by P. S. Lurie
“What’s wrong with us?” Jack asks.
“Only people with valued skills were welcomed. Everyone else...”
“The Utopia,” says Melissa, finishing his explanation.
“A red herring. True Utopia is still in the works, somewhere where the climate is amenable.”
“We’ve started starving them out,” Claire says.
Ronan seems surprised. “It doesn’t show, not yet anyway.” He considers it. “Maybe that’s why it’s finally happening. It doesn’t matter because they’re planning an attack tonight.”
“We’re ready now,” adds Dante, the man who rarely speaks.
“They’re trained. And armed. It will be over quick.”
“They?” asks Travis, already knowing the answer but wanting it spoken out loud.
“Children. From the Middlelands. Like me.”
“You chose to turn your back on the Middlelands.” Travis pursues the argument that it would be easier if the opposition weren’t children but since they are he can try to vilify them into being the enemy.
“No,” Selene beats him to it. “They played with their minds. Convinced them.”
Ronan agrees. He and Selene share this pain in an unspoken bond.
“But they couldn’t quite get there with you,” she continues. “Something triggered your mind.” Selene told us about the doctor who manipulated her, allowing her to believe that she was an Upperlander all along. Bravely, she admitted that she might have colluded with the lie in order to protect her mother but either way there was a memory of floating in the sea that she clung onto from her former life.
There are so many shared experiences and secrets between the four of us, which no one else in the Middlelands could begin to fathom but whilst Selene yearns for freedom I swing between hope and anger as my driving forces. Hope that I’ll find Jason. Anger that he may be dead. Hope that we’ll rescue Theia. Anger that she was taken to begin with. Hope that we’ll be able to live a life without threat. Anger that an army is coming our way.
I have so little hope left in me but I search down into my gut and it’s still there, shining dimly from inside.
I run my thumb along the harsh metal of the gun, mulling over what to do next, occupied by the contradicting emotions of anger that Ronan may have betrayed us and hope that he might be our saving grace.
Jack
“Put the gun down,” I say, disappointed that Ruskin has allowed his anger to dictate his emotions.
“He’s lying to us. There’s no way he escaped. They know where he is.”
“Selene was right,” Ronan explains. “Seeing Theia triggered the past, breaking their captivity over my mind. I had to see the house for myself. That’s where I met you.”
“I don’t believe you.” Ruskin shakes the gun.
“Ruskin,” I try, but I’m ignored.
“Make it quick. Apparently we don’t have a lot of time.”
“They told me about the great cull, about my family wanting me dead. How they showed no allegiance to the Upperlanders. How Theia tried to kill me and take my place.”
“She saved your life,” Selene says.
“President Callister killed our families,” Tess adds. “They lied to you.”
“They confused me. But then I saw Theia on the Fence and I realised that she would never hurt me. It was like they painted a picture of a monster in her place. I had to pretend up there to protect her. They would have killed us all if I’d revealed the truth.”
“So they know we’re here?” Claire asks.
“They see the fires at night. They figure there are a few hundred of you but there are more of them.”
“How about you?” Selene asks him.
“I escaped. I can prove it.” Ronan rolls up one of the sleeves on his uniform. His arm is mangled and bloody. I hadn’t noticed until then that it was drooping by his side. “They would have detected me from my watch. We all had one.”
“He’s right,” I say, working out that he must have been unremitting in his removal of the watch. Once we left the Upperlands and reconnected with the people from the boats they helped us destroy our own. Fortunately, searching for appropriate tools prevented us from losing a thumb like the doctor who abused Selene or whatever Ronan did to himself.
Melissa tends to Ronan’s arm. He doesn’t grimace when she touches the tear in his skin, which opens the wound and new blood trickles out. “I can coat it temporarily.”
“Don’t bother. I’m fine. But use it as a lesson: we’ve been trained to be tough. You’ll be wiped out if the army reaches you. The watch is somewhere down the side of the mountain between the fortress and the Upperlands.”
“And you climbed down?” Samuel asks, wide-eyed.
“Impossible. There’s one route in and out apart from by helicopter. It’s how they sneaked the remaining Upperlanders away from the city before detonating the ship.”
“How many are we talking?” Ruskin asks, the gun once more put away for now.
“A couple of hundred. Doctors, engineers, scientists, artists. The best at what they do. An intellectual gene pool protected by an army of loyal children.”
“Like you,” Claire says, her voice breaking along with her heart.
“And the army?” Samuel asks.
“We started with three thousand.”
“Started?” I ask, but dread the answer.
“Those unfit or wavering in loyalty or those that couldn’t be brainwashed were disposed of. There are maybe four or five hundred left.”
Everyone sighs or cocks their head in defeat. It’s a more manageable number than three thousand but still too many, and doesn’t avoid the problem that these are innocent children. The number is soul-destroying. What chance could we possibly have to counter that? I can’t bear to look at Ruskin because I sense all the hope extinguish from the room and I can’t risk seeing the expression on his face.
Yet it’s Ruskin who speaks up, rekindling hope once more. “It’s been a while since we had a challenge.”
