by T. C. Edge
Mostly, we’re told to walk upright and straight, and to hold our hands neatly to our sides. Posture, it seems, is considered important in identifying higher class citizens. Anyone caught slouching or crossing their arms whilst in public are immediately reprimanded by ‘posture police’.
Yes, they actually have those.
Our expressions, too, need to be reigned in. Tess and I know as much from speaking with Deputy Burns that the Savants aren’t exactly expressive with their facial movements. The rest of the Enhanced, by the sounds of things, are required to adhere to that doctrine.
“Smiling is allowed, of course,” says Sophie. “It’s considered a friendly expression, and so beneficial.”
“Not so friendly when Deputy Burns tries it,” jokes Tess. “He looks seriously creepy.”
Sophie laughs awkwardly.
“Some Savants have trouble with it, although many of them look natural,” she says. “Especially the lower ranked ones. They’re usually less detached and have a little more emotion.”
“So the higher up you go, the more cold and weird they are?” I ask. “I can’t imagine what the members of the Consortium must look like trying to crack a smile.”
Tess laughs loudly. Sophie looks like she’s about to frown, but holds the expression back.
“So, what expressions are disallowed?” I ask, struggling to ask the question in a serious manner.
“I did go through this yesterday, Brie. Don’t you remember?”
“I zoned out,” I admit.
She sucks in an exasperated breath.
“Well, OK then. Simply put, anything negative is undesirable. So frowning, gritting your teeth, shaking your head, things like that. Just smile and nod and everything will be fine.”
“Must be exhausting,” remarks Tess.
Sophie doesn’t counter the claim.
Soon enough, our makeovers are complete. As expected, mine took a fair bit longer than Tess’s. We step to the mirror and admire Sophie’s work, my face once more bright and glowing and my hair suitably glossy.
“OK, into the dresses please, ladies,” says Sophie.
We slip into the sky blue dresses bought for us the day before. I wonder if we’re going to get to keep them after, but don’t ask. Frankly, I can’t think of a single occasion where I’d put this thing back on.
Once dressed, Sophie brings forward some matching shoes. They look quite basic, flat on the sole and without any embellishments. I slide on my pair. They’re much too big.
“Not to worry,” says Sophie, leaning down.
She presses against the side of the shoe down by the big toe. Slowly, it begins to shrink in size until it fits perfectly.
“Better?” she asks.
“Um…yeah,” I say.
I wasn’t aware that such shoes existed. If only my work boots had the same function.
It doesn’t end there, though. At the rear of the shoe, she presses again, and a heel extends from the bottom of the sole. Up I go, gaining an inch in height, then two, then three. Soon, I’m struggling to keep my footing.
“You have worn heels before, yes?” asks Sophie.
We both shake our heads.
She leans back in and takes the heel down a bit.
“How about that? Try them out.”
We both do a little walk around the room, then out into the corridor. A couple of the other residents of the top floor giggle as they watch our little catwalk display. I feel completely foolish, even here. I can’t imagine how I’m going to feel being watched by the entire city.
After a few goes up and down, however, I manage to walk without tripping over. Still, I feel like I must look like a deer on ice.
Or Mrs Carmichael after one too many whiskeys…
“You’ll get the hang of it,” says Sophie.
Clearly she has more confidence in my abilities than I do. Tess, meanwhile, appears suspiciously adept from the word go.
“You sure you haven’t worn these before?” I ask.
She shrugs and smiles cheekily. “It’s all about balance, Brie. You’ll get it…eventually. Hopefully by this afternoon.”
Her little wink is unwelcome.
Damn you and your natural balance.
Unfortunately, I have little extra time to practice.
“Come now, girls, we need to get going. We’re already a good few minutes past schedule.”
She sounds worried. Clearly keeping us right on track is her priority today, and if she doesn’t see through that function, there might be hell to pay.
Before we go, however, Mrs Carmichael emerges from her den and looks upon us both with a smile.
“You look lovely, girls, you truly do. You’ll make fine wives to two very lucky men some day.”
“I completely agree, Mrs Carmichael,” says Sophie. “Looking like that, they’ll be sure to impress the residents of Inner Haven.”
I’m not sure that was what our guardian was getting at. She doesn’t correct Sophie, though, and merely tells us good luck. Then, as Tess and Sophie begin making their way down the corridor, she steps in towards me.
“Have you taken your medication today, Brie?” she asks quietly.
“Oh..no!” I say. “I’ve been so busy this morning I forgot.”
“Well, do it now, quick,” she says.
I dash into my room, open my bedside table, and pop a couple of pills. My stocks appear to be running low, something Mrs Carmichael notes.
“I’ll pick up some more for you at the black market,” she says.
I don’t much like her going there. The black market exists in the northern quarter, a necessary location in order to keep it under the radar.
I’m pulled into a very brief hug, as Sophie calls “what’s the hold up?” from down the corridor.
Neither of us answer.
Instead, Mrs Carmichael’s eyes narrow. “Be careful today,” she whispers. “Don’t trust anyone over there, do you understand?”
I nod.
