Itten

The inhabitants of Shelter 42 stood crammed into the concrete entrance hall. There were only three dozen of them, but in the cramped bunker entrance they stood shoulder to shoulder in quiet anticipation. Around them pipes hissed and fluorescent lights buzzed, and deep in the bunker the air purifier thumped its familiar rhythm. But no one spoke.

Micah was as nervous as the rest of them. Very few of them had met the Patron of their shelter. The foreman, Walter, dealt with the people from the tower, and usually only via the video intercom. For the Patron to come down from the tower and meet them in person was a rare occasion, but a necessary one. Walter had insisted. The shelter was in trouble, they needed more resources, and he had insisted the Patron come see for himself. Walter had tried to reassure them all. He'd said that the Patron had a duty to keep their shelter running, that they had always met their quotas and more than deserved what they asked for. Still, the tension was palpable.

"They're here," Gina said. She'd been peering out the reinforced window on the bunker door for what felt like hours now. They crammed closer. Micah could crane his neck just enough to see an old military jeep emerge from the smog. It was unusually thick that day. By the time they saw the jeep, it had already stopped. Micah saw a man in a suit and a gas mask exit the passenger seat, just before Walter chased them all back.

With a heavy mechanical clunk the door opened, just long enough for the man to step inside. The smog rolled in with him. Most of the shelter inhabitants looked down, but Micah couldn't resist staring. He'd never seen one of the Patrons before. His gray suit looked remarkably clean and pressed. His black wavy hair over the mask was washed and cut. Micah was sure that if he came closer, the man would smell like soap instead of yeast and sweat. He took off the mask, revealing sharp features folded into an impatient scowl. If he had to guess, Micah would say the man did not appreciate being called into the smog to be ambushed by an entire shelter population. But Walter had said there was strength in numbers, so they all stayed put, albeit with their heads down.

"What was so urgent I needed to come down here myself?" he asked, clearly straining to reach even that level of forced politeness. "I read your report, Walter. And if I remember correctly I already allotted Shelter 42 extra rations with the next shipment."

"Yes sir, and we're obviously grateful," Walter said. It was odd to see the confident, no-nonsense foreman so cowed by another man. "But there hasn't been word on the replacement parts for the air purifier. Last night it stopped for over three hours. It's being held together with tape and wire sir."

The man didn't seem to be listening. He'd fished a pair of silver-rimmed glasses out of his suit pocket and cleaned them with a piece of cloth so clean it almost sparkled. It made Micah look down at the sweater he was wearing for the third day in a row, stiff with grime. He probably stank like a sewer. If he was honest, he wouldn't have blamed the Patron for keeping that gas mask on. But apparently the man had been listening closely.

"Shelter 42 has seven hours of backup oxygen, if I remember correctly."

"Not anymore, sir. The tanks have that capacity, but they haven't been full for months now. The purifier can't keep up with the outages. We're not producing a surplus anymore, we're running on-"

"Have you heard from Shelter 31?"

The question took Walter by surprise. Everyone in the entrance nervously shuffled and exchanged glances while the man waited for an answer. Something he apparently didn't have the patience for, so he continued.

"You haven't, of course, because Shelter 31 was marked for decommission two days ago. I'm sure you'll receive the status report sometime today. They clung on for a year with a malfunctioning purifier. I sent them all the replacement parts they needed. In my estimation they had higher priority than 42 and its seven hours of backup. Maybe I was mistaken, but do you feel I should have written them off to send the parts to 42 instead?"

"No sir," Walter mumbled, because that was clearly the answer required, but Micah wasn't so sure he meant it. "In any case sir, there have been other problems. If you would allow me to give you the tour-"

"Absolutely not. Is that the requisition form?" he asked, pointing at the clipboard in Walter's hands. The man nodded and handed it over when the Patron held out his hand. He read it carefully, page after page, occasionally sighing and shaking his head. Walter had been wrong. There wasn't strength in numbers. Being ganged up on had only served to piss off their Patron. The realization made his stomach drop.

The Patron looked at him. For some reason his gaze wandered from the clipboard and pinned Micah down. With an uncomfortable jolt he looked down, startled at being seen so abruptly. When he looked up the man's eyes were back on the forms, but the nauseating tingle in his gut still simmered down for quite a while.

