Skin Trials

by S Y Humphrey

  As she described Advance Liberty’s capabilities, she ignored the tiny drone cameras and microphones that hovered inches from her face, picking up her every word. Several times, the gadgetry flew close to her, like gnats in a forest. But her parents’ lawyers had prepared her, grilling her with numerous potential questions, and testing her patience with mock scenarios that included fake protestors, rogue reporters from other Tiers, and even an attendee throwing an object at her. Her mother had pleaded with Seren to not invite the public to the presentation, to fill it with only the nicest Tier One reporters, and to pre-select the questions. But Seren had refused, and invited some of Tier Two so they could also witness this potential. She did not want an orchestrated political stage show. As far as she was concerned Advance Liberty was a movement that would inspire people.

  “Will you need space suits and oxygen masks?” an eighth-grade girl from Kansas asked. “Will you be floating out there all the time?”

  “No masks. This is 2042 and masks are for old-fashioned space shuttles pre-2028. This ship has a system that produces its own oxygen,” Seren answered proudly, turning and pointing to different areas of the ship. “We can also simulate gravitational force to create an Earth-like environment in some areas of the ship. That way we can walk sometimes, and also keep a barnyard with animals that give us milk, and eggs, as well as fields of crops you’ll see later on the tours. We’re growing rows of wheat, corn and soybeans. Certain parts of the ship will resemble aspects of Earth. No masks.”

  Another student marveled, “Wow, so what’s it like being the youngest astronaut ever? How cool is that?”

  More applause broke out around the stadium. But Seren gestured toward her teammates and professors, directing attention away from her age. “This work is all of us. Everyone you see here, side by side, works really hard everyday. We juggle college classes and tests with the work we do on this ship. Advance Liberty only exists because of all this hard work and a shared vision.”

  “This is so cool. Everybody in here looks the same. I wish the whole world could be this way.” One girl student’s eyes still danced around all the levels of the spaceship. “Can we go to school here too, with you guys? Then, we wouldn’t have to deal with all the crazies in the other Tiers. I can dig it.”

  Nodding their heads eagerly, students and investors began to clap.

  Another student joined in. “You’re all the cream of the crop. No dummies, or people who don’t deserve to be here. We just want to say ‘thank you’. For building a great place for us in space, without jails, disease, or poverty. Tier One will live in peace, because of you guys. We can’t wait to join you there.”

  The students jumped on their feet, gazing and smiling. The adults in the room, many of them investors and world leaders, started up another round of applause. Seren’s chest felt light. She found her friends Dax and Agnethe in the audience, who gave her a thumbs up. But then she also found Trane’s and Professor Michels’ faces. They seemed terse and unsmiling.

  “Yes, I have a question,” a crisp female voice projected from somewhere in the room. Seren did not recognize it. Without waiting for Seren’s permission, the sharp voice fired onward. “Why aren’t the other Tiers residing on your space colony? Don’t they deserve a perfect society as well?”

  Seren remained calm, even as her eyes scanned the audience for who had asked this question. She had prepared for the criticism from reporters and political enemies who had dubbed her spaceship “Escape Liberty.” Seren shaped her face to show no emotion, as she’d practiced.

  “The most loyal, hard-working citizens of Perfect Society will reside in space,” she answered, with resolve.

  “So then, what’s your value, Ms. Jernigan?” the female voice continued. “Are you sure you should be on this spaceship? As a Tier One? Or should you be a low-level Tier Two, fishing and farming in the Fottom to survive?”

  Seren’s mouth fell. This reporter was clearly not one of her parents’ friends. She glanced at her personal bodyguard, Tiny, who had already begun directing plain-clothes police agents from her father’s company to find the infiltrator. Some members of the audience began to yell at the woman, as Guardian police robots began to close in on her.

  “I don’t know who you are, but whatever you might think of me, I belong right here on this ship we built. Let’s see somebody from the Fottom build this.”

