Nicola Lombardi - The Tank

Yet even one second of weakness, an uncertain sigh, was enough to make Stevanich’s question come to his mind: Are you not afraid?

“No”, he said, closing his eyes and breathing as deeply as he could. “I am no.”

And he was sincere.

His first day in the Tank passed without any particular events, taking time to explore.

Without any rush he places his clothes in the wardrobe, the towels and bathrobes in the bathroom, he filled the shelves with razors, shaving foam, bars of soap, drugs… he felt like a traveller, excited and full of expectations, in the suite of a new hotel. Moreover, while trying to fit a shoebox in one of the wardrobe’s lower shelves he found a pair of weights five kilograms each. Perfect: they would help him in his purpose to find time each day for staying fit and avoid softening.

Back in the vestibule he noticed the Spy, over the entrance door; it was a red quartz lamp that lit together with a beep every time the elevator started. It was appropriate that the Keeper knew when someone – or something, in case of food or clean sheets – was coming up.

In the kitchen, once checking the content of the fridge (cold cuts, cheese, tuna, canned meat, milk, fruit, trays covered by aluminum foil, fruit juice, but no wine) and in the cupboard (tea bags, coffee, crispy bread slices, breadsticks, spices and dressings) he turned his attention to the television.

As he already knew, he could only watch three thematic channels via cable – news, cinema, documentaries – plus a radio channel for listening to music. The schedule went on seamlessly, one movie after the other, one documentary after the other, with periodic replicas, and it was not possible to choose. No problem. The NMO was okay with it and so was he. He would watch whatever was on, or do something else.

He went back to the Control Room.

On the wall to the right, half-hidden behind the door, there was a four-store bookshelf, not a very large one either, to which he didn’t pay much attention earlier. It was filled with all the books the NMO made available to the Keeper, a hundred or so, a micro-library used to pass the time. And he would have a lot of time to read. He ran a finger and his gaze on the books, catching random names: Hemingway, D’Annunzio, Verne, Calvino, Brontë, London, Melville… quite the diverse collection. There was something for every taste. Good, he would take advantage of it to fill many gaps.

A shelving on the right held some binders. He took a couple out to find out they were empty. It would be his job to fill them. There was no trace of all his predecessor’s work; the change of Keeper implied the transfer of all the binders, logs and dossiers of the previous year to the central office. He would’t have any real models to base on, but he didn’t need any; he remembered every single form he studied on the Manual. It was enough.

He forced himself not to look to the agonizing guests on the big screen, so he approached the console looking at the big chest of drawers lower on the right. He pulled the wheeled office chair, sat down and the first of the three metal drawers. It was filled with stationery, from pencil leads to a hole puncher, from rubber bands to a stapler. He would bet that every single item was registered. The second drawer contained a thick, green-covered register, the famous DMR, the Daily Management Register . Every procedure had to be manually written on it on a daily basis, including notes and highlights: it was a professional diary for the Keeper. Good.

The third drawer was locked, but a small key was hanging from the keyhole. Giovanni unlocked it and even before making the drawer slide open he could guess what was inside. There it was: a gun in a simple leather holster to secure it to his belt. He lifted it and unholstered it with a certain degree of deference, weighing it in his hand. An FS 93.9 Beretta with fifteen-rounds magazines, and it was his for a whole year. For a defensive purpose. For any circumstance. A magazine was already inserted and another one was sealed in its packaging inside the drawer. He put everything away and stood up, then sat on the stuffed office chair, relaxing his back against the seatback.

Next to the console was a fax machine and beside it a fourteen-inch monitor with a keyboard and a wireless mouse; it wasn’t hard to recognise it for what was unofficially named the Postman . Its official name was Direct Communication Terminal , but all technical terminology was destined to be substituted with easier and equally efficient words. There was a channel between the Operative Center, near the entrance of Camp 9, and the Keeper’s flat, that was used when the fax machine would not do. (There was no internet connection: the NMO didn’t think of it as necessary, or appropriate, for the Tank.)

On the screen a blue tetragram on a lighter blue background was slowly rotating and Giovanni thought he couldn’t actually expect to find a different screensaver. He slightly moved the mouse and a white screen with an intermittent cursor for writing appeared on the Postman. Curiosity took the best of him and, without considering how useless it would be, he pressed the question mark button, then ENTER. A small envelope-shaped icon immediately appeared and flew away. Why did he do that? He just sent a stupid message to who-knows-who. Not to the general, he hoped…

A high-pitched. sudden beep immediately made his tongue go dry. A new envelope started beeping behind his question mark. Did they already answer him?

With a heavy heart he moved the cursor on the icon, clicked, and read the three words that appeared in front of him: “Is there a problem, Keeper?”

“Such efficiency.” But embarrassment immediately followed the amazement. He behaved like a kid. He had to do something.

“No problem”, he wrote “I apologise, I just wanted to test the DCT. Thank you.”

He hoped that showing competence by using a technical term would make up for his levity. But after a minute or so without further answers from the Center, he got up and went out from the Control, the doubt still in his mind.

He set the table with plastic dishes and cutlery (he found plenty in a small cupboard beside the sink). He found some meat balls in a small styrofoam tray and put one in the microwave. He added some stick bread, mortadella, an apple and fresh water, then had lunch while light-heartedly watching a documentary about the daily life of an Eskimo.

With a full stomach he then decided to make a turnip inspection of the Ring to avoid falling asleep.

He looked at the Shutter beyond the dark-glass door, pressing his forehead and shielding himself with a hand from the glare of the neon lights, but he could only see his reflection, turbid and dull. He wanted to open the door, get to know the clever room he knew only by the diagram he studied, but without the code he had to input on the panel there was little he could do. He would receive it the following day. Okay, he could wait.

He kept walking, choosing a counter-clock path, and the rhythmic creak of his soles on the linoleum floor made him imagine some mice running beyond the curve, impossible to reach. He wondered whether his predecessor had come up with a name for that blind spot in the ring, impossible to see no matter how much he accelerated. The Dark Side would be a good name, fitting. Like the moon’s.

He stretched his right arm out, running his fingers on the concave wall. When he was a kid, he liked doing it with a stick while walking near gratings and gates. If his mother was with him, she would slap him, because it was a very noisy game. Now there was only a rustle and a pinch on his fingertips. You wouldn’t say anything now, mom. He thought. If you could see me now, you would be proud of me. And you too, dad, right?