[Original Novel] Not Long Now, Part 11

^{source
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9
Part 10}

I resolved to be more like Freddy. What better specimen to pattern my own habits after? To that end, given his recurring mentions of Miss Alice, I asked him about her. He have me an incredulous, and slightly appalled look.

“Everybody know Miss Alice. How you not know?” I answered that I was simply very dumb, and in need of some education. He grinned ear to ear, plainly pleased by the notion. “Miss Alice is everywhere, when she want to be. She see everything, all the time.” He formed faux goggles with his hands and peered through them for emphasis.

“You mean like, through cameras?” I queried. He shook his head, subtly misshapen now that I got a good look at it. “She just see. Wherever you are. She knows if you break the rules. We tell her what we do wrong every night before sleep, ask her to forgive, and promise to do better tomorrow. She is most beautiful, nice lady of anywhere.”

I asked how he knew she was beautiful given that she wore that silk sheet draped over her. He looked thoughtful for a split second, but then suddenly scowled at me. “What you mean? What you say that for? You think Miss Alice not beautiful?” He motioned as if to stand. Despite his short stature, he looked easily able to cave my skull in should I fail to choose my next words with extreme care.

“No, of course she is beautiful” I assured him. “The most beautiful there ever was. Everybody knows that. I’m just curious. I want to learn.” He studied my face for a moment, eyes narrowed. Then, apparently satisfied that I was sincere, he went back to animatedly describing Miss Alice’s astonishing capabilities.

He made her sound like a superstition. Yet I’d seen her with my own eyes just the other night! Something was amiss. I tucked it away in the back of my mind, wiped the sweat from my forehead with a freshly greased forearm, then buckled down.

Lunch was simple meat of the sort served with every meal thus far, but on a freshly baked roll of bread. Not much to look at, but the countless hours of tedious, repetitious labor worked up such a fierce hunger that it was gone nearly as soon as I got my hands on it. The pair of boys who’d given it to me out of their wheeled cart were terribly amused.

“Finish everything on your plate” I reminded them. “That’s what Miss Alice says.” A look of sudden sobriety replaced their smirks. Both sternly nodded, then pushed the cart back into the corridor and resumed their rounds.

That works remarkably well, doesn’t it? I filed that knowledge away for future use. Once they were gone, I noted their eyes had the same dull emptiness to them as Frederick’s. Their reactions, on the other hand, were noticeably sharper.

The more of them I met, the more convinced I became that something was slightly wrong with the lot. It’s hard to tell when they’re busy, hurrying about to perform various chores. But when you get the opportunity to talk with one, even briefly, it’s immediately obvious that something is off.

It’s not just that their schooling here is insufficient, though I wouldn’t be surprised given what I’ve seen so far. Rather, their mannerisms and patterns of thought seem...rudimentary. To varying degrees, save for Agnes, everyone I’ve met here comes across as helplessly sincere, docile, and very slightly confused by anything I say to them.

As I puzzled over this, I noticed Frederick set down his tools and retreat to a drinking fountain mounted by the door to the stairwell. I joined him there soon after, beneath the sign reading “Level 2” in stenciled characters.

He lapped it up eagerly, making no effort to hide his enjoyment. I quite liked that about him. The other side of the doubled edged sword of intelligence is duplicity. Frederick appeared incapable of pretense. I expected I would always find him easy to read, to calm down when he is agitated, and all around a reliable fellow to work with. A known quantity.

A rusty pipe ran from the drinking fountain up the wall, then through it and presumably along the ceiling of the corridor adjacent to the stairwell. The one running along the outer wall of the structure in a long, gentle curve. I wondered, briefly, what lay at the end of the pipe.

That was enough to set my gears to turning. A mistake, usually. Once I’ve got ahold of some question I often find I cannot let it go until I know the answer. The same relentless, methodical curiosity which drove me to explore the service ducts the other night once again tugged at my mind.

“I left something in my room, I’ll be right back”. Before I could reach the door, Frederick seized me by the arm. “Mind your station! No work stoppage. What you leave, anyway?” I froze, not expecting to be questioned.

Behind my back, I slipped the screwdriver I’d been absentmindedly carrying up my sleeve. “It’s...my screwdriver. I think I left it there.” He ambled over to my toolbox to make sure it was missing. Then offered me the use of his. “I am fix every problem that need screw turnings. But give back to me when finish.”

Sweating a bit, I sheepishly thanked him. Good ol’ dependable Freddy. I cursed up a storm inwardly, resolving to investigate later that night, then returned to working on that damned endless sea of stationary bikes.

When the dinner bell finally rang, it was as if an angelic choir descended upon me from the Heavens. They’d have to find some way through a dozen or so floors of iron on the way, I mused. Frederick accompanied me to a wash room on the way to the dining hall, where we did our best to scrub as much of the accumulated black residue from our hands, forearms and faces as possible.

The stains persisted, merely growing fainter with the vigorous application of soap and water. At the point where my skin started to feel raw from the scrubbing, I gave up and resigned myself to it. The machine’s marked me now. Does this mean I belong to it? I suppose there are worse things than belonging somewhere.

When we arrived in the dining hall, it was ablaze with commotion. The excited chatter drowned out the pistons, gears and various other nearby mechanisms as Frederick and I took our assigned seats.

---

^{Stay Tuned for Part 12!}