Though she was nowhere near done reading, Leia stood to her feet, placing the book down on the little table that rested next to her favorite library chair. A tender fur upholstered the oversized seat, and she could snuggle herself into it like the warmest hug. The fact that the material bore a faded version of her favorite pale teal color rendered it even more special, but this morning, she could not afford to get behind on her chores. She stepped over to the window and twisted the volume of the speakers down until they clicked off. Rafi really was a genius, reworking the scrap from the dump into little gadgets based solely on the manuals he found in the library. And how had he figured out which parts of the dome’s discarded machines held sound? She never understood when he tried to explain. Humans were not supposed to have access to that knowledge – only machines. She thought that was how the ridiculous robots kept everyone afraid of them, by reserving the magic for themselves and leaving the humans to minimal access.
Of course, it hadn’t ever worked on the people of her village, due in large part to her mother’s inside knowledge of how the domes worked. Leia especially was never afraid of the machines. They just seemed so mindless no matter how much they resembled people. The humans inside were much more terrifying, though probably not personally dangerous to her. People who administered an end-of-life drug? Who made dying more palatable, easier? That was messed up. Not that the insiders thought much about it since they were all sedated by the Curse. From what she could tell, they were left just alert enough to avoid turning into the zombies she had read about from a couple of centuries before – the ones shoved into hospitals and institutions. Insiders received just enough medicine not to complain, not to feel fear or emotional pain. To feel almost no emotions at all.
Just thinking about it sent prickles across her skin.
If her mother’s words meant anything, the ones Leia really needed to worry about were the Unspoken. Even the name infuriated her. According to her mother, Unspoken were the closest to guards or enforcers that anyone in the cage could claim, and if one of them found Leia, she just knew something awful would happen. Unspoken seemed a thousand times more alert to the world around them than the rest of the Insiders, like they were immune to the Curse or something. No one she had seen inside was as tall as Leia, but the Unspoken were strong. Some looked almost as strong as Rafi. She wouldn’t want to try to escape from one.
Overhead, the sun had just crested the top of the low dwellings when she had fulfilled her day’s responsibilities, and as she slid through the open gate, Leia stuck to the south side of the buildings to take advantage of the slightly wider shadows. The darkness still spanned the gap between the buildings from east to west, but she really didn’t know how long it would take her to make it across to the other side since she couldn’t walk and had to slip in and out of shadows. Whatever happened, she would need to wait until evening to head back or she wouldn’t find enough shade to hide her. Unless I go out a different gate. Did she risk the wilderness in an area she hadn’t explored with Travers? She had encountered enough wild animals, and an occasional wild man, on her treks with her once-guardian, and she didn’t care to encounter another during the day, much less after dark.
She already been inside for several hours when the alarms went off, and Leia had to fight a sudden panic. Fear was a liar, Eva had taught her, but fear was also a friend. Fear told a person to pay attention, then it was up to him or her to figure out why. Like Eva had taught her, she tried to take her thoughts captive, to pull the panic back into a compartment so she could examine the reality of her situation. She slid down against a building to hunker in the shadows, unable to think what she should do. Maybe Travers had been right; maybe she shouldn’t have gone so far into a cage. But her dad…she couldn’t think, so she closed her eyes. Her mind was buzzing, like unsmoked hives.
She could discern a slight elevation in the silence as people moved en masse from wherever they had been back to their dwellings, but even that range sinister to her confused thoughts. She squeezed her eyes shut. No one had any reason to look into the narrow strip of grass that ran between the low white stucco structures, and nobody inside seemed to suffer from an excess of curiosity. When the hum of a machine approached, she blinked up against the contrast from the backs of her lids. A man hovered on one of the Advocate’s little boards, only a few feet from her, and she scooted back into a ball, terrified even as that fear infuriated her.
