Another of the rebels beamed a light above me, illuminating the manhole cover. I began to climb.
“The Net powers the weapons the military used to open fire on my family during a raid. They killed them all, even my six month old son,” the giant said. “So, if you run, I will hunt you down and kill you. You will help to make this right.”
“Enough, Akoni,” this time Eli spoke.
I stopped climbing and looked down. Now, I could understand his hostility, but he really had it pointed at the wrong person. I wouldn’t let him put the blame on me. “I didn’t pull the triggers on the weapons that killed them.”
“You might as well have. Your family is responsible for the power imbalance, and you object to shutting the Net down.”
“I said enough.”
The man looked away, and I began to climb again. If I wanted help fleeing, it wouldn’t come from this cheery crowd.
I reached the top, twisted the latch, and shoved the cover to the side, climbing out and onto a vacant street. After spending the last few months inside at night, I’d forgotten how balmy and calm a Sententian night could be. The sounds of the waves breaking over the beach filled the air. Salt and the heavy scent of plumeria clung to an inland moving breeze. A prism from the moonlight striking the glass volcano twisted like ribbons in the sky.
Bats flitted around the hovering street lamps, also robotic drones programmed to come on when they sensed movement, which the small flying mammals more than provided. Like kids at a candy dispenser, they’d trip the lamps and snap up the tasty treats drawn to the illumination. Even they had been conditioned to expect food be delivered upon request.
Beams struck the pavement like an empty stage and highlighted the vacant neighborhood street. The only movement came from the bat’s shadows, dancing around on the concrete, creating a strobe effect, and the breeze ruffling the leaves of palm trees and tropical plants. Quiet. Too quiet.
Time seemed to slow to a crawl, and my skin tingled in warning.
I rubbed my arms and glanced down at Eli’s wrist chrono. Approximately six minutes before the patrol would return. I looked around as Eli, and then Akoni emerged from the sewers, along with five others. My mind screamed run, hide, yet I remained planted in place, the clock ticking down to discovery. It would be a waste of energy with the tag in my arm, and I’d no doubt Akoni would make good on his threat if I took off.
I would be on the lookout for a magnet, and when I found one, I’d neutralize the tracking device.
Gas expelled from the hole in a cloud of vapor, overwhelming the scents of paradise. It never ceased to amaze me how man could build a variety of technical marvels, floating fields that went on for miles, robotic bees, hovering vehicles and an unending supply of energy which provided power to them all, yet when it came to disposing of human waste, the process never changed. And that would be the last time I walked around in crap. Well, if I had any say in the matter, it would be.
I lifted my hand and blocked my nostrils. “If they don’t see us, they sure as hell will smell us.”
Eli shook his head, and Akoni put a hand up to silence me at the same time. Akoni, who I realized stood well over seven feet, looked even bigger under the streetlamps. He shot me a nasty look and stooped down, resealing the sewers. Eli grabbed my hand and pulled me toward a forest preserve.
“Walking in the forests is prohibited.”
“So is getting caught outside after dark.” Eli ducked into the brush, tugging me in with him. “Be very quiet. Sound is amplified at night.”
I glanced back in time to see the lights of a vehicle cresting a hill in the distance, and to see the hulking giant that occupied more space than five people had somehow vanished along with the rest of Eli’s crew. I wondered for a moment when I’d see Tyler again, and if in fact he was still my friend as he’d claimed. I didn’t like any of this.
I didn’t fight the rebel leader, as Eli might have picked the lesser of two evils, and I didn’t want to find out the hard way what happened to people caught outside after curfew.
6
Two hours later, we’d waded through dense vegetation in a place forbidden to the general population. Only those charged with caring for the wildlife and flora could venture into the forests, and never this deep. I doubted this wilderness had seen a human in over one hundred and fifty years. Just as those who worked the fields and kept the technology running were the only ones authorized to set foot on the floating acres, forest workers only worked where sent.
I questioned if I had any blood left, as the insects of the islands decided I made quite the buffet. In the cities and on floating fields, we had a sonic technology which kept the pests away. But the insects had to go somewhere, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out to where they’d relocated.
Feeling both tired and defeated, I saw a boulder and parked my ass on it, refusing to take another step. “I can’t do this.”
“This will help.” Eli tossed me a jar.
I caught it. My stomach grumbled, telling me I’d gone past empty long ago. I unscrewed the top and sniffed. Sticking my finger in, I popped a clump of the grease like paste in my mouth and scooped two fingers in, loading a second mouthful without tasting the first. I’d never been a fan of poi, but at this point, I’d eat anything.
And apparently I had. I coughed, spitting the clump out. “That’s not poi.”
“No, it’s bug repellant.”
My lips and tongue went numb. I spit again and used the bottom of my shirt to wipe the nasty stuff from my mouth. “It’s foul.”
“Bug repellant usually is. It’s how it repels mosquitoes.”
“You should have told me.” I continued to alternate between spitting and scrubbing.
“I thought you knew.” A smirk bloomed on Eli’s face, and I resisted the urge to throw the jar at him. Barely.
