Amatka

FIRSTDAY

Vanja watched from the doorway as the train pulled in to Amatka’s station, a simple block of concrete in the colony’s outer ring. The colony looked small compared to Essre, but its shape was familiar: the low gray cubes and rectangles of houses placed in concentric rings around the central building, the eight streets radiating from its center to the outer ring of domed plant houses. Beyond them, the yellowy gray of the endless tundra.

She heaved her suitcase down onto the platform, where it landed with a thud. She stepped off the train and shuddered. The air was raw, noticeably colder than in Essre. A group of workers waited on the platform to unload the two freight cars attached to the end of the train and load the pallets and sacks that stood in neat rows on the concrete.

A woman in blue overalls and jacket approached along the platform. Wisps of auburn hair curled out from under her black hat. She was maybe half a head taller than Vanja, possibly the same age as her, green-eyed.

“Welcome to Amatka. Ulltors’ Nina Four.” Her smile revealed a small gap between her front teeth.

Vanja took her outstretched hand. “Brilars’ Vanja Essre Two.”

A nauseating stink was spreading across the platform. The workers had begun to unload the large manure barrels from one of the freight cars.

Nina followed Vanja’s gaze. “It’s for the mushroom farms. You send us shit and get mushrooms back. Practical, isn’t it?” She chuckled.

“Oh. Yes.” Vanja cleared her throat.

Nina smiled. “Come on, let’s go. It’s not far.” She picked the suitcase up one-handed. “You’ll meet the others at home.”

Nina kept talking as they left the platform and walked toward the center of the colony. She was excited to have a lodger, she said; it was the first time her household had been drawn in the solidarity lottery. And since Amatka got so few visitors, it was a special occasion. Vanja refrained from impolitely asking how the household members would be compensated, but Nina told her anyway: they would be allowed time off.

“And it’s great that you gave such early notice,” she added. “This way we had time to get your room ready.”

Vanja blinked. “A whole room? Why?”

Nina shrugged. “It’s been empty for a while. Olof, the guy who lived there before, moved out last year.”

“In Essre, we’re two to a room. Even three, sometimes.”

“We’ve been short on people for a while.”

“Short? I’ve never heard of a shortage before. Why is that?”

Nina briefly clenched her jaw before giving what sounded like a rehearsed reply. “There was an accident. We lost a hundred comrades. It’s been a while, we’re recovering, and the committee has decided that we don’t talk about it. I’m only telling you this so you’ll know. And that’s all there is to say about it.”

Nina paused. “Textile workshop,” she said, and pointed at the building nearest to them.

“Textile workshop,” Vanja repeated automatically.

They’d already passed the plant houses and entered the factory ring, which consisted of gently curved one-floor buildings with small windows and wide doors. Their facades were all marked with name and function in black, square letters. “Vegetable refinery,” Nina continued, pointing at the next building.

“Vegetable refinery.”

“Medical supplies factory.” It was slightly smaller than the others.

“Medical supplies factory.”

Repair workshop, printing workshop, paper factory. Nina pointed out each one, naming them in turn, and Vanja repeated her words. The factories were smaller than in Essre but seemed to be better maintained. The words painted on them looked wet and fresh.

The streets were all but empty. The few people who passed by walked with hurried steps, and Nina’s voice echoed alone. Vanja stopped and dug her wrist clock out of her pocket.

“What time is it?”

“Ten thirty.”

The clock still worked. It was, however, running either six hours slow or fast. Vanja set it and struggled to put it on, her fingers cold and clumsy. She pulled her sleeves down over her hands and picked the typewriter case up.

They left the factories and entered the residential ring, where narrow alleys separated three-story houses. Through a window in the nearest building, Vanja glimpsed two men by the kitchen sink, one washing dishes and the other drying them.

Nina pointed. “Kitchens are on the ground floor, as you can see, and bathrooms, too. The two upper floors have three rooms each.”

Vanja nodded. “Kitchen and bathroom on the ground floor, three rooms each on the upper floors.”

“On the two upper floors,” Nina corrected.

“Sorry. On the two upper floors. I didn’t sleep very well on the train.”

Nina gave her a pat on the shoulder and pointed to the long children’s house that could be glimpsed farther down the curve of the residential ring. They continued inward to the first ring. A full quarter of its circumference was taken up by the clinic that dwarfed the other facilities. And in the very center, a towering pillar that Nina didn’t need to mention. Vanja knew exactly what it was: the commune office.

Nina pointed out the stores—pharmacy, groceries, clothing, tools, household items, sundries.

“You did bring your credit book, didn’t you?”

Vanja pulled out the little green booklet from the breast pocket of her anorak. It was made of good paper, recycled cellulose from the old world. Personal documents were too valuable to use mere mycopaper. “I got an advance on next month’s credit. And a special one for requisitions.”

“For what?”

“I mean the company’s requisitions. So I can collect things for the study. For my assignment.”

Nina scratched her chin. “You know, we weren’t actually told what it is you’ll be doing here.”

“I’m an information assistant.” Vanja tucked the booklet away. “I’m supposed to find out what kind of hygiene products people use here. Soap and such. So the company knows what products they should try to launch here.”

Nina hummed. “I suppose it’s mostly the commune’s own products. I don’t know what it’s like in Essre, but nothing much changed here after they allowed free production. People around here, they like familiar things. But why did you have to come all the way out here to find that out? Don’t you know all about these things in Essre already?”

Vanja shook her head. “The administration does, I guess. But it takes so long to get the facts; it’s forms here and forms there. There are so many new companies now. And my supervisor wanted more than just figures. She wants to know what people want. So here I am.”

“How many of you are there in this…”

“The Essre Hygiene Specialists,” Vanja said.

“You can just call it E.H.S.”

“How many employees are you at E.H.S.?”

“Twenty, but I am the first to venture out of Essre as part of this new program.”

“Wow,” said Nina. “And you’re going to make us use our credit to buy your soap.”

“Yes.”

“Why? I mean, what difference does it make?”

“I don’t know,” Vanja replied. “Because it’s new.”

“I don’t know if I think that’s a good thing,” Nina said. “We’re here.”

They’d made their way through the center and arrived at the residential houses on the other side. Nina turned down the row and opened the third door on the right, marked HOUSEHOLD NUMBER 24. She set the suitcase down in the little hallway and opened the door to the kitchen.

The ground-floor kitchen and common room was sparsely furnished and had only two small windows. Under the one facing the street was a stove and a kitchen counter with shelves and an inlaid sink. A small refrigerator rattled in the corner. Cans and carefully sealed bags were lined up in neat rows on the shelves of the doorless pantry next to the fridge. Everything looked old and worn but carefully marked. Vanja thought of her own kitchen, where the labels were scratched and worn: not so here. The long dining table against the far wall was covered by a bright yellow cloth that was almost luminous in the drabness.

A slender man with his plaid shirt stuffed into a pair of green dungarees stood by the sink with a steaming cup in his hand. He put it down and came to greet Vanja.

“This is Jonids’ Ivar,” said Nina. “Ivar, Brilars’ Vanja.”

“Welcome.” Ivar’s handshake was dry and light. He briefly met Vanja’s eyes before looking away. His dark eyes were bloodshot. “Hello. And good-bye. I’m off to my shift.”

He stepped past Nina, who stroked his back, and into the hallway.

“So that was Ivar,” Nina said when he’d closed the door behind him. “He works at the mushroom farms. He’s really very sweet. He’s just a little terse.”

“Don’t you have to go to work?”

“I’ve got the day off. So if you want me to take you anywhere or something, just ask. Otherwise I’ll probably be reading in my room.”

Nina gave her a tour of the kitchen, which looked just like the one at home. Everyone took turns buying food according to a shopping list displayed on the fridge door. Behind the kitchen there was a bathroom. Then Nina guided Vanja back into the hallway and up the narrow stairs to the apartments. The door on the first landing had only one name on it: DOOR. HERE LIVES SAROLS’ ULLA THREE.

“That’s where Ulla lives,” said Nina. “She used to be a doctor.”

“She has this floor all to herself?”

“I suppose you think that’s strange, but yes, she does.”

Vanja shuddered. “I see.”

“We check in on her every day, go around the rooms and mark everything. You’re very welcome to help. She’s getting a little senile, but she means well.” Nina continued up the next flight of stairs. “The alternative is to leave some houses empty, Vanja.”

Vanja’s room was of standard size but furnished for one person instead of two. The bed by the far wall had a thick mattress and ample storage space under its high frame; a quilted duvet, a worn blanket, and a pillow lay neatly stacked at the foot of the bed. By the window a small desk and a chair had replaced the usual second bed, but there were still two storage cabinets that Vanja would have all to herself.

Nina set the bag down on the bed. “I’ll let you make yourself at home.” She went into her own room next door.

Vanja put her satchel and typewriter case down in the doorway and made a circuit of the room. She touched each object, reading its label and saying its name aloud. When she was done, she heaved the heavy typewriter case onto the desk and stacked the satchel’s contents—folders, typewriter paper, and notepads—next to it. Finally, she emptied her suitcase: the set of sheets, which she laid out on the mattress; towels, sleep clothes, a few sets of underwear, trousers, sweaters, and a pair of overalls, all of which she folded and put in one of the cabinets. The suitcase only just fit under the bed. After some consideration she put on another pair of trousers and the thickest sweater she’d brought. It didn’t make her feel much warmer.

