Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The room was unexpectedly warm, a virtual fire burning in the fireplace, the room decorated in deep ochre reds and golds, the desk an echo of its proprietor, tall, wide, and square, imitating the colour of wood, but cold as metal to the touch. A wide, wide window on left when facing the desk displayed the busy hum of Jiin86.

« Hello. My name is Fey. »

She had to stand on her toes to see above the desk. She was too fidgety to stand still and tip-toe at the same time, so she swayed and fumbled just above the desk. Her hair, a deep, silky ebony, swung in curls past her waist, and her lace shoes with the silver buckles reflected the firelight.

« Fey. How do you spell that ? » the man behind the counter asked.

« F-E-Y. Fey. I’m seven. » It wasn’t said with pride, rather as a matter of fact, as though she were anticipating the question.

« Good. Very good. My name is General Loydd. » the man said. He was very, very big. His hair was grey, and he wore a grey uniform with an orange badge. His face was very big too, and his eyes were very small, and dark blue.

Fey didn’t like him. What’s more, he hadn’t told her his age.

« How old are you, General Loydd ? »

His answer was curt and distant « You must never ask your elders how old they are, Fey. It’s rude. » the man said.

Fey nodded very compliantly. It didn’t matter anyways. She already knew he was fifty-seven. And he didn’t like her either.

The man leaned forward, the leather of his chair squeaking unpleasantly as he did so, and he placed his hands on the edge of the desk, tightening his fingers on either side of Fey’s frail form. He smiled in a manner that was meant to be reassuring, but instead made Fey quail and let go of the desk, shifting her weight onto the balls of her feet to look up at him, watching his thin lips stretch over his yellow teeth.

« Tell me about these visions of yours, Fey. »

« Okay. » she said, she still had not smiled. « It’s about the dark time. »

« You mean the gammas. » the General corrected.

« No. That’s what they called it afterwards, but in my dream, it was the dark time. »

« It started a long, long time ago. People were happy. They were happy because lots of new things were being made, new medecine, new toys, new games. They were happy because everybody was at peace. There was no war, no famine, and education for all. Everybody always wore white. And nobody got sick. Nobody had to do anything because of them. »

The General frowned, leaning closer, his thick salt-and-pepper brows edging dangerously over his greedy eyes. « Who ? »

« Them. They were like people, except they weren’t born. We made them. Just like us. They smiled and laughed and played, but mostly they worked. They did all the work for all the people, and the people never smiled at them, or said thank you. The people thought things were perfect. They thought everyone was happy just like them. But it was a lie. »

She was in a trance now, staring straight ahead, standing stock still, nothing moving but her mouth in that dull, monotonous voice.

« It was a lie. There were these places, these places where people would go. If they started to cough, or if they were strange, if they did things differently. They would take them to these places, and put them in these chairs. They had these strange little hands, that they put inside your eyes, to keep them open, and they’d pull and pull until your eyes were wide, and they’d take a long metal cord and put it inside your brain. And they’d scream. The people, the strange people would scream and scream. It hurt them. And afterwards, they’d be empty. Nothing inside. No souls. They would take the empty shells and put them all together, in a big pile, in a big room, and burn them. Then they would dump the ashes in tehse other places. Filled with tons and tons of people who never got to be inside the perfect place. Who weren’t happy like the happy people. They were always coughing and doing strange things. They didn’t have them. The made people. Only themselves. So one day, there was a boy, his name was Starylai. Or, « Starry Lie. ». He was very famous. He made a strange thing. He said it was to change everything. To switch it all. To make the happy people sad and the sad people glad. He said that if he released it, it would hurt the happy people. Some of the sad people wanted him to do it, and gave him his help, they were called « LaLègue ».

