The Mushroom Wars

Chapter 5

Solani led me out of the small room into a long, narrow hallway. Circular lights, each the size of my hand, studded the walls like gems. Thick cables ran in bundles along the ceiling. It disappeared into a left-facing horizon fifteen, maybe twenty trees-lengths away from me. It was a hundred times longer than any hallway I'd seen before, and all along it were these doors like the one we'd just come out of. Hundreds of them as far as I could see in either direction.

By some miracle, the hallway was empty. The tight quarters made the massive building feel crowded and private. Still, I walked with my one arm covering my chest and the other covering my junk.

I did not like being naked.

I wondered how many rooms were occupied, and how many of them were just sitting there empty while corpses decorated the Open Wastes. I wondered how many of them had gotten there the same way that I had - fleeing toxic fog in a mushroom-fueled fugue, and if they felt they had made a mistake. I wondered how many of them would survive the week, and if I would be one of them.

"This ring is all dormitories." Solani stretched their hands out in either direction. "It's the outermost ring of The Grand Ficus, our capitol building."

"The Grand Ficus..." I looked around, struggling to comprehend the sheer enormity of the building we were in. "We're... inside a tree?" Some pious metaphor, no doubt.

Solani cast a mildly curious glance at me.. "Indeed we are. One tree, groomed and fed for thousands of moons." They caressed a nearby wall. "One of Rosea's grandest gifts, and growing every day." They started walking forward. "Stay close. We've lined the halls with anti-personnel devices, and you don't have any kind of ID." They held up their hand, and I saw a square of metal embedded in their forearm, etched with a precise pattern of squares and circles.

"Why are you showing me this?" Solani was kind and inscrutable - the most dangerous sort of person. Nobody in this world was truly kind, there was no space for it. Kindness was an illusion. Just a future investment in a world where thinking about the future was luxury most of us could not afford.

I saw Solani smile, before they turned left into a broad, short hallway with a tiled door on either side. "It's nothing personal. I just couldn't stand having someone so filthy wandering our halls." They chuckled and gestured toward one of the tiled doors.

A lie, no more than half true. Can't be trusted.

"There are clothes inside if you want them. I'll wait out here for you, but be quick. Rosea is serious about that time limit."

I stood in front of the door, my mind slowly trying to convince my body that there was no reason for them to trap me like this.

"You do know how to shower, don't you?" Solani smirked at me in a way that made me feel bare. My nudity was shameful, and my body was ugly, but my mind was like glass to Solani, and that was a completely different kind of shame.

I grabbed the handle and pushed, eager to leave this embarrassing conversation and get some clothes on. The door was stuck.

I pushed again. Harder this time.

The door didn't budge. My cheeks flushed red as I imagined myself on the end of some subtle prank of Solani's. Maybe I would have to beg for the key, maybe this subtle exertion of power was the key to his nefarious intentions. They had to remind me that I needed them.

"Could you uh... scan your ID chip for me? It's not letting me in."

Solani bit their lip - struggling to hold back a laugh. They pulled open the door and motioned me inside. "Just don't... eat anything while you're in there. No matter how good it looks."

I scurried into the room and shut the door behind me. I clicked and clacked the inner latch one too many times. I tried to tell myself that it was good to be underestimated, but it did nothing to stop my ears from burning.

The tiled room was square, and maybe a body's length on each side. There was a drain in the center of the floor, and a stone basin on one wall. In the far corner there was a watertight cupboard, and in the other corner were two hatches - one on the wall and one on the floor.

Three sticks of different sizes and colors hung from the wall. Each one of them had a frayed end, but none of them had an obvious purpose. There was a single, unmarked knob sticking out of the wall halfway between the stone basin's faucet and a showerhead near the top corner of the room.

I left my package of reclaimed barley in the cupboard, on top of a stack of identical robes. They were made of a strange fabric part way between hide and velvet, and colored like moldy pink rice. Next to them was a stack of plain sandals - soles and binding all of that same dingy pink.

I twisted the knob and nothing happened. Of course. I pulled it down. Again, nothing. I yanked the knob out and to the right. I heard a flush of water from underneath the hatch on the floor. Lovely.

I considered asking Solani for help. I imagined their smooth, smirking face standing outside the door, listening for the sounds of a shower. I imagined a massive clock counting down a solitary hour as I fought with a solitary knob.

I gripped the knob and wrenched it up and out, not quite sure if I was trying to rip it out of the tiles or make it work. A spray of icy water smashed into my face. I made a horrible kind of gasping screaming sound. Solani definitely heard that.

My whole body tensed up. My rib ached. The water lit up constellations of small wounds all around my body. I was hungry, and a big part of me was thinking of that barley. A bigger part of me was worried about how far Solani's goodwill would stretch.

The shock of the cold water wore off. The shower may have had hot water, but I didn't spend any more time searching. I was worried enough about the ticking clock, and something about the sheer opulence of a hot shower made me uncomfortable. Instead, I rubbed the grime run from my body, coarsely cleaning my wounds as I pondered the three frayed sticks.

The big one was red, as long as my forearm, and ended in a bundle of fibers pointing in all directions. The middle one was ashy, tapered, and ended in a more dignified line of bristles. The small one was white, only as long as my hand, but frayed strands covered half the length - all on one side.

Inscrutable.

After a handful of minutes, I gave up. The risk of a faux pas, or punishment felt too high. I knew how to clean myself well enough with my hands and water.

I pushed the knob back into the wall, and started to wipe the beads of water off my mottled skin. I heard something whirring in the walls and shivered as a breeze passed over me.

I opened the waterproof cupboard, grabbed one of the robes and the bundle of food that Solani had deemed 'unfit for consumption'. I pulled the robe over my head, and the fabric was warm and thick. Thinking about it for a moment, I grabbed a second robe and threw it on over the first. Never hurts to have a spare.