I, the Lamb

Chapter Two

My schooling continued, but as I grew older I became aware of the growing undercurrent of dissent building beneath the clean exterior of my society.

Through the years, I worked and became known among my peers. These days were happy, however busy. My classes grew increasingly more difficult and specialized, separate now even from Constance. My teachers seemed impressed by my scores, and I felt pride in that, an emotion I experienced so rarely. I was proud of who I was becoming, not only a part of society, but a well-known, well-liked, and useful one.

 I was seventeen and almost ready to graduate, looking forward to a year-long apprenticeship at the largest research facility in the province. This laboratory specialized in disease, and almost all of the substantial scientific discoveries in Totre were made by the many skilled researches and doctors working there. The thought of being among them gave me joy, near ecstasy. To see the places where the medicines we know today were created, and stand among the ghosts of the men who created them, was the ultimate dream for me.

As I blindly awaited my graduation, more rumblings of rebellion traveled through the province, as silent and deadly as poison. Always there were stories of young citizens sneaking out past their curfew to join in strange, wild parties outside hearing range of most officials. Underground art-trade was a growing epidemic, average citizens presuming to paint and draw and write and sing. They sold their work, or simply preformed for the joy of it. What joy they found in breaking the law, I am unsure to this day.

I heard all of this news from other students, whom I prayed were not personally involved in these crimes, though now I see how blind I was to their guilt as well. Even spreading these stories was a crime, though I suppose that makes me guilty as well, as I am telling you.

The words I write to you were never meant to be shared, but someday, somehow, everyone will see why I must do this, this thing most vulgar.

My Second School graduation was as bland as my First, though I remember it well. Final exams were completed the weekend before, and the following days had been spent bidding farewell to teachers and friends, and unpacking those four drawers that I still remember filling as a child. By law I was still a child, though I am sure I speak for my entire class when I say we all felt quite adult at that moment.

We stood in alphabetical lines again, but wearing clothing we picked ourselves. I wore my favorite blue vest and white pants, and I wore my hair in a low bun as was fashionable with girls my age.

The Officers of schooling stood before us as they had before, announcing where the name of each student and where he or she was going to apprentice. Constance and Nareese and the rest of my friends were not going to be with me in the next steps of my journey, but I didn’t mind. I wanted what the Officers wanted.

I travelled on foot to the laboratory, where I was told to move my bags into a small, half-made room supposedly for apprentices. This would only be my lodgings for a single year, and wherever I worked after that, I would have a permanent room, usually shared with only a few other women.

I worked under a brilliant doctor named Daniel, an older man with balding blonde hair a few shades darker than my own. We worked closely together for many months, him grooming me to become a researcher at this laboratory. I learned many things, which I have never forgotten, as useless as that information is now. Together, Daniel and I analyzed samples of blood under micro-viewers, studied growth and mutation of cells, and many other activities related to Daniel’s research. I am no longer clear on what his research was focused on, but at the time I remember being quite passionate about it, often working it in to conversations with my fellow apprentices.

Approaching eighteen years old, I felt nervous for my future despite myself. No hard-working citizen was ever left behind, yet finding a job was still up to me. My position at the research facility felt secure but there were always instances of graduates having to apprentice for an extra year, sometimes even two, before a job became available. If it were to happen that the Officers of medicine did not want another new researcher, I would have to remain in a temporary position, such as apprentice, until a spot opened up, or the need arose for more trained hands.

I worked harder as an apprentice than I had ever worked before, so desperate to show my true skills in order to secure a job. Immersed in my work, the brewing feelings of anger towards our government did not seem so serious to me. And they were not serious, not yet. It was simply sinfully prideful men and women like that one I had met on the street all those years ago, being conquered by their own need for individuality and attention, wanting to have control over their lives in a way no human can truly manage.

I know that I am helpless without my society. It provides for me a clear path through life, something that all humans of the past age wished for as they suffered and died at the hands of poverty, depression, and even each other. I stand by these truths to this day, and I shall be buried with them in my heart.

As I had so hoped, I was given a job as a research assistant at the facility, permanently moving into a room that I shared with four other female research assistants. I no longer assigned to work with Daniel, but instead put on a task force trying to decode the reason for a disease affecting a young girl. Her hands and feet were twisted beyond belief, her eyes clouded and blind. She looked almost reptilian, except for a pretty crown of red curls surrounding her sickly yellow face.

I worked with her directly, analyzing her blood and tissue samples, recording her condition over days, and collaborating with my colleagues about medicines to try to see how they affected the condition.

After about two weeks, we cracked the code. The girl was given the antidote we created and soon we saw her regain color and she was able to feed herself. Over weeks she eventually gained some eyesight and hand and foot mobility.

Of course she would never be able to work in any job fit for citizens, so she was sent to the home for sick and disabled.

I, along with the team I worked with, was praised highly by the Officers of medicine themselves, and felt proud to have been part of this discovery as we filed away a vial filled with antidote into one of the white, square compartments lining the Hall of Medicines. The name of the disease was carefully written on the label of the door and shut away until needed again, hopefully long from now.

In the intoxication of my success, I remember leaving the laboratory and wandering the town, buying some food and eating it as I walked, smiling at everyone I saw and enjoying the feeling of having those smiles returned. Before the sun went away, I witnessed two separate acts of treachery, both resulting in arrests by Officers in deep blue uniforms. Those were the uniforms of enforcers, I knew, those sent in to use brute force to protect the citizens.

These acts terrified me. The blatant disregard for authority and the wild, passionate eyes of the juvenile rebels was so new and unpleasant on my tongue that I felt ill as I walked home.

The crimes I witnessed were not severe compared to what was to come, but had I known, I would have enjoyed this calm before the storm. It would still be some time before the revolution took hold, but conditions grew progressively worse as time went on.

Most days I stayed inside the lab, preferring not to witness the devolution of orderly peace among my people. I was given days off, and these were often spent in my own company, studying or resting my mind as I stared out the wide, clear window of my quarters.

Practiced ignorance and apathy became my drug. In my mind there was no world beside my own mind, careful boundaries and restrictions placed upon my every thought. At first, these walls were enforced by the society. By now, I have learned to appreciate the protection this ignorance gives me. I was blissful in these times.

I enjoyed the company of my roommates, though they were as preoccupied as I and we rarely stopped in our work to speak to one another. All four were assistants like myself, but none assigned to the same team as I. I remember one was assigned to a team of genetic researchers stationed permanently at the Temple of the Birthers, the palace-like structure near the center of the province where the esteemed Birthers lived and brought forth every child in Totre. These select men and women were some of the most honored in the land, and it was an honor to even lay eyes on them. The woman from my room who lived among them was my favorite to talk to, as she shared with me many things about the mysterious Temple that enthralled the imaginations of all citizens.

Now as I write you this I wonder what became of the inhabitants of the Temple, and those four research assistants who had lived with me for those years.