“You need proper clothes.” Nina was back, leaning against the door frame.

Vanja pulled the sweater down over her hips. The shirt underneath bunched up. “You’re right. But I’m not sure what I need. Is it always this cold?”

“Yep.”

“Do you get used to it?”

Nina grinned and shook her head. “Nope. But you’ll get very good at dressing for the weather.” She pulled away from the door frame and went back into her own room.

Vanja sat down at the desk, took the lid off the typewriter case, and loaded a blank sheet. After punching the buttons one by one, reciting each character and number, she was confident everything was in working order.

There was a knock on the open door, and Nina entered with a note in her hand.

“Here,” she said. “I’ve made a list of the clothes we wear here. So you know what to get.”

Vanja scanned the list. “A sleeping cap?”

“The nights are even colder.”

Vanja thanked her and turned back to the desk to organize her papers. After a while she fetched the blanket from the bed and wrapped herself in it until only her head and hands could be seen. The temperature in the house wasn’t much higher than outside.

Her assignment was to find out everything E.H.S. needed to know about hygiene habits and needs in Amatka. That was it. Vanja had asked for more details, but Öydis, the supervisor, had shrugged her shoulders.

“We’ve never done this before, Vanja. Nobody’s done it before. We’re pioneers, you know? Just like our forebears. You, Vanja, have the honor of being a pioneer in this project. You’re perfectly suited. I’m sure you’ll find a good solution.”

Vanja still didn’t fully understand why she was so perfect for the job. Öydis had referred to her “quiet discretion.” Vanja suspected, however, that it had more to do with Ärna’s powers of persuasion. Ärna had told her she ought to have a change of scenery, and then made it happen. She was ever the big sister. Nepotism wasn’t really allowed, but Ärna had risen quickly through the ranks at E.H.S. and somehow managed to get Vanja the position.

She put two folders on the desk in front of her and took a thick marking pen from her satchel. She marked one folder CONTENTS: REPORTS and the other CONTENTS: NOTES. She picked up the notepad and leafed through it. It was mycopaper, shiny and new, with the scrap-by date printed in the bottom right corner of every single sheet. There should be time enough to fill the whole notepad, and transcribe the important parts, before it had to be scrapped.

Vanja was supposed to submit reports once a week. She grabbed a pencil and stepped out into the hallway to knock on Nina’s door.

SECONDAY

Vanja woke to the sound of thunder. The little windowpane showed a brightening sky, halfway between black and the gray of the daylight hours. She waited for the patter of rain against the glass. Nothing happened. Instead, more thunder.

She had gone to bed early, shortly after dinner. They’d had boiled turnips and carrots with savory fried mushrooms, a small round variety Vanja had never seen before. Ulla, who turned out to be old and bent but with a sharp gaze, had joined them at the table. She asked countless questions about Essre: how many people lived there nowadays, what did they wear, who was on the committee, and above all—was free production really a good idea? It seemed that the general population of Amatka didn’t receive much news from the rest of the colonies.

Vanja replied as well as she could. The last question she had no answer for, other than the official statement: to stimulate the people’s pioneering spirit and encourage cooperative development. It’s just my job, she’d said, I do what they tell me. Ulla shook her head and wondered how Vanja could be so uninterested. You’re completely inane, she’d said, and Vanja stared down at her plate. Nina had told Ulla that she ought to think before she spoke. Ulla had replied that she was too old for that.

Vanja excused herself, washed her plate and cutlery, and retired to her room, where she got into bed with her clothes on. No one came after her. It seemed that a closed door was respected in Amatka, too. She had lain awake for a long time, sorting through the things that had been said and done, coming up with all kinds of caustic retorts she could have delivered. Essre and its committee were ambitious and thinking ahead; free production was a necessary step in the expansion of the colonies. The people were ready to give it a try, in a carefully controlled effort. Amatka seemed to be doing well, no matter what Ulla might think. Did Ulla not have faith in her comrades?

Her boots lay next to the bed; she’d managed to take those off, at least. She pushed the duvet aside and shuddered in the sudden cold. She fumbled her shoes on, fetched a towel and washcloth from the cabinet, and went downstairs.

Ivar was at the kitchen table, eating with an opened book on the table in front of him. He nodded at her and jerked his thumb at the frying pan and the steaming pot sitting on the stove. Vanja nodded in reply and went into the bathroom. There was just enough room for a toilet bowl, sink, and bathtub. The third shelf on the wall was hers, not that she owned anything other than some washing products and a toothbrush. She reached for her toiletry bag, mumbled “toiletry bag,” and opened it.

She twitched and almost dropped the bag in the sink when she saw the contents. The bottom of the bag was coated in a thick paste. It was the toothbrush. She’d been careless. She’d noticed it on the train: the letters TOOTHBRUSH etched into the shaft had begun to lose their definition. Still, she’d thought it would last a little while longer.

Vanja forced herself to close the zipper. Now that she knew what was inside, holding it made her fingers tingle. She had a sudden vision of the contents escaping, slithering up her arms. The thought made her throat burn. She backed out of the bathroom with the toiletry bag in both hands.

“Ivar?”

Ivar’s hand and fork stopped midway between the plate and his mouth. “Yes?”

“I need to scrap this.” She turned around to show him the bag.

Ivar looked at what was in her hands, then at her, and nodded curtly. He rose from the table, went over to a cabinet under the sink, and pulled out a box. He opened the lid and held the box out to Vanja, who carefully placed the toiletry bag on the bottom. Then he put the lid back on and left. Vanja heard the front door open and close. Ivar came back in and sat down at the table.

“I apologize,” Vanja said.

Ivar smiled at her for the first time, a small smile with lips closed, and his face softened. “Don’t worry about it. Make sure you eat something.” He returned to his book.

Vanja fetched a cup and a plate and looked out the window. It still wasn’t raining. In the frying pan she found reheated leftovers from yesterday’s dinner; the pot contained coffee, so strong it was nearly brown. Vanja let the grounds sink and tasted it. It tasted unfamiliar, spicy and both sour and sweet, made from some mushroom unknown in Essre. She filled her plate and sat down across from Ivar. From what she could make out of the upside-down text, he was reading about plant-house farming.

When Ivar had emptied his plate, he stood up and closed the book.

“I’m off to my shift now,” he said. “Nina’s already at hers. She started early. You’re on cooking duty tonight. But you don’t have to get anything from the store. There’s plenty in the pantry.”

Vanja nodded. “What time?”

Ivar shrugged. “We’ll be home around five.” Saying nothing more, he washed his plate and left.

“Let’s mark all the things in here,” Vanja sang under her breath, letting her eyes wander around the room. “Table, chair, and a pot here; stovetop, fridge, and pantry there. We mark all things in our care.”

“The Marking Song” was part of everyone’s life, from the first day at the children’s house. When Vanja was younger, marking day at the children’s house was the best day of the week.

Her teacher Jonas would walk around the room, pointing at objects one after the other. Sometimes it was hard to make the name of a thing fit the rhythm of the song, and they laughed. Vanja’s voice was the loudest. Then they’d sing “The Pioneer Song” and “When I Grow Up.” Afterward it was nap time.

It was not until much later that they were told the reason for all this marking and naming. It was a special lesson. The children had spent several days before this lesson retouching signs and labels, singing extra rounds of marking songs. Teacher Jonas monitored them closely, punishing the careless. Finally, the children gathered in the classroom. The lecture was short. Teacher Jonas stood at the desk, his face tense and grim. In a silence so complete one could hear one’s own pulse, Jonas spoke. His powerful voice sounded thin.

A long time ago, when the pioneers came here, they built five colonies. Now only four remain.

When the lesson was over, the children spent the rest of the day singing marking songs and retouching signs and labels with a new intensity. It wasn’t a game anymore.

Vanja had been in a storeroom, tasked with marking pencils and rulers, and she took to the job in earnest. Pencil pencil pencil pencil pencil pencil, she had chanted, touching the pencils one by one, until the stream of words inverted and made a sound like cil-pen cil-pen cil-pen cil-pen cil-pen cil-pen, and the row of pencils had shuddered and almost turned into something else, and she realized that this is how it happens, and her whole chest tingled. Right then, the door to the storeroom opened, and Teacher Jonas was in the doorway. He looked at the row of pencils, then at Vanja. “I saw that,” he said. Then he grabbed her by the arm and steered her into the classroom.

The other children were already in their seats, except for Ärna, who was standing at the teacher’s desk with a strange expression on her face. Teacher Jonas pushed Vanja ahead of him and made her stand next to her sister. Vanja looked down at her shoes and waited. He was going to tell the others what he had seen, and she would be sent away. The silence seemed endless. She was about to look up when teacher Jonas spoke. “Vanja and Ärna’s father, Anvars’ Lars, has been taken into custody on charges of subversive activity.”

A murmur rippled through the classroom. “We have just talked about Colony Five and what happens when rules are broken. Now you all understand just what a terrible thing that is. A truly terrible, terrible thing. Do you want to destroy our community, to ruin everything we’ve struggled so hard to build?”

