by Tara Brown
He pressed his lips together, clearly forbidding himself from answering for a moment. Finally, he sighed and nodded. “It’s a possibility we will have to look at. There are treatment options we have yet to try. You recall small things, more so this week than any thus far. That's a good sign. We have ways to work with that.”
“Such as?”
“Sending you back to school to start fresh and try again.”
That actually sounded like a good plan. I nodded. “I agree. I don't think the orchard is the right place for me and Murphy seems nice, but I doubt I have a single feeling for him beyond the fear every morning. If I could go back to my area, maybe I could start fresh there and try again.”
He winced, obviously not a fan of me having a full fresh start. “Like most pairings here in The Last City of Men, yours was deemed to be a successful one. We have to honor the survival of our race. You and Murphy requested the pairing. It’s very rare for that to be allowed and I cannot see that bed being unmade.” He reached across the small space between our chairs and rested his hand on my knee. “You will grow to love him. I have seen it hundreds of times.” He pushed off of me, then stood and walked to the door. “I will speak to the engineers and let them know my opinion. We should have word by next Tuesday.”
I stood as well, confused as to what the point of the visit was. I didn't feel like I had answers. I didn't feel like anything had been resolved. I felt placated. I left the room with him muttering on as he escorted me back to the sitting area. I couldn't hear him, I had too many questions.
“Have a pleasant afternoon in the orchards and I will be in touch.” He pressed the button for me. When I stepped on, a man greeted me—a man dressed as a guard but not the one who I had seen before. This one had a much older face, like the doctor’s. He bowed his head slightly to the doctor and smiled at me as I stepped onto the elevator. Dr. Turner waved and turned away as the doors closed.
The guard smiled at me again but I ignored him. He didn't give off the warm feeling the other guard had. His hand didn't brush against mine. His body didn't seem familiar. He seemed like every other person on the street or in my life: hollow.
When the elevator stopped at the lobby, I got off and walked back to the street but I didn’t turn for the tram station. Instead, I turned away from it, wandering down the street.
Ideas and imaginations roamed my brain as I strolled aimlessly. My feet walked as if they had a purpose. I moved as though controlled, as I processed it all and tried to pin down exactly why everything felt like a lie to me. I had no reason to not trust, and yet I couldn't force myself to believe a single thing I’d been told.
Even the reset, the very foundation of our world, had let me down.
The way home
I had walked for so long and my feet ached so hard that I couldn't ignore the throbbing in them as I rode the tram. They had started with pins and needles but had moved quickly into pulsating pain that throbbed at the same rate my heart did.
The pain in my feet was so pronounced that it made me glance down at my heart. I had hardly noticed the pain in it from the overshadowing of my feet. But it did hurt, my heart hurt. I was almost grateful because it should hurt.
The tram stopped and instantly my stomach was in my throat. In front of me, out of the doors and onto the street, was a perfect area. I had missed my stop at the orchards and had gone on. I was either in the nutritionists’ neighborhood or the technologists.’ Maybe it was even the decision makers’ area.
Not that it mattered; I was clearly not where I should be. Regardless of the fact, my hands pushed off and my legs flexed, carrying me from the tram and out onto the perfectly manicured streets. I passed the plastic bench where the people of this place waited for the tram. My shoes made a sound on the cobblestone street that I recalled. It was a familiar noise. The sound of my lonesome footsteps on the sidewalk became a song in my head.
It was midday, so no one was about. The kids would be at school. The workers would be at their varying jobs. No one was there to stare at me, wondering why I—a lowly orchard worker—would be in such an area during a workday.
I wondered how it looked when the streets were full of the people returning home. I couldn't imagine it. I couldn't imagine what they all looked like.
I walked until I reached a place that called out to me. My feet would not take another step. They would not leave the modest home that matched the others here. I didn't know how I could tell the difference from it and all the others. The city was built on the foundation that everyone in a particular area was of the same station in life. It was made so that no one here was ever envious of what their neighbors had. It was the same in the orchards. I knew it was the same in all the areas.
But we all knew the nutritionists, technologists, and decision makers lived the best. Our society was built in a giant triangle. The largest part was the city and the smallest part was where the highest ranked in our system lived. We required very few decision makers but many laborers, farmers, and factory workers. If you caught the tram at the very smallest part of the triangle you would be where the decision makers lived, then you’d see the nutritionists, then technologists, then orchards, farmers, factory workers, and then the basic laborers.
I was somewhere between the technologists and the decision makers. I couldn't tell which, just that the houses were much finer than my cottage in the orchards.
“Gwyn?”
I turned, seeing a face I didn't know. A woman, older than me. Her voice rang in my ears, waking things—emotions.
“Gwynie?” she gasped, lifting her small pale hand to her trembling lips. She backed away from me, entering an open door and nodding at me once she was inside. I followed, nearly tripping on nothing. I knew her. I knew that comforting sound in her voice. The way she said my name, I knew it all. “Run away,” I whispered again. Was she the person I was to run away to?
The moment I entered the house I dropped to my knees, shaking and sobbing for no apparent reason.
