Eve of Man

by Giovanna Fletcher

  Saunders and I look at each other.

  “Why don’t you hear about the puppies they tested your rash cream on?” Saunders asks, looking at a dry, flaky patch of skin on Chubs’s arm. He covers it quickly, becoming self-conscious. “Because sometimes the results aren’t very pretty.”

  “So what happens to the women they get out of CS?” Chubs asks.

  “Thawed, dissected, refrozen, thawed, frozen—you name it, they do it, and no one can stop them,” Saunders says, perhaps making it a little more theatrical than I would have done. “Once you donate your body to the EPO it’s theirs to do with as they wish. They just don’t market it that way.”

  “Always read the small print!” Chubs jokes.

  “So, your friend inside the Tower can get to you and thaw you out before someone else finds you?” Ernie asks.

  “Hartman? Yeah, he’ll figure it out. He always does,” I say, almost believing it. “That’s only half the problem, though.” I rub my temples to help me think through my headache.

  “What’s the other half?” Chubs asks.

  “Actually letting Hartman know the plan! This is all useless if he has no idea what we need him to do. If I can’t get a message to him, he won’t even know I’m back inside the Tower. I’ll just be there, frozen for eternity, or at least until someone eventually discovers a perfectly preserved male squished up inside one of those tanks and decides to thaw me to find out why,” I finish, and they’re all quiet.

  The riddle plays on everyone’s mind.

  Ernie breaks the silence: “I’ll give him your message.”

  “You? How?” Saunders asks the old man, who’s sitting thoughtfully in the glow of our torchlight.

  “I’ll walk in there and tell him,” Ernie says simply.

  No one says a word.

  Then Chubs bursts out laughing, his belly wobbling.

  The laughter settles a moment later when we all realize the old man is serious.

  “Jesus, and I thought Bram was crazy!” Saunders says. “You two were meant for each other.”

  “They’ll shoot you as soon as you set foot on-site. You won’t make it inside,” Chubs says.

  “Yes, I will,” Ernie says.

  “What makes you so sure?” Saunders asks.

  “They went to such desperate lengths to cover up the murder of my wife, then created such an elaborate fiction about me to justify locking me up for all these years, when they could have just killed me then. It’s all about perception, creating this facade for the public, showing the world that they were doing what was right for Eve.”

  “But things have changed now. The world is different,” Chubs says. “People don’t care as much since they started being so secretive about Eve. Showing us less of the real Eve we used to see and more of their manipulated version.”

  “He’s right,” Saunders chips in. “If the public isn’t interested, the EPO won’t think twice about killing you.”

  “Then we need to make the public interested. We need to make people care again,” I say.

  “How?” Chubs asks.

  “We need every person in Central at the EPO gates. We need every lens of every camera, every holo-player, pointed at those front gates, just like they were when Eve was born, beamed on those screens around Central, around the world, to witness the return of Eve’s father after all these years. Reformed, rehabilitated, ready to see his daughter,” I say, staring at my team.

  Ernie smiles, despite the tears in his eyes.

  “They won’t have any choice but to open up and let him inside,” Saunders adds excitedly.

  “But what about once he’s inside?” Chubs asks.

  “I’ll refuse to talk to anyone but Kartman,” Ernie says.

  “Hartman!” I correct him.

  “Sorry, Hartman. Don’t worry, I’ll get it right on the night!” He chuckles with the youthful glint of rebellion in his old eyes.

  “Yes, but once you’re out of sight of the crowds, there’s no guarantee they’ll cooperate, no guarantee they’ll allow you anywhere near Hartman,” Saunders says.

  “He’s right. You’ll need to call him out to you,” I say.

  “What?” Ernie says.

  “You need to stand outside the front door, in broad daylight, and say you won’t go inside or talk to anyone but Hartman. With the world watching, they won’t use physical force on you,” I say.

  “Say the plan works up to then and Hartman comes out—then what? How can I tell him without telling everyone else watching?” Ernie says.

