by Ann Christy
Greta somehow managed to combine a nod and a shake of the head into the same motion. It was the picture of uncertainty. Marina stepped toward the board and looked for herself. She found the burial of Graham directly on the line connecting three of the timelines. She pointed to it and asked, “How did you get that? I didn’t find that.”
In response, Greta dug through the pile of open books spread across the table. She retrieved one that Marina had put into the interest pile the day before. It was the one with the strange misspellings and handwriting. “I found a similar problem, though not as bad as this one, in several of the other books. They all seemed to last about the same amount of time. So I went back to the original book you found the burial record in and found this.”
She pulled out the book in question, the one they had started calling the Burial Book, even though all the other farm books also detailed burials, toward her on the table. It was already open to the burial page. All of them had looked at it so many times they had the shape the entries made memorized. She flipped it forward a few pages and pointed to the entries. “If you look at this one closely, you’ll see the same thing. The handwriting isn’t much changed, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense when you try to read it,” she said.
Greta waved her arm across the table to indicate all the books arrayed there and said, “They all have it. Every single dirt farm has this period of strangeness. One of them even has an entry where a farmer says he dreamed he had a child but woke up and there wasn’t one.”
“Could everyone have had Remediation? That can’t happen, right?” Marina asked.
Piotr shook his head and responded, “No way. That wouldn’t even be possible that I’m aware of. Who would do it? Who would monitor the people?”
“Right,” Greta agreed. “Whatever this was it seems very unlikely that it would just occur to farms like that at different times. While I really dislike saying these words, I have to assume that this was a silo-wide occurrence. Or else it affected all the farms at the same time.”
Taylor broke in. “No way. If all the farmers just started going loopy someone else would have written something or there would be some evidence of it being corrected. Like a gap or something. This just trickles off in all the books.”
Greta nodded again.
“But what about that timeline? That isn’t very long ago. I mean, it is, but not really. I thought the First Heroes were…I don’t know…like thousands of years ago or something,” Marina said. It made her uneasy that the length of that timeline was so short.
The historian sighed. “That’s what is making me feel very uncomfortable. Taylor was right. Given the uncertainty of using ‘Orchard Years’, this looks like 110 years, 130 at most, when Graham died. And since we are given to understand that he died in the battle…”
“Then the time of the First Heroes is only three times as old as I am,” Piotr said.
“How could we get that so wrong?” Taylor asked, sounding as confused as he looked.
With a shrug, Greta said, “I think that all those entries that looked like they were done by remediation are probably how that happened. I’m thinking the entire silo got remediated and somehow history got changed.”
Taylor had begun shaking his head as she said the words. As soon as she was done he burst out, “No. Not possible.”
Marina didn’t want to get into an argument so she interrupted it before it could begin. “Whatever. It doesn’t matter in the details. It only matters that it changes our timeline. Because you’re missing the big picture here, Taylor. If it happened that recently, then that means that the Others were aggressively seeking our destruction not too long ago.”
“And,” Piotr took up the thread, “then it is possible that the nuke or whatever it was didn’t happen as far back as we think either.”
“Exactly!” Marina exclaimed and gave him a grim smile.
“Assuming all this is true, what next?” asked Piotr.
“Now we see what we can find that goes back further. We see if we can find the First People,” Greta said and slammed the book closed.
Chapter Fifteen
Marina went home and enjoyed a few days with her family after two solid weeks of work. Piotr and Taylor had also gone home, each of them having family to see. Taylor seemed to anticipate seeing his cat more than his parents or girlfriend, which earned him some well-deserved teasing.
So wrapped up in what they were doing were they that they might not have taken any time off, except that Marina’s husband kept coming up to ask when he might expect her. The last time it was said with a certain tone that made Marina think he was asking if she was ever coming home. They all really did need a break, no matter how momentous their discoveries.
As relieved as she was to see her own compartment and her daughter, she was almost immediately anxious to return to work. It was hard to refrain from talking about what she was doing with her family. Joseph made it easy on her by steering the conversation gently away whenever it started to come up. She overheard him having a stern conversation with Sela after he’d had to do that several times, telling her she needed to stop asking about it. She was grateful for his understanding, but sorry it had to be that way.
Understanding or not, she felt a gap between them that hadn’t been there before. It was like her duties at the Memoriam were a barrier between them. Even during her two nights at home, when she rested her head on his chest and his arm encircled her the way it had almost every night of their adult lives, she felt he wasn’t entirely with her. It wasn’t anything she could pin down or describe exactly. It was more like a distance had developed between them that she worried she had caused. Never one to shy away from intimacy, he hadn’t even given her the slightest hint he desired her in that way. At bedtime she was left with no idea that he had anything on his mind other than sleep.