"Apologies if I've been curt," the Patron eventually said to Walter, handing the clipboard back. "Nothing you've asked for is unreasonable. And I'm sure you understand that the other seven shelters under my patronage have problems just as urgent. It's a difficult task, sorting through these forms and allocating resources fairly. I've been thinking I could use an assistant. By my calculations one less person in 42 would be enough to allow the backups to replenish, given the purifier works without outages. Does that sound right to you?"

"Oh," Walter said, perturbed at the Patron's rather sudden turnabout. "Well, yes. If we got the parts-"

"Here's what we'll do," the Patron said, taking off his classes and sliding them back in his pocket. "There's a salvage team preparing to decommission 31 tomorrow. I'll earmark the parts you need, and I'll reassign one of your residents."

"And the masks?" Walter asked, pushing his luck. "The ones we have are barely working."

"Yes, I think we can find replacements for those as well. You there-"

The knot in Micah's stomach tightened when the Patron nodded his chin at him.

"What's your name?"

"Micah sir."

"Do you have family here?"

"No sir," he said, and he had great trouble holding that man's gaze. With creeping dread he realized where this was going.

"You wouldn't mind being reassigned to the tower then?"

He'd presented it as a question, but his tone left no doubt that this was a done deal to him. Panic gripped Micah, tightening his chest at the thought of leaving the shelter for the first time in 15 years. The only reason he'd ever crossed the threshold of the bunker was to load and unload the trucks. He'd never seen more than ten feet into the smog. The thought of leaving his concrete nest sent a jolt of fear up his spine. And Walter must have noticed, because he sounded very concerned when he spoke.

"Micah, is that what you want?" he asked, but it was hard to ignore his pleading tone. When he looked around, Micah could see all eyes were on him, gentle but desperate. They needed the replacement parts, they needed to live without the constant mortal terror of the purifier shutting down. He knew the soul-deep fear of sleepless nights listening to the thump of the machine and praying there wouldn't be a sudden silence. If he said no, no one would blame him. But he didn't think he'd be able to live with himself.

"Yes," he said, and he could feel the tense fear leak out of the room and relief settle in. "Yes, that would be fine."

"Excellent," the Patron said, getting ready to put on his mask again. "Then it seems to me like the issue is resolved. Walter, we'll be in touch, but expect the replacement parts as soon as the salvage team returns. Micah, please take a mask and follow me."

"Right now, sir?" he asked, his mind still simmering down from the shock of his decision.

"As quick as you can, please."

It was too much. He wanted to stall, for no other reason than he was scared to leave. He wanted to ask about taking his personal belongings, before he realized that nothing he had belonged to him. Even his clothes technically belonged to Shelter 42. There wasn't anyone to say goodbye to, no things to pack, no reason whatsoever to not do what he was told, other than he simply didn't want to. But the pleading eyes of the residents finally moved him to walk to the locker by the door and grab a gas mask. The Patron was already by the door, waiting for the door to open, but before it did Walter put his hand on Micah's shoulder.

"Thank you," he nodded, and before Micah had a chance to respond, Walter opened the heavy steel door and let the smog roll in.

The jeep made its way slowly through the smog, guided only by the bright yellow paint on the cracked asphalt. From time to time Micah could see shapes moving in the smog, but never clear enough to not doubt his own eyes. His mind was elsewhere. He'd heard about the tower, of course. He knew it was the place where the Patrons lived, where they organized their efforts to save humanity after the cataclysm. But he never thought he would see it for himself. As far as he knew, the tower was surrounded by military checkpoints, barbed wire, warning lights and even land mines if you believed the more breathless rumors. But if all that was true, he didn't get to see it. Visibility that day was even lower than usual. The light was tinted a foul brown and the smog seemed a living beast, worming its tendrils into every gap it could find.

Micah was surprised when the jeep stopped. He had thought the tower would be farther away, but it felt as if they'd only been driving fifteen minutes. He'd avoided looking at the man in the passenger seat. He preferred to not even think about him. But when the man got out of the car and beckoned him he followed. And for the first time in his life, he saw the tower, the heart of human resilience.

