Perhaps the game’s numbing powers were the reason it existed at all, why someone had spent the effort to create it, and why subsequent heads had kept it secreted away. He had seen it on Merriman’s face during that lift ride at the end of his shift. The chemicals only cut through the worst of the pain, that indefinable ache. But lesser wounds resurfaced. The bouts of sudden sadness had to be coming from somewhere.
The last few cards fell into place while his mind wandered. The computer had shuffled for a win, and Troy got all the credit for verifying it. The screen flashed GOOD JOB! in large block letters. It was strangely satisfying to be told this by a home-made game — told that he had done a good job. There was a sense of completion, of having done something with his day.
He left the message flashing and glanced around his office for something else to do. There were amendments to be made in the Order, announcements to write up for the heads of the other silos, and he needed to make sure the vocabulary in these memos adhered to the ever-changing standards.
He got it wrong himself, often calling them bunkers instead of silos. It was difficult for those who had lived in the time of the Legacy. An old vocabulary, a way of seeing the world, persisted despite the medication. He felt envious of the men and women in the other silos, those who were born and who would die in their own little worlds, who would fall in and out of love, who would keep their hurts in memory, feel them, learn from them, be changed by them. He was jealous of these people even more than he envied the women of his silo who remained in their long-sleep lifeboats—
There was a knock on his open door. Troy looked up and saw Randall, who worked across the hall in the psych office, standing in the doorway. Troy waved him inside with one hand and minimised the game with the other. He fidgeted with the copy of the Order on his desk, trying to look busy.
‘I’ve got that beliefs report you wanted.’ Randall waved a folder.
‘Oh, good. Good.’ Troy took the folder. Always with the folders. He was reminded of the two groups that had built that place: the politicians and the doctors. Both were stuck in a prior era, a time of paperwork. Or was it possible that neither group trusted any data they couldn’t shred or burn?
‘The head of silo six has a new replacement picked out and processed. He wants to schedule a talk with you, make the induction formal.’
‘Oh. Okay.’ Troy flipped through the folder and saw typed transcripts from the comm room about each of the silos. He looked forward to another induction ceremony. Any task he had already done once before filled him with less dread.
‘Also, the population report on silo thirty-two is a little troubling.’ Randall came around Troy’s desk and licked his thumb before sorting through the reports, and Troy glanced at his monitor to make sure he’d minimised the game. ‘They’re getting close to the maximum and fast. Doc Haines thinks it might be a bad batch of birth control implants. The head of thirty-two, a Biggers… Here we go.’ Randall pulled out the report. ‘He denies this, says no one with an active implant has gotten pregnant. He thinks the lottery is being gamed or that there’s something wrong with our computers.’
‘Hmm.’ Troy took the report and looked it over. Silo thirty-two had crept above nine thousand inhabitants, and the median age had fallen into the low twenties. ‘Let’s set up a call for first thing in the morning. I don’t buy the lottery being gamed. They shouldn’t even be running the lottery, right? Until they have more space?’
‘That’s what I said.’
‘And all the population accounts for every silo are run from the same computer.’ Troy tried not to make this sound like a question, but it was. He couldn’t remember.
‘Yup,’ Randall confirmed.
‘Which means we’re being lied to. I mean, this doesn’t happen overnight, right? Biggers had to see this coming, which means he knew about it earlier, so either he’s complicit, or he’s lost control over there.’
‘Exactly.’
‘Okay. What do we know about Biggers’s second?’
‘His shadow?’ Randall hesitated. ‘I’d have to pull that file, but I know he’s been in place for a while. He was there before we started our shifts.’
‘Good. I’ll speak with him tomorrow. Alone.’
‘You think we should replace Biggers?’
Troy nodded grimly. The Order was clear on problems that defied explanation: Start at the top. Assume the explanation is a lie. Because of the rules, he and Randall were talking about a man being put out of commission as if he were broken machinery.
‘Okay, one more thing—’
The thunder of boots down the hallway interrupted the thought. Randall and Troy looked up as Saul bolted into the room, his eyes wide with fear.
‘Sirs—’
‘Saul. What’s going on?’
The communications officer looked like he’d seen a thousand ghosts.
‘We need you in the comm room, sir. Right now.’
Troy pushed away from his desk. Randall was right behind him.
‘What is it?’ Troy asked.
Saul hurried down the hallway. ‘It’s silo twelve, sir.’
The three of them ran past a man on a ladder who was replacing a long light bulb that had gone dim, the large rectangular plastic cover above him hanging open like a doorway to the heavens. Troy found himself breathing hard as he struggled to keep up.
‘What about silo twelve?’ he huffed.
Saul flashed a look over his shoulder, his face screwed up with worry. ‘I think we’re losing it, sir.’
‘What, like contact? You can’t reach them?’
‘No. Losing it, sir. The silo. The whole damn thing.’
11
2049
Savannah, Georgia
DONALD WASN’T ONE for napkins, but he obeyed decorum by shaking the folded cloth loose and draping it in his lap. Each of the napkins at the other settings around the table had been bent into a decorative pyramid that stood upright amid the silverware. He didn’t remember the Corner Diner having cloth napkins when he was in high school. Didn’t they used to have those paper napkin dispensers that were all dented up from years of abuse? And those little salt and pepper shakers with the silver caps, even those had gotten fancier. A dish of what he assumed was sea salt sat near the flower arrangement, and if you wanted pepper, you had to wait for someone to come around and crack it on your food for you.
He started to mention this to his wife, and saw that she was gazing past him at the booth behind. Donald turned in his seat, the original vinyl squeaking beneath him. He glanced back at the older couple sitting in the booth where he and Helen had sat on their first date.
‘I swear I asked them to reserve it for us,’ Donald said.
His wife’s gaze drifted back to him.
‘I think they might’ve gotten confused when I described which one it was.’ He stirred the air with his finger. ‘Or maybe I got turned around when I was on the phone.’
She waved her hand. ‘Sweetie, forget about it. We could be eating grilled cheese at home and I’d be thrilled. I was just staring off into space.’
Helen unfolded her own napkin with delicate care, almost as if she were studying the folds, seeing how to piece it back together, how to return a disassembled thing to its original state. The waiter came over in a bustle and filled their glasses with water, careless drips spotting the white tablecloth. He apologised for the wait, and then left them to wait some more.