“How’s Claire?” I ask, ignoring him.
“Your sister is in the hospital,” he replies. “She was in a semi-comatose state when she was admitted, and I’m told she has a bacterial infection that is rather advanced. The doctors started her on a course of powerful antibiotics. We will know soon whether or not she responds.”
I lower my head.
“That cut is only a few days old. How could it possibly be this bad in just a few days?”
He shrugs indifferently.
“Her immune system was likely already weakened in the cold temperature. Her doctors also suggested that toxins entered the wound via contact with snow or moisture and aided the tissue decay. Perhaps you already know what happens if one melts and consumes the snow without treating it first?”
I remember the man from long ago, bled to death in his cave. I nod silently.
“Anyway,” he continues, returning to his book. “Today you begin work, and I’m here to tell you what you have to do.”
I watch his eyes move down the page as he finishes the current paragraph. When he’s done, he gives a slight smile, then dog-ears the page to mark it and closes the book.
“Jessica tells me you consider yourself a writer,” he says, offhand, glancing at the spine of the book one last time before placing it inside an open briefcase on the counter beside him. “Have you ever read it?” he asks. “Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness?”
I give a half nod. I’ve read it, but it was a long time ago. From another lifetime.
“I felt that it spoke to me when I was younger,” he says. “There was something about Kurtz that stayed with me after I read it, even though he was a horrible man.”
He sighs wistfully.
“I know he’s nothing but a tyrant now, and I can’t say I ever aspired to be like him, but I keep thinking that he’s more relevant now than ever. When it comes down to it, he was trying to do the very same thing we are here in New City: maintaining civilization in an uncivilized land. That’s all he wanted to do, and he didn’t care what or who he had to sacrifice to achieve it. That at least stands for something, don’t you think?”
I shrug my shoulders in answer.
“I don’t know. Isn’t it still important to try and do what’s right? That’s what it means to preserve humanity. Otherwise we’re just like the cannibals outside, in the winter.”
He smiles at me. Perhaps he’s amused?
“What’s important is that we do what we can to survive. I would like to let the people of New City do what they want, live their lives how they see fit, but we can’t afford to do that. The old world is long dead now. I’m doing what’s necessary to ensure that what’s left of us still have a future. I always thought my parents had a rather bleak sense of humor, giving me a name like Thomas Morrow. However, given the cause I strive for now, it turns out it’s a pretty apt name—do you agree?”
“You said you have work for me?” I ask him, changing the subject. I’m still not sure whether there’s anything of humanity left in this world, but when it comes down to it, talking about how and whether to hold onto it makes me feel depressed. I don’t know if it’s right to still hope.
“Yes,” he replies, closing the briefcase beside him and snapping the locks into place. “I was just getting to that. Jessica said you know how to use a gun. Is that right?”
“She’s right. I’ve been attacked before…I’ve had to kill.”
“Well, then that experience will serve you well. You get to replace Rowan, and his job was to stand guard over the food crops, near the water treatment plant.”
“Stand guard? What, in case it’s attacked?”
“No,” he says, chuckling softly. “You watch the workers from the guard tower, to let them know they have to keep working. Nobody’s allowed to slack off, and nobody’s allowed to take any food they haven’t earned. Those crops sustain New City—you have to make sure they keep growing, and that the people assigned to them do their jobs…and nothing else.”
“So you want me to shoot unarmed farmers? I don’t know if I can—”
“It shouldn’t come to that. Most people here already know their place.”
“What if it does? I can’t be responsible for innocent people dying.”
The woman and her children, back at the farm—growls the voice in my head as I say it. Remember them? It’s happened before.
“Just think of your sister then, and you won’t have anything to worry about,” says Morrow, standing up and taking hold of his briefcase. “It’s her you’re doing all of this for, right?”
He moves to the door and beckons for me to follow.
* * * *
It’s late afternoon. I’m standing in a guard tower fashioned out of planks of wood and corrugated iron. Just below me, visible through a meter wide aperture cut out of the metal, is a medium-sized park converted into a crop field. The open space where gardens, picnic tables, and a playground would typically be has been stripped bare, replaced with rows of hoed dirt from which waist-high stalks of wheat grow. Beyond the rows is what remains of a stone wall that once circled the perimeter of the park. Even further on, across a narrow street covered in patches of white, looms the huge concrete block that is the water treatment plant, on a hill overlooking the ocean. Occasionally people enter and exit through a door facing the street. Sometimes it’s a worker dressed in grey overalls, and other times it’s a guard like me.
I watch the door for a few moments, squinting so I can see it clearly. Sure enough, it opens, and two workers step outside, walking side by side. They stop in the street and then the worker on the left leans close to his companion to whisper something and, after a quick glance over his shoulder, hands him an empty plastic bottle. The other worker ponders it for a second, and then says something in reply, nodding. They go back inside.
