by T. C. Edge
“If the people knew...” I begin, thinking of the hundreds of thousands living in blissful ignorance of all of this.
“Then what?” Adryan’s voice cuts in, a degree of passion oozing from it. “This has been happening for years, right in front of them. The Enhanced have already had most of their liberties denied. They don’t complain. The Outer Haveners have been treated differently, yet the same is happening to them. The most effective methods of indoctrination take time, Brie. The longer it takes, the more natural it seems. And no one even knows it’s happening…”
As if on cue, a sudden tremble begins to rise up through the building. It shakes lightly, the glasses on the table rattling. I pick mine up to stop it from toppling off the edge.
When I look at Adryan, his eyes are already staring out of the window. There’s no look of shock at what he sees, merely a knowing expression, an expectation even, as if he anticipated it.
In some strange way, I did too. But it still shocks me. It cuts right to my core.
I see orange and black. The former hovers in a haze; the latter spews into the sky. The trembling dies down, and the room falls completely silent. And then, after a few short moments, the rumble of an explosion hits us, delayed like thunder after a distant flash of lightning.
Miles away, across the wall, Outer Haven burns.
I stare with wide, unblinking eyes, and allow the details to grow clearer as they zoom right in. From this high, my vantage is good enough to see the people fleeing in fear. See them writhing on the floor, drenched in flame. See the red blood and charcoal black and the growing grey of the suffocating fumes.
I watch the whole thing play out, seeing it as if it’s right before my eyes, and yet unable to hear a thing. A silent scene of destruction and death. Another attack from the Fanatics, from the Consortium, designed to weaken our resolve and fill the streets with more of their slaves.
Another pawn has been moved, and another of ours has been taken…
And as I watch, my heart fills with a fresh terror. I pull my gaze back and try to get my bearings. We’re in the north of Inner Haven, just off the Inner Spiral near the core. Yet this window is facing west, straight towards the districts I know so well.
It’s the western quarter that’s on fire. And it looks to be district 5…right near the academy.
My mind rushes with names.
Tess.
Drum.
Mrs Carmichael.
Abby.
I turn to Adryan, who looks upon my stark expression, his grey-blue eyes crinkled with concern.
“You need to go,” he says before I can. “Come on…”
We stand as one, sending chairs flying.
And together, we rush back to the door, down into the garage, and out onto the streets of Inner Haven.
43
Adryan commands his car to drive as fast as the laws of Inner Haven will allow. It’s a low top speed.
“Can’t this damn thing go any faster?!” I ask, pulling on my jacket and zipping it up tight to cover my dress.
“Its maximum speed is programmed into it,” he tells me. “It’s the same as all cars here.”
“Well can’t you, I don’t know, re-programme it?”
“Possibly. But that could raise a lot of red flags, and it’ll waste time. It’s best we stay under the radar.”
I grunt loudly, my eyes seething and cutting right through the front window.
“Fine.”
“Anyway, it won’t make much difference. We’ll be at the gate soon enough.”
What he can do, however, is ensure that the car takes the most direct route. So, instead of circling around the Spiral, the car twists and turns down linking side streets instead, stopping and starting as we hit red lights.
I fidget as we go, always shifting my position to get a better view ahead.
Adryan continues to study me, like an anthropologist living with apes. I suppose that’s why he’s so good at showing emotion, if muted. It’s because it’s his job to understand the Unenhanced and what’s makes them tick.
Still, I find it quite aggravating, and aren’t afraid to tell him so.
“Ah, sorry…force of habit,” he says, pulling his silver eyes back to the front of the car. “You realise there’s nothing you can do to help, though, right? There will be City Guards and Con-Cops swarming all over the place already.”
I turn to him with heavy brows cutting off half my eyes.
“I don’t expect you to understand. For all I know my academy could have been blown up. My friends, my family might…”
I hold back the thought, and the emotions bubbling inside me.
“I’m sure they’re all OK,” he says. His words are comforting, yet his manner is not. At least he’s trying, though.
He reaches out and lays a stiff hand on my shoulder. I don’t brush it away. I just sit forward and let it rest there awkwardly until he feels like sufficient time has passed and he can withdraw it.
Soon enough, we’re speeding – well, dawdling would be more accurate – onto the Outer Spiral and moving around towards the short linking road that provides passage through the western gate.
Before the car comes to an infuriatingly gradual stop, Adryan offers some words of caution.
“You’re emotional, Brie, and that’s very understandable. However, be careful out there. It may be tempting for you to use your new powers out in the open, and you might not be able to stop yourself in this state. Make sure you don’t. If a Con-Cop or City Guard sees you…”
“I know. I’ll be done for,” I rush. “I’m not that stupid, Adryan, despite what you might think.”
He fixes me with as warm a stare as he can.
“I don’t think you’re stupid at all. I think…I think you’re very brave.”
His more pleasant eyes are joined by a smile, and his cheeks cut with a couple of unexpected dimples that, I suspect, never see the light of day.
For a moment, he seems like he could be anyone, not a Savant at all.
