Lily stepped outside of her small house, glancing around the neighborhood. A group of kids played in the streets. It kinda looked like they were playing a game of baseball from what Lily remembered seeing images of the game when she was a kid before Sports were phased out of the politic society, citing how dangerous the various sports were.
The old woman everyone in the neighbor called Auntie, for some odd reason, knelt over her garden bed, pulling the weeds. Her husband took care of the yard while she worked. Lily knew he would be making the rounds to see if anyone else need someone to take of their yard while it was still cool.
A pair of young woman walked around the block, as part of their morning routine, chatting about this and that. Their voices drifted up to where Lily stood. Their topics of conversation for the morning was based on a rumor, but it could be true for all they knew. Lily was lending on the side of it being true. A battle on the outskirts of the coastal city had made it to the approved national news and the news anchor had spun it, making it sound like the worst of humanity was revolting against the sensible health laws recently passed.
A third young woman, this one lived across the street from Lily, stepped out of her house, carrying a babe on her hip as she pulled out the stroller and unfolded the stroller before she placed her baby in it and strapped the infant in. She was a new addition to the neighbor of three weeks ago. Her husband worked on some secretive project for the D.O.D. which didn’t explain why they ended up in this neighbor and often gone by sunrise and return well into the night, after the curfew had been activated.
For as Lily had lived in this gated Neighbor, it was always been populated by folks with questionable social credit scores. Somehow one by one, Lily’s neighbors had been forced to move into this community for the simple reason of their social credit scores. It was rare when one of them was able to move out into a different community with better social credit scored neighbors, but that usually happened after, they had disappeared for several weeks and returned with a better social credit score and their attitude toward the rest of the community had turned sour.
A man strolled on the sidewalk with graying brown hair, his hands in his pocket, and watched where he was walking. According to the gossip mill, he recently lost his job because some poor choices, reflecting his social credit score and if he wasn’t careful, he could end up in the re-education camps.
It was a normal Tuesday morning in the neighbor. She sighed, her shoulders slumped forward, and turned to lock her door when she spotted a convoy of 16 black vans sped through the open gate. She straightened up. Her heart skipped a beat then thundered in her chest. The blood rushed through her ears as her eyes followed the black vans to the far end of the street. She was sure there were screams of mothers summoning their children back to the house causing the children to scatter, running as fast as they could back to their homes as the single women hurried back to their homes. The young mother with the stroller didn’t bother taking her babe out of the stroller as she pulled the stroller over the lip of the sidewalk and straight into the house as her baby screamed. She slammed the door behind her once the stroller made it past the door frame.
Auntie’s husband hurried to Auntie and helped her to her feet before they scrambled back to their front door. Lily heard their door slamming shut behind them.
The black vans came to a shrieking stop along the sidewalk and men dressed in black technical gear jumped out of the van, fanning out before they ran up to several different houses.
Lily twisted on her heel and hurried back into the small house. She knew it wasn’t wise to be caught outside when the Men In Black started to dragging her neighbors out of their houses. She shut the door behind her and locked it. It would be a fruitless effect against them. They would be able to destroy the lock and flood her house with their bodies if they were after her. She hurried to the staircase leading to her bedroom and bounced up it. She hoped she could watched her bedroom window who was taken. She dropped her duffel bag at the foot of the bed and leaped on to it. She bounced as she landed on her knees and hands before she crawled up to the small window. She pulled back the curtain and peer to the street below.
A group of The Men in Black stopped in front of the house on Lily’s right. She gulped, wondering if they were coming to visit her as well. She hoped they weren’t. The Group Leader stepped forward and banged on the door, hard enough for it to rattle before he shouted, “OPEN UP!” he didn’t announced who he was. He wouldn’t have to. By now, everyone knew The Men In Black had arrived. However, the leader didn’t wait long. He stepped aside and nodded to one of his men. Two buffed looking men stepped forward and ran into the door. The door flew inward. It wasn’t long before Lily heard the screams of a woman for The Men in Black to stop and a man pleading for them to stop, that he didn’t know what he did wrong before they appeared. A glanced at the couple informed anyone watching from their curtain windows that the couple had been interrupted. The Men in Black didn’t give the couple to change into type of clothes before they were dragged out like a pair of Jews during Nazi Germany.
