by G F Cusack
“Understood,” came the quick reply.
With that, the two vehicles blocked both ends of the road and immediately became noticeable to the seven men.
Although slightly under the influence of the hooch, Simon checked his watch and noted that they still had twenty minutes to curfew.
“Keep calm,” he said to the group. “We’ve done nothing wrong and, if we don’t cause any trouble, we’ll get through this.”
There was nowhere for them to go. The vehicles blocked their advance and retreat but at the moment they hadn’t broken the curfew. Five Company soldiers stood in front of each vehicle, most of them with clubs drawn.
James, at the back of the group, was not as sober as Simon and he panicked. He assumed it was after curfew and decided he wasn’t going down without a fight. Apparently becoming more focused, James began to run towards the rear vehicle. The troops from this vehicle were ready with their clubs. James had a muscular frame and Carl initially thought that his momentum might allow him to break through the group. He watched as James picked up speed, getting faster and faster, as he approached the vehicle. When he reached them, the crewmen were ready.
The fact was that the troops were sober and James wasn’t. As he headed for a perceived gap between two of them, they both swung their clubs at the same time. Mid-flight, James crashed to the ground and crumpled into a heap. Almost immediately, the two soldiers continued to club him until he no longer moved.
Simon realised that James was either dead or pretty close to it. Was there anything he could do to save the rest of them? One of the other young men was still carrying a half-full bottle of hooch and attempted to throw it at Carl’s vehicle, but by this time the soldier’s weapons were drawn and one of them shot him twice before he even let go of the bottle.
The remaining five men from the wedding raised their hands, resigned to their fate.
“It’s not ten o’clock yet, you can’t do this, the curfew time is set, you can’t just change the rules.” In desperation Simon tried one last gambit. “I’ve got connections, my uncle is Hubert the butcher.”
“It is by my watch,” Carl said jovially, “and yes I can, even if you’re connected.” He had his troops restrain the five conscious men before putting them in the back of his vehicle. Then he waved for the other vehicle to collect the two dead bodies.
At the gel plants gates, the security guards acknowledged Carl with a wave. It was hard for Simon to move with his hands tied behind his back but he manoeuvred himself to look through the back windows of the vehicle. If this was to be his last view of the outside world, he wanted it on his terms.
The gates were opened quickly as Carl regularly contributed a full load. After depositing his haul at the plants, Carl headed back to the scene of the wedding. The night was young and he hoped to encounter more unlucky victims.
20
Kath and Florence discuss her adventures
01 September 2202
A day or so after her arrival with Pepper, Florence’s fever broke and she was able to tell Kath of her journey.
“What happened to you? You were off on a supply run about twelve months ago and then you just disappeared. I knew I shouldn’t have let you go, but you were so insistent!” Kath said in desperation.
“We were attacked by members of the Macadam Clan. They were after anything they could steal and then, as quickly as they’d attacked, they melted into the bushes so no one would pursue them. I don’t know why they took me at first but when they discovered my skills they decided I’d be useful for negotiations. I told them I could read people, hoping it would keep me alive, and it worked.”
“That was very risky for you but I’m so glad it worked.”
“I didn’t have many options. As time went on, word of my skills was spreading and, once I was outed, I became less useful to the Macadams. That was when they decided to trade me to another rebel band. Since then, I’ve been traded between various clans. The last one to hold me was the Murdoch Clan but not for long – as they waited for the trade to be completed, the Company attacked the building.” After some hesitation, Florence said slowly, “Mum, I need to tell you that my powers have changed!”
“What you mean, ‘they’ve changed’?”
“Not only can I read people’s emotions, I have started to hear people’s thoughts. And more than just hearing the thoughts of the people around me, I have seen through someone else’s eyes. There is a boy who seems to be of a similar age to me and I sometimes feel as if I’m actually inside him. I can see through his eyes and he's in a strange place.”
“What makes you think it’s strange?”
“It’s very bright and has lots of power, food and strange machines and lots of things that I just don’t recognise. It seems like a dream, but we’re communicating: he has been saying words in my head and I have been saying words in his head. He says he lives somewhere called the Sanctuary. Have you ever heard of that?”
Kath had heard of the Sanctuary. Many years ago a sick woman calling herself Mary had come to the Farm with her daughter. Mary had told how she had escaped from a bad man in a place called the Sanctuary. During the escape, she had been fortunate enough keep her daughter and her life but she hadn’t managed to bring her son with her.
Mary was very ill when she arrived and Kath had promised to raise the girl as her own, while her mother lay dying. She had explained to Kath that the Sanctuary was a very dangerous place. It was a place north of here, and she had also made Kath promise not to tell Florence about the existence of her brother.
Mary knew that if Florence tried to find her brother, she would be in great danger. Kath tried to push Mary to get more information on the Sanctuary but all she managed to find out for certain was that Florence’s father was a bad man.
