First Shift: Legacy (Shift, #1)(28)

“Sir, we’ve got a breach. The outer door, sir.”

“Fire the canisters now,” Troy said.

Saul radioed the control room down the hall and relayed the message. The view of the airlock filled with a white fog.

“Secure the server room,” Troy added. “Lock it down.”

He had this portion of the Order memorized.

“Make sure we have a recent backup just in case. And put them on our power.”

“Yessir.”

Those in the room who had something to do seemed less anxious than the others, who were left shifting about nervously while they watched and listened.

“Where’s my outside view?” Troy asked.

The mist-filled scene of people pushing on one another’s backs through a white cloud was replaced with an expansive shot of the outside, of a claustrophobic crowd scampering across a dry land, of people collapsing to their knees, clawing at their faces and their throats, a billowing fog rising up from the teeming ramp.

No one in the comm room moved or said a word. There was a soft cry from the hallway. Troy shouldn’t have allowed them to stay and watch. What was the point?

“Okay,” he said. “Shut it down.”

The overweight man shimmering with sweat fumbled with his keypad. Someone coughed into their fist. The view of the outside went black. There was no point in watching the crowd fight their way back in, no reason to witness the hills while they were coated in those who managed to make it that far.

“I want to know why it happened.” Troy turned and studied those in the room. “I want to know, and I want to know what we do to prevent this next time.” He handed the folder and the microphone back to the men at their stations. “Don’t tell the other silo Heads just yet. Not until we have answers for the questions they’ll have.”

Saul raised his hand. “What about the people in 12?”

“The only difference between the people in Silo 12 and the people in Silo 13 is that there won’t be future generations growing up in Silo 12. That’s it. Everyone in all the silos will eventually die. We all die, Saul. Even us. Today was just their day.” He nodded to the dark monitor and tried not to picture what was really going on over there. “We knew this would happen, and it won’t be the last. Let’s concentrate on the others. Learn from it.”

There were nods. Saul wiped his brow, then the seat of his pants.

“Individual reports by the end of this shift,” Troy said, feeling for the first time that he was actually in charge of something. “And if anyone from 12’s IT staff can be raised, debrief them as much as you can. I want to know who, why, and how.”

Several of the exhausted people in the room stiffened before trying to look busy. The gathering in the hallway shrank back as they realized the show was over and the boss was heading their way.

The boss.

Troy felt the fullness of his position for the first time, the heavy weight of responsibility. There were murmurs and sidelong glances as he headed back toward his office. There were nods of sympathy and approval, men thankful that they occupied lower posts. Troy strode past them all. He turned the corner, dodging the man on the ladder, who had moved a few fixtures down to replace another bulb.

More will go out, Troy thought. For all their careful engineering, there was no way to make a thing infallible. The best they could do is plan ahead, stockpile spares, not mourn the dark and lifeless cylinder as it was discarded and others were turned to with hope.

Back in his office, he closed the door and leaned back against it for a moment. His shoulders stuck to his coveralls with the light sweat worked up from the swift walk. He took a few deep breaths before crossing to his desk and resting his hand on his copy of the Order. The fear persisted that they’d gotten it all wrong. How could a room full of doctors plan for everything? Would it really get easier as the generations went along, as people forgot and the mad whispers from the original survivors faded?

Troy wasn’t so sure. He looked over at his wall of schematics, that large blueprint showing all the silos spread out amid the hills, fifty circles spaced out like stars on an old flag he had once served. It was an underground metropolis of sunken skyscrapers, of people completely cut off from one another and from the barren world.

A powerful tremor coursed through Troy’s body: his shoulders, elbows, and hands twitched. He gripped the edge of his desk until it passed. Opening the top drawer, he fished through his pens until he found a red marker. He crossed to the large schematic, the shivers still wracking his chest.

Before he could consider the permanence of what he was about to do, before he could consider that this mark of his would be on display for every future shift, left to glare down at those who manned this rudderless desk, before he could consider that this may become a trend, an act taken by the other silo Heads, a shared mark of their collective failure, he drew a bold ‘X’ through Silo 12.

The marker squealed as it was dragged violently across the paper. It seemed to cry out with a distant and mournful voice.

Troy blinked away the blurry vision of the red X and sagged to his knees. He bent forward until his forehead was against the tall spread of papers, old plans rustling and crinkling as his chest shook, not with shivers, but with sobs.

With his hands in his lap, shoulders bent with the weight of another job he’d been pressured into, the pills shrinking away from the force of his sadness, Troy cried. He bawled as silently as he could so those across the hall wouldn’t hear.