Lily pulled away from the curtain window, sitting on her bed, listening to random neighbors scream with rage, and humiliation as they were dragged from their homes by The Men in Black. She heard a gun shot and winced as tears welled up in her eyes. She was next. She knew it. She had to be next, she told herself. She stood up slowly and walked down to the living room before she sat down on the recliner she had managed to get herself a few months back as a reward for improving her social credit score by a few points. She hoped the next person who moved into her house would take good care of her items, but it was just hope.
A bull horn echoed through the silent neighbor, “Good Citizens, please come outside!” Lily took a shaky breath and stood up before she walked to the front door. She opened the door and stepped outside. She glanced around to see Auntie and her Husband walked from their front door with pale expressions, the wife of the D.O.D agent hugged her child close to her chest, and majority of her neighbors appeared on their doorsteps. Mothers holding their children close or stood in front of them.
“Please, gather around.” She turned her head to see the Leader of The Men in Black standing on top of a van. She frowned as she spotted out of the corner of her eye, the man who lost his job recently, his expression held glee and he almost bounced where he stood in the shadows of his house.
“Thank you, Citizens,” The Leader of The Men in Black started. His voice rang through the area, bouncing off the houses, “We have rounded up the people with the lowest social credit scores. They are a risk to this community and the rest of society at large. Don’t worry. In a few weeks, they will be returned to you. Let this be a lesson to you. Your social credit score will help you in life as you follow society’s polite rules. Long Live The Emperor!” There was a click as the bull horn was turned off. The Leader started to step off the van when he paused and turned his gaze on the crowd. There was silence until someone raised their voice, “Long Live The Emperor!” A heartbeat later, a few more voices echoed the line until everyone had said. The Leader of The Men in Black nodded in approval before he jumped down from the top of the Van. Lily watched him as he climbed into the front seat of the van. The Convoy of Black Vans slid out of the gated community, one by one.
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Lily raised her head as she stopped outside of the tall building. She stared at it with empty eyes. She had brought the paperwork she was given yesterday with her, storage in a duffel bag. She had filled it out after she set her cat out. She sighed as she wondered what will happen now. Her life was sad. Most of her family dead in various ways over the years since the Upraising and her social credit score wouldn’t allow her to raise above her station. She brought her gaze back down to the front door where there was a line of people, representing the various walks of life. She spotted one person who walked the more questionable way of life and watched as they pushed their way to the front of the line. She spotted the security guards standing on either side of the front doors. They didn’t move as the person shoved an elderly person to the ground and walked through the doors like they owned the place.
Lily heard the elderly person cry out in pain as they hit the concert. She hurried forward and knelt down beside the elderly person as they struggled to get up. She set the duffel bag on the ground beside her. She placed a hand on the senior citizen’s shoulder and said in a soft tone, “Let me help you.”
The elderly person, Lily could see it was a female or at least thought the person to be female, looked up at her and nodded her head, causing her salt and pepper hair bounced around her head.
“I’ll help,” a male’s voice rang out and Lily glanced over to see it was a male with short brown hair, but he wore a business suit designed for females. She nodded, but she didn’t say anything. It was common sight to see a male wearing female clothing, ever since she was a young child and a cultural revolution happened. She pushed those thoughts away. Hopefully, once she entered the game called High Seas, she would never have to worry about using the wrong pronoun and getting chewed out by a random person. He knelt down beside the elderly woman and held her elbow as Lily and he helped her back to her feet.
“What a pair of sweethearts,” the elderly woman spoke. Her voice did hold the feminine note to it. “Thank you very much for the help.” She walked on shaky legs and rejoined the line.
Lily glanced at the man dressed a business woman and nodded, saying, “Thank you for your help.” She bent over, grabbed the strap for the duffel bag, turned and walked away, joining the line at the end. She glanced down at the duffel bag, thinking about the items in there. She had heard previous gamers who signed up for programs like the one she was about to start had to bring a duffel bag full of comfortable clothes and other such items. It was strange.
According to the paperwork, she would be linked up to the servers for a certain amount of time before she will be pulled out to perform a Health check up which included a mental health check up. Now, she thought about it, it made sense to wear some of her comfortable clothes in stand of hospital grown she had seen characters wear on the HoloStars in the various documents over the pandemics and other hospital themes shows the government allowed the citizens to watch.
She waited in line as it slowly moved. She knew it would take at least another 10 to 15 minutes to enter the building. She hated how everything ran on the QR codes. She didn’t know who put that technology in place, but it came around shortly after the turn of the 21st century during the Great Global Unification Era.
