Wool Omnibus Edition (Wool 1-5)

Juliette felt nauseous. Even with three more of the small pumps from the hydroponic farms, and with three more runs of pipe and wiring to go with them, she was looking at a year, possibly two, before the silo was perfectly dry. She wasn’t sure if she had a year. Just a few weeks of being in that abandoned place, alone with a half-sane man, and she was already starting to hear whispers, to forget where she was leaving things, finding lights on she swore she’d turned off. Either she was going crazy, or Solo found humor in making her feel that way. Two years of this life, of her home so close but so impossibly far away—

She leaned over the railing, feeling like she really might be sick. As she gazed down at the water and through her reflection cast in that film of oil, she suddenly considered risks even crazier than two years of near- solitude.

“Two years,” she told Solo. It felt like voicing a death sentence. “Two years. That’s how long this’ll take if we add three more pumps. Six months at least on the stairwell, but the rest will go slower.”

“Two years!” Solo sung. “Two years two years!” He tapped his boot twice against the water on the step below, sending her reflection into sickening waves of distortion. He spun in place, peering up at her. “That’s no time!”

Juliette fought to control her frustration. Two years would feel like forever. And what would they find down there, anyway? What condition would the main generator be in? Or the diggers? A machine submerged under fresh water might be preserved as long as air didn’t get to it, but as soon as any of it was exposed by the pumps, the corrosion would begin. It was the nastiness of oxygen working on wet metal that spelled doom for anything useful down there. Machines and tools would need to be dried immediately and then oiled. And with only two of them—

Juliette watched, horrified, as Solo bent down, waved away the film of grease at his feet, and scooped up two palms of the brackish filth below. He slurped noisily and happily.

—okay, with only one of them working diligently at salvaging the machines, it wouldn’t be enough.

Maybe she’d be able to salvage the backup generator. It would require less work and still provide plenty of power.

“What to do for two years?” Solo asked, wiping his beard with the back of his hand and looking up at her.

Juliette shook her head. “We’re not waiting two years,” she told him. The last three weeks in silo 17 had been too much. This, she didn’t say.

“Okay,” he said, shrugging. He clomped up the stairwell in his too-big boots. His gray coveralls were also baggy, like he was still trying to wear clothing tailored for his father. He joined Juliette on the landing, smiled at her through his glistening beard. “You look like you have more projects,” he said happily.

She nodded silently. Anything the two of them worked on, whether it was fixing the sloppy wiring of the long-ago dead, or improving the farms, or repairing a light fixture’s ballast, Solo referred to as a “project.” And he professed to love projects. She decided it was something from his youth, some sort of survival mechanism he’d concocted over the years that allowed him to tackle whatever needed doing with a smile instead of horror or loneliness.

“Oh, we’ve got quite a project ahead of us,” Juliette told him, already dreading the job. She started making a mental list of all the tools and spares they’d need to scrounge on their way back up.

Solo laughed and clapped his hands. “Good,” he said. “Back to the workshop!” He twirled his finger over his head, pointing up at the long climb ahead of them.

“Not yet,” she said. “First, some lunch at the farms. Then we need to stop by Supply for some more things. And then I need some time alone in the server room.” Juliette turned away from the railing and that deep shaft of silver-green water below. “Before we get started in the workshop,” she said, “I’d like to make a call—”

“A call!” Solo pouted. “Not a call. You spend all your time on that stupid thing—”

Juliette ignored him and hit the stairs. She began the long slog up, her fifth in three weeks. And she knew Solo was right: she was spending too much time making calls, too much time with those headphones pulled down over her ears, listening to them beep. She knew it was crazy, that she was going slowly mad in that place, but sitting at the back of that empty server with her microphone close to her lips and the world made quiet by the cups over her ears—just having that wire linking her from a dead world to one that harbored life—it was the closest she could get in silo 17 to making herself feel sane.

5

• Silo 18 •

“—was the year the Civil War consumed the thirty-three states. More American lives were lost in this conflict than in all the subsequent ones combined, for any death was a death among kin. For four years, the land was ravaged, smoke clearing over battlefields of ruin to reveal brother heaped upon brother. More than half a million lives were lost. Some estimates range to almost twice that. Disease, hunger, and heartbreak ruled the life of man—”

The pages of the book flashed crimson just as Lukas was getting to the descriptions of the battlefields. He stopped reading and glanced up at the overhead lights. Their steady white had been replaced with the throbbing red, which meant someone was in the server room above him. He retrieved the loose silver thread curled up on the knee of his coveralls and laid it carefully into the spine of the book. Closing the old tome, he returned it to its tin case with care, then slid it into the gap on the bookshelf, completing the vast wall of silvery spines. Padding silently across the room, he bent down in front of the computer and shook the mouse to wake the screen.

A window popped up with live views of the servers, only distorted from such wide angles. It was another secret in a room overflowing with them, this ability to see distant places. Lukas searched through the cameras, wondering if it was Sammi or another tech coming to make a repair. His grumbling stomach, meanwhile, hoped it was someone bringing him lunch.

In camera four, he finally spotted his visitor: A short figure in gray coveralls sporting a mustache and glasses. He was slightly stooped, a tray in his hands dancing with silverware, a sloshing glass of water, and a covered plate, all of it partly supported by his protruding belly. Bernard glanced up at the camera as he walked by, his eyes piercing Lukas from a level away, a tight smile curling below his mustache.

Lukas left the computer and hurried down the hallway to get the hatch for him, his bare feet slapping softly on the cool steel grating. He scrambled up the ladder with practiced ease and slid the worn red locking handle to the side. Just as he lifted the grate, Bernard’s shadow threw the ladderway into darkness. The tray came to a clattering rest as Lukas shifted the section of flooring out of the way.

“I’m spoiling you today,” Bernard said. He sniffed and uncovered the plate. A fog of trapped steam billowed out of the metal hood—two stacks of pork ribs revealing themselves underneath.

“Wow.” Lukas felt his stomach rumble at the sight of the meat. He lifted himself out of the hatch and sat on the floor, feet dangling down by the ladder. He pulled the tray into his lap and picked up the silverware. “I thought we had the silo on strict rations, at least until the resistance was over.”

He cut a piece of tender meat free and popped it in his mouth. “Not that I’m complaining, mind you.” He chewed and savored the rush of proteins, reminded himself to be thankful for the animal’s sacrifice.

“The rations haven’t been lifted,” Bernard said. He crouched down and waved at the plate. “We had a pocket of resistance flare up in the bazaar, and this poor guy found himself in the crossfire. I wasn’t about to let him go to waste. Most of the meat, of course, went to the wives and husbands of those we’ve lost—”

“Mmm?” Lukas swallowed. “How many?”

“Five, plus the three from that first attack.”

Lukas shook his head.

“It’s not bad, considering.” Bernard brushed his mustache with his hand and watched Lukas eat. Lukas gestured with his fork while he chewed, offering him some, but Bernard waved him away. The older man leaned