He turned to Vanja and Ärna. Vanja’s head filled with a buzzing noise. His voice seemed remote. “It’s important that you girls renounce your father and his actions. Because you don’t want to be traitors like him, do you?”

“No.” That was Ärna.

“Then say after me: ‘As a loyal comrade of the commune, I renounce Anvars’ Lars and his actions.’”

Ärna repeated his words, her voice so bright and loud Vanja could hear it through the growing roar in her ears. Vanja had to be guided through the sentence word for word, three times until Teacher Jonas was satisfied. Then they were allowed to return to their seats.

Teacher Jonas held a speech about the importance of reporting infractions immediately and renouncing anyone who tried to bring harm to the commune. After class, teacher Jonas took Vanja to see a committee official.

Teacher Jonas told us about what happened with the pencils, the official said. You’re just a child. You didn’t know that what you did was wrong. Now you know better.

Yes, Vanja had replied, eyes downcast. I know better now.

We will be watching you, the official said.

It was time for Vanja to register at the commune office in Amatka. She left the house dressed in two pairs of trousers, with three sweaters under her anorak and her notebooks in her satchel. She pulled down the anorak sleeves over her hands. The sky had brightened to a light shade of gray. Farther down the almost empty street a woman in bright yellow coveralls pulled a cart from door to door, collecting scrap boxes. Vanja turned away with a shudder and started walking toward the center.

The commune office of Amatka had rounded corners and small, recessed windows. Like all central buildings in all colonies, it was built from concrete, that rare material that the pioneers had brought with them. And like all other things from the old world, concrete didn’t need marking to keep its shape. It was solid, comforting. The plaque next to the entrance read Central building constructed and erected year 15 after arrival. Long live the pioneers! Long live Amatka’s commune!

Immediately inside the entrance, a lanky receptionist sat behind a counter. Vanja showed him her well-thumbed papers and received two copies of a multipage form to fill out. Complete name, age, home colony, temporary address in Amatka, profession, names of children and their place of residence. Education, employment history, and other skills. Was she aware that she might be drafted should any of her skills be needed by the commune during her residence in Amatka? Did she have any diseases or other conditions of which the commune should be informed?

At long last, Vanja handed over the completed forms to the receptionist, who bent over the counter to read them through. He tapped his pen on one of the boxes.

“Here. You haven’t filled in the section ‘children and their place of residence.’”

“No,” said Vanja.

The receptionist tapped his pen on the box where Vanja had given her age. “I see.”

Vanja looked down at the floor. Her cheeks were hot.

He asked for her credit book and stamped it with hard little thunks.

“Welcome to Amatka,” he said as he handed it back to her. “You’re registered as a visitor and may move freely within the colony. Thank you.”

“I would also like to fill in a request for information from the archive.” Vanja avoided his eyes.

“Next floor, first door on the right.” The receptionist turned around and continued stamping documents.

On the next floor, Vanja presented her papers once more and filled in a request for a list of local independent businesses. She was told the procedure would take a few days, thanked the clerk, and left.

The necessary formalities thus taken care of, Vanja visited the clothing depot, Nina’s shopping list in hand. After wandering about among work clothes and outer garments at the front of the store, she eventually found her way to the section for sweaters, underclothes, and small items. The store had few visitors at this time of day; the only noise came from a clerk who moved from shelf to shelf with a marking pen, mumbling at each garment.

The fabrics were different here, the materials warm under Vanja’s hand. Most clothes were monochrome and bright. Vanja, who was entirely dressed in brown, hesitated. She thought of Nina’s blue overalls and Ivar’s green shirt and chose clothing in shades of blue and green: a sleeping cap, long underwear, a thick shirt, gloves, socks, a scarf, and an outdoor hat with earflaps and a chin strap. She tried some of the garments on in front of a mirror. She looked a little peculiar with the hat on; her hair stuck out from under the rim and the earflaps stood straight out. She pushed the hat back a little, tucked her hair in, and tied the flaps. That made it look a bit better. She fingered her thin anorak. It was worn at the elbows and shoulders, but it was freshly marked and would do for now. Her trousers were still decent enough, with plenty of space for underclothes now that they had become so loose.

The company hadn’t given Vanja extra credit for clothing, but her general disinterest had led to savings substantial enough for all the clothes she’d picked out.

The pharmacy was a couple of doors away. Products were stacked according to category on the shelves, most of them packaged in the red and white of the commune. A couple of dispensers were busy serving customers at the back of the store. Vanja walked slowly along the shelves, reading labels. The range was virtually identical to Essre’s, but the proportions were different. Amatka’s inhabitants apparently suffered from skin problems: a whole section was devoted to eczema, fungal infections, and other skin conditions. The general-hygiene section was sparse in comparison. Vanja grabbed all boxes not decorated with the commune’s colors and filled in a requisition form handed to her by one of the dispensers.

“Do you import any independent products from Essre?” she asked, as the dispenser, a young woman with her hair in a tight bun, packed the items into a brown bag.

The dispenser paused with her hand in the bag. “No. I don’t know why we would. We can barely get rid of the stuff made locally. By the independent businesses, I mean. So I don’t know how something from Essre would do.”

“Why don’t people want them, d’you think?”

“You’re not from here, are you? It’s new. People don’t like new. It never turns out well.”

The dispenser bagged the last of the items and rummaged for something under the counter. She brought out a couple of pamphlets and stuffed them into the bag.

“Take these, too.”

Vanja lugged her heavy load back to the house. She put the bags down on the kitchen table and found some coffee powder in the pantry. It looked homemade, stored in a jar with a mismatched lid. Ivar probably brought coffee mushrooms from work and dried and ground them himself. Vanja filled the pot halfway up with water, added a couple of spoonfuls of powder, and put the pot on the heat. While it simmered, she emptied her bag and went through the bottles, jars, and tubes, arranging them on the table. All in all, she’d brought back thirty-two products from two different manufacturers. When the coffee had finished brewing, it came out of the pot a pale yellow color. Vanja retrieved her notebook out of the satchel and started taking down the names of manufacturers and products, as well as content lists. It was soothing work.

A sudden laugh made her look up. Nina stood by the kitchen door, eyebrows raised. She looked at the jars and bottles covering the table, then at Vanja and then laughed again, not at all in an unfriendly way.

THIRDAY

Vanja was once again woken by thunder and unable to go back to sleep. She pulled a sweater and trousers over her sleep clothes and went down into the kitchen. According to the schedule on the refrigerator, both Nina and Ivar had morning shifts at work and would need breakfast. Vanja took a pot from the bottom cupboard and checked the pantry. Two bags of porridge flakes sat on the middle shelf: the everyday black bolete and the slightly milder pale polypore. She scooped bolete flakes into the pot and filled it up with two parts water. While the porridge simmered, she made new coffee from yesterday’s leftover grounds.

“Hi.” Nina had wrapped a large green shawl over her overalls.

She went to the fridge and took out a plate. “Here, we can fry up the leftovers.”

They stood side by side in silence, stirring the pot and frying pan. Nina’s sleeve brushed gently against Vanja’s arm as she poked at the leftovers in the pan.

Ivar came down in time to eat and set the table for three.

“It’s not as strong as yours, Ivar,” Nina said, sipping the coffee. “I might even avoid a stomachache for once.”

“Coffee can never be too strong,” Ivar retorted.

“Amatka’s coffee consumption is five times higher than the other colonies’,” Vanja said.

“How do you know?” Nina asked.

“I proofread a report on coffee consumption once. I tend to… pick up facts.”

“Ha,” said Nina. “Five times, eh? And Ivar makes up half of it.”

“I’m self-medicating. I couldn’t face the mushroom farm without it.” Ivar downed the rest of his coffee and poured himself another cup.

“Ivar doesn’t do so well with darkness,” Nina said.

Vanja pushed her porridge around with her spoon. “Can’t you change jobs? Don’t you have rotations?”

Ivar shrugged. “Officially we do. But no one’s been allowed to change jobs for years now.” He rubbed some yellow gunk from the corner of his eye. “The committee says there aren’t enough citizens for rotation to be feasible.”

“I’m sure they’re doing their best,” Nina said.

Ivar rose. “Thanks for breakfast.”

Nina poured herself more coffee. Vanja tried to eat some more porridge. It had gone cold and stuck to the roof of her mouth.

“I get so angry with Ivar,” Nina said eventually. “I know I shouldn’t, but I do. He’s down there in the dark, day after day, and gets worse and worse. He could probably get something else to do if he just spoke to the committee. If he just tried a little harder.” Nina jabbed her thumb at the door. “It’s like he’s given up.”

Vanja shifted in her seat. “Well, that’s none of my business.” She scraped the remains of her porridge back into the pot. “I thought I heard thunder this morning,” she said. “Outside.”

Nina blinked. “What? Oh, that. It’s the ice melting.”

Vanja slowly set the plate back down on the table. “Ice?”

Nina explained that the lake, which lay just beyond Amatka’s eastern border, froze over at night and thawed in the morning. Things had been that way for the last five years. When the sky grew dark, ice formed on the water. After an hour or so, the ice would be thick enough to walk on. The air didn’t get colder than usual; whatever it was only affected the water in the lake. And at dawn, the ice broke up again. It was the noise of thawing that Vanja had heard. Nina nodded when Vanja asked if she’d seen it with her own eyes.