My attention wanders back to the wheat crop:
Fatigued men and women move between the rows, cultivating the soil and harvesting wheat that has already peaked. They’re dressed in dirty overcoats, passed between them when they swap at the end of their shifts, and use tools that are rusted and in disrepair. They work silently, in an almost mechanical motion, without any thought or hesitation, moving from one patch of wheat to the next without looking at each other. Occasionally, one of them stops to wipe away the particles of frost that have accumulated on their coat, and at one point a gaunt woman with messy brown hair disappears into the toilet block for a few minutes. Nobody seems to notice. When she returns, none of the other laborers look up or wave.
Just outside the window, at the edge of the row closest to me, a thin, weedy-looking man hacks at the stalks with a sickle and deposits them in a plastic crate beside him. He gathers up a handful of wheat and stops, staring down at it in an almost longing way. With the slightest movement, he opens his coat and, for a moment, contemplates stowing the handful of stalks inside. I clear my throat loudly, and he looks up, aware that I’m watching him. His eyes drift off to the side, staring at my gun, and his mouth opens in surprise.
“S-sorry,” he stammers. “I was just—”
“It’s okay,” I say kindly. “I didn’t see anything. Go back to work.”
He nods and drops the wheat into the crate. Nervously, he edges towards the next length of crop and continues harvesting. Another handful of wheat goes into the box, and then he glances at me over his shoulder, making sure I saw it. I give him a curt nod and then I look away.
The next hour passes uneventfully, and I find myself thinking of Claire. I hope she’s okay, but for some reason, thinking of her now makes me suddenly feel incredibly sad.
You know what that means, don’t you?
No, shut up. I can’t think like that.
She’ll be okay. I’m here, doing what Thomas Morrow says, to make sure she’s okay. The doctors at the hospital will tre
at her, make her better. They’ll do that. Won’t they?
“No, you don’t understand! I wasn’t stealing, I was—”
“Shut up! We saw you, trying to get away with a bottle. That water isn’t your property.”
There are people yelling outside my tower, across the street.
An overall-clad worker is being escorted away from the treatment plant by two guards. It looks like the same one I saw before. The guard to his left is holding a bottle half filled with clear water, waving it in his face. He’s shouting.
“We saw you, filling this and then trying to sneak away. Do you think we’re stupid?”
The worker starts sobbing.
“Please! I…I wasn’t stealing! It’s my daughter—she’s sick. She needs water, and—”
“That’s still stealing,” says the guard on the right. “Nobody gets extra water. That’s the rule. Come on, you know that, John!”
“No! That isn’t fair! She’s dying, damn it!”
“You could have taken her to the hospital. We can’t just let people take what they want.”
“The hospital won’t do anything. They can’t. Not for this. I just want her to be comfortable!”
A third guard meets them at the end of the street. He presses a button on a walkie-talkie, then waves them past.
“Take him down to the gate. I’ve already let Morrow know. Someone will get his daughter and bring her along too. The boss will meet you there.”
The worker stops. He drops to his knees.
“No. You’re not...You’re not kicking us out?”
The guard on the right leans down and places a hand on his shoulder. He says something I can’t hear. The worker shakes his head. He stands up and starts running away.
“No! My Jennifer and I would never survive out there! That isn’t happening!”
The guards call for him to stop. He keeps running.
I look away.
The gunshots ring out in the same instant as the siren that signals dinner.
I feel tears forming in my eyes. I shake my head and flush them away. I’m not allowing myself to think about death. I can’t let myself get distracted. I have to learn to be comfortable with this place.
Chapter Thirteen
I don’t like New City. I’ve only been here for a day so far, but I’m already sure I don’t like it. Cities are supposed to be civilized, but this place is as bleak as the outside. If it wasn’t for Claire, I’d leave, because there’s nothing to look forward to here. Nothing to live for.
It’s not really that different to the wastes on the other side of the city walls.
After my shift watching over the farm, I climb down from the tower and join the farmers as they proceed single file down the street into a warehouse on the waterfront, converted into a dining hall. Nobody talks. They’re all far too weary, and I suspect, even if they weren’t, there wouldn’t be anything really interesting to talk about.
We pass by the crumpled body of the worker who tried to steal water. The guard who shot him kneels over the corpse, a wrinkle of frustration on his tired face. He sighs as he sees our procession of hungry farmers go by, and stands up. Another guard walks up and places a sheet of black plastic over the body, then he slings his gun over his shoulder and they both join the line. A few of the farmers in front of me glance at the covered body, but they don’t say anything.
“Stupid idiot,” says the guard who covered him with the sheet, slipping into the line behind me. “It didn’t have to happen this way.”
“It was only half a bottle of water,” I say to him, looking over my shoulder. “I was told that this city was a safe place to live.”
“You don’t get it, do you?” He sighs, putting his head in his hand.
“What’s to get? This is how I see it: people kill for half a bottle of water out there, in the wasteland. I didn’t expect it to happen here.”