Theia
There’s no way I’ll kill Maddie. But then again, what did I say in the prison? Hate it or not, surviving no longer means letting just anyone live over me, however innocent they may be. It was pure chance that Maddie was part of our group to fight together. I owe myself the chance to see my siblings. I owe her nothing.
I have to close myself off to her. It’s all part of enforcing my grateful stance to the men. It should be a simple choice. Maddie must have noticed something within my expression as I deliberate because she sneers, which turns into a full-blown laugh under her bruised face before she backs away from me. “You’re considering it. Thanks, friend.”
“It’s not like that.”
“Who are you fooling?” She then addresses the men. “What’s in it for me?”
“The same. Prove your loyalty and you’ll be welcomed into Utopia.”
“And if we refuse?”
“Return to your homes to think over your decision.”
“You won’t kill us?” I ask, surprised, expecting only one of us would be allowed to leave.
“President Callister is adamant that this isn’t a forced choice. You need to want to kill her for us, Miss Silverdale. Being forced to kill her proves nothing. This isn’t like the two Great Culls.”
“No fair,” Maddie says, tensing as she notices the pencil in my hand. I don’t throw it to one side. I’m contemplating what I need to do. If I kill her then surely I will have passed President Callister’s test. I’ve managed to keep composed for this long.
“Fine, I’ve worked too hard to give up now,” she says, and runs at me. She screams as she leaps through the air and sends me flying backwards. I hit the floor with a thump and a memory flashes through my mind of my father knocking me out. This time there will be no one to take her out, my grandfather no longer alive in the next room, and no divine intervention.
“I really did like you, Theia,” she spews at me.
The pencil flew out
of my hand with her surprise attack and is too far from my reach to grab and stab her with. I scramble, preventing her fists from punching me. She tightens her knees and squeezes them into my sides so that I am trapped.
“Wait,” I say in a sharp burst of precious air, needing to gain the upper hand. “We’re stronger together. There must be another way.”
“Loyalty is such a fickle thing with you.” She punches me on the temple and sends my head reeling to the side from where I can see the men staring on excitedly, waiting for a result and eager not to be disappointed by a truce. The force somehow focuses my mind that even though I’ll fail President Callister’s game I can’t betray Maddie. I couldn’t live with myself.
I let my body go floppy. “I won’t kill you. I give up.” If I can get some distance I can try and convince Maddie to break free.
“Why not? Why won’t you kill me?” Maddie says with infuriation, because I am making this too difficult for her. It would be easier on her if she could just kill me but she seems to be having the same doubts.
“Erica. Your sister too. They would hate this.”
The mention of the two girls that Maddie tried to protect but failed is enough to make her hesitate. Unexpectedly, she releases her clutch and stands up. She dusts off her knees. “Disappointing Theia,” she says, only it’s not her voice but someone older.
I turn to the men once more but they are gone. The room begins to fade. I call out for her but no word emanates from my throat. She’s vanished and instead President Callister stands with the doctor, her arms crossed once more, behind the glass in the testing room. I feel my brain burning up. Whatever they’re doing to me is killing me from the inside.
President Callister leans into the microphone. “You really aren’t helping yourself.”
Melissa
It was such a blur between Ruskin and Ronan collecting us and then being here that I haven’t had a chance to ask any questions, so everything Theia’s brother is saying is news to me. I’m learning that a fight is unavoidable and there will be multiple casualties before the day is done, namely on our side. There isn’t even the possibility of saving a few of us, which were the rules of the previous two battles that the Upperlanders put us through. This time it is simply annihilation.
I want to ask about Theia but trusting Ronan is more crucial at present. I think back to that moment on top of the Fence when Ronan directed for Jack, Ruskin and me to cross the bridge towards the bombs. “You told us to board the Utopia,” I say, knowing that he was obeying orders but if he had already realised we weren’t the enemy then our deaths would have been on his conscience. A part of me feels bad for putting him in this situation because I feel indebted to Theia that I should protect him. Theia was the only person apart from my parents that I communicated with on the night of the great cull across our gardens and then snared me in the risky process of hiding Leda in the Upperlands, which resulted in us being arrested. In an odd sense, it was the prison that saved us.
Ronan looks down. “That wasn’t me. They broke my mind. I had no choice.”
“He let us go,” Jack says.
I need to hear Ronan apologise. “Were we just collateral damage to you?”
“If Theia wasn’t so important to President Callister I would have been killed for that.”
“This girl,” Travis says.
“Why is she so important?” asks Claire.
“I don’t know. Determination? Something about Theia not giving up?”
“Where is she?” I ask.
“Captive. Some of the commanders want to brainwash her into being loyal but President Callister is trying to make her choose that.”
It doesn’t explain what President Callister wants with her but Theia is clearly no use being mindlessly compliant. I wonder why being reunited with Ronan and Leda wasn’t enough for her.
“You really don’t know?” Samuel asks. He hasn’t met Theia, only heard about her as some enigma that seems to have been selected by the Upperlanders for some higher reason. From what Jack regurgitates to us about these meetings, most of the people here have nothing but apathy for her as with the child soldiers.