“Of course, going there to look was forbidden at first,” Nina said. “But when it had been going on unchanged for six months, the committee decided that we should call it a ‘normal variation.’ So that’s what it is now. A normal variation.”

“You must have wondered if someone had, well, done something.”

“Of course. And maybe someone had. But I don’t know anything more about it. And nothing else has happened since.”

“Just the lake?”

“Just the lake.” Nina got up. “Time to go to my shift.”

Vanja had another cup of coffee and washed the breakfast dishes. Then she put on her new undergarments, tied her hat on, and went outside. She walked without an actual goal in mind, slowly ambling in a northeasterly direction, toward the colony’s outskirts. The air was damp. Breathing in so much moisture felt unfamiliar. The buildings and people walking between them were all covered in a wet sheen.

Vanja eventually reached the plant houses in the outer ring, their oblong domes translucent, the plants inside a faint green. Planters slowly moved between the rows, watering and weeding. A mumble of voices and song could be heard from inside. Beyond the plant houses, the tundra. Sky and earth blurred together in the distance; for a moment it was as if the colony floated on an island in the void. The thought made Vanja’s stomach contract. She turned around and walked back into the colony as quickly as she could without breaking into a run. When she’d made it past the residential ring, she walked into the first public building she saw, oblivious to the words on the facade.

She entered a hallway with coat pegs along the walls. The gray door at the far end was marked DOOR TO THE LIBRARY. Vanja hung her anorak and hat on one of the pegs and opened the door.

The room was small and lined with bookcases, with just enough room for a reading table in the middle. Behind a small counter next to the door sat a plump, bespectacled man with an auburn beard and curly, thinning hair. He was filling in small index cards.

When Vanja closed the door, he put the pen down and looked up with mild brown eyes. “Welcome.”

“Thank you.” Vanja remained where she was and looked around the room.

“Are you looking for anything in particular?”

“I’m a visitor,” Vanja said. “From Essre.”

“And you’ve come here.” The librarian brightened visibly. “Are you familiar with Amatka’s authors?”

“What? No.”

The librarian rose and walked over to a bookcase in the middle of the far wall. He cocked his head and scanned the shelves with his index finger until he located a thin volume. He pulled it out and brushed the cover gently.

“Poetry,” he said. “If you want to get to know Amatka, you must read our poetry. This one was written by Berols’ Anna. Very concise, very typical of our culture.” He offered Vanja the book.

She turned the book over in her hands. About Plant House 3 had been published twenty years ago: three hundred and sixty-five poems describing Plant House 3 in minute detail. Vanja opened the book to a random page.

“Is it popular?” Vanja asked.

“Very, very,” the librarian replied. “Not as popular as About Plant House 5, that’s the most popular one by far, but it’s on loan at the moment. But you can read them in any order you like. They’re written so that the reader can start anywhere.”

According to the endpaper, the series consisted of eight books, each one describing a plant house in the outer ring.

“It took Anna ten years to finish the series,” he added. “The final book is the most advanced. Extremely dense. Extremely dense,” he repeated, nodding for emphasis. “I recommend starting with one of the others.”

Vanja held on to the book as she walked along the shelves. The selection was very similar to Essre’s. Most of the shelves were filled with nonfiction, histories of the colonies and biographies of the Heroes: citizens who had excelled in their service of the colonies through their actions and sacrifice. Vanja took down About the Colonies, For Children from the shelf. They had read from it in class. Vanja had always wanted to go see the other colonies. She had fantasized about sitting on the shores of Balbit or seeing the great factories in Odek.

Vanja turned to the poetry section. It had no equivalent in Essre. Berols’ Anna’s poetry cycle was just one of many. Other titles were About Eight Mushroom Chambers by Idars’ Ivar, About Bodily Variations by Torus’ Britt, and a thick volume bound in red and marked only with the words About Trains.

She returned to the nonfiction shelves and chose a small volume entitled A Short History of Amatka. After asking for and reviewing Vanja’s papers, the librarian printed a small library card and registered her loan. Then he returned to his index cards and seemed to instantly forget all about her.

The street outside was almost empty; it was not yet time for the midday break. Vanja walked homeward.

FOURDAY

Thunder rolled, and Vanja sat upright in her bed. It was morning. The room was freezing; her breath came out in white puffs. Vanja pulled trousers and a shirt on over her sleep clothes. It was too cold to even think about washing.

Amatka felt just as desolate as their parents’ collective. Each time Vanja and Ärna went to visit their parents, Ärna seemed comfortable about the whole arrangement; she would move around their parents with ease, accepting the change of environment without complaints. Vanja would miss the dormitory and the noise of other children. Their mother, Britta, was withdrawn and forbidding. She spoke to her children in commands: eat, sit up straight, go to bed. She didn’t touch them unless she absolutely had to. Lars was different. He would let Vanja hold his hand, even crawl into his lap sometimes, but he let her down again when other adults were around. He shouldn’t coddle the children, Britta said. It would make them neurotic.

At night he would always tuck his chidren into bed. This one time, Ärna had fallen asleep straight away. Lars bent down and smoothed the hair from Vanja’s forehead. His beard tickled her cheek as his face came even closer. His whispered words smelled of alcohol: No one knows where we are. But we’re not allowed to say that.

That night, he had remained seated on the edge of her bed, studying Vanja’s face for a long moment. We understand each other, you and I, he’d said. And then he seemed to sober up and began to tell her a story about how people had found a hole in the world, and passed through, and ended up in this place. But where “this place” was, no one knew, not even the committee.

Downstairs, the kitchen was empty. She found some leftover porridge in the fridge, which she fried and ate in solitude. A formal-looking note on the table informed her that the requested material was now available for collection at the commune office.

The receptionist inspected Vanja’s note and papers and went to get a thin brown envelope. Vanja accepted it and exited the central building. The eatery next to the huge arc that was the clinic looked inviting. The interior was simple and tidy, small tables and chairs upholstered in green set along the row of windows. The menu offered coffee and alcohol, pickled mushrooms, a handful of warm dishes. Vanja ordered a pot of coffee and sat down at a table to open her envelope.

The list of manufacturers she’d requested a few days earlier turned out to be very short, with no names other than those she’d already found. She could add information on corporate organization, founding date, and revenue to her notes. All three manufacturers had reported stable revenues for several years. People didn’t exactly seem to be clamoring for new products. Vanja sighed to herself.

“It can’t be that bad,” said a voice behind her.

It was Nina. There were dark circles under her eyes, but she was smiling.

“Hello,” she said. “I usually eat here after the night shift.” She sat down on the chair opposite and prodded the envelope. “What’s that?”

Vanja shrugged. “A list of hygiene-product manufacturers. It’s not very exciting.”

Nina laughed. The cook rang a little bell over at the counter. Nina got up and returned with a plate piled high with hash and boiled beans. Vanja leafed through the papers while Nina methodically shoveled food into her mouth.

“Why did you get a job like that, really?” Nina said around a mouthful of beans.

Vanja folded and refolded one of the pages. “Ehm… I don’t know.”

“I don’t mean to be rude, but it’s a pretty odd thing to do. Interview people about how often they wash themselves?”

“Yeah… I suppose it’s not that great.”

Nina gestured with her fork. “I’m not saying it’s boring in itself, but you don’t exactly seem like you enjoy being around people. I mean this whole thing of making small talk and being friendly. You seem more like Ivar, like you prefer your own company, correct me if I’m wrong. So why pick a job where you have to talk to people? Or was it assigned to you?”

Vanja folded the paper again and again. “I don’t know how to answer that.”

Nina put her fork down. She rested her forearms on the table and leaned forward. “Let’s try this, then,” she said. “What’s your education?”

“Information assistant.” Vanja kept her eyes lowered, but she could feel Nina watching her.

Nina nodded. “That makes sense. And what did you do before you started work at E.H.S.?”

“I wrote pamphlets for the education unit. You know. Those little manuals.”

“‘How to Stay Healthy’ and ‘General Clothing Maintenance,’ that kind of thing?”

“Yes, exactly. It was sort of fun, actually.”

“And how did you end up at E.H.S.?”

“It was Ärna. My sister. She knew the founder of the company. She thought I needed to get out and meet people.” Vanja unfolded the paper and folded it in the other direction. “So I got an interview.”

Nina pushed the empty plate into Vanja’s field of vision. “And how’s that working out for you?”

“Eh. It’s okay. Or… I guess that’s irrelevant.”

“Okay, you’re going to have to relax a bit, Vanja. I know you’ve come to do a job, but you’re welcome here. I really enjoy having you.”

Vanja looked up. Nina was leaning in even closer, head tilted to one side. She smiled when Vanja met her gaze. The green in her irises was speckled with brown. Fine lines radiated from the corners of her eyes. They deepened as Nina smiled again.

“There you are,” Nina said. “Hi.”

“Hi.”

“I mean it. I’m glad you’ve come.”

Vanja felt her face flush and looked down at the table again. “I’m glad to be here,” she mumbled.

