Moved by Red

         Never move close to red. The man lived by these words, the last words he ever heard before he was cast down, down into the dark belly of the world. He mulled these words over again, as he had done before, countless times, sitting here, watching the small gauge that ruled his life. The needle flickered, sitting comfortably in the green. The last third of the semicircle was reserved for a dark red, but the needle was in no sign of moving towards it, and so the man sat, and waited.
         He wiped his brow. Not because he was sweating, but just because there was nothing else to do with his hands. The worn leather of his overalls rustled with the motion, the soft sound echoing down the corridors, mixing in with the symphony of hissing and rumbling that accompanied the pipes.
         The needle twitched fiercely. The man raised himself up at this. Perhaps this would mean… but no. It quickly settled down again. And so the man sat, and waited.
         More hissing. More rumbling. No rustling. The man thought of everything he could do. In his tiny room down here, beneath the earth, there were only three things of importance. The gauge he stared at, which he had set his sole chair in front of for the express purpose of watching it and the accompanying panels. His bed, tucked against the other wall. And the pipe. The pipe sat in the corner across from the door to the corridors. It lay dormant, and this fact more than any other saddened the man.
         Time passed. He did not know how long, for time was not measurable here. When the needle moved, it needed attendance. The rest of the time was taken up waiting for the needle to move. Those were the two stages of the man’s life, broken only by-
         The pipe flickered to life. A woman’s voice, brisk and curt, sounded through, “Heating requires attending.” The man paused, savoring those words, rolling them around in his head. The meaning wasn’t important. The sound, he craved. Once again, like before, his heart beat faster at the sound of her voice.
         And at her whim, he raised himself up and set off down the corridor. Heating was a simple fix. His feet would carry him unbidden, and his hands would carry out the task without thought. As they had so many times before. As they will so many times after. He wandered by the pipes, the endless pipes, the boilers, the handles and the valves. This was his world, an endless stream of metal built in halls of stone, lit by dim yellow bulbs.
         There was a world before. Before the metal. Before the earth. Before the shelter. A world with warmth, joy, and companionship. But then the calls and warnings. The fracturing relationships. And the need to hide beneath the ground. That was so very long ago.
         A passing thought occurred to the man. He had a name once, in the before-world. He had a name. A unique name, one that others called him, when there were others. But that was before. Here, there was no need for names. And there were no others.
         There were others above. In the upper reaches of the shelter, the citizens lived. The man did not know what they did. He never met them, and he never thought of them. But he knew he kept them alive. As long as he breathed, the shelter breathed, and with the shelter breathing, the citizens were breathing. His experience as a repairman was the only thing left from the before-world. It was why he was chosen to descend. Automation meant everything could be handled without intervention. But machines broke. And they would always need to be someone to fix it. Only one though. And that is why the man was stuck down here, always fixing, mending, and waiting. Never move close to red.
         But he did not like thinking about that. Those things would not make him happy, and they would never change. So he thought of the voice. The woman who spoke to him through the pipe. He did not know who she was. He did not know her name. He did not know what she looked like. But he knew her voice. She was tasked with relaying specific areas that needed maintenance, and it could come without notice. Not that he minded. If there was a schedule, there would be time. And if there was time, he would track it, and its passing until the next call would be acutely aggravating.
         He thought of all this in the time it took to walk to heating, and in the ensuing span of time it took to make minor repairs to the pipes and valves and return, he thought more about the woman. He liked to think she was like him, trapped in a small world, running through the same paths, the same routines. Realistically, he knew she lived with the citizens, and she had her own life to live, perhaps with others. But he much preferred the world he thought through rather than the world he walked through, so she remained similar to himself. And she remained similar, even with every face he gave her, with every word he wished she would say.
         He returned to his space, returned to his chair, and returned to the gauge. The needle hadn’t moved. It still hovered there, content within the range of green. Never move close to red. It never had.