On the board, he stood probably a couple of inches taller than her, but Leia knew he would look up to her from the ground level. Like all the Unspoken, his physique bulged with a well-defined musculature, somehow cleaner etched than her hardscrabble companions outside the dome. Maybe it was just the smooth skin, unusually pale under his flaxen hair. He was like a statue and a monster rolled into one, and he was an Unspoken – somehow, she held in the scream that tried to escape.
Even in the darkness, she could tell that he stared directly at her.
Her rational mind insisted that he wasn’t aggressive or ready to pounce on her, but her heart was racing like she was about to be killed. When he hopped off the board to approach her, though, his strength and expression carried a calming effect, and her fear melted into wariness. Finally, she could breathe, and she practiced counting to ten as she breathed in and out like her mother had taught her. Why was an Unspoken staring at her with so much curiosity? Curiosity and something else she didn’t know. If she hadn’t known better, she would think it similar to the craving crush of the adolescent boys in the village when they pined after their young women peers. The expression on this man’s face, though, more resembled eagerness, or maybe…hunger. Leia shivered and scooted further into the shadow.
“Are you an ANGEL?” the man queried.
With a quick glance to either end of the corridor, Leia sought a line of escape, but of course, she could discern none. That would have been too easy.
“Of course, you’re not an ANGEL,” he murmured to himself. “An ANGEL would never hide.” He mimicked her earlier motion, glancing back and forth to the ends of the corridor. “But the similarity is uncanny. You’re so tall…I know all the human faces in this city, and yours isn’t one of them. Since you’re dressed this way, I can only assume you’re trying to pass yourself off as an Angel.”
She made a mistake cowering like she had – if she had just stood tall, maybe he wouldn’t have noticed her. But, no. Of course she couldn’t. As much as she was brave in ideals, once reality hit, she couldn’t always keep it up. And whatever strange effect of the dome was stripping her of her confidence even more. “Maybe you’re wrong,” she challenged, her voice shaking. “Maybe I’m not pretending.
Instead of believing her, a grin split his face. “I’m not wrong. And it looks like you are in a bit of trouble.”
All of her alarms were going off because had she stood in a similar position outside the dome, she would likely face serious danger. But did crimes even happen inside the dome? She had never heard of one, and the Remnant had been exchanging with the Insiders since the inception of the domes. Surely she would have heard…“But you’re an Unspoken,” she ventured. “Why aren’t you taking me in?”
“An Unspoken?” The smile widened. “That’s quite the label coming from a Deplorable.”
“What do you know about the Remnant?” She wouldn’t let the “Deplorable” label stand.
“The Remnant…Not much, apparently. The only Deplorable I know is twice my age.”
In her current circumstances, with the swell of anxiety, his charm rang as more a ploy than sincere, and it hardened her against him. “Well, you don’t want to mess with the younger ones – we tend to be unpredictable.”
He shook his crown of golden hair in denial. “This is too good of an opportunity – I’m not letting you get away until I can find out a little more about what I’m missing out on.”
The words finally gripped Leia and raised her to her feet. He wasn’t going to let her get away” With strength like his, she wouldn’t stand a chance. She knew her own strength, and she knew the strength of a man. As recently as a couple of years before, Travers had hauled her out of a ditch where she had fallen while hiking with him and Marion. At half Travers’ age, the man before her would face even less difficulty manhandling her. When the alarms stopped, Leia forced herself to breathe, aware that the calmer streets would improve her chances of escaping. “You don’t mean that. You’re not going to keep me here, right?”
“Not really up to me at the moment,” he shrugged. “When the alarm sounds, the gates lock, and they can’t open under any circumstances until morning. I’ve seen them close for as long as two weeks before, so we just might have to find somewhere to keep you.”
Two weeks? She had to get past this man so she could find a way out, whatever he said. She backed away from him, avoiding the light that escaped from the windows that might expose her. Gauging the distance on either side of the Unspoken, she eased to the darker side of the alley. With every ounce of strength, she sprung toward the gap.