“Except that you hate your job,” Nina added.

“Except that. I don’t think I’m very good at this. I mean… there aren’t any instructions for what I should be doing. I’ve tried to do some research, but… I don’t even know what they want.” Vanja fingered the coffeepot. “What if I do it wrong? What if I’m here for three weeks and come back with information they can’t use?”

Nina laughed. “It’s not you—it’s your job that’s completely absurd. Well, all right. I’ll help you out, if you’ll let me.” She poked at the crumpled paper in Vanja’s hand. “You’ve got your statistics there. We’ll get you some workplace visits. We can start at the clinic, and then you can do a field study with Ivar. And then we’ll persuade Ulla to talk a little about what it was like back when she was young, so you get the historical aspect. And then you’ll have a nice little report for your boss.”

Vanja considered this. “It sounds good, actually.”

“Then that’s decided!” Nina got up. “I’m going home to get some sleep. I’m on the day shift tomorrow. You can come with me to the clinic then.”

Vanja stayed for a while after Nina had left. Nina’s familiarity was both unsettling and liberating. It was impossible to lie to her. If Vanja wasn’t careful, Nina would soon realize what a failure she was dealing with, and then she’d back right off. It was almost comforting to know that beforehand.

She tore a page off her notepad and wrote a short letter.

Vanja folded the paper and packed her things into the satchel. When she exited the eatery, she turned toward the center again, heading for a little all-purpose store, where she bought a couple of necklaces made of spotted pebbles from the lake. She moved on to the post office and sent the letter and the gifts to Ärna.

Back in her room, Vanja wrapped herself in the pink duvet and put the two library books down next to her on the bed. A Short History of Amatka described the pioneers and their hard work to build the colony—twice. According to the book, Amatka had first been built as a coastal colony in the style of Balbit. Shortly after construction commenced, the lake’s water level suddenly rose, forcing the colony to move. Most of the building materials could be transported inland, but some had been lost.

A section of the book was dedicated to the Heroes, pioneers who had contributed to the colonies with exceptionally hard work and initiative. Benins’ Yara and her group, who built the railroad from Essre to Amatka sleeper by sleeper. Haras’ Samir, the brilliant scientist who prevented an epidemic by synthesizing a cure from mushrooms. Danlas’ Åke, who organized the first children’s house. And Speaker Hedda, the greatest Hero of them all. When the old world was decadent and doomed to ruin, Speaker Hedda found a way into a new world and led her people there. No one had ever explained exactly where the old world was, or what it was like. It was irrelevant. They were here now, in the new world, where they had built the ideal society.

Another section of the book featured Amatka’s literature, especially its poetry. Berols’ Anna had a whole page to herself. In the picture she was solemn, of early middle age, with severe dark eyebrows over a soft face. According to the caption, Berols’ Anna was one of the people who died in the fire in Leisure Center Three. Vanja leafed through the book until she found a chapter with that title.

“Looking forward” meant that this was no longer an accepted topic of conversation. Perhaps the accident was someone’s fault: a decision made somewhere that would have made the committee look bad. Or people had mourned too much and for too long. That wasn’t proper, either. One should be grateful and look forward.

Vanja put the book down and opened About Plant House 3. The text was difficult to read at first. Every sentence had been whittled down until only the absolutely necessary words remained. Every one of those words was precise; it could have been lifted out of the text and hold enough meaning in itself. In Berols’ Anna’s poetry, all things became completely and self-evidently solid. The world gained consistency in the life cycle of plants, the sound of a rake in the soil. Breathing became easier. Vanja read the book from cover to cover. When she had followed Plant House 3 through an entire year, from harvest to harvest, the room had darkened. Downstairs, someone clattered with pots and pans.

“Would you help Ulla with the marking?” Nina called over her shoulder as Vanja came downstairs. “We’re to do it a couple of times a week.”

“Sure,” Vanja said.

Ulla opened the door almost as soon as Vanja knocked.

“Nina told me to help you mark things,” Vanja said.

“Ah,” Ulla said. “I can’t manage that on my own, can I. How kind of you.”

She showed Vanja into a little hallway, where the doors to all three rooms stood open. Two rooms were completely empty. The third, the room directly below Vanja’s, was furnished. Ulla had a table with two chairs, a bed, and a cabinet; books cluttered every surface.

“How are you finding Amatka, then?” Ulla said.

“It’s fine,” Vanja replied.

“I heard you had an accident.”

Vanja nodded. “I did.”

Ulla tutted. “That won’t do.”

“I know,” Vanja said. “I’m sorry.”

“Oh, don’t apologize. Once is just an accident, after all.” Ulla winked at her.

Vanja went through the other rooms to mark the lights, windowsills, and doors, then returned to Ulla’s room. Ulla was already busy marking her things, one by one. It became clear why she needed help: she owned more things than anyone Vanja had ever seen. She turned to the left wall and a rickety shelf.

Wedged between a copy of About Bodily Variations and A Biography of Speaker Hedda was a slim volume with the word Anna handwritten on the spine. No About, just Anna, as if the book was named Anna. One couldn’t name a book anything other than BOOK, or start the title with anything other than “About…” Naming an object something else, even accidentally, was forbidden.

Vanja drew the book out and opened it. Poetry, on what looked like good paper, handwritten in faded blue ink:

Ulla gently took the book out of Vanja’s hands. “That’s personal, dear,” she said.

“Is that Berols’ Anna?”

Ulla nodded. “Yes, it is.”

“But it’s handwritten,” Vanja said.

“It was a gift.” Ulla tucked the book back in between the other volumes.

“What does she mean, to become?”

Ulla looked Vanja up and down, as if she was examining her. “I might tell you sometime,” she said eventually.

“I read about the fire,” Vanja said.

Ulla’s mouth twisted. “Right. The fire.”

“What’s that?”

“Nothing. We’re looking forward, after all.” Ulla turned away. “Go on with the marking, dear.”

FIFDAY

It wasn’t yet light out. Nina and Vanja had a slow morning meal of fried porridge. The coffee Nina had made was acrid and bright yellow.

“I’ve arranged so you can go with me all morning,” said Nina. “After that I’ll have to take care of patients.”

The streets were nearly deserted. Amber light pooled under the streetlights. The white arc of the clinic building made everything else look very small.

Nina brought Vanja in through a side entrance. They entered a low hall almost entirely taken up by two gray vehicles with the words TRANSPORT VEHICLE stenciled on their sides. Nina led her through the garage and a pair of double doors. On the other side was a long corridor with doors spaced evenly along its white walls. A murmur of low voices and shuffling feet, punctuated by mechanical beeps. The air smelled of disinfectant. Vanja had forgotten how heavy that smell was, how it made her ribs feel too tight.

“Are you okay?” Nina asked beside her.

Vanja nodded automatically.

Nina continued down the corridor. “Anyway, this is the emergency room,” she said over her shoulder.

“It’s very calm,” Vanja said.

“There’s rarely any action in there.”

Nina made an abrupt left turn and opened a door to a stairwell. They climbed two stairs and emerged into a new corridor. The atmosphere was livelier here: staff in white overalls, patients in wheelchairs and on stretchers. Nina brought Vanja to a desk where she was asked to sign in. She accepted the small tag that said CARD FOR VISITORS, and followed Nina to a room lined with cabinets and shelves stacked with work clothes. Nina retrieved two pairs of white overalls and handed Vanja one of them, along with a pair of shoe covers. She opened one of the cabinets and took out a pair of white indoor shoes.

“You can put your clothes in here.”

Vanja’s overalls were too large. Nina pulled on hers and smiled as Vanja rolled her sleeves and legs up.

“It doesn’t matter which size you pick—they never quite fit.” Nina pointed to her own overalls, which were too short in the sleeves but too long in the legs. “The important thing is that they’re not tight across your bottom. That could make lifting patients embarrassing.” She winked.

Vanja took her notepad and a pencil from her satchel and hung it in the cabinet. “I’m ready.”

The smell of disinfectant washed over them as they returned to the corridor, and Vanja’s stomach turned.

“Are you really okay?” Nina asked again. She leaned closer. “You’re pale.”

“Eh. It’s just the smell.” Vanja laid an arm across her belly.

“Just let me know if you need to go outside.”

Vanja straightened. “No, no need. Can we get started?”

Nina looked at her for a moment, frowning. Then she nodded and continued down the corridor.

They spent the morning visiting the different units. Amatka’s population suffered from lifestyle diseases and work injuries: bad backs from work in the plant houses and the mushroom farm; cardiovascular disease; osteoporosis. And depression, everywhere depression.

“It’s a little darker here than in Essre, have you noticed?” Nina said.

Vanja shook her head. “I think dawn and dusk come at roughly the same times as usual.”

“No, it’s not that. The daylight is weaker. It’s at ninety percent of the brightness in Essre.”

“Who says?”

“The research department.”

“Oh.” Vanja considered this. “What does it feel like?”

“Feels? I’m used to it. But you must have noticed it’s dimmer.”

“Maybe a little… No. Not really.”

“Well. That’s how it is, in any case. That’s why we have the light rooms.” Nina pushed open a pair of double doors.

