The Culling

by Charles Ray

  34.

  Hiroshi, along with Leland and two other Freelanders, had been assigned to scout the area east of the river to look out for possible New Liberty patrols. After their successful raid on the armory, Moses thought it likely that New Liberty might mount a retaliatory strike of some kind.

  The five Freelanders had lain on the ridge line for nearly two days, watching the forested valley below, and had seen nothing but the occasional herd of grazing deer.

  “You know,” Leland said. “I don’t think they’re going to attack us. The militia was sent south over a year ago, and they’re the only ones in New Liberty that know anything about the outside world. The monitors had never been outside the fence before the militia left, and it was only when they told us to look for you that a monitor got out of sight of the fence.”

  Hiroshi scanned the terrain once more, nodding. “I think you’re probably right,” he said. “But, Freeland hasn’t survived this long by taking chances. If they don’t attack, we’ll have spent a few days camping here. But, if they do attack, we could be the difference between survival and extinction for our home.”

  Leland nodded. It was funny, Hiroshi thought. Both of them – well, three, counting Clementine – now thought of Freeland as home. Even stranger, he was beginning to think of Leland as a friend, and the feeling seemed to be mutual. Just a short time before, they were enemies. He recalled a quote from one of the books his father loved reading, an English translation of Chinese philosophy, ‘circumstances change with the passage of time.’ In this case, there had been a sea change in circumstances in a very brief span of time, and he felt that it was only the beginning.

  The pressure of Leland’s hand on his shoulder yanked him from his reverie.

  “There’s something in the bushes over to the southeast,” he said quietly.

  “Probably just a deer grazing,” Hiroshi said.

  “I don’t think so. A deer would be moving the lower foliage, wouldn’t it? Whatever is disturbing it now is about man-high.”

  Hiroshi tensed. While he had a phenomenal memory, recalling long passages he’d read years before, he was no match for Leland when it came to reading physical signs. The young monitor could see small details at great distances, and despite having been raised in the quasi-urban environment of New Liberty, quickly adapted his senses to the forests and mountains. If he thought it was a person moving through the brush, it more than likely was.

  The other Freelanders, taking their cue from Hiroshi, also tensed, arrows nocked in their bows.

  A figure emerged from the brush. The small herd of deer that had been grazing at the edge of the forest spooked and, leaping high in the air, fled to the north. Three bows were raised.

  “Wait,” Hiroshi said in a harsh whisper. “It looks like a prole.”

  “It is,” Leland said. “His singlesuit is dirty and torn, but he moves like a prole.”

  “He’s moving this way,” Hiroshi said. “Let’s wait until he gets closer.”

  As the figure neared, though, something about the way it moved triggered a memory in Hiroshi’s mind. The swing of the shoulders, and the way the feet splayed outward – it couldn’t be, he thought. But, when the bedraggled figure was just over two hundred yards away, there was no doubt in his mind. Hiroshi stood.

  “Wash,” he shouted. “Wash, over here!”

  Washington Benedict stopped, and looked around confusedly. His mind, he thought, must be playing tricks on him. He was convinced he had heard Hiroshi’s voice, but out here in the wilderness that was impossible. When he finally saw the figure standing on the ridge above him, his heart leapt. It was Hiroshi. He stumbled forward. Tears streamed down his brown cheeks.

  Hiroshi ran forward. Washington stumbled into his arms.

  “Hirosh,” he mumbled. “You’re alive, you’re really alive.”

  “Sure I am, Wash. But, what are you doing out here?”

  Washington told his friend what was happening back in New Liberty, or as much as he knew of it.

  “The monitors are killing people, Hirosh,” he said. “For no reason, they’re just killing people. We got as many out of the crèche as we could – the headmaster came with us. I hid them in one of the tunnels we used to play in, and came looking for you. She said you’d survived. I wasn’t sure I believed her, but she seemed so certain, I had to look for you. I don’t know what to do. I don’t understand why they’re killing people, Hirosh. Why?”

  Hiroshi felt as if someone had dropped a large rock on his chest. He knew why the monitors were killing people – it was because of him. If he’d gone meekly to his doom rather than resisting; and killing; the monitors who had come for him, this might not be happening.

  35.

  Gravius hadn’t realized that by ordering the monitors back onto the streets he was unlocking the gates to hell.

  Once outside the building, the troop encountered the monitors fleeing from the first building, and got a garbled account of what had happened. This resulted in a disaster. In the next block, they encountered four proles who hadn’t heard about what was happening, and who were on their way to work. When loudly challenged by the monitors they reacted the way most people would react when faced by a large crowd of armed, angry people – they ran. When they turned and ran, the monitors did what most adrenalin-fueled, angry, armed people will do – they opened fire. The four unlucky factory workers were torn to bloody shreds, and their remains spread over the sidewalk, parts of the street, and the wall of the building next to which they were when the darts struck.

  This unfortunate incident was observed by the proprietor of the small shop on the ground floor of the building, who made the mistake of coming outside to see what was going on. When the monitors turned their weapons his way, he ducked back inside, ran through the shop and out the back, screaming at the top of his lungs, thus alerting the other residents of the block.

