FLOOR 21 Read online

  That . . . probably deserves an explanation. A Scavenging wraps up based on a couple of things. Obviously, if the team loses a lot of Scavengers, they have to come back up, along with the supplies they were able to get. If I understand right, the floors just below Floor 21 have been picked dry. No food, no movies, nothing. So, Scavengers have had to go farther and farther down over the years, but the farther down they go, the more dangerous it gets. Why? Well, now, that’s a good question, isn’t it? I ask myself that all the time. Do the hallucinations get so bad that they, like, make the Scavengers go total nutjob?

  I dunno, but not all the people that go down make it back up. Facts is facts, Jack. Anyway, the other reason why a team might come back early is because of supplies. Scavengers have to eat food and drink water like anybody else, so they can’t just stay gone forever. When their food supplies are up, it’s time to wave them on home.

  There’s a time limit on each Scavenging, though. About . . . two weeks, I think. A team has to be back within two weeks so they can drop off whatever they’ve found. That stuff has to get sorted and sent out to people like me, after all. God knows I can’t live without my latest Blu-Ray movie. Lives are worth risking for movies and candy, am I right?

  Again, I’m kidding.

  When the Scavengers leave and when they come back, we’re all expected to line up in the halls to cheer on whoever’s representing our floor. Since mine doesn’t send anybody on the Scavenging, I usually line up with Allison on Floor 8. She might not live there, but Mike does, and I swear to God if she ever makes me go see him off alone, I’m going to kick her in the kneecap.

  Nah, joking. We’re besties.

  Don’t judge me.

  Anyway, going to Floor 8 is, like, double my pleasure. I get a chance to hang with Allison and say good-bye to Mike at the same time. Now, whenever the Scavengers get back, we always have this, like, triumphant music that plays from the speaker system. Yeah, the same speaker system that wakes me up on Sevenths Days. I’ve seen Mike come back from a Scavenging almost every three months since I was fourteen and he was eighteen. Eighteen, by the way, is when your career is chosen for you. I don’t want to think about next year. They’ll probably stick me in a boring job just ’cause my dad’s a scientist.

  Whatever. Here’s my point. The reason I say I’ve seen him come back “almost” every three months is because, once in a while, the Scavengers find something. We don’t exactly know what, but we know that it’s important. The triumphant music is canceled, the Scavengers skip on the march through the halls, and Security takes them straight up to Floor 1. Nobody sees them the rest of the day, normally not until it’s time for bed. Sometimes you don’t even see them until two or three days later. The only reason any of us know that it’s because the Scavengers found something important is because . . . well, we just know. Everybody knows; it’s not a secret. I don’t really have any proof, but Allison’s said that her dad—remember, he’s in Security—her dad sometimes mentions when the Scavengers come up with something rare, something the bigwigs running things from Floor 1 have to know about. Not the rest of the Tower, mind you. We get left out of the loop. That information’s just for the big guys.

  Psh. What is this, a dictatorship?

  Well. Yeah. Kinda.

  Recording Ten

  Almost been two weeks. I guess the Scavenging’s going well. Couldn’t really tell you either way, since we don’t get updates. But you know what we do get? Announcements. Every few months when this is going on, we wake up to the speaker saying, “Day one of the Scavenging has begun,” and then each night we hear, “Day one of the Scavenging has ended.” Well, I mean, obviously the day count changes each day. You’re not dumb.

  Who am I recording this for again?

  So, uh, Danny’s back.

  I say that in the loosest of terms.

  I don’t know what goes on in Reinforcement exactly, and the people that come out of it don’t talk about it. One of the rules of the Tower is that you don’t talk about what happens in Reinforcement. So, like, since the whole point of the process is to make sure you obey the rules, of course, nobody knows what goes on during reinforcing! I swear to God everything in this tower is off-limits or a secret. What’s on Floor 1? The Tower Authority. Has anybody ever seen them? Nope. What’s below Floor 21? Nobody knows but the Scavengers, and they’re not saying. All they’ll tell you is that it’s full of abandoned apartments and Creep. Not even Mike will say what else is down there.

