The Territory

by Sarah Govett

  ‘God, sorry, I’ll shut up now.’ Jack said apologetically. ‘And I meant for me. Not you. You’re definitely going back. You’re like a natural super-brain.’ My stare must have got more intense and glum as Jack put his hands up and said, ‘OK, OK, change of topic. Right, let’s listen to your music then.’ I fast-forwarded to my favourite track and the song started. The one where the singer just keeps on repeating, ‘You sent me away, now I’m gonna make you pay!!’ and it really seemed to capture and intensify all my mixed-up feelings of fear and anger – yes, above all I guess, huge boiling anger against the Ministry for taking us away and putting us through this. Jack and I were soon singing along and row upon row turned round to stare at us in total confusion. We looked at each other and just totally cracked up. Lost it. Tears running down our faces although we both knew it wasn’t really THAT funny, it was just a release.

  Ms Jones’ voice cut through the laughter. ‘Noa and Jack, stop this noise immediately.’

  Jack and I just burst out laughing again. I mean what could she do to us now? There was an unwritten policy against deducting points at this late stage. Seen as too cruel, I guess.

  The rest of the journey to the Waiting Place was pretty uneventful. We finally turned into the driveway at just after 4pm. I don’t know if it was just our mood, but as the tyres first crunched gravel, the clouds seemed to grow darker and darker and everyone seemed to shrink a little into their seats. The Waiting Place was massive. Like a factory, or a prison. Large, grey and squat, with loads of barbed wire and high railings. And this was supposed to be one of the nice ones. Waiting Place 12 to be precise – reserved for students from the most prestigious private schools. I guess pre-Archie Rycroft, freakoids got to stay at home and just bus in for the actual exams, so maybe standards were pretty low. I mean a fee-paying Norm’s still just a Norm. I’d hate to see what the other ones were like though.

  Hugo’s voice could be heard complaining, ‘My dad will have something to say to the Governing Body about this dump,’ but everyone else was mute, awed by the slab of a building that was going to be ‘home’ for the next five days. Even Ms Jones seemed slightly cowed and spoke reasonably gently with a tinge of – could it be? – pity in her voice as she told us to get out.

  We trudged through two sets of thick steel gates that made a threatening ‘clung’ as bolts slid in and out of place and then we were inside. Rooms were allocated randomly and Jack and I were each in a single-sex dorm of eight.

  A Waiting Place Attendant — think guard — filled us in on the programme — think drill. Dinner was at 6pm; lights out at 9.30pm; wake-up call for tomorrow’s exam 6.30am, breakfast 7am, exam start 8.30am. The rest of this evening was ‘Free Time’ to be spent in our allocated room or Communal Study Area 5C.

  We formed another sorry crocodile and were marched to our rooms. Luckily, Jack’s and mine were on the same corridor. Jack’s positivity and rebellious energy seemed to have evaporated inside the building. Like it had been sucked out of him by 360 degrees of concrete. I recognised the knotted lines in his forehead and knew that exam panic was building.

  I dumped my suitcase on the end of my hard bed and looked around at my fellow roommates: three Norms and four freakoids. If I didn’t know, I don’t think I could actually have definitely told the difference. Everyone seemed shy and a bit withdrawn. Maybe the Ministry hadn’t developed an upload that could totally eradicate exam fear.

  I got out my Scribe and my flash cards (which sent a few eyebrows rising) and, sitting cross-legged on the bed, started to revise in earnest. I figured if I ate dinner really fast, I had time for 30 mins History, 30 mins Biology, 30 mins Maths, 30 mins Geography and 30 mins Physics. Jack and I had agreed to study separately. I tried to talk him into letting me help, at least with the Physics, but he’d insisted. Said it was ‘everyone for themselves’, but I know it was really because he knew I’d get through more without him and he wanted me to pass. I think he might even want me to pass more than himself.

  We didn’t talk in the dinner hall. I forced mucor and some form of sweetened algae down, realising I needed all the fuel I could get to get through the next few days. I thought of Mum. She always used to feed me fish fingers before exams. Brain food, she used to say. That is, until all the fish got diseased. I quickly pushed such thoughts aside. They weren’t helpful. Not now.

