Uncoded

Chapter 4: Will

I was so sick of all of it.

The parties, the introductions, the 'well my husband is part of the coded army,' my mother on the other hand adored it, I think it was the only thing that stopped her from snapping and going full on uncoded in my opinion. When I was younger I began to stand up my mother and tell her that I didn't want to, that the parties were stupid which she responded with you'll understand when your older. I did understand now, I was a shiny toy for my mother to use, present and play with, someone to entertain her when dad was off for weeks at a time visiting 'relatives'. I felt for her however I knew how she felt, she felt lonely and it wasn't hard to do so in this big empty house. That's why I now just learnt to say yes, yes mum, of course mum, whatever you say mum, but to be honest my life wasn't my own anymore I knew that as I stared into the mirror in front of me, my bright blond hair standing out against my black suit that my mother picked out for me, it stuck to my chest just outlining my tone stomach.

I tightened my dark green tie that matched my eyes perfectly, not that I was surprised, as the richest of all the coded the Kyveli's were expected to only have the best of the best. Superficial things to fill our unsatisfactory lives that were void of love, excitement, and adventure, but as I said there was nothing I could do about it. Opening the door of my room I was faced with a marble hall, leading to a grand mahogany staircase that opened up to a crystalline emerald floor. That was mothers favourite thing about me apparently, my green eyes, she was so proud to be Able to say the higher machines blessed her son with green eyes that reminded her of the green liquid that ran through the Imprinters, apparently mum still had mine, put it on a cushion in the basement to bring out Every time we met with another coded family. My mother spotted me as I travelled down the stairs cooing at my suit, as she waited in her green silk dress the was held up by one shoulder before cascading down her left side.

"Don't you look handsome Will? That Birgitta girl will be all over you." She overlooked me before finding a imperfection with my tie and straightening it just a little bit more allowing her to fix it just by the slightest degree.

"The Dayna family are coming as well tonight? So will dad attend as well tonight?" My mother looked down slightly at the mention of my father before replacing her face with that perfect fake smile. She was still beautiful even at the age of 40 with round violet eyes that are like two drops of wine. Her fine, straight, golden hair is worn in a style that reminded me of a waterfall.

"We can never know, his work keeps him busy, but I'm sure he will make an effort to try and attend." I nodded at her giving a fake smile in return, hearing the ding of the door both our heads turned, my mothers in frantic confusion.

"Injections and mail, mum."

Calming down she brushed off her already immaculate dress as I went to collect the daily mail. Mail was collected through a machine called the transfer, placing your coded against a scanner of sorts a beep sounded and by looking in your hand an imprinter message would tell you your mail delivers and their contents,while the injections where collected from a small metal box that protruded from the wall. Injections were a inventions of the machines, of course, designed to keep us to doped up to realise we were just human cattle, young girls were sent to the academy and never heard of again, while men were either Heirs or soldiers growing up in boring similar lives. They claimed the injections contained vitiates needed to keep us alive and protected from diseases.

Often I wondered if the uncoded gave the diseases to coded as the machines told us, I wondered about the story's my mum told me when I was younger of their slanted orange eyes, the hollow cheeks and knobby ears that roamed streets waiting to take children from the streets and devour them for their next meal. The truth is that coded are feed lies by the machines but in fear of ruining their perfect lives of days at the parlour at nights at the bustling markets, or glamorous parties. Uncoded aren't even dangerous, their just trying to survive like us. I knew this because of the incident that occurred when I was out with my friend Kieran at our sectors bakery, it was the first time I saw a uncoded. I only saw her as they carried her out of the bakery, her arms failing revealing her blank tan arm, no numbers. I made a mental checklist in my mind as she passed us now, I couldn't tell if she had orange eyes but they weren't slanted as far as I could tell. Her cheeks did look slightly hollow but I theorised that was more from hunger rather then the fact she was uncoded, as for ears they were hidden by her thick, wavy, beige hair is neck-length which was worn in a complex, yet attractive style. She was more beautiful then the girls I was forced to meet by any chance. Their names mushed together in my head Efe, Alysa, Zana, Jenna. Girls who had fathers rich enough to bribe the high machines to allow their daughters not be trained in the academy. I wondered if my sister would have been sent to the academy if she was still alive, before it happened. I wondered what she would look like, my mother had done drawings of her. Not that she had know I had seen them, she would often hide it away quite like her emotions, like we did with every bad thing in this house. But occasionally when she was out hosting a party and I could get a few minutes away I would stare at the photo tracing over the outline of round blue eyes and silky, curly, cream coloured hair. Would we be close? Would we hate each other? Kieran said his sister and him fought on daily basis, usually about silly things like who was in charge of submitting the dinner menu to the cooks that night.