« They planned it all, made sure everything was just right, and then they released it from a tower in the sky. Nobody could see it, but I could. It was like a mist, a cloud, that got bigger and wider, rolling all over the world and everywhere…. Except for the place with the sad people. It killed and ravaged and hurt. People weren’t happy anymore. People sometimes mutated, became monsters, everybody lost somebody they loved. The androids malfunctioned, everything broke down. Soon there was nothing left, just a few hurt, angry people scattered all over the world. And then « LaLègue » took over. They said they could help. They cured the sick people, they cured the mutated people, and they made dome cities all over the planet to protect everyone. They separated each dome into three sectors. Sector one, two, and three. One was at the top, for people who were allieged to LaLègue. Sector two was in the middle, for those who had neither aided nor abetted. »

« A-and Sector three ? » The General stuttered, flustered and bereft by her pause. « What happpened to Sector 3 ? »

But suddenly she jolted, paused, and snapped into lucidity, her pupils widening and eyes darkening.

General Loydd came around the desk now, his small eyes bright and eager, to kneel in front of the little girl who, even here, barely reached his chest. « Fey, » he said very gently, raising a shaking hand to touch her and then dropping it to his side without even grazing her face, « Who did they put into sector three ? »

Her head snapped up, and she smiled in a manner entirely to cold for her age. « I’m sorry, General. Did you hear me say Sector three ? You must be mistaken. »

« What do you mean, » he growled, « mistaken ? »

« Why, General, » she breathed in her little voice. « There is no Sector three. »

And with those words there was a hard, urgent knock at the door.

The General stood, spine straightning automatically, chin rising, and pushed a small pale blue button on his desk.

The door behind Fey slid open, the synthetic, blindingly white hallway outside emitting a blue light that cooled the office. A man in full attire, proudly carrying three badges on his breast, saluted the General stiffly and promptly. The General returned it.

« State your presence, Lieutenant. »

« Sir, yes Sir ! » the man was efficient, prompt, and distant. He served without any thought to the cause he was fighting for or why he was fighting it. He simply did, and was, and was too brainwashed to conceive of any other notion of living. That is why his rank was so high. « Sir, We have a man down in Field 101, Sir. »

« Since when is that a problem ? » The General said, rolling his eyes, « Clean it up and send the body through to Space Tech. »

«Sir, No, Sir. » said the Lieutenant. « He was driving the Cr’ayne import, Sir. »

The Cr’ayne import was an illegal trade between the Earthian army and a distant and technologically advanced alien race named the Proiitecsht. They were a passive race that enjoyed luxury voraciously. They produced weapons only to finance their desire for the most lavish and expensive of all things in the universe. However, the technology they procurred crossed the Universal Interspatial Warfare Laws that had been Instated over fifty years before. If anybody realized the actual power of this ship, or that the earthian army possessed it, they could end up being penalized by Universal Contract.

The General snapped out an oath. « Alright, Lieutenant. »

Turning to the little girl, he ordered her, very promptly, to stay in the room. « I’ll send an officer to come and fetch you in a little bit of time. Until then don’t touch anything, and remain where you are. »

« Of course, General. » she said, smiling.

Saluting the Lieutenant again, they left the Office, the door sliding shut behind them and latching to lock.

Fey smiled again, as she had been smiling for the past twenty minutes, sickly, emptily, as though her face were a mask. She turned to the window, advancing to gaze out upon it’s white, orange, and grey splendor.

Even when drops fell into her lap and seeped through the fabric to her skin, she failed to realize that she was crying.

There was something thick and viscous all over his hands… dripping onto the floor, cooling on his fingers, making his skin tingle. He could hear nothing but for the slight buzz in his ears of his blood rushing to all parts of his body, trying desperately to get where it was needed, and also, the harried, ragged panting that he thought was somebody else, but soon realized was his own breath, puffing out into the humid, confined space.

Blood and sweat, that was what he smelt, filling the air with it’s sour copery aroma, making his empty stomach roil in distaste.

His hair was slick with it, brown becoming auburn. Although he wasn’t sure how much of the red was blood and how much was the drug. It was a moment before he was aware that he was even conscious, which was strange for him because this realization suggested that at a certain point he had become unconscious, and his understanding of everything between the time the red had gone and now was a sharp, grainy buzz of colour and noise and lack of control.

