DENIAL (STILL ON GOING)

I hesitated.

The sharp sting of the frigid air struck my eyelids open, the cold metal of the blemished iron table pressed against my obvious rugged cheek. The air in the agricultural sector was always cold, you know the kind that hits you out of nowhere, where it injects itself into each in every joint and just kind of lingers, lingering enough to coerce a shiver out of someone. The truth is, who was I to complain, it somehow managed to make me fall asleep enough to make it seem like I was even contributing beforehand. It was me assigned to checking the towering tanks of algae, yes me, continuously checking the seemingly never faulty tanks of the agricultural sectors pride, algae. In a place like this, air was our best friend. It keep us quiet, it kept people like me left unnoticed, long eno-

“Calder!”

I stood. My last name shouted across the towering tanks.

From the only voice capable enough to break a long tenure friendship with the air. Bex Bueckers. Just Bueckers, by most. The standing division head of the algae section, the oldest among us all. Not by much, but enough to mean something down here, which in itself meant something.The algae section was the youngest division in the entire agricultural sector, with it being the hardest to screw up. Once you’re seventeen you’re officially apart of the algae section, congratulations. The algae section consisted of around eighty of us, to be honest I never really kept count. It gets to the point you know where names blur together even when they don’t sound the same, faces as well.

Bueckers stood in front of me, slouched yet polished, holding herself upright entirely out of habit. Her sleeves rolled unevenly on both sides with the right side having that gloomy dark color of algae stained to her off white button up, yet her boots were laced up perfectly on each side. Like the ground was surely the reason why her shirt was stained.Her eyes were sharp, piercing even, but ringed, followed with dark eye bags, noticeable eyelids that slightly drooped down, dulled and heavy at the corners. Enough to make you forget how meticulously braided her golden hair was, with the type of precision you have when you want attention. It was obvious exhaustion seeped out of her, but in way it seemed like it didn’t, like she was not exhausted at all. Even with her semi-professional presentation, she was as serious as serious get, the kind of serious where you second-guess if your mind consciously said something but your mouth said it out loud.

“Calder, did you check the regulator on number nine?”

“I did.”

I didn’t. I hadn’t. I lied.

It was too smooth, too practiced. Too quick for someone like me, like it was ammunition, loaded, chambered and ready to fire. The silent sound of nothingness. I stood in what was a near quiet room just a few minutes ago, now filled with no other sound than that of a heartbeat. A heart beating. Was it mines? Was it Bueckers? It didn’t matter, I either got away or I just got caught lying. I don’t know why I lied, I just kind of did. Which made my job of being unnoticeable just long enough to be done for the day, harder than it should’ve been. I was noticeable.

“Check again.” Bueckers broke the silence. If there was one person who could both break the quietness of the air and give it life again, it was Bueckers. “Give the report to Montoya, once you’re done.” I nodded, as if I’m mute and didn’t just talk to her a few seconds before. As long as it lasted, it ended as quick as it could’ve, just before I knew it Bueckers was gone, out of sight.

I waited a few seconds, in case she had doubled back to ask me of something else. She didn’t, of course she didn’t. Bueckers, always said everything she needed before leaving and never repeated herself. If you didn’t catch her the first time, you’d ask just about anyone around you and they’d have told you, because those were our sources of entertainment every now and then.

“Check again.” A voice from behind me. A sharp, clipped, mocking voice. Not Bueckers. Instead, Juno Masha. Juno and me, lived next to across each other quarters, I was odd and he was even, that’s how I would remember it, not through sentiments but through numbers and proximity. Honestly quite sad, but it didn’t bother him, nothing ever did to be honest. Juno and his parents were moved from the manufacturing sector down to the agricultural sector, after an incident with his parents happened—which to this day isn’t talked about openly. Not even, Juno himself remembers—or at least he won’t tell me about it. Rumors spread but the truth always stays behind. Unlike Bueckers, or me for the matter, Juno was not a product of the agricultural sector. He was technically above us all but he sure didn’t act or behave that way.

To Juno I’m his—“partner in crime!”

I scoffed, not even acknowledging his grin.

“How was chat with, Bueckers?” He asked trying to make himself seem ominous, leaning against one of the tanks, he in fact was not.

“So-so,” finding myself rubbing the back of my head out of nowhere, “just have to give a report about the tanks to Alma. You coming along?”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world. Got to give Alma numbers about yesterday anyways.”

“Let me just check on tank nine real quick” getting a quick nod.

We made our way down the row to tank nine, its towering glass walls glowing faintly green in the low light. Where like always it seemed as normal as it can get. The regulator was doing its job, the levels were completely balanced and the water flow looked normal. A sounded beeping would’ve told me otherwise , yet the room was filled with nothing but a silent humming of air. Check again. I pulled out the handheld scanner from the table nearby and pressed it against the tank’s control panel. The screen blinked, numbers scrolling rapidly. Oxygen levels, nutrient balance, temperature—all seemed stable, nothing wrong with it, at least nothing seemed to be.

“Seems pretty fine with me, no?”Juno questioned out of nowhere, as if this was his expertise.

“Yeah, everything seems fine. Let’s go.” honestly unsure but wanting to be done with the day already.

The air in the room filled colder with the cold silent hum of the room leaving as we walked through the large metal corridors. The dim orange light flickering of the hallway replaced the faint green glow from the tanks of algae. As we continued walking, where the humming was gradually being reduced with the chatter of people in the corridors and the sounds of distant footsteps, as we were swallowed by the stations repetitive layout of the walls. The walls stretched for what it seemed endlessly on both sides, followed by the same design, a patchwork of worn metal grey panels followed by white wallpaper above it with every now and then you’d see the an occasional scuff mark or the peeling in the wallpaper. The obviously decade old panels—some indented, some corroded, some rusted— every few meters landed a metal door with little signs near them, labeling every room, but eventually losing meaning as everyone just got use to where everything was. Above were low hanging pipes that ran along the ceiling like veins in one’s arm, offering a faint breeze of recycled air that smelled faintly of metal and something else—algae?— the smell never bothered me. We turned a corner, the architecture didn’t, mirroring that similar look. There the sign stood, for the first time in the along time I noticed it, not sure why this time it was noticeable, faded and scratched yet still readable, “B5 - D.R Archive”.

“Here it is.” Juno smirked as if I didn’t read the sign with my eyes. “Go ahead.” Signaling me to open the door. I did. I reached out for the handle, letting out a metallic groan as it creaked open. We were met with a room filled to the brim with filing cabinets on each side—tall, industrial, mismatched, and varying in sizes. Some were obviously newer than others but still had the battered look to the one next to it, each one marked with the smallest portion of faded white tape with handwritten labels filling the strip. Some were barely even legible while some had been obviously rewritten over, slapped on with a new piece of tape. It was history itself refusing to be erased.  Maybe history itself trying to hide away. Or just some pieces of tape smacked on a filing cabinet.

The air inside was the complete opposite of that in algae room, even that of the corridors. It had that soothing warm feel, you’d only feel in the special parts of the sector. The air had weight, it was heavy, but it didn’t press on you. It settled gently on us, like it was someone laying their hand on your shoulder remembering you. The air remembered us.

I hadn’t come in here much as I use to since I got switched from the (CONTINUE)

Even then it was brief run-ins, here and there, and never alone. But still standing here in this very room felt familiar.