  Rapturous applause drowned out the arena, as kids and adults supported Seren. Seren further opened her mouth to state all the sacrifice that had gone into Advance Liberty.

  “And with that, everyone, thank you for coming aboard today,” her assistant Maura cut her off, walking onto the stage suddenly and began clapping her hands to end the presentation. “We’ll now split all the students into their individual tour groups, led by our awesome teammates.”

  Maura waved her hand frantically, motioning for Seren’s crew of fellow students to join her onstage. Crew members of engineers, agriculturalists, and mechanics squeezed onstage, standing at its outer perimeters, and flashing eager smiles. The audience continued clapping, and Seren’s classmates started whistling and hooting.

  Finally, the Guardians grabbed a reporter in the center of the press corps, but not before she catapulted a final question. “Ms. Jernigan, is it true you’ve received genetic treatments since you were born? To cover up a mark on the inside of your right thigh? A dark one?”

  What? Supporters fell silent. Heads and cameras turned back toward Seren. The air and energy left the room, and the ground seemed to slide from beneath Seren’s feet. Still, she squared her shoulders and lifted her chin.

  “No. I don’t know anything about a mark. But I’ve had enough. Get off my ship.”

  For the next few hours, she projected strength as she smiled, took photos, signed autographs, and gave interviews. While classmates offered hugs and reassurances, the investors wanted confirmation that she was in good health and of sound mind to head up a longterm mission for building a city in space. The rogue reporter’s questions had shaken them. One by one, she looked at all of them and promised that she was fit. Maura agreed to set up a private fitness screening and exam with a team of doctors, and invited investors to attend.

  Once the crowds poured out, and she had acknowledged the teams from Tiers One and Two, Seren’s feet made their way through the Dome to the back offices. The layers of her suit refused to peel off. Finally, her fumbling fingers shoved them aside. She hoped it had not returned. She inspected her beige legs. Horrified, she froze. The genetic enhancement was already starting to wear off.

  A tiny, black-eyed pea of a stain discolored her skin. She had never thought twice about it. But now, in the hands of a stranger, it screamed one warning. Tainted.

  2

  One More Mission

  “Seren! Are you in there?” Maura called.

  “Open up!” Agnethe called from outside. “Hurry up and come out of there! We’re missing the action, and it’s your celebration! As much as I like your office, I didn’t come from Denver to hang out in here.”

  Seren flung the door open to see Agnethe and Maura standing before her. Maura tapped her EarDrum and transferred a call to Seren’s watch.

  “Here she is, Mr. Secretary,” Maura said.

  Staring at Seren inside the little frame of her watch this time was her father, Stephen Jernigan.

  “Dad,” she breathed. Simply seeing his face was like a salve for her nerves. “Who was that?”

  “Some rogue reporter from Tier Two that I’ll deal with,” he answered in his smooth, focused manner. But as he said it, he loosened his tie, and Seren knew that meant he was pissed. She could see that he stood inside the War Room at their compound back in Denver, where he and his military staffers plotted strategy and attack campaigns around the world. “Nothing for you to worry about.”

  “Nothing to worry about? A complete stranger knew my private medical information, Dad,” Seren insisted, her heart starting to race again as she said it. “What is there to
deal with? She asked me if I belonged in Tier One, as if I… don’t.”

  His eyes narrowed. “When you get here, we’ll spend some time. Which would you prefer to do? Go swimming at the lake, fishing, or hunting?”

  Now he talked in code, as he had since she was a kid. They were not really going fishing or hunting. They had their own code talk he’d created for times of crisis or emergencies. He would ask how she wanted to spend time, which meant he was working to get control over whatever was happening— shootings in a park concert when she was eight, protestors outside her school in fifth grade, or being held hostage at a piano recital when she was twelve. How do you want to spend time always signaled he was closing in on their enemy and she would be safe soon. The follow-up questions were his way of asking what level of harm she was in— if she had a gun to her head, or one of their associates had turned on them. He’d thought of countless situations in which she could talk to him, without telling the world.