She only mentioned that Florence had a brother, Mary said, because they were twins – gifted twins – and she thought that as time went on Kath might have to deal with issues that sometimes occurred between twins like this.
“Gifted?” Kath had exclaimed. “What does gifted mean?”
Unfortunately from that time Mary had very little to say that was lucid. All these years later, Kath was starting to understand the meaning of gifted.
21
The resistance council meeting
09 September 2202
This was not the first time that Karla had dealt with Hubert and the other resistance leaders. All the same, the term ‘resistance’ made it sound like they were an organised force when in reality they were just a group of self-serving survivors.
Each of the leaders had their own speciality. She controlled the fighting pits and thus had ready access to muscle.
Hubert was a tall, well-built man with a slight paunch. He was called the butcher for two reasons. First, he controlled all the meat distribution in the capital and, second, anyone that crossed him was known to disappear. Perhaps he had started the rumours that some meat cuts contained human body parts but, whoever was responsible for the stories, they helped to solidify his reputation.
Next was Spider, an ordinary-looking man who seemed to blend into the background. Nobody knew his real name but he was revered for his intelligence network. It was said that his web of informants was rivalled only by Brand’s own band of spies and this inevitably led to some crossovers between the two. This detail was not lost on the others, who eyed Spider with a healthy dose of mistrust. A spy was by definition duplicitous and he could easily be sharing information with them and the Company, playing both sides for his own ends.
While their survival strategies differed, all of those strategies were built around self-preservation. If at times Spider traded information with the Company, it didn’t make him any worse than the rest of them. They all did what was needed to survive and although they were wary of Spider, he seemed open about what information he shared. Sacrifices were necessary for survival but he did what he could to limit the impact on the rest of them.
Hook was well named. As a recruit in
the Company naval forces, he had lost his hands in a training exercise. Hook had a part in everything that went through the ports of the island Sanctuary. His naval background had set him up well for this position so he was a powerful member of the group.
The final member of the group was Clarence Thomas. Known as CT, he supplied the alcohol to all of the elites around the Sanctuary. Although the elites might rule the Sanctuary, they relied on people like the individuals around this table to do the dirty work. CT not only supplied regulated, clean liquor to the elites, but was also responsible for the trade in illicit hooch to the masses.
They all had deals to provide kickbacks to certain Company bureaucrats, but together they had more power than anyone else outside of the Company.
Hubert started to talk. “I have called this meeting because we are being squeezed more and more every day. Since the last aging ceremony, it has been broadcast that the compulsory age for the gel plants is to be reduced to forty-four. The other evening my nephew left a wedding thirty minutes before curfew. It was only a twenty-minute walk home and he never made it. Through various means, I found out that he and his companions were picked up by a night patrol and delivered to the gel plants. Although a society survives by rules, the elite have for too long treat us like cattle and they are becoming more and more emboldened.
“You people in this room may be under the illusion that we have power but we all know that we survive at the whim of the elite. Once we reach the age of forty-five, or forty-four as the Company has just announced, or whatever other age the Company determines, it will cull us like cattle – we will end up in the plants just like any other member of the masses.”
“What do you propose that we do?” Spider asked. He was a man to look at the big picture. He was trying to figure out if anything said at this meeting was going to benefit him more than it would hurt him.
“We need to rise up,” Hubert said. “We need to overthrow the elites!”
Hook was not the kind of person to react first. This occasion was no different. He was studying the others in the room and waited for the others to respond.
CT was normally seen as a jovial person but when he spoke he seemed more reflective. “Why do we have to worry about other people? We have all got comfortable lives. We are all going to die some time so why not make the most of the time we have left?”
Karla stood up from the table. “You all know that I am not one prone to theatrics. We all think we control our own areas but we don’t. On occasions I have lent muscle to most of you for your illegal activities.”
“And you’ve been compensated for that,” CT interjected.
“That’s not the point I’m making. I’m here to tell you that I do not control my own house. Recently Brand came to the pits and killed three of my warriors. His excuse was that one of my warriors had been caught in a firefight with the Company during an illegal gel run. The gel run was one of your operations, CT, which failed due to your lack of planning.” She paused to let that sink in.
“This is not about just you, CT, but I want you to understand that our fates are all linked. Brand was not punishing me because one of my warriors had broken some rules – he was merely proving who had the power. He killed one of my best warriors a few months before the festival, just to emphasise that he has the power to do whatever he wants. We are all on borrowed time. Although Brand is the most savage of the elites, it is pointless trying to assassinate him. Aside from the difficulty of getting to him, even if we succeeded it would only lead to another dictator being installed and city-wide retribution for our actions. I am open to hearing more from Hubert.”
