In a nightmare world ravaged by misery, the Imperium offers utopia to a select few. When Arya and Everett are recruited into this elite society, they choose to leave their homes against their families' wishes.
Naive and young, Arya and Everett are...
This chapter picks up right where we left off: Arya and Everett are told by the Foreman that they have just about one week until their experiment is terminated. After this conversation, they're asked to return to the botanical gardens for work.
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For a few blissful moments outside the Wellness Hub, I'd allowed myself to float away with Everett to a safe, faraway place. Now, I return to the moment with a spurt of irritation at myself; fantasizing is pointless and only makes our reality all the more painful.
"I'm sorry," I turn to Everett apologetically. "What were you saying?"
"I asked what you were thinking about," he says with a small smile that fails to reach his eyes.
"I . . . I don't know what to think or feel right now," I say honestly, falling into step with Everett as we start the long walk towards the botanical gardens. I tilt my face to look at him, raising my eyebrows questioningly. The morning sun rays play lazily across his face as he nods in agreement.
Neither of us speaks for the rest of the way, the only interaction between us being the occasional brush of my hand against his. When we reach the garden, we grab our tools silently and take our positions at the hedges, ignoring the citizens' sharp looks as we walk past.
It's only when I'm lulled into an almost zoned-out state by the monotony of my work that the Foreman's announcement starts replaying in my mind. Only a week until termination.
How are they going to do it? When? Where?
Suddenly, I have a horrific vision of a group of citizens in black suits barging into the garden in the middle of the day, dragging Everett and me by our collars as the citizens watch in smug silence.
Will they even keep us together when it happens? The thought of being separated from Everett, never saying goodbye, and never seeing each other again fills me with anger. Fighting all our lives to be together, only to spend the last of it apart.
Hot tears fill my eyes, and I watch in silence as they slip out of my eyes and splash onto the perfect green leaves nestled in between the blades of my shears.
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That night, at the pods, I shrug out of my suit and get ready to step into the gas cubicle to be washed down. But just as I'm about to dump my suit into the open chute, a flat rectangular object clatters out of the fabric and skitters across the floor. I grab it and hold it up to my eyes under the dim yellow lights.
It takes a moment before recognition dawns on me. The remote I'd secretly grabbed from the Foreman's desk earlier today.
A sharp, unpleasant beep fills the air, and I realize with a grimace that I'm supposed to have stepped into the cubicle by now. Putting the remote on the floor, safely away from all the shifting panels on the wall, I walk into the cubicle, covering my ears until the beeping finally stops.