Lily shifted the duffel bag on her shoulder after a few minutes of slowly moving forward. Her shoulder started to hurt. She had packed a few other things she wanted to have on hand for when she pulled out of the game. She hoped the company would allow her to keep them, but she won’t know until she was pulled out. She let out a sigh. There was so many unknowns that it frightened her. Most of the time she had gathered the information she needed before she made her decision, but this time, she didn’t. She didn’t bother looking into the Project Manager’s past or the companies. She didn’t bother looking up all the information about the project she had hired for to participate in. The passing of her cat really screwed her up, mentally. That cat was her baby for the last 7 years.
She blinked, trying not to think about it. She looked up as grabbed her phone for the blasted QR code. She watched the app load as she walked forward and held up her phone to the screen, watching the red light scanned the QR code then turned green before the turnstile clicked. She walked through the turnstile, pushing on a random bar. She entered the lobby to see a large banner saying ‘Welcome, Gamers!’
She walked to the right side of the lobby, looking at the large banner. It was colorful, instead of black and white. She knew that was expensive. She wondered why they even put a banner. She glanced around the lobby and spotted Charlie lending against a wall, looking down at his phone while Julie sat in a nearby chair with a book open on her lap.
Lily felt a bit of joy leap from her heart as she strolled over to her friends. She gave them a smile as she called out, “Charlie! Julie!” they looked up. “Morning.”
Julie’s expression lit up with joy. She placed a bookmark between the pages and snapped the book shut before she stood up. She meet Lily half way and the two women hugged. Julie pulled back first and Lily glanced over at Charlie who had walked over and gave her an one armed hug.
“Hi, Lily,” Julie spoke, “I didn’t think you would have signed up for something like this.”
“Yeah, I normally won’t,” Lily started, “But something happened and I need to do something.”
Charlie looked at her worriedly as Julie cocked her head to the side. “What happened if I may ask?”
“I,” Lily’s voice trembled as she spoke, “I,” She took a deep breath and let it out in one go as she informed, “I lost my cat this morning.” Tears filled her eyes as she fought to keep in, “He got out last night and I couldn’t find him before curfew. I found him this morning on the welcome mat.” She paused as she tilted her head, looking at the ceiling. She felt the tears spread over her eyes. She slowly blinked. The tears didn’t escape, “It wasn’t a pretty picture.”
“Oh, sweetie,” Julie said, sympathetically, “I’m sorry.”
“He probably went out with a blaze of glory,” Charlie commented, “He was always a fighter.”
“Yeah, he was,” Lily admitted, thinking about all the times her cat would bully the other cats and sometimes dogs in the house when she was still looking with other people and their animals. Her heart felt a bit lighter, thinking about the times her cat had made her laugh and grin over his antics. “Anyway, I’m guessing you are here for one of the open positions.”
“Yup,” Julie chirped and Charlie nodded. The other woman went on, “I’m here for the Project Time Traveler while Charlie is here for the Project Shinigami.”
“According to the paperwork, I’m going into the Project Freedom Chaser,” Lily informed them, “But I don’t know anything else about it.”
“I’m sure they will tell us before we upload our consciousness into the game,” Charlie spoke up, grinning brightly. “They have to go over a lot of things different things like medical history.”
“You act like they don’t already have that information,” Lily said dryly, “Some of these Big Tech Companies probably have a loophole benefiting them in the various medical laws that have been passed since the Upraising and the Global Unification.”
“Sshh!” Julie hissed at Lily with narrowed eyes, “You know it is not safe to talk about that.” Her eyes darted back and forth. Lily knew she was watching for the Men In Black to show up and drag them off to the Re-education camps, just like they did this morning to Lily’s gated community.
“I’m sure they are busy this morning,” Lily whispered, looking between Charlie and Julie, “They raided my neighborhood this morning. I had to wait until they left before I could leave.”
“Shit,” Charlie breathed.
Julie gave her a frighten look, whispering, “I heard they have been increasing the raids of the At-Risk Social Credit Score folks. I don’t know why. It could be those rumors of another rebellion in the East.”
“Can you blame those folks?” Lily asked, “We have been living like this since we were young kids. There are people our age, willing to take a stand against The Emperor and The Men in Black. They are just not going against the Rulers, but they are ready to take on the entire World to get the Freedoms we lost years ago back.”
“I know,” Julie commented. Her expression held understanding. “I know you feel strongly about this issue since your parents fell in the last upraising.”
“Lilian Williamson!” Someone called out. Lily spun on her heel and peered at the person who called for her. Her heart was in her throat. Was she caught, talking about what happen that morning?