And so.

His stomach, his chest, his hair, covered in blood, his body trapped, hanging, dripping onto the surface below, his body convulsing involuntarily. He tried to speak, to say soemthing, but his mouth filled with the same viscousness and he found himself spitting out nothing but gurgles and chokes.

Finally.

He gasped out, cried, moaned, squeezing his eyes shut to rid them of the blood steadily pooling then opening them again in shock. Panting noisily. Trying to keep up with himself.

Still, no panic, confusion, disorientation, perhaps, but no panic. He didn’t understand. Where was he ? Why was he bleeding ?

He tried to breathe deeply, but something was holding his chest down, crushing it against another surface. Lifting his arm, he tried to manoeuver it between him and the object, squeezing it, with great pains, towards his chest – and yet, before his palm had reached a quarter of the way across, he felt an obstruction of some sort.

« Ah… » his breath caught and whooshed out, as his fingers encircled a wide, sharp object, and dipped into the hole it made, piercing through his skin and into, he could only imagine, his heart.

Frowning, he tried to remove it, push it back out, but the object was too thick, too heavy, too strong. He tried one last time, straining against the metal, then abandoned the task, gasping for air as he shut his eyes again, blood and tears leaking into his ears.

A sudden staticky noise buzzed all around him, and, craning his neck, he could just barely catch sight of the controls above him, as well as the holoscreen that materialized there.

A grim, square face with small, dark eyes stared back at him.

« Major. » the voice buzzed.

« S-s-sir… » Rhoogan moaned a the screen, his fingers twitching as, slowly, as if triggered by the Lieutenant’s presence, the pain began to seep into his conscious.

« I cannot begin to express my disappointment in you, Major. That’s a very expensive and potentially dangerous ship you’ve got there. » he said, his voice curt and cold and distant.

« Sir… Please.. I need- »

« In fact, » interrupted the General, « If we were to send you in to the medical unit you no doubt require, some questions, would, of course, be asked. Questions that the Earthian Government is not prepared to answer. Nor the Earthian Army itself. »

Rhoogan’s head swung as another lot of blood expelled itself. « Oh god… » he moaned. « Oh m-my god. »

« You see, Major T-601, one of the most cutting edge technological advances involved with the craft you high-jacked today is that all of its impulses are connected to a main computer board, a ‘mothership’ if you will. »

Desperation. « Please. »

« As a result, we are completely aware of your injuries and their potential implications for yourself and our organization. In case you are not aware, one of the ribs of the ships inner skeleton has detached itself and punctured your heart, inserting itself into your left side and out the back of your body. »

« No, god, no… »

« By the time we dispatch a medical unit to your location, have them attempt to salvage you from the ruins of our ship, and get you back to the hospital, it will be entirely too late to find you an artificial heart, especially considering the fact that you shouldn’t even be alive now, and also the fact that in light of some recent occurrences,any man with android parts, or, F.A., rather, will be terminated immediately, as they will be considered a liability to the Earthian army. »

« S-s-sir… Help-p-p m-me. Please. » His sobs replaced his pants, echoing in the still space, racking his already pained body with shudders and convulsions.

Undaunted, the Lieutenant continued, « Now, because attempting to save you would prove both futile and unfortunate for us as well as you, we’ve decided it is in our best interests to terminate you. »

« No ! »

« An undercover craft will be sent in due time to dispose of the ship with you in it. » the Lieutenant attempted an encouraging and mildly sorrowful smile here, which ended up looking a bit more like the face of an overweight reptile in pain. « Until then, just think happy thoughts, and know that you are entirely responsible for your misfortune »

The holograph bleeped out, leaving Rhoogan in the deafening silence that was his imminent death, punctured by his quiet and unabashed sobs.

