Wool Quotes
"Each life might wear away a single layer, even as the silo wore away that life."
"It was the laughter of youth, of souls who had not yet come to grips with where they lived, who did not yet feel the press of the earth on all sides, who in their minds were not buried at all, but alive."
"Neither life nor staircase had been meant for such an existence."
"Each step was slightly bowed from generations of traffic, the edge rounded down like a pouting lip."
"I’m not passing judgement, not saying anyone was right or wrong or anything like that. I’m just suggesting that maybe the servers weren’t wiped out by the rebels during the uprising."
"Tomorrow will be my salvation, Holston thought savagely, even if I die out there."
"Sometimes I just think I’ve been up here too long. The both of us."
"Seems like I would remember that," Deputy Marnes said, the first words he'd uttered since introducing himself to the doctor.
"Beyond the statute of limitations? Of course. I admit it. It was a worthless lie, anyway."
"And this is what drove her—" He stopped himself.
"I understand," Nichols looked over at Marnes, his eye drifting to the copper badge visible through the open, shoddily tied robe, down to the bulge of a pistol at his side.
"It’s more of a … political office. A citizen’s post."
"I thought the freedom would be good for her."
"You watch. You’ll be sore in the morning, but once you start moving, you’ll find that you’re stronger than you were today."
"I reckon he only ever wanted you to be happy."
"We recycle that down here. The toxins you exhale? We pump them back into the earth."
"The water, she realized, the poison meant for him."
"This light shined on mirrors attached to the generator and its large dynamo, helping her get them in perfect alignment."
"Her job was not only to figure out why this happened and who was to blame, but also to listen for the signs of it coming."
"She knew to listen, to observe, to ask questions."
"She hadn’t known it then, had been more concerned with simple justice and her private grief, but that case had been an interview and job training all in one."
"Was everyone else crazy to harbour thoughts of escape? Or was it something about her?"
"It was in the holding cell that she killed time between the static-filled calls on her radio."
"The process had been similar to fixing a machine on extra shifts."
"It’s about new beginnings, forgetting the past during these tumultuous times, looking to the future!"
"And she knew these were family there, all with useful skills that overlapped and covered one another."
"She was the one who had come up with the idea to do a refit."
"But at least she had allies up there. If people like Jahns and Marnes were able to get by, to survive, she figured she’d be okay."
"It’s for a display," he finally said. "But not for like a readout, or an LED, or a dot matrix."
"Her throat constricted with emotion, the release of so much pressure."
"She would have to reach out and brush her fingers across the words, but it wasn’t paper and wouldn’t be the same."
"The ability to forego sleep gave her time in the morning and at night to herself, time to invest in frivolous pursuits on top of the cases she was supposed to be working."
"She was several hours into sifting through the data when the cafeteria crew staggered in to clean up last night’s mess."
"She fought the urge to clear her throat or ask him a question."
"She imagined the man was young, probably in his late twenties, and quite handsome in that clean, office-like way."
"She tried repeatedly to lose herself in the files from Holston’s computers, but Marnes’s absence was incredibly sadder than his moping presence had been."
"She could imagine the floor plan; she’d heard the three levels shared much in common with Mechanical, only without the fun."
"He passed away a few years ago. My mom, she works in the nursery."
"I know her. She was shadowing when I was a kid. My father—"
"No, it’s not that. I just didn’t want you to hold anything against me. I know you and your father don’t—"
"But what if it’s for a different reason? What if someone made it expensive on purpose?"
"Walker, what kind of screen would be eight inches by two inches?"
"The Pact has changed before. It’s designed to change when events call for it."
"I wouldn’t want that for any member of the silo. I want people to be in their place. Where they fit in."
"I’m going to let you gather your things, what isn’t needed for evidence, and then allow you to see yourself back down."
"I can’t,’ Juliette whispered to the ghost, causing an upbound porter to turn his head as he passed."
"It would be less physically taxing than her walk up had been, but more draining in other ways."
"Reality passed through her helmet untarnished."
"The guilt was immediate. It punctured the anticipation, the thrill of discovery, of intimacy."
"She wondered if the air had finally worked past the seals and heat tape."
"It meant this tower below her … was not hers."
"Her own imminent death loomed large – a constant awareness, a new sense worn on her skin."