It wasn’t all awkwardness and distance, however. The ingredients for a favorite meal were waiting for her and she prepared it for them her first night home. The next day was a day off for Joseph and Sela so they spent the entire day together, strolling the bazaar and doing a little shopping. They listened to a truly wretched series of poems that all seemed to be written under the inspiration of unrequited love. They watched a puppet show that had them all in stitches. They ate their supper at one of the little food stalls, standing around a wobbly table and trying not to let their noses run as they dipped hot fried corn cakes into a spicy sauce.
Marina had never learned the art of creating these kind of sauces, a combination of savory and sweet and hot so delicious and tempting it was worth the red eyes and loose sinuses. To go with it they shared a skewer of rabbit meat marinated in something even more delicious. Even though rabbit was the least costly meat within the silo, it was still very dear and they savored each morsel. To cool their burning mouths, they each had water flavored with a small chunk of dehydrated lemon in it. Lemon water wasn’t as dear, but it was a unanimous family favorite and treat.
They shopped for the fruits and vegetables and other goods the family would need with Marina gone. She ensured she selected things easier and faster to prepare than she might otherwise have. With her not there, they would need to be able to confidently feed themselves. Joseph was only a passable cook and they had been eating in the cafeteria more while Marina was gone. It showed in their moods and puffy faces.
As they made their way back up the stairs to their level and compartment, sated and happy, Marina felt the smallest bit of the barrier between them fall away. It didn’t last though, and by the time they were saying goodnight to Sela and getting ready for bed, she felt the distance again.
When Marina kissed him goodbye as he went for his shift on the morning of her departure, she could sense the questions in him. She had no idea how to make it right. Instead, she lifted a hand, cupped his cheek and said, “I’ll be back. I promise. This work won’t last forever.”
She could tell from his expression that this didn’t give him the answers he wanted. A resigned s
ort of expression came over his face and he said, “I love you. Come home soon.” He smiled then, but it wasn’t a big smile or a very genuine one. He added, “Don’t make me come up there and get you again.”
Marina returned the smile but felt hers probably looked as real as his did. “I won’t. Love you.”
She felt guilty at how relieved she was when she closed the door behind him and was alone with her thoughts. It had been a strain for her to contain her excitement for her work. It was a like a low level drain on her energy to remain guarded. For the first time since the day she first kissed Joseph, she had a momentary wish that she was unencumbered. It was just a quick moment and she knocked on the concrete wall absently for luck so she wouldn’t get her wish.
She had everything she really needed but she wanted a few of the niceties she had come to rely on as part of her daily life. She added a spare pot of lavender soap to her pack and grabbed a few more kerchiefs. She selected colorful ones with interesting designs on them that she had been shy of wearing before. Tucked inside the private world of the archives, she wouldn’t feel quite so observed if she wore these. Given the dust situation, with constant sneezes and runny noses that came with it, she needed more kerchiefs than she had brought.
Next to their bed rested a little sketch of the family in a valuable fruitwood frame. An heirloom on Joseph’s side of the family, she wondered if she should take the delicate thing with her. She supposed she could just take out the sketch, drawn when Sela was still small enough to ride around on Marina’s hip. To Marina, that sketch was far more valuable than the frame. Before she could think too much more about it, she plucked it up from the little table and wrapped it in a spare undershirt. He would understand, she was sure.
She toured the compartment she had lived in for her entire adult life. Sela’s room was far messier than she probably would have allowed if she had been home. She made a mental note to jot down for her to clean it on their chalkboard before she left. The laundry that was hand washed at home was strung up on the lines across both bedrooms. It had been done only haphazardly during her absence and she felt it was the least she could do for them while she was home. She just hoped they would actually take it down and put it away when it was dry rather than simply pull things down as needed as she suspected they might do.
Marina sighed and went to their sitting area. Her knitting book was still on the shelf and it was overdue. The library at the bazaar was how writers made their money but it depended on those that used the library following the rules to make it profitable. A writer would painstakingly copy out an extra copy of their book and give it to the library. In return, the writer received half of the proceeds of the lending. Given the cost of paper and ink and the economical nature of the borrowing, it might take a year or more for a writer to break even on their work. Her keeping a book long past the due date pushed that day further out for the author. She decided to pay the cost of a lift-post to the library for the book and include a few chits as payment for her tardiness.
On the wall there was a new and bright spot of color she liked very much. The picture of the view that Joseph had selected was done by someone with real talent. He had laughed when she was surprised at how wonderful the picture he brought home was. It was drawn in vivid colors and showed the orange and red of the setting sun glaring on the sensors. It was really quite beautiful.
Outside there were still a few bits of color and glass that must have once been cleaners of long ago but those were just lumps in the landscape in this picture. Cleaners that gave the gift now went where sensors had burned out before they joined with the world. Those left inside never saw that part of the gift, which was as it should be.
Still, she remembered asking about the mysterious objects in the view as a child. Grandy had looked almost embarrassed as she explained it. It was like she was trying to describe a puppy making messes before they learned to use the mats. She said the people of the silo didn’t know enough to join the world out of view in the dim past.