  As I was queuing to leave the hall I heard a painfully familiar voice behind me. ‘Noa.’ I thought I must be hearing things. I turned and there, sure enough, was Raf. My heart leapt. I thought that maybe I’d got it all wrong. Maybe they hadn’t totally freakoided him. Maybe he still cared. He seemed about to speak again when he was suddenly flanked by Hugo and Quentin.

  ‘What do you want with the Norm?’ Hugo sneered. ‘I thought you were over Fish Face here.’

  Raf’s face became stone. ‘Of course I am,’ was his cold reply. ‘I just thought she could help me relieve some stress before the exams, you know. Everyone knows Norms are easy.’

  Hugo and Quentin sniggered like, well, like sniggering freakoids and I forced myself not to cry. How could I have thought he might still like me? I’m an idiot, idiot, idiot.

  When everyone else piled towards the Communal Study Area (where there were zillions of Ports in case you’d missed any uploads), I headed back to the dorm, to study alone on my bed. I channelled all my anger at Raf into super-concentration mode and read flash card after flash card until the lights went out. After all, every minute counts.

  How can you describe a day like today?

  The exams? Honestly, I have no idea. It’s too close to call.

  The exam hall was massive. Rows and rows of students — must have been at least ten different schools’ worth. And we were arranged alphabetically rather than by school so you had to sit in this sea of strange faces. Face after face you didn’t know. It really brought home how many people we’re competing against. Before, it was always that I had to beat or at least be as good as Hugo and Quentin and Barnaby, but today there were hundreds of Hugos and Quentins and Barnabys and they all looked pretty clever in a freakoidy way. And if that wasn’t stressful enough, positioned all round the room and down the dividing aisles were guards. Guards in uniform. With guns. And then before the first exam, Maths, even started, this super-scary invigilator guy stood up and declared that there had been, ‘an erratum’ on page twelve. ‘Triangles’ should read ‘triangle’. I mean?! We could have worked that out. It’s much easier to figure that out than to try and figure out what the hell ‘erratum’ means. Why couldn’t they just say error or, let’s go crazy, mistake, like any normal person? I swear they get some sort of perverted kick out of it.

  I think Maths was OK. There was one horrific question at the end that I had to leave out, but that was bound to happen and that was only 5 per cent of the total. There were some others I was a bit unsure of, but although I won’t have got the 90 per cent that I really wanted to boost my marks in other subjects, I should have cleared 70 per cent.

  Geography wasn’t so good. It was basically all recall so the freakoids are going to ace it. IT’S SO UNFAIR! There was also a long question on the Arable Lands that I hadn’t revised well as it’d come up last year so I’d assumed it wouldn’t this year. Supremely annoying! Physics and Biology were OK, especially as there were lots of questions on circuits and classification, which I’m quite strong on.

  History is the one I’m freaking out about a bit. We had to write an essay on the Dark Times and how life is better now, which is really hard to do. I’m not a denser, so obviously I wrote about everything being great now and terrible then but I didn’t have any statistics to back it up and I’m worried that maybe I tried too hard and over-compensated and it sounded really insincere.

  After the exams had finished, all I could think of was finding Jack. Seeing how he’d found it. Physics and Biology are two of his worst subjects, but then there hadn’t been much on magnetism or genetics (his two massively weak areas) so maybe he’d be OK. I just wanted
him to tell me that he’d be fine. That we’d both be fine and get to stay. I couldn’t find him in the dinner hall or his dorm and then like some brain worm, horrific images of him shoving a stylus up his nose and banging his head down kept burrowing into my head. The only other place I could think of to check was the men’s toilets. Maybe he was trying to drown himself in the bowl or strangle himself using the flush chain. Shut up, brain! I checked no one was in the corridor and then sidled into the men’s. No one was at the urinals but there was a cubicle, locked and I could hear rustling inside.

  ‘Jack!’ I shouted, beginning to pound on the door in my panic. ‘Don’t do it, Jack.’

  There was no response.

  ‘Jack, open that door or I’ll kick it in right now!’

  ‘That’s something I’d like to see,’ came a voice from behind the door. It wasn’t Jack’s.

  I mumbled some sort of noise of incomprehension and the lock slid back.