With that, Hubert continued, “I realise this is not a five-minute plan. This will take planning, secrecy and coordination. We are currently planning this year’s festival. I believe that if we work together, the festival will give us our best opportunity for success. It is the one time of the year that the elites are vulnerable. Most of them retreat to their winter homes and the troops are preoccupied with internal security for the capital. All the same, it will take all of us working together to make this happen.”
Looking around his companions, he decided that they needed more convincing. “If we do this, we are risking our lives – but we risk our lives every day for the pleasure of the elites. Wouldn’t it be fantastic to take control? To get rid of the illusion that we have the power and make it the truth? We can give the people back the power.”
Hook eventually spoke up. “Are you suggesting that we ditch the elites and take their place? We have some manpower under our control but even our combined numbers aren’t enough for anything like that.”
Hubert replied straight away, “I am not suggesting that we would control the Sanctuary or even lead the capital. But there will definitely be opportunities for us once the elite are overthrown.”
Hook paused for a minute before he replied, “I’ve spent a lot of time on the water and I spend a lot of time around the water, so I know the wildness of nature. If we unleash the masses, we might not be able to control them. I realise that our current situation is tenuous and that we live at the whim of the elites. But as CT said, at the moment we all have pretty comfortable lifestyles. We have food in our bellies, roofs above our heads and even CT seems to always have a warm body in his bed. I need more convincing that this venture is worth the risk.”
Hubert was next to speak. “Am I right in believing that when you lost your hand, Hook, they sealed it by sticking the stump in hot pitch?”
“Yes, it was very hot!” Hook replied. The memory of the pain never went away, so he was unsure why Hubert was asking this stupid question.
“Did you recoil from the pain?” Hubert asked.
“I would have if I hadn’t been held down by two men. They placed a piece of plastic in my mouth, which I bit through with the pain.”
“You reacted to intense pain as anyone would – but if someone had put your hand in a pot of cold water and slowly heated it, you wouldn’t have noticed the pain right away. We are somewhat insulated from the discomfort of the masses because of our creature comforts but, make no mistake, the elites are constantly turning up the heat. At any time we may be in the Company’s crosshairs and, if we don’t take action now, it may soon be too late.”
Hook pondered before saying, “I have had three of my crew arrested for speaking Spanish this month.” This crime would normally mean the gel plants for the offender but Hook had managed to bribe an official to get them released. He looked towards CT and Spider. “Perhaps we should listen to Hubert and Karla.”
Karla seized the chance to build on her argument. “The combined forces of the five of us are still not capable of overthrowing the elites’ Company forces. Even with my warriors from the pits, we just don’t have the numbers. We have to work smart. The masses have already started rioting in the capital. If we can increase the pressure and stoke the fire of unrest among the people, we can gain an army. The people outnumber the Company, which rules by fear. If we can let the people know that they are being played and that enough resources are available for everyone, their hunger can power our revolution.
“We need to build on this dissension. The riots in the streets are increasing. The people are starving, and hungry people make motivated recruits.”
“Even if they are unwitting recruits,” Spider added with a smile.
“A remark I would expect from a master manipulator,” Hook said.
“If this is to work, we need the masses to see rebellion as the only option – not just as one of their choices,” Spider pointed out.
They all nodded their heads in agreement.
“How are we going to make this happen?” asked Hook.
“I think we all have some tough decisions to make. I suggest we meet again in two weeks. Everyone is to bring their suggestions then and we can strategise. Has anyone got anything else to say before we close this meeting for the day?” Hubert asked.
Everyone shook their head and with that the meeting ended.
Karla left the meeting with a seed of a plan germinating in her head. She wasn’t prepared to share her full plan with the rest of the leaders yet, although maybe she would at the next meeting.
The young man named Zap who hung around the fighting pits was a computer hacker that she had used previously. He had access to technology and information; perhaps she could use his skills to stoke up anger among the masses.
He was young and understood technology better than she did. She excelled in blood and bone rather than electronics and mechanical things. Perhaps their combined skills could be put to good use. She would get word to him immediately and set up a meeting.
He had carried out illegal activities for her before so she knew that he wasn’t averse to breaking some rules. She had come across people like this before, who lived a good life compared to everybody else. Because he was not starving and had no need to fight the system, she had to tread carefully.
The minor tasks he had previously performed could have got him into trouble but she didn’t know if he was willing to risk everything. Was he willing to bond his survival with the rest of them? Zap might not see himself as one of the Norm class but surely he realised he wasn’t an elite?
She did not know if his previous activities had been distractions for some spoilt rich kid or if they were stepping stones to him becoming a full-blown resistance member. Her own survival could depend on his commitment so she needed to be sure.
22
Pepper and Kath plan his journey to the rebels
06 September 2202
It had been three days since Pepper and Kath had last spoken. When he walked out onto the porch for their arranged midday meeting, she was already sitting behind the steering wheel of a truck. She beckoned for him to climb in. As soon as he sat down and closed the door, she drove off around the Farm.
