on the chalkboard at the end of each of the main rows. As they emptied the stacks and rows, the material was sorted and then put in these newly labeled rows.

Deciding on when something happened was very difficult. When one only identified time in generic ways, one had to look a lot harder to place things in time. For her, each year belonged in a cycle of fifty years. Each year had 365 days, plus the null day before the new year every fourth year.

Maybe if they didn’t cycle the years after the fiftieth year they wouldn’t have so much trouble. She had been born in the 34th year and it was now the 24th year. It was only now that she realized how little sense such a system made. No matter where she looked or what kind of record she found, they all used this system. Except farm records.

Farm records seemed to be the most complete of all the types of records. Everything about them was recorded. From when things were planted to how many plants of each type reached maturity to how much was produced. Seed selection, cross pollination results and even pest activity was scrupulously recorded.

Often years were referenced in what Marina had come to call ‘Orchard Years’. The orchards were interspersed throughout the dirt farms and many of the dirt farm entries started out a new section with a reference to the trees.

On one the heading might be ‘30th Year of Oranges’ along with some location designation in one of the farms. It made sense in a way. The orange trees at that location would be there from year to year. From there the entire year for that whole dirt farm might be recorded. But when was the 30th year of the oranges?

When she had mentioned her idea of Orchard Years to the others, Greta had perked up and said that might be a good place to find out how long they had been down the silo overall. She explained that if they could collate all the orchards and all their years over the successive generations of trees, then perhaps they could count backward until they reached a point in which all the orchards started at year one.

They had all been excited and galvanized into action by the thought but after the endless books and binders and an increasing certainty that they were missing almost as much material as they had, the work had descended back into drudgery.  She had found a single year that seemed promising and that was in the first year of some other olives on some other level. The entry stated that the previous trees had endured through 65 years and that the new trees planted in their stead were twelve years old when they were decanted from their growing pots.

She had flipped forward in the book until she came to the next year and her heart sank a little. It started with the trees being designated as in their thirteenth year. How old were the previous trees when they were planted? How old were the ones before them? Greta was dutifully tallying anything found by any of them in hopes of working it out anyway.

As she went through the book it was just as she thought it would be. Only there seemed to be an obsession with beets and corn in this book as they passed through one Olive Year after another. As she flipped past a mind-numbing report on the amount of beet greens that could be harvested per beet before the size of the root was affected a name caught her eye. She returned to the page and located it again.

It was a burial record. It gave the specific area of the dirt farm and the date, though not the year. It was the name and the little blurb next to it that caught her eye. It was Graham Newton and the blurb said that the body was brought for planting by Mayor Wallis Short. Graham and Wallis.

There were a lot of men named Graham and Wallis recorded in these books of the past. She had seen that herself. Most were called something else along with it, needing three names to distinguish them from the myriad others. It was usually a Graham-Scott or Wallis-Peter or something like that. It was only in the last few generations that the council passed a resolution that no more children could be named Grace, Graham or Wallis because it had become too confusing.

But this was different. This Graham’s death was recorded with an age of sixty and his profession listed as ‘Head of IT, Level 34’. That and the title of Mayor in front of the name Wallis sent a shiver of certainty up Marina’s spine. It was the delightful shiver of having found something combined with the strange feeling of having touched someone so much a part of the silo that he was almost superhuman.

When she went to call out to the others, her voice came out a tiny squeak so she cleared her throat and called, “Hey! Guys! I found something. Something good!”

The tone in her voice must have spoken more eloquently than her words because Greta looked over her shoulder in Marina’s direction. She held up the book and the look on her face caused Greta to put down her stack of papers and rise from her knees. She scattered one of her precise stacks as she turned to make her way down the row towards Marina.

“What? What is it?” asked Greta.

“You’ll never believe it unless you look.” She handed it over carefully and reverently. Though she didn’t realize it, that care more than anything alerted Greta that there was something very special.

Taylor and Piotr came around the corner and into their row just as Greta found the passage and gave a gasp of shock. Greta completely ignored the men and looked at Marina and asked, “Do you think it’s them?”

Marina shrugged but the grin on her face was huge and unmistakable. “I don’t know. You’re the expert. It sure looks like it to me, though.”

Piotr stepped around Marina, still cross-legged on the floor and asked, “For Silo’s sake, what is it?” He craned his neck to try to read over Greta’s shoulder but she was too tall and at the moment, completely absorbed in looking at the book.

“It’s a burial entry,” Marina said, a gleam in her eye. At Piotr’s ‘so-what’ expression, the gleam became a teasing one and she said, “It’s for a Graham. A head of IT. Body brought in by the Mayor, Wallis.”

Marina was gratified to see Piotr’s expression drop along with his lower jaw as his mouth fell open. His fingers plucked at the edge of the book to turn it a little and he asked, “The Graham and the Wallis?”

Greta had kept on examining the book and the entries around it while the others babbled but she looked up at them, apparently satisfied with what she found. The expectant look on the faces of her fellow searchers varied in intensity, with Piotr’s looking almost angry with impatience, Marina’s a bit smug and Taylor’s tinged with confusion.  She turned the book toward the impatient Piotr and said, “I don’t know for sure if it is them.”

Marina burst out laughing as if she expected that answer but saw that Piotr had gone vaguely purple. He gritted his teeth and said, “You’ll never be sure. You could have a signed letter from him that specifically declares it and you would still find some reason not to be sure.” He stopped himself there, pursing his lips and clearly making an effort not to say anything really nasty.

The historian seemed to retreat a little into herself at his outburst. She didn’t step back or change expression or anything, but Marina sensed the retreat nonetheless. When she spoke, she sounded more distant. It was clear to Marina that Greta’s feelings were hurt. “You’re probably right. I’ve only spent my whole life training myself not to jump to conclusions so perhaps I’m a just a tad more cautious than you might like,” Greta said flatly.

Piotr deflated a little, clearly realizing his hastily spoken words had created a rift and were far ruder than he had probably intended. He handed the book off to Taylor and turned back to Greta before he said, “I apologize. That was really rude and uncalled for. I just got very excited and I’m not as…as…”

“Patient?” Marina supplied from her spot on the floor.

Piotr nodded and confirmed, “That’s it exactly. I’m not as patient as you or as patient as I need to be. I’m very sorry.” He ended with a little inclination of his head toward Greta. Just the quickest dip of the head that might have gone missed by many but Marina recognized it for what it was. It was the assenting nod of a shadow being corrected by their caster. It was a humble gesture.

Marina thought she saw the stiff stance of the historian loosen a little but if she did, it was so slight as to be indefinable. Greta said, “Let’s say nothing more about it, then.”

Taylor had stayed back a step or two from the others and studiously looked over the page in the book while the outburst was going on. As Piotr reached back for the book, Taylor didn’t give it up to his caster but instead stepped forward with it and joined the little circle of people. He said, “So what if it is them? What does that do for us? Other than it being a nifty tidbit to find out.”

Marina stood up, feeling very odd looking up at everyone on the floor. She brushed the dust off of her backside, creating a little cloud and said, “Because it gives us a time for the First Heroes! If we can find that, then we can maybe find the time of the First People. Don’t you see?”

Taylor gave an uncertain nod and handed the book back to Piotr. He accepted the book like it was a delicate baby he didn’t want to jostle awake.

Greta pointed toward the bottom of the next page and said, “You see here. This gives the information on the burial itself. Note that a Grace attended. Also, go back and page through till you find the year. It gives the year as the 13th Year of the Olive.” She paused a moment and asked Marina, “And did you say that the year before those olives were twelve years old and just planted to replace old ones?”

“It was 65 years, I think,” she answered.

All three of the others nodded almost in unison as understanding came and Marina smiled. “If we can narrow down the other orchard entries for that farm, the one that counts in olive years, then we can find out our timeline. Who knows what else we might figure out?”

Greta asked, “How many of the books for this farm have you found?”

“This is just the second. The other one is the one I just finished with,” Marina answered and pointed at the book she had so recently slammed shut with such frustration.

Greta accepted the other heavy book from Piotr, who looked reluctant to give it up, and told them, “I’m going to go through these and see about collating a timeline.” To Marina she said, “You keep on at this row. You’ve had good luck with it.”

“Do you want help?” Piotr asked, clearly wanting Greta to say yes.

Greta saw this yearning too and smiled. But she shook her head and said, “It only takes one to do this thoroughly and right now you’re more important as a searcher for more of the same.”

Without another word, she turned toward table and chairs on the very far end of the archives. Piotr looked crestfallen. Taylor gave him a pat on the shoulder and said, “We might find more.”

Piotr looked at the pile of discarded and yet to be searched materials on the floor where Marina had been sitting. He said, “Our stuff is boring old mechanical and maintenance reports. Manufacturing!”

Marina gave Taylor a little smile. He raised his eyebrows in return.

To Piotr he said, “But maybe we’ll find something else we can’t even imagine now. Marina certainly didn’t expect to find the burial of a First Hero in a farm book. Right?”

He perked up a bit then, not so much satisfied as mollified. He gave Taylor a hearty clap on the back and said, “You’re right. This is no time for dawdling.”

She dropped back into her sitting position on the floor and tugged her leg in close for better balance. She lugged the next of the farm books into her lap. It was for another section of dirt farm, this one counting years in apples. More fascinating entries on the cross breeding of carrots and the attractiveness of the brussel sprout heads competed in trying to put her to sleep but she found nothing that might date the book concretely and it carried no burial records of note.

She found nothing save a discontinuity that she jotted on a piece of the scrap paper and put inside the book to mark the page. The handwriting for this farm became erratic and almost illegible for a period of time. Words were misspelled that shouldn’t be. Carot written in place of carrot and other words that were used over and over in previous entries were wrong. It was almost like they were being spelled phonetically by someone who forgot how to spell and could write only by sounding out the words.

Marina flipped through the pages and found the errors lasted for a few months in total. They started suddenly, then increased until the writing and spelling were almost unreadable and then very slowly returned to normal. There were strange additions to the sentences too. Things like, ‘Her name is Callie,’ or ‘I live in compartment 22’ peppered the entries.

As she looked at the entries and their random additions, Marina thought it looked like whoever this was might be undergoing Remediation. Could that be possible? She had never heard of anyone going through the treatment and still going to work or living at home during the process. She knew that the process helped to order memories and restore balance but that the side effects were often holes in the rest of a person’s memories.

She flipped through the rest of the big book and paid close attention, but she found nothing. She set that book aside for Greta to look at, just in case. She had run out of farm books for the moment. As she looked at a messy stack of porter logs, she sighed. There was always more to choose from.

Chapter Fourteen

The farm books had turned out to be an unexpected bonanza of information once they knew what to look for and the majority of the pile for the historian’s attention was made up of those thick, dirty volumes. Taylor had found an entire box of logs from IT. The green fabric covers hid a surprising array of information about IT’s past, including the almost unbelievable number of computers that used to be in active use. At one time, more than six thousand computers had hummed throughout the silo. Now they had, at best, two thousand.

It was at the end of another long day of dust, sneezing and endless books and records that they gathered at the table. It was quickly becoming custom that Greta gave them an update on her progress to close the day’s work. She had drawn rough timelines on one of her chalkboards and tried to match dates along those various lines using the references they brought her.

Greta filled them in on the various tiny additions to the timeline, but soon she started to look nervous, even twitchy. What Marina noted even as she realized that Greta’s discomfort was increasing was that all of the six lines representing distinct dirt farms were now connected by a single line at one point. She peered at it but couldn’t make out the numbers from this distance. What she could tell was that it wasn’t as far back as it should be if it referred to First People or First Heroes.

Greta retracted her pointing finger back into her fist as she reached the line and gave a little cough. When she extended her finger again, it was pointing directly at the joining line for all the various timelines. She ran it down the jagged path that joined them and said, “And this appears to be the events outlined in the time of the First Heroes.” She paused as they all gaped at her. She looked uncomfortable and added, “But I can’t be absolutely sure of it.”

Taylor rolled his eyes but focused immediately again on the timeline. He was closest to it and had the youngest and best eyes of the three listening to Greta. He said, “But that is what, maybe a hundred and twenty years ago. That isn’t possible. Is it?”

Greta somehow managed to combine a nod and a shake of the head into the same motion. It was the picture of uncertainty. Marina stepped toward the board and looked for herself. She found the burial of Graham directly on the line connecting three of the timelines. She pointed to it and asked, “How did you get that? I didn’t find that.”

In response, Greta dug through the pile of open books spread across the table. She retrieved one that Marina had put into the interest pile the day before. It was the one with the strange misspellings and handwriting. “I found a similar problem, though not as bad as this one, in several of the other books. They all seemed to last about the same amount of time. So I went back to the original book you found the burial record in and found this.”

She pulled out the book in question, the one they had started calling the Burial Book, even though all the other farm books also detailed burials, toward her on the table. It was already open to the burial page. All of them had looked at it so many times they had the shape the entries made memorized. She flipped it forward a few pages and pointed to the entries. “If you look at this one closely, you’ll see the same thing. The handwriting isn’t much changed, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense when you try to read it,” she said.

Greta waved her arm across the table to indicate all the books arrayed there and said, “They all have it. Every single dirt farm has this period of strangeness. One of them even has an entry where a farmer says he dreamed he had a child but woke up and there wasn’t one.”

“Could everyone have had Remediation? That can’t happen, right?” Marina asked.

Piotr shook his head and responded, “No way. That wouldn’t even be possible that I’m aware of. Who would do it? Who would monitor the people?”

“Right,” Greta agreed. “Whatever this was it seems very unlikely that it would just occur to farms like that at different times. While I really dislike saying these words, I have to assume that this was a silo-wide occurrence. Or else it affected all the farms at the same time.”

Taylor broke in. “No way. If all the farmers just started going loopy someone else would have written something or there would be some evidence of it being corrected. Like a gap or something. This just trickles off in all the books.”

Greta nodded again.

“But what about that timeline? That isn’t very long ago. I mean, it is, but not really. I thought the First Heroes were…I don’t know…like thousands of years ago or something,” Marina said. It made her uneasy that the length of that timeline was so short.

The historian sighed. “That’s what is making me feel very uncomfortable. Taylor was right. Given the uncertainty of using ‘Orchard Years’, this looks like 110 years, 130 at most, when Graham died. And since we are given to understand that he died in the battle…”

“Then the time of the First Heroes is only three times as old as I am,” Piotr said.

“How could we get that so wrong?” Taylor asked, sounding as confused as he looked.

With a shrug, Greta said, “I think that all those entries that looked like they were done by remediation are probably how that happened. I’m thinking the entire silo got remediated and somehow history got changed.”

Taylor had begun shaking his head as she said the words. As soon as she was done he burst out, “No. Not possible.”

Marina didn’t want to get into an argument so she interrupted it before it could begin. “Whatever. It doesn’t matter in the details. It only matters that it changes our timeline. Because you’re missing the big picture here, Taylor. If it happened that recently, then that means that the Others were aggressively seeking our destruction not too long ago.”

“And,” Piotr took up the thread, “then it is possible that the nuke or whatever it was didn’t happen as far back as we think either.”

“Exactly!” Marina exclaimed and gave him a grim smile.

“Assuming all this is true, what next?” asked Piotr.

“Now we see what we can find that goes back further. We see if we can find the First People,” Greta said and slammed the book closed.

Chapter Fifteen

Marina went home and enjoyed a few days with her family after two solid weeks of work. Piotr and Taylor had also gone home, each of them having family to see. Taylor seemed to anticipate seeing his cat more than his parents or girlfriend, which earned him some well-deserved teasing.

So wrapped up in what they were doing were they that they might not have taken any time off, except that Marina’s husband kept coming up to ask when he might expect her. The last time it was said with a certain tone that made Marina think he was asking if she was ever coming home. They all really did need a break, no matter how momentous their discoveries.

As relieved as she was to see her own compartment and her daughter, she was almost immediately anxious to return to work. It was hard to refrain from talking about what she was doing with her family. Joseph made it easy on her by steering the conversation gently away whenever it started to come up. She overheard him having a stern conversation with Sela after he’d had to do that several times, telling her she needed to stop asking about it. She was grateful for his understanding, but sorry it had to be that way.

Understanding or not, she felt a gap between them that hadn’t been there before. It was like her duties at the Memoriam were a barrier between them. Even during her two nights at home, when she rested her head on his chest and his arm encircled her the way it had almost every night of their adult lives, she felt he wasn’t entirely with her. It wasn’t anything she could pin down or describe exactly. It was more like a distance had developed between them that she worried she had caused. Never one to shy away from intimacy, he hadn’t even given her the slightest hint he desired her in that way. At bedtime she was left with no idea that he had anything on his mind other than sleep.

It wasn’t all awkwardness and distance, however. The ingredients for a favorite meal were waiting for her and she prepared it for them her first night home. The next day was a day off for Joseph and Sela so they spent the entire day together, strolling the bazaar and doing a little shopping. They listened to a truly wretched series of poems that all seemed to be written under the inspiration of unrequited love. They watched a puppet show that had them all in stitches. They ate their supper at one of the little food stalls, standing around a wobbly table and trying not to let their noses run as they dipped hot fried corn cakes into a spicy sauce.

Marina had never learned the art of creating these kind of sauces, a combination of savory and sweet and hot so delicious and tempting it was worth the red eyes and loose sinuses. To go with it they shared a skewer of rabbit meat marinated in something even more delicious. Even though rabbit was the least costly meat within the silo, it was still very dear and they savored each morsel. To cool their burning mouths, they each had water flavored with a small chunk of dehydrated lemon in it. Lemon water wasn’t as dear, but it was a unanimous family favorite and treat.

They shopped for the fruits and vegetables and other goods the family would need with Marina gone. She ensured she selected things easier and faster to prepare than she might otherwise have. With her not there, they would need to be able to confidently feed themselves. Joseph was only a passable cook and they had been eating in the cafeteria more while Marina was gone. It showed in their moods and puffy faces.

As they made their way back up the stairs to their level and compartment, sated and happy, Marina felt the smallest bit of the barrier between them fall away. It didn’t last though, and by the time they were saying goodnight to Sela and getting ready for bed, she felt the distance again.

When Marina kissed him goodbye as he went for his shift on the morning of her departure, she could sense the questions in him. She had no idea how to make it right. Instead, she lifted a hand, cupped his cheek and said, “I’ll be back. I promise. This work won’t last forever.”

She could tell from his expression that this didn’t give him the answers he wanted. A resigned sort of expression came over his face and he said, “I love you. Come home soon.” He smiled then, but it wasn’t a big smile or a very genuine one. He added, “Don’t make me come up there and get you again.”

Marina returned the smile but felt hers probably looked as real as his did. “I won’t. Love you.”

She felt guilty at how relieved she was when she closed the door behind him and was alone with her thoughts. It had been a strain for her to contain her excitement for her work. It was a like a low level drain on her energy to remain guarded. For the first time since the day she first kissed Joseph, she had a momentary wish that she was unencumbered. It was just a quick moment and she knocked on the concrete wall absently for luck so she wouldn’t get her wish.

She had everything she really needed but she wanted a few of the niceties she had come to rely on as part of her daily life. She added a spare pot of lavender soap to her pack and grabbed a few more kerchiefs. She selected colorful ones with interesting designs on them that she had been shy of wearing before. Tucked inside the private world of the archives, she wouldn’t feel quite so observed if she wore these. Given the dust situation, with constant sneezes and runny noses that came with it, she needed more kerchiefs than she had brought.

Next to their bed rested a little sketch of the family in a valuable fruitwood frame. An heirloom on Joseph’s side of the family, she wondered if she should take the delicate thing with her. She supposed she could just take out the sketch, drawn when Sela was still small enough to ride around on Marina’s hip. To Marina, that sketch was far more valuable than the frame. Before she could think too much more about it, she plucked it up from the little table and wrapped it in a spare undershirt. He would understand, she was sure.

She toured the compartment she had lived in for her entire adult life. Sela’s room was far messier than she probably would have allowed if she had been home. She made a mental note to jot down for her to clean it on their chalkboard before she left. The laundry that was hand washed at home was strung up on the lines across both bedrooms. It had been done only haphazardly during her absence and she felt it was the least she could do for them while she was home. She just hoped they would actually take it down and put it away when it was dry rather than simply pull things down as needed as she suspected they might do.