  Frightened, confused, and not a little angry, proles began barricading themselves inside the nearest buildings. Those who sought shelter in the few one-story buildings on the block were quickly routed and killed. The lucky ones who had made it into multi-story structures quickly realized that the ground floors were little more than kill zones, and made their way to the floors above, blocking stairwells with furniture and empty crates. From the upper floors, at a range where the flechette pistols were of only minimal effectiveness, they began bombarding the monitors on the sidewalks below with whatever they could lift or throw, and in some cases that included objects of sufficient weight to disable any hapless monitor who failed to get out of the way quickly enough.

  By the time Gravius had exited the crèche, and reached the scene of the standoff, five of his monitors were sprawled on the sidewalk, their bodies mixed in with proles, while the remainder had sought shelter behind piles of trash and broken furniture, occasionally sending a fusillade of darts arcing up at open windows. A futile gesture at best, and each time met with a fresh avalanche of furniture and trash.

  Gravius stopped just outside the drop area and called for the senior monitor in charge of the group. A black-clad figure moved from behind a pile of tatty stuffed chairs and ran zigzagging toward him.

  “Yes, citizen,” the man said as he reached Gravius.

  “What the bloody hell is going on here?”

  “We were carrying out our orders. The proles resisted. They are now barricaded inside the building out of range of our weapons.”

  “Holy shit,” Gravius thought. “Who would ever thought the fucking proles had it in them to fight back. This is a total cluster fuck, and it’s landed right in my lap. Surgical elimination of a few proles to break any resistance, my ass. We have a full-scale war on our hands now, and there’s nothing left to do but try my best to win it.”

  “Very well, monitor,” he said to the waiting man. “You’re in charge of this position. Send me one man to act as a runner. I’ll send for reinforcements.”

  The monitor nodded and ran back to comply. As he waited for the ru
nner, Gravius composed the messages he planned to send – one to Wainwright asking for reinforcements from among the external patrols, another to his executive across the river directing him to send all remaining monitors to the prole community, and a final message to Cruz informing him that his plans to send a message to the proles about resistance had achieved just that.

  However it ended, Gravius knew that his career was over. There was no way that Cruz would accept responsibility for the mess he’d created. He would be lucky, he thought, to escape with his life. More than likely he’d be assigned, no consigned, to some desk job in the bowels of the headquarters building, keeping track of crop yields or citizen births, kicked off The Committee and forgotten.

  36.

  Freeland

  “We have to do something,” Hiroshi said. He was shaking, and almost in tears.

  He, Leland, and Washington were sitting in Abraham Moses’s living room. The big man had listened to Washington’s story, and was now thoughtfully stroking his beard.

  “I reckon you’re right, son,” Moses said. “But, what can we do? The New Liberty forces outnumber us, and even with the weapons we took from the armory, they still outgun us. I’m not sure we’re ready yet to take them on.”

  Hiroshi sank down in his chair. His frustration was mounting, along with his feelings of guilt.

  Leland timidly raised a hand. Moses smiled and nodded at him.

  “It seems to me,” he said. “If Washington and the others from the crèche ran away, it’s likely that others did as well.”

  “Makes sense,” Moses said. “But, how does it help us?”

  “Well . . . with the militia away, the monitors are responsible for all the security in both communities. Any kind of resistance from the proles would generate fear across the river like you can’t even imagine. When I was in training, the instructors talked more about the danger of a prole rebellion than an invasion from outside. I imagine that all security right now is focused on the prole community.”

  Moses’ lips turned up and his eyes took on an impish twinkle.

  “Son, are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

  “If we go back in the way we went to attack the armory, we’d be coming in behind most of the security. We could attack the headquarters, which is only lightly guarded at the best of times. If they’re focusing on troubles in the prole community, it’ll be even more lightly guarded, because just about everyone will be trying to handle that problem.”

  “What would happen if at the same time a small force attacked the fence east of the river?” Hiroshi asked.

  Leland laughed. “They’d probably shit their pants,” he said. He looked over at Washington. “I take it some of the proles are fighting back?” Washington glowered at him, but nodded. “Think about it – the monitors are up to their asses in angry proles – two more enemies appearing from two different directions will confuse them like you wouldn’t believe. Our tactical training was only about how to deal with unruly proles. The militia was supposed to protect the border.”

  Moses ran his fingers through his beard, looking from one young man to the other. He was deep in thought, assessing the pros and cons of an attack on New Liberty.

  “You know, the two of you together come up with some pretty good ideas. This just might work,” he said. “So, let’s talk about how we go about doing it.”

  The three of them came up with a plan that was bold – in Moses’ words, as audacious as their raid on the armory, because it would be a repeat of that raid.

