Troy

Story so far

Troy first awakened in 2110 beneath the hills of Fulton County, Georgia, after decades of sleep. Too weak to raise his arms, he needed help leaving his coffin and taking water and pills. He grieved for people he believed were all gone, even as the pills began erasing his memories. His orientation remained clearer than his older life. Assigned ten six-month shifts without volunteering, he took over Merriman’s post in Silo One after a sudden promotion from training to lead one silo to responsibility for all of them. His apartment was on level thirty-seven and his office on thirty-four. He felt underprepared and as though he were following a script, despite being treated as the person in charge. The ruined landscape initially made him cry, then became oddly comforting. He wanted to talk with Hal about memories that surfaced on waking and disappeared during the day, though he felt he should not.

As head of Operation Fifty of the World Order, Troy welcomed Marcus Dent into the operation, telling him that the Legacy was true while withholding how much true information it omitted. He suspected that truths had been removed from people’s memories as well as books. He envied other silos both for their women and children and for their residents’ ability to retain painful memories. While amending The Order and writing announcements in approved vocabulary, he tried to numb his depression with solitaire and secretly increased his pill doses as their effect weakened. He suspected Biggers was either complicit in Silo Thirty-Two’s population problem or had lost control, and agreed he should be replaced. When Silo Twelve collapsed, Troy took charge despite his panic. He advised its deputy to secure himself in a holding cell, ordered the airlock canisters fired after the outer door was breached, and ordered the server room locked down, a backup checked, and power switched to Silo One. He withheld news from other heads pending investigation, demanded reports and debriefings, and marked the lost silo with a red X before breaking down alone.

Locked in his office to investigate, Troy went without medication for two days under his doctors’ direction and began remembering his father and life before orientation. He regretted making someone else press the button to execute his order and was troubled that these thousands of deaths hurt more acutely than the billions already lost. He interpreted the IT head’s hesitation as possible awareness of danger from her shadow, and concluded that she had been murdered because she could not kill to protect others. Questioning whether young shadows could withstand the truths they learned, he proposed age limits for certain positions of authority. His signed four-page report identified warning signs that had gone unheeded; he also concluded that the many camera feeds could reconstruct disasters more readily than prevent them. After submitting his report and deleting his video copies, he pretended to take his pills in front of Victor, then spat them out. He had decided to remember.

Concealing medication caused mouth ulcers, while insomnia, crying and paranoia worsened. Troy avoided medical help lest his refusal of medication be discovered. He felt his old self returning, grew uncomfortable with his name, and remembered that orientation had used code names to obscure the past. Believing Hal was remembering rather than going mad, he nevertheless signed the authorization to put Hal into the Deep Freeze. There he recalled specifying similar doors for a computer room and found a familiar woman in a pod whom he recognized was not his wife. Memories returned violently; he realized Troy was not his name, collapsed, and lost consciousness after an injection. Later, groggy and unable to account for events or an aching injection site, he returned through coded doors seeking something he felt he needed to see. He remembered choosing his name as a connection to his wife, frightened crowds taking pills, and a conversation about deliberately ending the world before it ended on its own. In his recollection, the bombs were a spectacle meant to make people move and forget. He also remembered passing through white fog after an explanation of why his group had been spared.

Stopping at a pod labelled Helen, Troy recognized an auburn-haired woman as someone who had wanted to be his wife. With his shift ending two weeks early, he feared that, like Hal, he might no longer respond to the pills. He signed the doctor’s document and asked for more time, but was injected with bright blue liquid. Convinced he was being killed rather than put to sleep, he lost consciousness thinking his dead wife waited in Tennessee. He has now awakened from frozen sleep again, severely weak and cold, needing help to hold a cup and swallow. He does not recognize his attendants, but remembers both that Troy is not his real name and that he had expected to be dead. Told he has been awakened because his help is needed, he refuses the offered pills. He recognizes the man behind his wheelchair as the man who wakes frozen people and hopes he has slept through the crisis.

Appearance

Troy wears gray overalls that distinguish him from other men in the cafeteria. His latest awakening leaves him severely weak and cold, needing help to hold a cup and swallow, and seated in a wheelchair.

Role

Troy served as the head of Operation Fifty in Silo One, supervising the other silos and directing the response to Silo Twelve’s collapse. His shift ended early; he has now been awakened again because his help is needed, while his identity remains unresolved beyond his knowledge that Troy is not his real name.

Relationships