Glancing up at the screen, Kaĉjo narrowed his eyes. He was still learning the monitors, but even he could read the anomalies.

Fourteen Relenters, all within ten city blocks of the eastern gate, had decided not to go through with the procedure.

“It’s always been the eastern gate,” offered Channer when he noticed the direction of Kaĉjo’s eyes. “I mean, for the past sixteen or so years. A few times, we would see a cluster to the southeast or northeast for a month, but it was always east.”

“So, is it a mechanical problem? Are the Dispensers malfunctioning?”

“That’s what you and I are going to try to find out.” With that, Channer gripped the scanner and started to the door, the eager Kaĉjo close on his heels.

“I could see a mechanical problem if it limited itself to a particular block, since they share circuitry, but several disconnected clusters?”

“That’s the thing, though,” Channer shrugged. “Nothing’s actually disconnected. I mean, they have their own grid, but all the wires come together into a node under each block, and then that node combines with the other nodes before being sent out from the neighborhood for power. The malfunction would require both an upline and a downline disruption to system, and that seems unlikely.” They mounted the transports, programmed in the destination, and let the boards carry them out the door. “You might want to hold on since you’ve never used one of these before,” Channer suggested, but since he didn’t look back, Kaĉjo ignored him.

“Could someone have messed with the system from the outside? One of the humans undermining the Structure?”

“The Cure would prevent that, for sure. You know – you’ve only been here a couple of weeks. You remember what it’s like when they have you under the treatment.”

“Just…relaxed, and unconcerned. It’s probably been the hardest part of moving to this job. I wasn’t made for this kind of anxiety.”

“You actually will adapt,” Channer insisted. “It takes a month or two, but your brain stops noticing the constant overstimulation and turmoil. It’s why you’re given a mentor for the transition to majority: they have to give you time, as well as make sure you know the rules before they set you loose.

Kaĉjo blew out a breath. “If I don’t go crazy before then.”

“They don’t let you!” Channer bared his teeth, and Kaĉjo managed a huffed laugh.

“Fine, so what are we looking for?” The white plaster houses lined up neatly, obedient soldiers in the designers’ troop. If not for the slight dip in elevation, Kaĉjo would have no idea that they had moved away from the Paramount, convinced they had traveled in a straight line back to their origin.

“It’s right up here.”

Sensing his companion’s deceleration, Kaĉjo finally gripped the rail, expecting the change in velocity to send him into a lurch. Once the board stopped, he let go, hopping off with ease – no lurch. I should know that Benevolence wouldn’t allow such a thing. Benevolence controlled everything it was possible to control, down to the number of nitrogen particles in the atmosphere. During the day, the monitors shifted constantly, adjusting the ebb and flow of molecules into the dome. At night, once the gates were closed and no more Deplorables could bring risk, the engines whirred at a steady pace, a lulling hum in the backdrop of the night. For Kaĉjo, it seemed as soothing as a lullaby. More soothing, actually, since his vague and disjointed memories of lullabies, no doubt sung by ANGELs, rang haunting and hollow. Without the calming chemicals of the Cure, a shiver ran over Kaĉjo’s skin at the memory.

“The subject is over here,” Channer murmured, tugging Kaĉjo’s thoughts back to his surroundings.

“And why can we not just have him fill out an incident report?”

“He did. It was too generic to give us any relevant information, and Benevolence thinks we can get more with an in-person interview.”

“Benevolence thinks…” Kaĉjo scoffed.

“You know what I mean.”

From inside the little dwelling, Kaĉjo could make out the sound of the Companion alerting the subject of their presence. “Opening the door for the Advocates in thirty seconds,” insisted the cool tones. “Please finalize any necessary apparel.”

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Kaĉjo hesitated even after the door opened, but Channer strode in without preface and began the questioning. Fine with Kaĉjo, since he wasn’t exactly comfortable with the process yet. By the time Channer finished, the “Advocates” walked out with a pretty good idea of what had happened.

“So, an ANGEL came in, went through the usual routine, then sang him a song – that’s different, but available as an option before Relenting.”

“But after this song, the young man changed his mind.”

“It sure would be nice if the ANGELs were connected to Benevolence – he could just tell us which one is malfunctioning.”

“We don’t know that it’s a malfunction, and you know the ANGELs are independent. Not that I know the details, but I’ve been told the disconnect goes all the way back to the Divestiture. The ANGELs were cut off because giving bodies to Benevolence almost wiped out humanity. Unattached, they can serve us. Attached, they caused some kind of rampage against us.”

