Hugh Howey - Wool Omnibus Edition (Wool 1-5)

At the end of the groomed grow station, the hallway took a dark turn. She peered around the corner into more unexplored territory. A long patch of darkness wrapped toward the other side of the silo, a distant glow of light emanating from what was probably yet another crop station sucking juice from IT.

Someone was here. She knew it. She could feel the same eyes she’d felt for weeks, could sense the whispers on her skin, but this time she wasn’t imagining it; she didn’t have to fight the awareness or think she was going crazy. With her knife at the ready and the welcomed thought that she was between this someone and defenseless Solo, she moved slowly but bravely into the dark hall, passing open offices and tasting rooms to either side, one hand on the wall to guide and steady herself—

Juliette stopped. Something wasn’t right. Had she heard something? A person crying? She backed up to the previous door, could barely see it in front of herself, and realized it was closed. The only one she could see along the hall that was closed.

She stepped away from the door and knelt down. There had been a noise inside. She was sure of it. Almost like a faint wail. Looking up, she saw in the wan light that some of the overhead wires diverted perpendicular to the rest and snaked through the wall above the door.

Juliette moved closer. She crouched down and put her ear to the door. Nothing. She reached up and tried the knob, felt that it was locked. How could it be locked, unless—?

The door flew open—her hand still on the knob—it yanked her into the darkened room. There was a flash of light, and then a man over her, swinging something at her head.

Juliette fell onto her ass. A silver blur moved past her face, the crunch of a heavy wrench slamming into her shoulder, knocking her flat.

There was a high pitched scream from the back of the room. It drowned out Juliette’s cry of pain. She swung the knife out in front of her, felt it hit the man’s leg. The wrench clattered to the ground, more screams, people shouting. Juliette kicked away from the door and stood, clutching her shoulder. She was ready for the man to pounce, but her attacker was backing away, limping on one foot, a boy no more than fourteen, maybe fifteen.

“Stay where you are!” Juliette aimed the knife at him. The boy’s eyes were wide with fear. A group of kids huddled against the back wall on a scattering of mattresses and blankets. They clung to one another, their wide eyes aimed at Juliette.

The confusion was overwhelming. She was seized by the sensation of wrongness. Where were the others? The adults? She could feel people with bad intentions sliding down the dark hallway behind her, ready to pounce. Here were their kids, locked away for safety. Soon, the mother rats would be back to punish her for disturbing their nest.

“Where are the others?” she asked, her hand trembling from the cold, the confusion, the fear. She scanned the room and saw that the boy standing, the one who had attacked her, was the oldest. A girl in her teens sat frozen on the tangle of blankets, two young boys and a young girl clinging to her.

The eldest boy glanced down at his leg. A stain of blood was spreading across his green coveralls.

“How many are there?” She took a step closer. These kids were obviously more afraid of her than she was of them.

“Leave us alone!” the older girl screamed. She clutched something to her chest. The young girl beside her pressed her face into the older girl’s lap, trying to disappear, to not be seen by not seeing. The two young boys glared like cornered dogs, but didn’t move.

“How did you get here?” she asked them. She aimed the knife at the tall boy, but started to feel silly for wielding it. He looked at her in confusion, not comprehending the question, and Juliette knew. Of course. How would there be decades of fighting in this silo without that second human passion?

“You were born down here, weren’t you?”

Nobody answered. The boy’s face screwed up in confusion, as if the question were mad. She peeked back over her shoulder.

“Where are your parents? When will they be back? How long?”

“Never!” the girl screeched, her head straining forward from the effort. “They’re dead!”

Her mouth remained open, her chin trembling. The tendons stood out on her young neck.

The older boy turned and glared at the girl, seemed to want her to remain quiet. Juliette was still trying to comprehend that these were mere kids. She knew they couldn’t be alone. Someone had attacked Solo.

As if to answer, her eyes were drawn to the wrench on the decking. It was Solo’s wrench. The rust stains were distinctive. How was that possible? Solo had said—

And Juliette remembered what he’d said. She realized these kids, this young man, was the s ame age that he still saw himself . The same age he’d been when he’d been left alone. Had the last survivors of the down deep perished in recent years, but not before leaving something behind ?

“What’s your name?” Juliette asked the boy. She lowered her knife and showed him her other palm. “My name’s Juliette,” she said. She wanted to add that she came from another silo, a saner world, but didn’t want to confuse or freak them out.

“Rickson,” the boy snarled. He puffed out his chest. “My father was Rick the Plumber.”

“Rick the Plumber.” Juliette nodded. She saw along one wall, at the end of a tall dune of supplies and scavenges, the gear bag they’d stolen. Her change of clothes spilled out the gaping mouth of the bag. Her towel would be in there. She slid toward the bag, an eye on the kids huddled together on the makeshift bed, the group nest, wary of the older boy.

“Well, Rickson, I want you to gather your things.” Kneeling by her bag, she dug inside and searched for the towel. She found it, pulled it out and rubbed it over her damp hair, an indescribable luxury. There was no way she was leaving them here, these kids. She turned to face the other children, the towel draped across the back of her neck, their eyes all locked on hers.

“Go ahead,” she said. “Get your things together. You’re not going to live like this—”

“Just leave us,” the older girl said. The two boys had moved off the bed, though, and were going through piles of things. They looked to the girl, then to Juliette. Unsure.

“Go back to where you’re from,” Rickson said. The two eldest children seemed to be gaining strength from each other. “Take your noisy machines and go.”

That’s what this was about. Juliette remembered the sight of the compressor on its side, more heavily attacked maybe than Solo had been. She nodded to the two boys, had their ages pegged for ten or eleven. “Go on,” she told them. “You’re gonna help me and my friend get home. We have good food there. Real electricity. Hot water. Get your things—”

The youngest girl cried out at this, a horrible peal, the same cry Juliette had heard from the dark hallway. Rickson paced back and forth, eyeing her and the wrench on the floor. Juliette slid away from him and toward the bed to comfort the young girl, when she realized it wasn’t her squealing.

Something moved in the older girl’s arms.

Juliette froze at the edge of the bed.

“No,” she whispered.

Rickson took a step toward her.

“Stay!” She aimed the point of the knife at him. He glanced down at the wound on his leg, thought better of it. The two boys froze in the act of stuffing their bags. Nothing in the room moved save the baby squealing and fidgeting in the girl’s arms.

“Is that a child?”

The girl turned her shoulders. It was a motherly gesture, but the girl couldn’t be more than fifteen. Juliette didn’t know that was possible. She wondered if that was why the implants went in so early. Her hand slid toward her hip almost as if to touch the place, to rub the bump beneath her skin.