“Of course, Mrs Carmichael. Don’t worry…I’ll be back later.”
I leave her there, and wander down the corridor towards the other two. Her paranoia and distrust of Inner Haven, and the Savants in particular, isn’t something new.
Still, they serve to make me even more nervous than I was before. Hardly the best pep talk, really.
Downstairs, the residents of the academy have gathered to see us off. The girls swarm around us and tell us how pretty we look, as Sophie tries to stop too many of them from tugging at our dresses, slapping away grubby hands and ushering us quickly on.
The little boys stand back, giggling, while the older ones look on at us admiringly. When I catch them staring, they blush and turn away.
I lock eyes with Drum for a moment, who stands at the back with a sheepish look on his face. He flashes that smile that only I ever see, and mouths ‘good luck’, before returning his eyes to his feet.
Before we even get to the door, I can feel the draft of cold morning air whistling through. When the door opens, and we step outside, it becomes evidently clear that these dresses are going to be woefully insufficient in keeping us warm.
“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine in Inner Haven,” says Sophie, watching us shiver as we step into the car. It appears to be the same one as yesterday.
This time, I’m not so daunted when Sophie gives the order, and the vehicle begins moving off of its own accord.
“Western gate to Inner Haven,” she says.
I feel a thrill at the words.
From the centre of the western quarter, we begin moving eastwards towards the middle of the city. I’ve travelled these streets a thousand times before, and know them like the back of my hand. When I was young, I’d creep as close to the wall as I could manage, get right up to its base and imagine what the world was like on the other side.
Today, I’ll find out.
The wall isn’t overly tall, a couple of storey high perhaps. It’s thick, though, and built from iron, a perfect circle s
urrounding Inner Haven with four entry points at the north, south, east and west. At each entry point, large gates provide passage to the two parts of the city, manned by members of the City Guard.
We move beyond the colourful, vibrant streets of Outer Haven, drenched in neon and filled with life, and up a straight road that leads to the wall. Immediately, the transition becomes apparent, the street turning quiet and drab as it stretches towards the core of the city.
When we reach the wall, a door to the side of the gate opens, and a Brute steps through, dressed in his armour and with the badge of the city at the top of his chest. He’s enormous, ducking his head slightly to move through the door, which clearly wasn’t built with such colossal men in mind.
Sophie gives the order for the right hand window to open, and it swiftly retracts into the door of the vehicle.
“Name and identification number,” says the Brute, his voice booming from his mountainous chest.
“Sophie Winchester. I.D. HKW-193. I’m here to escort two Unenhanced to the ceremony this afternoon. They’re to be honoured for their role in the terrorist attack.”
The Brute raises a monstrous arm and taps Sophie’s information into an interface on his inner forearm.
Then he nods.
“Proceed,” he says.
He steps back, and the gate ahead begins to open, splitting from the middle and winding into the metal wall. I try to peer ahead to get a good look, but the front window is narrow.
Sophie takes note and rectifies the situation.
“Activate transparency mode,” she says.
The vehicle’s computer takes action. Immediately, the external shell of the car seems to fade, the sleek grey seeming to melt into the air. I reach up and touch the ceiling to make sure it’s still there, and feel that the surface remains solid.
“Hopefully that’ll give you a better view,” says Sophie, smiling. “In Inner Haven, there’s no need for us to hide.”
I stare forward, the top half of the car now almost completely see-through, and get my first proper look at Inner Haven. As the car begins moving through the gate, my eyes are immediately drawn to the towers ahead, all of them the same height, same shape, same colour. It’s as if they were clones of each other, lined up along the street, clean and pristine and glimmering under the morning sun.
“Activate tour,” says Sophie. “Follow the Spiral.”
The car moves forward away from the gate, turning onto a wide and open street that curves around the boundary of Inner Haven alongside the wall. As we go, Sophie turns into a tour guide - a part she probably plays a lot with her clients – telling us about the structure of Inner Haven and its component parts.
It seems it works in a spiral, something I wasn’t aware of. Here, the main street flows around the boundary of the city, curving gently in until it arrives at the High Tower right at the city’s core. It’s a simple structure, that allows for only one major street, with smaller ones spreading out in all directions from the core to provide quicker passage to the various districts.
The spiral works, unsurprisingly, to help determine class. On the outside coils, the members of the Enhanced who marry Unenhanced live. Further in, you’ll find single members of the Enhanced, followed by Enhanced who have married partners of their same kind.
The innermost coils, closest to the High Tower, are reserved for the more lowly Savants and members of the Court. The High Tower itself, however, is home to higher class Savants and Courtiers, with the summit occupied by the Consortium.
Many floors of the High Tower, as well as many buildings across Inner Haven, are used for working purposes too. Here, the main trades are science and engineering, where the supreme intellects of the Savants are put to good use, ably supported by the Enhanced and their useful physical improvements.
We drive around the main street, slowly but surely circling in. I look out at the streets and note that they’re fairly quiet and still. There’s no trash, no art, no colour. All the buildings are drenched in sleek tones of grey and white, so different from the vibrant melting plot on the other side of the wall.