  “Swimming,” she answered, indicating there was no immediate danger.

  “Good,” he said, heaving a big breath. “Now, I said I would take care of it. Let me do that. You were phenomenal. When you get here, everybody is waiting to see you and we’ll celebrate. Just like we planned. Go to your crews and classmates, and we’ll see you in a few hours.”

  She sighed also, trying to relax, before going back out to campus.

  Her mom popped into the frame. “You were fantastic, sweetheart. We couldn’t be more proud.”

  Seren’s friends came to stand and wait for her, holding congratulatory balloons, cake and gifts. Agnethe held up a big basket of Seren’s favorite exotic fruits that were illegal to own in America, now only available on the black market, in the Fottom.

  “How bad was that?” Seren asked Agnethe after clicking off the call. “Do you know who that woman was?”

  Agnethe leaned forward, tilting her head against Seren’s. “Who cares? Be quiet. And listen to that.”

  They heard faint singing across the campus, at the student union, on the eve of the signing of a new American Constitution.

  We are the Stars,

  We are the light,

  The souls that are weak

  await our might…

  “Girl, you did it,” Agnethe whispered. “You’re not just your parents’ kid anymore. Not Seren, the daughter of somebody else. Just Seren. And no matter how hard all of your crazy enemies tried, none of them stopped you. You’re going to space.”

  The two of them threw their arms around one another’s necks, clinging for a moment. Trying to shove the blemish and the reporter’s smug voice to the back of her mind, she ran out to join the celebrations.

  “Seren! Get over here!” Dax, her boyfriend’s best friend, called out.

  Over at the student union, laughter rolled throughout the high-tech atrium as students took turns roasting each other for various mistakes they’d made over the last few years.

  Dax jumped up on a chair, and Seren could feel his relentless humor coming.

  “Hey, everybody, listen up! Did you guys see Seren’s eye twitching earlier today? Be honest. Who out there was placing bets that Seren here was going to jump off that stage and get that stupid reporter in a headlock?”

  Classmates across campus held their sides, and for a moment, Seren smiled.

  Dax continued in mocking fashion, as he slapped his knee with a microphone, pretending to be Seren beating the reporter up. “I said I don’t… have… any marks… dammit!”

  Students doubled over. Seren stiffened. Agnethe squeezed her arm. “You see? Who cares?”

  Dax continued, looking at Seren. “You were awesome, babe. We couldn’t have a better woman at the forefront of the future America! You’re my best friend’s girl, and when you’re the president out in space, Lyndon will be your second in command since you are clearly the smarter one in the relationship.” More laughter erupted around the union as Dax brought up Seren’s boyfriend. “Make him give birth to your babies. He just needs to learn how to cook because, you know, his spaghetti ain’t so good.” More cackling followed before Dax’s face turned serious. “But really, Seren had a vision a long time ago for an America where we don’t have to apologize for wanting peace, hard work and intelligence. Her dad started Perfect Society back in ’25, but after all those disasters, Seren asked why do we have to stay here? Why can’t we go into space? We’re smart enough to control our own destiny, and we don’t need anybody’s permission!”

  He jabbed his finger into the air defiantly, and all the Tier One student believers yelled at full throttle.

  “We don’t have to pray for an answer. We are the answer!” Dax asserted to more cheering and yelling. “Seren did more than talk! She put in the work! We left our families behind, and you left all the crap in the other regions, to answer the call! We wanted something greater! Now here we are! To perfect our strength is to advance our liberty!” Dax ended with the new American slogan.

  The entire school was on its feet, chanting, clapping and stomping for a long time.

  Their fellow classmates yelled it back at the top of their lungs. He then led the school’s students once again in the new American national anthem, We, the Stars, Light the Night. Seren wrapped her arm around Agnethe, who returned a squeeze and joined in the singing and swaying. Dax looked in their direction, giving Seren a wink and pointing at her. Her chest could have been a balloon swelling with gratitude. She pointed back at him, and turned to Agnethe and her teammates around her.

