ust (Silo, #3)(115)

Away from the tower, Solo and Walker wrestled with some kind of fabric enclosure and a set of poles, sorting out how it was supposed to prop itself up. They scratched their beards and debated. Juliette was amazed at how much better Walker was doing. He hadn’t wanted out of his suit at first, had stayed in until the oxygen bottle went dry. And then he’d come out in a gasping hurry.

Elise was near them, screaming and chasing through the grass after her animal. Or maybe it was Shaw chasing Elise – it was hard to tell. Hannah sat on a large plastic bin with Rickson, nursing her child and gazing up at the clouds.

The smell of heating food wafted around the tower as Fitz managed to coax a fire from one of the oxygen bottles, a most dangerous method of cooking, Juliette thought. She turned to go back inside and sort through more of the gear, when Courtnee emerged from the bunker with her flashlight in hand and a smile on her face. Before Juliette could ask what she’d found, she saw that the power inside the tower was now on, the lights burning bright.

“What did you do?” Juliette asked. They had explored the bunker down to the bottom – it was only twenty levels deep, and the levels were so crazily packed together that it was more like seven levels tall. At the bottom they had found not a mechanical space but rather a large and empty cavern where twin stairwells bottomed out onto bare rock. It was a landing spot for a digger, someone had guessed. A place to welcome new arrivals. No generator, though. No power. Even though the stairwell and levels were rigged with lights.

“I traced the feed,” Courtnee said. “It goes up to those silver sheets of metal on the roof. I’m going to have the boys clear them off, see how they work.”

Before long, a moving platform sitting in the middle of the stairwell was made operational. It slid up and down by a series of cables and counterweights and a small motor. Those from Mechanical marveled at the device, and the kids wouldn’t get off the thing. They insisted on riding it just one more time. Moving supplies outside and into the grass became far less tiring, though Juliette kept thinking they should leave plenty for the next to arrive, if anyone ever did.

There were those who wanted to live right there, who were reticent to venture any further. They had seeds and more soil than reckoning, and the storerooms could be turned into apartments. It would be a good home. Juliette listened to them debate this.

It was Elise who settled the matter. She opened her book to a map, pointed to the sun and showed them which way was north, and said they should move toward water. She claimed to know how to gather wild fish, said there were worms in the ground and Solo knew how to put them on hooks. Pointing to a page in her memory book, she said they should walk to the sea.

Adults pored over these maps and this decision. There was another round of debates among those who thought they should shelter right there, but Juliette shook her head. “This isn’t a home,” she said. “It’s just a warehouse. Do we want to live in the shadow of that?” She nodded to the dark cloud on the horizon, that dome of dust.

“And what about when others show up?” someone pointed out.

“More reason not to be here,” Rickson offered.

More debate. There were just over a hundred of them. They could stay there and farm, get a crop up before the canned goods ran out. Or they could carry what they needed and see if the legends of unlimited fish and of water that stretched to the horizon were true. Juliette nearly pointed out that they could do both, that there were no rules, that there was plenty of land and space, that all the fighting came when things were running low and resources were scarce.

“What’s it going to be, Mayor?” Raph asked. “We bedding down here or moving on?”

“Look!”

Someone pointed up the hill, and a dozen heads turned to see. There, over the rise, a figure in a silver suit stumbled down the slope, the grass at their feet already trampled and slick. Someone from their silo who had changed their mind.

Juliette raced through the grass, feeling not fear but curiosity and concern. Someone they’d left behind, someone who had followed them. It could be anyone.

Before she could close the distance, the figure in the suit collapsed. Gloved hands groped to release the helmet, fumbled with the collar. Juliette ran. There was a large bottle strapped to the person’s back. She worried they were out of air, wondered what they had rigged up and how.

“Easy,” she yelled, dropping behind the struggling figure. She pressed her thumbs into the clasps. They clicked. She pulled the helmet free and heard someone gasping and coughing. They bent forward, wheezing, a spill of sweat-soaked hair, a woman. Juliette rested a hand on this woman’s shoulder, did not recognize her at all – thought it was perhaps someone from the congregation or the Mids.

“Breathe easy,” she said. She looked up as others arrived. They pulled up short at the sight of this stranger.

The woman wiped her mouth and nodded. Her chest heaved with a deep breath. Another. She brushed the hair off her face. “Thank you,” she gasped. She peered up at the sky and the clouds in something other than wonder. In relief. Her eyes focused on and tracked an object, and Juliette turned and gazed up to see another of the birds wheeling lazily in the sky. The crowd around her kept their distance. Someone asked who this was.

“You aren’t from our silo, are you?” Juliette asked. Her first thought was that this was a cleaner from a nearby silo who had witnessed their march, had followed them. Her second thought was impossible. It was also correct.