The Dream Thief

Chapter 5-1

Chapter 5

The next day was so hectic that Karl barely had time to breathe, much less ask around about all those new admissions. The overwhelming workload forced him to rush eleven raw trainees through their orientation in record time. His guilt at that sank deeper into his gut when they followed him on rounds later that morning. After watching their frightened expressions as they dealt with dozens of terribly distressed patients, he expected fully half of them to quit that afternoon. At least no one seemed to know he'd been snooping around looking at records the night before.

The only sense he could make of what people muttered as they struggled to keep up was that something strange had happened yesterday. He was still too nervous about all his sneaking around to ask more.

Whatever the disruption was had managed to filter through the entire facility, as things like that seemed to do. Karl couldn't figure out how doctors, staff, and patients in this building could possibly know what had happened several buildings away, but they did. His whole day was spent trying to keep his confused recruits from panicking, help the doctors keep patients and other staff calm, and clean up the mess when all of that failed.

By the time he took a very late lunch, it was all Karl could do to put one foot in front of the other in the food line. To top everything off and make a stressful day worse, the mechanical food conveyors had broken down. A fractured copper steam pipe filled the whole cafeteria with heavy, damp air, but the queue was too long to let the mechanics shut everything down to try to fix it.

A group of sweaty, sullen low-level orderlies had been recruited to serve as a human conveyor belt. Karl kept his head down, took his food without looking to see what it was, and plodded toward an empty table.

He was staring at his chipped white plate, wondering if the grayish gravy-covered thing in the middle was more meat or mystery, when another wooden tray slammed down beside his. George Wood fell into the chair beside Karl's hard enough to make the legs creak. He didn't say a word, just took off his round glasses and sat with his head in his hands.

George was a contrast to Karl in nearly every way. Short and round where Karl was tall and angular, charming and funny where Karl was serious and too often shy. The close friendship they'd found growing up together back on Lilac Row helped keep Karl going.

"Tough day, Georgie?"

"You have no idea." George ran his fingers through his messy brown hair, but he didn't open his eyes. "Does that look as bad as it smells?"

"I don't even know what it is today," Karl said. "If this was ever alive, it was a long, long time ago."

"Yeah, they're having trouble in the kitchens too, not just out here." George finally looked at his plate with a matching slab of something right in the middle. His mouth turned down, and he closed his eyes again. "I could throw a rock and hit the lake where they get fish. Fresh off the docks every day. Meat can’t be more than an hour or so older. And somehow, they turn it into this. The sad thing is I'm so bloody hungry I'm going to eat it anyway."

The two men ate in silence, and Karl was relieved that the most offensive thing about the gray blob was a lack of any sort of discernible flavor. He thought he might regret eating whatever it was in a few hours, but for now it filled his middle.

"What's going on around here, anyway?" Karl said. "I was out all day visiting the family yesterday."

"You must have left before word got around," George said. “One of the monsters got out night before last. A bad one. Did a lot of damage before they finally got it under control again."

"Aren't the ’sters supposed to be restrained? Or at least locked down?"

"Supposed to be, yeah," George said. "If you can answer the question of how this one managed to make such a mess, you'll be Director of that wing in a week's time. I hear the job will be open after this little disaster. They nearly had to kill it."

Karl stared at George, not sure what to think, much less say. The ’sters out here were a secret so well kept that he hardly knew anything about them. He did know they were bad news. Having to kill one of them would be a mess big enough to get any Director shown the door.

"I've never even seen one of them. Have you, Georgie?"

George’s dark brown eyes stared at something Karl wasn’t sure he wanted to imagine. Those eyes were sunken and bruised-looking with exhaustion, more than Karl had ever seen.

"A few times," he said. "Most of the time when I was supposed to. The other night when I wasn't. I wish I'd been back at the Gate with you, even if that meant visiting my own family."

"Do you know where they really come from?" Karl whispered. He didn't want to upset his friend, but he was in the grips of that terrible curiosity once again. "I've heard everything from the Fog to caves to some kind of Build gone wrong."

"Not quite that dramatic," George said. "Though they wouldn't be such a big secret if any of that were true. Listen, I know we've been friends for a long time. I'm not supposed to know any of this, much less tell you or anyone else. It'd be the sack or worse for both of us if someone found out."

Karl did think about it, or at least he tried to. He was right up against one of the most important things about working at the Columns. You didn't ask, you didn't tell, and you did your level best not to remember. That had been drilled into him since he met with the first recruiter, after he got the job, and at every evaluation or promotion meeting ever since. He’d told his new trainees the same a few long hours ago.

Keep your mind on your job while you're at work, then forget it. All of it. The less you know, the better your chance of keeping your job instead of getting a lifetime pass to join the residents on the other side of the restraints.

Not telling was usually easy for Karl, and forgetting was too, at first. Not so much lately.

Not asking had been the toughest thing for him since day one.