Two soldiers let them through into the lobby, and Micah was struck with a strange sense of familiarity. He had seen a hotel before, ages ago before the cataclysm. He had vague memories of his parents taking him on a vacation when he had been very little. But the tower looked nothing like he remembered from the before. The marble floors were cracked and covered in dust. The front desk was deserted. What had once been a lovely fountain sat crumbling and dry in the middle of the lobby. Nobody had even thrown out the dead plants. But he didn't get much time to look around. The Patron called an elevator down. Micah was shocked to see the button light up and the old dial above the doors move. It worked on electricity. He hadn't seen anything like it in years.

"Go ahead without me," the man said while they waited, his voice muffled by the mask, and it was the first thing he'd said since they had left the shelter. "I'll be with you as soon as I've taken care of something."

Before Micah could ask questions the elevator dinged and the doors slid open. He wanted to ask where he was supposed to go, what he was supposed to do, but the Patron unceremoniously ushered him into the elevator and pressed the button for the sixth floor. Before he could articulate any questions the doors slid closed again, and with a heavy thunk the elevator rattled back to life.

In a dazed state of shock Micah waited for the doors to open. Just an hour ago he had been at the shelter. Home, as far as there even was such a thing. He tried to imagine never seeing the packing tables again, never sleeping in the lumpy bunk bed in the dorm again, and he didn't know why he was biting back tears. Life in the shelter had been miserable. Not a soul alive would judge him for wanting out. By all rights he ought to be relieved, but all he could feel was electric fear prickling in his gut, waiting to flare up at the slightest hint of danger. He didn't believe the Patron. His frightened mind didn't allow him to conjure up any ideas on what that man might want from him.

The ding of the elevator startled him. He had expected the doors to open into a hallway, but to his surprise he stepped out into a wide open living room with higher ceilings than he'd ever seen. The wall opposite was made entirely of glass. In the before times he imaged the view of the city would have been spectacular, but now the glass was covered in the slick grime the smog left behind. Instead the room was lit with electric lights. Not the buzzing fluorescent tubes that kept him awake and gave him migraines, but soft glowing bulbs. The gray carpet was old but clean. It smelled fresh in that room, like oxygen and unfinished wood. The left wall past the kitchen had two doors and was covered in ivy. There were couches by the window and an open kitchen top his left, a dining corner on the right. But most of all it was quiet. The missing rhythm of the purifier set him on edge. After 15 years of shelter life, silence made his chest tighten with fear.

He stood outside the elevator for a long time, in silence so deep he could hear his own heartbeat. The Patron didn't return. The elevator stayed quiet. A nervous tingle rose up, prickling his mind with terrible thoughts of what might be happening to him.

There was a thud. In the silence it was so sudden it made the coil of anxiety shoot up and electrify his brain. For a few quiet moments he thought he'd imagined it. Then he heard it again, and goosebumps rose on his arms. His stomach squirmed. He could swear he heard the sound of a muffled voice.

There was a door to his right, to a room behind the dining nook. It was the only place the sounds could have come from. He knew down to the marrow in his bones that the best thing to do was to ignore it and stay where he was. The Patron probably wouldn't appreciate Micah wandering around his home. But pure fear made him move. He needed to know, to solve at least one mystery of what was happening to him.

The door was unlocked. After a short moment to gather his rapidly waning courage, he turned the knob and opened it.

The room beyond the door was dark and very small, much smaller than the shape would suggest. It seemed like a closet entryway to a bedroom. But Micah's eyes weren't on the suits and neat row of shoes. On the floor, in complete darkness, he saw the shape of a body. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust, and the more they did, the more the horror grasped at his throat. It was a body. A boy, naked and motionless, a gag in his mouth. For one horrifying moment Micah thought he was dead, until the boy stirred and chains rattled.

Micah dropped to his knees. With trembling fingers he removed the gag. The boy coughed and wiped his mouth. Micah saw that his hands were bound and hurried to untie him.

"Are you alright?" he asked, and he was shocked at how much his voice shook.

The boy didn't look up. He kept his eyes down, as if even the soft orange light hurt them. And something was off about him. Even through the haze of panic Micah noticed something was wrong. The boy wasn't scared. He was obviously cold, judging by the goosebumps on his bare skin, but he seemed completely at ease with his nudity. He didn't try to get away, he barely even moved.