“I’ll be in touch soon,” he tells me. “Think about what you want from all this, and think about what I’ve told you. Talk to your brother, Brie. He may have some more answers for you.”
“I…I will. Thank you for filling me in. At least you were honest.”
“A quality I’ve lived with my entire life. Until now, at least, with all this subterfuge. Savants usually have no reason to lie. It’s just a symptom of our world.”
He reaches over, like he did when removing my coat. I have no expectation of a hug this time.
Instead, he opens the door for me, and leans back.
“Now go, Brie. Don’t let me keep you.”
I take one last look at him, so intriguing as he is, before stepping from the car and rushing towards the gate. When I reach the door to the side of it, I find it unlocked, and quickly step through. It appears that only the Outer Haven side of the gate is guarded by Brutes And the door itself is like a cat flap: unlocked going one way, and locked going the other.
“Back already?” asks the Brute, watching me scuttle past. “Didn’t it go well?”
I stop briefly in front of him.
“It went fine. I just…I saw the explosion from a window. Do you know where it was exactly?”
I look up to him eagerly, praying that no one I knew was caught up in it.
Is such a thing selfish? People will have died, and judging by the size of the blast, many more than before. Am I a horrible person because I don’t even care about that right now? That I’d be happy if a hundred died, or two hundred, or many, many more, if it meant someone I truly cared about was OK.
Maybe my Savant side is taking over? Or maybe I’m just colder than I thought…
My insides churn as the Brute looks at me, the cave that is his mouth opening up to deliver the news.
“District 5,” he says.
My body tenses.
“Where!”
“The main market there,” he says. “Terrible thing. The
se Fanatics…”
I don’t hear the rest of his sentence. Turning from the gate, I set my sights on the cloud of orange and grey and black fog swamping the distant streets, clearly visible even now under the cover of darkness, and start to run.
Hindered by my dress and accompanying shoes – the heels I wore on my first visit to Inner Haven – my progress is slow. Perhaps that’s a good thing. Pumped with adrenaline as I am, who knows how my newly altered body would react. I might just shoot off down the street, my Dasher powers blazing to life, leaving a trail of dust behind me for the Brute to follow.
And he knows my name. Not good.
Heeding Adryan’s advice, I focus and make sure I’m only going so fast. Before I’ve travelled a hundred metres, however, I’ve grown sick of my heels and have discarded them to the street, flicking them off down a side-alley for some lucky person to find and leaving me running barefoot.
They’d probably fetch a pretty penny at a second-hand market or pawnshop somewhere. For the poorest among us, such a treasure could feed them for weeks.
I don’t quite know how to feel as I run. I’m relieved, of course, that the explosion wasn’t closer to the academy. The market is nearby, but not so much that anyone on Brick Lane could be affected by it. They’d have felt a ferocious rumble and heard a thunderous noise – and perhaps a few plates or glasses would have been broken from the ensuing tremors – but nothing more.
However, what does concern me is the fact that the marketplace is a common venue to visit for several of the occupants of Carmichael’s. It’s where Mrs Carmichael will often go to buy the foods we eat, especially when there’s a particularly good sale on, or if certain foods are available for bulk purchases.
Others go there too, mostly those in transition. If Mrs Carmichael doesn’t want to go herself, or if she has a particularly large order to fetch, she’ll either bring along a host of the transitioners to go with her or will send out a troop in her stead.
And tonight, I know, the night market will be in full swing. Mostly it’s busiest during the day, but during the middle of the week, when people go along after work, it can get extremely busy after dark as well.
And that’s why they chose it.
The ‘Fanatics’, under orders from the Consortium, will have taken another batch of lives. It’s the perfect place to strike, and the perfect time.
Just when the people are starting to feel a little safer, just when they’re creeping back out of their shells, Outer Haven has been rocked once more with the cries of the dead. And the wailing of the loved ones they’ve left behind. And the terrible realisation that this isn’t going to stop.
Fear will spread again, and the warnings of the Fanatics will echo in people’s minds.
Emotion is Evil. Give in to Logic.
Bit by bit, such a belief is being seeded. And when the Consortium bring forth their reckoning, the people will greet it with open arms.
They’ll walk willingly into the darkness, and the endless gloom of a life without emotion, a life without meaning. Only muted expressions of love will remain. The entire notion of family will die out. Joy will be expunged, no pleasure blooming in a heart from the sound of music, or the sight of a beautiful painting, or the taste of delicious food.
In the end, we’ll all just march on into the future, each day the same as the last. Nothing but a bunch of pawns on a chess board, and just as inanimate.
My mind whirs with such thoughts as I speed through the streets, passing through district 1, and along the centre boundary of 2 and 3, and arriving into the heart of district 5.
I continue on, the district unusually quiet. Even when I near the market, set in a large square and surrounded by low slung tower blocks, the numbers of pedestrians remain thin.
When the first attack happened at Culture Corner, it caused a stir. People who’d never been interested in art and music gathered to look at the site, at the carnage the attackers left behind. Those days following the blast, the place became more of a tourist attraction than ever.
It was a novelty. An attack like that hadn’t happened in decades, and nor did anyone expect it to happen again. A terrible tragedy that looked set to fuel the rumour and gossip fire for many a month after.
