Part 5

　　The Stranded¹

　　53

　　• Silo 18 •

　　Marck stumbled down the great stairway, his hand sliding against the cool railing, a rifle tuckedunder his arm, his boots slipping in blood. He could barely hear the screams all around him: the wailsfrom the wounded as they were half dragged down the steps, the horrified² cries from the curiouscrowds on every landing who witnessed their passage, or the shouts of promised violence from themen chasing him and the rest of his mechanics from level to level.

　　The ringing in his ears drowned out most of the noise. It was the blast, the god-awful blast. Notthe one that had peeled open the doors of IT—he had been ready for that one, had hunkered downwith the rest. And it wasn’t the second bomb, the one Knox had lobbed deep into the heart of theirenemy’s den³. It was the last one, the one he didn’t see coming, the one that spilled from the hands ofthat small white-haired woman from Supply.

　　McLain’s bomb. It had gone off right in front of him, had taken his hearing as it took her life.

　　And Knox, that stout⁴ and unmovable head of Mechanical—his boss, his good friend—gone.

　　Marck hurried down the steps, wounded and afraid. He was a long way from the safety of thedown deep—and he desperately⁵ wanted to find his wife. He concentrated on this rather than the past,tried not to think of the explosion that had taken his friends, had wrecked⁶ their plans, had engulfedany chance at justice.

　　Muffled⁷ shots rang out from above, followed by the piercing zing of bullets striking steel—onlysteel, thank God. Marck stayed away from the outer railing, away from the aim of the shooters whohounded them from the landings above with their smoothly⁸ firing rifles. The good people ofMechanical and Supply had been running and fighting for over a dozen levels; Marck silently beggedthe men above to stop, to give them a chance to rest, but the boots and the bullets kept coming.

　　Half a level later, he caught up to three members of Supply, the one in the middle wounded andbeing carried, his arms draped over shoulders, blood dotting the backs of their yellow overalls⁹. Heyelled at them to keep moving, couldn’t hear his own voice, could just feel it in his chest. Some ofthe blood he was slipping in was his own.

　　With his injured arm tight against his chest, his rifle cradled in the crook¹⁰ of his elbow, Marck kepthis other hand on the railing to keep from tumbling headfirst down the steep stairwell. There were noallies behind him, none still alive. After the last shootout, he had sent the others ahead, had barelygotten away himself. And yet they kept coming, tireless. Marck would pause now and then, fumblewith the unreliable ammunition¹¹, chamber¹² a shot, and fire wildly up the stairwell. Just to dosomething. To slow them down.

　　He stopped to take a breath, leaned out over the railing, and swung his rifle toward the sky. Thenext round was a dud. The bullets buzzing back at him weren’t.

　　Huddling¹³ against the stairwell’s central post, he took the time to reload. His rifle wasn’t liketheirs. One shot at a time and difficult to aim. They had modern things he’d never heard of, shotscoming as fast as a frightened pulse. He moved toward the railing and checked the landing below,could see curious faces through a cracked doorway¹⁴, fingers curled around the edge of the steel jamb.

　　This was it. Landing fifty-six. The last place he’d seen his wife.

　　“Shirly!”

　　Calling her name, he staggered down a quarter turn until he was level with the landing. He keptclose to the interior, out of sight from his pursuers, and searched the shadowed faces.

　　“My wife!” he yelled across the landing, a hand cupped to his cheeks, forgetting that theincredible ringing was only in his ears, not theirs. “Where is she?”

　　A mouth moved in the dark crowd. The voice was a dull and distant drone.

　　Someone else pointed¹⁵ down. The faces cringed; the cracked door twitched¹⁶ shut as another ricochetscreamed out; the stairway shook with all the frightened boots below and the chasing ones above.

　　Marck eyed the illicit¹⁷ power cables draped over the railing and remembered the farmers attempting tosteal electricity from the level below. He hurried down the stairs, following the thick cords, desperateto find Shirly.

　　One level down, positive that his wife would be inside, Marck braved the open space of thelanding and rushed across. He threw himself against the doors. Shots rang out. Marck grabbed thehandle and tugged¹⁸, shouting her name to ears as deaf as his own. The door budged¹⁹, was being heldfast with the sinewy²⁰ restraint of unseen arms. He slapped the glass window, leaving a pink palmprint, and yelled for them to open up, to let him in. Eager bullets rattled²¹ by his feet—one of them lefta scar down the face of the door. Crouching²² and covering his head, he scurried²³ back to the stairwell.

　　Marck forced himself to move downward. If Shirly was behind those doors she might be betteroff. She could strip herself of incriminating gear, blend in until things settled down. If she was below—he needed to hurry after her. Either way, down was the only direction.

　　At the next landing, he caught up with the same three members of Supply he’d passed earlier. Thewounded man was sitting on the decking, eyes wide. The other two were tending to him, blood ontheir sides from supporting his weight. One of the Supply workers was a woman Marck vaguelyrecognized from the march up. There was a cold fire in her eyes as Marck paused to see if theyneeded help.

　　“I can carry him,” he shouted, kneeling by the wounded man.

　　The woman said something. Marck shook his head and pointed to his ears.

　　She repeated herself, lips moving in exaggeration, but Marck wasn’t able to piece it together. Shegave up and shoved at his arm, pushing him away. The wounded man clutched his stomach, a redstain ballooning out from his abdomen²⁴ all the way to his crotch. His hands clasped somethingprotruding there, a small wheel spinning on the end of a steel post. The leg of a chair.

　　The woman pulled a bomb from her satchel²⁵, one of those pipes that promised so much violence. Itwas solemnly passed to the wounded man, who accepted it, his knuckles²⁶ white, his hands trembling.

　　The two members of Supply pulled Marck away—away from the man with the large piece ofoffice furniture sprouting²⁷ from his oozing²⁸ stomach. The shouts sounded distant, but he knew theywere nearby. They were practically in his ear. He found himself yanked backward, transfixed by thevacant stare on the face of this doomed²⁹ and wounded man. His eyes locked on to Marck’s. The manheld the bomb away from himself, fingers curled around that terrible cylinder³⁰ of steel, a grim clenchof teeth jutting³¹ along his jawline.

　　Marck glanced up the stairwell where the boots were finally gaining on them, coming into view,black and bloodless, this tireless and superior enemy. They came down the dripping trail Marck andthe others had left behind, coming for them with their ammo that never failed.

　　He stumbled down the stairwell backward, half dragged by the others, one hand on the railing,eyes drifting to the swinging door opening behind the man they’d left behind.

　　A young face appeared there, a curious boy, rushing out to see. A tangle³² of adult hands scrambledto pull him back.

　　Marck was hauled down the curving stairs, too far down to see what happened next. But his ears,as deadened as they were, caught the popping and zinging of gunfire, and then a blast, a roaringexplosion that shook the great stairwell, that knocked him and the others down, slamming himagainst the railing. His rifle clattered³³ toward the edge—Marck lunged for it. He grabbed it before itcould escape and go tumbling into space.

　　Shaking his head, stunned³⁴, he pushed himself up to his hands and knees and managed to riseslowly to his feet. Senseless, he staggered forward down the shuddering³⁵ steps, the treads beneath hisfeet ringing and vibrating as the silo around them all continued its spiral into dark madness.

 

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