Wool (61 page)

As she picked her way across the landscape, the sight of the occasional dead seemed sadder now than during that previous hike, more tragic for having shared their home for a while. Juliette was careful not to disturb them, passed them with the solemnity they deserved, wishing she could do more than feel sorry for them.

Eventually, they thinned, and she and the landscape were left alone. Trudging up that windswept hill, the sound of fine soil peppering her helmet became oddly familiar and strangely comforting.
This
was the world in which she lived, in which they all lived. Through the clear dome of her helmet, she saw it all as clearly as it could be seen. The speeding clouds hung angry and gray; sheets of dust whipped sideways and low to the ground; jagged rocks looked like they’d been sheared from some larger piece, perhaps by the machines that had crafted these hills.

When she reached the crest, she paused to take in the vista around her. The wind was fierce up there, her body exposed. She planted her boots wide so she wouldn’t topple over and peered down into the inverted dome before her, at the flattened roof of her home. There was a mix of excitement and dread. The low sun had only barely cleared the distant hills, and the sensor tower below was still in shadow, still in nighttime. She would make it. But before she started down the hill, she found herself gazing, amazed, at the scattering of depressions marching toward the horizon. They were just like the silo schematic, evenly spaced depressions, fifty of them.

And it occurred to her, suddenly and with a violent force, that countless others were going about their days nearby. People
alive
. More silos than just hers and Solo’s. Silos unaware, packed with people waking up for work, going to school, maybe even to cleaning.

She turned in place and took it all in, wondering if maybe there was someone else out on that landscape at the exact same time as her wearing a similar suit, a completely different set of fears racing through their mind. If she could have called out to them, she would have. If she could have waved to all the hidden sensors, she would have.

The world took on a different scope, a new scale, from this height. Her life had been cast away weeks ago, likely should have ended—if not on the slope of that hill in front of her home, then surely in the flooded deeps of silo seventeen. But it hadn’t ended like that. It would probably end here, instead, this morning with Lukas. They might burn in that airlock together if her hunch was wrong. Or they could lie in the crook of that hill and waste away as a couple, a couple whose kinship had been formed by desperate talks lingering into the night, an intense bond between two stranded souls that was never spoken or admitted to.

Juliette had promised herself never to love in secret again, never to love at all. And somehow this time was worse: she had kept it a secret even from him. Even from
herself
.

Maybe it was the proximity of death talking, the reaper buffeting her clear helmet with sand and toxins. What did any of it matter, seeing how wide and full the world was? Her silo would probably go on. Other silos surely would.

A mighty gust of wind struck her, nearly ripping the folded blanket out of her hands. Juliette steadied herself, gathered her wits, and began the much easier descent toward her home. She ducked down below the crest with its sobering views and saddening heights, out of the harsh and caustic winds. She followed that crook where two hills met, winding her way toward the sad sight of a couple buried in plain view, who marked her fateful, desperate, and weary way home.

She arrived at the ramp early. There was no one on the landscape, the sun still hidden behind the hills. As she hurried down the slope, she wondered what anyone would think if they saw her on the sensors, stumbling toward the silo.

At the bottom of the ramp, she stood close to the heavy steel doors and waited. She checked the heat-tape blanket, ran through the procedure in her mind. Every scenario had been thought of during her climb, in her mad dreams, or during the walk through the wild outside. This would work, she told herself. The mechanics were sound. The only reason no one survived a cleaning was because they never had help; they couldn’t bring tools or resources. But she had.

Time seemed to pass not at all. It was like her delicate and precious watch when she forgot to wind it. The trapped soil along the edge of the ramp shifted about impatiently with her, and Juliette wondered if maybe the cleaning had been called off, if she would die alone. That would be better, she told herself. She took a deep breath, wishing she had brought more air, enough for a return trip, just in case. But she had been too worried about the cleaning actually happening to consider that it might not.

After a long wait, her nerves swelling and heart racing, she heard a noise inside, a metallic scraping of gears.