The corridor they entered was more brightly lit. The doors on either side had little windows that revealed rooms entirely furnished in white. Every room was populated by people in white coats who sat in white reclining chairs, their legs wrapped in white blankets. Ceiling lamps spread a bluish-white light.

“Anyone can go in here when they need to,” Nina said, and nodded at the door closest to them. “Some come every day. Most people come about once a week or every other week.”

“Does it help?” Vanja squinted at the patients. Most were reading books or deep in conversation.

“It does. Most of the time. And don’t forget we have coffee, too.” Nina winked at Vanja. “But I suppose we’re all a little melancholy, even those of us who aren’t ill.”

Nina left Vanja in the clinic’s storeroom and went to take care of some administrative task or other. Vanja busied herself making an inventory of the hygiene products stacked on the shelves: soap, rubbing alcohol, cream, lubricant, disinfectant. The unease that the stench permeating the corridors had stirred up in her chest slowly dissipated. It crept back when the door opened and Nina came back in.

“How are you doing?”

Vanja frowned at her list. “Not sure any of this is useful. You only use the commune’s products. Are there things you don’t stock? Things you might need?”

Nina sucked her front teeth. “Don’t think so.”

Vanja put a bottle of lotion back on the shelf. “I’m done. Let’s move on.”

“There are only a few more units left to see. This way.”

They went down a set of stairs and into yet another white corridor, where a pair of double doors were marked DOORS TO FERTILITY UNIT. Nina pushed the doors open, releasing a fresh puff of disinfectant smell. The stink crept into Vanja’s nostrils and down into her stomach, sending it into a new spasm. Nina paused with a hand on the right door and looked over her shoulder.

“What’s wrong?”

Vanja shook her head. “We don’t need to go in there,” she said.

“Why not?”

“How about we just say we’re done.”

Nina gazed at Vanja and then at the sign on the door. “All right.”

She turned back and headed in the opposite direction. Vanja followed her. They were alone in the corridor; the sound of Nina’s shoes echoed against the walls.

“Do you have children, Vanja?” Nina’s voice was low.

“No.” The word sounded harsh.

Nina’s voice softened further. “You’ve been to that kind of unit quite recently, haven’t you?”

Vanja glanced sideways. Nina’s face didn’t have the expression of sickly pity that her sister’s and Marja’s had had. On the contrary, she looked a little weary. Vanja nodded and squeezed her lips shut so they wouldn’t quiver. Her eyes stung.

Nina sighed and ran the back of her hand down Vanja’s arm. “It’s hard.”

“Yes.” Vanja pulled away.

“I’m sure they did everything they could for you. Sometimes that’s just how it is. It happens more often than people think.”

Vanja hummed and crossed her arms over her chest.

“I should warn you, our children are visiting this weekend,” Nina said as they reached the end of the corridor. “If that’s too difficult, then… we could find some other solution.”

“No. It’s not that.”

“Then what is it?”

“Uh.” Vanja’s face was warm and tingly. The words wouldn’t quite get into sequence. She breathed in and out a few times. “It’s not that. I don’t care about your children. It’s… I don’t care about them.”

Nina stood still, studying her with a deep frown.

“I’ll be going now. Thank you,” said Vanja. “I can find my way to the dressing room.”

Nina nodded slowly. The frown didn’t disappear. “You’re welcome.”

Vanja walked back the way they had come, fighting the impulse to run. As she walked past a set of double doors, they opened to let through an orderly pushing a wheelchair. The woman in the wheelchair was dressed in a paper gown. Her temples were shaved and scabbed over. She stared blindly into the air. The orderly gave Vanja a sharp glance and moved past her.

The woman had been taken care of, like Lars had been taken care of, like everyone who spoke out of turn were taken care of. There was no death penalty in the colonies. Dissidents had to be stopped from endangering the community, however. The procedure that destroyed the brain’s speech center was an elegant solution. Vanja ran the last few steps to the exit.

The cold air in the street rinsed the clinic’s stench out of Vanja’s nostrils. Few people were out at this time of day, but she still felt claustrophobic. The whole colony and its buildings crowded her. She went home to pack her satchel.

Vanja followed the fat water conduit eastward. To her right and left the plant houses marked Amatka’s perimeter. Beyond the plant houses there was only the tundra and a narrow path along the irrigation pipeline. The lake was visible as a broad gray band on the horizon. It separated ground and sky, made them two distinct units.

It was a longer walk down to the bay than Nina had said. A slight breeze blew across the tundra, and Amatka’s sounds gradually faded behind her. The silence made her ears ring.

She had been outside a colony once before, beyond the protective shell of civilization or a vehicle. Leaving the colony wasn’t forbidden as such, but straying outside the narrow safe zone was intensely discouraged. Good citizens kept inside the plant-house ring. Only eccentrics ventured farther out willingly.

East of Essre, out on the steppe, there was a place about which everyone knew, but of which it was inappropriate to speak. Lars had spoken about it sometimes, only to Vanja and in whispers, when Vanja and Ärna came for their weekend visits.

When the pioneers arrived, Lars said, they discovered they weren’t the first. Out on the steppe, east of what would become Essre, they came across a cluster of empty buildings. Whoever had once lived there had left no other trace. The architecture was alien, the proportions inhuman: huge, lumbering houses with odd angles. And despite the fact that the buildings lacked anything resembling markings or letters, they were completely solid. The place was off-limits, but everyone knew that this was where they put criminals: far away from everyone else, in a place they couldn’t ruin. One wonders who the builders were, Lars would breathe, and why we can’t go there. Nobody knows where we are. But we’re not allowed to speak of it.

Then Vanja came home on a weekend visit, and Britta told her that Lars had been taken away. He was disloyal and had to be contained. Vanja knew where they had taken him. She snuck out of the house and ran out onto the steppe. She walked for what felt like hours before Essre’s lights finally faded behind her. The sky had begun to brighten into gray when she reached the top of a low hill. Ahead of her, the ground sloped down into a flat valley. And there they were, the strange buildings. She approached not completely knowing what she would find.

Now beneath Amatka’s silence, there was the gentle surging of waves lapping against the rocky shore. A gentle breeze brought with it the scent of something wet and somehow bright; it must be what lakes smell like. A little ways to the south along the beach rose an angular and broken silhouette: the first Amatka, the one that was never finished.

Vanja found a large, flat rock by the water’s edge. She dropped her satchel on the ground and took out two blankets; she spread one of them over the rock, then wrapped herself in the other and sat down to watch the fading of the light.

The process was so quick she could see it happen. A whiteness appeared at the water’s edge, and spread like a web across the lake with a crackling noise. The water underneath was dark at first, then grew cloudy as if fogging over. After an hour or so, the ice had cleared into a pure, bottomless black.

Vanja left her blankets and satchel behind and tested the ice with her foot. The surface was uneven and firm. Getting traction was easy; the ice received Vanja’s footsteps with a blunt, scraping sound. The sky above her had darkened, but the glow it reflected from Amatka’s lights reached all the way to the lake. Vanja took a few more steps out onto the ice and looked back over her shoulder. Far away, the plant-house bubbles shone in yellow and white. She turned toward the lake again, Amatka’s light warm against her back. No civilization this way, no human life; just the ice and the tundra and the devouring darkness. For a moment, she thought she saw a flickering reflection from across the lake, so faint it might as well have been one of those flashes the eye creates in darkness.

Vanja rubbed her eyes with her mittens and returned to the beach. The darkness pulled at her back. She packed her blankets into the satchel as quickly as she could and walked, almost ran, toward the warm glow of the plant houses.

SIXDAY

The next morning, not quite as early, it was Ivar who knocked on Vanja’s door. The coffee he’d made was even stronger than yesterday’s. Nina had already left for work. “Have you been to the mushroom chambers before?” Ivar asked as they sat down for breakfast.

“Never.”

“You’ll see,” Ivar said. “I think you might find it interesting.”

The entrance to the mushroom chambers lay to the southwest, in the middle of the third quadrant. The low building aboveground housed a canteen, changing rooms, and offices. Ivar showed Vanja into a room lined with shelves. He picked out overalls, rubber boots, gloves, and hats for both of them.

When they’d changed into their protective clothing, and Ivar had made sure Vanja’s pants and sleeves were properly tucked into her boots and gloves, he opened a door at the other end of the room. A wide, dimly lit set of stairs zigzagged downward.

At the bottom, they stopped in front of a heavy door, which Ivar pulled open. Sconces spread a mild light across the white walls of the corridor beyond. The sharp smell of detergent stung Vanja’s nostrils. When Ivar pushed open the door at the other end of the corridor, a damp chill rushed over them from the gloom beyond the threshold.

The gradual dimming of the light had made it easier to adapt to the semidarkness. The vaulted tunnel stretched as far as Vanja could see; broad shelves ran along both sides of it. Every surface was covered in a layer of soil. Out of the soil sprung white, round mushrooms. “It’s not as dark as this everywhere,” Ivar said behind her. “This is just the section for photosensitive mushrooms.”

Vanja nodded. “I understand,” she added when she realized Ivar might not have been able to see the gesture.

Under the layers of damp, soil, and detergent there was a whiff of something sickly that stuck at the back of Vanja’s throat. “Ugh,” she said. “The smell.”

