The Rebels

by Eliza Green

  Dom pulled back his hand and the hatch closed with a snap. He backed up until he sat against the wall. He pulled up his top to examine the ragged scars he had lived with for so long. Thoughts of Carlo infected his mind, and how he’d disappear for a month after each of Dom’s operations. Was his father paid for his permission to use his son as a guinea pig?

  Dom buried his face in his hands and yelled.

  ‘What is this place!’

  The sound bounced off the walls.

  His memories increased in strength. The name Anya returned to him. She was someone he used to know. He had seen her in the holding room. She’d been right there but he didn’t remember her. And she didn’t remember him. But the fog lifted slowly.

  Arcis was a trap. He’d known it from the beginning, but not why it needed the participants. Just five had made it through the final test: the giant machine.

  Was this all planned? Did his scars really exist because of some Praesidium technology inside him? Was he even ill or had someone made him sick so the surgeries could proceed without questions?

  The Collective. He’d heard that name before, just not how or in what context. What did it want with him? Would it ever let him go?

  He ground his fists into his eyes and yelled, but the deadened space muted his attempts.

  He was trapped.

  WARREN - 1

  If there was one lesson Warren’s parents had taught him in his seventeen years, it was never to show weakness. They lived by that rule. His mother, Jean, was a teacher and his father, Philip, was a farmer. Ordinary jobs for town dwellers, but they never took any shit from anyone and were both highly respected in their fields. Not being a pushover was a solid way for Warren to live his life. He just hadn’t figured out how to do it yet.

  When he’d bumped into Anya in Southwest Essention, he’d grabbed the chance to strengthen his position in Arcis by suggesting an alliance between them. Similar to Anya, Warren had been forced to join Arcis’ education programme. Except his parents weren’t dead. They’d abandoned him. But Arcis didn’t seem to care about that detail.

  He was done with everybody trying to teach him something. He would have preferred a job in one of the factories to an education facility; his whole life had been one long lesson. His parents were always pushing him to better himself, to stand up for what he believed in, to become a man.

  But Jean and Philip Hunt were gone and Warren now had to find his own way in life, starting with the quickest route out of Arcis and Essention. He was stuck on the ground floor, doing stupid cleaning jobs while creepy wolves watched him.

  That night in Southwest, his rage simmered when Anya had said, ‘Um, Tahlia told me your parents joined the rebellion.’

  But he’d somehow kept a lid on his rising anger by kicking a stone ahead of him.

  ‘I didn’t know Tahlia was so interested in my life. What else did she say?’ Anya didn’t respond. ‘That’s what I thought. Some bullshit about me in school, no doubt.’

  ‘Um, Jerome and Frank are nice.’

  She tried to change the subject. He didn’t need her pity.

  Warren shrugged. ‘I think sometimes they’d rather I wasn’t around.’

  ‘Why?’

  Was she blind? ‘It’s a guy thing. I’m not into fighting as much as they are, despite what people say.’

  ‘Well, that shouldn’t matter. You’re part of the group. Tahlia and June like you.’

  ‘June, maybe. Tahlia’s never been my number one fan.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘She seems to think of me as this dick who goes around beating people up.’

  ‘Because of the girl and the race?’

  Warren grimaced. ‘She told you about that? It was one time. God, she doesn’t forget anything. She’s labelled me this over-competitive freak who will do anything to get ahead.’ He stopped walking. ‘I’m just trying to survive, like everyone else.’

  It was true. His parents had abandoned him for some stupid rebel cause he knew nothing about.

  Ω

  At the end of his shift the next day, he waited for Tahlia outside the changing room. She gave him a strange look when she came out.

  ‘What do you want, Warren? You know it’s creepy to hang around the female changing room like that.’ She logged off at the console in the lobby and exited Arcis. He stuck with her. ‘Stop following me.’

  ‘I need to talk to you.’

  She kept walking until she passed through the force field surrounding Arcis. She stopped and turned. ‘What about?’

  ‘About what you’re saying to people about me. You need to stop it.’

