Marnes didn’t say anything. Jahns wondered if she was referring specifically to the “dying” part.
“Did you ask him why he never comes to see me? Because he has all the time in the world. He has nothing up there.”
“Yes, we met with him. Your father seemed like a very busy man. As determined as you.”
Juliette looked away.
“And as stubborn.” Jahns left the paperwork on the bed and went to stand by the door, just a pace away from Juliette. She could smell the soap in the younger woman’s hair. Could see her nostrils flare with her rapid, heavy breathing.
“The days pile up and weigh small decisions down, don’t they? That decision not to visit. The first few days slide by easy enough; anger and youth power them along. But then they pile up like unrecycled trash. Isn’t that right?”
Juliette waved her hand. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m talking about days becoming weeks becoming months becoming years.” She almost said that she’d been through the same exact thing, was still piling them up, but Marnes was in the room, listening. “After a while, you’re staying mad just to justify an old mistake. Then it’s just a game. Two people staring away, refusing to look back over their shoulders, afraid to be the first one to take that chance—”
“It wasn’t like that,” Juliette said. “I don’t want your job. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of others who do.”
“If it’s not you, it’s someone I’m not sure I can trust. Not anymore.”
“Then give it to the next girl.” She smiled.
“It’s you or him. And I think he’ll be getting more guidance from the thirties than he will from me, or from the Pact.”
Juliette seemed to react to this. Her arms loosened across her chest. She turned and met Jahns’s gaze. Marnes was studying all this from across the room.
“The last sheriff, Holston, what happened to him?”
“He went to cleaning,” Jahns said.
“He volunteered,” Marnes added gruffly.
“I know, but why?” She frowned. “I heard it was his wife.”
“There’s all kinds of speculation—”
“I remember him talking about her, when you two came down to look into George’s death. I thought, at first, that he was flirting with me, but all he could talk about was this wife of his.”
“They were in the lottery while we were down here,” Marnes reminded her.
“Yeah. That’s right.” She studied the bed for a while. Paperwork was spread across it.
“I wouldn’t know how to do this job. I only know how to fix things.”
“It’s the same thing,” Marnes told her. “You were a big help with our case down here. You see how things work. How they fit together. Little clues that other people miss.”
“You’re talking about machines,” she said.
“People aren’t much different,” Marnes told her.
“I think you already know this,” Jahns said. “I think you have the right attitude, actually. The right disposition. This is only slightly a political office. Distance is good.”
Juliette shook her head and looked back to Marnes. “So you nominated me for this, is that it? I wondered how this came up. Seemed like something right out of the ground.”
“You’d be good at it,” Marnes told her. “I think you’d be damned good at anything you set your mind to. And this is more important work than you think.”
“And I’d live up top?”
“Your office is on level one. Near the airlock.”
Juliette seemed to mull this over. Jahns was excited that she was even asking questions.
“The pay is more than you’re making now, even with the extra shifts.”
“You checked?”
Jahns nodded. “I took some liberties before we came down.”
“Like talking to my father.”
“That’s right. He would love to see you, you know. If you came with us.”
Juliette looked down at her boots. “Not sure about that.”
“There’s one other thing,” Marnes said, catching Jahns’s eye. He glanced at the paperwork on the bed. The crisply folded contract for Peter Billings was on top. “IT,” he reminded her.
Jahns caught his drift.
“There’s one matter to clear up, before you accept.”
“I’m not sure I’m accepting. I’d want to hear more about this power holiday, organize the work shifts down here—”
“According to tradition, IT signs off on all nominated positions—”
Juliette rolled her eyes and blew out her breath. “IT.”
“Yes, and we checked in with them on the way down as well, just to smooth things over.”
“I’m sure,” Juliette said.
“It’s about these requisitions,” Marnes interjected.
Juliette turned to him.
“We know it probably ain’t nothing, but it’s gonna come up—”
“Wait, is this about the heat tape?”
“Heat tape?”
“Yeah.” Juliette frowned and shook her head. “Those bastards.”
Jahns mimed pinching two inches of air. “They had a folder on you this thick. Said you were skimming supplies meant for them.”
“No they didn’t. Are you kidding?” She pointed toward the door. “We can’t get any of the supplies we need because of them. When I needed heat tape—we had a leak in a heat exchanger a few months back—we couldn’t get any because Supply tells us the backing material for the tape is all spoken for. Now, we had that order in a while back, and then I find out from one of our porters that the tape is going to IT, that they’ve got miles of the stuff for the skins of all their test suits.”
Juliette took a deep breath.
“So I had some intercepted.” She looked to Marnes as she admitted this. “Look, I’m keeping the power on so they can do whatever it is they do up there, and I can’t get basic supplies. And even when I do, the quality is complete crap, probably because of unrealistic quotas, rushing the manufacturing chain—”
“If these are items you really needed,” Jahns interrupted, “then I understand.”
She looked to Marnes, who smiled and dipped his chin as if to say he’d told her this was the right woman for the job.
Jahns ignored him. “I’m actually glad to hear your side of this,” she told Juliette. “And I wish I made this trip more often, as sore as my legs are. There are things we take for granted up top, mostly because they aren’t well understood. I can see now that our offices need to be in better communication, have more of the constant contact I have with IT.”
“I’ve been saying that for just about twenty years,” Juliette said. “Down here, we joke that this place was laid out to keep us well out of the way. And that’s how it feels, sometimes.”
“Well, if you come up top, if you take this job, people will hear you. You could be the first link in that chain of command.”
“Where would IT fall?”
“There will be resistance, but that’s normal with them. I’ve handled it before. I’ll wire my office for some emergency waivers. We’ll make them retroactive, get these acquisitions aboveboard.” Jahns studied the younger woman. “As long as I have your assurance that every one of those diverted supplies were absolutely necessary.”
Juliette did not flinch away from the challenge. “They were,” she said. “Not that it mattered. The stuff we got from them was crap. Couldn’t have fallen apart better if it’d been designed to. I’ll tell you what, we finally got our shipment from Supply and have extra tape. I’d love to drop off a peace offering on our way up. Our design is so much better—”