  ‘Well, get in here. Quick about it. And don’t scream.’

  Part of me wanted to run, but something stopped me. I pushed the door. One blue eye, one green. Raf dragged me inside and locked the door.

  I tried not to panic, my ears straining for other sounds outside the door. There was nothing. We were very much alone.

  Taking a deep breath, I forced myself to look him straight in the eye. No flinching. Maybe I could unlock some buried memory of us together. Maybe I could stop him hurting me. At least I was in position to try some sort of eye gauging manoeuvre.

  I was expecting to see danger in his face. But there were no glinting eyes. Not even a hungry wolf’s grin. Instead I saw pain. He might even have been blinking away a tear.

  ‘Noa.’ It was almost like he’d breathed the word. ‘God, I’ve missed you.’

  Raf. He was back.

  ‘What the hell is going on?’ I asked, trying to sound angry, but there was the old Raf grin and eye sparkle. ‘I mean I saw you upload. I saw what they did to you. I watched you become a monster.’

  ‘It was just an act.’

  ‘But I saw you plug in and twitch for God’s sake. I saw it all.’

  ‘You saw what I wanted you to see. What I needed everyone to see. I’ve got a freakoid sister. I’ve watched enough people upload to know how to fake it. I’m sorry, Noa, it was the only way to keep us both safe.’

  The tears welled up in my eyes, and I found myself punching him repeatedly as hard as I could. Laughing and crying and angry all at the same time. Then something struck me.

  ‘But the upload…’ I stammered.

  He pulled a piece of gum out of his mouth. ‘I pushed it into my Node when I inserted the cable.’

  ‘Gum? But how did you know it’d work … that it wouldn’t short the circuit or blow the Port or something?’

  ‘I didn’t,’ Raf replied grimly. And it all started to make sense – what he’d done. The risk he’d taken – for both of us.

  ‘I’m sorry, Noa. I hated myself for having to act like that, say those things. And all I wanted to do all the time was wrap my arms round you, kiss you, ask you how you were holding up. I wanted it to be me looking after you, not Jack, but imagine what they’d do if they found out I’d deceived them and that you knew. They can’t be made to look like fools, Noa. We’d both have been sent to the Wetlands immediately. We wouldn’t even get to sit this exam.’

  I knew he was right.

  And then he wrapped his arms round me, drew me close and started to kiss me. And I kissed him back, harder than ever. It felt like everything was back to normal. Well, almost.

  ‘When did you start hiding out in toilets?’

  ‘Well, I’d heard that Norms were easy so I thought I’d hang about and see if I could get some Norm toilet cubicle action.’ I punched him again.

  ‘If you keep that up you’re going to get a sore hand.’

  I landed another punch, putting my full weight into it.

  ‘Ow, OK, OK, I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist. I’m here because I’m revising,’ Raf laughed.

  ‘In a toilet cubicle?’

  ‘Well, I can’t exactly be seen studying in my room can I as I’m supposed to be a proper freakoid now, as you’d put it, and us freakoids don’t stare at notes all evening. And I don’t know about you, but I’ve got a pretty serious set of exams tomorrow.’

  Mention of exams suddenly brought us back to reality with a bang.

  I needed to be studying and I needed to find Jack.

  I kissed him again.

  ‘I missed you so much,’ I murmured into his neck.

  ‘Me too. Me too,’ he replied.

  ‘By the way, how did they go?’

  ‘OK, I think. Yes, kind of OK.’

  ‘Me too. I think’

  We left separately, and hadn’t heard anyone else come into the men’s so our secret should be safe. I eventually found Jack in the communal revision room, staring intently at notes for tomorrow’s exams.

  ‘How did it go?’ I asked. ‘I was so worried about you! I thought you might even have done something stupid,’ and I told him about my toilet suicide theory (minus the Raf bit), which made him laugh.

  ‘No. I’ve got to stay around to look after you, right?’ The intensity of feeling in his voice made me feel massively guilty. ‘I don’t know how I did, not great. But maybe good enough. Who knows.’ Hope shone through his smile and my heart leapt. ‘You obviously aced it though.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well, just look at you. You’re beaming.’

  They’re over. Just like that. All that work, that cramming for just two days.

