Eve of Man

by Giovanna Fletcher

  The elevator slows to a stop and the doors open on what should be the collection bay. It’s pitch black and I notice I’m not hit by a wave of fresh chilly air as usual. Instead there’s nothing. No change in the atmosphere at all.

  I know there’s no turning back, so I force myself to take a few steps out of the elevator. As I do so, light ripples across the space in front of me, showing me the collection bay, but not as I know it. The lighting is harsher and not as inviting.

  The usual black car is waiting in front of me, its door open and ready, but without Ketch beside it, like he was the last time I was here.

  I close the door I usually get into and walk around to the driver’s seat. I’ve never driven before, or watched anyone else do it, but as I climb in and look at the space around me, I realize it isn’t going to be a problem. A button has the word ON engraved into the dark metal. I press it, knowing I don’t have long. The car roars into life. The only other gadgets I can see are a black leather wheel directly in front of me and two pedals at my feet. I press one and nothing happens, but when I place my foot on the other, the vehicle flies forward and wobbles, thanks to my hands grabbing the wheel, which I can see will steer me where I want to go. I take my foot off the floor and notice the car begin to slow. I press the other pedal and come to an abrupt stop.

  Okay, I think. This is okay. Go, stop, steer. That’s all you’ve got to remember.

  As I take a breath, I spot shadows in the little mirror slightly above me, which is angled so that I can see behind. Someone’s coming. With that knowledge I place my foot on the go pedal and propel myself far from them, my hands gripping the steering wheel in an effort to keep control. I don’t know where I’m going, but straight and away seems good.

  Within seconds I’m out of the collection bay. There’s nothing but dull gray concrete all around me. I keep going.

  Then I notice lines that have been painted on the floor in bright yellow. It’s hard not to laugh. I always knew when we were close to my little garden, and I knew the whole route we took to get there. My body memorized every bump and turn that meant I was getting closer to my little haven. They must’ve known that.

  Poor little gullible Eve.

  In the distance I can see a clump of green and notice that the end of the maze on the floor will eventually lead me there. I decide not to go by their usual pointless route and take a shortcut.

  It’s only when I see the height of the trees that I observe the height of the ceiling above me. The space is gargantuan. There’s a clear break in the man-made forest for me to drive through, and it isn’t long before the path becomes uneven, causing the car to jitter. I put my foot slowly on the brake—so that I’m not in danger of veering off the track, but still moving.

  And then I see it, the place where the car usually stops before I step out of my padded cell to take in the natural beauty.

  I want to slow down, to get out and take in the falsehood of the piece of outside they gave me to fulfill my inquisitive mind. I want to rip apart the leaves and see what they’re made of. I want to hunt for the pump that engineers my perfect stream, and the lights overhead that make it all seem so magical when it’s nothing but a fabrication. This is what I want to do, but I can’t. My hands are so tightly on the wheel, my foot so clamped to the floor.

  “Stop, Eve. Stop now.” Vivian’s voice is so loud that I think she’s in the car with me.

  I gasp but keep my eyes ahead of me and focus on my steering. I know she isn’t here, but her voice is being played in the human-made, heartless void of level 800.

  I’d thought this place was special, but it was just another part of their trap to keep me here, unquestioning, so that I live my life as they’ve always wanted me to.

  It’s another form of manipulation. Another lie. At least I always knew Holly was a figment of someone’s imagination. This trickery seems far crueler.

  I don’t know what is real anymore.

  Do they really want me to become a brainless dummy so they can do as they like without me wanting things for myself? Would it make life easier for all of us?

  I push my foot down harder and accelerate.

  The car growls in response, pushing me back in my seat.

  “You are breaching national security. We will be forced to take drastic measures if you do not come to an immediate stop, Eve,” Vivian barks.

  “Go for it,” I snarl. It’s not like I can actually go anywhere.

  A bump from behind causes my chest to bash against the steering wheel. With my concentration gone, the car gains a mind of its own. I struggle to regain control. Another hit from behind causes it to spin to the left. The fake shrubbery gets under its nose and propels me upward.

  For a brief second I fly.

  Then I flip.

  I see the tree ahead moving closer and closer in slow motion. We collide. I hear a bang, a crack, and a thump as my head makes contact with something hard.

  The glass around me shatters.

  There is no smell of jasmine. No sound of birds singing or the stream cascading through the meadow.

  “Eve!” she shouts.

  Just her.

  50

  BRAM

  “It’s okay, ladies. It’s just the EPO springing another not-so-routine visit on our guest,” the old lady calls up the stairs to where a dozen or so equally wrinkled faces look down on us.

  I smile at them, but no one smiles back. Some turn away in disgust and I hear sobs from a room above us.

  “Don’t mind them. They never take too kindly to the men the EPO sends to check on Mr. Warren.”

  The woman’s words fill my veins with fire.

  He is here.

  We have found him.

  Now we just have to keep our cover and get him out of this place.

  “Would you gentlemen care for a drink?” she asks.

  “No thanks, Miss…?”

  “It’s Mrs. Sutcliffe. But you can call me Anne,” she tells Frost, with a twinkle in her eye. She might be old, but there’s a feisty youthfulness about her.