No advertising displays fill the sides of buildings, no neon lights spill down and saturate the air with their multi-coloured glow. What colour there is belongs to the Unenhanced who have come here, women like Sophie who drift about, upright and tall, in their sky blue dresses and suits.
It’s like an alien world, one devoid of life. A place of order where everyone seems to wander to the beat of an imaginary drum, all walking at the same pace as they pass to work and back. Calm and serene, I feel like I’ve entered a weird dream just looking at the place.
The look on Tess’s face suggests she’s thinking exactly the same as me. Truthfully, I don’t see how anyone who’s come from Outer Haven couldn’t.
“It’s strange, isn’t it,” remarks Sophie. “Strange to your eyes.”
We both nod together.
“Everyone who sees it for the first time thinks the same. But there’s a charm to the quiet here, a sense of calm that I could no longer live without. Everyone comes round eventually.”
Looking at the streets, I don’t see how that’s possible. I’d have to get a lobotomy to be able to stomach it here.
We continue to circle, drawing closer to the core, the High Tower appearing between gaps in buildings and teasing us as it continually flashes and disappears. The buildings, too, most of them apartments, grow more grand, larger allowances of space provided to the higher ranked members of the city.
“What’s the point of having all that space?” I ask Sophie. “The Savants don’t care for art. They’ll just have bigger blank walls to stare at.”
Sophie gives a hint that she agrees. I see it in the twitch in her eye. Naturally, she has a pre-programmed response, though.
“It’s a status symbol, Brie. It shows importance, influence.”
Still, I wonder if that even matters to them. Where is the line drawn? So, they don’t feel emotions, and therefore can’t love, or hate, or feel fear or joy. So why does status matter? Status, surely, gives a feeling of pride, perhaps of superiority. Do they feel those things?
I don’t bother Sophie with the query, since she’ll just give me a canned response. Most likely, they’re not entirely devoid of emotion, just severely lacking in it.
I mean, surely if a Savant had to watch their parents die, as Tess did, they’d feel some grief at the loss, some anger at the perpetrators, some desire for revenge?
And if they don’t, then surely they can’t be human. Some higher evolution in their own minds, perhaps. Higher in some ways, lower in others.
For me, it’s culture that sets us aside from the rest of the birds and the beasts. If it’s just survival and proliferating the species that matters to them, then they have more in common with cockroaches than they do with us over in Outer Haven.
As my mind rumbles on, the car does so too, albeit as silently as the streets around us. Soon, Sophie is drawing our attention to the front as the car curves around the final bend.
Ahead, the High Tower comes into full view for the first time, stretching up to the heavens. It looks so much more imposing up close, its base wide and circular, its domed roof disappearing into the low hanging clouds.
The street finally goes straight as it leads towards its foundations, set up with towering stands with tiered seating on either side. Between them, a stage awaits, sitting within an open square before the many glass doors that lead into the building. And all over, huge screens have been erected, ready to broadcast the ceremony across the city.
Above the stage, several storeys high, a balcony extends out from the High Tower, looking down upon the world below. White chairs adorn it, waiting to be occupied by only a dozen men and women.
And in the middle, one stands out more distinguished than the rest.
“Who sits there?” asks Tess, staring at the balcony, her eyes dazzled by the scene ahead.
“Oh, didn’t I tell you?” says Sophie. “The Con
sortium will be in attendance, watching from up there.”
My heart thuds. I had no idea they cared…
“And the middle chair…” continues Sophie, bristling with excitement. “Well, that will be occupied by Director Cromwell, the Consortium’s senior member. I hope you girls know what an honour that is.”
I look upon the scene again, and the word ‘honour’ doesn’t register.
Fear. Nerves. Deep anxieties.
Those are all far more appropriate.
10
“I didn’t even realise the Consortium had a senior member,” Tess is saying as the car curves into an underground parking garage to the side of the road. “So, this Director Cromwell is their boss?”
“I suppose you could say that,” says Sophie. “He’s their elected leader. The members of the Consortium are all the most prominent people in the city, leaders of its various committees and operations. His job is to oversee them all.”
We pull to a stop against a wall, sliding up against other similar looking vehicles. As we do, the walls of the car once more take shape, losing their transparency.
“So, what now?” asks Tess.
“Now, we wait. The ceremony will be beginning soon enough. But before then, let’s take a stroll. Give you a closer look around.”
“Sounds good to me.”
I follow the two of them out as they continue to converse, Tess seeming oddly undaunted by what we’ve just seen. Frankly, I can’t even begin to imagine what it’s going to be like out there when the stands are full, and all eyes are on me.
I shudder and send the thought to the rear of my mind as I jog to catch the others up.
When we emerge outside of the parking garage and onto the city streets, it quickly dawns on me how warm it is. Outside of the academy, it was freezing wearing only this dress. Here, it feels like a regular spring day.
“Underfloor heating,” Sophie says, tapping her heeled foot on the ground. “It’s the same across Inner Haven. The temperate is based on scientific evidence for the ideal heat for happiness and productivity.”
“I’m starting to see the appeal of living here,” jokes Tess, a vocal hater of the cold.
