Chapter 41 — The Ship That Never Looks Back

Directive Number Twelve

The Gas Scanner made an unusually dry "click" sound, then displayed a number that made Doan Bich Thu look a second time. She held the card closer to the screen, as if distance could change what appeared there.

"Water rations are reduced by fifteen percent, ma'am." The distribution station attendant, a young woman wearing a Root Layer uniform, spoke without looking up from her notepad, her voice calloused from having to repeat this sentence hundreds of times that morning. "Applicable from today, in accordance with Safety Directive No. Twelve of the Operations Oversight Committee."

"Why?" Doan Bich Thu asked, even though she had predicted how vague the answer would be.

"The reason listed was increased resource savings due to increased technical problems in off-site recycling systems." The person on duty replied, his voice monotonous as if reciting by heart. "Specific details are not released at the distribution station level, ma'am."

Khe Lam stood behind her grandmother in the line of people lining the hallway, listening to that answer, feeling a familiar coldness spread down her spine - not because of the number fifteen percent, although that number was enough to make an old person like her grandmother have to recalculate every sip of water every day, but because of the phrase "increasing technical problems." She had worked for the Roots Week for eight years, long enough to know that the outside recycling systems had not had any significant problems in recent months. She personally inspected most of them.

She walked up, scanned her card, got the same reduced number, the same stereotypical explanation. As the two of them left the distribution station, carrying two smaller water jugs than usual, Khe Lam looked around the hallway - the familiar faces of the Root Floor, everyone had a look of quiet resignation that had been ingrained in generations of living habits, no one protested loudly, only sighs, glances exchanged between neighbors, mental calculations about where to cut back to make up for the shortage.

"I don't think this is a coincidence, right?" Doan Bich Thu asked quietly, when they had gone a long way from the distribution station.

"I don't know for sure." Khe Lam replied, although in her heart she was almost certain. "But I applied for your records not too long ago. Bach Van and I just searched the student library. If anyone up high is worried that more people are starting to ask questions, tightening the entire Root Layer at once would be the most effective way to extinguish any small fire before it can spread — no matter where exactly that fire is burning."

"So that means it's not just you who has to pay for what you're doing." Grandma said, her voice heavy. "This whole floor is paying the price with me, and none of them know why."

That sentence stuck deep in Khe Lam's heart all the way home, a new burden she had never considered when she started her journey to find the truth. She was mentally prepared for herself to be in danger, for Bach Van to lose everything, but she never thought that thousands of people who knew nothing about Lam Chu, about Night of Roots, or about her mother, could have to suffer indirect consequences just because she dared to ask questions that should not be asked.

In the morning at the maintenance workshop, Vu Khac Dang gathered the whole team earlier than usual. His face carried a tense expression that Khe Lam rarely saw in the team leader who always remained calm in all situations.

"From today, all shifts outside the central area must scan their confirmation card at each checkpoint. They are no longer exempt like before." He spoke, his voice rough, obviously trying to suppress a grievance he was not allowed to express publicly. "The new curfew applies from the twenty-second hour to the fifth hour of the next morning. All public corridors outside residential areas will be locked, only open to emergency shifts with special permits. Anyone found moving outside those hours without a permit will be handled according to new regulations, much stricter than before."

"How strict, sir?" Ha Dinh Khiem asked, his expression was both curious and worried.

"First time, warning and points deducted for Air Tickets." Vu Khac Dang replied. "The second time, temporary suspension and security questioning. I don't know what the third time will be like, and I don't want anyone on this team to have to find that out through real-life experience."

Phung Bao Nhan frowned and tried to make a joke as usual to lighten the atmosphere. "So from now on, when dating, you also have to ask permission from the Operations Supervision Committee first?" But his joke fell silent, no one laughed, even he himself realized it was more bland than before.

Trinh Yen My glanced at Khe Lam, a fleeting glance but enough for Khe Lam to realize that her friend was paying more attention to her reaction than usual. Khe Lam tried to keep a calm face, memorizing the new numbers — twenty-two o'clock, five o'clock in the morning — in his mind, immediately calculating how this would affect the meetings with Bach Van in the old supply compartment, which often took place at late hours when there were no people around.

The whole working day passed in an unusually heavy atmosphere. Every time she passed a new checkpoint hastily set up at the corridor intersection, Khe Lam felt an invisible scrutiny following her every step, even though she knew most of that tension only existed in her mind, a natural reflex of someone carrying a secret.

At noon, during a short break, she secretly texted Bach Van via her personal device, using the simple coded phrase they had agreed upon before: "The weather is colder today." A few minutes later, he responded: "Same here. See you later, same time, but more careful." She read that message, not knowing that on the Dome Floor, Bach Van was also facing his own changes, albeit in a completely different form.

That night, when she returned to her small apartment, Khe Lam saw her grandmother sitting at the table, calculating her water ration for the whole week on an old piece of paper. Her handwriting was shaky but careful, dividing each sip of water into small boxes like a math problem with no perfect solution.

"You don't need to do that, let me—" Khe Lam said, stepping closer.

"You can do it." Doan Bich Thu interrupted, not raising his head. "I've lived through more austerity than you can imagine, my child. This isn't the first time the Council has tightened its grip on the Roots when they feared something. I just never thought I'd live to see it happen again, and this time, it was because of my niece."

Khe Lam sat down next to her, silent for a long time, looking at the tiny numbers on the paper, fully feeling the weight of the price that the truth was beginning to demand - not only from her, not only from Bach Van, but from a whole community of thousands of people who had never been consulted, never knew what they were paying for.

"Have you seen this before?" She asked, her voice quiet.

"Many times, on a smaller scale." Grandma replied, finally raising her head to look at her. "Every time something worries them, rations are reduced, hours are tightened, checkpoints spring up like mushrooms after the rain, and then a few months later, everything quietly goes back to the way it was, with no explanation as to how it started, and no explanation as to why it ends. That's how they run this ship, Khe Lam — not with loud orders, but with small, regular squeezes, enough to remind everyone of who they are." in power, but not big enough to cause anyone to rebel.""

"This time is different." Khe Lam said, her voice stiffened. "This time I know why it started."

Doan Bich Thu looked at his niece for a long time, then placed his hand on her arm, a gesture that was both comforting and a silent reminder of the growing responsibility on that girl's shoulders.

"Then you have to be doubly careful." She said. "Because now, not only the lives of you and Mr. Bach Van are at stake, but also the fragile peace of thousands of people who don't know they are standing in the middle of this underground wave. Can you bear that extra weight, child?"

Khe Lam did not answer immediately. She looked out the small window of the apartment, where all she could see was the gray metal wall of the hallway opposite, no sky, no stars, just the structure of the ship surrounding her from all sides as it had done for twenty years of her life. She thought of her mother, of her father, of Dinh Khac Bat, of all the people who had once stood in this exact position, facing the same question.

"I don't know." She spoke at last, more honestly than ever. "But I know I can't stop anymore, no matter how great the weight is. If I stop, everything they are enduring now will be meaningless — a price to pay for a question left unfinished."