Zero.

The word lingered in my mind, but I would not falter now. Not when the fate of our nation stood in the Bridge. I activated my smartwatch and marked Ivore a debtor. Sealed his chances of ever becoming an Achroite. Forever destined to a life most dreamed of, that of a regular Fengel. And their Eugenex was relatively cheap. So the other Fenglas treated them as inferior subjects, even though they were all the same. At least on paper.

But they were not particularly smart as Mind Fenglas, whose Eugenex enhanced their neuron connections so they could develop bionics, robotics, cloning technology, and tend to the psychological and physical needs of the human body in their quest for immortality. Fools, despite their brains. Nor were they as physically adept as Body Fenglas, whose Eugenex enhanced their bodies and muscles to the point they could search for our devastation in the depths of the Pacific trenches, the ice caves of Antarctica and the Himalayas, and the scorching tunnels of the Sahara and Gobi. Enslaved folks, though still rarer than Tussenvolken. I had never seen one, as Body Fenglas didn’t tend to use VirtuaNet. So I never understood why they still believed Zielkkenhom’s lies.

“No, you idiot!” he cried. Real tears. “Change it back, bridger. Go back in time, bridger.” He knelt and fisted the floor, as if he wanted to tear a hole in it. “You are a human chronometer. Please go back in time. I implore you, bridger!”

No Achroite could owe bridgers money. Only to themselves. They loaned money to the lower classes, not the other way around. They were not poor saps. Because he could apologize now and I would eliminate his debtor status, but no Achroite would forget. He would forever be branded. But I had not made it so, regardless of the thoughts, regardless of how easy it felt marking Ivore a debtor, regardless of Brandon’s clenched fist aimed at my chest from afar.

Ivore had brought it upon himself.

“Spare me your tears.” The words, an ice blade that gashed my throat. Colder than they sounded in my head. Colder than I thought myself capable of saying them. But I would become ice if it meant freedom through peace. “You still have your family. And money to support it. They won’t kick you out of your status unless you stop paying for Fengel Eugenex, regardless of the inappropriateness of your behavior.” Something I knew firsthand. “Besides, you have killed countless Naturals and got away with it because of unjust laws, because you’ve bribed judges.” I raised Ivore by his shirt. “You sold a Natural’s daughter to a VirtuaNet brothel because her father owed you money,” I said. “So do not expect my pity. Charity for the weak. Justice for the strong.” I tossed him into the floor.

Ivore stood, eyes magma globs ready to erupt at any second. “It is my hope that you are forced to gaze as your family suffers a most gruesome fate at the hands of the EF. And that someone severs your limbs one by one, until you perish in the most brutal of torments.”

I thought I’d have yelled is that a threat? But I just sneered, dousing the wrath that drowned me when I thought about the European Federation, EF for short, about the bastard who ruined the world, the bastard who invaded Wexford, and robbed me of a father, cousin, grandparents. Robbed us of a home. Ivore knew better than to threat a bridger. A Class A+ bridger. A bridger who could call a mass strike. At least in his mind, in everyone’s minds, as perception was power, and right now, perception was my sole sword. But I would hire more Esne guards to be sure. Because perception didn’t tend to last long.

But then gravels pummeled me. I thought they would not. Could not erase them. Could not block them. As much as I wanted to. Ivore’s tears. Cries. Though they did not take me back to Wexford. Nothing could ever match those silent screams, those hollow wails, timestill explosions. Ivore just trudged away, as if his family had just died. Or worse, in their mind, his mind. As if he had lost all his money. His derivatives company. But in spite of the gravels, despite the gravity blast that hacked my soul, compressed my chest as if I had plummeted into a dark hole, I had not gone too far.

I had not gone too far.

I extended my arm towards Owen, but he stood on his own, as if I could no longer help him, and stared at me, though I didn’t know what to make of his puzzled look, as I had never seen an Impure confused. Only smiling. I hoped it was for the better. “Huffing, dawg?”

Most Enhanceds, and a few bridgers kept their conversations with Impures to a minimum, because of their raw onion stench breath, but it never bothered me. Besides, the onion breath was an enhancement specifically made for Impures. To mask their alcohol-soaked breath. So I had to pray for calmness when I saw a Fengel or Achroite cover his nose while talking to an Impure. Or a Natural for that matter. Because onion breath was a chocolate apple cake compared to most Naturals’ breath.