  First, Leland would spend a day teaching a hundred Freelanders how to use the weapons stolen from the armory. A hundred flechette pistols, if employed at the right time, could help redress the imbalance in arms between the two sides. Fifty Freelanders, armed with the pistols, would go with a force of two hundred to attack the fence east of the river, while fifty others would be part of a group of a hundred who would mount an assault on the citizen’s area. Leland came up with the idea of dressing twenty-five in monitor uniforms. With this group leading, it might be possible, he reckoned, to get deep within the area before the attack was detected. Moses, accompanied by Washington, would lead the force in the east. He gave Hiroshi command of the second force, and Hiroshi asked that Leland be made his second in command. There was a bit of grumbling among some of the older Freelanders, but Moses reminded them that, despite their youth, Hiroshi and Leland were the most knowledgeable of the area in which they’d be operating, so it made sense. Under his stern glare and no nonsense tone of voice, the grumbling subsided.

  The two forces were primed and ready to march on the third day. Their sendoff was somber. Clementine stood with Sarah Moses, a forlorn look on her face. The older woman had a stoic look that mirrored that of her husband. Hiroshi tried to look brave and stoic, but as he looked over his shoulder and saw Clementine with her head against the other woman’s shoulder, he felt like crying himself.

  37.

  Gravius was fuming as he walked toward the door to The Committee’s main meeting room. That Cruz would summon him back across the river at the very time that his forces were beginning to make a little headway against the barricaded proles made no sense. A few more hours and they would clean out the main centers of resistance. That should cause the rest to capitulate, but even if they didn’t, it would just be matter of time.

  He was angrier when he entered the room and found Armand Wainwright sitting at Cruz’s right hand, a smug look on his face.

  “Come in, citizen,” Cruz said with a smarmier note than usual in his voice. “Have a seat, please.”

  He was tempted to stand, but decided that it would be a childish gesture, so he took the seat opposite Cruz. “Why did you need to see me, citizen?” he asked. “I was busy with the situation across the river, and really should be there with my men. We almost have it under control.”

  “Ah, yes. The situation in the prole community. Very disturbing to say the least. That is, in fact, precisely why I called you here.”

  “I understand that you might want an update on the situation,” Gravius said. “Most of the proles remain holed up in three buildings near the central district, but we should have them out by the end of the day.”

  Wainwright made a quiet snickering sound. Gravius glared across the table at him.

  “Well, citizen,” Cruz said in a cold voice. “I appreciate your efforts in that regard, but really, this should never have happened in the first place.”

  “That is for damn sure,” Gravius thought wryly. “And, if you’d listened to me and not ordered this fool’s mission, it wouldn’t have happened.” He wanted nothing more than to utter the thought aloud and then follow it by smashing his fist into the idiot’s face. Instead, though, he took a deep breath and locked gazes with Cruz. “You’re right, citizen,” he said evenly. “It shouldn’t have happened. But, we are bringing it under control.”

  “I’m greatly disappointed in you, Citizen Gravius. I expected better of you. Now, I must make an important decision, one that is very difficult.”

  “You wouldn’t be thinking of calling for a withdrawal, would you? While I didn’t think the operation was wise, now that we’re committed, pulling back would send the wrong signal to the proles.” Gravius knew that to terminate the operation before routing the rebellious proles would lead to open season on his monitors. He'd have to send them into the prole community in platoon strength to maintain any semblance of order.

  He should have known better, though. Cruz had no intention of ending the operation.

  “No,” Cruz said. “I not only want the operation to continue, but I want every prole in those buildings terminated as well. No, I’m afraid, Citizen Gravius, that your performance in this situation has left much to be desired.”

  Gravius felt his cheeks burning. He’d been a monitor before this punk was born, and had been commander of the monitors since he was a teenager waiting for his father to die. “What about my performance fails to satisfy you, citizen?”

 
; “I’m not sure I like your tone.”

  “I don’t think Citizen Gravius meant any disrespect, citizen,” Wainwright offered. There was no sympathy or sincerity in his voice. “Perhaps some details about the shortcomings we discussed would be in order.”

  Gravius leaned forward, his clenched fists on the table. He was dangerously close to losing it. “Shortcomings? What shortcomings? Everything was done according to regulations and protocol. There was no way we could have anticipated prole resistance. In fact, if we hadn’t gone in with such force and begun killing them – per your orders, I might add – they might have calmed down on their own.”

  “I should think,” Wainwright said in an oily tone. “That the chanting the day of the culling should have been a warning that something was amiss, and that prole boy killing two of your monitors was a blatant act of rebellion. I, for one, don’t think they would have calmed down.”

  Of course he’d been aware of those incidents. That was why he’d argued against Cruz’s idiotic idea of punishing the community. It would have been far better to let things cool down. Cruz’s stony expression, however, made it clear that he wouldn’t hear any criticism of his decision, nor would he accept any blame or responsibility for the outcome.

  “Very well,” he said. “I accept responsibility for what went wrong.”

  “How noble of you,” Cruz said. His voice dripped with sarcasm. “I’m afraid, though, that’s not enough. Citizen Gravius, I am hereby relieving you of all duty, and placing you under house arrest until The Committee can decide on the appropriate punishment.”

  Gravius stood. “With all due respect, citizen,” he said. “You can’t leave the monitors without a commander while they’re in the middle of a battle. They’re capable, but they need direction in a crisis like this.”