Marina sighed and went to their sitting area. Her knitting book was still on the shelf and it was overdue. The library at the bazaar was how writers made their money but it depended on those that used the library following the rules to make it profitable. A writer would painstakingly copy out an extra copy of their book and give it to the library. In return, the writer received half of the proceeds of the lending. Given the cost of paper and ink and the economical nature of the borrowing, it might take a year or more for a writer to break even on their work. Her keeping a book long past the due date pushed that day further out for the author. She decided to pay the cost of a lift-post to the library for the book and include a few chits as payment for her tardiness.

On the wall there was a new and bright spot of color she liked very much. The picture of the view that Joseph had selected was done by someone with real talent. He had laughed when she was surprised at how wonderful the picture he brought home was. It was drawn in vivid colors and showed the orange and red of the setting sun glaring on the sensors. It was really quite beautiful.

Outside there were still a few bits of color and glass that must have once been cleaners of long ago but those were just lumps in the landscape in this picture. Cleaners that gave the gift now went where sensors had burned out before they joined with the world. Those left inside never saw that part of the gift, which was as it should be.

Still, she remembered asking about the mysterious objects in the view as a child. Grandy had looked almost embarrassed as she explained it. It was like she was trying to describe a puppy making messes before they learned to use the mats. She said the people of the silo didn’t know enough to join the world out of view in the dim past.

In this picture there was nothing to show that, just long shadows over the ridges of wind-blown sand and rocks. The sun was a burst of light that put a white star of radiating lines on the view where it hit the sensors too directly. It was beautiful and stark and perfect. She wondered if people who made their living by drawing the view for the tourists were influenced by so much viewing of the outside. She wondered if they went to remediation more than others. If she saw this beautiful sight every day when the sun finished its daily trip and went to sink away she might start to want to go out and see it in real life. She would have bet some of them did, too.

She drained her morning tea, washed the dishes and wrote her notes on the board. Ready to go, she was now strangely reluctant whereas before she had just wanted to get moving. She shook it off, grabbed her pack and left her compartment behind.

* * *

In her absence, Greta had not been relaxing. Though she took a mandatory day off, she used that time to send lift-posts back and forth to the council containing bits and pieces of their evidence for their review. Eventually, the lift-workers began to complain that her urgent posts were ruining their cargo schedule and making the post late for everyone else. Whatever the delays, she had managed to get the council, minus the two who were here doing the work, up to date on their progress.

Marina made it back and entered the archives in good time. Her legs had recovered completely and she made sure she did the exercises recommended by the medic every morning and the stretches he advised before bed. She was determined not to be hobbled by the stairs again. She was gratified to feel no more than a pleasant ache in her thighs from the climb.

Piotr and Taylor hadn’t returned, but were expected soon and Greta had already been at work for hours. She glanced up absently to greet Marina but then looked up again and complimented her on her colorful kerchief. In reply, Marina pulled another out of her pocket, this one a dyed a bright blue with a starburst of orange that reminded her of the picture in her compartment. She handed it to Greta.

Greta unfolded the kerchief and smiled down at it, running her fingers around the circle of bright orange as if she knew what Marina had meant when she selected it. “Thank you. It’s beautiful.” She took off the plain tan one she had around her neck and tied on the new one. She gave the knot a little twist to put it at the side and asked, “Look okay?”

Marina bobbed her head and said, “Perfect.”

They paused a beat, conversation now difficult to start. Presents were sometimes an awkward business and this one had no occasion to go with it. Marina just felt like Greta had given her so much by opening this world to her. However dusty and old and disorganized, it was a place full of wonders. She cleared her throat to hide her emotion and asked, “What are we doing today?”

Greta sighed and gave the book in front of her a little tap. Then she looked up at the rest of the piles on the table and around her feet. The piles were much expanded from when Marina was last here. The historian pointed to a pile of books on the other end of the table and said, “You can start with those. I went back through and kept the timeline we constructed in mind and found some additional references. I think we can work backward a bit more.”

Marina inclined her head to show compliance but didn’t quite know what she would be looking for. The books weren’t the farm books she had been working on. Instead they were maintenance logs. Big ones.

“Maintenance logs? They didn’t have year identifiers, just days and months,” Marina said.

“No, they didn’t. They used the schedules themselves as a calendar. Let me show you.”

She turned the book she was looking at around and pointed out specific lines to Marina. Air duct cleaning. Valve testing and lubrication. Door seals. It just looked random to Marina. She shrugged.

“You’re missing it, Marina. Look closer. Here, there are three lines for filter cleaning on an air duct and then the next entry had filter cleaning and duct cleaning. They are all three months apart,” Greta said, clearly feeling like what she said explained it all.

“Sorry. I don’t see what is important there,” Marina apologized. Then she got it. If this maintenance log covered a section of a level then one could go back and count the cleanings. She smiled.

Greta saw the comprehension come over her face and smiled too. “Exactly. If we can find all the maintenance logs for just one section, then we can count how long they’ve been maintained. It looks like this particular section gets the intake duct cleaned every twelve months. One year.”

“How could we have missed that before?” Marina asked, taking in the piles again. They had all been gone through because she distinctly remembered the groans and complaints coming from the rows where Taylor and Piotr had been working. Out of sight, but definitely not out of earshot. They seemed to feel about maintenance logs the exact feelings she had harbored against the farm logs.

The older woman gave a short little half shrug. She was just as confused as Marina it would seem. “I honestly don’t know. I got the first one from the overflow pile at the end of the row. It was obvious to me so I just can’t imagine them missing it. Especially with so many of them,” she finished with a wave at the collection of dusty paper.

Marina took in the piles her wave encompassed. There were a lot of maintenance books and they must have simply dismissed them after not realizing what they held in the first book. Blame wouldn’t help so she moved the conversation back on track. “So, we’re looking to match up the logs with the sections?” she asked.

Greta nodded and pointed to the pile she wanted Marina to look through, “Right. So get to it!”

By the time Piotr and Taylor came in, fresh and happy from their home time, the two women had well and truly lost that excited glow from a fresh discovery. Instead they were frustrated, covered in dust and only recently settled after a rather harrowing encounter with an unexpected spider guest that raced along a book Marina had picked up.

Piotr saw them at the table and dropped his pack to see what they were doing. His face went from jovial and amused at something Taylor had been saying to serious and interested in a flash. Marina saw it and gave him a little smile when his searching eyes happened to fall on her. His return smile was a distracted one and he looked at the book in her hand.

“Did you find something?”

Greta glanced up for only the partial second it took to dutifully register their presence without being rude and went back to studying the lines of print. She pushed a bead down the line of her counter to register her count every few seconds. The rack of beads, strung as they were on stiff wires, was some long abandoned and archaic toy that showed children how to count. It had found a new and far more important purpose as Greta’s new method of counting years in the maintenance logs.

Her head back down and counting, she answered him with a distracted, “Yep.”

Taylor hung back a little and Marina saw the briefest pass of something like anger cross his face. Perhaps she was mistaken because when his eyes met hers his normal friendly expression fell into place. She put it down to his being absent during a discovery and gave him a sympathetic look. She shrugged and said, “Greta found it while we were all gone.”

Piotr moved to stand behind Greta and looked over her shoulder at the logs. The historian didn’t need to explain or say a word. Her finger moved down a few lines and one more bead clicked and that was all it took.

“That’s brilliant!” he exclaimed and bent down further so as to read what was written. “I can’t believe we missed that.” He stood and faced Taylor, who remained at the far end of the table, not quite joining the group yet. “You didn’t notice that?”

Taylor followed the line of Piotr’s pointing finger and gave a dismissive shake of his head. “Notice what? It just looked like maintenance reports. It doesn’t mean anything.”

His caster’s eyebrows lifted at the tone. He stayed as he was, just looking at Taylor with an almost evaluating stare. When Taylor broke eye contact and looked at his feet, Piotr said, “Well, no need to be embarrassed about it. It seems obvious now but it probably looked very different to you then. We weren’t looking for that, really, were we?”

Taylor didn’t look up but he shook his head. It was a picture of an embarrassed shadow found wanting, or it was supposed to be. Piotr didn’t seem to notice, but the whole pose struck her as purposeful and a little false. She couldn’t think what the purpose would be. It was probably some other dynamic at work between caster and shadow. They all developed their own sort of codes with each other, distinct manners of speaking or acting that smoothed out rough edges and avoided conflict. She dismissed it and waved Taylor over to where she sat amongst her piles.

“Come help me, Taylor. I’ve got plenty to share.”

Chapter Sixteen

The days of counting backward continued but the gaps were just too much to overcome using just the books. Marina stayed with her previous tasks, filtering through the years of farm records until she overturned the last box and final filing cabinet and ran out of books to search. The pile was prodigious and her search wasn’t exhaustive but it would take an army of careful readers to truly search each book.

What she couldn’t overcome was the number that simply weren’t in the archives. Greta hadn’t been certain, but she had a notion that there might have been some purge in the past. Marina had found a sheaf of papers in a dusty drawer comprised of summary sheets for production and consumption that may have been related to the farms, but the identifiers were something she had no way of understanding. What could 2053 mean? 2051?

Greta was doing better with the maintenance reports, but like the farm reports, much was missing. Receipts for recycling started to outnumber the books. Piotr came up with a stunningly simple yet effective idea. They decided to average out the books in terms of years and then decide on the number of books between known books and count that way. It wouldn’t be highly accurate and Marina had a feeling that it would end in the same dead end she had encountered. Something fundamental had changed and she was pretty sure all the books of all kinds would lead back to the same undefined nowhere.

Marina checked in with the others and found Piotr and Greta with their heads together and working hard. Taylor was doing something else but related, his eyes flicking up and listening intently as they spoke. His easy smiles had disappeared somewhere. He appeared tense and drawn instead of the enthusiastic man of before. Something was going on with him and Marina wished she knew how to help him. It was a lot to take in, all that they had found so far, and she supposed that must be taking a toll.

The other end of the vast room was the one in the most disarray. It was the end where boxes were stacked in haphazard, leaning towers hiding filing cabinets with drawers that were crooked and permanently ajar. Marina walked toward them through the dim patches between the sparse bright lights. Only every other row of lights was lit, like every place in the silo that didn’t absolutely need brightness. It always sent a shiver along her spine when she walked such paths in quiet places.

She dismantled one of the leaning towers of boxes and sat amongst them, determined to sort them properly. Her reed pen was sharp and her ink pot full so there was no excuse not to finish the task. She gave a little grin and thought that she might even find something. So far she had been quite the lucky one.

The first box was filled with an uninteresting assortment of voter records and usage reports for power and water. She put them into piles and delved into the next, which held more disorganized bits though she did find a copy of a book she hadn’t read before. It looked like a fantasy novel about the outside. Something to do with a battle over some woman by the name of Helen in some place called Troy. It was neatly done, the writing almost as perfect as any she had seen. The binding needed work but it should be in the library so she set that aside.

The next tower was different. It was filled with books, with half a dozen copies of some of them in the boxes. She had never seen any of them before. She peeked inside one and immediately found herself embarrassed and looking around. It was a romance novel, heavy on the smut. The title was shocking enough, My Other Lover. It was a play on words as a quick read showed her. The other was an actual Other. “Yuck,” she said aloud in her corner.

As she piled through the boxes she found a single copy of a book that was machine printed. It was small and slender and bound in a way she had never seen before. The cover reminded her of the leather made from goats or rabbits but different. Thick and very beautiful, it invited touch. Along the outside edges of the paper there was a golden glimmer. She opened the pages to see and the gold appeared to have been painted along the edge of the paper. She couldn’t imagine such an extravagant use of the rare metal. The pages were supple and only slightly browned at the edges.

The book title was difficult to read. Also in gold, the script was strange. She teased out the letters until she could read it. In Memoriam by Alfred Lord Tennyson. She had never heard of him but the title was the same as the Memoriam so it must be related. She turned a few pages gingerly and found various attributions that wasted whole sheets of paper.

On the next page she found another wasted sheet and the words Copyright, 1897, 1900 and 1902. Her mind shot back to the papers they found with the numbers 2053 and so on instead of years. Was it possible that these were years in some past time?

She looked back and made sure that none of the others could see her. The path was clear and she could hear their voices rising above the sounds of air coming from the vents. The book was very small, no bigger than her hand, and would fit into a pocket in her coveralls without a problem. She knew it was wrong but she wanted to look this over privately. The little book had an air of illicitness to it. She would keep it just to see. Just for a little while.

She slipped the book into the front pocket of her coveralls and set to work on the other books, ever careful of the book next to her chest. She browsed the titles and found a pretty standard array. Some poetry, a few romances and an adventure or two.

She packed them up and took those boxes, one at a time, toward the staging area near the table. At Greta’s raised eyebrows, Marina let a box clunk to the floor and waved off any urgency. She said, “Books. But not that kind. It looks like books from the library. I thought they might go back. After you checked them, that is.” She stopped and thought about the smutty book, then added, “I think they might be banned books. Some of them are, umm, a little dirty.”

Greta nodded and said, “Sure. I’ll take a look.”

“How do you think they even got put in here?” Marina asked. She noticed that Piotr was looking over at the box with a bit more interest. She suppressed a smile.

The other woman shrugged, her interest reclaimed by what she was doing. She answered without looking up, “Who knows. How did half of this stuff wind up in here?”

“I’ve been wondering the same thing,” Taylor asked, unsmiling and with a strange tone to his voice. It sounded to Marina like he was asking it in a way that meant it should not be here at all. No one else seemed to notice.

Piotr gave Marina a little grin. He said, “In case you haven’t noticed, historians have a problem with sending things to recycling.”

Greta’s head came up sharply and she said, “We do not!”

His eyebrows gave a wiggle in Marina’s direction and she smiled at his successful ploy to get a rise out of Greta.

The woman in question motioned to all that lay before and around them in the room and said, “We wouldn’t have any of this if we had been too eager to recycle.”

“True,” Piotr said, drawing out the word while his eyes took in the piles.

They went back and forth, the two of them bantering like the fast friends they were becoming. Marina didn’t know how long the two of them had known each other but it was at least as long as the two served on the council. The queer formality of the council had been warming up since their mission had become a joint one. It was nice to see but Marina’s mind kept turning to her coverall pocket. The book pressed hard corners into her breasts and dragged her down with the weight of her decision to hide it.

She stopped herself from reaching up to touch the book. She rubbed her hands down the sides of her coveralls, like she would if she wiped off sweat or grime. She gave them one last smile, her face saying that all was fine, and went back to her messy corner of the archives.

It was all anticlimactic from there in her searching. Her hand came unbidden to the square form inside the pocket of her coveralls time and again. Several of the leaning towers were now organized and no longer leaning. They bore her neat Fabber script detailing the contents and several were empty and waiting for the results of further organization throughout the room.

By the time they were ready to break for dinner, Marina could barely control her desire to open the strange book and read. Pleading a headache, she escaped from the meal as soon as she could shovel it down her throat and went back to her room. She put the chair in front of the door and wedged it beneath the handle, then adjusted it several times, yanking the door to be sure it held.

On her bed, she pulled the book out with careful fingers. It was warm and that made it even more inviting, if that was possible. She felt the grainy green cover and depressed letters on the spine. There was a design on the front, also wastefully impressed in gold, that reminded her a little of the artifacts with the strange clawed animal. It wasn’t really the same, but it gave the same general impression.

She squished her pillow behind her head, took a fortifying breath and opened the cover. She could feel the strain of the old binding so she didn’t open it fully, just enough to turn a page and read. Beyond the blank and thick first pages, there was a page covered in a large and almost indecipherable script. A name, Catherine Meeks, and some gifting words that were so normal it made Marina smile. Then the words; June 16, 1907, Graduation Day.

What did that mean? It had the flavor of a date. Graduation was something she understood and there were always gifts given since it usually coincided with a first shadowing. It was the start of adulthood. This had that same feeling but if it was, what did it signify? What is June? What did 1907 actually relate to?

She shook her head and turned the page. Again, a full blank page but this time it had a much more understandable script. Rather than large and elaborate and loopy letters…a wasteful script… it was neat and very precise. It read:

Everything Ends,

Even Worlds

Some Company for a Like Mind

For the Trip

-T

“Hmm,” Marina hummed into the quiet room. “Even worlds, huh.”

The words somehow reeked of arrogance, a wink and a nod toward the catastrophe that was the silo, and it pissed Marina off. Whoever this T was, she was certain he was an asshole. That was the down deep of that.

She almost passed the next page. The two pages wanted to turn together. She separated the pages with a fingernail and found yet another page of writing, this time with the familiar neat and tiny letters of a silo person well acquainted with the value of paper. The letters were blurry so she held the book under the bedside light in her room and adjusted it further away from her eyes until it swam into sharp focus.

Livy — I just got back from watching you sing with the other children at the Null Day celebrations. You’re growing up so fast it’s almost painful. You won’t remember me but you are, in many ways, like a daughter. It occurred to me as I was making the trip back up that I’m getting old and I need to take care of things. One of those things is this book. It belonged to a good friend once and I’m leaving it to you. When I’m done with this, I’ll wrap it and hope that will be enough to ensure you get it. I’ll be sure it is in my will but I’ll never know, of course. What I most want is for you to read it and know that even though our circumstances may change, there is always hope. Have you ever wondered why we have a Null Day? Why do we insert a holiday with no number and no date, between the last day of the year and the first of the next every four years? Why do we adjust the lights so that we are always either increasing or decreasing the dim time, going toward long days of light or the reverse? I know why. If you want to know why, then you can. I left it all for you. Use the knowledge well if you can and if not, save it for another person and another lifetime. With love and gratitude.

- WG       5-14-64    Spare

She touched the words as she finished. They were intimate words that imparted the feeling of a final goodbye, of some last bit of crucial advice. The signature may be only initials but Marina knew exactly who it was. Wallis Grant. It seemed like he was following her around the silo now, appearing over her shoulder to push her gently in one direction or another. Whoever Livy might be, she either never got the book or turned it in. Kept with those boxes of banned or distasteful books, this little treasure had languished. Was some part of Wallis around, even now, speaking so quietly that no one could hear?

Marina looked around her room and into the corners, half fearing and half hoping she would see some spectral Wallis pointing in the direction he wanted her to go next. She gave a shiver and sat up, trying to shake off the creepy feelings she was giving herself. There were no specters, no voices from the past, only this book and a sad letter that was either rejected or never reached the intended recipient. She held the book up to her face and breathed in the pleasant musty smell of old paper and the past and said into the leather that bound it, “I got it, Wallis.”

Reading the book for further clues yielded nothing. There were lots of underlined words or words with tick marks or numbers with circles around them, but none of it made any sense. Much was done at different times. She could tell by the fading of the ink or the strange greyish brown marks used instead of ink. On top of that the whole thing was poetry. She hated poetry. She would rather read that nasty book she had found about doing it with an Other before poetry.

While she was eating dinner with the group, Piotr and Greta teasing Taylor to break him out of yet another sour mood, the unidentifiable something that had been nagging at her finally clicked into place. “Shit! Of course!” she exclaimed, spattering dressing off her fork with her sudden gesture.

Everyone at the table stopped mid-sentence and looked at her, Greta wiping a drop of oily dressing from her cheek.

“Ah, yeah,” Marina stumbled with her words. She needed something —anything— reasonable. “I just remembered something I have to do.” She dropped her fork to her tray and shoved it toward Taylor, who could be relied upon to eat anything on anyone’s tray that was left over. “Can you eat that for me? I’ve got to go.”

He gave her a cool look she assumed was related to the tray, but nodded. Greta and Piotr just exchanged that “she’s weird” look with each other they always did and waved her off. Squeezing her fists to keep from flying out of the room, she left as casually as she could. The squeak of excitement that escaped when she got to the deserted hallway was a quiet one. She broke into a run at the corner but she kept her footfalls as light as possible in her heavy boots.

The door shoved closed and her chair beneath the knob once more, she opened the book and looked again. Yes, there is was. What she ignored at first as a date of some sort could not possibly be a date. Null day had no date and it sure wasn’t in the fifth month of the year. She considered the possibilities. Sometimes older people wrote dates by their age rather than the year and this could be that. The fourteenth day of the fifth month of the sixty-fourth year of his life. What about the spare after it? What did that mean? No, Marina was sure of one thing and that was that she was following a trail not laid by accident.

What did he mean by ‘I left it all for you’ in the letter? It had to mean there was more than this book. And the only thing that doesn’t fit in was the date and the word spare. That was the clue. But what in silo did it mean? Compartment numbers were one possibility but they weren’t labeled that way. Compartments were by level but then it was all one number. Her compartment was 95-0916R. Level 95, section 9 compartment 16. If it was a compartment then it would be Level 5, section 14 and compartment 64. That didn’t make sense unless the compartments up there were a whole lot smaller there than the rest of the silo. She couldn’t imagine how tiny the quarters would be to get at least 64 of them on a single section.

