Under Changing Skies

T H I R T Y - S E V E N

The Foreman enters the room, his frame looming more threateningly than usual from my vantage point on the floor. Everett stands before offering me his hand and helps me to my feet.

My hands clench into tight fists as the Foreman takes his place behind the massive desk, my fingernails digging into my palms as I dread his imploring questions about last night.

Instead, he takes me by surprise when he suddenly asks, "Do you know what the real beauty of the Imperium is?"

One side-eyed glance at Everett tells me he's equally nonplussed. I return my gaze to the Foreman, silently pondering his question.

Back home, everyone is raised with the knowledge that the world is clearly divided into three parts: one is home, the place we are born in; another is the Imperium; and the third is the wastelands that comprise the rest of the world, rendered uninhabitable by centuries of destruction.

Much like everyone else, I thought the Imperium was the most beautiful place that anyone could ever live in. But now that I know the realities of this place, I know that any beauty that may exist here is lost, meaningless.

I think of Everett's words, spoken in the near-darkness of the pods in the dead of night yesterday. You and I are the only ones really living here. Everyone else is just . . . existing.

Yes, the Imperium takes away so much of the pain that filled my life back home. The hunger, the fear, the oppressive heat, the suffocatingly smoky air, and the pain of never, ever having enough of anything. But in exchange, I had to surrender myself to the Imperium, allowing myself to be turned into someone that would never get to feel any of the good things about this place.

"It's not in the buildings or the gardens," the Foreman says, and it takes me a moment to orient myself. "No, the real beauty of the Imperium is in our surveillance . . . or lack of it, rather. We don't have to watch the citizens' every move, the Chips ensure their absolute compliance with all the rules. The only ones we have to track are you."

The Foreman lowers his voice, as though he's talking more to himself than us. "Clearly, you need closer surveillance, considering what you managed to do last night, but I don't think that matters any longer."

"What . . . What do you mean it doesn't matter?" Everett asks dubiously.

For one second of blissful ignorance, I wonder if the Foreman is going to forgive us and let us go. But his words bring me crashing back to reality.

"This year's experiment is being terminated."

Terminated. The word sends a chill through my bones. It sounds irreversible, so final.

"What does that mean for us?" I ask, struggling to speak through the lump in my throat.

"Well, F930, it means you're both being terminated," the Foreman says, his tone laced with condescension.

I walked into this room with Everett today knowing that our decision to trespass yesterday could have painful consequences. Yet, the way the Foreman makes this declaration with such casual cruelty makes me stagger backward as though he's physically struck me.

I don't want to cry in front of him; the thought of displaying any vulnerability makes me sick. But when Everett steps closer to me and wraps his hand around mine, I feel his fingers tremble ever-so-slightly against my skin, and my eyes betray me and well up.

"But y-you said there was more to learn from us," I say hoarsely, blinking away the blurry film of tears clouding my vision. "At the garden, when the citizens attacked . . . You said we needed to be saved because there was more to learn from us."