Rebels of Eden

by Joey Graceffa

  “Where?” Mira asks, excited.

  I spread my arms to the vast lake before us. “Right here.”

  They look at me like I’m crazy.

  I don’t have any idea how it got there, but I know for a fact that the city is under the lake. But there’s only one way to prove it.

  Rather than trying to explain my crazy hunch, I kick off my shoes and wade in.

  For the first few steps it is shallow. Minnows shimmer as they flee my feet. Then the bottom drops out from under me abruptly, and I sink with a sputter all the way under. I bob up, shocked fully awake by my sudden dunking, and turn to give the other competitors a thumbs-up before striking out with a smooth stroke. Every once in a while I pause to look down under the water, but all I can see is a pale sandy bottom.

  The water is cold, and I’m getting tired. Maybe this wasn’t the best idea. Zander probably found an old highway and is following it to the city right now, while I waste all this time on a foolish idea. He’ll be ranked first, and I’ll be ranked . . . I don’t even know what the lowest level is.

  But I can’t bear to go back and climb out onto the bank in defeat, a wet, shivering, bedraggled failure. That thought pushes me farther out into the lake until I try one more look. I swim out for another few strokes, then dip my head under the water.

  At first I only see a blur, and my heart sinks. I’m still over the flat, featureless bottom, same as ever. Then the ripples from my swimming dissipate, leaving the surface clear enough for the sun to shine strongly through. There, far beneath me, I can make out a grid of uniform lines.

  I have to come up for a breath. “It’s here!” I shout, but duck down before they can yell anything back. I have to wait again for the wavelets to clear, but when they do I can see not only what must be city streets, but also the roofs of buildings, all laid out beneath me. It’s hard to make out details through the water, but there’s no doubt that it’s a city trapped under the chilly lake waters.

  My head pops up again, and I gulp a few deep breaths. On the last one I hold it, and tuck down in a dive, kicking hard, striving for the rooftops. The pressure builds as I swim down ten, twenty feet, until my ears pop and equalize. I shake my head, and work my jaw until my ears feel normal. I could go down a little farther, but my lungs are starting to cry out for air. Reluctantly, I kick back to the surface.

  “The city is down there!” I shout to my mom and friends waiting for me on shore, but it is too far away for them to hear me clearly, so I start the long swim back. Their shouted questions become clearer as I near the shore, but I save my breath for swimming.

  Part of me wishes I’d kept my revelation to myself. This is a competition, after all. Maybe we’re mostly proving that we personally have what it takes, but there’s also an element of showing that we’re better than the other people in the trial. Having grown up in Eden, Mom and I are at a disadvantage. These people have been swimming their whole lives, and I know they can swim farther, dive deeper, hold their breath longer than I can. Now that I’ve showed them the secret city, they’ll easily surpass me. Maybe I should have gone off with them to search the mountains, then doubled back to investigate the lake on my own, or just with Mira and Mom.

  No, I decide—that’s exactly the kind of thing that Zander would do. But these people are my friends, my neighbors. I’ll be living with them for the rest of my life, and what good is a community whose members don’t look out for each other? I wouldn’t be happy with myself if I didn’t help my friends.

  I made the right choice. I can only hope that the elders look at it that way when they judge.

  I stagger out of the lake, shivering, and Mom rubs my arms to warm me up as I tell them what I found. Some are skeptical, thinking it was just rocks, that my mind saw what it wanted to see. “No,” I assure them. “I’ve had too much experience doubting my reality to be easily fooled. That’s a city down there.”

  We waste no time in heading out, agreeing to swim out together then once we’re over the city to explore on our own as we search for an artifact to present for the trial. As we’re about to go in, I hear an unwelcome voice.

  “What are you doing, going for a swim? That’s no way to win.” It’s Zander, strolling back to see what we’re up to.

  “Oh, did you find the city already?” I ask with mock sweetness. “Well done.”