  About Danny. Yeah. Whoever I knew before . . . that guy’s gone. This new Danny’s a lot quieter. Less goofy most def. I mean, old Danny could be a toolbox once in a while, but at least he was funny. He made it easier to pass time when we were working the gardens up on the rooftop. This new Danny, though? Well, let me just say he works reaaaaal hard. Like, that’s all he wants to do. Single-minded, focused on the task. Yeah, a real toolshed. Old Danny might waste your time, but you didn’t feel like he was. Now I feel like I’m pulling teeth just trying to get him to laugh at my jokes.

  I decided to ask Dad what it is they do in Reinforcement, but because he’s decided becoming a mute is preferable to talking to me, he wasn’t really saying much. Don’t even know why I bothered wasting my time.

  So I’m staring at a picture of us from when I was young. We’re both in uniform, and I’m barely, like, half his height. Guess I was eight in this picture. We’ve both got our bats slung over our backs, and he’s got his arm around my shoulder. Mom took the picture with an old instant-print camera Dad traded for when he found out she was pregnant. Must have been at a time he thought having a kid was a good thing. If I remember right, he had to work double duty in the labs, plus I think he gave up one of the televisions he owned. What I do remember is that this was one of our Mondays together. After we got done with our morning swings, he took me to the roof. Mom’d always been the family gardener, but Dad was no slouch, so they used the rest of the afternoon to teach me about gardening. Mom talked about how you should plant different vegetables through the year, and Dad taught me about how the rain was filtered so they could use it to water the gardens.

  Know what I realized that day? Gardening sucks.

  But . . . I’d still rather have that day back than deal with ones like today. Dad came through the door and waved as he went into the kitchen. Really, I wasn’t sure whether to bother him or not, so I just kinda shuffled through the living room. He sees me coming and pops back out with a bottle of water.

  “Hey, kid,” he said with that smile that’s just become so . . . intimately unnerving. “What’s new?”

  “Oh, you know, the usual. Arguing with Allison. Breaking ankles on the basketball court. Being my all-around awesome self.”

  “Well, you were always good at that,” he says as he drops into a chair. He’s already going into ignore mode. I can tell because he’s picking up a tablet to do some reading, which is his go-to move for telling me and Mom that he’s not paying attention. Or at least, not paying much. “So, what’ve you got planned for today? Any school?”

  “Nah, already went earlier.” His eyes are already off me and on his screen. I’m left standing there for a second like a piece of mediocre artwork, like I’m not even worth paying attention to. “Uh, so, hey, I was wondering if I could ask you something.”

  “Is that so?” he asks, not even taking his eyes off of the screen. “What’s that?”

  “Well, Danny’s back. From Reinforcement.”

  See, I know he’s paying attention because he flinches a bit when I say it. “Good for him, champ. I guess they were able to straighten out any of the confusion he had about the Tower rules.”

  “That’s the thing. He’s acting . . . weird. Like he’s not really Danny. He used to be a real piece of win, and now I don’t even recognize him.”

  “Isn’t that the point, Jacko? People are supposed to change after Reinforcement. It helps them obey the rules better.”

  “Yeah, well, this is about a little more than rules.�
�� I grab one of the small pillows off the couch and toss it in front of his tablet, but it doesn’t take him more than a second to slide it to the floor and get back to reading. “Look, all I want to know is if you know anything about what happens up there. You’re all Mr. Mad Science, after all. I figured you’d be able to tell me something about why he’s acting like they messed with his brain.”

  “Jackie, all Reinforcement does is reinforce the rules. It’s no different from the classes you go to. Besides, you don’t need to know anything about Reinforcement. Best not to ask questions about it, right? Don’t want to have Tower Authority getting curious about why you don’t trust them.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “Jackie.” His eyes shoot up to me. “Why don’t you go listen to some music or something? It’s not good to ask too many questions.”

  I can’t keep my jaw from slinging open at this. “Seriously? Am I making up all the memories I have of you taking me to the lab and telling me that to be a good scientist you had to be curious?”

  “About some things, Jackie. Other times we just have to trust.”