Whatever Channer said, Kaĉjo had trouble believing ANGELs could ever cause problems for humans – it was their most basic programming, not to hurt people. It was why humans had to carry out the culling. It was why there was a hierarchy of human roles, and most were limited to benevolent monitoring or interference. “So we just have to guess, which is pretty ineffective. I would think it has something to do with the song, but we know all the songs, and this effect seems pretty unlikely with any of them. If it had just been this kid, it might have been an anomaly, but this is almost a dozen in as many weeks. Have you seen anything like this?”

Channer shrugged as they mounted their boards again. The kid had hit on something, and it was something Channer had been thinking about for a couple of years. Why were they disconnected from Benevolence? It would have made their job so much easier, and the histories didn’t say anything that would justify adding so much difficulty to keeping everyone calm. “A few years back there was a cluster of cancellations from Relenting. That was less than ten, but then the general numbers went down on the east side for almost three years. Benevolence tried as many alterations as they could – which is a lot, like in the trillions – and they thought maybe they had found the problem since the numbers resolved in the last iteration.”

“But now this is an even dozen.”

“I certainly hadn’t heard about the singing before. Still, we would have to interview the others, and some of them have decamped to the Dregs.” The singing made Channer uneasy, and he had started to sense the possibility that the general human population – not his men, of course, but the others – had lost some of the order that maintained the peace inside the domes. If he kept seeing signs, he would consult with the Advisor. The man had been preaching reconnection for years, and Channer found the idea more and more compelling.

As the boards slowed, Kaĉjo shook his head. He couldn’t imagine choosing to move out of the city, if for no other reason than things like climate control, insects, food supply, medical care. He had been told that last one brought thousands into the city, and after the mandatory administration of Cure, most of them stayed. After two weeks without his lifelong chemical treatment, his nerves were shot. His reflexes worked fine – maybe even too quickly – but everything approximated pain. Not that he felt actual pain in his flesh, but even the wind on his face created tension inside him.

“We’ll pick back up in the morning,” Channer promised. “I know this seemed like a waste of time and energy, but you needed an inauguration, and we had time for one visit tonight.

The boards took their place along the wall, and Kaĉjo forced himself not to speak. There was no way he could sleep, not without the Cure. As it stood, he dreaded returning to his dwelling, staring at the ceiling again for hours before dozing against his discomfort for a couple more. Just thinking about it, his head hurt, and he glanced back at Channer to see if he noticed. Fortunately, Channer didn’t care about anything beyond work, and once they had finished their job, he had dismissed Kaĉjo out of his mind.

Shrugging his shoulders, Kaĉjo pressed through the door into his dim, pale dwelling. Whatever had happened with the Mitigation, it had awakened serious dissatisfaction in him. Not like the despondency he had felt when he almost Relented – that was motionless and disabling. This feeling? He wanted to move, to tear out of his dwelling and scream at the sky. Then the Mechs will come and sedate me and take me away.

He was going crazy. All it would take was the Cure to fix it, but if he admitted he needed it, they would kick him out of the Advocates. Or maybe they didn’t even do that. Since he had joined, he had known at least one man who disappeared. Maybe he had asked for the Cure, and they had sent him away somewhere. The Sanitorium? he wondered. Despite the lack of official acknowledgement, Kaĉjo had begun to believe the place existed. He had no doubt that if he had been born in the Dregs, without the Cure, he would have ended up there, would have been one of the Broken. The realization terrified him. Would it happen if he broke now?

With an act of will, he slipped off his boots, switched the house to sleep mode, and slid onto his mat. Maybe if he acted like he wasn’t crazy, the craziness would eventually leave him alone. A vision of the SENTORs flashed against the back of his lids, and he thought about the songs they sang. By thee we are saved. They lied. They had not saved him. They had fooled him and given him a vague sense of something beyond himself, beyond the dome. So, was there nothing beyond the dome except a lawless mob of sub-human inhabitants? Beyond the glass of the dome was another dome above the earth, and then near endless space. Squeezing his eyes shut, he listened to the whirring of the Mechs that patrolled in the night. No, there was nothing beyond the dome, and he was too broken to save himself. A last resort, he threw the words up as a shield against the inevitable visions that would visit him in the night. Save me.