Ivar came up next to her and prodded at the shelf closest to them. “It’s the fertilizer. The mushrooms are grown in composted feces.”

They moved on along the shelves. Eventually the light grew stronger, and they entered a hall where the mushrooms on the shelves were taller and plumper, with broad caps. Disk-shaped growths covered the walls. A couple of technicians on narrow ladders were busy carefully prying the lumps off a wall. “Polypores?” Vanja asked.

Ivar nodded. “Exactly. Those are pale polypores—they’re ground down for porridge and custard. It’s the same kind of porridge we had this morning.”

“Can you use them for other things, too?”

“Not really. They’re very tough and stringy, so it’s the only way you can make them edible.”

They came to a fork in the tunnel. New fungi appeared on the shelves: brown agarics with low, wide caps; yellow tangled clavaria that grew in tall clusters; and small, black funnel chanterelles. There were also mushrooms she didn’t recognize: thick-stalked mushrooms with tiny caps, mushrooms sheathed in slimy membranes, mushrooms spread flat across a wall. Ivar named each one and described their uses. Enormous polypores covered one of the tunnels from floor to ceiling, the smallest ones the size of dinner plates. Mycopaper base, Ivar explained. “There are other sections,” he said, “for medicinal use. We don’t allow visitors in there, though. Some of the fungi are poisonous.”

“How big is this structure?” Vanja asked.

“About as big as Amatka.”

The next door opened into a large, brightly lit chamber taken up almost completely by the four shiny cylinders in the middle of the room. Ivar pointed. “This is where we grow the mycoprotein.”

He guided Vanja up a small ladder leaning against the side of the cylinder closest to them and opened a small hatch. Through a thick window, Vanja could see a brown mass that covered the inside of the cylinder. “It doesn’t look very tasty right now, does it?” Ivar said. “It gets better once it’s processed.”

They left the chamber through a door on the other side of the chamber and emerged in the part of the tunnel they’d first set out from. Vanja paused to let her eyes readjust to the sudden darkness. The white mushroom clusters slowly reappeared in front of her.

When they came back up to the surface, they went back into the changing room, and Ivar took Vanja’s protective clothing and put it down a hatch together with his own. They washed all parts of themselves that hadn’t been protected by an unbroken stretch of fabric: wrists, ankles, heads, hair.

The canteen served a stew of root vegetables and mycoprotein, ladled into large bowls. The farmers ate like they worked, in slow silence. Vanja and Ivar sat down by one of the long tables. Vanja found herself lowering her voice to a near-whisper.

“What is your situation with hygiene products?”

“Right. That’s the reason why I really wanted you to visit.” Ivar jerked his head toward the other guests in the canteen. “Look at their hands and necks.”

More than half of the farmers had sizable red blotches on their necks and around their wrists. In some cases the rash had developed into full-blown eczema, scaly and wet-looking. “It’s the laundry detergent and the soap,” Ivar said. “We have to kill off any spores and microorganisms so they don’t spread outside the farms. Some of the species are very aggressive. But the fungicides are so strong. People get rashes.”

“What happens if the spores get out?” Vanja asked.

“There are some species that tend to invade buildings,” Ivar replied. “It’s a sort of dry rot. Breaks down structural integrity.”

“You haven’t complained about the fungicides to the committee?” Vanja reminded herself to spoon some of the stew into her mouth.

“Of course we have. But nothing’s happening.” Ivar scowled.

Vanja nodded. “I’ll report back to the company.”

She glanced at Ivar. He’d been calm, almost cheerful, in the mushroom chambers. Back in the canteen, his frown was now back.

“Why did you start working in the chambers, Ivar?”

Ivar shrugged a little. “I like growing things.” He filled his spoon. “And the quiet.”

“But it’s dark.”

“I’ve tried to transfer to the plant houses. But the committee won’t let me.”

Vanja’s spoon clattered against the bowl. “The committee, again.”

“Don’t know if there’s any point trying again. I’m in line already. It’ll happen when it happens, I guess.” Ivar put his spoon down and got to his feet. “I have to go back downstairs. You know the way out, right?”

Vanja nodded. She stayed for a while after Ivar had left. The mushroom farmers moved like they were still in the chambers, slowly and methodically. A low murmur of scattered conversation billowed along the floor. When Vanja returned to the street, the outside noises grated on her ears.

Vanja came home to find Nina and Ulla at the kitchen table. Two girls in red children’s house overalls were seated across from them. They turned their heads in unison to look at Vanja as she entered. Both of them had inherited Nina’s loose curls, the older girl in Ivar’s rich shade of brownish black, the younger in the metallic red Nina must have had as a child. They watched Vanja intently.

“This is Tora and Ida,” Nina said. “And this is Vanja, the one I told you about. Say hello to Vanja now, girls. Up you get.”

The girls immediately stood up. They each stuck out their right hand. “Ninivs’ Tora Four,” said the eldest. “Ninivs’ Ida Four,” said the youngest, lisping through the gap of a missing front tooth.

“Brilars’ Vanja Essre Two.” Vanja shook hands with each of them.

Tora and Ida studied her with solemn eyes and then returned to the table.

“Tora and Ida just told me what they’ve learned this week.” Nina fetched a cup from the kitchen cabinet and poured Vanja coffee.

Vanja sat down at the head of the table and sipped from her cup. The girls’ eyes were fixed on her, brown and green.

Nina smiled at them. “What else have you learned?”

“We’ve memorized mushrooms,” Tora offered. “And the shape of the world,” Ida added.

“They learn everything by rote these days.” Nina took a sip of her own coffee. “Apparently they’re not supposed to have books anymore. The teachers claim the children learn quicker without them.”

“Quit using books?” Vanja frowned.

“Go upstairs to Ulla’s room and do some marking,” Nina told the children. “If that’s all right, Ulla?”

Ulla shrugged. “If it gives them something to do.”

Tora and Ida left the table without a word.

“Something’s going on with the good paper,” Nina said. “It’s the same thing over at the clinic. We get less and less good paper, so we have to start committing things like schedules and routines to memory. We’ve even had to start using mycopaper for the medical records.”

“But that won’t work.”

“No. We’ve had to bring more people in just to retype the records before the old ones reach their scrap-by date.”

Vanja glanced at Nina. “But why? Do you think we’re running out?”

“They say the good paper is needed elsewhere.”

“And you haven’t thought to ask why?” Ulla said.

Nina waved her hand dismissively. “I’m sure they’ll tell us if it’s important. Until then, we probably shouldn’t talk about it.”

“But it’s good paper, it’s okay. It’s not mycopaper,” Vanja said. “We can talk about good paper as much as we like.”

“But still,” Nina said.

“We all know something will happen sooner or later,” Ulla said. “We’re running out of good paper.”

“I’m not stupid,” Nina cut off. “I just don’t see why you feel a need to talk about it.”

The sound of the girls’ high-pitched voices could be heard through the ceiling: Bed! Chair! Cabinet! Lamp! Nina put her arm around Vanja’s shoulders. Vanja was suddenly very aware of her scent: sweet, spicy, with an underlying hint of something she couldn’t name. The heat from Nina’s arm radiated through the fabric of her shirt.

“Hear how good they’re doing? We’ll be fine,” Nina said. “Now stop dwelling on it.”

Ivar and Nina were both very physical with the children. Tora and Ida always had a parent’s hand resting on their shoulder, or arm around their waist, or fingers running through their hair. The girls responded by jumping down from the lap they’d been lifted onto, sliding out from underneath the hand, ducking away from the fingers. They clung to each other instead. Their body language was completely synchronized. At bedtime, they said good night and ran up the stairs before their parents could reply.

“Every time they visit, it’s like they’ve forgotten who we are,” Nina said when the sound of footsteps had faded. “But they do become more friendly with time.”

According to the committee, it wasn’t healthy for parents and children to be too close. They were to socialize once a week, to satisfy the emotional needs that unfortunately still plagued many and that, if entirely neglected, could needlessly cause neuroses. But a bond that grew too strong made the children dependent and less inclined to feel solidarity with the commune.

At the children’s house, Vanja had always longed for the weekend, when Lars would stand in the doorway to the dormitory, and she would walk—but not too quickly—over to him and take his callused hand, and he would look down at her with brimming eyes and say: There you are. Once, he knelt down and hugged her. Then Teacher Elin had taken him out into the corridor and talked to him for a long time. After that, he just held out his hand.

SEVENDAY

Sevendays were for wholesome fun with family and friends, and most citizens had the day off. Parents could spend time with their offspring, if they wanted to. Everyone would visit one of the leisure centers to play games, sing together, and enjoy a delicious Sevenday dinner.

Vanja declined to join Nina and Ivar, telling them that she’d come by later. She wouldn’t have to be there until evening anyway. She slid her book into her anorak pocket, so she would have something to hide behind once she got to the center, and walked out of the house with no particular goal in mind.

The library’s window was lit and the door unlocked. Inside, the librarian sat at his desk with a thermos and a pile of books. “It’s Sevenday,” he said without looking up.

“I’m sorry,” Vanja said. “I’ll leave.”