  He looks at my sopping wet body, then his eyes widen as he understands. “Beneath the surface, eh?” I expect him to be mad that he didn’t figure it out first, but he just takes off his boots and shirt and starts toward the water’s edge. “Don’t start feeling smug, city scum. You might have found it, but I’m the best swimmer in Harmonia. You don’t stand a chance. I bet your patient died on the last test.”

  He laughs, and steps confidently into the water.

  Lotte, everyone’s friend, calls, “Look out, it drops off!” just a moment too late, and I have the gratification of seeing Zander plunge down just like I did.

  Then we’re all in the water, striking out for the deep. It feels almost like a game now, all of us swimming together. Almost like the capture-the-flag game I won yesterday morning. Part of me is enjoying the easy camaraderie of people my same age. But part of me remembers how yesterday’s game could have turned out. So I take care to stick to Mom and Mira, and we all stay away from Zander. He’s right, he’s much more confident than any of us in the water. I’m just glad he’s so focused on getting the best artifact and being ranked first that it doesn’t occur to him to try to drown me.

  As soon as we’re over the flooded city, they start to dive down. I wait, watching, to see what they come up with, taking advantage of the opportunity to rest as I tread water. They are down longer than I can hold my breath, but one after another they come up empty-handed.

  “The bottom is too far,” Lotte says as she gasps for breath. “I can almost get to the rooftops, but not any farther.”

  Everyone else has the same report. Though he doesn’t deign to say anything, Zander hasn’t retrieved anything either. I can see his scowl as he takes three deep breaths in rapid succession and dives down for another try.

  I make a few attempts, but I can get no farther than the others, not even reaching the top of the tallest roofs. There aren’t any artifacts up there that I can see, even if I could reach it. I start to consider whether I can pry off a piece of a building . . .

  Mom, as usual, has some good ideas that rely on teamwork.

  “If we weighted ourselves, we could sink faster,” she muses. “That way we could get to the bottom before we ran out of air and got exhausted. Maybe if we held rocks.”

  “But how would we get them here?” someone asks. “We can’t swim with rocks.”

  “We could build a boat, or no, a raft. Something just strong enough to carry the rocks, and we could push it out here and take turns going down.”

  They like the idea, but the sun is sinking lower in the sky. We might only have a couple of hours until sunset. Could we build a viable raft in time?

  “Or we could fish for things,” Mom offers a little desperately. “The way ancient people used to catch fish for food. Make a line with vines, weigh it down, fashion a hook for the end. If we drag the streets we might snag something.”

  They are good ideas if we had plenty of time. I still felt like there must be a clue in Elder Night’s message. “What did she say about a dome?”

  “Go beneath a dome,” Mira quotes. “I didn’t see any domes, but if we can’t reach street level, I don’t see how we’re going to get below a dome even if we find one in the first place.” Her shoulders heave in an exasperated sigh, making the water around her ripple.

  Some of the other testers are talking about heading back to shore, either to construct something, or in hopes that over the generations an artifact might have washed up on shore. It wouldn’t be following the letter of the elder’s instructions, but it might be better than nothing, they’re saying. Mira looks undecided.

  “I’m not ready to give up
,” I tell her. “There’s more to the city than this little bit we’ve seen. I’m going to look for a dome.”

  “What’s the use if you can’t even . . .” she begins, but if I hear any more protests I might give up. I start swimming farther out. Mom and Mira follow reluctantly. The few who are staying in the water float and watch.

  The water is surprisingly clear and still, but despite that I can only see things more or less clearly straight below me. Beyond that everything fades into a bluish blur. It is impossible to scan ahead, to search for anything resembling a dome. It will be a matter of luck if I find anything. I swim for a long time before I see directly beneath me a roundish golden smudge that looks different from the square and rectangular building tops.

  I don’t want to announce it yet. Everyone would come over, and they’d be disappointed if I’m wrong. And maybe there’s a part of me that wants to succeed all on my own first, before I help out anyone else, even if I will share my information eventually. So without a word even to Mira and my mom, I dive down to investigate.

