Second Shift: Order (Shift, #2)(3)

The landing on nineteen was crowded as a jam of people attempted to squeeze inside the farms for the day’s food. Standing apart from them was a mother in farmer green cradling a wailing child. She had the stains on her knees of a picker and the agitated look of one sent out of the grow plots to soothe her noisy brood. As Mission crowded past, he heard between the baby’s cries the words of a familiar nursery rhyme. The mother rocked the child frightfully close to the railing, the infant’s eyes wide with what looked to Mission like unadulterated fear.

He worked his way through the crowd, and the cries from the infant receded amid the general din. It occurred to Mission how few kids he saw anymore. It wasn’t like when he was young. There had been an explosion of newborns after the violence the last generation had wrought, but now it was just the trickle of natural deaths and the handful of lottery winners. It meant fewer babies crying and fewer parents rejoicing.

With much cajoling and claiming the passage of a porter, he eventually made it through the doors and into the main hall. Using his ‘chief, Mission wiped the sweat from his lips. He’d forgotten to top up his canteen a level below, and his mouth was dry. The reasons for pushing so swift a pace felt silly now. It was as if his looming birthday were some deadline to beat, and so the sooner he visited and got away the better. But now in the wash of sights and sounds from his childhood, his dark and angry thoughts melted. It was home, and Mission hated how good it felt to be there.

There were a few hellos and waves as he worked his way toward the gates. Some porters he knew were loading sacks of fruits and vegetables to haul up to the cafeteria. He saw his aunt working one of the vending stalls outside the security gate. After giving up chipping, she now performed the questionably legal act of vending, something she’d never shadowed for. Mission did his best not to catch her eye; he didn’t want to get sucked into a lecture or have his hair mussed and his ’chief straightened.

Beyond the stalls, a handful of younger kids clustered in the far corner where it was dark, probably dealing seeds, not looking nearly as inconspicuous as they likely thought. The entire scene in the entrance hall was one of a second bazaar, of farmers selling direct, of people crowding in from distant levels to get food they feared would never make it to their shops and stores. It was fear begetting fear, crowds becoming throngs, and it was easy to see how mobs were next.

Working the main security gate was Frankie, a tall and skinny kid Mission had grown up with. Mission wiped his forehead with the front of his undershirt, which was already cool and damp with sweat. “Hey, Frankie,” he called out.

“Mission.” A nod and a smile. No hard feelings from another kid who’d jumped shadows long ago. Frankie’s father worked in security, down in IT. Frankie had wanted to become a farmer, which Mission never understood. Their teacher, Mrs. Crowe, had been delighted and had encouraged Frankie to follow his dreams. And now Mission found it ironic that Frankie had ended up working security for the farms. It was as if he couldn’t escape what he’d been born to do.

Mission smiled and nodded at Frankie’s hair. “Did someone splash you with grow quick”

Frankie tugged on his locks, which were nearly down to his shoulders. “I know, right My mother threatens to come up here and knife it in my sleep.”

“Tell her I’ll hold you down while she does it,” Mission said, laughing. “Buzz me through”

There was a wider gate to the side for wheelbarrows and trolleys. Mission didn’t feel like squeezing through the turnstiles with the massive pump strapped to his back. Frankie hit a button, and the gate buzzed. Mission pushed his way through.

“Whatcha haulin’” Frankie asked.

“Water pump from Winters. How’ve you been”

Frankie scanned the crowds beyond the gate. “Hold on a sec,” he said, looking for someone. Two farmers swiped their work badges and marched through the turnstiles, jabbering away. Sweat dripped from Mission’s nose. Frankie waved over someone in green and asked if they could cover for him while he went to the bathroom.

“C’mon,” Frankie told Mission. “Walk me.”

The two old friends headed down the main hall toward the bright aura of distant grow lights. The smells were intoxicating and familiar. Mission wondered what those same smells meant to Frankie, who had grown up six levels down near the fetid stink of the water plant. Perhaps this reeked to him the way the plant did to Mission. Perhaps the water plant brought back fond memories, instead.

“Things are going nuts around here,” Frankie whispered once they were away from the gates.

Mission nodded. “Yeah, I saw a few more stalls had sprouted up. More of them every day, huh”

Frankie held Mission’s arm and slowed their pace so they’d have more time to talk. There was the smell of fresh bread from one of the offices. It was too far from the bakery for warm bread, but such was the new way of things. Probably ground the flour somewhere deep in the farms.

“You’ve seen what they’re doing up in the cafe, right” Frankie asked.

“I took a load up that way a few weeks ago,” Mission said. He tucked his thumbs under his shoulder straps and wiggled the heavy pump higher onto his hips. “I saw they were building something by the wallscreens. Didn’t see what.”

“They’re starting sprouts up there,” Frankie said. “Corn, too, supposedly.” They stopped by the public restrooms. The sound of a loud flush on the other side of the wall flicked a switch inside Mission’s bladder and made him need to go.