“Gwynie!” The woman I suddenly suspected was my mother also shook as she closed the door and dropped behind me, holding me. The scent of her and the house filled my nose so full that it burst something in my brain. My head felt as if it had exploded and the result was a shower of memories and images. They made no sense, and yet, somehow made perfect sense.
“Gwynie, I thought you’d left the city. Oh, my Gwyn. I told myself every day not to worry because you’d left and found a better place.” She stroked my hair, brushing her fingers through it. I closed my eyes, exhausted and relaxed enough that I instantly yawned. I leaned into her, letting this become my world. Not the orchards. Not the man I didn't know. Not the doctor who lied to me. Not the bitter, untrusting feeling lodged in my stomach. No, I was just me and she was part of that me. The me I recalled with more clarity than I recalled anything.
We were in the technologies area.
My father was a tech.
My brother, my dear sweet brother, was a memory maker. His name was Greg.
My mother was always with me.
My house was simple compared to many houses but it was nice enough and safe. I felt safe. She lifted me from the floor, helping me to the couch. It was fine compared to my home in the orchards, the house I didn't quite understand.
“Your father is going to be so excited to see you.” She kissed my cheeks and my forehead over and over. Each kiss brought another tear from my eyes. Soon I lost her in a kaleidoscope of colors and movements. When it started to make me dizzy I closed my eyes again and rested my head on her as she went on and on in excitement.
Dreams filled my head, exotic places I couldn't have ever seen, and yet I felt like I had. Sand dunes where the wind rolled across, lifting the grains of sand and tickling them along the surface in waves. A forest filled with naked bodies, hands reaching and jagged teeth gnashing. A coal fire burning black in the dreary sky of a filthy city. Image after image filled my eyes, and yet no reason for it ever entered my mind. No explanation
or timeline ever occurred, showing me how or why I saw these places in my head.
I woke, opening an eye, confused for a moment. The room took a second to come into focus and my brain took a minute to wrap around the idea I was home. I was finally home. As the sleep that should have reset me, pulled away like fog retreating over a field, my insides untangled. It felt as though they had been knotted for years, ages even. But I suspected it had been mere months since I had last been myself.
Memories were still distorted and confused with imaginations, but I made sense of most of it. I was home, I had left the city. My brother had come with me. I remembered that.
When I sat up I smiled instantly, seeing a face I had not for so long. “Dad!”
He sat across from me, looking worried and not looking excited to see me at all.
“Dad, it’s me.”
He nodded. “I know, Gwyn. But you shouldn't have come.”
My insides tightened instantly. “Why?”
“They’ll be looking for you. They’ll look here first. They’ll know your memories are back. That was the only thing preventing them from ending you—that, and the secrets you’re hiding inside of your brain.” His voice was solemn, “Lyle and Bran don't know you’re here, do they?”
I shook my head, realizing I knew them. “I saw Bran on the tram today and Lyle was a guard at the building where the physicians work. They’re following me, they might know I’m here.”
“Run. Now. Go back to the city, leave through the gates tonight when they send the delinquents into the wilds.”
A chill ran up my spine. “I can’t make that journey again. I can’t do it. I won’t survive it.” The fear of it swallowed up the brave girl I had become. Pieces of the story filled in. I didn't have to walk to the river people again. I could walk to the kingdom, that journey I could survive. I was not the feeble girl I was pretending to be.
“You will be fine.” He nodded, swallowing emotions and arguments. “I’m coming with you this time. Your mother and I will meet you.” He looked at his feet. “Things have changed in The Last City of Men since you took the memory wipe. There is violence every day. They have given the guards their memories, but only the truly evil ones.”
I scowled, not remembering how my memory was altered.
“Lyle’s father and uncle have started a revolution. It’s a silent one, preparing to destroy the city from the inside. Bran has killed Lisabeth. I heard rumors her body was found outside of the city gates, left in the sand and rocks to rot. They are upping the guards, searching homes randomly, and hunting for this rebellion. They don't realize it reaches the highest level of society. They assume it’s the lower levels complaining about the unfairness of the system.”
I joined him in swallowing hard.
He sighed, rubbing his tired eyes. “I need you to run, I need you to get out. I need you to stay on the outskirts until we know the city is ours.”
I scowled, tilting my head to the side. “Dad, I’m not a delicate flower.” And there she was, the girl I had become, out there in the wild. I could fight and help. I didn't need to hide. I had forgotten how strong I had actually become, but I remembered now.
His face matched mine. “No, you’re associated with people who are now considered outsiders. Lyle is seen as a coward. His father has spoken out publically of the shame he has brought to his family. And of how proud they are of a man like Bran, someone from the lower ranks standing up for the needs of the city and not of himself. Not the way Lyle did.”
“But—”
“No buts. You were caught in the city, near the pier. The moment they took you into custody they knew your memory had suffered a trauma. It was blamed for your random disappearance. It was blamed for the abandonment of your station and your pairing. They believed something heinous had occurred—an accident that must have changed your brain patterns. They believe you are a victim of the rebellion, attacked or kidnapped and drugged with something that set you back with the reset to a place where you couldn't learn anything new. Your innocence in the whole affair is believed by all. But now they want to know who took you. Who had you? They want answers. The man they stuck you with, Murphy Collins, he’s an assassin—known for his kills.”