Juliette tensed, her arms rippling with chills, her throat constricting. This was it. She shifted in place, listening to the great grind of those heavy doors as they prepared to disgorge poor Lukas. She unfolded part of the heat blanket and waited. It would all go so quickly. She knew. But she would be in control. No one could come in and stop her.

With a terrible screech, the doors to silo eighteen parted, and a hiss of argon blasted out at her. Juliette leaned into it. The fog consumed her. She pushed blindly forward, groping ahead of herself, the blanket flapping noisily against her chest. She expected to run into him, to find herself wrestling a startled and frightened man, had prepared herself to hold him down, get him wrapped up tightly in the blanket—

But there was no one in the doorway, no body struggling to get out, to get away from the coming purge of flames.

Juliette practically fell into the airlock; her body expected resistance like a boot at the top of a darkened stairway and found empty space instead.

As the argon cleared and the door began to grind shut, she had a brief hope, a tiny fantasy, that there was no cleaning. That the doors had simply been opened for her, welcoming her back. Maybe someone had seen her on the hillside and had taken a chance, had forgiven her, and all would be okay …

But as soon as she could see through the billowing gas, she saw that this was not the case. A man in a cleaning suit was kneeling in the center of the airlock, hands on his thighs, facing the inner door.

Lukas.

Juliette raced to him as a halo of light bloomed in the room, the fire nozzles spitting on and reflecting off the shimmering plastic. The door thunked shut behind her, locking them both inside.

Juliette shook the blanket loose and shuffled around so he could see her, so he would know he wasn’t alone.

The suit couldn’t hide the shock. Lukas startled, his arms leaping up in alarm, even as the flames began to lance out.

She nodded, knowing he could see her through her clear dome, even if she couldn’t see him. With a sweeping twirl she had practiced in her mind a thousand times, she spread the blanket over his head and knelt down swiftly, covering herself as well.

It was dark under the heat tape. The temperature outside was rising. She tried to shout to Lukas that it was going to be okay, but her voice sounded muffled even inside her own helmet. Tucking the edges of the blanket down beneath her knees and feet, she wiggled until it was tightly pinned. She reached forward and tried to tuck the material under him as well, making sure his back was fully protected.

Lukas seemed to know what she was doing. His gloved hands fell to her arms and rested there. She could feel how still he was, how calm. She couldn’t believe he was going to wait, had chosen to burn rather than clean. She couldn’t remember anyone ever making that choice. This worried her as they huddled together in the darkness, everything growing warm.

The flames licked against the heat tape, striking the blanket with enough force to be felt, like a buffeting wind. The temperature shot up, sweat leaping out on her lip and forehead, even with all the superior lining of her suit. The blanket wouldn’t be enough. It wouldn’t keep Lukas alive in his suit. The fear in her heart was only for him, even as her skin began to heat up.

Her panic seemed to leach into him, or maybe he was feeling the burns even worse. His hands trembled against her. And then she literally felt him go mad, felt him change his mind, begin to burn,
something
.

Lukas pushed her away from himself. Bright light entered their protective dome as he began to crawl out from under it, kicking away.

Juliette screamed for him to stop. She scrambled after him, clutching his arm, his leg, his boot, but he kicked out at her, beat her with his fists, frantically tried to get away.

The blanket fell off her head, and the light nearly blinded her. She felt the intense heat, could hear her dome pop and make noises, saw the clear bubble dip in above her and warp. She couldn’t see Lukas, couldn’t feel him, just saw blinding light and felt searing heat, scorching her wherever her suit crinkled against her body. She screamed in pain and yanked the blanket back over her head, covering the clear plastic.

And the flames raged on.

She couldn’t feel him. Couldn’t see him. There would be no way to find him. A thousand burns erupted across her body like so many knives gouging her flesh. Juliette sat alone under that thin film of protection, burning up, enduring the raging flames, and wept hot tears. Her body convulsed with sobs and anger, cursing the fire, the pain, the silo, the entire world.

