41
• Silo 18 •
MISSION MADE RECORD time downbound. It helped that traffic was light, but it wasn’t a good sign that he didn’t pass Cam on the way. The kid must’ve had a good head start. Either that, or Mission had gotten lucky and had overtaken him while he was off the stairway for a bathroom break.
Pausing for a moment on the landing outside of Supply, Mission caught his breath and dabbed the sweat from his neck. He still hadn’t had his shower. Maybe after he found Cam and took care of this job in Mechanical, he could get cleaned up and get some proper rest. Lower Dispatch would have a change of clothes for him, and then he could figure out what to do about Rodny. So much to think about. A blessing that it took his mind off his birthday.
Inside Supply, he found a handful of people waiting at the counter. No sign of Cam. If the boy had come and gone already, he must’ve flown, and the delivery must have been heading further down. Mission tapped his foot and waited his turn. Once at the counter, he asked for Joyce, just like Wyck had said. The man pointed to a heavyset woman with long braids at the other end of the counter. Mission recognized her. She handled a lot of the flow of equipment marked special for IT. He waited until she was done with her customer, then asked for any deliveries under the name of Wyck.
She narrowed her eyes at him. ‘You got a glitch at Dispatch?’ she asked. ‘Done handed that one off.’ She waved for the next person in line.
‘Could you tell me where it was heading?’ Mission asked. ‘I was sent to relieve the other guy. His . . . his mother is sick. They’re not sure if she’s gonna make it.’
Mission winced at the lie. The lady behind the counter twisted her mouth in disbelief.
‘Please,’ he begged. ‘It really is important.’
She hesitated. ‘It was going six flights down to an apartment. I don’t have the exact number. It was on the delivery report.’
‘Six down.’ Mission knew the level. One-sixteen was residential except for the handful of less-than-legal businesses being run out of a few apartments. ‘Thanks,’ he said. He slapped the counter and hurried towards the exit. It was on his way to Mechanical, anyway. He might be too late for Wyck’s delivery, but he could ask Cam if he might pick up the pay for him, offer him a vacation chit in return. Or he could just flat out tell him an old friend was in trouble, and he needed to get through security. If not, he’d have to wait for an IT request to hit Dispatch and be the first to jump on it. And he’d have to hope that Rodny had that much time.
He was four levels down, formulating a dozen such plans, when the blast went off.
The great stairwell lurched as if thrown sideways. Mission slammed against the rail and nearly went over. He wrapped his arms around the trembling steel and held on.
There was a shriek, a chorus of groans. He watched, his head out in the space beyond the railing, as the landing two levels below twisted away from the staircase. The metal sang and cried out as it was ripped free and went tumbling into the depths.
More than one body plummeted after. The receding figures performed cartwheels in space.
Mission tore himself away from the sight. A few steps down from him, a woman remained on her hands and knees, looking up at Mission with wild and frightened eyes. There was a distant crash, impossibly far below.
I don’t know, he wanted to say. There was that question in her eyes, the same one pounding in his skull, echoing with the sound of the blast. What the hell just happened? Is this it? Has it begun?
He considered running up, away from the explosion, but there were screams coming from below and a porter had a duty to those on the stairwell in need. He helped the woman to her feet and bid her upward. Already the smell of something acrid and the haze of smoke were filling the air. ‘Go,’ he urged, and then he spiralled down against the sudden flow of upward traffic. Cam was down there. Where his friend had gone with the package and where the blast had occurred were still coincidence in Mission’s rattled mind.
The landing below held a crush of people. Residents and shopkeeps crowded out of the doors and fought for a spot at the rail that they might gaze over at the wreckage one flight further down. Mission fought his way through, yelling Cam’s name, keeping an eye out for his friend. A bedraggled couple staggered up to the crowded landing with hollow eyes, clutching the railing and each other. He didn’t see Cam anywhere.
He raced down five turns of the central post, his normally deft feet stumbling on the slick treads, around and around. It’d been the level Cam was heading towards, right? Six down. Level one-sixteen. He would be okay. He must be okay. And then the sight of those people tumbling through the air flashed in Mission’s mind. It was an image he knew he’d never forget. Surely Cam wasn’t among them. The boy was late or early to everything, never right on time.
He made the last turn, and where the next landing should have been was empty space. The rails of the great spiral staircase had been ripped outward before parting. A few of the steps sagged away from the central post, and Mission could feel a pull towards the edge, the void clawing at him. There was nothing there to stop him from going over. The steel felt slick beneath his boots.
Across a gap of torn and twisted steel, the doorway to one-sixteen was missing. In its place stood a pocket of crumbling cement and dark iron bars bent outward like hands reaching for the vanished landing. White powder drifted down from the ceiling beyond the rubble. Unbelievably, there were sounds beyond the veil of dust: coughs and shouts. Screams for help.
‘Porter!’ someone yelled from above.
Mission carefully slid to the edge of the sloping and bent steps. He held the railing where it had been torn free. It was warm to the touch. Leaning out, he studied the crowd fifty feet above him at the next landing, searching for the person who had called out for him.
Someone pointed when they spotted him leaning out, spotted the ’chief around his neck.
‘There he is!’ a woman shrieked, one of the mad-eyed women who had staggered past him as he hurried down, one of those who had survived. ‘The porter did it!’ she yelled.