“She wanted to find someone like Theia,” Ruskin says. “Callister wants someone determined; it’s an attribute that she’s been looking for. It’s why she set up the culls. They weren’t to pick us off. They were an experiment.”
“Maybe that,” says Ronan.
Tess looks confused. “To bring peace?”
“No,” says Selene. “There will never be peace between us.”
“Correct,” Ronan says. “No one’s coming to negotiate. We all know that there’s never going to be peace after what’s been and done. The world isn’t big enough for the Middlelanders and the Upperlanders. The new world order doesn’t include you.”
“Theia will never comply with that,” Selene says, demonstrating the stubbornness that the two share.
“Maybe not. But they’re trying. Her determination makes her priceless to President Callister but also gives her a problem. The other members of her government are growing fed up. They’ve been itching for tonight for months.”
“What do you suggest?” Jack asks. “You must have thought about what we should do.”
“It’s risky but, yes, I do have a suggestion.”
“Don’t hold back,” says Travis.
Ronan shakes his head. “I want to talk to Jack, Melissa, Selene and Ruskin first. If they agree then we’ll share it with you.”
Selene smiles at this and I notice that Ruskin can’t help but grin either, considering they both wanted to have more of a say. There’s a momentary stand-off but Travis isn’t stupid and knows he can’t sway this. Half of me is relieved that finally we’ll be instigating something but the other half is terrified that the day I’ve pretended will never come is finally here.
“Fine,” Travis says. “You let the adults know when you’ve finished with your group hug. Oh, and why not take your time,” he adds with a note of sarcasm.
Everyone scarpers from the room as I carry on tending to Ronan’s arm; despite my anger at him because of what happened on top of the Fence we need him to be healthy. “You could do with having that cleaned and some stitches.”
“Thanks Melissa.”
“How do you know who I am by the way?”
“Leda told me.”
I was focused on Theia and didn’t ask about Leda. The girl who must have grown so much since I last saw her has memories of me.
“That’s encouraging,” Selene says.
“How is she?” I ask.
“Healthier. Thanks to you.”
Those words undo all the fury I felt towards Ronan as he speaks kindly, and it’s moments like these that remind me of the absurdity of forcing gratitude on the Upperlanders when real gratitude needs to be earned rather than demanded. I feel strangely good that this baby that was smuggled into the Upperlands and I cared for is able to remember me. “It’s the least I could do.”
“Your mother too, Selene. And another woman from what I understand.”
“Harriet. She died in the prison.”
Selene’s eyes have misted over, unlikely in response to Harriet’s name, our dorm-mate who Selene met briefly outside Nathaniel’s apartment, but rather for her mother with whom she was barely reunited before watching her die. I notice that Selene leans against a countertop, and I’m worried that her body isn’t physically capable of much more than resting today but that’s an argument I will brace myself for later.
Zeke
I made it.
Everyone will be at their stations so there is no foot traffic and I have no choice but to scan my watch against the panel to allow me access into the engineering hub. “Zeke Samuels. Status: Approved,” the automated voice says on the digital pad. The extraneous information about gratitude and loyalty no longer rings out because, for those of us deemed worthy of outliving the Upperlands, no one has anything left to prove. Except me, and now the guards will know where I
am so I have little time to act.
I brace for some sort of alarm but nothing comes other than the automated voice that speaks out my arrival. The central area, where all processes to keep water, electricity and technology functioning is in the heart of the fortress, in a cavernous room that stretches nearly the whole width of the mountain and measures at least three floors high. My father has shown me around plenty of times, teaching me about sophisticated energy renewal sources, advanced methods to cultivate crops at this altitude and a drainage system and a pumping mechanism to swap unsanitary water for fresh water from somewhere deep underground but doesn’t connect to sea-level. The fortress is self-sufficient except for one problem: space. Being housed here was always a short-term solution and now that the world has opened up to us we have been promised to soon migrate to a better environment.
My father should be here, working alongside his colleagues who don’t yet know about his death. I can’t let painful memories cloud my focus.
“Zeke?” asks Lester, one of my father’s colleagues. “Why aren’t you at school?”
“Dad’s ill. He wanted me to tell you he’d be back tomorrow.”
No reaction of concern, that’s how trusting everyone is that we’re on our way to a utopic existence. I glance at the digital clock above his head; every second matters. “When will he be back?” Lester asks, oblivious to my state. I thought I’d look worse, panicking even, but he doesn’t suspect a thing.
“They said a day’s rest. But he wanted to work on a faulty connection with his watch and asked me to fetch some tools.”
“You know where it is?”
I nod, following his gaze at the mainframe for the identification chips that are inserted into our watches. Everyone else is focused on their delegated jobs and for the first time I realise this doesn’t mean that they buy into President Callister’s rule without question; instead, they might be cynical but know the implications of stepping out of line.
I don’t know the engineers who reset faulty watches that well but enough to know that they use one core computer terminal to program them in a far section of the hub. The watches are almost foolproof but every once in a while malfunction so there’s hardly any focus on maintaining that project and, incongruous with the busyness of the rest of the area, the only people there are a woman who sits with a newborn on her lap as a technician places a miniature watch around the baby’s wrist.