  The four of us fall silent again and mull over this new conundrum.

  “I could be dead for all the EPO know,” I say, the dust of an idea gathering in my mind. “I could easily have been caught up in the blast at Grim’s Ditch.”

  “True,” Saunders says. “They won’t assume you’re dead, but they’ll certainly know it’s a possibility.”

  “So tell them you’ve come to deliver a message to Hartman in person,” I say, suddenly having an idea. “Tell them you won’t answer any questions until you’ve given him the message. Let them think you’re delivering news of my death to my best friend.”

  Ernie smiles and nods. I can see that the thought of his part in this mission is igniting a fire inside him, like he’s been waiting to free his daughter his whole life, and this is his shot.

  “Assuming they play along and Hartman comes out to greet you, tell him this: Your dear friend Bram is at peace. He is now with his mother.”

  “Your mother?” Chubs asks.

  “She’s in CS,” I say.

  “Are you sure he’ll know what that means?” Chubs asks. “I mean, it’s not giving him much to go on.”

  “It’s as obvious as we can afford to be,” I say.

  “What if he doesn’t believe me?” Ernie asks.

  I think for a moment. Then I feel it, the cool metal hanging around my neck. I slip the silver cross over my head and hand it to Ernie. “Give him this.”

  “You believe in God?”

  “My mother did. It was hers,” I explain.

  “Well, we need one now more than ever,” Ernie says, placing the chain over his head and tucking it safely under his cotton shirt.

  “If we can get Ernie’s return out there for the public to see, the whole world will be watching. Waiting to see what happens next,” Saunders tells me.

  “I know,” I say.

  I know.

  58

  EVE

  “Vivian hasn’t been in,” I say the following morning when I hear Mother Kadi walk through the door. I’m glad that she’s come with a key for the cuffs, which remained on my wrists all night. The skin beneath them is now red and sore, but that has hardly troubled me at all. Instead my mind has been busy batting away the inevitable nightmare visions fighting to invade my head. At first I tried to stop myself from nodding off, sure the horrors would infiltrate my sleep, but they came anyway, bringing with them a night of cold sweats, vomit, and anxiety.

  I’m relieved that it’s now the start of a new day. A new day feels hopeful somehow, as though it comes with fresh possibilities for new discoveries. I’m still none the wiser on how to move forward after yesterday’s revelations, but a new day symbolizes new opportunities to make sense of it all.

  I keep telling myself that more will become apparent in time. The world around me is starting to unravel and show its true self. I just need to be open and alert to what I see and hear around me. Once I have more information, I’ll be able to formulate a plan somehow.

  “She’s been busy,” Mother Kadi says, seeming distracted as she hands me my cup of tablets before laying the tray by my side, revealing a breakfast of fruit and herbal tea.

  While she arranges my clothes for the day, I tip the tablets into my hand and take a closer look at them, thinking of
how many I’ve taken over the years.

  Vitamins, as they say, or another lie?

  I quickly place them under my pillow before Mother Kadi turns back to me. “Everything okay?” I ask.

  “Of course it is, darling!” She smiles, nodding in her usual upbeat manner. Yet I hear the wobble in her voice and see the bottom of her eyes fill with tears. I know she’s lying.

  She stops and takes a breath. “I’m sorry,” she chokes, putting the clothes she’s fetched on the bed. “I’ll have to ask Mother Tabia to get you ready today. I’m not feeling too well.”

  “Mother Kadi?” I call as I watch her flee.

  I’m meant to be gearing up for implantation, when my altered egg will be returned to me, and my womanly attributes given their first proper test. As I’m not sure if I failed in my mission to destroy that egg, and anything else they hold of me, it’s unclear as to whether the previous plan is going ahead. All I know is that if it does, I want Mother Kadi by my side. I know I can trust her.

