Affliction

Chapter 6-The Institution

As the bus came to a halt I could feel the tense atmosphere building throughout the vehicle. Silence fell and everyone began to shift uncomfortably. The driver stepped down and brathed in and stretched. His great mouth opening in a wide "o" and yawned, his yellow un-brushed teeth were displayed as he did so. He then turned around and said " All right my pretties, get your stuff and hop off the bus." his lecherous tone made my stomach turn. Girls slowly started to rise from their seats and make their way towards the exit. They all looked petrified. One girl threw herself on the floor and burst into tears before she reached the exit, her auburn hair falling in front of her face as she wept. The driver stepped into the bus and picked her up roughly by the arm . She screamed. " Stop that!" he said. She was tormented and he dragged her out of the bus and threw her onto the ground. Trembling she rose her head. The girl who was standing next to her before this act of violence was committed, suddenly attacked the driver. She punched and scratched and kicked with all her might. But he threw her to the ground too and then pulled out a type of device on which he dialed a number and said "yeah we got two bad ones here already,they need punishment." Then he snapped the phone shut and looked at the two girls menacingly. The other girl then tried to force herself up but the driver punched her hard in the stomach and she fell. The other girls,petrified, slowly started to dismount the bus. I noticed and we came down the steps that the opening we were in was also surrounded with other buses form different areas. Hundreds of buses with thousands of girls pouring out of them miserably. Each carrying the assigned bag to put the small amount of belongings that we had in. The drivers were all surveying the area,all of them purities. As we got out we waited in line in the hot summer air. None of us knew what we were waiting for. From a distance,we heard a clacking. It sounded like clapping. As some of the girls strained their eyes to see where the mysterious noise was coming from a pair of legs appeared. Not a mans,long and straight. These legs were slim and went in and out at the knees. They walked in a flamboyant way,showing themselves off. At the bottom of these legs,were a pair of high heels,a crimson red. The rest of the body shortly appeared,silhouetted against the sun. It approached us,one hand on hip. The face was pensive,the hair scraped back from it and the eyes covered with a pair of shiny glasses. Behind these glasses, were a pair of piercing blue eyes,with long lashes protecting them. A red lipsticked smile greeted us. "Welcome," it said ",to the Institution for young ladies."The face surveyed the crowd with an icy stare. From the sides appeared Guardians armed with machine guns. Their red uniforms were a low orange in the sunlight and their guns were pointed at the few girls who had rebelled when they were coming out of the bus. Apart form the two who had attacked the driver,there were a few others who were cowering away from the Guardians. The face with the red shoes nodded to one of them and the Guardians advanced and gripped the girls by the arms. They screamed and kicked and wailed as they dragged the away from the rest of the crowd. All of a sudden the girls went still and I saw from the corner of my eye a Guardian withdraw his hand from a girl containing a sort of small box. They hauled the girls away silently as the face watched with a slight smile. "So!," she said clapping her hands together,"welcome,welcome,welcome." We stared back at her blankly. We had never seen high heels before,they were alien to us. I clung to my treasure box that lay inside my bag,stroking the hard tin corners with the tips of my fingers. "Please notice that we do not tolerate unladylike behaviour of any kind." she said,signalling towards the girls who were taken away.'However,if you conduct yourselves in a civilized manor,I am sure that you will do very well here." From behind her appeared some women clad in blue. The Celestial's. The Celestial's were women who had sworn not to breed,or women who had had only sons in their lifetime and when they had menopause were transferred to the celestial section. They helped at the institution. I don't know what they do. The only thing I know is that they have a retreat behind the Oak Mountain.That is where they taught their new comers to remain in celibacy. They had whit veils covering their hair and a little pin that held up a veil to cover their face when they entered the city where Purities were present. They advanced on us and grabbed two of us each by the arms. They were of all ages. One of at maximum seventeen grabbed Peggy and I. She looked determined,obviously this was some kind of initiation for them. She looked at us grudgingly and then stopped and put us firmly in line with the rest of our area groups. When she had left I heard her murmur "filthy little brats" to herself. "Charming," I thought. I wonder where my mother was right now? And my sisters? At the orphanage section probably,being taught how to scrub floors. I wanted to cry,but I held the tears in. Thinking about them would only make it worse. Once all of us were in area order,the woman stood in front of us. She touched her spindly finger to her neck and said "FOLLOW ME!' her voice was projected high and loud. I didn't know how she did it,but it fascinated yet scared me. We marched in our straight lines,flanked by the Celestials,their sombre faces looking at us sideways,watching us in case we made a move. We marched along a narrow path that stretched across the lonesome landscape. There was not a single movement in the distance,not a sound. Except the clomping of our feet and the fretful whispers of the other girls around me. "Quiet" said the steady voice of the woman,"we must obtain it to reach the site of the Institution." She looked back at us and smiled. There was something about that smile that made my spine tingle and every nerve in my body sensed that this woman did not mean well. Some girls still whispered and this time she turned and gave them an icy glare. She raised her hand and gestured at the celestial standing next to the girls. The celestial turned to them and asked them to stop walking. We moved awkwardly around them as we strived to move forward. We left them behind,the ghost of our tracks. They reminded me somewhat of two rabbits caught in a trap,unable to move. Their eyes glinted with fear and tears dripped down their faces,slowly. Like blood escaping a wound. I felt bad for them. As if I knew them. Of course I didn't,but I felt as if we had been friends forever. The celestial was staring at me and I soon noticed that my cheek was wet with tears. I quickly wiped them off with the heel of my hand, and turned my face to the side. My long hair was pulled back into a braid. I had sworn to mother that I would never cut it,and so I wouldn't. it was the only gene that we shared. My green eyes came from my father. The twins were the ones blessed with her features. I was my father in and out. I heard the screams of the two girls behind me and felt an acid stab in my stomach. I had no clue what was going on back there,but what I did know is that it definitely wasn't positive. The Celstials didn't move. They stood beside the lines,their faces showing no pain or contortion to the piercing scream. But then I heard a sob about two meters in front of me. She obviously knew what was going on back there. One of the elder Celestials turned to her and the woman at the front suddenly held up her hand in a signal for us to stop. The Celestial next to me stopped abruptly and grabbed my arm. I turned to look at her. Her face looked flushed and she was evidently in despair as she watched the girl carried to the front of the formation three Celestials in lighter blue uniforms swished up in their long skirts in a semicircle around the Celestial who was now wailing. She was saying something. It sounded like "don't,please don't.' Suddenly the women around her started chanting. They were chanting in Latin. I knew this because I had secretly borrowed a book from Mrs.Clarkson in that particular language. She helped me learn the language and soon I could translate entire passages. "You learn well Nausicaa," she had said ",it is a shame that that brain must go to waste." I didn't know what she meant at the time,but I would soon find out. The women who were now chanting around the Celestial were the joined by the rest. The Celestial was bawling now: "no,NO!" One woman in the semicircle withdrew a knife from the folds of her robe. "NO!' screamed the girl. The woman raised the knife. I flinched. Everything was still. My eyes were fixed on this girl,of no more than fifteen,probably the youngest age you must be for Celestial initiation and I watched as the knife came down. But no,the woman with the knife had grabbed her hand and cut a wound in the skin. The blood seeped out. Another woman held out a small vial. The woman said "you have failed Celestial initiation. Your blood shall be collected and preserved for all eternity for god to preserve part of your cleansed soul. This means you may not be allowed to return to campus and you may chose to abandon your life of celibacy." The girl was lamenting, and held her head in her hands as she wept. "You have betrayed your sisters and what you have worked so hard for. In our eyes you are now a disgrace. A car shall be called to take you as far as the gates and from there you shall choose your own path." The woman collecting the blood closed the vial and the woman with the knife went back to her station another Celestial woman took out a device that was presumably meant to contact other human beings. since she held it to her ear and talked into the small metal box shaped implement. She was obviously calling the car that they had spoken of. Then I understood. The girl had not been afraid of dying,she knew that they were only going to cut her hand, but she acted like she was being called to her death. But the truth was that she had been given fate even worse than death,she had been disgraced. Just for crying about what they were doing to those girls from the bus. Any woman who is disgraced will not be excepted into the capital,into the institution, not even into the areas. They must leave the country and they are sent to Seltius Island. Where they will live in poverty and when they reach the age of forty,are killed and their bodies displayed in the Capital square. To remind every woman that they must be faithful to their services. Which is why we are here, I guess you could say...