In this picture there was nothing to show that, just long shadows over the ridges of wind-blown sand and rocks. The sun was a burst of light that put a white star of radiating lines on the view where it hit the sensors too directly. It was beautiful and stark and perfect. She wondered if people who made their living by drawing the view for the tourists were influenced by so much viewing of the outside. She wondered if they went to remediation more than others. If she saw this beautiful sight every day when the sun finished its daily trip and went to sink away she might start to want to go out and see it in real life. She would have bet some of them did, too.
She drained her morning tea, washed the dishes and wrote her notes on the board. Ready to go, she was now strangely reluctant whereas before she had just wanted to get moving. She shook it off, grabbed her pack and left her compartment behind.
*****
In her absence, Greta had not been relaxing. Though she took a mandatory day off, she used that time to send lift-posts back and forth to the council containing bits and pieces of their evidence for their review. Eventually, the lift-workers began to complain that her urgent posts were ruining their cargo schedule and making the post late for everyone else. Whatever the delays, she had managed to get the council, minus the two who were here doing the work, up to date on their progress.
Marina made it back and entered the archives in good time. Her legs had recovered completely and she made sure she did the exercises recommended by the medic every morning and the stretches he advised before bed. She was determined not to be hobbled by the stairs again. She was gratified to feel no more than a pleasant ache in her thighs from the climb.
Piotr and Taylor hadn’t returned, but were expected soon and Greta had already been at work for hours. She glanced up absently to greet Marina but then looked up again and complimented her on her colorful kerchief. In reply, Marina pulled another out of her pocket, this one a dyed a bright blue with a starburst of orange that reminded her of the picture in her compartment. She handed it to Greta.
Greta unfolded the kerchief and smiled down at it, running her fingers around the circle of bright orange as if she knew what Marina had meant when she selected it. “Thank you. It’s beautiful.” She took off the plain tan one she had around her neck and tied on the new one. She gave the knot a little twist to put it at the side and asked, “Look okay?”
Marina bobbed her head and said, “Perfect.”
They paused a beat, conversation now difficult to start. Presents were sometimes an awkward business and this one had no occasion to go with it. Marina just felt like Greta had given her so much by opening this world to her. However dusty and old and disorganized, it was a place full of wonders. She cleared her throat to hide her emotion and asked, “What are we doing today?”
Greta sighed and gave the book in front of her a little tap. Then she looked up at the rest of the piles on the table and around her feet. The piles were much expanded from when Marina was last here. The historian pointed to a pile of books on the other end of the table and said, “You can start with those. I went back through and kept the timeline we constructed in mind and found some additional references. I think we can work backward a bit more.”
Marina inclined her head to show compliance but didn’t quite know what she would be looking for. The books weren’t the farm books she had been working on. Instead they were maintenance logs. Big ones.
“Maintenance logs? They didn’t have year identifiers, just days and months,” Marina said.
“No, they didn’t. They used the schedules themselves as a calendar. Let me show you.”
She turned the book she was looking at around and pointed out specific lines to Marina. Air duct cleaning. Valve testing and lubrication. Door seals. It just looked random to Marina. She shrugged.
“You’re missing it, Marina. Look closer. Here, there are three lines for filter cleaning on an air duct and then the next entry had filter cleaning and duct cleaning. They are all three months apart,”
Greta said, clearly feeling like what she said explained it all.
“Sorry. I don’t see what is important there,” Marina apologized. Then she got it. If this maintenance log covered a section of a level then one could go back and count the cleanings. She smiled.
Greta saw the comprehension come over her face and smiled too. “Exactly. If we can find all the maintenance logs for just one section, then we can count how long they’ve been maintained. It looks like this particular section gets the intake duct cleaned every twelve months. One year.”
“How could we have missed that before?” Marina asked, taking in the piles again. They had all been gone through because she distinctly remembered the groans and complaints coming from the rows where Taylor and Piotr had been working. Out of sight, but definitely not out of earshot. They seemed to feel about maintenance logs the exact feelings she had harbored against the farm logs.
The older woman gave a short little half shrug. She was just as confused as Marina it would seem. “I honestly don’t know. I got the first one from the overflow pile at the end of the row. It was obvious to me so I just can’t imagine them missing it. Especially with so many of them,” she finished with a wave at the collection of dusty paper.
Marina took in the piles her wave encompassed. There were a lot of maintenance books and they must have simply dismissed them after not realizing what they held in the first book. Blame wouldn’t help so she moved the conversation back on track. “So, we’re looking to match up the logs with the sections?” she asked.
Greta nodded and pointed to the pile she wanted Marina to look through, “Right. So get to it!”
By the time Piotr and Taylor came in, fresh and happy from their home time, the two women had well and truly lost that excited glow from a fresh discovery. Instead they were frustrated, covered in dust and only recently settled after a rather harrowing encounter with an unexpected spider guest that raced along a book Marina had picked up.