  Once I’m down about ten feet, I can see that I was right—it is a burnished half sphere, with lines in the same color radiating out from it. From above, it looks like a resting octopus. I kick as hard as I can, pull with my arms, and still my lungs are burning long before I reach the golden dome.

  Maybe, if I gave it everything I got, I could reach the dome. But I don’t believe I’d be able to get back to the surface afterward. At least, not conscious. I’ve read that in the salty oceans people float easily, buoyed up by the water. If this was salt water, I would probably rise back to the top with minimal effort. But in this fresh water it is almost as much of a struggle to rise as it is to swim down. Even if I could make it to the dome, I’d have to save something for the return trip.

  “It’s no good,” I tell Mom and Mira as they swim over. “It’s there, but I can’t make it.”

  Mira tries several times, resting between each attempt, warning me about the dangers of blacking out if she doesn’t give her body enough time to get rid of excess carbon dioxide. We float together, despondent. My only consolation is that no one else has figured out a way to get town to the sunken city.

  Mom never runs out of hopeful ideas. “We could get hollow reeds and build a long breathing tube. We could fill gourds with air and weigh them down with rocks at intervals of ten feet. It might be enough for one breath . . .”

  Mira shakes her head. “We only have another couple of hours.” Already the sun’s low angle makes it a little harder to see under the water. It would be a lot easier if it was directly overhead.

  “Well, if we fail, at least we all fail together,” I say. “Maybe that is part of the test, to accept that some things aren’t possible. Or she wants us to come up with something clever, like the artifact that caused the most damage to the environment isn’t in the drowned city—it’s us!”

  “Clever,” Mira says, floating lazily.

  I run through Elder Night’s words again. She clearly said to go beneath the dome, that it would make it easier. What else did she say? Oh yeah, trust that the wisdom of the elders wouldn’t allow us to come to harm.

  I sit up suddenly—or would have sat up if I wasn’t floating on my back. As it is, I mostly make a big splash as I curl myself upright. “I’m going to try one more time,” I say, trying to keep the excitement out of my voice. This might not work, and if it doesn’t . . .

  If I tell them, they might try to talk me out of it. Or Mira might volunteer, being the better swimmer. Which does make sense, but since I thought of it, I should be the one to take the risk. I won’t put either of them in danger.

  I slow my breathing, slow my heart, force myself to be calm. Five very long deep breaths, then three very quick shallow ones with strong exhales. Then, finally, one last deep full breath.

  Quite possibly my very last breath.

  I WISH I had been swimming all my life. Even in this stressful trial, the utter peace that seems to come over me as soon as my head is submerged is astounding. My pulse slows automatically, my thoughts become somehow both more calm and more focused. I feel as if I’ve been welcomed into a different world, a weightless dimension with no sharp edges, where everything flows smoothly, even my thoughts.

  I pull myself deeper beneath the surface with strong, slow strokes, kicking my feet with a rhythm like an easy jog. The golden dome looms closer with each stroke. This time I make it farther than I have before, so close that I can make out designs embossed on the dome. In the center there’s what looks like a starburst. Around the outside I can see letters, but I’m not close enough to make out what they say.

  My lungs are aching, and every part of my body is telling me to kick to the surface. Every part except my brain. Elder Night says we are animals, but I wonder if this little difference is what actually sets us apart from our wild brethren—that we can put aside our survival instincts in search of a higher purpose. Any animal would know that if it kept swimming down right now, it might die. I’m animal enough to know that, too . . . but human enough to ignore it and keep going.

  A few more strokes, a few more kicks, and my limbs start to tingle from lack of oxygen. Now I can make out the words on the dome: “Supernova Systems.” Another kick, and I can press my hand on the dome, smooth and metallic, untouched by corruption after all this time under the water.

  My diaphragm is convulsing now, my body desperate to breathe. It takes every ounce of self-control to force my lungs not to take a suicidal breath. I’ve committed this far, trusting to Elder Night’s words. I have to go on.

