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

“They keep this whole goddamned place running!” Juliette declared. “The oxygen you breathe? We recycle that down here. The toxins you exhale? We pump them back into the earth. You want me to write up a list of everything oil makes? Every piece of plastic, every ounce of rubber, all the solvents and cleaners, and I’m not talking about the power it generates, but everything else!”

“And yet it was all here before you were born,” Jahns pointed out.

“Well it wouldn’t have lasted my lifetime, I’ll tell you that. Not in the state it was in.” She crossed her arms again and leaned back against the wall. “I don’t think you get what mess we’d be in without these machines.”

“And I don’t think you get how pointless these machines are going to become without all these people.”

Juliette looked away. It was the first time Jahns had seen her flinch.

“Why don’t you ever visit your father?”

Juliette snapped her head around and looked at the other wall. She wiped loose hair back on her forehead. “Go look at my work log,” she said. “Tell me when I’d fit it in.”

Before Jahns could reply, could say that it was family, that there’s always time, Juliette turned to face her. “Do you think I don’t care about people? Is that it? Because you’d be wrong. I care about every person in this silo. And the men and women down here, the forgotten eight floors of Mechanical, this is my family. I visit with them every day. I break bread with them several times a day. We work, live, and die alongside one another.” She looked to Marnes. “Isn’t that right? You’ve seen it.”

Marnes didn’t say anything. Jahns wondered if she was referring specifically to the “dying” part.

“Did you ask him why he never comes to see me? Because he has all the time in the world. He has nothing up there.”

“Yes, we met with him. Your father seemed like a very busy man. As determined as you.”

Juliette looked away.

“And as stubborn.” Jahns left the paperwork on the bed and went to stand by the door, just a pace away from Juliette. She could smell the soap in the younger woman’s hair. Could see her nostrils flare with her rapid, heavy breathing.

“The days pile up and weigh small decisions down, don’t they? That decision to not visit. The first few days slide by easy enough, anger and youth powers them along. But then they pile up like unrecycled trash. Isn’t that right?”

Juliette waved her hand. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m talking about days becoming weeks becoming months becoming years—” She almost said that she’d been through the same exact thing, was still piling them up, but Marnes was in the room, listening. “After a while, you’re staying mad just to justify an old mistake. Then it’s just a game. Two people staring away, refusing to look back over their shoulders, afraid to be the first one to take that chance—”

“It wasn’t like that,” Juliette said. “I don’t want your job. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of others who do.”

“If it’s not you, it’s someone I’m not sure I can trust. Not anymore.”

“Then give it to the next girl.” She smiled.

“It’s you or him. And I think he’ll be getting more guidance from the thirties than he will from me, or from the Pact.”

Juliette seemed to react to this. Her arms loosened across her chest. She turned and met Jahns’ gaze. Marnes was studying all of this from across the room.

“The last sheriff, Holston, what happened to him?”

“He went to cleaning,” Jahns said.

“He volunteered,” Marnes added gruffly.

“I know, but why?” She frowned. “I heard it was his wife.”

“There’s all kinds of speculation—”

“I remember him talking about her, when you two came down to look into Rick’s death. I thought, at first, that he was flirting with me, but all he could talk about was this wife of his.”

“They were in the lottery while we were down here,” Marnes reminded her.

“Yeah. That’s right.” She studied the bed for a while. Paperwork was spread across it.

“I wouldn’t know how to do this job. I only know how to fix things.”

“It’s the same thing,” Marnes told her. “You were a big help with our case down here. You see how things work. How they fit together. Little clues that other people miss.”

“You’re talking about machines ,” she said.

“People aren’t much different,” Marnes told her.

“I think you already know this,” Jahns said. “I think you have the right attitude, actually. The right disposition. This is only slightly a political office. Distance is good.”

Juliette shook her head and looked back to Marnes. “So you nominated me for this, is that it? I wondered how this came up. Seemed like something right out of the ground.”

“You’d be good at it,” Marnes told her. “I think you’d be damned good at anything you set your mind to. And this is more important work than you think.”

“And I’d live up top?”

“Your office is on level one. Near the airlock.”

Juliette seemed to mull this over. Jahns was excited to have her even asking questions.

“The pay is more than you’re making now, even with the extra shifts.”

“You checked?”

Jahns nodded. “I took some liberties before we came down.”

“Like talking to my father.”

“That’s right. He would love to see you, you know. If you come with us.”

Juliette looked down at her boots. “Not sure about that.”

“There’s one other thing,” Marnes said, catching Jahns’ eye. He glanced at the paperwork on the bed. The crisply folded contract for Peter Billings was on top. “IT,” he reminded her.

Jahns caught his drift.

“There’s one matter to clear up, before you accept.”

“I’m not sure I’m accepting. I’d want to hear more about this power holiday, organize the work shifts down here—”

“According to tradition, IT signs off on all nominated positions—”

Juliette rolled her eyes and blew out her breath. “IT.”

“Yes, and we checked in with them on the way down as well, just to smooth things over.”

“I’m sure,” Juliette said.

“It’s about these requisitions,” Marnes interjected.

Juliette turned to him.

“We know it probably ain’t nothing, but it’s gonna come up—”

“Wait, is this about the heat tape?”

“Heat tape?”

“Yeah.” Juliette frowned and shook her head. “Those bastards.”

Jahns pinched two inches of air. “They had a folder on you this thick. Said you were skimming supplies meant for them.”

“No they didn’t. Are you kidding?” She pointed toward the door. “We can’t get any of the supplies we need because of them. When I needed heat tape—we had a leak in a heat exchanger a few months back—we couldn’t get any because Supply tells us the backing material for the tape is all spoken for. Now, we had that order in a while back, and then I find out from one of our porters that the tape is going to IT, that they’ve got miles of the stuff for the skins of all their test suits.”

Juliette took a deep breath.

“So I had some intercepted.” She looked to Marnes as she admitted this. “Look, I’m keeping the power on so they can do whatever it is they do up there, and I can’t get basic supplies. And even when I do, the quality is complete crap, probably because of unrealistic quotas, rushing the manufacturing chain—”

“If these are items you really needed,” Jahns interrupted, “then I understand.”

She looked to Marnes, who smiled and dipped his chin as if to say he told her this was the right woman for the job.