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He nodded and threw a last frowning glance at the trunk Juliette could tell he would rather stay and help He squeezed her ar the door Juliette sat on her cot and squeezed herself into yet another suit and could hear hi seal tape around the door The vents overhead had already been double-bagged Juliette reckoned there was far less air in the container than she had allowed inside Silo 17 – and she had survived that ordeal – but they were still taking every precaution They were acting as if even one of those containers had enough poison in it to kill everyone in the silo It was a condition Juliette had insisted upon

Nelson zipped up her back and folded the velcro flap over, sealing it tight She tugged on her gloves Both of their helive theen bottle froulated with a sh a set of double valves Testing the set-up, Juliette had found they could go for days on the trickle of air fro the volume on her radio

"Yeah," he said "Ready"

Juliette appreciated the rapport they had developed, the rhyth the saarded the project, challenges to overcome, tools to pass back and forth But she had also learned that Nelson’sdown to the Deep to become a doctor She also learned that Nelson had built the last two cleaning suits, had fitted Holston before cleaning, had just ned to her Juliette had decided that this project was ashours that she didn’t think she could expect froht

Selecting a flat screwdriver fro caulk from around the lid of the trunk Nelson chose another driver and worked his side When their efforts met, she checked with him, and they pried the lid open to reveal thethis out, they rested it on a cleared work surface Juliette hesitated Fro suits looked down on them in silent disapproval

But they had taken all precautions Even ludicrous ones The suits they earing had been stripped down of all the excess padding, loves as well Every concession Lukas had asked for, she had provided It’d been like Shirly with the backup generator and the dig, going so far as to throttle back thethe tunnel with blast charges in case of contamination, whatever it took to allow the project to move forward

Juliette snapped back to the present as she realized Nelson aiting on her She grabbed the lid and hinged it open, pulled out the saon from the airlock, one each of surface and deep soil, and one of desiccated human remains They were each placed on the workbench, and then the metal container was set aside

"Where do you want to start?" Nelson asked He grabbed a sth of steel pipe with a piece of chalk slotted into the end, an iloved hands A blackboard slate stood ready on the bench to take notes

"Let’s start with the air sa the samples down to the lab Her private fear was that there’d be nothing left of the gaskets by now, nothing to observe Juliette checked the labels on the containers and found the one marked "2" It’d been taken near the hills

"There’s irony here, you know," Nelson said

Juliette took the sah the clear plastic top "What do you mean?"

"It’s just …" He turned and checked the clock on the wall and scratched the ti allowed to do this, to see what’s out there, to even talk about it I ether I was lead tech on the sheriff’s suit" He frowned behind his clear dome Juliette could see a shine on his brow "I reet dressed"

It was his third or fourth aard attey, and Juliette appreciated it "You were just doing your job," she assured hiht just hoerful that sentiment was, how far down a nasty road that could take a person, shuffling along and si their job

"But the irony is that this roo down froht this roo as possible, help explore the outside world that nobody’s supposed to talk about And finally, here we are More than talking about it"

Juliette didn’t say anything, but he was right It was a room of both hope and dread "What we yearn to find and what’s out there are two different things," she eventually said "Let’s stay focused"

Nelson nodded and readied his chalk Juliette shook the first saaskets inside separated The durable one froe were still there The other gasket was in far worse shape Its red es eaten away by the air inside the container The same was true of the two samples of heat tape adhered to the bottom The square piece frole in order to tell theh it

"I’d say an eighth gone on the saasket," Juliette said "One hole in the heat tape three millimeters across Both Supply samples appear fine"

Nelson wrote her observations down This was how she had decided tothe seals and heat tape designed to rot out there and compare it to the ones she kneould last She passed him the container so he could verify and realized that this was their first bit of data This was confirreat as her survival on the outside The equipe bays was meant to fail Juliette felt chills at the momentous nature of this first step Already, her mind raced with all the experiments to perform next And they hadn’t yet opened the containers to see what the air inside was like

"I confir inside the container "I would go two and a half mils on the tape"

"Mark two and a half," she said One way she would change this next tiht affect his and vice versa So rabbed the next sample while Nelson scratched his numbers

"Sa inside, she spotted the whole gasket that had to be froasket was half worn It had nearly pinched all the way through in one place Tipping the container upside down and rattling it, she was able to get the gasket to rest against the clear lid "That can’t be right," she said "Let’s see that laht toward her Juliette aimed it upward, bent over the workbench, and twisted her body and head aardly to peer past the dilapidated gasket toward the shiny heat tape beyond

"I … I’d say half wear on the gasket Holes in the heat tape five … no, six mils across I need you to look at this"

Nelsonthe saht to his side of the bench She hadn’t expected a huge difference between the two samples, but if one sample orse, it should be the one froood air

"Maybe I pulled therabbed the next sample, the control She’d been so careful outside, but she did re scrambled She had lost count at one point, had held one of the canisters open too long That’s what it was

"I confirm," Nelson said "A lot more wear on these Are you sure this one was from the ra Daht have to throw those numbers out, at least for any comparison"