  Using the very last of my strength, I kick as I slide along the outer edge of the dome, using the raised designs and letters to pull myself to the lower edge. Under the dome, Elder Night said. I can feel the darkness creeping along the edge of my vision as with one last pull I glide under the dome and look up . . .

  To the shimmering ripples of the surface. A surface just a few feet above me.

  My trust was not misplaced. There’s a pocket of air trapped beneath the golden dome!

  I rocket up into the air, the beautiful, blessed air, and take the sweetest breath of my life. It tastes a little stale on my tongue, but I don’t care. I made it! My faith paid off!

  It takes a moment for my vision to clear as my brain relishes the oxygen and my bloodstream flushes out excess carbon dioxide. When I look around, I’m amazed. This isn’t just a little air pocket. The dome is the size of a large building. The entire testing group can easily breathe in here for hours while we make scouting trips down to street level. I duck my head and look below. The streets are still far below, but maybe some of us can make it, as long as we have this way station.

  I swim around the inside of the dome. It is like a covered swimming pool, and it is hard to remember that I’m in an air bubble deep under water. The inner dome is the same burnished gold as the outside, darkly shining. Wait, it shouldn’t be this light in here. I realize that the dome itself is illuminated, casting a sort of sunset glow over the interior. So there’s a power source?

  The dome is held above the street by stout underwater columns. I see the remnants of what might have once been elevator tubes that would have brought people up from street level, but for what purpose? And why is this dome still filled with air when the rest of the city is flooded?

  Then, about ten feet above the waterline, I notice openings all around the dome. Those are the things that looked like octopus arms radiating from the center. Tunnels, all branching out from the dome! It looks like the elevator system once brought people directly to the tunnels, but now all that is gone, except for crumbling ruins. However, there is a ladder carved directly into the side of the dome leading to each tunnel opening.

  It feels strange to be at the mercy of gravity after the weightless water, I think as I climb the ladder. Every sound echoes in this chamber. The ladder was probably used for maintenance crews, and is a bit awkward to navigate, but luckily the curve of the dome here isn’t too extreme. Wat
er drips off me, plinking into the water below.

  The tunnel is clear, air-filled like the dome, and stretches as far as I can see. And like the dome, the tunnel walls themselves are lit up with a golden glow. From here I can see straight into some of the other tunnels. They are clear, too.

  I think I know what it is: an elevated transportation system. It must have ferried people all around long ago when this was a thriving city. Now the people are gone, but somehow the system that kept air flowing and the lights on persists. Maybe it was solar-powered and enough sun filters through the lake to power parts of the city. That’s simply amazing! Or maybe the elders devised a way to reactivate part of the city just for our test. Either way, it gives us a chance to explore the way life used to be before most of humanity perished.

  I’m a little baffled, though. Even with advanced technology, is it possible that the city has been preserved so well throughout the thousand or so years since the Ecofail? Some of the city, made of materials that required maintenance and upkeep, has indeed crumbled away, but so much of it remains intact that it makes me suspicious.

  For a while I poke down one of the tunnels. It’s fascinating, almost empty but not quite. It looks like it was just been shut down for maintenance today. There’s a food wrapper of some sort on the ground, and a stray piece of clear plastic wrap. Near the entrance is a poster made of a material I don’t recognize, showing a happy family sitting on a checkered cloth by a riverbank. The mother and father are holding glasses of a pale pink bubbly liquid, and the detail is so fresh, so perfect, that it makes me thirsty. The five children in the image are playing a game with a large colorful ball.

  Children! More than one, to the same parents! Even though that is commonplace in Harmonia, seeing it here, so naturally, makes me feel an emotional little catch in my throat. I wonder what life was like in this city. Above the happy family it says “Welcome to Three Rivers.” It seems like such a pleasant place. Sure, it was flawed, as all civilization was before the fail. It had waste and garbage I’m sure. But it sickens me that the cheerful family in the picture must have been wiped out along with almost all of humanity.