"Who are you?" he asked in a frail voice that begged for a sip of water.

Micah didn't answer right away. He was still trembling with the shock of finding him in that state, and very confused at how calm he was. It wasn't until the boy looked at him with ice blue eyes he realized he'd been asked a question.

"Sorry, I'm... I'm Micah. The Patron sent me up here."

"Oh, is that how it is?" the boy said, and to Micah's surprise he smiled. And when he looked closer, something dawned on him. It had been hidden in the dark, but a silver gleam caught his attention. The boy was wearing a collar with a silver pendant. Kitten. In that instant, he understood what was happening

"I should go," he said, but when he tried to stand up Kitten grabbed his arm.

"Wait. Don't go. If Master sent you up here you have to stay with me. He'll be angry if you don't."

Despite his better judgment Micah stopped and sank back to his knees. There had been real fear in that voice.

"Angry with you?" he asked, and the boy nodded and bit his lip. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't be here-"

"Please," he begged, and to his shock he put his arms around Micah's waist. His eyes had adjusted enough to now clearly see him, his slender white body and his blond curls. The searing panic in his body still wouldn't die down, but it took on a different quality. Nobody had hugged him in years. He was sure he knew what was going on now, but to his own surprise he didn't care.

"You want to stay, don't you?" Kitten purred, his arms around Micah's waste and his cheek on his thigh. And he was right. Not even his deep shock could compare to the sensation of being held. He couldn't remember the last time. Pure melancholy washed over him when he realized just how deprived he had been. He looked at the boy's body and saw bruises, scars, welts on his back as if he had been whipped. But his thin lips were curved into a smile and his eyes shone bright when he looked Micah in the eye.

"You don't have to do anything," he said, and Micah didn't stop him when he lifted Micah's sweater just enough to run his fingers over the skin underneath, leaving a trail of goosebumps where they went. "Just stay. Close your eyes. You can pretend I'm a girl if you want. I'll be quiet."

There was so much Micah wanted to say; that he didn't have to do anything either, that he didn't have to be quiet, or pretend to be anything else, but he couldn't force out a single word. He just watched. Kitten was stretched on the floor, and it was hard to imagine he didn't know how beautiful he looked. With his cheek on Micah's thigh he must have realized how hard Micah was, and the boy took it as permission to undo his pants and pull them down just enough to see the tip of his cock. With a jolt Micah tensed. The boy flicked his tongue over the tip and looked up with a wide curious smile.

"Yes?" he asked, biting his lip and glowing with eagerness.

Before he had even decided to, Micah nodded.

"Yes. Please."

He may have had only the foggiest idea of what was happening, but he knew he wanted it too. He was still on his knees, leaning back on his hands, wrapped safely in the darkness and the shadows in the orange light. When the boy took him in his mouth he tensed and closed his eyes. The prickle in his gut turned delightful and rose through his body when he felt Kitten's tongue. The pendant on his collar jingled light a bright bell as his head moved up and down. Micah looked down again, but all he could see was a mop of blond curls moving in time with the jolts of pleasure shooting through him, rising and swelling in just moments. A gasp escaped him, and the sound spurred the boy on. He went faster, he crawled closer between Micah's knees, and his whole body moved with him. With surging dread Micah realized he wouldn't last a moment. Before he could do anything the cluster of pleasure exploded in his gut and he came with a loud groan.

He heard the boy swallow and wanted desperately to apologize, but he didn't have to. Kitten rolled on his back, his head resting on Micah's lap.

"Has it been a while?" he said with an impish smile, and Micah nodded. He looked at the boy, stretched out on his back like a act in a spot of sunlight, still squirming and hard. With the rush fading he regretted not even trying to pace himself, but it had been so long, and he was so lost.

"Thank you," he said in a hoarse voice, and Kitten beamed.

"You're sweet," he said, reaching up to touch Micah on the tip of his nose. "I like you."

"I think he gets that."

They both jumped. A shadow fell over them. Micah whirled around to see the Patron leaning on the door frame, his arms crossed. It was impossible to tell his mood in the dark. Micah doubled over like he'd been punched in the gut and yanked his pants back up. Relief washed over him when the Patron laughed, but it did nothing to alleviate the shame. He opened his mouth to say something, to apologize, anything, but the man held up his hand.