"She was nearer the city, still walking towards that skyline, the tops of which were still rendered whole and gleaming."
"He adjusted his light and saw a stack of silo vouchers on top, wrapped in a piece of wire."
"Juliette told herself that this could be done. Grease, heat, leverage."
"The manual looked like something she’d put together herself, either as a reminder from piecing the room’s operation together over time, or perhaps a helpful guide for others."
"Her curiosity wanted it open. This time, to see what was outside."
"She fell to the floor, scrambled around and shoved herself against the door, sealing it tight."
"He could feel the sweat running down his chest, could feel guilty heat in his armpits and around his neck."
"He watched his friends and co-workers get all riled up, barking at the empty air for answers, their passions stirred."
"She had passed through that fear on the crest of the hill and was now in new lands, seeing new things, a terrible gift for which she had to be grateful."
"She considered lying down and letting her air supply run out instead."
"She adjusted the knife towards her own neck, groping for the latch."
"She took a lungful, the odour still overpowering, the soup coating her."
"Killing a man should be harder than waving a length of pipe in their direction. It should take long enough for one’s conscience to get in the way."
"We are the seeds. This is a silo. They put us here for the bad times."
"Her voice echoed back, but it sounded different in the lit air, if that were possible. There was life in here, electricity, other ears to hear her voice, which made the echoes somehow fainter."
"We get no credit for being sane, do we? I get no credit. Even from me. From myself."
"And tell me, where will you be, Knox of Mechanical, when the bombs fly? When these men and women who look up to us are facing their gravest test, where will you be?"
"Seeds don’t go crazy. They don’t. They have bad days and lots of good ones, but it doesn’t matter. You leave them and leave them, however many you bury, and they do what seeds do when they’re left alone too long."
"The world is changing. And she rarely does it pleasantly."
"In the Event of a Failed Cleaning: Prepare for War."
"Sometimes you think there’s more of you, though? More survivors?"
"I had to read all these. I don’t think they were meant to be read."
"She wiped the welling spot of blood onto her grey overalls, then finished the splice and secured the wires to the railing to keep the strain off."
"Leaving her small tool bag on the steps – no danger of anyone coming along to trip over it – she took the treads two at a time and spiralled her way deeper into the silo."
"Juliette wondered who had rigged this stuff up."
"Juliette shook her head. ‘We’re not waiting two years,’ she told him."
"She leaned over the railing, feeling like she really might be sick."
"Juliette leaned far out over the railing and placed her hand on the hotchpotch of pipes and tubing fastened to the concrete wall of the stairwell."
"Because it happened. And it only happened one way, and it kills me not to know."
"Solo laughed. He started munching on a piece of bread until he realised she wasn’t joking."
"Juliette stopped at the landing of one-thirty-six, the last dry landing before the flood."
"Wait for me. Wait for me. Wait there, my dear. Let these gentle pleas find your ear, and bury them there, so this stolen kiss can grow on the quiet love that no other shall know."
"This is why I chose you, Lukas. You and a few others have some idea what’s stored on these servers. You’re already prepped for learning more. Can you imagine if you told any of this to someone who wears red or green to work every day?"
"Evil men did this, but they’re gone. Forget them. Just know this: they locked up their brood as a fucked-up form of their own survival. They put us in this game, a game where breaking the rules means we all die, every single one of us."
"The people who did this, they were in charge of a powerful country that was beginning to crumble. They could see the end, their end, and it scared them suicidal."
"We are not the people who made this world, Lukas, but it’s up to us to survive it. You need to understand that."
"We weren’t any part of what those crazy fucks did. If I had those guys, the men who did this, if I had them in a room with me, I’d kill every last goddamned one of them."
"I used to work in a place that cared for newborns. Let me…"
"This isn’t how anyone should have to live their days, not even their last ones."
"I’m here to help you," Juliette told the girl.
"I need to talk to them!" Juliette yelled, her voice impossibly far away.
"The only reason no one survived a cleaning was because they never had help."
"You’re going to help me and my friend get home. We have good food there. Real electricity. Hot water."
"You have to stop the fighting," she said. "Whatever it takes."
"It’s just that we couldn’t give you all the notes that were sent to you."
"You wouldn’t have to," Peter said. "You have an office, you shake some hands, sign some things, make people feel better."