DIVIDE

~Chapter 1~

Date 04/08/2364. Time, 18:42

I don't go out much. So, I routinely sit at my desk in my bedroom and paint, allowing all of my emotions just flow from my paintbrush, paint swirling across the page in a tangle of very separate colours that mix and blend into one another, depicting my fantasies of a better world. Boundaries crumbling to dust. I use black and white the most- never alone, mind, always together. Black and white are absolute; grey is their overlap, neither black nor white, a continuous spectrum without a borderline, limitless. Our society is black and white. Our Society is Good and Evil. I am grey. I have no labels.

Sometimes I write too. Stories of valiant heroes and whirlwind romances and regular people rising up together in the name of reform. I know that this is more of a diary than a story, but even so, I must introduce my characters: My name is Quinn Rae Potts. I should have been killed by the government of Halo Province seventeen years ago, but an undercover journalist exposed these intentions just in the nick of time. Jorge Watson, the President of Halo at the time of my birth, and Yosef Hudson, a senior consultant at the infirmary, were both exiled. Meanwhile, I was left with an arguably worse fate; I was exposed as being an abnormality in the Provinces, rather than my existence simply being covered up, by death or otherwise. 

The issue is that I am unmarked, so I don't fit into either of the Provinces. Apparently, the residents Halo find this disturbing. They treat me as though I'm a dangerous curse or a contagious disease. I remember my first day of preschool: I waited outside the building with my mother, and hand in hand we talked about the paintings in the windows created by the other children. Only now do I realise that we did this together every morning so that I wouldn't hear the hushed whispers and the fingers pointed towards me. Once I completed preschool, my mother arranged for a tutor to come to our house instead, which was probably for the best. 

I wish I had the tools to turn the tables and view my existence as a blessing. While they are branded, from birth, as either Good or Evil, I'm a blank canvas. In theory, I shouldn't need society to write my story for me. I should be in charge of my own life. But ironically, I'm just the same as they are. Trapped. 

I realise at this point I haven't told you much about where my story is set. I live in Halo Province with my mother. My father fled from Halo before I was born, and his whereabouts is now unknown. Sometimes my mother sits in her armchair, gazing of a picture I assume to be him, fingering a lock of sunset red hair taped to the corner of the frame. The photograph itself is black and white, very much reminding me of those in my ancient history books, yet I can still see that I share no features with him. His face has a sort of angular and sallow structure, bone white, while mine is much fuller; rounded cheeks and a small nose, spattered with freckles.

My current and permanent location is my bedroom. I spend a lot of time in my room, hiding from the world. It used to be a comfort to me: the pale green bedspread, the bookshelf, tightly packed with books of all genres, framed titbits from my life- photographs of my mother and I, works of art I'm particularly proud of, and the newspaper cuttings. The bold titles scream statements such as: 'EVIL EQUALITY MARCH 2361' and 'BARRIER BROKEN: Experts wonder whether this could be a trigger for revolution'. The writers of these papers, incidentally, fear what I most truly desire, but even they admit that this divided society is not going to last forever. Walls are crumbling, and people in Inferno are catching on to the idea of rebellion.

In this society, at some point during their eighteenth year, residents of both provinces are called up by Taj Shamsay (director of the human migration and territorial placement office) to take their rightful place in the province they truly belong in. Its supposed to be a huge, honourable ceremony with a feast and singing and dancing, but it is rarely so. Immediately afterwards, the twin destined for Inferno Province is dragged to the train station and torn away from their families. The other twin, who before that, had never left the side of their brother or sister, is restrained by their parents. Together they watch the bullet-train vanish beyond the horizon. I could be notified of my 'rightful position in society' any day now, and I'm simply playing the waiting game. 

This brings me back to the now. The waiting game. After packing away my paints, I walk over to my bedroom window, and use the little key next to the windowsill to unlock it. I open it a fraction, and inhale the fresh air. The breeze rushes over the corn fields behind my house, which whisper in the fading light. The streets begin to clear- we're not allowed in public premises after dark. I imagine what it would be like to go out there now, the moon and stars and the now jet-black sky being the only witness to the outing. I wonder what has been stopping me from doing just that, all these years. I leap down from the window and creep through the house. 

The only sound to be heard is the rustling of the corn in the fields to my left; the city is deadly silent, but its appearance alone screams out to me. Straight ahead, a dense forest of skyscrapers with tiled walls like glassy mirrors reach towards the stars, twinkling in the fading light. Their architecture is beyond words, as they weave, twist and bend into seemingly impossible shapes, in a tangle of progress itself. The bluish tint of holograms projected onto the night sky (advertisements, replays of recent news stories, and messages from the President himself) gives everything a ghostly glow. The four infamous above-ground societies (Skybound I, II, III and IV) flash menacingly more than 400km above my head. Their inhabitants, the ancestors of environmental migrants who left earth decades ago are unknown to everyone in the provinces but those of utmost authority. A sudden breeze blows over me, ice cold, but only for a few moments. It happens at the exact moment that four silhouettes of armed air-pods fly over my head, streaking the night sky with wisps of silver. I've seen them with increasing frequency, of course, over the last few years or so, because of all of these uprisings in Inferno. I assume that the Halo government know they're in trouble; I doubt they want to be overthrown, especially since this would mean everyone here would lose their privileges, which up until recently were well hidden from Inferno, hence they had no reason to rebel. The pods are probably just for another army-response drill, I think.

A sharp rapping on the window brings me back to the here and now instantly.  I am already imagining my mother's face pressed against the window, filled with rage at my failed attempt to break the law unnoticed. I am not wrong.  She's shouting at me through the glass frantically. I can see her lips moving, but the words are obscured by a gust of wind. She's pointing at the sky. She screams some more inaudible words, gesturing to something in the distance, behind me. I immediately panic; the pods have circled back around towards me, and if I am seen the consequences are severe. I see now that the airpods are advancing towards the Wall, perhaps about 20 metres from where I'm stood. Past the Wall, and into Inferno. All clear, I think, and let out a sigh of relief. Even if those in the pods saw me breaking the law, which I assume is what my mother was so afraid of, abandoning an army-response drill would not be worth my capture. I turn on my heel to find that my mother is still positioned by the window, her face full of relief (but still bearing traces of fear) while she gestures for me to come inside. I can't tell whether she's angry or not, because the glass has partially steamed up. Sighing, I can already imagine what she'll say to me when I get inside. 'What were you thinking? Halo government have been waiting for a chance to get rid of you for seventeen years, and you almost just gave them one!' Fantastic. I wipe cold beads of sweat from my forehead with the palm of a clammy hand, and take a deep breath of cool, fresh air, exhaling a shaky breath.

And that's when the bomb is dropped.