Bernard Holland was the controlling head of IT and acting mayor, killed in the airlock fire after being sent to clean.
Short, portly, and protective of IT’s authority, Bernard opposed Juliette’s appointment as sheriff and became acting mayor after Jahns’s death. He was the prime suspect in the investigation of that death, though he proposed a forgiveness moratorium while planning to keep both offices. He later detained Juliette, dismissed her from the sheriff’s role, and watched her cleaning expecting her to die within sight. When she crossed the hill, he hurried to the servers to report the failure to Silo One. Preserving their data was his highest priority.
Bernard chose Lukas as his shadow and disclosed the hidden study, the other silos, and The Order. He confined his apprentice while directing the fight against Mechanical, expecting hunger and force to end resistance. Even as he enforced the system, Bernard condemned the people who had destroyed the world and described the silos as prisons. He told Lukas that obedience brought suffering but breaking the rules could kill everyone. He also taught that a leader’s duties included killing people considered threats.
After Lukas uncovered evidence that George had been murdered, Bernard admitted the killing but refused to name the killer. He interpreted Lukas’s request to leave confinement as a request to go outside and arranged his cleaning. Over the radio, Bernard threatened Juliette’s friends and promised to make Lukas’s suit himself so he could not survive to the hills. Lukas subsequently accused Bernard before Peter Billings and said he had proof of a killing. Bernard’s removal for cleaning ended his unopposed election campaign.
Juliette returned intending to rescue Lukas and tried to shelter the cleaner beneath a protective blanket during the airlock fire. The dead man was instead Bernard. Lukas now remembers him burning rather than going out to clean or accepting rescue.
Short and portly, with glasses, crooked front teeth, a wispy mustache, and pressed silver IT overalls.
Deceased former head of IT and acting mayor, whose rule connected local repression to the authority of Silo One.
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