  That’s the end of conversation as far as he’s concerned, and his eyes fall back onto the tablet. My eyelid is twitching. How does an eyelid start twitching? Finally it’s totally apparent I can’t deal anymore, so I flip around and stomp as hard as I can back into my room. I hope he can hear how angry I am, not that I’m sure he cares. Whatevs. I don’t need my dad to be my therapist. That’s what I’ve got this recorder for. ’Cause at least it pays attention to me.

  Wow. Pretty sad.

  Though, seriously, Reinforcement just reteaches the rules? As if putting a guy through a class makes him turn out like Danny did. It was just Dad blowing me off again. Still, I’m willing to bet that the “lessons” happen on Floor 1, since that’s where all the supersecret stuff goes down. I just don’t know what room, when, or any serious details about the process. Because in the Tower you’re not supposed to know anything important about anything, apparently.

  Recording Eleven

  It rained today. Thank God for the plastic they use for the sides of the greenhouse, or we’d be boned. The solar panels don’t take any damage, but fresh rainwater is toxic. I’m not talking Creep toxic. I mean, it’ll make you sick and possibly kill you. You’re not supposed to be on the rooftop when it rains, and if it weren’t for the tarp we use to cover the veggies, our garden would be dead. Rainwater isn’t exactly good for plants, or at least not au naturel. That stuff has to get cleaned before we use it to water the garden.

  I hate the rain. It’s all black and thick, more like oil half the time. You get to see it pooled up when a storm’s over and you head back up to the rooftop, but nobody’s supposed to deal with it. Not us, anyway. That’s a job for Cleanup. Those guys have it the worst. At least the life of a Scavenger is exciting. Cleanup guys just . . . well, they do what they’re called: cleanup. Bunch of charred Creep that Security’s gotten done frying? Call Cleanup to wipe up the mess. Did someone lose their lunch while playing too hard in the gymnasium? Cleanup gets to mop it away. That should basically tell you the story of what they do after it rains. It’s Cleanup’s job to get that stuff soaked up. It’s a real hazard for the workers, too, ’cause you never know when you might put a foot in it.

  It’s not that hard to imagine it happening. I wasn’t there for this, but there’s a story that one of the kids once stepped ankle-deep into the stuff. It wasn’t his fault; he’d just been trying to stare over the edge of the roof. We all do it. Well, there was a pool of rainwater just sitting there. He didn’t lose his foot, but he wasn’t able to walk straight after that. Seriously, what a mess. That’s why the rain’s more dangerous than the Creep. Creep won’t cripple you or poison you.

  I mean, not normally. I still don’t know what happened that one night . . . on my birthday.

  We need the rainwater, though, even if it’s disgusting and poisonous. I know this is a totally groundbreaking revelation, but we kinda need water to live. Now, you shouldn’t go around just drinking the stuff. If it’ll cripple you just by touching it, then who knows what’d happen if you drank it? That’s what the filters are for. The whole roof’s lined with them. Cool thing is, when it rains, a lot of the rooftop floor slides away. Underneath’s where the filters are, and they collect all the rainwater they can get. Afterward they make sure whatever’s deadly in it gets drained out, of course. Don’t ask me how they do it, since Dad’s the only one that could explain, and at this point I’m pretty much done trying to talk to him.

  All I know is that without it, I wouldn’t be able to take a shower. God. That would suck. I’m not going to lie; I’m not the most “feminine” smelling of girls without my daily rinse. Doesn’t help that I like to work out a lot. I might not be a jock, but I like to keep in shape. You know?

  Mom keeps telling me that the older I get, the easier it’ll be to gain weight. Thanks for giving me another reason to look forward to the future, Mom.

  Recording Twelve

  I was down in the gym today. If I’m going to be honest, I smell like the bottom of a sweaty sock right now. So why am I recording this?

  Psh. Who knows? I’m just one of those girls.

  No, I’ll get around to it. I mean, I might as well. I’m here. At home. My empty, empty home.

  So, Mom’s gone. Not like she’s never coming back or anything; I just mean that she’s visiting some people down on Floor 6. Thank God. That woman needs more friends, I mean, just to keep her sanity. I’m not even joking when I say that I’m legit happy that she’s out with people. She’s even spending time off of our level! Cue the band and pop the champagne.