“Look, we can’t do anything about it,” he says in a somber tone. “We let him take that water, and what next? Everyone thinks they can come in and do the same, and then what are we supposed to do? Morrow’s got a set of rules for living in this place, for dividing all of our resources equally. I’m not saying I agree with it, but if we don’t have rules to live by, how are we any different to those savages outside?”
He looks over his shoulder, giving the corpse a second thought. His face crumples, and something seems to bother him, then we turn a corner and he shakes his head in frustration.
“I’m hungry,” he says to me, rubbing his hands together. “Wonder what we’ve got tonight?”
The dead worker is already forgotten.
* * * *
At dinner, everyone sits together at four long tables. The farmers and workers sit at the table on the far end of the room, opposite the doctors and medics from the hospital. Between them, there’s us, the guards and enforcers, and Morrow himself, sitting to my left. Next to us, there’s a table of scientists and researchers, people who, I’m told, spend their days trying to figure out what’s become of the world.
I’m told that they haven’t yet found any answers.
The dinner itself—it’s not much—is a portion of grilled fish with two pieces of sliced carrot and a chunk of bread. I get a small pitcher of water to drink with it, the kind that’s usually used to serve whiskey. It’s barely more than a mouthful. The first thing I try is the fish, which isn’t that bad, save for a slight taste of overcooking. The carrots aren’t much, and aren’t very sweet, and remind me of wet cardboard, for some reason. The bread, as usual, is stale.
I don’t hear anybody complaining, I note, as I slowly chew a mouthful of fish. At least in New City, you’re guaranteed a meal at the end of the day, provided you stay alive that long. There’s no danger of anyone trying to kill me for my food, or of me having to risk death scavenging it from some ruins.
For some reason, though, it still isn’t enough.
“I’m still hungry,” I lament out loud. To my right, Jessica hears me, and transfers a slice of carrot onto my plate.
“You’ll get used to it,” she says.
“I hope so,” I say. “I don’t know exactly what, but I just keep feeling that something’s lacking here.”
Morrow leans over and places a hand on my shoulder.
“You’re still looking for the old world, aren’t you?”
I nod.
He smiles forlornly.
“Well, you’re not going to find it here. This is New City. This is where we’re building the new world. The future, Lionel, not the past.”
The future.
I don’t want the future. I want to go back to how things were before.
* * * *
After dinner, as I leave the dining hall, a black-haired man in wire-frame glasses stops me.
“You’re Lionel Morton?” he asks, shaking my hand. “I’m Mark Anderson. I’m a doctor at the hospital—I look after your sister, Claire.”
“How is she?” I ask, skipping the formalities. “Is she recovering, or isn’t she?”
He frowns, thinking how to phrase his words.
“Well, that’s why I came to talk to you,” he begins, in a nervous voice. “We’ve been trying her on all sorts of antibiotics all day, and, uh, she hasn’t responded to any of them. Her vital signs are getting weaker and weaker, and…” He hangs his head. “I’m sorry.”
“So you’re saying she’s done for? There’s no hope?” I ask, in a frantic voice that surprises me.
“Well, I don’t know at this stage, to be honest,” he says softly, after a moment of consideration. “We don’t really know how the radiation out there works, after all. It could just be that it’s taking her longer to respond than usual. She could take a turn for the better in the night.”
“It’s not looking go
od, is it?”
He shakes his head.
“I’m sorry. Look, as I said, we still don’t know for sure what will happen from here, but… I just thought you would appreciate knowing.”
No, says the voice in my mind, screaming at him. No, I don’t want to know that.
I turn away from him and start walking out onto the street.
“Thank you. I appreciate it,” I say. “You’ve done all you can.”
* * * *
It’s bedtime. Once again, I’m awake, thinking. Once again not sure what to do next.
The thing that watches from inside my mind, the shadow being that hovers around me and judges me, is standing at the end of my bed.
Just thought I’d keep you company, it says. After all, you might be alone very soon.
I turn away from it, trying not to dwell on its words, or the dark thoughts floating around my subconscious.
You know that already though, it whispers, leaning over and seizing the side of my head in an icy grip. It laughs cruelly. You know that, don’t you, Lionel?
“No, go away,” I say, trying to shake it off. “I’m not going to lose Claire. I don’t want to think about that.”
Of course you don’t want to think about it. It’s your fault she’s like this. If you weren’t so stupid and naïve, she’d still be perfectly fine.
No. I don’t want to think that. I want the shadow to leave me alone.
I’m not going away, Lionel. I’m here to make sure you don’t forget.
You deserve to be alone.
No, I don’t want—
Who’d want to be around a monster like you?
* * * *
There’s too much on my mind, so I decide to spend a few hours writing before I go to sleep. The shadow hovers over me, mocking. This isn’t healthy. I need to try and fight it off, shake away dark thoughts.
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