  And now it’s probably all over for me too. Because I’m stupid, stupid, stupid.

  Maybe I suffered burn-out, maybe my brain was on Raf rather than Chemistry or maybe I’m just a natural denser after all, but for whatever dumb reason I double turned over. The most obvious, stupidest mistake anyone could make in an exam. I missed out two whole sides of questions. High-mark questions on bonding and calculations. That’s at least 30 per cent of the marks. It’d be better not to know. I was checking through the paper at the end, feeling SMUG, can you believe it?! Smug that I’d finished with so much time to spare. I’d even indulged in a little daydream about going on a trip to the Woods with Raf when this was all over. Strolling in dappled glades. Throwing leaves at each other. Idiot. Just as the invigilator said, ‘Pens down,’ I opened the empty pages and nearly puked from fear.

  ‘NO!’ I must have shouted aloud as all eyes turned to face me and the invigilator hiss-shouted, ‘Silence. All eyes to the front.’

  My paper was collected with all the others and my stomach started to eat itself.

  The afternoon’s exams were a bit of a blur. English was OK. I think my essay hung together and made sense and I included loads of ‘powerful’ verbs and ‘persuasive’ language. Art was a bit of a joke as I’m rubbish even at scale drawing, but all I could/can think about was the Chemistry paper and those blank pages.

  When the bell to mark the end of the final exam tolled, I couldn’t join in the yells and mad celebrations that seemed to break out. I caught sight of Jack’s face in the distance. Tired but kind of relieved and almost happy looking, so he must have had an OK day, which I’m so pleased about. I couldn’t face him though. Didn’t want to talk about it as talking would just make it even more real. I slipped down a side corridor and shunning dinner, headed back to my dorm knowing I’d get a few minutes peace there, at least until everyone had finished eating.

  Solitude didn’t seem to help either though. I pounded my pillow and then started sobbing into it. It wasn’t only me that I’d doomed. It was my entire family. Mum and Dad are as stubborn as I am and would insist on coming with me. Results Day was in just two days and after that I’d never see Raf again either. Just thinking his name was enough to get me bawling again. I needed him.

  For no massively logical reason, I started sprinting down the corridor to the men’s. Hoping he’d somehow be in there again. The cubicle was occupied a
nd I ran up to it, and knocked.

  ‘What the hell?’ came a reedy, nasally voice. Not Raf’s. Of course it wasn’t Raf’s. What was I thinking?

  Feeling even more of an idiot, I slunk back down the corridor to my dorm. I kicked open the door, ready to sob back into my pillow, when I saw a figure sprawled out on my bed. Raf.

  I was so happy to see him that I couldn’t even form proper sentences. ‘Not in the men’s,’ was all I could manage.

  ‘No,’ he replied, smiling wolfishly. ‘I don’t spend all my time there, you know?’

  I moved forward and I think my pale swollen face must have then been directly under the light as he seemed to register my horrific appearance and all mockery vanished.

  ‘God, Noa, are you OK?’ he whispered gently. ‘I thought today would have been a great day for you. I mean these are some of your best subjects. I thought we could celebrate together. It all being over, I mean.’

  I told him about my Chemistry fiasco and I could see worry lines form on his face and his eyebrows starting skulking just like Dad’s. When he finally spoke it was with quiet determination.

  ‘You’re over-reacting Noa. You’ll have done really well in the other sciences and Maths, you’ll have extra percentage points in the bag so you’ll still totally average 70 per cent. I’m not worried.’ But his eyebrows didn’t look so convinced.

  ‘I’ve got to average 72 per cent, remember. And what if I don’t? What if they take me away and that’s it? I’ll die some horrific death in some swamp. And I’ll never get to see … lots of people again.’

  ‘That’s not going to happen,’ Raf urged. ‘I think I’ve passed and there’s one thing I’m sure of and that’s you’re way smarter than me. You are massively smart, Noa. You’ll get to stay, no doubt. And even if I fail, you’ll stay and Jack can look after you.’

  ‘But I don’t want Jack,’ the words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. ‘I just want you.’ And the brutal honesty of my words hit me. Despite everything he’s done for me, despite the years he’s been my best friend, if it comes down to a choice, I choose Raf.