Excerpt: One Meeting With Morpheus (Is Sometimes All It Takes)

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The generator has finally worked its way up to full steam—Rafe has a particular affinity for that awful pun, even if he would never indicate as such—and that means it is now up to the point where it fills the entire level with a nearly deafening riot of metallic rattling.

Rafe lightly places his palm against the main housing, feeling the machine at work. It is a gratifying thing to see that their efforts have made it possible for nearly half of this building to surge to life once again. Not as though he really wants it to, but this is the only place that they’ll find the answers they’re really looking for. Perhaps Ordstrom will be able to lend them some, but Rafe is reasonably certain he’ll be of only limited use. The archives here, on the other hand, have documented everything.

That’s what he hopes, anyway. With the sort of security measures that Sortis used to have in place, why would they bother deleting anything?

There is a feeling of vague satisfaction upstairs from Vale, though he hasn’t noticed her level of uncertainty go down at all for the past while. At least Ordstrom isn’t giving her any real trouble, or taking advantage of her optimism. It has been a long time since Rafe has felt her this hopeful, and if anything is done to take it down a notch, he is determined to pay the guilty party a very thought-provoking visit.

He splays both of his hands out on the casing and closes his eyes, feeling the minute jolts running up through his arms, his shoulders absorbing the shock. Whenever he walks outside and opens his head to the others passing by, their appreciation for sensation seems to be awfully dampened. They don’t think about how their ankles move and take the weight of their body as they walk, nor do they consider the air against their face, or how it pours down into their lungs and back out again, fuelling their individual engines. They don’t think about their muscles contracting and lengthening, their heart steadily taking all the abuse they put it through every day and still powering along, the blood coursing through every tiny area of their body.

Rafe has been sorely tempted on multiple occasions to invade every nearby mind that he can and force them into an awakening. Vale always tells him it’s a bad idea, and he has to reluctantly concede the point that people will only really be able to wake up under their own initiative. That doesn’t make it any less tempting, though.

And now there’s Ordstrom, the most tempting subject of all. Rafe suspects he could turn the man’s head inside out as easily as yanking the toe of a sock through its ankle, but he doesn’t. There is general human decency to be concerned about, he supposes, and anyway Vale would be very angry. But a little quiet exploration on the side can’t hurt too much.

His thoughts are interrupted by a blossom of astonishment on Vale’s part. She isn’t paying attention to him just now, thankfully, but to Ordstrom instead.

No, not to Ordstrom. Something unknown.

Rafe cautiously presses in just in time for his right hand to feel as though it’s being immersed into water. The sensation conflicts with that of the metal against his palms and he yanks them back, reflexively rubbing them together as he glances upward. It isn’t water she’s feeling; her hand is still dry. Whatever is happening up there isn’t dangerous, but it certainly is odd, and her surprise hasn’t diminished.

It’s coupled, for the briefest instant, with a hint of admiration/fascination. Rafe makes sure his resentment gets no chance to make its way into her attention, dampening it down until it might as well have been flat against the ground. At least whatever is appealing to her doesn’t carry on with the impression too long; barely a moment later her mind is filled once again with suspicion. It floods in like concrete being poured into a mould, encasing Rafe as well.

At least they are both reasonably certain that something is not right with Ordstrom.

Rafe hopes that’s what she is thinking.

He checks over the row of metres that they have set up and nailed to a plank on the side of the main casing. The generator seems to have levelled off, and he gives one of the dials a slight twist to ensure it stays that way before starting off toward the stairs. His path takes him over a hanging walkway cobbled together with scrap metal that dangles thirty metres over the water below. It took quite some time, but he and Vale had managed to knock much of the flooring out in this area of the building, save for what they needed for their plans to construct the generator. The particularly difficult part of the project was getting rid of flooring that was already underwater. An important part of their schematics lies under the surface, taking advantage of a current that they discovered, a newly established underwater river that runs through the city. Some of their construction efforts went into redirecting a small part of the flow in through this building and it has maintained itself quite well so far, keeping the generator online when they so choose to turn it on. The process had been long, complicated, and exhausting, and Rafe had nearly gotten electrocuted once or thrice, but their efforts have rewarded them.

Now he anticipates further results of that reward. If Ordstrom does not manage to reap some answers from the machines upstairs, then they will have to find someone else. Or if he refuses, perhaps Rafe will just ignore Vale’s protests and look into the man’s head for himself.

He hums an ambivalent tune to himself as he scales the short ladder at the end of the walkway, and once at the top he rubs his hands over the side of his trousers to get rid of the traces of soot clinging to his palms. There seem to be perpetual traces of the stuff on the ladder, but it can’t be helped. At least the generator here is largely clean, or Rafe would emerge from this level looking like a lump of charcoal. Worse than the filth, though, would be having to stock the thing up. He doesn’t want to think about the amount of coal that something of this size would blaze through from hour to hour.

The ladder extends to a remnant of one of the storeys they punched through, the floor following along the wall until it reaches the old stairwell. They left it wide enough to walk on comfortably, just over a metre, and Rafe stands up there for a minute to stare down at the generator before giving his hands one final wipe against his trousers and making for the stairs.

Narrow and dim as the stairwell is, Rafe and Vale had found its sheltered walls useful to draw out some rough schematics with bits of charcoal, and their diagrams ascend several floors; Rafe is revisited with their planning processes every time he scales up and down and appreciates the reminder of their purposes. Seeing those sketches detailed out in front of him is like viewing a testament to his and Vale’s competence in keeping up with the chaos of this world.

And perhaps someday they will be able to do even better than just keeping up.

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