  “Stay with me,” I call, my hands reaching out and imploring her, wondering what’s changed since yesterday to make her so distant and distracted.

  I pull back my bedding and am about to go after her, but as she flings open the door and runs through it, I feel light-headed. I take a deep breath and close my eyes, but the feeling intensifies, my body heavy and uncontrollable. I try to call out to Mother Kadi for help, but nothing happens. I can’t seem to open my mouth or shout.

  I know I’m exhausted from the previous day’s events. Although they’ve tried to build up my fitness with dance, boxing, and martial arts over the years, yesterday I moved in ways I’ve never had to before. I overexerted myself too soon after the crash. My body is paying for it now.

  Ever so briefly my mind turns to my mother. Her body couldn’t keep her and me alive. It failed us. Maybe mine will be the same. Maybe my own future is doomed. Maybe history will, inevitably, repeat itself.

  My fingers rest on the rough patch of skin on my wrist, a heavy sadness creeping in at the thought of what might have been.

  Wave after wave of wooziness washes over me, nausea building. I close my eyes and take a deep breath, slowly letting the air go, then sucking in a fresh lungful and feeling it disperse around my tired bones.

  “Well done.”

  My eyes snap open. Vivian is standing at the base of my bed, looking at her fingernails, as though I don’t warrant her full attention.

  “You’ve really made quite a mess downstairs. A ball of destruction.”

  “Good,” I say defiantly, sitting a little taller against the headboard, forcing my dizzy head to pull itself together while she’s in front of me. I don’t want her to think of me as weak. Not only that: I don’t want her to panic and restrict my life here any further. To be bedbound would be horrendous.

  Her eyes flick up to lock with mine, pinching together in a squint of disgust.

  “I know all about your lies. I don’t want to be any part of it,” I declare, an eyebrow edging skyward.

  “I know. We heard,” she says with a sickly smile, glancing to the corner of the room, where a chrome security camera is staring straight back at us. “It was quite the emotional display you performed last night. All that weeping and sobbing,” she mocks, her hands rolling in a circular motion while her face drops to mimic mine. She stops suddenly, her face deadpan. “You shouldn’t be putting yourself under so much strain.”

  “Like you care.”

  “Eve…” She sighs, sounding exasperated, as though I’m being unreasonable in taking offense. “You have to start leading with your head, not your heart.”

  “Meaning?”

  “What we’re doing here is for the greater good.”

  “By playing God?”

  “By sacrificing the overpopulated to give a chance to those who can make a difference,” she says, cocking her head to the side.

  “Girls?”

  “Of course.”

  “And what if I can only produce boys?”

  “We’ve been working on that on your behalf,” Vivian shares, as if I’m an accomplice in her plan. “We couldn’t have left it to chance. A boy would’ve been a failure. You wouldn’t have wanted that. Everything you saw downstairs was done for you.”

  My jaw drops in horror. Then I say, “I don’t want that. I didn’t do any—”

  “Your emotional attachment is natural, Eve. But this goes far beyond mothering a child. It’s a fight for survival. If we don’t manipulate nature, if we don’t use the science we’ve created to its full potential, we’ve lost our right to be here.”

  “It’s more than a game of win or lose. By doing what you’re suggesting, we don’t deserve to be here anyway!” I yell, my body becoming hot as I speak. “Mother Nature didn’t just turn off her love for us overnight. It’s actions like the ones you’re committing that turned her against us in the first place. The lack of respect for her…magic,” I say, searching for the right words, which is not easy when I’m debating with Vivian. “Her ability to give life and love is what has led us all here. We have to show her we care, that we’ve atoned for whatever monstrosities occurred before.”

  “An interesting thought.” She nods slowly.

  “I mean it. We can’t just repeat past mistakes,” I say, my hand on my chest.

  “You’re right.” Vivian purses her lips but is unable to hide the start of a smile. “Let’s see what she does with your ‘atoned’ and caring heart tomorrow.”

  “Pardon?” I swallow.