In her memory, she hadn’t seen a man move so fast, and he had thrown his body in her path before she made an inch past him. Still, she pressed her feet into the grass beneath her with as much force as she could manage, even spinning away from the wall to see of she could gain the other side. Instead, she found herself vised tightly in an unforgiving grip, his arms encircling her with her arms pinned to her sides.
“So, you’d rather deal with the Mechs?” he grunted against her struggle.
“I’d rather make that decision myself,” she panted. “I know they can’t hurt me, unlike you.” Frustrated, she finally stopped struggling, aware that she could never win against this man’s strength. Maybe it was the age difference or some drug they gave the Unspoken, but even Travers and Rafi didn’t move like this man. She would have to rely on brains instead of brawn.
“Look…” He relaxed his arms just enough that he wasn’t going to hurt her but not enough for her to move away from him. “I don’t know how everything works in this dome, but I know that when the alarms sound, there is something that happens to everybody’s fear – I think it’s something they do to get everyone back in their dwellings. If you can wait a little bit before you panic into something dangerous, the effects should soon wane. They want people to sleep, so they somehow undo the panic. As long as you keep your head for a while, you should be okay soon. The Mechs aren’t supposed to be able to hurt anyone, but not only are you an outsider, you are doing something I have never seen in my life. You’re upsetting the order, and maintaining order is the machines’ main directive.”
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
“What are these Mechs you keep talking about?”
“If I let you go, will you promise not to run?” When she nodded her head, he released her toward the back of the alley, and though she spun on him with fury, she didn’t try to run. Whether because of the power of suggestion or because something had really changed, her panic was fading. “The Mechs –” The man held out his hands as if to appease a nervous animal. “ – are the machines that run this place. They don’t like disturbances, and they don’t really care who causes them. You sick them on me, and they will almost definitely come after you, too.”
At least this time when the panic rose, she could breathe it away. He was right. Even though she thought of the people inside the dome as unalterably different from her, they were at least human, so she might be able to predict them on some level. The machines? She had no idea what they were capable of.
“It’s okay, angel,” the man soothed, and he stepped toward her again, gently laying one hand on her arm. “You’re okay with me. If you let me help you, I can take you some place until they open the gates.”
She peered at him from under her lashes, not at all certain what he really intended. Even though she could easily have interpreted his words as a threat, with his offer to “take her some place,” his teasing manner rendered them less clear. From what she could hear, the numbers of people in the street had already dwindled because of the alarm, and even if she had wanted to run, there were few humans in the streets to hear her. He was likely right about the machines. “Where will you take me?”
He tried to take her hand, but instead, she twisted away from him altogether, raising her eyebrows at him in defiance.
“No, I guess not. Let me go look around before we bring you out into the light, even if there’s not much of it yet. You’re right about most of the Unspoken – you can’t trust them – but I will figure out somewhere you can be safe.” He glanced to the end of the path and then strode in the opposite direction. Once he reached the edge of the building, he peered around in assessment before returning to Leia. “Okay, now I need you to listen. My name is Ivan, and you’re right: I’m an Advocate, which you apparently call an ‘Unspoken. Sounds like things have calmed down,” he ventured, “so at this point, if we get out of here, chances are that no one will notice an ANGEL and an Advocate walking down the street after an alarm – as long as you can play the part.”
“What are you talking about? I haven’t even agreed to anything.”
“You could just stay here. Or, you could walk out of here with me and we can get you some place safer.”
“Even if I said yes, I don’t know if I can. I’ve been in here a long time, and the Curse has had a bad effect on me. There’s this place I go to in my head, where I play cool. And you have definitely ruined that for me.” She managed a glare, but he just flashed another grin.
“Let me see you try.”
Drawing a breath, Leia blanked her expression, adopting her best impression of the stiff, unnatural ANGELs.
“Not bad…” Ivan allowed, “but I think you should try to stay in the shadows.”
“Okay, where do you plan to take me?” she demanded again.
“You’re not going to like it, but it is one of the only unmonitored places in the dome.”
“Which is?”