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“N’answer? I’ll take it a no. Strategy then, dawg?” He fist bumped me as he kept scarfing down his beer chips. His smile returned.

Booze, and gluttony, the main vices of the Impures, though I didn’t think them completely responsible for it. Zielkkenhom had Impure Eugenex made specifically for fast reflexes, enhanced metabolisms, physical activities fit for their manufacturing, and textile jobs, so they were always lean, bony more likely, to the point some even looked malnourished, despite enormous calorie consumption, and without having to exercise, unlike the other classes, which exercised as a means to develop endurance, strength. Only though, because Enhanceds didn’t want filthy Natural hands making their clothes, building their homes and gadgets, handling their food.

Naturals could only work as sewage or street cleaners. And only if Impures didn’t need the job.

Brandon stepped on a corpse as he stood without any help. By accident of course, fear drowned his eyes for a second, though it must have distracted him from the pain, but his fists remained clenched. And his lips narrowed. “No wonder you chose to make us wait. Again.” He sneered. “Naïve idealism must be the result of not being forced to drink raw sewage like the rest of us, unlucky ones. Only hardship brings about pragmatism.”

I thought of punching him, and putting his hand on a flame to see if he thought bridging was a swim in Curracloe, but I just raised my arms, palms facing him, and took a step back. I didn’t want to fight a fellow Natural.

For a second there I thought Brandon had a point. I guessed that’s why his insults enraged me, but it must have been the gravels. I hoped. But before I could utter a sound, I heard someone unhook himself from one of the terminals, and tiptoe right past me on his way to the changing area to dispose of his automatic waste removal suit, so they did not soil themselves while unconscious. Didn’t even glance at me, or anyone for that matter, on his way there. Either because he thought us traitors. Or because he felt guilt for his addiction.

I hoped for the latter, but thought the former more likely. This time, not for better or for worse, though. Just for worse. No doubt. I turned to Brandon, though still thinking on those yet to unhook themselves. “If I can’t protect those in front of me, how can I protect those I cannot see, those I know nothing about?”

Brandon leered at me, but he did not clench his fists this time. “That kind of thinking is what cements your reputation as a sellout.” His steps, a heavy noise that echoed as he marched toward me. “Sometimes, you have to let those in front of you suffer and perish for a higher goal.”

“Only the Harmonists spew those lies,” I said. “Lies that sound suspiciously similar to ríceablæd.” Which I guessed had poisoned us all. But that I would soon rid this country of. Before it was too late.

“Lies or not, Cael,” Brandon said. “People are starting to believe them.” He faced the floor, the glint in his eyes gone, as void as those of Owen, as if hoping for a future that could not come through peace. “And I think I am as well.”

His words, a tomb. To the point that a waft of Ivore’s previously undetected Eugenex stench had now crept into my nose. And not even his cologne could mask it.

“The only thing that saves you is that you work with the Lexingtons and not the Bernharts,” Brandon said. “That ought to keep people on your side. For now at least.”

“True thing, the Harmonists promised everyone Achroite Eugenex if they succeed,” Owen said as he munched on his beer chips, Impure invention. All the Impures did. Their faces almost always with a smile, despite the fact that most people thought them the laughing stock of the nation, even more so than the Naturals, though only because we were its scapegoat, and its punching bag. World happy, I guessed, the Impures. At first, I couldn’t understand their speech pattern, because they tended to talk with their mouths full, but now I was used to it. “Long as you don’t save a Berhart, the Harmonists’ll remain fringe nuts.”

And with that, they strode away.

Another Natural the Harmonists snatched. And perhaps an Impure. Though I prayed it was just foolish words you said without thinking but did not follow once you saw their folly. The Harmonists had only snatched a few. But one by one they would gather an army of Naturals who had lost hope, and Enhanceds who craved for more. And I would hear the wails of Wexford again.

I would not let it happen.

But I had done the right thing. I just needed to find an Achroite to support my reform before the Harmonists launched their offensive.

Of course, that was easier said than done.

Because if I failed, I could have launched the rebellion I had tried to avert ever since the Harmonists did their first terrorist attack at the water plant that robbed me of a brother.

What a gamble.

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