She paused. The librarian’s posture seemed off somehow: slumped and tense at the same time. When she didn’t leave, he looked up. His eyes were bloodshot and swollen, and salty white lines ran down his cheeks. He cleared his throat and tried to smile. His voice was rough when he spoke. “You borrowed About Plant House 3, didn’t you. Did you like it?”

Vanja nodded.

The librarian rubbed his eyes, sniffled, and rose. “I suppose we’d better get you another one, since you’re here.”

Vanja followed him to the poetry section. The librarian ran his finger along the shelf. Between the books were gaps that Vanja hadn’t seen before. She peered around the room. In some of the bookcases, whole sections gaped empty. The librarian handed Vanja a small volume. The cover was stamped ABOUT PLANT HOUSE 7.

“Thank you,” Vanja said. “Have people been borrowing a lot recently?” she added, and waved her book at the shelves around them.

The librarian cleared his throat again. “No.” He walked over to his desk and picked up the topmost book, which he leafed through without really looking. “I’m culling.” He put the book back down, took his glasses off, and pressed his palms against his eyes.

Vanja stood very still by the poetry bookcase. It wasn’t proper to barge into other people’s private affairs. But the fact that he was alone in the library on a Sevenday, with tears running down his face… The librarian let out a long breath and sniffled.

“Are you all right?” Vanja finally asked.

The librarian drew a shaky breath. “I’m culling.” It came out as a whimper.

He breathed in and out a few times, then rummaged through one of his pockets, pulled out a wrinkled handkerchief, and wiped his face and beard. Then he blew his nose and put his glasses back on. “I’m culling.” This time, his voice was steady; only the tears in his eyes betrayed him. “The committee has ordered me to remove half of the books here,” he continued. “Anything not… essential… is to be destroyed and recycled. Because the committee needs good paper.”

Vanja frowned. “What for?”

“I don’t know!” The librarian waved his arm at the bookcases. “These books are going to disappear forever so the committee can have… forms or special paper to wipe their fat arses with.” He drew a shaky breath. “And I have to decide which ones to destroy. And they won’t be replaced, do you understand? They’ll never come back. Ever.” New tears trickled down his cheeks. “Everything that’s just… useless entertainment. Everything that only exists to make you feel good. It has to go.”

“That’s horrible,” Vanja said. Speaking the words aloud sent little shocks through her body.

The librarian stopped himself and slapped his forehead. “But what am I saying? I didn’t mean anything by it. You understand that, don’t you? That I didn’t mean anything by it. Of course the committee’s decision is for the good of the commune. You know that, right? I was just upset. Could we leave it at that? I didn’t mean what I said. Okay?”

“But I agreed with you.”

They looked at each other in silence. “So you did,” the librarian said slowly.

Vanja’s back was itching, as though someone was standing behind her. She looked over her shoulder. Nobody there, of course. But someone could be, at any moment. “I have to go,” she said, and held out her hand. “Brilars’ Vanja Essre Two.”

The librarian took her hand and shook it firmly. “Samins’ Evgen.”

“We talked about books today.”

Evgen gave her a sudden smile. “If you want to talk about books again, I’ll be here.”

Back in the street, Vanja shoved her hands into her pockets. About Plant House 7 was in the left one. She’d forgotten to register the loan. It would have to wait. A strange energy was running through her. What if someone had overheard them? She reminded herself to breathe.

The double doors of Leisure Center Two were wide open. Music and voices spilled out into the street. Inside, citizens were divided into groups, engaged in fun activites. It was a packed full-day program: sack racing, three-legged racing, ring tossing, ball games, dancing. The sound of an old dancing tune could be heard now: The farmer stands like so, watch her walk and watch her sow.

Soon, it would be time for the communal evening meal. Children without active parents would be seated among the other households. Everyone would stand up and sing “The Pioneer Song.” Then they would sit down to eat. The children would tell everyone what they’d learned at the children’s house during the week. Their elders would listen and praise them for their diligence.

Vanja stepped inside and gave the clerk by the entrance her name and designation. She continued into the main hall without bothering to hang her anorak up in the coatroom. The hall was long and narrow; high above, square windows close to the ceiling let in the last gray light of evening. Below each window hung posters adorned with quotes and words of wisdom from the Heroes. The long tables in the back of the hall were already set with plates and utensils. Cooking smells spread all the way from the kitchen doors by the stage at the other end of the room. In the space between the stage and the tables, children danced in a ring. Their parents stood around them, clapping a rhythm on their thighs. Vanja found a seat as far back among the tables as possible. She glimpsed Nina and Ivar, playing awkwardly with their daughters in the crowd. She sat still and let the cacophony wash over her until it was late enough to make absconding acceptable.

At home, it was as Vanja fumbled for the light switch that her foot landed in something with a wet noise. The sound traveled up her leg as a cold shock. She forced herself to lift her foot very slowly and then turned the light on.

It was the suitcase. It had been out of sight under the bed, and she hadn’t marked it for several days. It had been so worn, the text on the lid almost erased. She should have scrapped it. Now it was too late. The whitish gloop it had dissolved into had spread across nearly half the floor. It stuck to the sole of her boot. Nothing but her boot between her and that substance. She didn’t know what would happen if she touched it, but it would spread to other objects if she didn’t act fast. Vanja struggled to untie her laces and kicked the boot away. She rushed down the stairs and collided with Nina in the coatroom. She grabbed Nina’s shoulders to stay upright, sending her stumbling backward into the front door.

“What? What is it?” Nina shouted.

“Don’t go upstairs, don’t go upstairs.” Vanja’s heart beat out syncopes against her rib cage. “There’s gloop on the floor.”

Nina exhaled slowly through her nose. “You stay here. I’ll get a cleaner.”

Vanja sat down on the stairs. Ivar came in; he was alone. He glanced at her and then up the stairs. Vanja shook her head, and Ivar pressed his lips together. He went into the kitchen.

Nina came back with two cleaners in yellow overalls in tow. They carried shovels and boxes. She ushered Vanja into the kitchen so the cleaners could pass.

Nina motioned for Vanja to sit down next to Ivar. She poured her a cup of cold coffee.

“Are the girls at the children’s house?” Vanja said, just to fill the silence.

“We have to make sure we mark things here,” Nina said.

Vanja looked into her cup. “It was an old suitcase.”

Nina snorted. “Then you should have had the sense to scrap it.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t think it would happen so quickly.”

“Maybe it’s different in Essre,” Ivar said. “Maybe you can afford to be a little careless there. Because there are more of you, I mean. More people who can mark things.”

“That doesn’t work here,” Nina filled in.

“I get it,” Vanja said. “Please, forgive me.” She pulled her unshod foot into her lap and warmed it between her hands.

They sat in silence, nursing their cups. The cleaners walked up and down the stairs several times. Creaking and scraping noises could be heard from the second floor. Eventually one of the cleaners came into the kitchen. Her face was sweaty.

“We’re done,” she said. “It had barely spread at all.”

“Spread?” Vanja exclaimed.

The others looked at her. “She’s from Essre,” Nina said after a brief pause.

“Aha. Hey,” the cleaner said. “MOSO, remember?”

“Mark often, scrap often,” Vanja replied automatically.

“Here, that means often. Or it’ll spread. You’ll keep an eye on her, yeah?” The cleaner gave them a wave and left.

“Well, then.” Ivar pushed his chair back. “Let’s see what’s what, then.”

The corner where the bed had stood was empty. The cleaners’ tools had left long scratches in the floor. Vanja’s boot was nowhere to be seen. “This is ‘barely’?” Vanja said. She took a step into the room. The foot without a boot tingled.

Ivar let out a short laugh. “It’s always ‘barely.’”

Vanja looked around the room. It would be very uncomfortable to sleep on the floor. And so close to where it had happened.

“You can sleep in my room,” Nina offered. “We’ll get you a new bed tomorrow.”

Vanja hadn’t been into Nina’s room before; the door had always been closed. It was more austere and unadorned than she had thought it would be. The bed was immaculately made, the cabinets shut. There was no desk. A poster of an old evening poem sat on the wall:

Nina stripped down to her green underpants and a shirt that fit snuggly across her shoulders and upper arms. They were beautiful shoulders, wide and rounded. She wasn’t wearing a bra; her breasts moved freely under her shirt. Vanja turned away and peeled off her outmost layer of clothes, folding and stacking them carefully. She was afraid to turn around.

“We’ll have to lie on our sides,” Nina said. “No room for sleeping on your back.” She was already in bed, facing the wall.

Vanja slipped in under the duvet next to Nina and stared out into the room. “Are you angry?” she asked.

“I got over it hours ago,” Nina mumbled. “But if you steal the duvet or snore. Then.”

“Anyway, I’m sorry.”

“Or if you apologize again. Then.”

“Sorry,” Vanja said before she could stop herself.

Nina gave her a kick. “Last chance. Good night.”

Vanja heard Nina’s breaths deepen and slow down, heard the rustle of sheets when Nina’s legs twitched as she drifted off. It shouldn’t be that difficult to fall asleep; it had been a long day. The business with the suitcase had been draining, and she was used to sharing a bed. But the warmth radiating from Nina’s back was so palpable. It spread down the backs of her legs and made the soles of her feet prickle. Vanja scooted as close as she could without actually touching Nina’s back with her own. She lay awake for a long time.