  “We’d just like to see Ernie and get out of your way as fast as we can,” I tell her.

  “Very well. He’s downstairs. I’ll leave you to it. The door is open.” She gestures to where the stairs wrap around on themselves and disappear into a basement.

  Frost and I look at each other. The door is open? I take the lead and walk down to the lower floor.

  The sight that greets us takes my breath away. It’s a vast open space, with long wooden floors that stretch the entire length of the building. The brick walls are lit by soft bulbs, giving warmth to what is essentially a cellar. At the far end of the room two windows look out at a beach, where transparent waves crash against the white sand. Suddenly it vanishes and a lush rain forest stands in its place. Sunlight pierces the deep greens, and the ultra-realistic views on these screens help to create the illusion that this isn’t just a basement with no windows and one door.

  As we step into the room I see a worn leather sofa with deep depressions in the cushions. A table is piled high with paperwork and littered with mugs half-full of cigarette butts. A small single bed stands across the room, near a toilet and a bath. A man is shaving in the mirror by the washbasin.

  “Gentlemen,” Ernie says as he shaves the fine gray hair around his upper lip.

  “Mr. Warren,” I begin.

  “Mr. Warren? It’s been a while since anyone’s called me that. You must be new. Shall we get this over with?” He washes the shaving cream from his chin and pulls a white vest over his wrinkled body.

  I’m not sure what I was expecting to find, but it definitely wasn’t this man. After all the stories, all the rumors surrounding the dangerous, mentally unstable individual who had to be confined and sedated, this one standing before us, taking a seat in his well-worn spot on the couch, se
ems…normal.

  He sits back and holds out his wrist to us.

  Frost and I look blankly at each other.

  “Well? Quick as you like, chaps. Arthritis doesn’t make this too comfortable, you know,” Ernie says.

  After a second or two he relaxes his arm and looks at us. “Are you going to check this damn thing or not?” he says, pointing to a small scarred patch of skin on the side of his wrist.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Warren, but today isn’t going to be like our normal visits,” I say.

  “Oh? Why’s that, boy? My goodness, how old are you? Do they really let kids come and do this now?” he asks, talking to himself more than to us.

  “We’re leaving,” Frost says. “And you’re coming with us.”

  Ernie is dead still. He looks up at Frost and then at me. His eyes drop to the EPO patch on my chest. “Leaving?” he asks.

  “Yes, right now. We have a lot to explain, but not here,” I say.

  “Where are we going?” the old man says, sounding concerned. “We had a deal! I’ve not tried to escape again. I’ve not left this room. I’ve done everything you’ve told me. Is it Eve? Is she all right?” He grabs my arms, worry written on his tired face. I glance around the room and see photos of Eve on every surface. Newspaper articles, magazines, pencil drawings—every bit of table space, every spare chair, is covered with them. My heart aches for him, the man who lost his daughter.

  “Eve is fine,” I say, placing a hand on his shoulder to calm him. “We just need to move you somewhere safer. Grab anything vital that you need and let’s go.”

  “So, you’re going to take this out, then?” Ernie says, pointing to the scar on his wrist again.

  “Take what out?” I ask.

  Ernie stares at us. His wrinkles rearrange themselves and I can almost hear the questions inside his head.

  “You’re not from the EPO, are you?” he says slowly, his veiny hand trembling slightly.

  I feel Frost look at me. There’s no time to muck around. “No, we’re not,” I say. “We’ve come for you, and then we’re going to free your daughter.”

  The old man takes a moment to absorb what I’ve said, then slumps back into the sofa, cupping his hands over his face.

  “No, no, no,” he says through his fingers. “They’ll already be on their way.”

  “Who will?” Frost barks.

  “Them! The EPO! What—did you think they just locked me away down here and forgot about me? They’re watching us right now. All of us!”

  He raises a bony finger to a patch of ceiling directly over our heads. Frost and I look up to see a 360-degree camera staring down at us, still and cold, its small red light blinking with each subtle movement we make.

  “Shit,” says Frost. “We’ve not got long.”

  “We need to leave right now,” I tell Ernie.

  “You’re not listening to a word I’m saying. I can’t leave. Not unless they remove this thing in my arm,” Ernie says, waving it at us.

  “What’s in your arm?” I ask.

  “It’s an explosive, isn’t it?” Frost says.

  “More than that. It’s the trigger,” Ernie tells us.

  “The trigger for what?”

  “For the rest of the explosives,” Anne says from the stairs behind us. I turn and come face to face with the barrel of her shotgun again.

  “What explosives?” I ask.

  “This building is not what you think it is,” Anne replies simply as she tightens her grip on the weapon to steady her aim. “If he leaves that door—boom. He kills us all. He’s the trigger, and this whole house is the bomb. They figured it was the only way to stop him from trying to escape.”

  “This isn’t a sanctuary—it’s a prison,” Frost barks.

  My blood boils. How could they keep him here like this? How could they put these poor women through such torture? “Why don’t you all leave? Together?” I ask.

  “And go where? They’d find us. We’d all be killed,” Anne replies.

  “Can’t we cut it out?” Frost says, studying Ernie’s scarred arm.