Still, it was possible. But where in any compartment could anything of any real size be hidden? Nowhere. The walls are concrete, ducts are cleaned regularly. She looked around her room, seeking where that she might hide things if she were Wallis. Sink, no. Floor, no, nothing large anyway. No, no and more no. Still, she would have to go look. Maybe it was just the next clue. She let out a wry chuckle when she considered that maybe he hid a clue under a floor tile just as she had. How in the silo would she get the resident of that space to let her search it or start pulling up tiles?

Marina tucked the book back into her coverall, patting it like a puppy or child after she buttoned up her pocket. She tucked her mussed hair back behind her ears, gave her ponytail a tightening tug, smoothed her coveralls and plastered her normal smile back on her face before she went back out of the room. There was no one there to see the performance so she dropped it and rushed back to the archives where everyone was probably already at work.

When the others asked her what was up, clearly referring to her abrupt departure, she passed it off as a forgotten special occasion that needed a note sent. Piotr had apparently been in that situation before because he mumbled, “That never works,” as he turned back to his work. Greta laughed at that and nudged his shoulder. She wasn’t married but she could guess as well as Marina could that Piotr was either a forgetter of birthdays or anniversaries, or both.

Only Taylor didn’t join in on the revelry. The way he looked at her made Marina feel uncomfortable, though it wasn’t a mean look or anything of that nature. It was just sort of a vague look that crept under her skin. She gave him a nervous smile and resisted the urge to pat the book again while she made her escape back to her corner of the archives.

Chapter Seventeen

The group had been making tremendous progress and the archives were a different place. The shelves were absent dust and filled with organized files. The cabinets were beginning to empty and be refilled, now with newly greased skids and rust free rails. It was a beautiful thing, Marina thought. For decades this place had remained almost untouched. The historians had a case for expansion that couldn’t be argued with if the timeline really did verify out and a mere handful of generations had passed since Graham and his group had made their stand.

Sadly, not much more was being found but that didn’t matter when she considered all that they had done. It made her feel like they had accomplished something wonderful. The origins of the pocket watch would probably be forever lost, but in a way, that was fine too. It was a beautiful mystery for another time from another time.

Marina smiled and patted Greta’s shoulder as she passed her to deliver yet more logs to the shelves. These hadn’t turned out to be very useful, containing only the records of repairs without a consistent date pattern. She opened the first book to look where they wanted it shelved and found no note. She put it aside and shelved the others before returning to it. Marina had been doing a lot of this organizing too so she thought she would see if she could place it herself rather than go ask for help yet again.

Flipping open the cover, she scanned the first pages of work to see the levels. That was easy to figure out. Then she looked at the repair types to see what type of repairs. Also easy, electrical and electrical related. Feeling rather satisfied, she trailed a finger along the spines of the books arrayed before her to find the level and the type. And then it hit her.

Stepping back from the shelves she opened the book again and looked at the locations. They were all strings of numbers with little dashes between them. A junction box on Level 20 read 20-14-37J. An electrical panel on Level one read 1-11-23F. They were all like that. The letters must be the codes for the type of box and the more she looked along the lines the more that seemed likely. Another listed as switchbox had an S. Another with a R was marked relay. It was simple, logical and very mechanical.

She shoved the book in the slim bit of space between the books and the shelf and took the little book from her pocket. Opened to Walls’ letter, she saw how easy it was to read and figure out if only one knew what to look for. She considered this and wondered if Wallis had known that the only time his clues were likely to be deciphered was if there were many someones to do the deciphering, each contributing what they knew from their own lives.

She tucked the book into her pocket again and shelved the log. She bit a ragged bit on her thumbnail as she tried to figure out her next move. It was a long climb to Level 5 and would take a good while for her to make. They were due for a day off but her family would be expecting her. That wouldn’t work.

She felt a sharp pain as the ragged edge let go so she shoved that hand in her pocket and leaned her forehead against the shelves. She had to figure out how to get a day alone. She might be wrong, true, but she could be right. It was worth finding out.

* * *

Piotr died that night so making plans were the last thing on Marina’s mind once she finally discovered the fact.  No one woke her so she had no idea what had happened when she stumbled out of her room to grab some breakfast before work and found the atmosphere strangely oppressive and still.

In the dining hall there were vague whispers and sidelong looks that first made Marina check to be sure she was buttoned up and then that her coveralls weren’t ripped in the back. None of her compatriots were in the room so she sat by herself to eat, the few others present clustered at the other end of the room.

She had already finished her breakfast grains, a bit of fruit and strong tea before anyone approached her. The historian shadow, Florine, walked over hesitantly. Her hunched walk was out of character, more like a shuffle than her bouncing stride.

“I’m very sorry for your loss,” she said in a quiet and serious voice.

Marina didn’t know what to think. Clearly she had missed something vital here. Her thoughts went to her husband and daughter first. “What loss? Who was lost?” she demanded.

“Oh, I thought they must have told you. I’m sorry,” the girl trailed off, uncomfortable now.

“What in silo’s name are you talking about? Did someone die? Who was it?” Marina asked loudly, standing now, breakfast tray forgotten. “Did something happen to my family?”

The girl had been backing up, looking confused and a little frightened at Marina’s response. Though she looked behind her, probably for someone better equipped than she for giving bad news, her head whipped back around at Marina’s final words and she said, “No. No. I’m sorry. No, nothing like that!”

Her body felt like it deflated all at once when she realized it wasn’t her family. She didn’t need the stumbling words, Florine’s expression was enough. She sagged against the table and into her chair again. She put her head in her hands and tried to still her shaking limbs sourcing from her racing heart. She vaguely heard the girl give a little half sob and tell someone else that she was sorry. Marina didn’t raise her head when someone started soothing Florine and the two moved away.

The sound of a clearing throat next to the table finally made Marina open her eyes and raise her head. It was Greta. Someone must have gone to get her. She said, “She didn’t mean to frighten you like that. She’s young and doesn’t know what it’s like to be a mother. She thought you knew.”

“Knew what?” Marina asked, not really wanting to know the answer. Why did bad things always seem to come when they were least looked for.

Greta pulled one of the chairs around next to her and sat down, a bad sign for sure. She took Marina’s hand and said, “Piotr passed last night.”

The words registered but the concept didn’t. Piotr passed last night. What is that? He was here and he ate dinner and he played a game of checkers with Taylor while Greta and she played a game of cards right next to them. Passed?

Marina shook her head and asked, “You’re telling me that Piotr is dead?”

Greta winced at the word but she nodded. Marina could see her throat bobbing as the other woman held her emotions in check. They said nothing for a moment. Greta must have managed to push down her feelings because she said, “It was an accident. On the stairs.”

The stairs? Marina put her free hand to her mouth. That would be a terrible death. How could that careful man have had an accident? What would he have been doing on the stairs anyway?

“I don’t understand, Greta. How did he have an accident on the stairs? When could he have?”

“It was stupid. Just a stupid accident.” Her voice broke then and fat tears rolled down her face.

Marina didn’t know how to ask delicately, so she decided the best approach was just to ask. “Did he fall?”

It was Greta’s turn to put her head in her hands. A muffled sob came from under her hands and she nodded.

She didn’t want to push Greta any farther. Clearly, they were all friends now but Greta and Piotr had a long history of mutual work and that had been taking root as a strong friendship, the kind one didn’t find all that often in life. She suddenly remembered his family and said, “What about his wife? His kids?”

Greta’s sobs intensified then and whatever she said then was entirely unintelligible, but Marina assumed it was just more sad confirmations. She shook her head, thinking of Piotr, thinking of him falling, of what a fall can do to a body. What his family would face when they heard about it over and over as time passed was even worse. The joke all falls became with time would prevent them from ever truly healing.

“You’re sure it was an accident?” Marina asked, though she regretted it the moment Greta raised her head. Her eyes were red and wet and very hurt at the question.

“Never mind. It had to be an accident,” Marina answered herself.

They sat there, Marina’s leftover breakfast congealing on her tray and the tea developing an oily slick on top. After a while, Greta took her kerchief from around her neck, blotted her swollen eyes and blew her equally swollen nose. She hiccupped a few times but the storm had passed and this was all just the aftereffects. Marina waited.

“It was the lights that did it,” Greta said suddenly. It meant nothing to Marina so she raised her eyebrows in question. Greta saw and explained, “The lights didn’t shift right. You know that moment of dark you sometimes get before the red lights come on after the half-dim lights go out?”

At Marina’s nod, she continued, “Well, the red ones didn’t come on last night. Something was wrong with the switch. Taylor and Piotr were on the stairs and he just…missed.” She waved her hands out, a perfect mimic of a person missing a grab for something.

“Why wouldn’t he just wait? Or call for a light or something? That’s not like Piotr at all,” Marina said, trying to picture the scene. She wouldn’t have moved at all if there wasn’t enough light. She would have called out and someone would have come with a light eventually. Or just turned them back on.

Greta shook her head. Marina could tell that she was equally baffled. No one in the silo would be careless like that. There were just some things everyone knew and what to do if the lights went out was one of them. It happened now and then. Things broke. You waited for them to be fixed and you definitely did not wander around near the stairs. When the lights went out anywhere in the silo, it could get so dark it made a person dizzy.

Even in primary school kids learned how to find the floor when it went dark. They had been put into the dark to learn how hard it was to tell up from down and how to safely get down to the floor. If you were with someone else, you were supposed to hold their hand on the floor because it helped. It sounded so simple that it was funny, until you had to do it and couldn’t tease out which way was up. But that was a closed room with no light. Some light, however weak, would have traveled through the stairwell from the other landings. Perhaps not much, but some.

Once Greta was calm again, Marina helped her to her room, a supporting arm around her waist, and put her to bed. She brought her a cup of herbal tea and a cool, damp towel for her eyes. She tried not to be impatient to leave and sat with her. As soon as Greta’s breathing took on the measured regularity of sleep, Marina quietly made a quick exit.

She didn’t need to go looking for the scene because the landing was still awash with people. Deputies tried to keep gawkers from the rails overlooking the ‘splash zone’, as it was called. Porters struggled up the stairs while the lifts were unavailable and were grumbling as they trudged upward.

But all the rest, and there were a good many, were gawkers. They might be there under the guise of being on their way to a shift or home from a shift or on an impromptu visit to the Memoriam, but they were really pausing too long because they were hoping for a tidbit of information. As Marina stood there by the entrance, she heard people betting on whether or not it was a fall or a jump. She was disgusted. People were usually so good, but when something like this happened they were positively gruesome.

Marina saw her husband before he saw her. She pushed her way through the gawkers until she got near him. His arm went across the chest of the man in front of her with a rough, “Stay back. Let them work.”

She stopped short as the man in front of her did. She gaped at him, never having seen this side of him before. He was intimidating.

He saw her over the shoulder of the man he had stopped and grimaced. “Sorry, honey!”

The man pushed Joseph’s arm off his chest and exclaimed, “Don’t call me honey!”

Joseph rolled his eyes and motioned for Marina to go back toward the Memoriam then called for Sela to take his spot. He waited until she got there and Marina could see the very serious expression on her daughter’s face. She wasn’t the least bit intimidated by the onlookers. Joseph stepped through the little crowd and gave Marina a one armed hug when he reached her.

She wasted no time and asked, “Why are people still here?”

He sighed and said, “You don’t want to know. It’s a bad one.”

Marina blanched at the matter of fact way her husband said it. He was Piotr yesterday. Today he was a bad one. It was too much to try to tie together. She took a handful of his coverall sleeve and tugged, “Tell me. He was my friend.”

Joseph’s face lost the hard edge and he patted her hand, “Yeah, I know. Are you sure you really want to know all this?”

She nodded and bit her lip.

“Well, it’s an Othered mess down there. He hit the landing on 73, the lifts and from there he basically fell apart and went everywhere,” he said, back in deputy mode and speaking with such a lack of feeling that Marina felt nausea rise in her belly. She put a hand over her mouth and choked back a cry. Joseph cleared his throat and went on, his voice less clinical, “He wouldn’t have felt it. For him it was over as soon as he hit that first landing.”

“You’re sure?” Marina asked, hoping that was true.

“Very sure,” he said.

It was said with such confidence that Marina realized she didn’t want to know the detail that gave him that level of surety. She lowered her hand from her mouth and gripped his arm again, “How could this have happened?”

Joseph seemed at a loss for that one. “I don’t know. Why would he have fallen like that? It was almost like he was aiming for it or something. You don’t fall that far sideways. But he didn’t jump, that we know. He was with someone else and their story matches the facts. He fell. He just tripped on the stairs and fell when the lights went out.”

“What about Taylor?”

“The other guy is fine. A little banged up from trying to grab him when he fell, but physically he’ll be fine. He’s a mess though,” Joseph said and pointed at his head. Of course Taylor wouldn’t be fine. It had been clear that Piotr viewed Taylor as a son and friend. Taylor just as clearly admired Piotr. No, he wouldn’t be fine at all after that.

“The lights?” Marina asked.

“That was weird. Some idiot jammed a piece of cloth between the contacts inside the switch. How does that happen, I ask you? Probably a prank, but I doubt very much whoever did it thinks it’s funny now. They certainly won’t if I find out who it was,” Joseph answered, his voice grim at the thought of the person who sabotaged the lights.

“It’s been all night. Why are people still here?”

“Uh, well,” Joseph started. At Marina’s hard look he made a face and said, “We were done, but people keep finding, uh, more stuff.”

Marina’s bile rose and she was pretty sure she was a hair’s breadth from vomiting up her breakfast. She took a step backward and leaned over, her breath pushing out like she might be able to breathe it out with her lungs instead of spew it from her stomach. Joseph rubbed her hunched back, trying to be supportive even while keeping half an eye on the landing.

She stood and pushed his arm away, not ungently but without hesitation either. “Get it taken care of. He has a family. It’s not entertainment,” she said, her breath still coming out in uneven puffs. She pointed toward the people remaining on the landing and hissed, “And get them out of here.”

Without waiting for an answer she turned and went back into the Memoriam and straight to her room. She fished the book from her hiding place and tucked it into her pocket. She almost left the Memoriam then, but knew that an immediate absence might cause alarm. She went to Taylor’s room and knocked on the door. No one answered and she was about to turn away when the door opened a crack.

A single eye, recognizable as Taylor’s though it was rimmed in red and swollen, showed through the crack. “Hey,” Marina said, quietly and without expectation. She thought he probably needed someone right then. If he was there when that happened then all that he had heard would still be sounding in his ears. It was almost good that he was spared the sight, that it had been dark.

His breath hitched and he opened the door wide. Marina stepped in and hugged him. He felt broken. He sounded like he had become hollow and the sounds he made were heartbreaking. He practically gurgled his words, he was so filled with tears and grief. “I’m sorry.”

“Oh, Taylor. Don’t be sorry. No one blames you. No one!” Marina assured him, guiding him to his chair and getting him down into it. He was like a puppet. He bent and moved but only in response to another. He was a wreck. Blood speckled his coveralls from shallow gouges on one cheek. She saw more gouges, deeper ones, on his wrists and hands. He must have tried so hard to hold onto Piotr when he fell to be so wounded.

She poured him a cup of water from the pitcher on his table and pressed it into his hands. “Drink,” she said and guided the cup to his mouth until he drank.

He swallowed once dutifully but a sob came and he spluttered water in the doing. She put that aside and washed his face with a cool cloth, re-wetting and wringing by turns at the small sink in the room. She kept her eyes on him at every moment. Eventually, he calmed and the sobs died down. It was a horrible replay of what she had just gone through with Greta. The difference was that Taylor wasn’t just sad and in shock from the loss, he appeared shattered.

Soon enough, he was calm but it was an eerie, absent calm. It was more like the collapse of someone who just can’t process one thing more. Greta came a bit later and assured Marina that she had gotten a little rest. She would stay with Taylor for the time being.

Marina hated to be an opportunist, but this was just too much of an opening to miss. She was upset about Piotr too, certainly, but there was something that needed doing. Piotr would probably have done the same thing had their positions been reversed.

As she opened the door, she turned and said, “We won’t be working so I’m going to take care of some things I’ve been putting off. I’d just rather not think about…this. I’ll be back tonight. Is that okay?”

She saw Taylor wince on the bed at her oblique mention of what had happened and Greta’s eyes grew shiny, but she only nodded. As Marina closed the door behind her, she saw Greta sit on the bed and stroke Taylor’s hair back just like a mother would for an upset child. It made her feel like less of a shit for sneaking away knowing they would comfort each other.

She gathered her things and pressed her hand to the book again. The only comfort Marina wanted was to see if she was right. She told her husband she was going to do so some work elsewhere for the day and earned a confused look that she ignored. She took to the stairs.

Her exercise had made a difference and the levels slipped past as she focused ever upward. She took breaks and did stretches, garnering a few curious looks as she crouched right on the landing to do them. She drank plenty of fluids and took a dose of the pills she had remaining just to be sure. This was a trip further than the one that had done her in not so long ago but she was going to get it done fast even if it killed her.

When she crested the landing on Level 34 she was exhausted and she knew she was at her limit. They were used to seeing her now and knew she was engaged in some special, possibly IT related project, and so they simply let her go where she wanted. Piotr’s office was off limits and that would be in poor taste anyway, but she borrowed an empty room and lay down for a nap. Her pack served as her pillow and she drew her knees up to her chest against the chill, but the short sleep was deep and satisfying. Her legs felt good so she took another dose of pills and spent time preparing for the next part of the climb.

She was hungry, but wouldn’t stop further. Her task was simply too urgent. Despite the fact that whatever was there, if anything was there, had been there for a very long time, she had the irrational feeling that she needed to hurry or it would be gone when she arrived.

At Level 5 she took a moment before entering the double doors. Marina wanted to look exactly like she belonged and raise no curiosity from passersby. She squared her shoulders and swung the entry door wide. Her eyes went directly to the drop ceiling. Yes, it was exactly the same as the one on her level. Above those ragged tiles would be a busy runway of pipes and conduits, air ducts and electrical wire. And there would be relay boxes. Numbered relay boxes.

Marina tore her eyes from the ceiling and pushed back her desire to loudly proclaim victory at being this close. She hurried to the section of Level 5 she needed. From the maintenance closet she extracted one ladder and one tool kit, not signing the log but hoping she’d have it back in place before anyone needed it. The next problem was that she had absolutely no idea where in all these ceilings it would be.

Each section of the level was numbered, like a slice of pie. She was in fourteen like the clue in the book indicated. That was easy. But even in the correct section, there was a whole lot of hallway space and how they were numbered wasn’t something Marina had ever picked up. Joseph probably knew but she hadn’t seen any way to bring that up when she dashed away with barely a word. Oh, hey honey, I’m off to do something entirely legitimate but mysterious so can you tell me exactly how the relay boxes in the ceilings are numbered before I do? She gave a quiet little laugh. Yeah, that would have gone over like a dropped lift bag. Then she remembered Piotr and all the humor fell away.

There was only one thing to do so she started right where she was and climbed up to peek in the ceiling. It was extraordinarily dusty and dirty up there. As she kept the foamy tile tilted up with her head, she was faced with at least an inch, maybe more, of dense grayish brown dust. It was even piled in little ridges all along the pipes. She immediately regretted letting out a deep sigh when it disturbed the surface and sent a cloud into the air. She popped her head back down to let it settle for a moment and gave an all-business nod to a resident that walked by eyeballing her. The gray coveralls with a patch that bespoke something to do with electronics and mechanical apparently gave her a pass.

When she thought it was probably safe, she poked her head back up and flicked her light around in the dim space. She could see boxes set at regular intervals along the walls on both sides. Peeking back down and then up to try to marry their locations, she decided that each box marked the change from main lines to the compartments. There were more doors than boxes so the ratio looked to be about two to one. It made sense.

There was no box near her, perched as she was at the start of the hallway near a closet, so she reset the tile and moved the ladder. It was perfect. Her head was no more than a foot from the box. It was much bigger than it had looked to be from her initial position. She thought about how much she could stuff into one of those and her excitement rose.

This box was covered with a thick layer of obscuring dust like everything else and she couldn’t even make out the engraving on it. She smoothed it away and read the designation. She had no idea if that meant she was close or not. She was in the right area, though, and that was something.

She repeated the procedure about halfway up this main rear hallway. Ahead of her, the curve of the silo wall obscured what lay beyond. She considered and counted the number of boxes she must have passed in her head. The numbers were decreasing and if she was right about the pervasive logic of the silo, the smallest ones should be where the next lower numbered section met this one.