And then it happened again. This time in the eastern quarter, where a warehouse was destroyed, and so many workers were killed. The Fanatics’ markings appeared again. And people realised – this isn’t going to stop.
The warehouse didn’t attract as much attention. People stopped gathering in large groups unless necessary. Some even stopped going to work for fear the Fanatics might strike again.
And now, as I rush towards the site of the most recent blast, I find the streets so clear, almost deserted. People have already flocked to their homes, wrapped up tight in fear, their faith that the Fanatics will be stopped beginning to wane.
And so it should.
The scent of burning is powerful. The colours, in a part of town usually so vibrant, are dark and foreboding. With my new eyes able to see so much more clearly, even in the darkest of places, I make out the heaving swirls of black smoke, and the smouldering reds and oranges of the flames as they’re beaten back and quenched.
Moving into full view of the square, I see that the buildings surrounding it have been devastated. That the attack didn’t only target the merchants and browsers in the market, but the many families living along its boundary too. Hundreds of people killed in an instant, blasted apart or burnt to a crisp or suffocated by the toxic fumes.
My eyes scan the bodies on the floor as rescue teams continue to clear and secure the area. Many are regular people, dressed in the expected garb of Outer Haven. Yet among them are others, Con-Cops or members of the Enhanced, City Guards sent down here to keep the peace.
Bats stationed to listen for danger. Sniffers sent in to catch the scent of trouble. Hawks watching from their high perches on the building tops, blasted into the stratosphere as the world shattered beneath their feet.
I even see a couple of Brutes, their mountainous bodies and armour unable to withstand the blast, lying like giant piles of rubble amid the chaos.
Only Dashers, perhaps, with their super speed, could have possibly escaped the onslaught.
I stand and stare and, unlike the first time, I don’t react at all. I just stay stationary, betraying the advice of Adryan, using my vision to scan the place for some sight of someone I know.
It’s no use. The place is too hectic, too many people pulling bodies from rubble, or dowsing flames, or holding back any onlookers or loved ones of victims, wailing to the sky and cursing the Gods.
It’s not the God’s they need to curse…
As I stand there, I feel a hand on my shoulder.
It causes me to jump. I swing my head to the side and see Rycard, looking so different to how he did this morning. His face is half covered in soot and shadow, blood dripping from multiple lacerations on his right cheek and forehead. One eye is shut, a cut slashed across it, oozing blood down to his lips.
“Rycard!” I gasp.
I raise my hands as if to offer attention. He holds them back.
“I’m OK,” he says. “Just a few cuts.”
“But your eye!”
He shakes his head and turns to look at the carnage.
“I was lucky,” he says. “I’m alive.”
“What the hell happened?!”
He seems subdued, his voice soft and far less buoyant than usual. His playfulness is gone, replaced with a grimace and a stare.
“I was stationed on the roofs to the north of the market. It…it came from nowhere. It just happened. I couldn’t see it until it was too late.”
“Does Sophie know you’re stationed here?”
He nods.
“You need to let her know you’re alright. She’ll be going out of her mind!”
“I will…when I get a chance. I should go back…go and help.”
“But you’re injured. You need attention…”
/> “Others need it more.”
He steps away from me, preparing to re-enter the fray. I reach out and grab his arm, stopping him. He turns his good eye back to me.
My mouth opens, but the words don’t come out.
It was ‘them’. It was the Consortium. That’s what I want to say. To tell him that all of this has come right from the top. That his own bosses commanded the deaths of my people, his people.
But I don’t. I merely smile weakly and say: “Stay safe.”
“And you, Brie. You should go home. This isn’t a safe place to be…not for you.”
He turns and his figure fades away into the fog, engulfed by a fresh deluge of smoke as a wind sweeps through, bringing a rain of ash with it. I look to the sky and see black clouds approaching, the type that people usually run from.
Insult to injury. Acid rain onto the site of such terror and devastation.
If I ever needed to be reminded how unforgiving my world is, I only have to remember this scene before me.
I know it’s time for me to go. But there’s something that keeps me there for a few moments more, an impulse to let the vision sink deep into my pores, settle into the back of my head.
To take a mental picture of this, and place it side by side with the face of Director Cromwell.
If what I’ve been told is true, and he really is the man behind this scheme, then maybe I will do the unthinkable. If it’ll save innocent lives, and stop a war, and if I really am the only one who can…then do I really have a choice?
Was I born for this purpose, this very reason?
Is it my fate to become a killer?
My train of thought is broken by the fresh arrival of relief, a small platoon of Con-Cops swarming through nearby from the street behind. They move in formation, and go right into the fray with no fear whatsoever for their own safety.
Some people call them brave. But to be brave, you first need to feel fear. And for Con-Cops, such a sensation of fear is no longer present, their emotions suppressed and modified and altered to make them better at what they do.
I used to hate them all, and perhaps still do. But now, at least, I understand them better. Every one of them was once an Unenhanced, living right here in Outer Haven. Some will have committed serious crimes, and were thus taken and reconditioned and turned into something quite the opposite.