“Come with me. We’ll talk as we walk.” Before she had time to pull back, he had gripped her hand, tucking the board under his other arm. Leia wanted to drag her feet like she had before, but she had just about given up. She guessed this “Ivan” could have reported her to his compatriots if he were going to. Surely, they carried around some kind of electronic communication device. She would never make it out if she ran for it. If he headed anywhere near the Discord, she would just take her chances and run.
Once they stepped into the street, she realized that “Ivan, was right.” Not only did no one seem to notice the “ANGEL” and the Advocate walking together, but people looked away from them.
“You’re the problem in the east,” the man interrupted her thoughts.
“I’m what?”
“You’re the anomalies. The people who change their minds about Relenting, the – I don’t know what to call them.”
“Unrelenters.”
“Huh, that makes sense. The Unrelenters. Man, you’re tall…” he repeated.
Leia almost smiled at his obvious disbelief. He was only a couple of inches shorter than her, above average for the dome, she would guess. “We’re not pumped full of poison from the time we’re born. Before you’re born, really.”
“Poison?”
“The Curse?” she challenged, and she could read his confusion. “It’s what they pump into the air that makes you guys so miserable.”
“I’m not miserable. Especially at the moment.” His crooked smile showed that he meant it.
“You’re an Unspoken. They make you guys different – scarier.”
“Scary? Me?” Ivan laughed without making a noise. “You’re the size of a giant, and I’m the scary one.”
She wasn’t sure how to answer, but circumstance stole her thoughts anyway. As they passed a cross street, black eyes glinted at her from a shadowed corner opposite where she strolled with Ivan. It was a man, his olive skinned and sable hair difficult to discern against the deepening shadow. His gaze narrowed as their eyes met, and a muscle twitched in his rigid jaw. Like Ivan, the uniform accentuated the cut of his obvious strength, but he stood taller – maybe only an inch shorter than Leia herself. She found herself leaning toward Ivan, as if she could trust him for protection.
“He’s not as scary as he looks,” Ivan interrupted her thoughts as the man passed out of view.
“He looks scary. And why did he look at you that way? Is he angry at you? I thought people inside couldn’t get angry.”
Ivan scowled, an expression Leia wouldn’t have expected on his face. “He doesn’t like me all that much, but I wouldn’t say he’s angry. Not that Advocates don’t get angry – they do, just not in the aggressive sense. We can get something close to irritated – I don’t have much experience discerning between the two, but I think that’s more the reality. Advocates are given a drug that…takes away our contentment. ”
As he had spoken, his face fell, and Leia’s next words came out more gently despite the sentiment. “Is that what you call the non-life you spend in here?”
“I mean, I guess it’s boring.” He shrugged. “…but at least no one is sad.”
“No one is alive,” she retorted. “Whatever is in the air just sucks the life out of you.”
“You said that before. Why do you think there is something in the air? You couldn’t know anything about what’s in our air.”
“Well, I know that something is in the air, because when I’m in here too long I get sick. It’s probably what sent me into a panic before.” She had forgotten to watch the road as they talked, and all of the sudden, a large building rose in front of her. “You brought me to Discord?” she gasped, and in an instant, she chose a path and dashed toward it. An unforgiving hand gripped her arm and halted her forward progress.
“Wait!” Ivan hissed. “Just wait.”
She tried to pull away from him, but she couldn’t shake his grip without drawing attention to herself.
“Yes, this is Benevolence, but wait – we’re not going in. Just come with me over here.”
He began to drag her, and at first she resisted, but when she realized that he had aimed them east of the Discord, she let her feet shuffle along with only a hint of drag. “Where are you taking me?”
“I admit, it’s not the most fun place, but no one goes there.” He approached a gate that stood in a white stucco wall, barely discernible from the house attached to it. When he opened it, the smell hit her, and a gag rose in her throat.
“Is this…a dump?”
“There’s one nearby here, on the outside, and it’s the only place the vent coincides with a dump – which means, no one likes to come here.”
“Understandable. You can’t expect me to go in there.”