  Tahlia folded her arms. ‘Or what? You gonna tell on me? You gonna beat me up? I may be short, but I’m not afraid of you.’

  Warren stepped closer. He towered over her by at least six inches. Tahlia flinched, but held her nerve.

  He grabbed her arm and pulled her off the street and under the stilts of the Monorail. ‘I want to talk to you. I want to know what your problem is with me.’

  Tahlia laughed. ‘What’s my problem? You were a little shit to me in school. Or don’t you remember?’

  He frowned. ‘When?’

  ‘When I was trying to impress Billy Swanson and you told him the reason I was so small was because I was deformed. Or when I tried to get in with a bunch of girls who were more popular than me, and you told them I had a rare disease that was transmitted through touch. They called me “Scabby Skin” for the rest of the year.’

  Warren smiled. ‘Oh yeah, I remember now. That was funny. The looks on their faces when you touched Francesca’s arm! She scrubbed her skin raw until it bled.’

  Tahlia folded her arms. ‘I didn’t think it was funny.’

  ‘Well, maybe you don’t remember why I started all those rumours.’

  ‘I certainly don’t, Warren. I didn’t do anything to you.’

  It was Warren’s turn to laugh. ‘So it wasn’t you who told Coach Dewson about my bed-wetting? He said I couldn’t run track because he was afraid I’d piss myself.’

  ‘I didn’t know you had trouble with bed-wetting.’

  ‘I didn’t!’

  ‘So what’s the problem?’

  Warren grabbed clumps of his hair. ‘Are you seriously going to play dumb? You told lies about me.’

  ‘So did you!’

  ‘And now you’re telling Anya about me tripping up that girl in school? She thinks I’m a dick.’

  Tahlia uncrossed her arms and nodded. ‘Ah, that’s what this is about. You like Anya.’

  He didn’t like her in the way Tahlia suggested, but if he mentioned his proposition of an alliance with Anya, Tahlia would surely attempt to undo all his good work.

  ‘No, I just don’t appreciate you telling strangers things about me that aren’t true.’

  Tahlia lifted a brow. ‘So you didn’t trip up that girl then?’

  Warren paused. ‘Well, yeah I did, but I didn’t mean it.’

  Tahlia sighed. ‘I still don’t know why you needed to talk to me about this. Why do you care what people think of you in Arcis? You don’t mix with anyone. You’re a loner.’

  ‘I don’t mix because I’ve got better things to do than listen to you and June waffle on about your stupid town lives.’

  ‘And what’s so stupid about them? You’re from the same town as me. Oakenfield has been good to us.’

  ‘Like Praesidium has been good to you and your family?’

  Tahlia stared at him for a moment. He’d hit a nerve. She stormed out from under the stilts and headed down a road leading away from the Monorail station. Warren followed. ‘What, you didn’t think I knew you were there? Half the town knew. You know what the townspeople said? That your parents were kicked out of Praesidium because you couldn’t cut it as an artist. That was the only reason they took you there. Praesidium wanted to study you, study your skills.’

  Tahlia stopped walking and turned round. ‘We weren’t kicked out. We left of our own free will.’

/>   ‘My father said nobody ever leaves Praesidium of their own free will. They stay there forever or they get kicked out.’

  ‘Well, we didn’t get kicked out, if you must know. Dad needed to return to Oakenfield to take care of some business. It was a mutual agreement.’

  ‘What business?’

  ‘I don’t know. He didn’t say.’

  Warren folded his arms, feeling smug.

  Tahlia leaned in and lowered her voice. ‘Don’t think I don’t know your parents abandoned you. They joined the rebellion. They left you behind because you were weak. You’ve always been weak. You bully people to get your own way, but that’s not power. That’s fear.’

  Warren’s anger surfaced and his chest heaved. How dare Tahlia say that about him? His parents had taught him how to be strong.

  So why did they leave you behind?

  ‘I’m not afraid of you, Warren,’ said Tahlia.

  Warren stepped into her space once more. ‘You should be. I won’t let you get away with saying that to me.’

  ‘But it’s okay for you to say hurtful things to me?’

  ‘Yes, if they’re true.’ He tried to control his erratic breathing.