  “Not unless you know how to disarm it. It has sensors on it. It knows if you cut it out, and it’ll set them all off,” Ernie says.

  “We need Johnny,” I tell Frost, but suddenly the ceiling above us is vibrating. Dust falls through the cracks, and the threatening hum of arriving airships rumbles down the stairs.

  “They’re here,” Ernie says.

  Muffled gunshots ring out from above, and the sound of men shouting is just audible over the noise of an airship hovering somewhere above.

  “I can’t let you take him. You’ll kill us all,” Anne says again, looping her finger around the trigger of her weapon.

  “We need to get out of here fast,” Frost says.

  “I didn’t come all this way to leave him behind now!” I shout over the sound of bullets hitting the bricks of the house above.

  “You can’t take me! People have tried and failed so many times. They all have the same fate, boy, and you’re too young for that yet,” Ernie says with a worn kindness in his voice. The voice of someone with no fight left. “Get out now.”

  “He’s right, Bram,” Frost says to me. “We’ve got to leave him.”

  “No!” I shout back. “I’m not leaving him here.” I stare Frost in the eye, his heavy body towering over me. “If we leave now they’ll move him and we’ll never find him again.”

  Frost’s eyes don’t leave mine. He’s trying to read me, trying to see how far I’ll go for this man, for Eve. I don’t budge.

  “There is one way to do it,” Ernie says, interrupting our stare-off.

  “Ernie, no,” Anne whispers sharply.

  He shrugs away her plea and points to Frost’s boot. “I don’t suppose either of you has a knife?” he asks.

  “They’re unarmed,” Anne replies, but Frost is already reaching inside the lip of his heavy boot and unsheathing a small machete.

  “Do it quick and don’t feel bad. I’m tougher than I look. Tried doing it myself years ago, but they caught—”

  Ernie doesn’t get the chance to finish the sentence before Frost raises the blade over his head.

  “Wait!” Anne calls, dropping her gun and reaching out toward Frost, but her old legs can’t get there fast enough. He swipes in one swift, heavy movement, cleanly slicing off the old man’s arm from the elbow down.

  I jump to Ernie’s side, pulling off my belt and strapping it tight around his upper arm. The scarred patch containing the trigger sits, lifeless, on the floor at his feet.

  “Shit, Frost,” I say, my words barely coming out through the shock of what he just did.

  Frost bends down and carefully picks up Ernie’s lower arm. He pulls off his own belt and ties it impossibly tightly around the end as blood seeps out of it.

  Anne covers her mouth with trembling hands, trying to process what is happening.

  “Gotta keep this warm,” Frost growls as he rips a wool blanket from the chair opposite us and neatly wraps it around Ernie’s amputated wrist. He walks toward the far wall, near the sink, and places the arm on the towel rail. “Don’t turn the heating off.”

  51

  BRAM

  We pull Ernie up the stairs, keeping his bloody stump raised. As we enter the landing, the front door bursts open and our Freevers fill the hall, followed by a shower of bullets across the front of the house.

  We duck for cover. The women’s screams pierce my ears worse than the bullets do.

  “What the hell happened?” Saunders asks, rushing over to help lift the old man.

  “I’ll explain later. We’ve got to get him out of here now.”

  We hoist Ernie up and move through the rooms to the back of the house.

  “They’ve landed!” Chubs cries as he takes aim thr
ough a broken window at the front of the house and fires.

  “There has to be another way out,” I say to Saunders.

  “Th-that way,” Ernie’s weak voice stutters as he motions to a corridor off to our left.

  “Let’s go! Follow me!” I call to the men behind me as they begin returning fire through the windows and doorway at the front of the house. “Frost, we need to leave now!”

  A scatter of shrapnel shakes the house, like an earthquake.

  The flash blinds us momentarily, and the high-pitched tone drowns out all other sound. As my sight returns, I glance around to check Ernie. My heart stops at the sight.

  “Man down!” Chubs cries.

  Frost is kneeling over a bloodied body.

  It’s not Ernie.

  “It’s Johnny,” Saunders cries, looking back too.

  Johnny’s lifeless body lies on the wooden floor.

  Frost gently places his large palm on his forehead and I see tears pour from his eyes and disappear into his beard.

  “It’s his son,” Saunders whispers, the words catching in his throat.

  “I know,” I croak back. Barely.

  I can hardly watch.

  Johnny.

  This is my fault. I brought them here.

  My heart aches for him. For them both. But in that moment of sadness, among all the mayhem, I’m suddenly overcome with a strange admiration. Like I’m witnessing some beautiful event. Tragic, of course, but beautiful. Seeing the love of a father for his son at its most extreme, pouring out of him in a flood of tears, his voice screaming at the sky. To feel this kind of love is something I’ll never know.

  Frost stands, picking up his and Johnny’s guns before marching to the door.

  “No! Frost!” I cry, handing Ernie’s weight to Saunders. I run toward him as fast as I can but don’t get to him before he steps out onto the front porch and opens fire. Between the flashes from his gun, I see the approaching EPO squad scramble for cover.

  Frost’s vengeful rampage takes down one, two, three men. Then I see him. Ketch.