Two of the rebels who’d rejoined us a few minutes into the forest snickered behind him. I shot them a glare, and they looked away, going back to setting up camp.
“I don’t use this stuff. We have the bees to keep the fields free of insects, and we use sonic technology elsewhere. Nobody smears chemicals all over their bodies anymore.”
“You don’t have a choice if you want to keep your blood,” Eli said as he came up next to me and retrieved his bug paste, taking a clump out and slapping it onto the back of my neck. “Rub it in.”
I knocked his hand away and spread it. At this point, I didn’t care. I’d already ingested a healthy dose. What would a little on my skin do?
“We’re deep enough into the forest we should be able to set up camp, have a small fire, and avoid patrols. The smoke will also help keep the insects away.”
“Camp?” I surveyed the moonlit clearing. “We don’t have blankets or food, anything.”
Akoni, who had the creepy habit of appearing out of nowhere for a big guy, handed me a spiky looking ball. I stared at the odd thing in my hand. “What the hell?”
He snatched it back and twisted it open. “Lychee, or dragon’s eye. It grows wild on the islands. I collected it while we navigated the jungle. Eat—or starve, princess. I really don’t care.”
“Easy,” Eli growled.
Akoni dropped several of the fruit at my feet, along with half a dozen coconuts, something I recognized. “Drink some of the milk from these.” He yanked a knife out of his pocket, flipped it open, and threw it at my feet. It stuck in the ground five inches from my toes.
“Hey!” I jumped back.
“You’ll need that. Try not to cut yourself or lose my knife. On second thought, just don’t lose my knife.”
And off he went, with a charming snarl on his face.
“I’ll have a talk with him later. He’s harmless, just angry. He’s lost a lot lately.”
“Right. Haven’t we all.”
“You don’t want to go there, Iia. Believe me, you don’t.” Eli shook his head. “And he’s right about the milk. The coconut will help to hydrate you. I’ll bore holes in
them for you.” He stooped down and grabbed the knife. Wiping the dirt off on his pants, he got to work.
I returned my attention to the dragon’s eye, studying the white flesh Akoni had exposed. “Is it good?”
“Delicious. Most of the people here are used to commercial fruits and vegetables. The more delicate and mysterious traditional foods have been exchanged for crops designed to provide greater harvests and more calories. You can still find foods like the dragon’s eye on the black market and out here, if you know what you’re looking for.”
“It’s hard to look for them when this area has been put off limits. Even the forest workers don’t come this deep.” I sniffed and took a bite. Sweet, then a little tart. The juice ran down my chin. I closed my eyes and groaned. God, it was good. I took a bigger bite this time, rolling the strawberry, grape, and melon flavor around my mouth. I could live on this stuff alone.
“Hence the reason they’re on the black market. Of course, most of the population believes they’re poisonous.”
I spewed the fruit from my mouth.
He looked up and grinned. “Relax. The government only says that to keep people from going into the wild areas to harvest food. Akoni’s family has been on the islands for centuries, and he’s familiar with many of the native plants. He helped to develop alternate food supplies and medicines in our camp, like the paste you ate. Our government has made sure the people would have to go deep into the forests to discover any of it, and then only if they’re inclined to break the law. They count on the population’s obedience and, for the most part, get it.”
“If these are native to the islands, why haven’t I heard of them before? They should have come up on the drone’s pollination logs.”
Eli shrugged. “For the same reason nobody is allowed out here. The government is controlling its people through their needs and pacifying them by giving them an excess of what they don’t need. Like nano-cosmetics and technology. The ancient Romans called it bread and circuses.”
“Seriously, we’re going back to that now?”
“I didn’t know we left the topic.”
“It’s a conspiracy theory.”
“So, how does your conspiracy theory taste? Something had to pollinate the plant to produce fruit, and since we have no natural bees on the islands—”
“You know what I mean. Maybe this is a protected plant, it’s why it doesn’t show up on the logs or why nobody knows about it.”
“Did you happen to notice how many of these protected plants are out here in this forest preserve? There are enough to feed a city’s population. They grow like weeds, along with the pineapple and papaya you are familiar with. They’re not endangered, Iia. Not yet. If the people discover the natural foods growing out here, the government will take herbicide to them. Then all these plants will be extinct.”
“So, I’m supposed to believe our leaders would keep a potential food source from starving people?”
“When are you going to accept the people of Sententia are shackled by their own choices? The population is too afraid to live without their modern conveniences. Until they kick their addiction to technology, nothing will change. They will continue to rely on robotic bees for sustenance and do exactly what they are told without question so they can continue to enjoy their technology.” Eli frowned. “Humans were never designed to live the way we do. We were meant to live free, not like this. Not this farce of an existence, shaped into a mold of the government’s choosing.
“The people of Sententia have been conditioned like rats to navigate a maze looking for a cheese reward. They’re sleepwalking, and someone must wake them up and show them there is more to life than what they’ve been taught to expect. There is freedom out there—to love whom you want, speak your mind, express yourself in words, art, song, and dance. You can have children—as in more than one—live to be one hundred, explore other continents. The people of Sententia have choices they don’t know they have.”
