Cleaning
Cleaning is a death sentence presented as maintenance of the outside sensors. Donald now realizes that each cleaning replenishes destructive nanos outside.
Story so far
People condemned to Cleaning are fitted with suits and sent outside to scrub the sensors, dry them, and apply protective films. Requesting to leave or suggesting life outside might be better can bring this punishment, as can other serious offenses. The condemned traditionally choose a final dinner, while the cleaning brings holidays, travel, celebrations, and a clearer view to residents inside.
Bernard Holland considered the visor’s false hopeful landscape the reason unwilling cleaners eventually performed the task. Juliette broke the remembered pattern by refusing to clean. The ritual had also been understood as a way to calm unrest, and reports of previous cleanings fabricated test results to justify fear of the outside.
The airlock uses pressurized gas to force air outward. Donald now realizes that cleanings also replenish the nanos outside, giving the recurring ritual a destructive function beyond sensor maintenance.
Role
A punitive sensor-maintenance ritual that also releases nanos into the outside world, according to Donald’s realization.
Relationships
Sources — 34 recorded facts, by chapter
- People sent to cleaning are condemned to death.
- Tradition allows a person awaiting cleaning to choose dinner.
- Jahns says people who threaten not to clean nevertheless perform the cleaning.
- Most people sent outside are caught committing an offense and find their confinement unexpected.
- Some residents worry Holston may not clean because he has not threatened to refuse.
- At the time of Allison’s discoveries, five years have passed since anyone was sent to cleaning.
- Questioning whether the silo’s own side were the good guys comes dangerously close to grounds for cleaning.
- Holston believes anxiety as cleaning approaches can cause someone to lash out or say something that leads to confinement.
- The cleaning procedure requires two squirts of cleaning liquid, wool scrubbing, towel drying, and ablating films applied last.
- The silo’s top floor is usually empty during cleanings.
- The suit makers and cleaning technicians preserve intensely observed oral traditions.
- Expressing a desire to leave the silo is treated as the great offense.
- Discussing the possibility that life outside is better can lead to cleaning.
- Technicians prepare a fitted suit and cleaning tools after Allison is confined.
- A cleaning is followed by celebrations and increased rowdiness.
- People use time off and holiday chits to travel up for the clear outside view after a cleaning.
- Jahns recognizes that cleaning celebrations stimulate the silo’s economy.
- Post-cleaning travel reunites family and friends who may not have met for months or years.
- Juliette believes the taboos prevent people from openly expressing sympathy or regret for cleaners afterward.
- Attempted murder can be punished by cleaning even when the intended victim survives.
- Juliette observes that cleaners always have time to clean before dying.
- Bernard regards false hope induced by the visor display as the mechanism that persuades unwilling cleaners to clean.
- Before Juliette, Bernard knows of no cleaner who refused to clean.
- A cleaning is marked by a paid holiday.
- Nobody has refused to clean during either Samson’s or Walker’s lifetime before Juliette.
- Bernard claims cleaning works on people who want a better world outside because they want to see the images they are shown.
- The most recent cleaning occurred only a few months before Mission’s visit to Central Dispatch.
- Mission reflects that cleanings tend to follow unrest and calm people down.
- Children are excused from school on the scheduled cleaning day.
- Jimmy’s family customarily visits relatives and watches the cleared view on cleaning day.
- A cleaning is scheduled for the next day.
- Reports from previous cleanings fabricated test results to justify fears of the outside.
- Cleanings use gas to pressurize the airlock and force air outward.
- Donald realizes that cleanings periodically replenish the nanos outside.