Until eventually—she had no more tears and the fuel ran its course. The boiling temperature dropped to a mere scalding, and Juliette could safely shrug off the steaming blanket. Her skin felt as if it were on fire. It burned wherever it touched the interior of her suit. She looked for Lukas and found she didn’t have to look far.

He was lying against the door, his suit charred and flaking in the few places it remained intact. His helmet was still in place, saving her the horror of seeing his young face, but it had melted and warped far worse than hers. She crawled closer, aware that the door behind her was opening, that they were coming for her, that it was all over. She had failed.

Juliette whimpered when she saw the places his body had been exposed, the suit and charcoal liners burned away. There was his arm, charred black. His stomach, oddly distended. His tiny hands, so small and thin and burned to a—

No.

She didn’t understand. She wept anew. She threw her gloved and steaming hands against her bubbled dome and cried out in shock, in a mix of anger and blessed relief.

This was not Lukas dead before her.

This was a man who deserved none of her tears.

Awareness, like sporadic jolts of pain from her burns, came and went.

Juliette remembered a billowing fog, boots stomping all around her, lying on her side in the oven of an airlock. She watched the way the world warped out of shape as her helmet, a viscous thing, continued to sag toward her, melting. A bright silver star hovered in her vision, waving as it settled beyond her dome. Peter Billings peered through her helmet at her, shook her scalded shoulders, cried out to the people marching around, telling them to help.

They lifted her up and out of that steaming place, sweat dripping from faces, a melted suit cut from her body.

Juliette floated through her old office like a ghost. Flat on her back, the squeal of a fussy wheel below her, past the rows and rows of steel bars, an empty bench in an empty cell.

They carried her in circles.

Down.

She woke to the beeping of her heart, these machines checking in on her, a man dressed like her father.

He was the first to notice that she was awake. His eyebrows lifted, a smile, a nod to someone over her shoulder.

And Lukas was there, his face—so familiar, so strange—was in her blurry vision. She felt his hand in hers. She knew that hand had been there awhile, that he had been there awhile. He was crying and laughing, brushing her cheek. Jules wanted to know what was so funny. What was so sad. He just shook his head as she drifted back to sleep.

It wasn’t just that the burns were bad; it was that they were everywhere.

The days of recovery were spent sliding in and out of painkiller fogs.

Every time she saw Lukas, she apologized. Everyone was making a fuss. Peter came. There were piles of notes from down deep, but nobody was allowed up. Nobody else could see her but the man dressed like her father and women who reminded her of her mother.

Her head cleared quickly once they let it.

Juliette came out of what felt like a deep dream, weeks of haze, nightmares of drowning and burning, of being outside, of dozens of silos just like hers. The drugs had kept the pain at bay—but had dulled her consciousness, too. She didn’t mind the stings and aches if it meant winning back her mind. It was an easy trade.

“Hey.”

She flopped her head to the side—and Lukas was there. Was he ever not? A blanket fell from his chest as he leaned forward, held her hand. He smiled.

“You’re looking better.”

Juliette licked her lips. Her mouth was dry.

“Where am I?”

“The infirmary on thirty-three. Just take it easy. Do you want me to get you anything?”

She shook her head. It felt amazing to be able to move, to respond to words. She tried to squeeze his hand.

“I’m sore,” she said weakly.

Lukas laughed. He looked relieved to hear this. “I bet.”

She blinked and looked at him. “There’s an infirmary on thirty-three?” His words were on a delay.

He nodded gravely. “I’m sorry, but it’s the best in the silo. And we could keep you safe. But forget that. Rest. I’ll go grab the nurse.”

He stood, a thick book spilling from his lap and tumbling into the chair, burying itself in the blanket and pillows.

“Do you think you can eat?”

She nodded, turned her head back to face the ceiling and the bright lights, everything coming back to her, memories popping up like the tingle of pain on her skin.