My heart raced. “What?”
“He is protecting you from the rebels until they can get inside of your head and find out what you know about the rebels and their intentions.”
I shook my head. “I don't know anything. I never was a rebel. I was shown a small piece of the puzzle. Lyle’s father and uncle were the only rebels I knew. How can I help them if I left through the gates?”
“No one knows you left through the gates. In fact, they all believed you had been murdered. It was feared in the highest circles, where the crimes of the city are freely discussed common knowledge.”
That bothered me even more than sleeping next to an assassin. “They know about the crimes?”
“Of course they do.” He chuckled to himself but I could see there was a level of frustration in the laugh. “They rely on three things to run this city: Firstly, they take all the brightest and put them in jobs that will stroke their egos. They do this so that the cleverest are not sitting on a farm with heaps of time on their hands as they pick carrots and potatoes. They make certain they’re busy in stressful jobs that will challenge them, instead of giving them an easy life with time to plot. Secondly, they rely on the fear of what we once were. We were savages and we polluted and took advantage of the earth. We caused World War Three, killing off huge portions of the earth and taking the people there with her. So long as we fear the past, just enough, we won’t ever want to make that same mistake. This is the haven we protect by following the rules set out to protect us.” He paused and shook his head, lifting one side of his lips into a wry grin. “Lastly, they rely on the simple fact that people don't remember the huge cock-up from all the yesterdays. People don't remember seeing a man dragged into the shadows and beaten. They don't remember being hurt or abused in any way. People are oblivious to the past and the future is set by a simple set of controlled memories that have been preselected for them. Their future has been predetermined. There are no crimes because they are not remembered. There are no murders, no rapes, no beatings, no thefts. Yes, they happen, but none of that is remembered. Therefore, there are no trials for crimes committed. No one is tainted by the negativity of the crimes. We all go to sleep and forget. We have not become better than we were before, just more malleable.”
My insides were hard like a rock but I sat quietly, processing it and comparing it all to the memories I had.
“We could take back our lives and correct the wrongs and flaws in the system, but it would take all of us to do it. We have to all agree that we want to remember yesterday—that memories hold beautiful things inside of them. Things we need as a people. I believe we are lacking in many emotions and experiences because we forget. The flaws inside of us are nothing compared to the flaws in the system. We could make this world better by reclaiming a little of who we once were. But that is idle talk, because no one will ever agree to stand and fight. We are lazy, placated into thinking we are making some sort of difference. Every one of us has a plan for this to all end. Every one who remembers, that is.”
I saw something in that moment, something I hadn’t really seen before—passion. My father passionately believed in the end of The Last City, but he was defeated by the task of ending it before he even started. I wondered before I spoke, how much he already knew. “So you are aware that this is not the last city of mankind?”
He nodded, taking a deep breath. “When I was a boy, my only friend who knew I remembered everything was Lyle’s father, Rodger Getty. No one else knew of course, otherwise we would have surely never been allowed to have children be intended for one another. At any rate, we grew up together in the farms. He caught me once in a lie, confronted me about remembering, which in turn proved he too remembered everything. We were friends from then on. When he married he discovered
that a member of his wife’s family had once gone on what we all called a walkabout. We discussed it at great lengths many times.”
“I know the story.” I didn't say anything more. I honestly couldn't take much more of it. Everything was making me feel dizzy.
“Of course you do.” He looked down, fidgeting his fingers. “It doesn't matter. It’s a moot point. The important thing is that you need to run.”
I shook my head, remembering so many things. Killing the woman who was the slaver—running and fighting. “I’m not the girl I was before.” I couldn't meet his eyes. I couldn't let him see. His hands reached out for mine, holding them tightly. He ran his fingers along the scars.
“No one who knows the truth can be the same. This is no life at all. I won’t be part of ending it, though I wish we could, but I will flee this place and start over.”
“Okay, but—” Fire burned inside of me, made of fury. “While I like life outside of the gates, we have a problem here to figure out. Life out there is better even if it’s a struggle, because there’s freedom and vengeance and choices. The kingdom is a place we could go, but how could we all live, knowing everyone in the cities is suffering under this? I have a choice to walk away and save myself or help Lyle and Bran stop this.” I swallowed hard, forcing the brave girl I had become in the wilderness beyond the walls to rise up again. “I choose to free people.”
My dad shook his head. “What I’m trying to tell you—what I was trying to tell you before—they don't want to be saved. They don't remember being annoyed or angry or evil or sad. They don't care. They don't see what we are now, what we have become. Making everyone remember isn’t the answer. Don't you see that? Taking all of them and giving them their memories isn’t the answer. They’ll all panic if they remember the things they saw or did or lost.” I could see the horror and pain in his eyes and hear the tremble in his voice. He shook as he gave me a look filled with heavy sadness. “Maybe they did save us from us, those who came before. Maybe we were evil, are evil.”