  Tahlia looked at Arcis and its dual majestic black towers. ‘So what are you gonna do to me in Arcis, Warren? We’re surrounded by cameras. There are giant mechanical wolves patrolling the ground floor.’

  Warren turned to leave. ‘Just wait, Tahlia. It will happen when you least expect it.’

  2

  Warren

  It had been two days since Tahlia received an electric shock that put her in the infirmary. Warren had asked Yasmin if she’d heard anything about her condition, but she hadn’t. He’d even asked the first-floor supervisor who did little more than shrug when he’d mentioned her.

  Warren stared at the file in his hand, the one he’d just scanned at his terminal to beat the clock and to avoid getting a shock of his own. Seeing Tahlia frozen to the spot like that had terrified him. The scanner she’d gripped too tight had acted as the conduit for the electricity. Why hadn’t she dropped it? His thoughts went back to their last conversation where he’d threatened her. Just to scare her off, not to hurt her. When Yasmin had suggested they target the slowest in the group, he’d jumped on board the idea. Warren needed to progress and Tahlia would help him whether she wanted to or not.

  Tahlia had to be fine. Why wouldn’t she be? So what if the task on the first floor delivered a shock? Nobody got hurt, not really. The shocks rattled your body and shook your mind, but they didn’t kill you. He dropped his file into a box at the side of the terminal.

  Tahlia’s demise had started three days ago when he’d the overheard the male and female supervisor talking about how Arcis would rotate everyone on the first floor if someone was consistently last. Turned out Tahlia Odare had been the slowest. Was it his fault she’d wound up the target? She’d been a bitch to him in Oakenfield. Maybe she’d think twice about gossiping behind his back to Anya and the others.

  He kept telling himself she’d asked for it.

  The bell signalled the end of the working day. But Warren and the other first-floor participants were no longer allowed to leave the premises. They had been assigned beds in the dormitory on the same floor.

  Spirits flagged, including his own, as everyone headed to the dining hall. Anya was biting her thumb. Yasmin and the others in her group who’d orchestrated the plan to target Tahlia looked contrite, as though they now regretted their actions. Warren had spoken to Yasmin straight after, convinced her well enough that if it wasn’t Tahlia it would have been someone else. He believed that to be the case. But he saw from the way Yasmin’s group sat together, their heads in a huddle, that they wavered on their original decision.

  He knew how these things went, how guilt forced people to shift the blame onto others. There was no way he’d take the fall for this one.

  Warren selected his dinner and sat with Anya, June, Frank and Jerome. The mood at the table, plus his own guilt, gnawed away at his confidence. Anya played with her food. June looked around the room, sharp and focused as usual in her observations. Jerome was quiet as usual and Frank, normally so vocal, ate in silence.

  Warren hated this. He needed to change the mood, to say something that would stop the ache in his stomach.

  ‘So, what do you think about Praesidium?’ he said.

  Anya looked up. ‘What about it?’

  ‘Do you think the city really has the best tech there, or is that all bullshit?’

  ‘Who cares about Praesidium right now,’ said June. ‘Tahlia’s in the infirmary and we haven’t heard anything about her.’

  ‘Yeah, I know. I’m worried for her, too,’ said Warren.

  Anya shot him a surprised look. He knew what she thought of him. It had been his suggestion to target Tahlia. She blamed him for the situation.

  ‘What tech do you think the city has?’ asked Frank.

  Warren shifted round in his chair, grateful for Frank’s curiosity.

  ‘I don’t know. I hear the medical equipment the city uses is top of the range. Like when you get a cut, it can heal you in an instant.’

  Jerome scoffed. ‘That doesn’t sound useful.’

  ‘Why?’ said Frank. ‘Just because you’ve never been sick a day in your life doesn’t mean the rest of us couldn’t use a helping hand.’

  Anya seemed to be only half-listening. Frank turned to Warren. ‘Okay, so say you have a car accident, your leg is mangled in the crash. Can the city make it as good as new?’

  ‘I’ve heard its equipment can completely re-engineer the cells, bone, skin tissue,’ said Warren. ‘It would be like you’d never been injured.’

