Jasper Fforde: Shades of Grey

“He’s gone,” I said, to a rapid intake of breath from everyone watching.

“With just a 342-94-98?” repeated Dad, incredulous. “That’s just not possible!”

Dad checked the disc I had handed him, but there was no mistake. He wiped his forehead, took the ninety-second sandglass from his pack and placed it on the floor next to us. With the heart stopped, ninety seconds was the time it took for the blood to drain away from the retina. Once eye death had occurred, there would be no way to get any more color into the patient’s body, and it would all be over.

And that was bad. Not just because he was a Purple, but because his full functionality hadn’t been fulfilled. And anyone who didn’t make target expectancy was communal investment wasted.

Dad flashed him several other hues but without success, then stopped, thinking hard while the sand slowly trickled through the glass.

“Everything I’ve tried has failed,” he said to me in a whisper. “I’m seriously missing something here.”

Everyone in the shop was silent. No one even dared breathe. I looked up at the customers and staff, and they stared back blankly, unable to assist. After all, National Color took care of decorative hues, not healing ones. It was true that they mixed euphoric shades to aid in maintaining a good humor among the residents, but it was always in consultation with the swatchman general.

I suddenly had a daring thought. “The hues are having no effect,” I whispered, “ because he’s not Purple! ”

Dad frowned. Wrongspotting was so rare as to be almost unheard of. It carried a thirty-thousand-merit fine—effective Reboot. You might as well put yourself on the Night Train and have done with it.

“Even if that’s true, it’s no help at all,” he whispered back. “Red, Blue, Yellow? And how much? We’d need six months to go through every possible combination!”

I looked down to where I was still holding the man’s hand and noticed for the first time that his palms were rough, the top of one finger was missing and his nails were ragged and unkempt.

“He’s Grey.”

“Grey?”

I nodded and Dad stared at me, then at the patient, then at the timer. The last few grains were beginning to dribble through, and with no plan except the default “do nothing and hope,” Dad removed the offset spectacles, selected a glass disc and, after shouting “Cover!” again, flashed the color into the man’s eye.

The effect was instantaneous and dramatic. The Grey convulsed as his heart restarted and the ear monitor flicked back to steady amber. After a few minutes of carefully selected swatches, to which the patient responded successfully and, more important, predictably , he was soon back to flashing green, and everyone in the shop began to chatter in relieved tones about how Dad would be up for some serious A++ feedback and an extra cake chit for saving the life of—they thought—such an eminent resident. We exchanged glances as they said this, but for the moment Dad wasn’t letting on. There was no point in ruining the chances of a full recovery. Besides, the Collective needed every Grey there was—more than we needed Purples, in fact, but no one would ever say so.

Someone entered the shop in a hurry and knelt down next to us. She introduced herself as Miss Pink, a junior swatchwoman in Vermillion’s practice. She looked at Dad quizzically when she saw just how many hues were written on the Grey’s forehead, and he explained in a hushed tone about the wrongspottedness.

“You’re kidding?” she said, suddenly looking nervous, as though simply being near such a grevious infractor made her guilty by association.

“I’ve never been more serious. Do you recognize him?”

“Not one of ours,” she replied after peering closer, “probably a Grey with nothing to lose on his way to Reboot. Let’s take a look.”

She unbuttoned the Grey’s shirt to reveal his postcode, but the neatly scarred number was partially obscured by a livid sweep of extra scar tissue. Not content with wrongspotting, the wretched infractor had also tried to hide his identity.

“It looks like an LD2,” said Dad, staring at the mottled flesh carefully, “but I can’t read the rest.”

Miss Pink took the Grey’s left hand and stared at it. The second fingertip had been neatly cut above the first joint, rendering his nailbed identification worthless. Whoever he was, he didn’t want us to find out.

“Why do you think he collapsed?” asked Miss Pink, filling out a feedback slip so we could be on our way.

Dad shrugged.

“Mildew, probably.”

“The Rot?!”

She said it too loud, and there was an undignified rush for the door as the grim possibility of catching the Mildew overcame natural curiosity and good manners. I’d never seen eight people try to get out a door at the same time, but they managed it. Within twenty seconds we were alone.

“Actually,” said Dad, who had an impish sense of humor, “I don’t know what he’s got, but it’s not the Mildew. I would hazard a guess that he may have suffered an aneurism. I would recommend a palette of light yellows somewhere around gervais to promote healing, but you should probably keep him unconscious while you do it. Unless, that is,” he added, “the Mildew does come for him.”

“Yes,” said Miss Pink thoughtfully, “we must always consider that possibility.”

She fell silent. No one liked talking about the Mildew.

2.3.02.62.228:Approved words to be used in oaths and chastisements can be found in Annex 4 (permitted exclamations). All other cusses are strictly prohibited. Fine for noncompliance: prefect’s discretion, one hundred demerits maximum.

Мiss Pink gave Dad positive feedback, we bade her good day and then stepped out of the shop and back into the close summer heat. We loosened our ties no more than the proscribed amount, and looked about. The square, which before had been busy and noisy, was now deathly quiet. The townspeople had organized a voluntary fifty-yard exclusion zone—not unusual, but pretty pointless. A Mildew sufferer only becomes dangerously infectious an hour after death, when the skin is covered in fine grey tendrils and the victim, whose lungs are now under pressure from the rapidly multiplying moldy growth, will involuntarily expel the spores in a single explosive death cough. That is the moment to panic and leap out of the nearest window—irrespective of which floor you’re on, or whether it is open or not. Barring industrial accidents, sudden body failure, angry megafauna, Riffraff and—most relevant to me—the occasional yateveo, the Mildew got everyone in the end. It steadfastly ignored the barriers of hue and took the strongest Violet with the feeblest Achromatic. One morning you’d wake up with long nails and numb elbows, and by teatime you’d be good for nothing but tallow and bonemeal. But paradoxically, although the Mildew was the number one killer by a long stretch, very few people actually died of it. As soon as a victim had been diagnosed and murmured a rasped good-bye to tear-brimmed loved ones, they would be wheeled into the nearest Green Room, where they would drift into a highly pleasurable reverie and, from there, to death. It was safer that way—a corpse could be bagged and safely in the icehouse when it coughed.

When we reached the small crowd of onlookers at the edge of the exclusion zone, they parted to let us through, but not without a barrage of questions. Dad answered asambiguously ashe could. No, he didn’t know if a Mildew had been confirmed, and yes, Miss Pink had taken control of the situation. He was then asked by a reporter for the Vermillion Chronicle for an interview. He initially refused until the reporter mentioned he was also a newsfeed for Spectrum, so Dad agreed to say a few words. While he was thus engaged, I looked idly about at the gathered townsfolk and made a note of the time. We had thirty-one minutes to catch our train, and if a slowpoke Yellow was on verification duty today and we missed our connection, we might very well be here another day.