Hugh Howey - Second Shift - Order

He passed beneath the door and reached up to slap the paint as he went. A small hop where terrible leaps were once needed. He remembered employing a ladder before that, spilling a bucket of blue paint, hearing the complaints from Fourteen as it dribbled down. Maybe that’s where the idea for the plasticwrap paintbombs had come from. It must’ve been. Kids playing at the wars their fathers had fought. Screams fading to laughter over time—warlike grunts into giggles—chasing each other with imaginary weapons and kitchen utensils, fighting over who got to be Security and who had to play the bad guys.

Mission remembered how exciting those adventures had felt. Such joyous times now seemed sad as they became truer and truer.

He entered the Nest to find the hallways empty and quiet, the hour early still. There was a soft screech from one classroom as desks were put back into order. Mission caught a glimpse of two teachers conferring in another classroom, their faces scrunched up with worry, probably wondering what to do with a younger version of himself. The scent of strong tea mixed with the odor of paste and chalk. There were rows of metal lockers in dire need of paint and stippled with dents from tiny fists; they transported Mission back to another age. Just yesterday, he was terrorizing that hall. He and all his friends whom he didn’t see anymore—not as often as he’d like.

The Crow’s room was at the far end adjoining the only apartment on the entire level. The apartment had been built especially for her, converted from a classroom, or so they said. And while she only taught the youngest children anymore, the entire school was hers. This was her nest, her aerie.

Mission remembered coming to her at various stages of his life. Early on, for comfort, feeling so very far from the farms. Later, for wisdom, when he was finally old enough to admit he had none. And more than once he had come for both, like the day he had learned the truth of his birth and his mother’s death—that she had been sent to clean because of him. Mission remembered that day well. It was the only time he’d seen the Old Crow cry.

He knocked on her classroom door before entering and found her at the blackboard that’d been lowered so she could write on it from her chair. Mrs. Crowe stopped erasing yesterday’s lessons, turned, and beamed at him.

“My boy,” she croaked. She smiled and waved with the eraser to beckon him closer, a chalky haze filling the air. “My boy, my boy.”

“Hello, Mrs. Crowe.” Mission passed through the handful of desks to get to her. The power line for her electric chair drooped from the center of the ceiling to the pole that rose up from the chair’s back. Mission ducked beneath it as he got closer and bent to give the Crow a hug. His hands wrapped around her and the chair both, and her smell was one of childhood and innocence. The yellow gown she wore, spotted with flowers, was her Wednesday fare, as good as any calendar. It had faded since Mission’s time, as all things had.

“I do believe you’ve grown,” she said, smiling up at him. Her voice was a bare whisper, and he recalled how it kept even the young ones quiet as death so they could hear what was being said. She brought her hand up and touched her own cheek. “What happened to your face?”

Mission laughed and shrugged off his porter’s pack. “Just an accident,” he said, lying to her like old times. He placed his pack at the foot of one of the tiny desks, could imagine squeezing into the thing and staying for the day’s lesson. He noticed only a handful of the chairs were arranged for use. The rest were shoved against the back wall, waiting for the next boom, the next surge in population.

“How’ve you been?” he asked. He studied her face, the deep wrinkles and dark skin like a farmer’s but from age rather than grow lights. Her eyes were rheumy, but there was a life behind them. They reminded Mission of the wallscreens on a bright day but in dire need of a cleaning.

“Not so good,” Mrs. Crowe said. She twisted the lever on her armrest, and the chair built for her decades ago by some long-gone former student whirred around to better face him. Pulling back her sleeve, she showed Mission a gauze bandage taped to her thin and splotchy arm. “Those doctors came and took my blood away!” Her hand shook as she indicated the evidence. “Took half of it, by my reckoning.”

Mission laughed. “I’m pretty sure they didn’t take half your blood, Mrs. Crowe. The doctors are just looking out for you.”

She twisted up her face, an explosion of wrinkles like a palm as it closed into a fist. She didn’t seem so sure. “I don’t trust them,” she said.

Mission smiled. “You don’t trust anyone. And hey, maybe they’re just trying to figure out why you can’t die like everyone else does. Maybe they’ll come up with a way for everyone to live as long as you some day.”

Mrs. Crowe rubbed the bandage on her withering arm. “Or they’re sorting out how to kill me,” she said.

“Oh, don’t be so sinister.” Mission reached forward and pulled her sleeve down to keep her from messing with the bandage. “Why would you think such a thing?”

She frowned and declined to answer. Her eyes fell to his sagging and mostly empty pack. “Day off?” she asked.

Mission turned and followed her gaze. “Hmm? Oh, no. I dropped off last night. I’ll pick up another delivery in a little bit, take it wherever they tell me to.”

“Oh, to be so young and free again.” Mrs. Crowe spun her chair around and steered it behind her desk. Mission ducked beneath the pivoting wire out of habit; the pole at the back of the chair was made with younger heads in mind. She picked up a container of the vile vegetable pulp she preferred over water and took a sip. “Allie stopped by last week.” She set the greenish-black fluid down. “She was asking about you. Wanted to know if you were still single.”

“Oh?” Mission could feel his temperature shoot up. Mrs. Crowe had caught them kissing once, back before he knew what kissing was for. She had left them with a warning and a knowing smile. “I saw Jenine yesterday,” Mission said, changing the subject, hoping she might take the hint. “Everyone’s so spread out.”

“As it should be.” The Crow opened a drawer on her desk and rummaged around, came out with an envelope. Mission could see a half-dozen names scratched out across the thing. It’d been used a handful of times. “You’re heading down from here? Maybe you could drop off something for Rodny?”

She held out the letter. Mission took it, saw his best friend’s name written on the outside, all the other names crossed out.

“I can leave it for him, sure. The last two times I stopped by there, they said he was unavailable.”

Mrs. Crowe nodded as if this was to be expected. “Ask for Jeffery, he’s the head of security down there, one of my boys. You tell him that this is from me and that I said you should hand it to Rodny yourself. In person.” She waved her hands in the air, little trembling blurs. “I’ll write Jeffery a note.”

Mission glanced up at the clock on the wall while she dug into her desk for a pen and ink. Soon, the hallways would begin filling with youthful chatter and the opening and slamming of lockers. He waited patiently while she scratched her note. In the while, he scanned the walls at the old motivators, as Mrs. Crowe like to call the posters and banners she made.

You can be anything , one of them said. It featured a crude drawing of a boy and a girl standing on a huge mound. The mound was green and the sky blue, just like in the picture books. Another one said: Dream to your heart’s delight. It had bands of color in a graceful sweep. The Crow had a name for the shape, but he’d forgotten what it was called. Another familiar one: Go new places . It featured a drawing of a crow perched in an impossibly large tree, it’s wings spread as if it were about to take flight.