At the last hallway junction to this section, the dividing line was denoted by a strip of very old black paint with a 14 on one side and a 13 on the other. She turned down the hallway and selected a spot. One more peek and she realized she was very close. Shining the flashlight, she tried to count down the boxes and saw there was an extra. After seeing them in their ordered lines, an extra stood out. It was like a banner hanging up to proclaim a winner. She grinned into the dim space, leaving cracks in the dust that covered her face.

It was the end of a shift and the hallways had more traffic, this one a lot more. Given that almost this entire level was residences, it made sense but it also made her work awkward. Anyone might decide to stop and see what she was doing. If there was a lot in the box, then it would be obvious. She shook her head and decided there was nothing to be done about it as she resettled the ladder at the spot she would need. A few more nods to residents and one explanation that there was a short that needed tracking down and she was ready.

The box was sealed with a loop of wire and a plastic tab like all the others. It was covered in the same thick layer of dust and bore the same engraved plate. The difference was that it was marked, ‘Spare’, in bold letters on a second plate and there was no tube of metal containing wires coming in or going out of it. It was on its own. She wondered that no one had ever noticed before. Perhaps such spares were common. Based on the dust, she thought it was just that nothing had broken up here in a very long time.

She positioned her pack on the ladder’s hook, close to hand but not obviously so, and propped up her tool bag on the ladder’s shelf. When she clipped the wire she felt like she was entering a new territory. It was like she has found some unseen and untrodden new level that suddenly appeared in front of her. It was equal parts thrill and anticipation and fear. She hoped it wasn’t empty and feared it might be full.

The lid opened with the loud creak of unused hinges. Particles of rust broke free and rained down, creating little divots in the blanket of dust. Marina closed her eyes and opened the lid wide. One small breath later she opened her eyes.

It was full. Oh, so very full.

Chapter Eighteen

Her trip back to the maintenance closet seemed to take forever and the pack on her back seemed to weigh as much as a person, maybe as much as the silo itself. It almost burned through her clothes and crisped her skin as it silently called for her to look. It whispered for her to just peek once. She shut herself into the closet and realized there was no lock. She cursed and wondered if she should risk it, but her anticipation was only trumped by her desire not to get caught. She settled for a peek inside her pack and a quick reassuring touch that it was all real.

She almost flew down the stairs. She needed privacy and she discarded each level she passed with increasing frustration. She stopped at the infirmary but was thwarted by the presence of a man resting up from the same holiday malady she had suffered. It was an excruciating twenty-nine levels to 34 that she finally went and asked again for a room to rest in. There was a window there, just like before, but a flap in front of the window on the outside let people know it was occupied. Only the rudest of people would lift that flap and look in so she felt relatively secure.

She nestled into the corner nearest the door, pulling all but her extended legs out of view, and opened the pack. She started to withdraw the contents, stacking them after examination right next to her.

The book was huge and it reminded her of the burned remains she had seen not too far from here. The title was ‘Legacy’ and the spine had the letters, ‘Sh-St’, on it. That was tempting but she put it aside. There were three other books, small ones with faded black fabric covers and curled edges. Many pages were missing from them and she knew, even from the second that she opened one to glance inside, that the pages were the exact ones that were hung in the Memoriam to explain the Tenets. It was only with the greatest reluctance that she put them aside.

The rest was all paper. A sheaf of papers held together with a metal clip. A bundle of letters tied with a faded purple ribbon. Many other individual items, a few in envelopes made of other sheets of paper, had also been stuffed inside. She selected one of these at random, a thick one with no hint of the contents, and opened it. It seemed to just keep unfolding until it was the largest piece of paper she had ever seen. It was like the whole version of the partial one Greta showed her in the archives. But what was depicted was not the same.

In a beautifully precise arrangement there were circles and inside each was a number. The title of the piece was machine printed in bold letters across the top. It read, ‘Silo Field Diagram’. The edges were torn in a precise match to the remains she had seen down below in the burned room. It wasn’t immediately clear what the diagram meant until she spotted the circle labeled ‘49’ with the single word, ‘Us’, next to it. Then her eyes took in all the other circles, all the other numbers. All the other silos.

Marina felt her face grow hot and her vision pinpoint down until all she could see was that 49 and that word — us. Us. We. The jacks down below, the communications destroyed that went to unknown places. The fifty slots with one of them just a space and not a jack. The next to the last one. The 49th one.

How long she was frozen like that, those numbers running through her mind and her breathing making a ragged racket in the silent room, she had no idea. It seemed impossible that she could simply return to normal but that is what happened. Her vision stopped dancing and her breathing slowed down and the jitters that made her boots clack together in front of her slowed and then stopped. There are other silos but I am okay. There are forty-nine other silos but I am awake and alive and will not die from knowing it. It was a strange feeling.

She laid the paper on the floor and looked at the details. Faded red X’s marked a few of the circles. No, a few silos, she mentally corrected. Numbers that didn’t mean anything to Marina ran along those X’s. A large grayish-blue blob with uneven edges encroached on the paper from the end closest to the one marked 49 and the one marked 50. There was a notation inside that was difficult to decipher but it appeared to read, ‘Catchment Lake’. She didn’t know what that was. Lake?

There was so much more to see but she became keenly aware of how much time had passed when the lights beyond the privacy flap blinked to half-dim. That meant she had two hours until the dimming and she was far from the Memoriam. It was with sharp reluctance that she packed her finds back up and secured her pack. She took another dose of pills after she stood and her legs screamed with the effort of the day. Her pale and sweaty face, her shaky voice and her hurried gait earned her a few looks as she thanked the IT reception worker and made her way out.

On the stairs she misjudged the steps or caught a toe more than once. She had to stop and pull herself together on Level 36 before continuing on. They had just lost Piotr and she could easily wind up the same way if she kept being so clumsy. It hit her as she passed Level 40 that Piotr would not see this. He wouldn’t get to know. He missed it by just a single day. Less than that, really.

It was heartbreaking and the tears she hadn’t shed earlier threatened to come when she most needed them to stay away. Her grip tightened on the central post and she hugged the center until she felt more in control. A curious look or two was cast her way from others climbing the stairs but no one said anything and she was able to pick up her pace once more.

On Level 70 she stopped at the deputy station. Joseph and Sela were long off duty by then so she made her greetings, secretly amazed that she was able to do so, and left him a note. She wrote that she had made it back late and would probably sleep in. He had made a habit of stopping by, having a chat and stealing a kiss on his way to work each morning. Tomorrow she knew she wouldn’t be capable of such. She might not ever sleep again until all of this had been gone through and the secrets revealed. The cadence of her steps had been consistent the whole way down. There — step — are — step — other – step — silos.

She made her way to her room inside the Memoriam and stuffed her pack under her bed. She was almost faint with fatigue and she knew a big part of that was lack of food. She had eaten nothing since that morning and expended a great deal of energy since. She checked the hallway clock and thought that she might be able to go and grab something without meeting anyone given the late hour.

The last person she wanted to see was sitting in the near darkness of the kitchen and dining hall when she entered. Greta cradled a cup in her hands and was bent over it like it was the last warmth in the silo. She turned dull and glazed eyes toward Marina as she entered. She gave her a weak attempt at a smile but it was sadder than if she hadn’t tried at all.

Marina joined her and rested a hand on her arm. “How are you holding up?”

Greta tried that smile again but it came off as a grimace. Her voice was ragged when she answered, “I’m better. Taylor is bad, though.”

There was no helpful reply to give to that so Marina just nodded in understanding.

“I don’t know why I’m taking it this bad,” Greta said. “I mean, aside from this project, we just sort of were,” she paused and searched for the words. “I guess you could say we were friendly strangers.”

Again Marina nodded. She understood this well. Everyone had people like that in their lives. This time she added, “But we aren’t anymore. You were his friend and he yours. We all shared something special, right?”

Greta looked up at Marina, her eyes grateful at the understanding. “Exactly,” she said. “And the way it happened.”

“Don’t think about that, Greta. Just don’t,” Marina said firmly. “I don’t know what you’ve been told, but Joseph told me it would have been so fast he wouldn’t have felt pain or known what was happening. That is more than many can hope for in this life.”

Greta’s expression said she did know that but she was not getting past the graphic after-effects of the death. Those were hard things to get past and sometimes, like this time, they were too hard to put aside. After a few minutes, Greta took her leave and Marina was left alone, her stomach growling and the memory of that unfolded sheet of circles flying around in her head. She grabbed some handy leftovers, refilled her flask and hurried back to her room. She knew she should go and see Taylor and that she was being a very bad friend. She rationalized that he was probably asleep by now and it would be worse to disturb him.

She gobbled the food as fast as her mouth would let her chew and her stomach would accept it. She was a bundle of nerves and her suddenly loaded stomach actually felt worse than the fluttery emptiness of before. She belched and giggled, entirely inappropriately considering the day just past, but there had been too much and she wasn’t reacting right. Other silos. Other people. Others?

In her room, she emptied her pack and sorted the contents on her bed. She was careful with the fragile papers but the pack hadn’t been so kind. Crumbles of paper drifted out along with the contents. The chart, back in its envelope, she left alone. There was so much more. She selected a few others and found a diagram she immediately recognized as something a Fabber would use for reconstruction or repair. She examined it, read the notations and understood it was for a radio.

She thought back but couldn’t remember the details of the various handheld radios she had repaired or made parts for in the past to compare with, but this one struck her as different in any case. On the back, in careful letters, were the instructions for frequencies to contact forty. She had to assume that was for Silo 40 and not Level 40. The former seemed more likely than the latter, given the situation.

There was so much it was almost overwhelming. On her way in she had carefully looked at a few of the pages displayed beneath the tenets. Many of them were just as she remembered and a quick look inside the fabric books confirmed that these books were their origin. In times past, the non-visible side of the page had been copied onto another sheet and hung in protective frames alongside the originals. Those were different, obviously, but the originals had the same writing as these books. Eventually she, or the group, would need to figure out where in each book the pages came and put it all into context.

The big book was something else entirely. It was machine printed, just like the little volume that led her to the box. She knew what to look for now so she opened the cover and the first few pages until she came to the one that had the numbers. There she found what she was looking for, ‘Legacy, Inc. 2045, 2048, 2051’. She touched the letters. The first book, so old that it was almost indecipherable, had numbers in the 1800s and 1900s. This book had numbers in the 2000s. The records upstairs, the ones furthest back and least useful had numbers only slightly higher than these.

And those records had recorded things in terms of drafts, initial plantings, testing and dry runs. These were terms she understood. They signified a trial of something before it became the accepted way of doing things. Marina felt very sure, in a place deep inside her, that she knew the answer to their questions.

Outside, the world had not cycled their years in batches of fifty. They had been there at least 2051 years and then they had tried things inside the silo. They had dry runs and tests of the systems.

And then they had come inside and everything had changed.

She opened the book at a random page, ignoring the many little metal clips that marked specific pages, and discovered the existence of Shorelines, Shoreline Management and part of Shoreline Usage. She flipped again and revealed the hideous beauty of Skinks. Again and she was faced with the Solar System. A metal clip on the next page led her to Earth and the note there told her that this was what they lived on. It was a ball, much like the sun looked in those rare instances when the fiery orange gleam could be seen clearly when it set. They lived on a ball but this one was beautiful, and shone blue and green and brown and white.

A tiny dot marred the surface and a hand drawn arrow pointed to the words, ‘We are here’. She bent her head to try to see closer but all she saw was a swath of green partially covered with a swath of white. So tiny were they against all that space.

Marina couldn’t really take in any more. She wasn’t taking it in now, merely piling un-absorbable facts over already unbelievable facts. She felt dizzy with it, like she was walking around in a dream and no one but she could see that. She lay down on the bed and pulled all the wonderful things toward her. She spooned them like a child and fell asleep.

Chapter Nineteen

Waking up to someone who shouldn’t be there moving around in a room is a jarring thing. Marina woke to just that and saw Taylor gently trying to remove the book from underneath her arm. He saw her eyes open at almost the exact moment they did and he didn’t delay. He moved with a purpose Marina wasn’t ready for after a few hours of disturbed sleep and dreams of blue orbs. Just as she uttered a sound of confused query, he snatched the book from under her arm and made a grab for the envelopes that had scattered while she slept.

Marina bolted upright and grabbed his outstretched arm. “Taylor! What are you doing?”

“You can’t do this. This isn’t right! I’m making it right!” he exclaimed as he tried to yank his arm back. Marina jerked with each yank but held on. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the chart with the silos unfolded on the floor. He had been in here long enough to do that. What else might he have been up to?

Taylor dropped the book back to the bed and papers fluttered to the floor around him as he put more force into the yank. Marina had a grip on him and leverage on the bed while he was trapped by the little chair and table. When his body signaled he was about to make another big effort, she timed her response and threw herself into a solid push at the moment of his pull. Taylor flew backward and hit the table and then the chair. The table fell over with a bang and dishes clattered across the floor.

Marina stepped off the bed and picked up the metal pitcher that normally held water. She held it over his head as he tried to untangle his long limbs from the chair and growled, “What in silo’s depths are you doing, Taylor?”

He righted himself and tugged his coveralls into place. He went to take a step toward her but she held up the pitcher and braced herself. She was confused but she was also angry. This man had been in her room. He’d been taking things while she slept and he had fought her for them when she woke. That bespoke danger and that made her mad.

“You!” he growled right back and jabbed a finger at the level of her eyes. “You and your searching and your little secret finds! Do you know what this will do? I have to fix it!”

“Fix it? Fix what? I just went to get it. I wasn’t going to keep it!” She said this but knew that what she said was at least partially untrue. She would have shared it but the knowledge of what it said would be hers first. It was becoming an obsession with her and she knew it. If he had only been worried about her keeping it he would have brought Greta, not come in and tried to take it while she slept.

He scraped a hand across his unshaven face and said, his tone icy and calm, “I know you would have shared it. That is the problem, Marina.” He enunciated each word clearly and slowly.

Marina didn’t like the way he was looking at her. It was like she wasn’t a person or even alive. It was the look of someone trying to figure out a problem that needs solving and clearing away. Like she had turned from a friend into a mess that needed cleaning up. She tightened her grip on the heavy pitcher and jerked her head in the direction of the book and the scattering of papers. “You were going to get rid of those, weren’t you?”

He nodded, his look measuring and weighing, his shoulders bunching with anticipated movement.

“I can just scream, you know,” she said hurriedly and had the satisfaction of seeing him ease back a little.  She could see the exact moment he decided to try another tactic by the shifting of his eyes. A certain slyness crept in that frightened Marina more than the blank anger it replaced.

“You have to understand, Marina. That,” he pointed toward the unfolded chart, “is poison. It will spread and we will all die. You’re proof that it is poison!” His tone changed then. It was more conspiratorial, more intimate. He said, “We can get rid of it. Just you and I. No one ever has to know you found anything.”

She gave a curt nod, agreeing that was a possibility. And it was possible if only in the most abstract way that anything would be possible. She would no more get rid of this find than she would toss her husband out the airlock. She asked, “How exactly did you know that I found anything?”

“I was out on the landing. I was just,” he paused and the emotions that ran across his face were everything from loss to guilt, “sitting near where it happened.”

Marina had been so exhausted by the time she made it back that she hadn’t bothered to see if her movements were being noted. She wouldn’t have thought that it mattered. The Memoriam always had someone around, looking or thinking or trying to figure out a problem in life. The benches on the landing were in shadow when it was dim. She wouldn’t have seen him unless she had been looking.

“Okay. But how did you know I found something?” she asked. Her arm was beginning to ache from holding up the heavy pitcher but she refused to let it dip and show fatigue. That might make him think it was a good time to make another grab at her.

He shrugged, his shoulders slumping a little, looking resigned. His tone was almost normal when he said, “I don’t know. The way you were walking, maybe. I knew you went to IT when you left here.” He sighed, his look almost resigned, before he went on, “I got the report today, you know.”

Of course. He would have gotten the IT summary that Piotr got each evening. Since IT and the Memoriam both had working terminals, it had been being sent via wire and Piotr excused himself every evening to review it. She should have known visitors requesting rooms, especially ones working on this little hush-hush project, would have been noted. How stupid of her.

She gave another curt nod, indicating her understanding and waited.

He made to reach downward and Marina braced herself with the pitcher. He stopped and held up both hands and said, “I’m just going to get the chair. I’m tired.”

Marina could see that much was true, at least. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days and exhaustion came off him in waves. She took a step backward, making distance, and said, “Go ahead. But slowly.”

Taylor righted the chair and Marina thought he was going to sit down. The pitcher was formed of thick stainless steel and heavy. She had the passing thought that it was meant to last the ages and give a bitter internal laugh. Of course it was.

It happened so fast that Marina had no time to react. Taylor hit the chair and it slid violently toward her. She tried to skip aside, keep her eyes on Taylor and figure out how to hit him with the pitcher all at the same time. He had no such quandaries, because he took one step and leapt at her.

They collided, Taylor’s larger bulk carrying the momentum, and Marina fell back with frightening force. Her pitcher banged once on the floor and skittered away with loud ringing clangs on the tile floor. His hands were around her throat before she could even process the situation. She saw his grimace, lips skinned back from his teeth in a parody of a smile. His hands were so tight there was no possibility of a breath, just a squeaky trickle that didn’t do enough to replenish what she had lost when he fell on top of her. The knot in her kerchief was like a heel being pressed to the side of her throat.

Marina kicked and tried to reach his face but his arms were longer and he seemed to have an instinctual knowledge that he should raise up and out of her reach. How could anyone have an instinct for murder, Marina wondered even as she struggled. She grabbed his wrists and felt the iron in his grip and stance.

She could not stop him. She could only hope that he could stop himself. She raised her hands, fingers splayed as the black spots grew in her vision. She could see his eyes and see that he was looking at her. She had no breath, no matter how hard she pulled in nothing was coming, so she mouthed the words, “Hope. Future.”

Every fiber of her being was screaming for her to fight and she lost control of her hands. They pulled at his fingers almost of their own accord. Suddenly, the pressure was gone. The tightly clenched fingers lifted away and the breath she had been straining to take rushed into her, making her feel like she might float away. The dark blotches in her eyes grew and all she could hear was the liquid thud of her pulse in her ears and the squealing breaths sawing in and out of her.

Her hands and body didn’t feel totally connected but the desire to survive is strong and primal and doesn’t think. It just acts. She felt herself lever up and her arms and legs scrabbled to move her backward and away from her attacker. The blotches diminished into spots and she could see Taylor on his knees, hunched over and head bowed, but her body kept moving back and toward the door.

She turned to crawl and grabbed the pitcher where it lay against the door. She missed the lever twice but on her third paw at it, she caught it and jerked it downward. Everything was drifty and dizzy and out of focus. All she could do was keep sucking in air with huge, loud gasps.

Somehow she got the door open and crawled into the hallway. The air rushed in, cool and dry and painful. She tried to make a sound, cry for help or just get out anything at all but it was a ragged whisper that felt like fire in her throat.

She fell against the wall on the other side of the hallway. The dizziness was so profound she was having a hard time deciding which way was up. All she could do was lift the pitcher and bang it against the wall. The first couple of strikes were weak but the loud reverberation gave her heart. She hit harder, then harder again, and the clanging of metal on concrete sent increasing waves of sound down the deserted hallway. Piotr and Taylor and she had been the only guests on this hallway. She struck harder and felt a give as the thick metal began to dent.

It was two men in maintenance red that peeked around the corner, tentative and unsure. One held a tool bag and the other a large square filter. They said nothing and stopped at the corner. Marina could no more talk than she could stand up and offer them cookies but she managed one more bang and held out her arm. She got out a single croaking word, “Help.”

Chapter Twenty

The maintenance men half dragged and half carried her out of the hallway, not understanding what was happening but knowing that their best bet was medical help. Eventually, they picked her up and managed a stumbled run toward the Memoriam proper. She kept trying to get out words to tell them as the dizziness passed, but the sounds that came out were clicking and incoherent. Something in her throat was damaged, that much she knew.

One of the maintainers hollered out as he opened the Memoriam door and the shadow on duty met them in the main exhibit throughway. The girl stopped short and put her hands to her mouth. She pointed them to a padded bench big enough for a dozen to sit on where they laid her down carefully. The girl bent, looked once and saw the red on her throat. Her brows drew together and she turned to the men. She asked them what happened and they reported what they saw in a few brief and confused phrases.