  ‘How long does it take to heal?’

  ‘A couple of days for bigger injuries.’

  Jerome blew out a breath. ‘Sounds like science fiction to me. If the city really has that kind of tech, why haven’t we seen it in the towns?’

  Warren noticed June pretending to look like she wasn’t listening.

  ‘Because the towns have only ever gotten the cast-off tech,’ said Frank. ‘My uncle said Praesidium is huge. The size of six towns put together. He said the place is one giant computer. Every facet, every component, is wired to each other. He said it has underground lairs where the people in charge conduct experiments on people.’

  ‘Why?’ said June joining the conversation.

  Frank shrugged. ‘To figure out what makes them tick. I don’t know.’

  June laughed. ‘Why would they do that?’

  ‘Again, sounds a bit far-fetched if you ask me,’ said Jerome.

  Warren had heard the same story from his rebel-obsessed parents. He’d grown up hating his life filled with rules and regiment. He’d dismissed most of their crazy stories as hyperbole. That was until the day they left.

  ‘Tahlia lived in Praesidium for a while,’ said Warren.

  Everyone at their table stopped eating. Anya looked up.

  ‘What did she say about it?’ said Frank.

  ‘Not much. That it was white, bright and clean.’

  ‘So?’ said Anya. ‘We know that, already. We’ve all been there on our mandatory school trips to the library.’

  ‘That was different,’ said Frank. ‘The officials brought us straight to the library, then home. We never saw the rest of the city.’

  ‘And did she see any of this amazing tech you say the city’s supposed to have?’ said June.

  ‘No, she was too young. But her parents were kicked out of the city. I don’t know what happened.’

  ‘Maybe you should wait until Tahlia is here to speak for herself, Warren,’ said Anya.

  ‘I wasn’t being mean, Anya. I was just saying.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I think your timing sucks.’ Anya stared at her food, her mouth set in a tight line.

  ‘Don’t mind her,’ said Frank, elbowing Warren and giving him his full attention. ‘I want to hear more about what Tahlia saw and didn’t see.’

  Th
e ache in his belly grew. Anya was right about the timing. ‘She didn’t say anything else. Sorry.’

  Frank groaned and sat back in his chair. The silence at the table resumed.

  After a short while, Warren spoke again. ‘I only mentioned Praesidium because it built Essention and runs Arcis. If the city has the tech to heal injuries so fast, then Tahlia will be okay.’

  ‘There’s no reason why she shouldn’t,’ said Jerome. ‘I mean, we’ve all received shocks before and we’re all fine.’

  ‘Plus there’s the injection they give you to counter the effects of the electric shock,’ said Frank. ‘The first-aiders gave it to Tahlia. I saw them. She was awake when they took her out of there.’

  Yasmin and the others had turned to the conversation.

  ‘Has anyone tried to see her?’ said Yasmin.

  ‘I have,’ said June. ‘I asked the supervisor if I could visit her. He said he’d see what he could do but he never came back to me after that. If she’s still up there tomorrow, I’m going to ask again.’ Their access cards no longer worked to activate the elevator. Without a pass, they couldn’t leave the first floor.

  ‘Well, maybe I’ll come with you. See how she’s doing,’ said Yasmin.

  Anya glared at Yasmin then stared at her plate. Warren had overheard the supervisors talk about rotation and a last place participant. It was Yasmin who’d told Anya she had to scupper Tahlia’s chances to succeed, but not before Warren put the idea in her head. Up until now, Anya had been helping Tahlia to avoid the shocks. Then, with one word from Yasmin, Anya changed her tactics and slowed Tahlia down. It was clear they were all sick of the first floor. Even Yasmin, who had missed one rotation already, had been excited to hear from Warren about the supervisors’ plan for rotation. Warren refused to shoulder the blame alone for what had happened. They’d all played their part.

  Compliance. The wonder drug messed with peoples’ minds and made it so easy to convince them to do something bad. But what it didn’t do was repress feelings of guilt. It only pushed the guilt into the background, made it easier to function. But it was still there.