  “Implantation?” she whispers flamboyantly, her eyes round with surprise as she mocks me. “You’ve not forgotten, have you? We’ve been monitoring the process. The fertilized cells have been multiplying perfectly…”

  My resolve drops along with every muscle in my face.

  Vivian’s face twists into a snarl. “That’s right. Tomorrow is the special day when you will collect your potential offspring and give her the chance of life. She’s already waiting for you, Mother Eve—her cells multiplying, her budding future sparkling with possibility. All she needs now is her kind mother, who recognizes the beauty of life, a girl who finds those who crush any promise of life abhorrent and cruel, to collect her. She’s already here, Eve. Congratulations.”

  I have nothing to offer her in return.

  “Enjoy your day exploring the wonders of the Dome,” she says, her voice thick with sarcasm. “I’ll be waiting for you tomorrow night, with your daughter.”

  I was wrong. Vivian is, as ever, two steps ahead of me. I’m exactly where she wants me. In just twenty-four hours my fate will be sealed. I will be trapped here forever.

  59

  BRAM

  “Two teams,” I announce to the watching crowd looking down at me from every angle of this grand submerged room. Briefly I become aware of the importance of this moment, of the effect my words will have on the future for all of us. Either way, what we do next will make history.

  “But how will we know if the other team is successful?” Helena calls, and I see Anne and the women from the sanctuary standing around her.

  “We won’t,” I reply without hesitation. “We will be working completely in the dark, zero communication. Once I’m in the tank, I won’t know if Ernie has succeeded in passing on the message until I’m revived. If he fails, I’ll never find out.”

  “And what if you fail?” another voice calls. “What happens to Ernie?”

  “Then I shall face my fate in the Tower alone,” Ernie replies as he stands at my side. “I’ve been an observing prisoner for too long. It’s time to play my part.”

  I look around the room. It’s silent. These men and women, these Freevers, have been no more than protesters and rioters for years. Now they are soldiers, an army, and war is imminent.

  “Helena, you will lead the Tower team. You’re to escort Erni
e to the EPO Tower at sunrise. We have leaked messages throughout Central, hinting at something monumental occurring at the Tower today. Expect crowds. This is to be peaceful. This is the epic return of Eve’s father. It is not a protest. You are to keep Ernie hidden and protected until he is ready. Then give him space. We want the world to see this. Show the people that even after all these years, the EPO can’t destroy the love of a father for his daughter.”

  There are a few mumbles around the room, people discussing the plan, but no one questions it. Helena nods at me, accepting her mission.

  “Cold Team, you’re with me. This will be a little tricky. We’ll be secretly boarding the morning delivery to the Cold Storage levels of the Tower.”

  I flick a switch, and the projector splashes an image of the large ship, armed guards pacing the deck. There are whispers around the hall.

  “We’ll have approximately twenty minutes to board, make our way to their storage level, and, well, the rest is up to the docs here.” I nod to Dr. Oliva and his small medical team, who will accompany us onto the ship.

  “What happens after that? After Ernie shows up it’s going to be mayhem down there. The crowds will be massive!” an older Freever calls down from the balcony.

  “Yes, and that’s exactly what we want!” I say.

  “It’ll be hysteria again, like back when my Eve was born,” Ernie adds. “The crowds won’t leave.”

  “And neither will we!” Helena cheers, and voices rise in agreement.

  “Stay hidden among the crowds. I can’t say how long for, but if we succeed, we’ll need you out there waiting for us. If I make it out of that place, I won’t be alone.”

  The room is silent. Everyone trying to picture the impossible image of Eve leaving the Tower.

  “How will we know?” The old voice speaks again. “How will we know if you’ve succeeded?”

  “Trust me. When the time comes, you’ll know.”

  The meeting comes to an end after hours of intense talks, memorizing river bends, studying the blueprints of the EPO ship, preparing weapons, and loading the equipment we’ll need.