The girl told one of the men to get to the medics on Level 70 and the other to stay with Marina. She patted Marina’s arm and said she was going to get Greta for her. Marina could only picture Taylor and his hands and this girl walking the hallways unaware. She gripped the girl’s arm before she could turn and tried to tell her but the clicking and wheezing were all that came out. She pulled the girl toward her with a clawed grasp, alarm growing on the girl’s face. When she was close enough, she breathed the words, “Taylor. Hurt me.”

The girl didn’t seem to be registering what Marina meant so she reached up and put her fingers around the girl’s throat in a gentle imitation of what Taylor did and croaked, “Taylor.”

Her brow cleared but horror replaced the confusion as she realized what Marina was trying to say. The maintainers, obviously not knowing Taylor, understood the parody well enough. Such violence was so rare that it immediately passed into a sort of perpetual silo-wide memory when it occurred.

The larger of the two men put a halting hand on the shadow’s back and said, “You stay here. I’ll go.” He pulled a big wrench and then a hammer from his bag. He turned to the other maintainer, handed him the wrench and said, “You stay here too. We’ll get medical once I’m back.”

Without a word he turned and marched with purpose the way they had just come. Before he went out of sight he turned back and asked which room. The shadow answered and he gave a brief and serious nod. The nod told them he was ready and he would take care of everything. The shadow let out a relieved breath.

The dizziness was almost completely gone. It amazed Marina that she was thinking and felt almost in control of her limbs in so short a time. It seemed impossible that one can go from near death from lack of air to this in a few short minutes. Her throat was another matter. She swallowed and felt a strange moving click and a pain so sharp it made her want to avoid swallowing again. She pushed herself up on her elbows. She could taste metal in her mouth so she turned and spit a stream of saliva and blood into her hand.

The girl froze with a look of disgust and fright fighting for dominance on her face but the maintainer didn’t bat an eyelash. He whipped a rag out of his pocket and put it on the palm of the hand she had just spit on. He braced her as she sat upright and didn’t let go until he saw her eyes and the clarity there. She wiped her hand and then made a motion like writing on air before motioning toward her throat.

The shadow understood and darted away, returning a moment later with a few slips of lumpy pulp paper and a writing stick. She thrust these at Marina like she was preparing to dodge another stream of blood. Marina wrote, ‘Broken in Throat. Need Medic. Taylor from IT choked me. Need deputy! Don’t touch things in room. Important!’

Both people read the words, eyes darting from the words and back to her a couple of times. The maintainer shuffled his feet, unsure about what he should do but obviously knowing that a medic and a deputy were probably both just a few levels away. Marina could see him weigh that against the orders he had just gotten.

She reached out and took the wrench from him and stood. She held the wrench in two hands, took a ready stance and motioned with her head for him to go. He did, running with the easy grace of a former porter on a delivery of utmost importance.

The shadow watched all this in silence, clearly afraid and without any idea what she should do. She looked at the wrench and at Marina a few times, apparently decided something and darted away once more. A few seconds later, she returned with a long metal rod, metal pins dangling from each end. At Marina’s inquisitive look, she said, “From the Podium.”

Marina gave her a grave and impressed nod that hurt more than she could have imagined. The girl turned to stand next to Marina, facing the door to the private quarters where Marina had been attacked. They heard the commotion and the muffled bangs of something coming before the door swung open.

They both braced themselves. Marina felt sweat slicking her palms and hoped the wrench wouldn’t fly if she tried to hit Taylor with it. Even though they were ready, both of the women still flinched when the door swung wide and slammed against the wall.

Through the door came the maintainer, dragging a blanket wrapped shape behind him. Greta followed close behind, eyeing the blanket for anything amiss. It must have been Taylor wrapped in the blanket and Marina could see the multiple colors of many blankets. They had wrapped him over and over and she wondered how in the silo they had gotten him still enough to do that. The maintainer had a split lip that was already swelling to impressive size and Greta had two rows of scratch marks on her bare arms.

Inside his blankets, Taylor was thrashing and she could hear the mumbled sounds that were probably screams from his point of view. For a brief second she wondered how he could breathe in there and then she thought of how it felt not to be able to breathe and pursed her lips. Greta must have been thinking the same thing because she told the maintainer, “Harvey. We’ve got to pull that back enough for him to breathe.”

Without delay, Greta threw a leg over the wriggling figure and dropped hard, sitting right on top of him. Both ends of the blanket lifted when she did and a small sound escaped. Harvey took that moment to yank the edges of the blankets down and Marina saw first Taylor’s hair and then his face appear from the mass of pink and green and yellow blankets. His breathing was a parody of her own mere moments before and Marina fought the urge to come down on that head with her wrench.

Harvey must have seen that in her eyes because he said, “He can’t hurt anyone now.” He looked around for the other maintainer, the one he had told to stay put.

Marina waved a hand in front of his face to regain his attention and then pointed to the metal bar in the shadow’s hand and held up the wrench. She handed him the note she had written for the others. He pursed his lips but gave her a curt nod of acceptance.

Greta watched it all from her seat on top of Taylor with utter calm. She looked so different from any other time Marina had seen her that she really wished she could say something instead of stand there and wheeze. Her hair had always been tightly braided and coiled at the back of her head but now it seemed to flow without end. Tight waves from the braids cascaded down her back and puddled on the blanket wrapped form below her. Her coveralls were pulled on halfway and the arms were tied around her waist. In her undershirt, Marina saw that she looked just like everyone else without the patchwork of color to hide behind. And she was pretty.

Taylor began to get agitated again now that he had sufficient air. He was combining yelling, whining, pleads and demands in a most unpleasant way. At the moment, he was claiming that it was all a misunderstanding. He jerked his head in Marina’s direction, the rest of him tightly bound in blankets. He said, “Look. See, she’s fine! It was an accident.”

Greta looked away from him to the angry red marks on Marina’s neck, the finger marks clear against the white skin. Marina couldn’t see it, but she could feel it. The historian could see what Marina couldn’t apparently because when she looked away from Marina, she landed a sharp and loud slap across Taylor’s exposed cheek. He froze and went silent.

The other historians and shadows began to file out, wakened by the commotion or through some other means. As they came out they all looked at the blanket wrapped man and then at the tableau of people and edged around, giving them all a wide berth.

The shadow girl finally handed her metal rod to the big maintainer, him having returned without his hammer, and joined the little cluster of her fellows. Marina saw her gesticulating and speaking and saw the eyes of the listeners widen and narrow and look from person to person as the story unfolded. Marina hated that this would now travel all over.

Greta must have thought the same because she called to the group, “This is not for discussion. To anyone. For any reason. We don’t talk about people when they get sick like this.”

With those few words she had changed the situation from a sudden attempt at murder that would inspire gossip to a man who had suffered a break that needed remediation or some other treatment. In the silo, there were few topics off limits but this was one of them. Her authoritative glare drove the point home and Marina would have sighed in relief if it didn’t hurt so bad just to breathe at all.

Greta turned to Marina and leveled that same glare in her direction. Marina stiffened but didn’t flinch from it. Greta said, “I’ve secured the space. That’s no problem.”

Marina closed her eyes tightly and felt a combination of shame and relief wash over her. When she opened her eyes, Greta was still looking at her. She nodded her acceptance of the information and all that would come after and Greta finally released her from her gaze.

Taylor started in again, clearly not at all happy at this turn of events and Greta raised her hand again. She lifted her eyebrows and the message was clear. Do you want this again? Taylor apparently didn’t and shut his mouth.

The deputy showed up first, panting and sweating from running down from the station. He saw Marina and stopped short, looked at her neck and then turned a mottled red himself. It was someone she knew, of course. He charged over toward Greta, Taylor and Harvey and took in the scene. “Anyone want to tell me what the silo is going on here?” he demanded.

Greta’s eyes flicked once toward Marina and then back to the deputy. She licked her lips and said, “Deputy, we have the situation under a measure of control right now but we need your assistance.”

The deputy snorted and said, “I can see that.”

Greta cleared her throat and said with a dignity Marina didn’t think could be accomplished while sitting on a man wrapped in blankets, “This is a special situation.” She emphasized the special and the deputy straightened. She went on, “We’re going to need the medic representative to the council for this. We need you to make sure everything stays controlled until we get him here. Okay?”

The way she said it, the emphasis on certain words, let everyone know that this was going to be one of those things. Those stories dealt with a person badly in need of remediation whose words and actions weren’t to be thought of, let alone repeated. The deputy cleared his throat and nodded. He stepped away and tuned his radio, speaking quietly and rapidly to whoever was on the other side of the line. He kept his eyes on Taylor and his free hand near his stick.

The medic from Level 70 came while he spoke and both Greta and the deputy pointed directly at her when he arrived. Finally, Marina could put down the wrench.

Chapter Twenty-One

Marina woke in a different room in the guest wing at the Memoriam. When her eyes opened the first thing she saw was Joseph, awkwardly asleep in the chair next to her bed. She forgot her throat and said, “Joe.” It came out a hoarse and frightening creak. It also renewed the sharp pain that had faded while she slept under the gentle influence of a little poppy extract. It did the trick though and Joseph started awake.

He leaned in close and wrapped the hand she held up in both of his. He smiled and tried not to keep looking at her neck when he said, “Honey. Honey. How are you feeling?”

When she opened her mouth to try to whisper that she was fine, he stopped her with, “No. You’re not supposed to even try to talk. You think you can write?”

She tried to lift her head and sit up but the pain that shot up the sides of her neck was excruciating and she dropped back to the pillow. She motioned for him to help and he lifted her gently and braced her while he piled the pillows behind her. Once she was sitting she felt much better, the pain retreating back once more. She smiled wanly and made the writing motion with her hands.

He plucked a small chalkboard off the table and gave it to her with a piece of chalk. She wrote, ‘I feel better. Neck hurts. Why can’t talk?’

He read the words even as she wrote and said, “Medic says that there is a little bone in the neck that he thinks is damaged.” At her alarmed look he put his fingers to a spot right above his Adam’s apple and said, “Not that kind of bone. It’s a little one that just sort of floats around in there. But it will hurt and make it hard to talk.”

She wrote quickly, ‘How long? Forever?’

He shook his head and soothed her, “No, honey. I’m making a mess of this. It will heal and he thinks you’ll be able to talk pretty soon. It’s very hard to break. He said it is connected to everything else by a lot of connections so if it gets swollen or jarred or anything, it can be very painful.”

Marina tried to nod understanding but even that hurt. She wrote, ‘Taylor?’

Joseph wrinkled his brow in a way that let Marina know from long experience that he was unsatisfied with the answer to a puzzle. She wished she wouldn’t have asked. At least she couldn’t talk and he wouldn’t expect a long explanation. He did answer though. “You were there. He had a break. He’s at remediation but no one is talking to him. Only the council medic.”

The last was said with a distinct air of suppressed suspicion. He said it like he really wanted to talk to Taylor and not just because Taylor had throttled his wife. Marina motioned for a wiper and cleared her board, creating a little shower of white dust on her blanket. She scribbled, ‘Not his fault. Piotr died. Very upset. Thinks too much.’

She would have held her breath or chewed her lip if moving her jaw didn’t hurt so much. She hoped he would accept that and let it go. He sighed and squeezed the hand still holding the chalk. “You’re so kind. Yes, I hadn’t thought about his caster being the one that died like that. Very hard. Very hard for anyone.” He patted her hand and Marina silently thanked Greta for her fast thinking.

She extracted her hand to free the chalk and write. She wanted to ask for Greta, to get moving, to get back to the find she had made and not been able to fully explore. She wanted to get out of bed. When she made to put the chalk to the board, Joseph kindly, but firmly, plucked it away and said, “No more. If you woke up I was supposed to let you know what happened and give you five minutes. After that, I’m supposed to give you another dose. You have to sleep so you don’t move your throat and neck too much.”

She made a moue and earned a laugh from Joseph. He said, “Pouting does not work on me.” He poured a small spoonful of medicine from a bottle and spooned it into her mouth a few drops at a time. It was harder to swallow than she thought. The instinct to swallow was so basic that she hadn’t realized the mechanics of it before. By the time the drops were gone she was already sleepy again. He helped to lower her back down and tucked her in like she hadn’t been since early childhood. She felt him press a kiss to her forehead and felt so very safe and loved. It was easy to fall asleep.

* * *

Days passed slowly and Marina grew increasingly impatient. Greta had only popped her head in for visits when Joseph was there and she was unable to speak in detail. Her indirect references toward their project had earned only cold glances. She was healing but using her voice was still taboo. That made it even harder to be subtle since everything was chalked onto a board.

When she finally got a look at her neck she had been appalled at what she looked like. An angry set of handprints encircled her swollen neck in shades of purple and blue and bright red. There were even bruises on the point of her chin and the back edges of her jaw. It was horrible looking.

While Joseph was out of the room she gave her voice a tentative try and found that almost nothing came out like it should. It was a weak and reedy thing that was also strangely deep. It sounded a bit like a boy’s does when in the process of changing. And it hurt.

Everything having to do with eating, talking, swallowing or moving her neck hurt. While she was drugged and asleep the medic had inserted a tube that ran from her nose to her stomach. She had to suffer the unique experience of feeling the change in temperature as liquid food was forced through the tube and down into her stomach. Without having to go through her mouth, she found herself nauseous after she was fed. The mind worked in mysterious ways.

Sela visited every single day, though Marina was careful to hide her neck from her daughter with a handy piece of sheet or by draping a towel across it. She looked at it often and Marina knew she wanted to see what had happened, but Marina nudged the topic away and Sela complied. As a deputy’s shadow, there was no lying to her about what had happened, at least not lying any further than the official story, so Sela knew that a person had hurt her mother. She handled it relatively well, Marina thought, and was proud of her.

During one of the other lulls where Joseph was gone for a break, she had searched the room and the things that had followed her from her former room. There was nothing from her finds in any of the drawers. Even the small book she had found first and her pack were gone. She had crept down the hall to her old room but it was as bare as if she had never been there at all.

After six days had passed in bed, the medic pronounced her fit to resume light duties but only on the condition she kept the tube in and refrained from trying to speak. She had readily agreed, bobbing her head in agreement to all his terms despite the dull pain that resulted. Joseph and she had gotten into what might be termed an argument if any exchange in which one party was limited to abbreviated words on a chalkboard could be called such.

He was adamant that she come home. He argued that she couldn’t possibly deny that whatever she was doing — emphasis on whatever — had already caused her pain and brought her near to losing her life. He loved her and she could see that. She knew he would rather stay right where he was and watch over her if she didn’t come home.

She used his own excuses after coming home with a black eye or split lip after subduing an angry drunk or breaking up a fight. He looked at her with such disappointment that she nearly crumbled. Then she thought of the blue orb against the black of a space so big she couldn’t truly imagine it and regained her resolve.

Marina was up and around and ready to confront Greta if that was what was needed. Her antsy behavior let Joseph know the time for bedside care was over. He took his leave and returned to duty after following her around for a day and fussing every time she did something he thought too ambitious. He barely got a foot onto the stairs when Marina stopped waving and marched toward the archives where she hoped to find Greta.

Greta was there and at her accustomed place at the table. Instead of the maintenance records of before, she was surrounded by all the treasures that Marina had uncovered. She looked up from her reading, the giant Legacy book open in front of her. They said nothing for a moment and just stood those feet apart, looking at each other. The last two standing, the look seemed to say.

The historian broke eye contact first, her eyes returning to the page. She asked, “How much of this did you look at before the Taylor thing happened?”

The question was a loaded one and the tone let Marina know it was meant that way. She wasn’t just asking what she had been able to read, but how long she had hid it all so she could read it alone. She was asking how long she had been scurrying around while the rest of them followed the rules.

Marina couldn’t answer her with her voice so she approached the table and knocked on the surface sharply with her knuckles. While Greta looked on, Marina scribbled her answer on the chalkboard she now carried around with her. Finished, she thrust the board at Greta like she was daring her to do something. She had written, ‘Returned late. Had to see if there. Then T came to kill me.’

Greta flinched a little at the final words. She faced Marina with a searching gaze, her eyes flicking once to the lurid blue, green and yellow of her bruises. She inclined her head, a bare suggestion of an accepting nod that also let her know she had reservations about giving it. She asked, “How did you even know where to search? Where did you search?”

Marina scrubbed the board while Greta spoke and quickly sketched her response. Before she turned the board around she pointed to the small book, the In Memoriam book that lay at the edge of the table. Then she turned the board. ‘That book. Found in archives. Curious to read. Found the code. Went right away.’

Greta reached for the book and handed it to Marina. She said, “Show me.”

She skipped the revelations about the numbers being years so as to not confuse the issue and went straight to the letter from Wallis. Greta only looked on, brows drawn together as she tried to follow along without words of explanation to help. Marina pointed to the numbers and then held up a finger for her to wait and went to retrieve one of the logs. She showed her the codes for the electrical boxes and willed her to understand.

Greta took the book from Marina’s hands and then spent a long moment comparing the two notations. She looked back up at Marina with something like surprise in her face, “You figured this out by yourself?”

Marina screwed up her mouth to the side in an expression that conveyed very clearly, ‘Is that so surprising?’

Greta shook her head, a wondering look on her face and said, “I wouldn’t have figured this out in a year. I wouldn’t have even thought to look at it like that.”

Marina pointed to her badge, the sign of Fabbers with its bolt of electricity and crossed tools, and shrugged.

Greta nodded again and said, “Of course.” She set the little book down with care and crossed her arms. Marina knew that this was not a completed subject. At some point, she would need to explain it all and she would have to tell Greta how possessive she had felt about the find and how the curiosity seemed to burn in her and grow with each new discovery. She would have to confess how much she wanted to know.

But that was for another day. Greta merely pointed with one finger extending from her crossed arms towards the big book in front of her. “Did you get to read any of that?” she asked.

She gave a half nod and held her fingers very close together, indicating the smallest possible amount.

“I’ve been reading it almost non-stop,” Greta said and then stopped short. She started to blink her eyes very quickly and Marina saw a wet gleam there. She waited.

Greta finally uncrossed her arms and said, “I had no idea. How could anyone have guessed?”

Marina nodded at that too. It was such an insufficient response and she wanted so badly to simply tell Greta that she had been just as overwhelmed. She opened her mouth and croaked, “Can’t believe.”

“Don’t talk. I mean it.”

Marina made to zip up her lips and toss away a key. Greta narrowed her eyes and repeated, “I mean it. Now sit. And take this board back!”

There was a final thing she wanted to get out before they fell into this bounty of information again. She wrote, ‘Taylor? Where? Need to talk!’

The other woman pursed her lips and answered without looking at Marina, “He’s in seclusion. Sedated, but not yet in remediation. The council has to handle this one, for obvious reasons, and they wanted to wait for you to be well enough to be present.”

Marina tapped the last thing she had written with her chalk. Greta glanced at the board and said, “I don’t know about that. I’m not even supposed to ask you about it right now.”

Once again Marina tapped the board and underlined the word ‘need’ twice. Greta snatched the chalk from her and said, “No. Not until the council meets with both of you. He did something unforgivable and they are going to want to know why. And not after you’ve had a chance to mesh up your stories either.”

Marina realized that Greta not only didn’t understand what happened, but was at least entertaining the possibility that there was some wrongdoing between the two of them. She snatched back the chalk and wiped her board with her sleeve. She wrote, ‘I didn’t tell anyone. He didn’t know. He was talking crazy. I think he did something else very bad. Not sure. Need to talk.’

Greta followed along as she wrote and asked, “What bad thing did he do?”

Marina could tell by the look in her eyes that Greta knew very well what she was talking about. She pointed to the chair on the other side of Greta, the one that Piotr always sat in.

“No!” she exclaimed. “That I can’t believe. Why? He had no reason for that!”

Marina made to wipe the board again but Greta grabbed her arm and stopped her. She said, “Please. Don’t talk about it anymore. Not until we get to the council. Once you’re well.”

She pointed to herself and pantomimed a hale and hearty look. All she got in response was Greta eyeballing the piece of tubing hanging out of her nose and taped to her face. Marina made a face. Greta remained firm.

She decided to leave the subject alone for the moment and switched her attention to the neatly arrayed papers from her find on the table. She found the large sheet, now minus the envelope. She unfolded it and found a long tear in it from the struggle in her room. She made a sound of distress and pointed but Greta soothed her and told her it would be properly cared for. She carefully laid it flat and pointed to the circle that represented their silo.

Greta turned away for a moment and then looked back. This was hard for her, Marina could see that. Her whole life had revolved around the preservation of objective truth or the best version of it that could be ferreted out with certainty. This one paper had put the lie to all of it.