They led us on,with each Celestial holding tightly onto the girl on the end of a line. Fortunately, I was one of these girls. The one who was holding me was looking on into the distance, a look of woe in her eyes. The girl who had failed intiatio was obviously her friend. She saw me looking and squeezed my arm tighter then looked away. I looked at the ground. It was that kind of ground that looked like it had supported the weight of many different people. Who knows since when,probably when the Institution was built. Shortly after the war. The war... Mother had not told me much about the old time. People weren't allowed to speak of it. But I'd heard many things. I'd heard from the girls down the street back in my area that there used to be no districts and no systems but instead everyone payed for their house and was allowed to live in it with whoever they wanted. Boys and girls went to the same school for no less than twelve years! Imagine! Books weren't burned so that women couldn't read them outside of school and no one got hurt. People could buy things from these places called "shops" and this was called "shopping." Now we got all our goods from a big lorry which came once a month to our district and gave us more supplies, simple things like carrots and rice and sometimes if we were lucky we got meat. Apparently girls as young as fourteen wore short trousers like men called "shorts" and no long sleeves. Most men would have thought this disgraceful nowadays. I managed to get my converse sneakers from my mother. She said that they were hers when she was my age. I wore them everywhere. They were a sea blue and they fitted perfectly with my dress. Women in districts wore long black dresses and sometimes even veils. Little girls wore short black dresses up to the knee with knee socks. You could wear a grey item of clothing to church on Sundays but that was it. When you had come back from the institution and declared a woman,you were given the regulation black ankle length dress,head cover and veil. Men only came to check up on dress once a year. They would make us gather in the district square in long lines and each would quickly look over each of us. This was the day that the little girls had to tie back their bedraggled hair into a braid and had to wear the regulation sandals. And every single woman had to put on a veil and the head cover, for modesty. Any woman or girl who failed to be in the correct state of dress was taken away. We didn't know where. I imagined somewhere desolate,with no one to love them and no one to tell them what was right and what was wrong. And to be honest that sounded worse than death.