48
• Silo 18 •
BEFORE HE WENT anywhere, Mission needed to get in touch with friends he could trust, anyone who might be able to help, the old gang from the Nest. As Morgan urged everyone on the landing back to work, Mission slunk down the dark and smoky hallway towards the sorting room, which had a computer he might be able to use. Lyn and Joel followed, more eager to find out about Rodny than to clean up after the fire.
They checked the monitor at the sorting counter and saw that the computer was down, possibly from the power outage the night before. Mission remembered all those people with their broken computers earlier that morning at IT and wondered if there would be a working machine anywhere on five levels. Since he couldn’t send a wire, he picked up the hard line to the other Dispatch offices to see if they could get a message out for him.
He tried Central first. Lyn stood with him at the counter, her flashlight illuminating the dials, piercing the haze of smoke in the room. Joel splashed among the shelves, moving the reusable sorting crates on the bottom higher up to keep them from getting wet. There was no response from Central.
‘Maybe the fire got the radio too,’ she whispered.
Mission didn’t think so. The power light was on and the speaker was making that crackling sound when he squeezed the button. He heard Morgan splash past in the hallway, yelling and complaining that his workforce was disappearing. Lyn cupped her hand over her flashlight. ‘Something is going on at Central,’ he told Lyn. He had a bad feeling.
The second way station he tried up top finally won a response. ‘Who’s this?’ someone asked, their voice shaking with barely concealed panic.
‘This is Mission. Who’s this?’
‘Mission? You’re in big trouble, man.’
Mission glanced up at Lyn. ‘Who is this?’
‘This is Robbie. They left me alone up here, man. I haven’t heard from anybody. But everyone’s looking for you. What’s going on down there in Lower?’
Joel stopped with the crates and trained his flashlight on the counter.
‘Everyone’s looking for me?’ Mission asked.
‘You and Cam, a few of the others. There was some kind of fight at Central. Were you there for that? I can’t get word from anyone!’
‘Robbie, I need you to get in touch with some friends of mine. Can you send out a wire? Something’s wrong with our computers down here.’
‘No, ours are all kind of sideways. We’ve been having to use the terminal up at the mayor’s office. It’s the only one working.’
‘The mayor’s office? Okay, I need you to send a couple of wires, then. You got something to write with?’
‘Wait,’ Robbie said. ‘These are official wires, right? If not, I don’t have the authority—’
‘Dammit, Robbie, this is important! Grab something to write with. I’ll pay you back. They can dock me for it if they want.’ Mission glanced up at Lyn, who was shaking her head in disbelief. He coughed into his fist, the smoke tickling his throat.
‘All right, all right,’ Robbie said. ‘Who’m I sending this to? And you owe me for this piece of paper because that’s all I have to write on.’
Mission let go of the transmit button to curse the kid. He thought about who would be most likely to get a wire and send it along to the others. He ended up giving Robbie three names, then told him what to write. He would have his friends meet him at the Nest, or meet each other if he couldn’t make it there himself. The Nest had to be safe. Nobody would attack the school or the Crow. Once the gang was together, they could figure out what to do. Maybe the Crow would know what to do. The hardest part for Mission would be working out how to join them.
‘You got all that?’ he asked Robbie when the boy didn’t reply.
‘Yeah, yeah, man. I think you’re gonna be over the character limit, though. This better come out of your pay.’
Mission shook his head in disbelief.
‘Now what?’ Lyn asked as he hung up the receiver.
‘I need overalls,’ Mission said. He splashed around the counter and joined Joel by the shelves, began searching through the nearest crates. ‘They’re looking for me, so I’m gonna need new colours if I’m getting up there.’
‘We,’ Lyn told him. ‘We need new colours. If you’re going to the Nest, I’m coming with you.’
‘Me too,’ Joel said.
‘I appreciate that,’ Mission said, ‘but company might make it more dangerous. We’d be more conspicuous.’
‘Yeah, but they’re looking for you,’ Lyn said.
‘Hey, we have a ton of these new whites.’ Joel pulled the lid off a sorting bin. ‘But they’ll just make us stand out, won’t they?’
‘Whites?’ Mission headed over to see what Joel was talking about.
‘Yeah. For Security. We’ve been moving a ton of these lately. Came down from Garment a few days ago. No idea why they made up so many.’
Mission checked the overalls. The ones on top were covered in soot, more grey than white. There were dozens of them stacked in the sorting crate. He remembered all the new hires. It was as if they wanted half the silo dressed in white and the other half fighting one another. It made no sense. Unless the idea was to get everyone killed.
‘Killed,’ Mission said. He splashed down the shelves to another crate. ‘I’ve got a better idea.’ He found the right bin – he and Cam had been given one of these just a few days ago. He reached in and pulled out a bag. ‘How would you two like to make some money?’
Joel and Lyn hurried over to see what he’d found and Mission held up one of the heavy plastic bags with the bright silver zipper and the hauling straps.
‘Three hundred and eighty-four chits to divide between you,’ he promised. ‘Every chit I own. I just need you for one last tandem.’
The two porters played their lights across the object in his hands. It was a black bag. A black bag made for carrying the dead.