At Marina’s inquiring look, Greta said, “Yes. I figured out that represents our silo.”

Marina made a big circle with her finger around all the other circles and gave a questioning shrug.

Greta understood her and answered, “I don’t know. They could be just like us or they might be…not like us…Others. How can we know?”

There was just so much to say, to relay, to ask and discuss that Marina’s frustration crested suddenly and she had to remove her hands from the sheet of paper lest she damage it. She wrote, “Radio jacks in burned room. Fifty of them. One blank. Ours blank.”

That surprised Greta and Marina watched her face as she tried to picture the burned room beneath IT, the jacks and to match it all together in her mind. She said, “You think that they are like us and we all used to be able to communicate.”

Marina nodded and Greta considered that possibility. “That would change things, wouldn’t it?”

Marina nodded again and smiled.

Chapter Twenty-Two

While Marina healed, she and Greta worked on the finds. Detailed reports were sent to the council and the replies were equal parts excitement, concern and admonitions for secrecy. Even after two weeks, ghosts of the bruises could still be seen on her neck and she wore her kerchief unrolled to hide as much as she could. She had not left the Memoriam during the healing, as much to preserve the secrecy of what had happened as her dignity.

Word had spread, of course, but it was limited to Taylor losing control out of grief and guilt that his caster had died without him being able to prevent it. It was a sympathetic tale and people moved on after a few re-tellings. Joseph visited twice a day, concerned but understanding the ways of the silo.

He had too much experience with people losing their perspective and needing remediation to not understand that something he would rather not know was going on behind the scenes. If he had suspected before that she was dealing with something from ‘before’, now he felt sure of it and his only concern was getting his wife back as soon as possible.

Her voice returned slowly but it did begin to return. It was not the same voice she had before but it was an interesting change to have a new one. It surprised her every time she heard it. The tube was finally removed but she was still on a soft food diet. Thin porridge, strained vegetables and nothing chewy at all were the fare she was allowed. The better she felt the more she worried over what Taylor had said to her, the look on Taylor’s face when she had mentioned his loss and the way he had said that all they found was poison.

One morning when they met for breakfast Greta told her the council would be meeting with them the next day. She kept her face so scrupulously neutral that Marina knew she was all nerves. It was how Greta dealt with things, she was coming to learn. Calm in the face of chaos.

“We need to get to the upper main medical facility first thing,” Greta added and left it open.

Marina felt her belly clench with nerves. It must have showed on her face because Greta squeezed her hand on the table and said, “It’ll be okay. He can’t hurt you again.”

In her new and croaking voice Marina said, “It’s not that. It’s just…everything.”

“I know. I feel the same. I really don’t know what will happen. We’ll just have to see,” Greta replied with a sigh. She gave one final squeeze of her hand and went off for her tray of food.

They took the stairs slowly during the dim-time. It was a little unnerving to be taking the stairs in the dark once more, and not just because of what happened to Piotr. It was in the dark that Taylor had watched her return. Greta had been mindful of it and provided them both with lights. Their packs were stuffed and heavy with all that she had brought back, a summary of their discoveries to date and their own personal goods for their stay.

The quiet of the silo during these late hours didn’t encourage conversation and kept their footfalls light. It was a long trip that way. They took breaks but even then they were subdued on the quiet landings where they stopped.

When they arrived, it was still deep into the dimming and they were tired and footsore. They would be staying in the medical facility since it usually had empty rooms, now being no exception. It was unnerving to be there. This was where remediation was done, along with other serious care that required a patient to remain for treatment. The mere idea of remediation often kept people from visiting and encouraged people to be well enough to go home somewhat faster than in medical facilities serving the mids or the down deep.

They napped and then prepared, Greta mumbling to herself as she practiced her opening remarks. Marina remained quiet, thinking of what she wanted to happen and also what was probably better did happen.

They were shown into a hastily prepared room. A hospital room just like the others, the two narrow wheeled beds had been removed and lined the hallway outside the door. Deep grooves had been worn into the tile after countless moves of the beds. Even the plastic baseboards had been worn thin in places where repeated scrubbings and rubs had occurred over the countless years.

Despite the signs of wear, the room was clean and smelled it. The lights were bright and shone down on a cluster of mismatched chairs around a battered but serviceable table. They had even provided pitchers of water and tea, along with several cups. It would do.

The council was not yet in place, but Marina and Greta were let in early to set up their exhibits and order their case. Once they opened their packs, no one but the council, and eventually Taylor, would be allowed to enter. Outside the door, a burly medic stood guard. He tuned a radio receiver to a channel not in use and filled the hallway with static so that no one might overhear. They were thorough; Marina had to give them that.

The presentation went surprisingly well considering what the two women were revealing. The council had read their confidential reports so it wasn’t a complete surprise but Marina would have expected more reaction when faced with the physical evidence of such momentous news. The most expressive reaction Marina saw came when she showed them the entry for the solar system and explained what it said and then showed them the one labeled Earth.

She passed the book in front of their faces so they could see the tiny dot that represented all those silos. The mayor’s eyes grew wide and Marina’s former supporter, Darren, opened his mouth in an amazed O and kept repeating that it must be huge. With every repetition the word huge altered as if he couldn’t find the right way to express it.

The meeting lasted for hours and fatigue had settled over her like a thick blanket by the time they broke for lunch. Knowing the strain they would be under, lunch rations had been laid out in the visitor’s room where they could eat without curious eyes upon them. It was almost completely silent during the entire meal. Everyone sat or stood, abortive attempts at small talk overcome by glazed expressions. The subtext of every word was clear. “Can you believe it?”

They didn’t even last the time allotted for lunch. Everyone had returned and was in their place before time so they pressed on. Now would come the part that Marina dreaded. The council wanted to know what had caused Taylor to react as he had when he encountered Marina that night. They felt it important to understand it in context.

He had been demanding that he be heard, that they were going to make a mistake and that they needed to hear him. The council had solicitously asked if she wanted to withdraw for his hearing and she considered it. Only for a moment, though. There were a few things she wanted to ask him, too.

Taylor had been held in seclusion with no contact other than the council medic. Even the guards that brought him meals wore earmuffs the same as the ones worn in mechanical. The belief in the silo that madness could be spread was a real one and based on real evidence. When one person tried to convince another to go with them outside or chisel through the silo walls to some imaginary place where things were better, sometimes that person listened. Remediation was a private thing. The madness and dangerous behavior that brought them there was also private. For Taylor, that privacy had been heightened because of what he might say.

Taylor was brought in wearing un-dyed pants and a matching shirt. It was what a medic might wear in surgery but it was also the uniform of the mentally unfit. The ends of restraints dangled from his wrists while padded bands encircled them. Without pockets to hide things in he was safer to be around. Without boots, he was less likely to try to run. It was simple logic but it made him look stripped and powerless. His face was pale and puffy, the lack of normal activity allowing weight to pad his fit frame. Even after what he had done, Marina hated to see him like that.

He met her eyes almost immediately but looked away just as fast. Marina could see the shame in his expression. Now that whatever had seized him had passed and the frenzy was gone, he clearly regretted his actions. The council’s questions were supposed to come first. Taylor gave them no opportunity. His eyes scanned the table and his lips tightened. He said, “You have to get rid of all of that. Destroy it.” It was said in a calm and very even tone, but it was not a suggestion. It was a command.

The mayor’s eyebrows lifted at the tone and he pressed his hands to the Legacy book. He leaned forward just the tiniest bit and replied, “I’m inclined to deny that request.”

Taylor’s fingers twitched in agitation and the council medic tightened his grip on Taylor’s arm. He pressed Taylor into a chair and then deftly tightened the free ends of the restraints to the chair arms. They fit perfectly and Marina noticed that the chair he was in was different from all the others. Since they were all different, she hadn’t noticed at first. His had a thicker, sturdier frame and wide flat armrests. She suppressed a little shiver because that was the chair she had almost chosen as her own.

Once secure, the medic stood and asked Taylor if he was comfortable, a silly question if ever Marina heard one. Taylor gave the man a nod and he retreated back to the council side of the table. He inclined his head at the Mayor and said, “You can go ahead now.”

The mayor cleared his throat and asked the big question first. “Why did you attack Marina?”

Taylor hadn’t expected that because he flinched and shot her a sidelong glance. He licked his lips nervously and answered, “I saw her come back and I just had the feeling she had something. Maybe it was her pack or something, but I just knew it.”

“So you attacked her?” Darren asked.

“No. I didn’t intend to do anything to her,” Taylor answered and paused.

He had been alone for enough time to create a smooth story that would come out perfectly, but he seemed to be searching for the right words. Marina thought that probably meant he was telling the truth. For some reason, it made her feel better.

“I really just went to see if I was right. Even when I opened her door, I kept thinking that I was being silly. I thought I would take a peek, see nothing and I could just put this all behind me.”

“But that isn’t what happened. What did happen?” the mayor asked.

He sighed deeply and looked down but he answered, “I opened the door and saw what she had.”

The council medic was paying attention to Taylor, his gaze an evaluating one, but Marina noticed that he was also looking at her similarly. It made her nervous but she understood. She was sitting near a person who had almost killed her. That was cause for some clinical interest, she supposed.

“And then?” the mayor prodded.

“I guess I just wanted it gone. Not her,” he said abruptly, looking up as he made his point. “I didn’t even know what all she had. I just saw the big book, some small books and all those papers. I tried to tell myself it was probably things from the archives. Things that we had already seen and dismissed. I had to look, though. I had to be sure.”

Marina remembered the open chart, the papers collected from where she had put them and how it felt to wake up and realize someone had been moving around in her room as she slept. She hadn’t considered how strange it must have been for him to be doing it.

The mayor was about to prod him further but Taylor cut him off, raising his fingers off the chair as much as the restraints allowed. “I looked at just a few things but it wasn’t hard to figure out that she had something entirely different. I saw the journals,” he pointed with his head toward the black books on the table, “and I knew what they were. We had been walking past the pages for long enough to recognize them right away. Then I saw the chart and I sat there a while, just looking at it. Something just…broke.”

She watched him talk, her hands pressed tightly to her legs to keep them from fluttering about. It helped her keep her peace. He had sat there a while? He had sat in her room and what? Decided to kill her? To take the objects no matter the cost?

Something must have shown on her face because the council medic interjected, “Based on what I’ve been able to draw from Taylor, at that point we believe he suffered a complete break with reality. When that happens, the idea of cause and effect, of action and consequence, starts to become meaningless. It’s rare, but it does happen. Usually when there is something occurring that simply can’t be accepted.” He motioned to the array of papers and books and said, “Something like this would qualify.”

The mayor listened, nodding his understanding and then looked back to Taylor. He asked, “Does that mean you don’t remember it?”

Taylor shook his head. “No. I wish I could say that, but I do. It just seems more like something from long ago or a little unreal or something.” He stopped and looked at Marina for the first time full in the face. He said, “I’m so very sorry.”

Marina felt tears prick her eyes. If he was asking for forgiveness, then he was going to be unsatisfied. She wasn’t ready for that. Not at all. She just looked away from him and didn’t acknowledge his words.

“Marina’s account was clear. She indicated that she awoke, you struggled over the book and that you pretended to stop only to attack her again as soon as the opportunity arose. Is this accurate?” the sheriff asked.

“Basically, yes,” Taylor answered, making no excuse.

“She also reports that you stopped on your own and made no further move to prevent her escape. Is that true?” he asked, making a few notes.

Taylor nodded and said, “Yes.” It was so quietly said that it would have been missed had the room not been so silent.

The council members looked at each other, giving each other meaningful little nods that held something she wasn’t privy to and didn’t want to be privy to. The mayor’s attention returned to those gathered in front of the table and to Taylor. “You understand what happens next. We have found nothing in your testimony today that would change our original decision or override the recommendations of the medic. We’d like to offer you the opportunity to address us if you think there is more that might influence our decision.”

Taylor blanched but remained very still. No one had said the word, but they were all very aware that he would leave here and undergo remediation, possibly the most drastic kind depending on how he responded to lesser forms. Either way, he wouldn’t leave this level the man he was now. When he left, whole parts of who he was would be gone. He seemed to gather himself, straightening in his chair and clearing his throat before speaking.

“I don’t have anything that I would expect to change your mind, but I do have something to say that I hope you’ll consider.” At the mayor’s nod, he went on. “You may have already made up your minds about what you have in front of you and what we found in the archives, but I’d like you to think again. This seems like good news. It’s exciting and different and it means we’re not alone. But it’s poison.”

Marina flinched a little at the word. It was the same way he had described it in her room right before he became dangerous. She could feel her palms beginning to sweat and had to work to resist the urge to stand up and back away from him. She looked at the council medic and he met her gaze. He didn’t make an overt movement, but his look told her that everything was okay. She wondered how he did that and if that was something medics practiced.

“Just look at Marina, at me and at Piotr,” Taylor went on and Marina looked up at the mention of her name. “She couldn’t stop looking and searching. She was compelled. And she is a fairly disciplined person as far as I can tell. And Piotr. He wouldn’t stop going on about how knowing how long we had been down here would change the way people viewed things. About how they could better hope and work for a future. About what more we might find.”

He stopped himself abruptly and his expression grew first hard and then regretful.

“You killed him,” Marina said. She said it quietly but without doubt. She hadn’t meant to say it but it had come out and she knew deep inside that it must be true.

All eyes shifted to Taylor then, some alarmed and others unsure. He just looked back at Marina. He nodded and said, “I did.”

“Why?” Greta demanded. She had remained silent during Taylor’s testimony. He had, after all, been one of the four allowed in on this secret and that brought people close very quickly. “Why would you do that?”

He shrugged again. With his hands tied to the chair, it seemed his shoulders had to do his expressing. “It just happened.”

“No, that’s not an answer. Killing people doesn’t just happen,” Greta said, rising a little in her seat and pointing an accusing finger at him. “You tell me right now.”

“We were on the stairs and he just kept talking about how people would be if we could tell them why we came to the silo. About how that might mean it would all end with us back outside. He wasn’t thinking! When I tried to explain what would really happen he just brushed me off. It was like he was just too excited to listen to sense!” He paused and swallowed, squeezing his eyes shut as he remembered. “Then the lights switched but didn’t come back. We were standing there on the stairs, being still just like you’re supposed to, and he told me that I didn’t have enough faith in humanity. Enough faith?”

Taylor shook his head, his expression bitter. He looked at Marina and then Greta when he said, “Faith? Look at what happened with us. Imagine it on a larger scale. Imagine if everyone acted the way we did.”

Marina knew what he was saying. She could see from the way Greta’s eyes flicked away from hers that she understood it too. Marina had kept secrets and searched without caring about consequences from the moment she encountered the pocket watch. She hadn’t just lied to her family, she had kept her clues even from those few who were supposed to share the secret. And Greta, she had forgotten that objective truth is to be found rather than leaping to conclusions. She became more a searcher than a historian. And Piotr, well, if Taylor was to be believed, then he had been filled with dreams of sharing their new possibilities with the silo. Taylor had become a killer. It was a very grim sort of math.

“I didn’t really decide to do it or anything. I just did it. I pushed him. Hard. He went over,” he finished, his voice fading away.

No one spoke for a moment, but each of the council members looked at the table and over what lay on it. Marina didn’t know precisely what they were thinking but the fact that they were all thinking hard was clear. She wondered which way their opinion would go. She looked at the fading red lines of scratches on his hands and face and remembered the vandalism of the switch and knew that it was no sudden impulse. It would do nothing more except bring Greta pain to delve further.

Taylor was watching them too. He broke the silence and said, “I’m not a medic or a historian or anything like that. But I do know what people are like. If they find out that there are more silos and that those silos aren’t necessarily Others and that we once talked to them, something will happen. The urge to know will eventually be too much. They will have to find out.” He motioned once more to the little black books and continued, “I didn’t get to read those so I don’t know what they say. But I will bet you that if those are really from before, you’ll find out that I’m right. I would stake my life that this was kept a secret before. I’ve had a lot of time to think about this. It will destroy us to know any of that.”

Greta’s face flushed and her eyes darted toward the Legacy and the chart and the pile of letters from Grace to Wallis with their faded ribbon holding them together. The mayor watched her and waited. So did Taylor, his agitation and hope and fear written on his face. Marina watched too and she saw all the emotions warring within Greta like they were written on her face. Finally she looked at the Mayor and said, “He’s right.”

The mayor gripped the Legacy book unconsciously but Greta held up a hand and continued, “He’s right about some of it but not all of it. Historians have always vowed to bring truth to the silo, but it is very clear that we were never given the truth to begin with. And we have kept some things secret for the well-being of all on more than one occasion. I think there is a reason for that and it is likely those reasons mirror Taylor’s own.”

The mayor couldn’t hold back any longer and he interrupted her with, “If you think we’re going to destroy this…”

Again, she held up the hand. “No. That is where he is wrong. Some of this is already a part of our deeply held beliefs. Like the Tenets. Some of the other things,” she pointed toward the chart, “may inspire just what Taylor fears. But we shouldn’t even consider destroying them.”

Marina held up her hand just as she did in her classes as a child when she hoped to be the one chosen to give an answer. When she was finally acknowledged, she said, “Unlike Taylor, Greta and I have read the Graham books. Though they are really Graham and Wallis books if we’re precise. Aside from Taylor’s assertion that everyone will go stark raving mad, Greta and I gave you the report on the place of the Others, Silo One.”

The mayor nodded, shuffling in his seat uncomfortably. It had been a frightening report and they had completely overtaken the wire terminal in the Memoriam as they sent messages back and forth. Taylor’s attention was riveted on her in a way that made her uncomfortable.

She had seen his eyes wide with rage and murder. It was hard to look at him now. But he hadn’t had any access to the find other than what he had while she slept. That couldn’t have been much. He must have been itching to know ever since.

“Well,” she continued, “from the way the books are written, it seems as if the other silos are divided into sides. Some are with the Others and the rest are a part of some sort of resistance to them. We were on that side, obviously.” There were nods all around. This much had been clear in their report. “But what we don’t know is how that might have changed. If we decide that this silo 40 is safe because they helped Graham and Wallis and they have since switched sides or been taken over or whatever it is the Others do, then we might simply expose ourselves.”

More nods came. This was territory they understood. Politics was a game that these people all played it to one extent or another.

“As it stands right now, the Others must think we’re dead and gone, correct?” Marina asked the room but didn’t wait for an answer. “If people do get the idea to go out and meet the silos, then the Others will know we’re very much alive. What Graham and his people went through might all start again.”

Taylor’s mouth hardened as she spoke and he shot a look at the council table. In his eyes was something like a dare, or a demand. “They don’t necessarily think we’re dead,” he said. He said it with conviction and surety and he glared at Greta when he spoke.

Marina looked at Greta and saw the other woman flush. She wouldn’t meet Marina’s eyes.

Taylor went on. “Why don’t you tell her what Piotr told me? Why don’t you tell her how we know the Others are still out there? I know you all know it.”

The mayor spoke up when Greta didn’t. “That isn’t for here, or right now. Greta, you and Marina know each other. It might be better coming from you.”

Greta still wouldn’t meet Marina’s eyes, but she gave a stiff nod of acquiescence.

Marina asked no one in particular, “What? Something to do with me?”

“Not now. Really,” the mayor said, his voice not entirely unsympathetic. “I agree that you should know. Honestly, I think we should have told you when you were adult enough to understand. But after enough years pass, well, it seems like it is best to just let things go.”

She was confused by his statement. Marina wondered what it could be. Her life had been utterly ordinary aside from losing her parents. Her train of thought stopped right there. Was that it? Was it something to do with how she and the other children lost their parents?

She looked at Greta, hoping to read an answer there but the other woman was looking anywhere but at Marina. She clenched her hands on her coveralls and tried to push it aside for the moment, reminding herself that she had gone her whole life without knowing whatever it was. She could get past this meeting without it.

“So what are you going to do with all that we found?” asked Marina.

The mayor sighed and smoothed his hands across the cover of the Legacy again. “We’re going to have to figure that out. Let’s adjourn.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

Marina paced their room again. She’d been shifting from pacing to sitting to lying down for hours. Greta was ensconced with the rest of the council making decisions that would impact them all, even if only in that they made no impact because no one would know.

For herself, she couldn’t decide what was best. If what Taylor and Greta thought was true — and Marina had read the journal of Graham and his words of uprisings and death in other silos — then they might inflict such a cycle on their own people. On the other hand, knowing where they came from and how they came to be would free them from uncertainty of another sort. It might give them all a goal for the future.