  Seren called out, “Who is Dax kidding? He is really the one who’ll be president when we get to space.” Another round of laughter and hooting followed.

  After playing a few rounds of air basketball with Dax and some of her boyfriend Lyndon’s other buddies, she’d had enough. One thing still lingered in the back of her mind. The smugness of the voice hours earlier, as if that person knew a secret about Seren that she did not know about herself.

  The youngest Jernigan finally escaped outside, to grab some evening air. The VScan confirmed who she was before granting her access to the massive terrace outside. A couple who was making out got up to leave, acknowledging her on their way.

  “Hello, Ms. Jernigan, would you like your usual lavender tea?” the automated VScan inquired.

  “Yes,” she answered. Walking to the edge of the terrace, she leaned against its smooth carbon fiber rails, closed her eyes and let the cool night draft blow some of the day’s stress from her bones.

  “It felt good, didn’t it?” a voice caused her to jump and whip around. Several feet away, sitting in the dark shadows, against the glass, sat Professor Michels. “Seeing all of their faces light up, as they applauded work that came out of your head.”

  “Oh, my goodness!” Seren laughed with relief. She’d been on edge. “I thought I was alone out here.” Her tea arrived through an automated chute system, before she crossed the expansive space to take a seat next to her mentor. Recalling that amazing moment revived her once again, the adulation and awe. And it didn’t belong to her parents. She’d finally stood at the apex of yearslong sacrifice.

  “Their eyes were so big, and they looked at me like I’m some kind of savior.”

  “Well, are you a savior?” the professor asked.

  She thought about the question, tossing a glance at the uproar inside the high-tech student union. All of the brightest kids from around the nation threw their heads back with abandon. Her eyes dropped down to her own cup.

  “No. I don’t think so. Tier One doesn’t need me. I’m just their front woman.”

  “Wisely stated,” the older woman noted, not looking at her trainee, but focusing her eagle-eyed gaze on some point in the distance. “But I think they do need you. One day, you’ll show them their better selves.”

  “Why are you out here? Why are you not…?”

  “… With the other professors? Or at my cottage? I talked to my children briefly today. I was missing them. I didn’t want to be alone, so I came to be near the yout
hful energy. The other professors can be kind of… stuffy.” The two of them laughed.

  Professor Michels, a former astronaut, got classified as Tier Two at the beginning of Perfect Society, effectively ending her career in space. The times Seren had visited her home, pictures of the professor as an astronaut swarmed her walls, displaying the younger woman only twenty years before, happily suspended in weightlessness, her long, once-black hair spreading around her face. In all the photos, adorning her left hand was a simple gold ring that she no longer wore now.

  Watching the last gasps of the disappearing sun, they sipped tea. The blunted music from within the building still bumped from behind them. When Seren entered college at thirteen, the Tier One professors were too busy with their own career ambitions to worry with a child. The Ones only interacted with Seren when they thought it might get them an audience with her father. It was Professor Michels who had provided warm moments when her parents couldn’t always get there, whipping up home remedies for colds and sniffles, taking Seren to see the latest Zipman movies and for comic books, going for tampons when Seren started menstruating, holding her after news her favorite aunt had passed, and scolding mean remarks and jealousy from the older students. During testing and simulations, the professor had even played soulful music that Seren had come to love. The sharp-eyed, witty intellect in homey cardigans and old-fashioned spectacles on a chain, had added heartiness to Seren’s life. In a sense, she’d even added a steely realness to Seren that her parents did not.

  “Why did you care about me?” Seren finally asked.

  “Hmph, why do you ask?”

  Seren’s eyes dropped from the dusky mountain ranges to the still tea in her cup. “Your children are on the other side of the country. Your husband too. You missed all your grandchildren’s births. And only met them in person once. Your space career is over. But you’re still here.” She looked to the former famous astronaut, classified as a Tier Two, who would not be authorized to travel with Seren to space.