“I heard that you Deplorables were prone to drama, but it’s not that bad.”
“Maybe if you’re brain-dead from inhaling zombie drugs all the time. Otherwise, it’s awful. Besides, if I go in there, I’ll be trapped. This whole place is a cage, but that is like a box. And the smell…”
“Look, angel –”
“It’s Blix,” she insisted, finally tired of the charming act.
“What is?” The curiosity was back.
“My name is Blix.”
“Seriously?”
“What’s wrong with Blix?”
“It’s…I don’t know, it’s not exactly human. Just hold on a kronia.” When she tried to pull away from him, he gripped her arm with irresistible force and yanked her inside, vising her other arm once the struggle would be out of sight of the road. When he had a firm grasp, he pressed her against the wall of one of the houses, riveting his eyes to hers. “Just stay here – inside the gate, okay? You can prop it with your foot so it doesn’t shut, since you’re so nervous. Maybe you can get some fresh air. I won’t be gone long.”
How was this man so persistent? She wanted to scream at him, though she didn’t want to draw attention to herself. “If I let you go, you’ll get someone to help you restrain me.”
He made a very deliberate motion to peer at each of his hands where they held her in place. “Do you think I need help to restrain you?”
She gritted her teeth. Apparently not. “If you want me to stay quiet.”
Shrugging, Ivan released one of her arms, digging in his pocket for something before holding it out to her. “Take this.” She just stared at it then back at him, so he shoved its handle into her hand. “It shoots a charge through anyone within five feet in front of it. I request that you don’t try it on me yet, or I won’t be able to move for ten kronia, and I need to take care of something before someone comes looking for me.” Turning the little device so she could see it better, he indicated a small round, black disk that sat naturally under her thumb. “Look…You’ll just push this button if someone looks aggressive.”
“How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
He finally let her go completely, convinced she wouldn’t run now that he had given her the means to immobilize him. “Then just shoot me now, I guess.” He held his hands up in surrender. “I’d rather you didn’t, though, since it hurts, and I won’t be able to move for a bit.”
When she didn’t push the button, he sought her eyes. “No? Can I leave now?”
“Could I stop you?”
His eyes dropped to the gadget. “Yes, you could. But I have to meet a couple of my coworkers in the next little bit or they’re going to come looking for me. I’ll get back as soon as I can – alone, I promise.” He reached for her waist, using leverage to spin her so that she could see down the length of the wall behind her. “ When I return, I’ll come through a door on this wall.” He pointed to a faint outline. It was getting harder to see as the shadows deepened, but she thought she could make out the outline of a door.
“Fine.” She swallowed as the fingers brushed across her hip. “I might wait, and I might not.” Of course, she would wait, though his lack of propriety sent her into more anxiety than being trapped in an alley. Still, she knew that she was entirely too sheltered in that sense, and she recognized that she couldn’t understand the customs inside the dome. Come to think of it, she had never seen a man and woman as much as holding hands inside, but maybe it just wasn’t a public practice. “Maybe I’ll be here when you get back.”
With another smirk and a shake of his head, Ivan backed away, mounting his board again as he disappeared through the gate. Once he was gone, Leia stared into the near black of the night shadows. In the streets outside the little gate, silence reined. Other than the soft, easily discernible shuffle of the ANGELs and the occasional low whoosh of the Advocates’ boards, she could hear nothing. Apparently, the people in the Cage were scared enough of the sirens that they stayed inside when they were told.
Blowing out a breath, she forced herself to relax. Compared to all these people inside, she held a world of freedom, even the freedom to resist an Unspoken. She wasn’t drugged into submission.
Leia’s lip curved up for a moment, wondering if Travers and Rafi wished she were so obedient. No, that’s unfair, she admitted to herself. Even for obedience, they knew that this kind of forced submission was one of the evilest of practices. Sliding down to the ground, she picked up a few pebbles from the dirt. A game of solo knucklerocks was her only hope of passing the time without going crazy.