I didn’t follow his cult and certainly didn’t plan to sit quietly and not challenge his delusions. “How do you expect everyone to just give up their technology on a whim there might be something more? Even I don’t believe we can have that. These islands can’t sustain life without following the path we’ve had laid out for us. To have unregistered children would tax the economy and food supply. To spend our free time in leisure would destroy our ability to feed and protect ourselves. We can’t waste time and resources on everyone dancing and painting. Only a few privileged are allowed to engage in cultural enhancement. We are given assigned duties from birth for a reason. We can’t just change who we were born to be, not without it throwing our society out of balance.”
“Yes, we can. You can. Do you really believe all you were born to be is a beekeeper? Maintaining electronic swarms is your sole purpose in life?” Eli plopped down on the rock next to me. “How can you accept that the only thing you are good for is programming hives? Think of what you could be capable of if you could choose to do anything you wanted. I know I’m meant to be far more than a soldier, and I refuse to put myself in a designated box. The government doesn’t define me. I do that. As far as giving up the technology, it’s like ripping a bandage off. We won’t offer Sententia a choice. The people will see before we are done that they can have all I mentioned and more.
“There is a whole different world out there beyond our shores. It’s time we leave the nest and find out what is waiting for us. What the population is doing isn’t living; it’s surviving—and even that, they are failing at. Whatever happened to freedom? Joy? Having an identity of your choice?”
“It’s a fairytale.”
“Then prepare to wake up, Sleeping Beauty, because there’s no going back now.”
Coast of California, June 12th, 2239
* * *
“When Eli told me to prepare to wake up, I don’t know what I’d expected, certainly not what I got. Not only had I woken up to a different world, one I could’ve firmly told you months before I knew, but I woke up to a new life, and weeks later, a new home, a place I never expected to exist, let alone visit.” I slip the new solar-skin on Axel’s artificial hand, and though it doesn’t look natural anymore, it works as it should. I secure the membrane in place and seal it with a heating tool. Once I feel it is as good as I can make it, I let go of his limb. “It’s not pretty, but it’s not broken anymore either. Give it a test.”
He opens and closes his fingers, makes a fist and rotates his wrist, turns his hand palm up and then down. A smile creeps onto his face. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” We lock gazes and for a moment, I forget how to breathe. I avert my eyes, staring at the toes of my boots. “All of this is more than my imagination could conjure up. I never wanted to wake up here. Live like this. But if I were to be honest, I don’t know if I could go back to my life before, even if given the option. Eli had been right. We were so controlled we no longer had an identity of our own.”
“How did you expect to live? It sounds like where you came from, you were enslaved, like I had been.”
“Except we were willing parties to our own incarceration. You didn’t have a choice, did you?”
He snorts and shakes his head. “No, but I do now. And so do you. You have freedom here in your new home. I will die before I allow someone to enslave me again. I am human.”
“Why would you think you weren’t?” Curious. I lift my gaze and study his face. He is as human as any man I’ve met, and yet it sounds as though he didn’t always believe it.
He frowns, his brow furrowing.
“Scientists created me in a lab. I grew in a mechanical womb until I’d matured enough to be harvested. All of my life, told I wasn’t human.” He stared at his hand and opened and closed it. “This”—he held the robotic limb up—“isn’t human. It doesn’t feel or have a soul.” He rested his hand over his heart and patted his chest. “This feels, hurts, and loves. I’m not an object, but a person. Now that I know who I am, I will never go
back to being anything less.”
I nod. We have more in common than I realized when I first met him. “Before all this happened, I would never have wanted to be set free. I thought life wasn’t so bad—not perfect, but not bad either.” I set my bio-driver down on the workbench and fiddle with a piece of the skin from the dome of my floating field. I’d used the same material to power my bees. It also proves to be the most suitable source of energy to operate his hand.
“When you are enslaved, you have to condition yourself to accept your fate or go crazy. It’s not as easy breaking free mentally as it is physically,” he said. “I still struggle with old behaviors.”
“I’m not so sure I haven’t lost my mind,” I say. “All this seems so surreal, and I’m sure I come across as a lunatic with all I’ve told you. If I hadn’t lived it, I wouldn’t believe it. Months ago, in my wildest imagination, I would never have seen myself here, in this place, building a compound, starting my life over.”
“So you didn’t plan to come here? You seem rather well prepared.”
“Plan? No. Prepared, yes. Somebody made sure I was.” I lift my gaze from the tip of my boots and look my new companion in the eyes. “I never asked for this, any of it. When they burned my chip, they took away my identity. When Eli stuck me on the raft and set me adrift, he took away my life. No, I didn’t plan to come here. But I knew if I wanted to survive, I had to adapt.” I sweep my hand around the room. “Coming here was like waking up from a nightmare.” I close my eyes and recall the day I arrived in California. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to find yourself somewhere you never expected to be?”
“More than you can possibly imagine.”
* * *
The coast of California, December 30th, 2038
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