If she couldn’t make up her mind on the subject, she couldn’t imagine a room full of people deciding on the same course of action. How could they make such a decision? Of course, Marina thought, they could always change their minds later if they chose not to share and circumstances made it a better choice in the future. But if they shared now, they could not stuff it back into the deep if they realized later they shouldn’t have.

Greta looked weary beyond belief when she finally arrived. She flopped face down on the bed she had taken for herself in their shared room. Her arms outstretched and hanging over the edges, she groaned into the covers. She turned her head to the side so she could see Marina and said, “It’s over.”

Marina arched an eyebrow. “And?”

“And, we’re going to hold back most of it. The Legacy will be shared to some extent, but carefully. We’ll put out as much information as is safe, but not necessarily in full context. And nothing about the other silos,” she answered, her voice weary.

“Ah.”

“I can’t tell if that means you agree or disagree with the decision,” Greta said.

Marina tried to decide that herself, but she still felt ambivalent. “I wouldn’t have entirely agreed with either decision, I don’t think,” she answered.

Greta let out a short and bitter laugh. “You should be on the council. All of us feel that way.” She rolled into a sitting position and motioned for Marina to sit. After she perched carefully on the edge of her own bed, the flutters in her stomach returning full force, Greta leaned across the space between them and gave her arm a squeeze. “Are you ready?”

There could be no question that whatever Taylor found so compelling and the rest of them so uncomfortable was the subject of her question. Marina nodded.

“You know what the Watch is, correct?” Greta asked.

“Of course. They come to talk to every class before graduation. To recruit,” Marina replied.

“Your parents were members of the Watch, Marina.”

Marina shook her head. “No. My father was a paper maker and copyist. My mother was an electrician.”

Greta inclined her head in agreement but said, “Yes, but they were also members of the Watch.” She sighed a sigh full of meaning. “This is going to be difficult. Will you just listen?”

“I’ll try,” Marina answered and laced her fingers together on her lap.

“The Watch was a little different then. It was what happened to your parents that tightened things back up. Do you know how it works?”

“Sort of. The recruiter said we would work Up Top one week in so many weeks or something like that.”

“Right,” Greta confirmed. “As of now it is one week in eight. Back then things had gotten pretty lax. Nothing had ever happened that anyone knew of and people sort of looked at it as a vacation. Couples would serve their week together and bring their kids.”

Marina’s thoughts went back to those memories of her father showing her all the things on the screen. Dim memories of a room with bars instead of a wall and playing with other children in front of a screen flicked through her mind. She nodded understanding and said, “My parents were like that?”

“Yes. Two people are on watch at a time. Two shifts a day. A night shift and a day shift. Your parents were on the dim shift. Another couple had the day shift.” Greta’s voice was soft but firm. She was watching Marina for a response. “Does any of this sound familiar?”

“Not really,” Marina answered, shaking her head. “I sort of remember the sun and the view and my parents, but nothing specific.”

“That’s understandable. You were very young. I was a brand new shadow when it happened so you would have been a few years old at most. Are you okay for me to continue?”

“Did my family get killed by Others? Is that what Taylor was talking about?” Marina asked, getting right to the point.

Greta sighed heavily and answered her. “That is what we thought at the time. Given what we know now, about the other silos, we may be wrong.”

“But it was people from somewhere else? How did it happen?”

****

What followed was almost too strange to believe but it made sense of the discordant images she had in her memories, like the one of the frightened face of her mother saying that she loved her. Greta had been patient with her and as complete as she could be. The truth was that there would be no way to ever know the entire truth since everyone involved was dead aside from the children.

What was known was that her parents were like all the other young people who joined the watch at the time. They served their week together, brought their young child with them, and had a good time while they were doing their duty. The other shifts were the same and all agreed that it had been so long since anything happened that it wasn’t even a concern anymore. It was good duty and gave them a whole week away from the drudgery of work while getting paid to enjoy the view.

What wasn’t known were the details of that night, the night her parents died. The day shift had been woken by her mother, frantic and claiming that an Other was walking down the ridge toward them. The day shift had, in their turn, used the terminal to send an emergency wire to the Sheriff that stated just that. By the time the sheriff and deputies had arrived, both shifts were either outside or in the airlock and a lone cafeteria worker was trying to operate the airlock without knowing what to do.

The cafeteria worker, an unlucky bystander, had been trying to recover her parents, who were in the airlock. Even then the silo had been trying to figure out a way to bring people back inside once they cleaned. So far, not one had been successful in a long term sense. Whether it was because only the terminally ill were allowed to volunteer or because the system wasn’t yet working was hard to parse out. Back then it was still an entirely new process and no one had been recovered at all.

The Memoriam writings of the First Heroes directed no repairs to the airlock purification system, which was somehow disabled during the battle, were to ever be attempted. Instead, they were to find another method of cleansing the cleaner with the eternal aim of bringing them safely back into the silo while allowing nothing from the outside in with the cleaner. Many things had been tried, without success, but the newest idea was to fill the entire airlock with water and wash whatever it was away. It was not working particularly well.

For her parents, it didn’t work either. Both had breached suits and the water that filled the chamber in an attempt to wash away whatever it was that killed people drowned them instead. The cafeteria worker had also cycled the airlock too quickly in his attempt to retrieve them after the day shift went out. He hadn’t released water into the airlock to clean it first, exposing himself to the toxic air.

Aside from the evidence of her drowned parents, he told them little else before he died. Some contamination had leaked through and the sheriff and deputies had also begun to claim that their skin was burning. A quick thinking deputy had turned a fire hose on all of them and the whole cafeteria. That had finally halted the spread but didn’t save the cafeteria worker.

The day shift had dragged the blood soaked corpse of the “Other” in front of the screen and tried to pantomime coming back. They and their dead Other were lost from view and that was all that Greta knew of them. The next cleaner had written the message that they were on “the ramp” but that was all.

Greta had tried to be kind but there was no escaping the truth. Her parents had gone outside and then drowned trying to come back. When she asked about her memory of a dark room, Greta confirmed that the day shift had two children and that they, as well as she, had been crammed into a storage room within the cafeteria. The fourth child was the child of the cafeteria worker, whose mate had pre-deceased him.

Finally, she had her answers. The council had covered up the incident as a way to spare the silo worry, since no one really knew what happened. The sheriff had seen the limp body of someone in a different style of suit but that was all they knew. The Watch was re-structured so that no children came with a parent and no couples served together. It was a more serious watch from that day forward and had remained such. They still worked on a system for recovery and would continue to do so. That was some comfort to Marina.

That her parents died trying to defend the silo was some comfort as well, but Greta was right about that, too. Given that they now knew there were other silos and not all of them necessarily harbored Others, might that have been someone coming to try to meet them? What a terrible idea, Marina thought and shuddered for the poor person if that was what they were and not an Other at all.

Greta stayed with her and did her best to comfort her and answer her questions, but in the end all Marina wanted was to be alone to think. She lay on her little bed in the medical quarters and tried to decide what she would do. When she decided, she sought out Greta.

Chapter Twenty-Four

She found Greta in the hastily converted hospital room. It was now empty of people or artifacts and held just the debris of their meeting and Greta. Seated in one of the chairs in the half-light that spilled from the hallway, she was still and deep in thought. When Marina tapped the door jamb to announce her presence, she lifted her head and gave a wan smile.

“How are you doing?” Greta asked.

It was such a loaded question. There was so much that could be wrong that it would take a dozen answers combining a whole range of un-fineness to answer. Marina shrugged instead and stepped into the room. She pulled one of the scattered chairs close to Greta’s and sat facing her.

“I can’t live knowing all of this,” Marina said without preamble. It was best to just get it out in the open and deal with it.

Greta bowed her head again and Marina saw a tear fall. “I was afraid of that,” she said sadly.

“Remediation isn’t such a big price to pay for peace, is it?” Marina asked.

There was a long pause before Greta answered. She said, “I have an idea of how you might be able to live with it and be okay.”

Marina listened.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Marina banged on the wall that separated their quarters from Sela’s room with her boot. If the girl didn’t hurry she would be late for her shift. Their new quarters were small and inconvenient compared to their old ones but it was more than inconvenient not to have a door directly to their daughter’s room.

Alas, there were only a few compartments with more than one bedroom on the Memoriam level and they were all taken. They’d had to settle for a one bedroom compartment next to a studio for Sela. It was a trial. She banged again and thought she heard a faint noise that might have been acknowledgement from the other side.

Even after a year, Marina was having trouble getting Sela to keep her room clean and show up for meals on time. She had taken up with a nice young man from Supply and Marina thought there might be a match soon. Sela would leave and then Marina would miss this so she tried to keep it all in perspective.

Joseph liked the distance, which surprised Marina until she realized that his ardor for her was at a higher point than it had been since Sela was old enough to wander into their room if she woke. It was a very nice change, indeed.

Her daughter came in while she was banging again and laughed when she saw what her mother was doing.

“Mom. I’m right here! You can stop cracking the walls now,” Sela said and snatched up a flat of bread for her breakfast.

Marina dropped her boot and scowled while she tried to pull it on without sitting down. “You’re going to be late.”

Sela gave an unconcerned shrug and said, “No, I won’t. I only have to go two levels. I can make it in a flash.” She finished with a snap of her fingers and shoved the rest of the bread into her mouth. She followed it with a swig of tea from the cup at her place and waggled her fingers in farewell. She was gone just that quick.

Her boot finally on her foot, Marina looked for her kerchief and made ready to go for the day. It was nice to live this close to her job but she was still too new at it for her to feel comfortable popping in at home throughout the day. There was always so much to do but it was exciting in a way that being a Fabber hadn’t been.

She stepped out of their compartment and made her way toward the public parts of the Memoriam to check in. Before she opened the door, she smoothed down the multicolored patchwork of her coveralls and gave her kerchief a tug.

As the door opened, the shadow Florine saw her and said brightly, “Good Morning, Archivist Patrick!”

Marina smiled.

Thank You

You have my sincerest thanks for reading my work and I sure hope you enjoyed it. If you did, please take the time to write a review on Amazon. Without such reviews, those who publish direct to the reader would never have even the slimmest hope of reaching interested readers. Plus, you can believe me when I tell you that without those nice words, there is no way I’d be able to force myself to muddle through and keep writing.

I love to hear from readers, even the ones who didn’t like something I did. Readers do change the way I write and what you say might even impact a future character. You never know. You can reach me via email at Ann.ChristyAuthor@gmail.com or on Google+ under Ann Christy.

You can also follow the progress of the rest of the series, and give me a shout out, on the series webpage at http://Silo49.blogspot.com. Go on, click it!

As for the progress on the next work in the series? Well, the last one is the most exciting of them all. Silo 49 changes and evolves in fascinating ways. The characters in this final story are my favorite. I wish I could invite them over for dinner, to be honest.

And yes, you get to see the end. The end as I imagined it even before Dust was released. Don’t worry.

And finally….

Just like last time, I wouldn’t dare to give you a sneak peak of the third and final volume of the Silo 49 series. I would never do that. The next page is surely blank. Right?

SILO 49: DARK TILL DAWN

Part Three of the Silo 49 Trilogy

A Wool Universe Series

by Ann Christy

PART ONE

A Pleasant Jog Through Hell

Chapter One

The shadow assigned to assist her came right on time. Cane in one hand and a sturdy arm bracing the other, Marina Patrick made her slow way toward the area set aside for today’s events. After more than thirty years as the Archival Historian of the silo, she has aged into the oldest of them, yet this is her first cleaning. It is also certainly her last. Even being ported up to Level 1 had been almost more than she could bear. Her joints ached and ground like badly cut metal with each step she took.

As per protocol, Marina was to arrive early to record the event and all that surrounded it. Only the sounds of her shuffling footsteps and puffing breaths accompanied them along the passageway of partitioned rooms. The sounds of engineers yelling, construction workers banging and metal workers doing both were finally gone, their work leaving the whole level a different place.

Three decades of learning and the work that came from what they had learned were complete at last. Everything was ready and it would be up to the cleaner and those who would support him to prove they had done well. And up to Marina to record the events, of course.

The bright light and open space of Level 1 made her blink after the dimness of the hallway. Her eyes were drawn immediately to the place where all the construction had been focused. New walls enclosed a much larger part of Level 1 than previously. The new door was a solid one, with large overlapping seals on the working side visible even from this distance. Beyond that, a further rim of concrete had been added that rose about eight inches above the floor. So many people had tripped on it during construction that it was now painted a vivid yellow.

No other evidence of the vast changes made could be seen from here. People who came to the cafeteria to enjoy the view wouldn’t be bothered and that was just as it should be. Getting over the little barrier was harder than Marina would have thought. She was forced to grab a handful of her coveralls and lift her less able left leg over the lip. No amount of internal demand seemed to force the leg to lift more than a modest inch or two on its own.

Inside the newly built walls, the stations for final stage decontamination were set up and ready, their carefully placed supplies covered by sheets to protect them. A neat stack of clothes, hospital wear of un-dyed cotton and a pair of slippers, waited in an optimistic pile for the end of today’s events.

The door to the one time offices and cells of the sheriff’s station had been sealed on the working side also. More of the big, wide strips of gray sealing plastic, combined with pressure, kept the air where it needs to be. When the shadow pulled the door open, it made a sucking sound that was vaguely obscene to Marina’s ears.

A breeze rushed past her and into the room where the air pressure is lower, so that her hair is the first part of her to enter. This area is no longer a simple workplace. It is a command center for the event to come and hopefully, for every one after if all goes well. Precious monitors are crammed side by side along the walls, their views dark for the moment. And at the other end of the room, the cell door has been removed to allow for easy passage toward the inner decontamination staging area.

The airlock, though she can only see the first door, is both an expanded and divided affair. Additional airlock doors, one of them from the passageway in the Fabber section where she once worked, have been fitted into the airlock to divide it. The airlock itself has been expanded into the room providing a three stage system of airlocks that all tests to date confirm will work. Bags and bags of fine orange dust have been used in the tests and not a single grain of it has ever escaped into the room where she now stands. They are ready.

Chapter Two

Marina accepts help into her chair, a well-padded one that has been marked for her use alone. She smiles at the shadow and says, “Thank you, Steven. You can run along if you like. I’m just going to start writing my initial impressions of the day.”

Steven eyes her a moment, his expressions saying he’s unsure about leaving the frail old woman she has become. After that moment passes, he gives her a respectful nod and bids her goodbye. When the door slams closed with another peculiar sucking noise, Marina removes her book from her pocket and opens to the first blank page. Her little pot of ink is full and her pen has a new nib that is shiny and sharp.

She looks around the room, at the tanks of water mounted on sturdy platforms all along the walls to either side of the expanded airlock, the vast hoses that can dump it with amazing speed into the airlocks and at the pumps that will move that same water back out and into more tanks set beneath the platforms. All of it has the rough look of the newly made. There are shiny spots on the metal where it has been recently ground, the welds all standing out in sharp relief and the bolts un-rusted and freshly milled.

She records it all and finds that time has escaped her when she finally looks up again at the clock. She has filled many pages with the details. Marina notes that old flutter in her belly. The hint of excitement brought about by the knowledge that soon the action will start.

Even as she thinks that the door un-suctions and the preparation group enters in a rush of anticipation and energy. The room fairly crackles with it. They give her a respectful nod and slow their steps for a beat or two, but it is a temporary change. They are back at full speed, calling out their checklists to each other as they ready their respective stations.

The runner —no longer a cleaner she reminds herself yet again— enters with his training team and the last of his suit team. He’s a long and lean young man, vibrant with good health and energy. Marina examines his face as he passes but sees no fear there, only purpose.

He’s already wearing his skin suit, its support systems put in place in the privacy of the medical prep room. She can see the little bulge where a pouch is affixed to his leg underneath the suit, ready should he find it necessary to urinate. Her fingers twist along the pen as she considers whether or not to include such intimate details in her report.

More bulges along the back of his shoulders show where all the battery packs have been placed. It is safest inside the skin suit, which is the last thing that will breech if the worst happens. The coated wire harness that will attach to his helmet electronics bounces behind him as he walks. To Marina it looks like the upraised tail of a cat in fine fettle.

The suit team springs into action the moment he nods his readiness. The council had trailed in behind him, some holding back a bit and others hot on his heels depending on their personality. While some of them watch with anxious expressions, the ones who hung back look like they are trying not to see what is going on at all. Marina can understand this well. The paradigm of who is chosen to clean is a firm one and hard for many to break, some of the council included.

Until today, there have only been two successful recoveries of cleaners but they are the most recent two which gives them reason for hope. Both were terminally ill, as the laws required, and both were volunteers. Today it is a very different situation. This young man is at the prime of his life and in perfect health. It is true that he is also a volunteer and that he competed with unwavering devotion for this day, but it still seems wrong in many respects. Some changes are harder to accept than others.

Marina flips open her book again as the suit team gets to work. Portable oxygen tanks cadged from the hospital have been filled and fitted. That and the small scrubber for his exhalations are fitted to his back at exactly the spots his training has determined are the best for his gait and endurance. The hoses are threaded through the routing ties and create another tail for the runner, this time in front of his chin. The young man doesn’t seem to mind his increasing encumbrance and gives the girl on the suit team that adjusted it for him a wink and a smile.

The innermost suit layer is snug but not as tight as the skin suit and it crinkles noisily as they tug it on over his body. The sealing of this layer is as complete as it would be for one of the old single layer suits. Only the stiff ring that will fit into the innermost groove of the helmet seal is left unattached.

The looser second layer is tinted red as a signal that his time outside has come to an end. The many tests they have done all confirm that having the innermost suit still sealed is crucial to a successful recovery. If the runner sees that red peeking out at any of the places where the suit seems to wear fastest then he knows that he must return without delay.

The outer suit is the recognizable one. It isn’t that much different from the suits they have been using for many years, though much improved from the suits that still sit unused in the vaults. The care with which it is sealed is obsessively perfect.

Marina gives a start when she hears him speak suddenly, along with everyone else in the room.

“Any chance I’ve got time to take a poo?”

Though it is funny on its own, given the situation and his complete encapsulation in three suit layers, it was the expression on the suit-fitter that made it hilarious. The expressions that cross his face combine shock, embarrassment and absolute helplessness against the layers of suit.

The runner winks and says, “Just kidding,” which sent everyone around him into gales of laughter.

The suit fitter makes a wry face and replies, “You’re such a dick, Henry.” After a pause, the roll of heat tape still dangling from his fingers, he makes a sound somewhere between a chuckle and a sob. He drops the tape and grabs the runner in a tight hug.

After an awkward beat, Henry returns the hug and pats the fitter’s back. Marina dips her pen and scribbles a description of the scene as quickly as she can, giving a quick nod to one of the artists standing by to do the same in pictures. He goes straight to work and Marina can confidently forget the artist for the moment.

All the artists present are all in the employ of the Historians for today and look to her for guidance. She has to remind herself not to put them too far out of her mind. It is her responsibility to make sure this important event is recorded for posterity.

She makes a quick note to find out the story of the fitter. How does he know Henry and what is their relationship? They look about the same age or thereabouts, so perhaps they went to school together or were playmates in childhood. When she looks up again, the two have disengaged and are performing the same manly postures all men do after moments of emotion. Marina suppresses a smile since a woman smiling knowingly during such moments is never much of a help.

The last bits of the suit are hooked up and Henry tests the transmitter key on his leg beneath the suits. The click, click on his leg sounds out as beeps on the control console across the room. The code is slow and cumbersome, requiring long and short taps of the key to create letters, but it is a safe backup should anything go wrong with the suit communications in his helmet.

At a nod from the operator, Henry stops keying and flexes his hands inside the constricting gloves. Marina jots down those first signs of nervousness in her book. The tight lines of Henry’s face are a shade paler than they had been only moments before. She gives another directive look toward the line of artists, all of them glancing her way at her movement, and the next one in line immediately bends to put a few broad sweeps on his paper and board. Each of them has been selected for their ability to capture ephemeral moments quickly, to imply detail without actually putting it to paper. She hopes they will perform as well as they need to. There are no do-overs.

Two of the suit mechanics lift the backpack to Henry’s frame and began the process of connecting it to him. It is only the frame for now to keep the weight down while they can. The entire system has been designed and built just for Henry’s weight, stride and strengths and it is a marvel to Marina. The gaps within the framework fit perfectly around the bumps and bulges of his tanks and all the rest beneath his suit.

The cage that will hold the glass balls, glass being one of the few things that isn’t structurally affected by whatever it is outside, is handy to one side so that each new ball will roll down the slide and be exactly within reach when he needs it.