  But that got me to thinking. Actually it’s been on my mind for a while, if I’m going to be real about it. How did everyone settle on where to live and who was going to run things?

  From the top. Floor 1 is Tower Authority. So, although I’ve never been there . . . well, no, I can’t say much about it. I mean, nobody really knows what goes on there. They give out the food every week and run all the other departments. They’re in charge of Security, Cleanup, Science, Scavenging . . . basically everyone. They pick your job for you when you turn eighteen. How? Well, some of it’s based on your floor. The higher up you live, the less chance you have of being put in Security, for example. Don’t get me wrong, there are exceptions. I mean, take Allison’s dad. They live on Floor 6, and he’s Security. He just, you know, didn’t have the smarts to be anything else.

  God, I hope Allison never hears this recording. She’d tear my hair out for saying that. It’s true, though.

  Anyway, beyond that, nobody really knows much about Floor 1. You can’t go in, and nobody in Authority ever comes out. Which sucks for everyone else. I mean, if your job is kinda based on what floor you’re born on but nobody ever leaves Floor 1, then that means the only chance to be in Authority is to be born into it. It’s not like you ever hear of someone from the lower floors getting a job with them. It just doesn’t happen.

  That sucks, man.

  Well. Whatever.

  Floor 2. Really, we only go there for Sevenths Day, but Reception Hall isn’t the only thing that’s on that level. Receiver Garry and others like him live there, so they’ve got apartments. And hey, does anybody think it’s a little messed up that the science department is below them? A bunch of scientists being forced to work beneath Receiver Garry, a man whose sole purpose in life seems to be to discourage questions? Priorities, kids.

  Right, so that brings me to Floor 3. I know Dad works there, but Science covers a lot of stuff. What he actually works on is kinda a mystery to me. Technically speaking you can go to Floor 3 anytime you want, but most people don’t. There’s lots—and I’m telling you this as a person that sees tons of Security on the lower floors—there’s lots of Security on Floor 3. They don’t tell you to get out, but they do this creepy stalker thing where they follow you around. Yeeeeahh, I think I’ll skip that, thanks. I get my weekly dose of paranoia from wondering a
bout how we got in this tower. Nobody lives on Floor 3 anyway, basically, since it’s the only place in the entire Tower without any apartments . . . that should tell you that the place is, like, really important. It’s all science labs, which means locked doors, which means why the heck would I want to visit there anyway?

  I mean, besides visiting Dad. Even if I’m just slowly forgetting why I’d even want to do that.

  I’m kidding. I love him, but I’m just . . . super-frustrated today is all. I feel like he’s lying to me even when he’s not saying anything.

  Why’d I start talking about this?

  Oh, yeah. Sweaty gym time. I got a chance to play basketball with—wait for it—with Tommy today. Say whatever else you want about him, but the guy’s kind of beast mode. He’s superstrong and fast. If he had some smarts, he’d be heading for a job as a Scavenger instead of Security. Oh well, sucks to be Tommy.

  Not so bad a guy when you really talk to him, though, which I was mildly surprised to learn today. He’s just super into himself. Whatever, so he comes up to me and says, “Hey, Jackie, did you think about that date?”

  “No, Toolshed,” I tell him. He doesn’t take this well and gets a scowl across his face, but he also looks confused at the same time, like he can’t digest the fact that someone’s mocking him. His ego’s too big to let him give up, though, so he asks me, “Well, why not? Are the guys really lining up to take you out? Last I heard, you’d never even been on a date.”

  “What’s bigger than a toolshed?” I fire back. “A tool tower? Yeah, that’s it. You’re a tool tower. Tool Tower Tommy.”

  “That doesn’t even make any sense,” he says.

  “Only because your brain is too small to get it,” I tell him. This gets the usual round of “ooooohs” that kids like to give whenever insults start getting thrown around. You know Tommy’s not going to take that kind of insult and just walk away, though, so he puffs out his chest, you know, like a peacock. At this point his nostrils are getting really big and he’s breathing heavy. He kind of has a horseface going for a second. Then he says, “Whatever, Jackie. You think you’re so tough? Let’s see how tough you really are.”