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Lukas almost blurted out that the top slid, that it was so finely crafted you could barely see the joints and that it took a bit of effort Bernardand set the box aside

"What exactly are we looking for?" Lukas asked He leaned forward and grabbed the box, pretended to be inspecting it for the first tilared at Lukas "How did this greasershe did? One of er So what if she hadn’t cleaned--it would’ve been a double anyway Was Bernard pissed because he didn’t knohy she’d survived so long? Thisby accident, it drove hi break And he’d seen Bernard angry before, but this was so different The man was livid He was manic It’s just how Lukas would feel if he’d had such an unprecedented piece of success with no cause to pin it on

Sih it "Hey boss--"

Bernard snatched it fro "Soh all this," he said He pushed his glasses up his nose "There n of collusion in here--"

"Hey look," Lukas said, holding out the box "It opens" He showed the lid

"Lemme see that" Bernard dropped the notebook to the table and snatched the wooden box away He wrinkled his nose "Just chits," he said disgustingly

He dumped therabbed it froe man said "You think it’s a clue, or can I--?"

"Yes, keep it, by all means" Bernard waved his arms out toward the ith its view of the entrance hall "Because nothing of greater fucking i on around here, is it, shit-for-brains?"

Sied noncommittally and slid the wooden box into his pocket Lukas desperately wanted to be somewhere else, anywhere in the silo but there

"Maybe she just got lucky," Si the rest of the box onto the table, shaking it to loosen the ed in the bottom He paused frolasses

"Lucky," Bernard repeated

Sims tilted his head

"Get the fuck out of here," Bernard told hiet out!" Bernard pointed at the door "Getthefuckout!"

The head of security smiled like this was funny, but luently clicked the door shut behind him

"I’m surrounded by morons," Bernard said, once they were alone

Lukas tried to iine this was not meant as an insult directed at hi his oddamn server What the hell do I pay these other ratshit techs to do?"

He pressed his glasses up the bridge of his nose again, and Lukas tried to remember if the IT head had always cursed thisinteried It felt strange to even consider Bernard his friend anymore The man was so muchunder the stress that ca the one to send good people to cleaning--

"You knohy I’ve never taken a shadow?" Bernard asked He flipped through the manual, saw the play on the reverse side, and turned the bound sheets of paper around He glanced up at Lukas, who lifted his paled

"It’s because I shudder to think of anyone else ever running this place"

Lukas assumed he

Bernard set the play down and gazed out the here ued once e where your friends, the people you greith, are dropping like flies, but you’re still young enough to pretend it won’t happen to you"

His eyes fell to Lukas The young tech felt unco alone with Bernard He’d never felt that before

"Silos have burned to the ground before because of one man’s hubris," Bernard told hi you’ll be around forever, but because one ers "--and leaves a sucking void behind, that can be enough to bring it all down"

Lukas was dying to ask his boss what the hell he was talking about

"Today is that day, I think" Bernard walked around the long conference table, leaving behind hiaze drifted over the iteh them vanished to see how they’d been treated He wished instead that he’d stashed away more of them