On the other side are the two springy bits of steel where two other glass balls will be held. They are different and special, though. Each will hold a precious camera pried from one of the thousands of derelict computers within the silo on a gimbal. This mean that it can be tossed but the camera inside will always turn to face the side when rolls to a stop. They won’t work for long but that doesn’t matter. The batteries inside will wear down quickly under the drain of the transmitter and the camera, but while they do they will provide vital information to those inside and watching.

One of the electrical engineers brings the two precious balls forward and Henry taps a key on his other leg. A green light glows briefly inside one of the balls and then goes out just as quickly with a second tap. Another couple of taps, on another key presumably, and the same happens inside the other ball. A grave but satisfied nod from the engineer is his only reply before he walks away with cautious steps.

The most important part of suiting up is still to come. It is also the most frightening part of the process. It will separate Henry from the silo in every way until he returns, if he returns. The helmet rests inside a cushioned box and Henry glances that way, knowing that will be next. But that won’t happen until he is in the airlock proper to conserve his air.

At a nod, Henry’s mother and father are let inside the space. They must have been waiting outside the door the whole time because they rush in and head directly for their son. Both give him careful but slightly desperate hugs and his mother touches his face all over. Marina can see that she is doing her best to be brave but the tremors of emotion that flit across her face are heartbreaking in their intensity.

She gives another nod toward the artists and another of them sets to work. The first artist has removed the paper from his board and is already smoothing down a new sheet in readiness. Their speed is impressive.

When the hugs are done, it is Henry that tells them to go rather than the control room personnel. Marina watches him tell them that he will be fine with utmost confidence and give them both a jaunty smile. He keeps the smile on until the door closes behind them and then it falls away in swift stages.

The mood in the room has shifted somehow in the small moment between them opening the door and it closing behind them. It has become all business and tense but not in a way that feels bad. It’s more like the tension that comes from focusing on a job so that it will be well done and that is, paradoxically, a tension that feels good and full of purpose. Marina notes it in her book because it seems like something very easy to forget when recalling the scene later.

The whole production now moves toward the airlocks and the rest of the operation crew file in the outer door and proceed directly toward their stations. Someone comes and helps Marina up so she can follow the smaller group. By the time she is lowered into a chair close by the first airlock, Henry is already inside with the helmet fitter.

The helmet, though much like the original in general shape, is a very different affair in almost every way. Before being lowered over his head, the wire harness is hooked up and there is a sudden burst of sound behind them as two of the screens blaze to life with color and sound. Henry’s breathing is amplified painfully into the room and the operator scrambles to lower the sound to a more useful level.

After a thumbs-up, the system is shut down to conserve battery power and Marina watches as the screen darkens once more. Once the helmet is lowered, time becomes the enemy so the speed of everything has to pick up considerably. The first ring from the suit is clamped in place around the helmet, then the second and finally the outer suit ring. This will keep Henry safer because all three suits have to breech before contaminated air gets into his helmet.

The mouthpiece is awkward. The face piece looks a bit like a cone and keeps the lower half of his face out of view even when not engaged, but he can still speak. In order to seal it, he will have to shove his head forward inside the helmet, grab the mouthpiece with his mouth and clamp down on it. If that happens, and they are hoping it won’t, then he will no longer be able to speak and will be forced to use his leg key. The only reason for him to use that face piece would be in the case of a suit breech all the way into the inner layer.

They have found through terrible experience that getting whatever it is out there inside of the body is a sure path to death. Survival after topical exposure, at least for some period of time, is much more likely. Marina knows without looking that somewhere amongst the equipment at the various stations are irons which can be heated quickly and used against skin that is exposed. It is painful and not guaranteed, but it worked the only time they had tried it previous to this.

The last cleaner had worn through one knee of his suit quickly after a fall. It seems that anyplace there is friction, or where the suit faces the wind, the process of disintegration is faster. That cleaner’s breech had been very small, an area no more than a couple of inches across. The idea of using heat had come from a suit designer. His logic was that fire had once been used to cleanse the airlock of toxin so why wouldn’t it do the same when directly applied.

The whole process had been gruesome from what Marina read afterward and she was heartily glad not to have been there. But it had worked. That cleaner, afflicted with what was believed to be cancer of the lungs, lived without effect until it took him three months later. In quarantine for some of that time, he spent a halcyon month as a celebrity before he took to his bed for the last time.

Marina would rather not think about the iron and turns her gaze back to the runner. With his helmet in place, the cone rests in front of his face but she can see the smile in his eyes. He gives another thumbs-up to let them know the air is coming out of it at the rate it should. Marina knows from the briefings that it will be a very slow trickle rather than a stream. It is enough to keep him oxygenated but not enough to require any be vented. The scrubber will do the rest.

The ripping sound of more heat tape breaks the tense quiet and the helmet is finally fully sealed against encroachment. The secondary fitter and the quality checker go around Henry quickly but thoroughly, calling out a continuous stream of “Check” as each checklist item is called out. One hearty slap on the back for Henry, to get through all the layers, and he is ready to go.

The technicians leave the airlock and it is sealed with a clank of metal that many in the room flinch at. Marina notes that as well. From her seat, Marina can see Henry’s helmeted head through the little round window much like the one she looked through countless times during her former life as a Fabber. He turns to face forward with no ceremony and the process begins. It is almost anticlimactic.

Chapter Three

Henry operates the second airlock himself and enters the mid-station. The door is actually the original airlock door but it has been extensively reworked. He seals it behind him and at the noise of it, the operator stations blaze to life once more. Henry’s reflected face shows up five feet tall on one of the screens while the door of the final section of airlock spins into view as he turns.

The shiny inside of the helmet is reflective enough that they have been able to have both cameras facing outward, one slightly offset to get more of the view. His ghostly reflection is more than enough to assess Henry’s situation though it is somewhat disconcerting, as if he were already halfway gone.

Marina, along with everyone else, watches as Henry’s view shifts slightly up and then back down. He has taken a deep and fortifying breath. His eyes narrow above the dark swath of the face cone and his hand appears in the view as he opens the door to enter the final bit of the airlock. He points with his head toward the door behind him to show that he has sealed it fully and the light that turned red when he opened it flashes back to green to confirm closure. The operators at the consoles give their confirmations and then the airlock operators start their work.

Through Henry’s helmet Marina sees the patter of droplets that rain down on him from the nozzles inside. The gas that was once used is now more just as the automated door mechanism is defunct. Marina now understands that this happened at the time of the First Heroes, but before her discovery of the Graham and Wallis books, it had been something they knew, but didn’t understand well. These nozzles are their own design and are nothing more than a fancy shower.

The solution the covers Henry is mostly water, but it contains a complex mix of chemicals that create an almost filmy layer on the suit. Marina dipped a finger into the solution before it was ported up to Level 1 and thought it strange. When she rubbed her fingers together they were slick and slippery but at the same time they felt like there was nothing there at all. She could see the glisten of the wetness on her fingertips, but could not feel it. The solution was years in the making.

They test coated several items, including suit fabric, and exposed it in the outer airlock with the door open. Whatever is in the air outside, it doesn’t like the juice at all. The uncoated items were pitted and eroded within moments. The coated ones barely touched. Even raw meat soaked in the fluid appeared less impacted than the uncoated slab.

The only downside is that the fluid is intensely irritating to the skin. When applied to humans —mostly technical personnel who volunteer too easily to test their new toys— it creates a burning rash that is intolerable. That irritation soon turns into watery blisters if the solution remains. And the only really effective way to wash it off is immersion in a tank full of water heavily dosed with laundry soap.

Everyone’s view skews as Henry rotates; lifting his arms and legs in turn to ensure he is as coated as he can possibly get. The hiss of the spray ceases abruptly and Henry faces forward once more. His eyes have gone from narrow to wide and almost surprised. A few calming words come from the operator so others in the room must have also noticed those widened eyes. The camera bobs as he nods and then says, “Let’s do this thing. I’m burning air, here.”

Deep rumbling noises from the airlock doors opening begin almost immediately and the vibration can be felt all the way to Marina’s chair. She grits her teeth and nods to an artist to capture the operators and the screen. The rest of them have their eyes as glued to the screens as everyone else. What she sees almost captures her, too.

The door has begun to open.

Chapter Four

Henry’s head bobs up and down as he bounces, anxious for the doors to open completely enough for him to start his run. A few of the heads in the control room bob a little too in unconscious sympathy with what they see.

Marina knows that Henry is fully aware that he mustn’t try to push the envelope and squeeze through the gap in the doors. What he has on his body increases his bulk substantially and he can ill afford to have any of it damaged, least of all his suit.

A puff of dust laden wind pushes its way into the gap and makes the bright light outside hazy and beautiful for a moment. Henry raises a hand to clear his helmet, and a few people in the room gasp, but stops himself just in time. The coating is important for his gloves and brushing it away on his helmet is not a good idea so early in his run.

When the opening is wide enough, the operator calls out a sharp, “Go!”, and Henry doesn’t pause for even a moment. He grabs the tank with the power wand that is waiting for him and bursts forward with long, confident strides. The tilt of the ramp looks so strange from her position in a chair that Marina feels a touch of vertigo. It lasts for only a moment and she regains the presence of mind to call out a sharp, “Draw”.

One of the artists calls back, “Got it!”, and starts without taking his eyes from the moving image.

Henry breeches the level ground beyond the ramp and it is a very strange thing to see. Perhaps it is the human element of his reflected face, but the world seems much larger through that helmet than in the view screen they see in the cafeteria. Or perhaps it is that the view is moving rapidly as he turns and scans the area while the one in the cafeteria is static and eternally still.

What he is doing is all a part of his script. Stop, turn a full 360 and show the view, turn back to the silo itself and stop again. He is doing it so perfectly it is like he is reciting it in his head. Perhaps he is. The operator who is in charge of speaking with Henry throughout his run gives him a confirming check for the next stage.

Henry brings up the wand and a blast of their solution comes screaming out of the tank at the flick of his finger. It is under pressure and meant to work quickly and completely. If there is time, Henry will put on the ablative film during his return run, but that is not their priority. The view is still in pretty good shape for now and the blast from their washing tank should be enough to clean it.

They all hear the whine as the pressure bleeds out of the tank and Henry mutters an expletive as he fumbles with the handle wheel. He must get it closed before the pressure is completely lost or they can’t bring it back inside. The danger of contamination would simply be too great. He manages it, the whine weaker but still audible through the helmet, when it abruptly stops at the same moment his hand stops turning the wheel.

He gives the tank a gentle underhand toss toward the head of the ramp and it lands solidly in the sandy dirt, ready to be grabbed and brought back. He turns without hesitation, making Marina dizzy in the process as she watches it on the screen. Henry runs to the rise that surrounds them and crests it. He examines the view in the only safe direction they are aware of, just as he’s been briefed to.

The diagram on the wall has been based on everything Marina and the other Historians have been able to glean from Graham’s books and what past cleaners reported. There is a wide wedge drawn on it, extending from their silo to the unknown that lies beyond it. But that wedge is in a specific direction because all who understand their situation agree that going near any other silo will bring nothing but disaster.

There are too many unknowns. Too many strange occurrences have been noted in the last decades. A column of dust and dirt was seen boiling up from the surface at the edge of their viewscreen some years ago. The council knew that another silo lay in that direction and such a disturbance did not bode well for any peaceful meeting in that direction. On another occasion the Watch reported sighting a trio of figures walking along the ridge line in the dark of night, though no one else saw them.

No matter what might be going on elsewhere, the wedge is the safe direction. It is away from the array of silos and it is where none have gone before. They are very fortunate that their silo is in the outer perimeter of silos and Marina knows this fact alone gives hope.

Marina raises a hand and says, “Draw.” One of the artists has already begun and Marina is glad that they understand what is important to her and the rest of the silo.

The operator gives some instructions, which reverberate back from the speaker in Henry’s helmet so that it sounds like two men are reciting the same thing but have poor timing. Henry responds and turns his head to capture the view. He stays steady while the details are noted, only the sound of his measured breathing in the speakers.

The operator and his echo ask, “Henry, what’s the feeling out there today?”

Henry’s helmet jiggles and Marina sees his reflected eyes dart about for a moment. “There’s a little breeze, maybe a touch stronger than the silo norm. It’s pretty clear, too. I can see a good distance. More than I thought. No evidence of anyone around.”

“Good. Now go for the program. Do you have your point to run to?”

Henry’s view shivers a little as he points the helmet and it’s camera directly at a ragged disturbance in the direction of the catchment lake, which isn’t visible at this distance but is known to exist somewhere beyond their range of sight. Marina sees another artist dip his head to begin drawing and nods in satisfaction.

“That’s my direction. Verify, please.” Henry is polite even while he is outside and under the most severe stress any silo person can ever experience.

The operator turns to Marina, as does the rest of the council. She knows the structure is the one reported by former cleaners and is well within the safe wedge. She gives them a nod and the operator immediately turns away.

“Henry, you are a go for run. I repeat, you are a go for your run. Run!”

Chapter Five

Marina finds herself unable to continue looking directly at the screen almost immediately. When she tears her gaze away and looks about her she can clearly see that others are feeling the same. Hands are reaching for the backs of chairs for support and heads are bowing. Even the artists are looking away. One of them has turned quite pale and is gripping his drawing board as if he might vomit.

It’s the bouncing that is doing it. No one with any real vigor has ever gone outside that Marina is aware of. Previous expeditions consisted primarily of the plodding gait of a fading life, not the wide open run of someone at the peak of health. The view through the helmet is absolutely nauseating. That there are two views, one camera offset just a little from the other, just makes it worse because they are not exactly even. One is pointed a bit further up than the other and it makes the whole room seem like it is tilting.

With a hard swallow, Marina looks back up at the screens. She is responsible for recording everything she can. There are other watchers in the room who are supposed to provide their own viewpoint, as are the artists of course, but she is ultimately responsible. It isn’t any better and Marina spreads her feet a little on the floor so she’ll feel more stable as the view in front of the runner bounces and jags with unpredictable movements.

One of the operators at the consoles yells out, “Five minutes!”

There is a sort of collective sigh around them. It is part relief but also part fear. They have never had anyone go fast or far. To date, forays outside by cleaners have been frail and slow and lucky to get done what needed doing before they shuffled off, sucked down their poppy extract, and collapsed behind the silo where no one inside can see them. No one has ever taken off like this and it is breathtaking and frightening and terribly exciting.

The jagged bit in the distance that Henry is aiming for doesn’t look any closer to Marina, but added to that jagged bit is a darker shadow on the ground at such a great distance that it is more a suggestion than anything definable. Marina waves at one of the artists to come over. He does, craning his neck to keep watching the screens as he approaches.

“Do you see anything there, to the right of his marker?” she asks him, nodding toward the screen. “Can you tell me what it is?”

He turns away to examine the screen and Marina watches him. He sees it too, his eyes squinting a little and his head tilted to the side. “I’m not sure. It seems large and on the ground. Flat. Perhaps a land feature?”

Marina nods, her mouth tight. This is more than they had expected. She and the rest of the Historians had assumed that the blotch on the map marked ‘Catchment Lake’ was far away. Further than this anyway. But the land is sloping downward a little in front of Henry. Even she can see that. She plucks his sleeve to regain his attention and he tears his gaze from the screen reluctantly.

“Young man, I want you to focus on that feature. It may be very important. The distance is what I want most of all. If you can get anything about it on paper then you must.”

Marina tries to put the import of what she wants in her words and it appears to have worked because the young man’s expression turns grave. “I will. I will get everything that can be gotten. You can count on me, ma’am.”

She gives his arm a little pat and shoos him back with a wave. “Good, good. See me directly after so that I can take down your impressions before they fade.”

He nods and goes back to his seat, almost immediately setting his writing stick to a fresh sheet of paper. Marina looks back at the view and thinks that the shadow is clearer now, darker. Time passes and she finds that she is getting used to the bouncing scene, her own body straining and relaxing as if she were the one running.

The sound feed from Henry’s helmet is limited to his breathing and short acknowledgements of the times as they are called out. Ten minutes, fifteen and then twenty minutes pass and then Henry is directed to stop and look at his suit. He holds out his arms and looks at his legs and the murmurs in the room increase in volume as the suit engineers discuss what they are seeing.

Henry is covered with a fine layer of dust that has glued itself to him via the slippery film. It is only the finest of the grains that have stuck and his suit looks almost as tan as the Sheriff’s in places. What is worrisome is the ragged look of the suit along the front of his thighs, on his forearms and on the back sides of his hands. To Marina, it almost looks fuzzy.

Marina sees Henry’s reflection better now that he is standing still and sees that he is sweating. A small computer fan inside the helmet is keeping it from fogging up, but it doesn’t do much to ease the heat that builds up inside quickly.

Marina is sure that this is the cool part of the year because the days are at their shortest. The single volume of the Legacy they have describes the solar system and they have been able to learn and confirm this much in thirty years. Even so, he is wearing a lot of layers and keeping most of his heat inside.

The operator asks for a close up of his arm again and then the suit engineers give their verdict. The operator pauses, as if he doesn’t like what he’s being told to say. He shakes his head, but leans toward the microphone anyway. “Henry, that suit looks good enough to keep going. But keep an eye on your arms and hands. At the first sight of red you turn around. Got it?”

Henry nods inside the helmet and then says, “Got it!” He is running at full speed almost immediately and the sound his feet make on the rough ground sounds a bit like someone chewing a mouth full of seeds.

The council medic is clearly upset with the suit engineers and pushes one of them aside to speak to the operations crew. He raises his voice enough for the council members to hear, which means that everyone can hear him. “His suit is one thing, his endurance is another. He isn’t going to be able to run back as fast as he ran out there. It’s a pretty simple equation. He shouldn’t stay out until he sees red. He should turn back before that.” He pauses and jerks his hand toward the screen where Henry’s breathing sounds out loudly like a second opinion. “Anyone disagree?”

Marina watches them make up their minds and she can see the battles going on inside each of them. A movement out of the corner of her eye draws her attention. It is the artist she assigned to monitor the feature in the distance. He is standing, jaws agape while he stares at the screen and then he starts to make a choking noise.

As she whips her head back toward the screen, Henry’s voice sounds out as do a few others in the room. Henry’s is amplified and dominates the weaker voices inside. “Do you see that? Does anyone see that?” He sounds almost afraid and his fuzzy looking arm rises and points toward a spot in the distance, far to the left of the jagged shape he’s been aiming for.

She does see it. Everyone sees it. A chair falls backward and clangs on the floor. The operator shakes out of what is gripping them all first and slams the talk button on his microphone. “We see it, Henry! Describe it for us so we know we’re seeing what you’re seeing!”

Henry is still breathing heavy and his words come out tight in between his gulps of air. “It’s blue. It’s a patch of blue. There’s brown around it, like maybe the blue is past a hole of some kind in the dirt. I can’t describe it. It’s moving though.”

His pointing finger draws a line in the air, up and down. He says, “It’s changing shape. Getting longer and skinnier.”

One of the artists calls out, “Oh no! I think it’s going!”

Marina stumbles from her chair, hips grinding with pain, and yells toward the operator. “Get the direction! Don’t let him turn until we have a direction!” She can see that the patch is disappearing and knows they will never be able to precisely identify where it was once it is gone if he moves even the slightest amount.

The operations crew and two of the artists spring into action. Marina just stares at the shrinking patch of blue. It is already less blue than before, smudged with the brown of the dusty wind and not nearly as brilliant a shade. She can hear Henry’s sound of distress as the last streamers of blue abruptly disappear. It sounds like a sob and she can see in his reflection the grief there, even on only the upper half of his face.

The operator turns to the room and shouts, “We’ve got it! The direction! We’ve got it!”

The room erupts in yells and shouts and laughter and tears. It is a frantic scene and that is bad. They still have a runner out there.

Marina lifts her metal chair and bangs it on the ground several times to get the attention of the room. When the operator, who has jumped up and started hugging the other console operators, finally turns to her she says, “Bring our runner home.”

Copyright Information

© 2013 by Ann Christy.

All rights reserved. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of the author.

This is a work of fiction. All resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and the product of a fevered imagination.

Cover Art

Torrey Cooney — http://torriecooney.blogspot.com

Content

SILO 49: DEEP DARK
Part Two of the Silo 49 Trilogy
A Wool Universe Series
by Ann Christy

Author’s Foreword

The Ten Tenets

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Thank You

SILO 49: DARK TILL DAWN Part Three of the Silo 49 Trilogy A Wool Universe Series by Ann Christy

PART ONE A Pleasant Jog Through Hell

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Copyright Information