         His thoughts drifted to the pipe in the corner. There was no point in talking to it. It only worked one way. He could forever hear her, that lovely voice ringing around in his head, but she would never hear him. Did she think of him as much as he thought of her? He liked to think so. Of course she didn’t, but he wanted her to.
         Time passed. In stages of either a moving needle or stretches of nothing but humming and rattling metalwork. The voice still spoke, and he listened. He would always listen. The only changes were the brief respites sleep provided and instant meals from packages. He didn’t know who made them, but there was enough stored down here for well past his lifetime. Cleanliness was not a concern. At one point, the man had tried to maintain his appearance, but that was some time ago. Now, the grime that had settled along his clothing and the beard that adorned his face were of no concern. There was no one else here to maintain appearances for.
         Time passed. That’s all the man knew. He lived in the bowels, his body living by the final words he heard, and his mind living by the voice he waited to come. The voice that set his heart beating, that allowed him to carry on within the dim halls of rust, metal, and stone. And it is what galvanized him when, for the first time, the needle caressed the red.
         It came without warning. One moment the needle was where it always was, resting in a zone of green, the next it had snapped to straddle the line between the two colors. Instantly, the pipe spoke, “Central reactor critical failure. Immediate repairs required.” The man paused only for a second. The central reactor had never needed mending before. This was a serious matter. But the voice had asked this of him, and so he went, for the first time he hurried down the tunnels, to the heart of the shelter.
         The central reactor was large. It had to be, to power the entire facility. All lives above depended upon it. And the reactor depended upon him to keep it alive. With practiced motions, the man checked the panels nearby. An overheating within the main fuel storage. The man hurried over to the heat exhaust, and within moments had it working as it should have. But the panels showed no change for the better. The rods within would have to be cycled to dispense the heat buildup. The man stopped in front of the door leading to the main fuel storage. Through the thick glass window, the main chamber was awash in red. Radioactivity would be lethal, without a doubt. And once again, another first happened in that time span; the man felt a new emotion. Sweat trickled down his neck, as a new sensation gripped his heart. Was this fear? He did not like it. It paralyzed him, prevented him for opening that door. He would die if he did and he was afraid of that.
         In that moment of panic, he heard it again. That voice. It was only a memory, some long distant time when he had first heard it, but it struck the same feeling now. Was that woman up there now feeling fear? Of the possibility of death, with no way to stop it?
         The man heard that voice, and thought of the woman. And he strode forward and threw open the door.
         His body was instantly wracked with pain. The burning was so intense. But he pressed on, focusing solely upon the voice, giving it words to push him on, encouraging him. He opened a rod, and a hiss of steam accompanied it as a blast of heat washed over the man. He gritted his teeth, and moved to the next. In the longest period of time he had ever felt, the man opened every rod and left the chamber, sealing the gateway behind him. He was gasping for air, the very act burning his lungs and skin. He could feel his heart fluttering, but now it wasn’t because of her.
         Somehow, he stumbled his way back. Through the halls, the lights seemed harsher now. The rattling softer, the stone colder. He limped into the room, and collapsed near the pipe. Reaching up, he pushed a small button on a panel, and spoke the only words he was allowed to say to the world above, “Shelter repairman requires replacement. Reason: imminent expiration. New repairman necessary.” His voice was raspy, too long without use.
         And with that done, he let his arm slide down. He lay there, staring up at the pipe. He had hoped there would be a response, something to acknowledge him. To his left, the gauge needle had come to rest within the green again. Never move close to red. He had not allowed it further.
         The pipe remained silent. His breath was coming shorter, gasps of air choking on coughs. Fear began creeping upon him, but he beat it back. He had to speak. In his final moments, gasping for life, he whispered, “I love you.” to the pipe, vainly wishing that somehow, she would hear. And then he was no more.
         In the room, the rattling of the needle could now be heard, never coming close to the red. And the pipe spoke, above the body of the repairman, “We heard you, repairman. This is Red speaking, a replacement will be down shortly. Thank you for your work.”