Ann Christy: Silo 49: Going Dark

Graham took it gratefully and tried not to burn himself on the hot metal, curling a finger around the handle where a bit of yarn had been wrapped to keep away some of the heat. He blew across the surface of the hot tea and steam rushed away from him.

He took a careful sip while he waited for Wallis to settle himself and then said, “You’re taking this rather better than I thought you would.”

Wallis put down his hot cup and leaned forward again. He looked excited and eager. Actually, Graham thought he looked a bit too excited.

“Am I? How should I have taken it?” Wallis asked.

“Well, let’s just say that I spent 33 days locked under a floor after I was told just a small part of what I told you last night.”

Wallis leaned back in this chair and let out a whoosh of air as he gaped at Graham in surprise. His hair, already sticking up in every direction in unruly grey tufts, got another work over as he ran his hands up the sides of his head. Afterward, he looked like a little goat with horns flaring up, save that his horns were made of hair. He looked Graham up and down as if seeing him for the first time.

Graham imagined he was probably visualizing cabinets and cubbies like those they hid in as children during games. In those tight places they’d folded themselves up, chests compressed, and half hoped they would be found first.

“It wasn’t like a closet or anything. It was a series of rooms tucked under the floor,” Graham explained and saw that his guess had been right by the look on Wallis’ face. He clarified, “But I was locked in, very frightened and confused. You’re not, though. Why?”

Graham watched Wallis as the man thought about what he would say. He watched just as he had with his own shadow, but without any intention of doing anything about it should his friend run screaming from the room. The time for that kind of absurdity was past now. Anything in the Order had to be treated with reservation now. Perhaps the whole thing was just so much trash and wasted paper.

Finally Wallis spoke. The excitement had diminished and a more serious tone entered his voice. “I think it is because I know there are others and when we die, it won’t be the end. Until now, I thought we were the only people that existed.”

Graham thought about what Wallis said for a moment, then nodded. This was a sentiment he understood. It was both reasonable and truthful.

Wallis went on, his voice low and a little sad, “You know, until today, I’ve been waking up every day and wondering if that would be the day cancer got started inside me. Or maybe if that day was the day I wouldn’t be able to take it anymore and I would jump over the rails. I can’t even remember the last time I woke up without those actual thoughts running through my head.”

“And today?” Graham asked, his voice gentle.

“And today I woke up and thought about how we can fix this shit.”

Graham smiled at the profanity. It was something he heard rarely from Wallis. As first a teacher and then a politician, it was something he had just given up when they all left childhood behind. After all, it wouldn’t have done for a primary school teacher to send the kids home after school with that sort of special vocabulary.

“I like the way you think,” he replied, the grin still on his face.

“What about you, Graham? Don’t tell me you didn’t feel the same. At least at some point, you must have.”

He tried to remember if he had ever had that type of thought and didn’t think he had, but he knew that Wallis was referring to their mutual losses over the years. The thoughts that went through his head were always tinged with the knowledge he carried of the other silos. “No. Actually, my most awful thoughts were the exact opposite of yours. Even scarier, I think.”

Wallis looked skeptical, “Scarier than cancer or jumping? The only thing scarier than that is slow cancer.”

“What I woke up and feared was that I wouldn’t get sick. I knew I would never jump. My responsibility absolutely prevents that. What I feared was being the last one here.”

There was silence between the two men, each pondering the concept.

At last, Wallis spoke, expression flat and voice deadpan. “I have to tell you, that is just so fucked up, my friend.”

Graham spluttered as inappropriate laughter bubbled out of him. Wallis joined him after a tick, gales of laughter choking out of him until he bent over and held his stomach, claiming he was going to wet himself if Graham didn’t stop snorting. The laughter petered out, a few false stops coming and going as they started laughing again.

Eventually, Graham wiped his eyes and saw that years of grief had fallen from the face of his oldest friend. The lines were still there, as was the grey hair and the increasingly wild eyebrows, but the lines held less pain in them. He hoped it would stay that way.

Once he recovered his composure, Wallis said, “All this hilarity aside, I have a whole lot of questions. I get the impression they aren’t going to move whatever agenda you’ve got forward just to save our asses. Unless blowing up our home is the kind of help you were looking for, that is. I’m not thinking that is the case. So, why don’t you tell me where we need to go from here and let the questions take care of themselves.”

“Okay. This is what I think we’ve got to figure out and I really don’t think we have a whole lot of time to do it in. First, Silo 40 already took care of the lines outside that Silo One could have used to start the self-destruct Up-Top,” he said and held up his hands to forestall questions when Wallis’ mouth opened.

“And before you ask, I have no idea how they did it. It was long before my time. That’s only half the system, though and it’s that other part we have to worry about.”

“That’s the stuff on Level 72 you were talking about, right?” Wallis asked.

Graham nodded, “Yep. But here’s where it gets tricky. If we start disabling things they might figure out we’re up to something. The whole system, for the whole silo, has to be disabled at once. And just like 40 did when they disabled the topside lines, it probably needs to be coordinated with the other silos or whatever else they did to make it unnoticeable. We don’t know, and have no real way to find out, how much Silo One knows about us down in here. I think we can be sure they won’t allow themselves to lose control of us without a fight.”

“And your plan is to not give them the ability to fight, huh?”

“Exactly,” replied Graham. “That means we need one more person and I need to get on the comms.”

Three days after Wallis had been brought into this secret side of silo life the duo of conspirators became a trio. Grace, one of the last really experienced electricians left in the silo became their third person and they were lucky to have her at all.

She was dying, but slowly, and it wasn’t exactly what the two men had been hoping for. What she lacked in future longevity she made up for in experience and stability in the here and now, however. According to Wallis, Grace was bedrock suitable for building a silo on, steady and unflappable.

Graham stood by the switch-box one level below IT as she muttered about someone taking a sledgehammer to the innards of the switch-box she was working on. He felt bad about that because that was, in fact, exactly what he had done. There were still bits of mattress stuffing drifting about on the landing from the one he’d used as a cushion to deaden the sound of the blows.

He kicked a few of the fluffy bits away guiltily with the toe of his boot when she said that and felt like he probably had what he’d done written across his forehead. It was a crucial safety switch for lines leaving IT so he had been able to summon the best tech up to repair it and do it quickly. So, busting that unit had been a perfect choice for his needs. And though it made him feel even guiltier, there had been more than a little fun involved in wielding that sledgehammer.