Hugh Howey: Dust

“You don’t have to ma’am me,” she told him politely. “Juliette.” She extended a hand.

“Remmy,” the boy said. A hand emerged from his cloak. Juliette accepted it.

“See to the pews,” Wendel said. “We have another service yet.”

Remmy bowed to both of them and shuffled away. Juliette felt pity for the boy, but she wasn’t sure why. Wendel peered across the landing and seemed to listen for approaching traffic. Holding the door, he waved Juliette inside. “Come,” he said. “Top up your canteen. I’ll bless your journey.”

Juliette shook her canteen, which sloshed nearly empty. “Thank you,” she said. She followed him inside.

Wendel led her past the reception hall and waved her into the lower chapel, where she’d attended a few Sundays years prior. Remmy busied himself among the rows of benches and chairs, replacing pillows and laying out announcements handwritten on narrow strips of cheap paper. She caught him watching her as he worked.

“The gods miss you,” Father Wendel said, letting her know that he was aware how long it’d been since she’d attended a Sunday. The chapel had expanded since she last remembered it. There was the heady and expensive smell of sawdust, of newly shaped wood made from claimed doors and other ancient timbers. She rested her hand on a pew that must’ve been worth a fortune.

“Well, the gods know where to find me,” she answered, taking her hand off the pew. She smiled as she said this, meant it lightly, but saw a flash of disappointment on the father’s face.

“I sometimes wonder if you aren’t hiding from them as best you can,” he said. Father Wendel nodded toward the stained glass behind the altar. The lights behind the glass were full-bright, shards of color thrown against the floor and ceiling. “I read your announcements for every birth and every death up there in my pulpit, and I see in them that you give credit in all things to the gods.”

Juliette wanted to say that she didn’t even write those announcements. They were written for her.

“But I sometimes wonder if you even believe in the gods, the way you take their rules so lightly.”

“I believe in the gods,” Juliette said, her temper stoked by this accusation. “I believe in the gods who created this silo. I do. And all the other silos—”

Wendel flinched. “Blasphemy,” he whispered, his eyes wide as if her words could kill. He threw a look at Remmy, who bowed and moved toward the hall.

“Yes, blasphemy,” Juliette said. “But I believe the gods made the towers beyond the hills and that they left us a way to discover, a way out of here. We have uncovered a tool in the depths of this silo, Father Wendel. A digging machine that could take us to new places. I know you disapprove, but I believe the gods gave us this tool, and I mean to use it.”

“This digger of yours is the devil’s work, and it lies in the devil’s deep,” Wendel said. The kindness had left his face. He patted his forehead with a square of fine cloth. “There are no gods like those you speak of, only demons.”

This was his sermon, Juliette saw. She was getting his elevens. The people came far to hear this.

She took a step closer. Her skin was warm with anger. “There may be demons among my gods,” she agreed, speaking his tongue. “The gods I believe in… the gods I worship were the men and women who built this place and more like it. They built this place to protect us from the world they destroyed. They were gods and demons, both. But they left us space for redemption. They meant us to be free, Father, and they gave us the means.” She pointed to her temple. “They gave me the means right here. And they left us a digger. They did. There is nothing blasphemous about using it. And I’ve seen the other silos that you continue to doubt. I’ve been there.”

Wendel took another step back. He rubbed the cross hanging around his neck, and Juliette caught Remmy peeking around the edge of the door, his dark brows casting shadows over his dark eyes.

“We should use all the tools the gods gave us,” Juliette said. “Except for the one you wield, this power to make others fear.”

“Me?” Father Wendel pressed one palm to his chest. With his other hand, he pointed at her. “ You are the one spreading fear.” He swept his hand at the pews and beyond to the tight rows of mismatched chairs, crates, and buckets at the back of the room. “They crowd in here three Sundays a day to wring their hands over the devil’s work you do. Children can’t sleep at night for fear that you’ll kill us all.”

Juliette opened her mouth, but the words would not come. She thought of the looks on the stairwell, thought of that mother pulling her child close, people she knew who no longer said hello. “I could show you books,” she said softly, thinking of the shelves that held the Legacy. “I could show you books, and then you’d see.”

“There’s only one book worth knowing,” Wendel said. His eyes darted to the large, ornate tome with its gilded edges that sat on a podium by the pulpit, that sat under a cage of bent steel. Juliette remembered lessons from that book. She’d seen its pages with those occasional and cryptic sentences peeking out amid bars of censored black. She also noticed the way the podium was welded to the steel decking, and not expertly. Fat puckers of paranoid welds. The same gods expected to keep men and women safe couldn’t be trusted to look after one book.

“I should leave you to get ready for your elevens,” she said, feeling sorry for her outburst.

Wendel uncrossed his arms. She could sense that they had both gone too far and that both knew it. She had hoped to allay doubts and had only worsened them.

“I wish you’d stay,” Wendel told her. “At least fill your canteen.”

She reached behind her back and unclipped the canteen. Remmy returned with a swish of his heavy brown cloaks, the shaved circle on his head glimmering with perspiration. “I will, Father,” Juliette said. “Thank you.”

Wendel nodded. He waved to Remmy and said nothing else to her as his acolyte drew water from the chapel fountain. Not a word. His earlier promise to bless her journey had gone forgotten.

Juliette participated in a ceremonial planting at the mids farm, had a late lunch, and continued her laconic pace up the silo. By the time she reached the thirties, the lights were beginning to dim, and she found herself looking forward to a familiar bed.

Lukas was waiting for her on the landing. He smiled a greeting and insisted on taking her shoulder bag, however light.

“You didn’t have to wait for me,” she said. But in truth, she found it sweet.

“I just got here,” he insisted. “A porter told me you were getting close.”

Juliette remembered the young girl in light blue coveralls who’d overtaken her in the forties. It was easy to forget that Lukas had eyes and ears everywhere. He held the door open, and Juliette entered a level packed with conflicting memories and feelings. Here was where Knox had died. Here was where Mayor Jahns had been poisoned. Here was where she had been doomed to clean and where doctors had patched her back up.

She glanced toward the conference room and remembered being told that she was mayor. That was where she had suggested to Peter and Lukas that they tell everyone the truth: that they were not alone in the world. She still thought it a good idea, despite their protestations. But maybe it was better to show people rather than tell them. She imagined families taking a grand journey to the Down Deep the way they used to hike up to gaze at the wallscreen. They would travel to her world, thousands of people who had never been, who had no idea what the machines that kept them alive looked like. They would travel down to Mechanical so that they could then pass through a tunnel and see this other silo. On the way, they might marvel at the main generator that now hummed, perfectly balanced. They could marvel at the hole in the ground her friends had made. And then they could contemplate the thrill of filling an empty world so very much like their own, remaking it how they saw fit.