The ruin of the village was so vast that even Yaan, blind as she was, knew that what remained was nowhere near what had been, and she found herself running through it before she had cleared the back of the beast she rode. Her sandaled feet pounded the earth, smeared in ash and blood and soot, and the continuously falling flakes of ash, feather-light, clung to her hair and shoulders.

She stopped in the square, moaning in disbelief.

Ruin. Everything was in ruin. The air was filled with silence, with the deadly soundless moan of loss. And all of this was above ground. What had happened beneath ?

When she finally found the gate to the underbelly of Or’gone, she found it littered with the bodies of those who’d been desperately trying to gain entrance before they were obliterated. She found herself gagging,choking, head reeling as she was forced to turn away and double over, spewing orange bile onto the sodden ground beneath her feet.

She had to clear the bodies, push them out of her way, feeling blood sliding beneath ger grip, simply to get to the gate.

Which, once copper in colour and gilded with carved leaves and vines, was now charred and blackened, and stained with blood. This too slid beneath her fingers, cutting at her already calloused skin, as she ran her fingers over it, sobbing her disbelief, shaking with fear and shock and anger.

In her attempt to open it, she found that it could be wrenched off with barely any force applied at all, practically crumbling in her grasp. She grimaced at the potent and rank stench of burnt flesh and boiled blood as she gingerly stepped over the bodies, advancing into the darkness.

The musky, overwhelming sedative scent of old, motheaten pages, leather, and glue, filled her senses and brought tears to her eyes. Would she ever smell so sweet a scent again ? Would she ever feel those pale, fragile flakes of parchment beneath her fingers beyond this moment, this memory ? She wanted to sit, to run her fingers over the words she could not read, to feel those pages one last time. And yet, somehow, she knew, time was of the essence.

She headed towards the back of the room, knowing that there would be a table about as high as her knee, and on them she would find the books she needed to complete it. Complete her full documentation of every work that had demonstrated what had made the earthians of the past so humane, and had convinced her that those she was surreounded by know inhumane.

Reaching out, she tried to grasp the books with her fingers, but instead her hand came in contact with a rough, calloused hand instead.

She withdrew her hand in a flash.

« What ? » she whispered, reaching out again, but this time, those warm, rough fingers grasped hers. She gasped, trying to pull away but feeling the grip tightening, painfully.

« Whatcha lookin’ for, darlin’ ? » the voice was calm, gruff, and deep. She recognized it instantly as Kimu’s.

« What are you doing here ? » she murmured, « You aren’t supposed to know about this place. »

The hand creeped up her arm,tightening on her shoulder and pulling her up against damp, rank muscle. She shuddered in revulsion. His breath reeked of hemp and gari and raw meat. It became ever strong as he leaned down to address her. « Just how dumb do you think I am, Girly ? Did you think I’d risk antagonizing the fuckin’ domedwellers and risk my skin ? » he chuckled lowly, « Might as well save it, and trade what they really want and need. Labourers, workers, lab rats. Your grandmother and all the rest of your kin are already loaded onto a truck for D-NYC. You’ll be on your way before long, yerself. »

The horror and fear was fresh and real before her eyes, stars exploding. « You filthy, vile beast. You foul monster » she spat in his face, and had barely caught her breath when a searing backslap, startling in it’s force and intensity, tumbled her over the floor and into a pile of books. Disoriented, she was not prepared to be hauled up again.

« I ought to keep you as a slave to warm my fucking bed, ye nasty whore. Aren’t worth much more. »

Angry, she tried to pull away, but he still held her close. He started pulling her away, his grip cutting into her skin, and this foul reek filling her head. Crying out she lashed out, catching him with her elbow and then lunging forward, toppling the table and falling back.

His angry heaving breaths filled the silence as she scrambled back, hands feeling through the papers and closing upon the book chips. The second her hands closed around them she was hauled up and flung over Kimu’s shoulder, screaming as she was carried away. Knowing in her heart that she would never hear of Orgone, or her grandmother again.