New Dawn

by Attila Orosz

  His mother did not listen, she continued on her crusade. What she did not know was that Phasebook penetrated deeper than any of them could have imagined. The former social network had been seized by the state, soon after the former USA and Canada had merged into a new super-power, which had done away with the structure of quasi-independent states joined together under the rule of a federal government, and established a one-state government over all former territories, under the ethos of national interests and better security.

  Phasebook had become an official self-surveillance program that every UNA citizen was required by law to regularly update with geographical coordinates, moods and short statuses. All their equipment, the compulsory cameras around the house, the wearable cameras and bio-sensors, the smart jewellery, everything was linked. Phasebook infiltrated even underNet, no encryption stood in its way. His mother had no chance to be a dissenter and get away with it.

  Alex was in the middle of a pool party when a State Police Officer delivered the message of his mother’s death. The SPO said that Alex only avoided arrest himself, being a close family member, due to his good behaviour. The SPO said that rebellion was in his blood, given his parents’ record of dissent, which had also showed in his brother’s misconduct. This of course proved Alex’s father right, but there was not much good coming out of that now. The SPO said that they would leave him alone for the time, because he behaved exceptionally well, but he would continue to be watched.

  He was also told that when the Armed Police had come for his mother, she had struggled and resisted arrest. One of the APOs had shot her twice in the head, his father watching, and doing nothing at all. When he had tried to recover her body, they had beaten him half dead and left him to die. His mother’s corpse had been taken and was never seen again. After many months of painful and slow recovery, when his father fully regained the control over his limbs, he used his returning strength to end his own life. He left no suicide note. He probably did not feel that anyone would care to read it.

  Alex could not ignore life any longer. He dropped out of his classes, eventually abandoning his studies completely. To quench his growing bitterness, he took up his parents’ heritage, continuing his mother’s activism, searching for the opportunity to inflict pain wherever it hurt most. His target was dim and undefined. He wanted to hurt the state, the system, the police, everything and everyone that stood for it, and whatever it stood for.

  He was not very good with computers, so he could not assist the hacktivists who sought to disrupt government systems, and carried out small scale sabotages against data-servers and power plants. He knew they would never succeed in bringing down Phasebook, so that was all in vain. Where he saw the real opportunity, was distributing information, just like his mother used to do.

  He experimented with independent movements across the United North America, but found little satisfaction. What he uncovered about the prison system was on the verge of being unbelievable. It was a well-known albeit rarely spoken fact that over half of the UNA’s population was officially incarcerated, mostly on petty charges, but there was no way to know anything further. Once suspected, people would be arrested and detained indefinitely. Yet what he found was hard to accept even under such circumstances. All evidence showed that the prisons were empty, with no indication as to what might have happened to the inmates.

  But the people were apathetic, nobody seemed to care anymore. You could shove any evidence right under their noses, but they could not care less. Of course most of the people were oblivious, or just too busy having a comfortable life, but there were always some who acknowledged that the evidence existed and, unless it was politically acceptable, their behaviour merited life imprisonment or even worse. The problem was that they just did not want to do anything about it. Nobody seemed to be interested in changing anything. People were bought with conveniences and high standards of living. The behavioural standards were easy to follow, and life was satisfying if one obeyed the rules. Nobody really wanted to give up their comfort for some vague idea of freedom.

  What was even worse, the activists themselves had not done much to change things either. They formed closed communities, exchanged information amongst themselves, held secret meetings and generally exhibited the same elitist behaviour one could have expected from any self-satisfied upper-middle class fresh graduate. They never descended to the people to talk to them, or address them directly; no wonder common men showed little interest in what they were doing. Activism had become much like an exclusive club, where only those who prove themselves worthy could even hope to get a glimpse of what was really going on.

  In the meantime, State Security was tightening to a degree where one could not even breathe without having to report it to Phasebook. Every movement of every person was recorded and new, improved algorithms tried to predict their next moves, both geographically and organisationally. The SS was cracking down on more and more independents, the situation was quickly becoming unmaintainable. He narrowly escaped arrest a couple of times, but he knew that his luck would not last long.

  Finally, he decided to leave. He got on one of the last low security hypersonic shuttles to Europe in 2052, just in time before the European borders permanently closed down, even for the citizens of the allied Americas, unless they were on special or official business. He soon disappeared in the borderlands, joining the HUM, delivering people to the HQ. He immediately felt that this was something different. They operated in the real world, they did something real, other than impotent activism. But his excitement wore off after a few months of mundane, almost menial work. He went out, collected arrivals, and delivered them, but never saw the results of his actions. He did not even know what happened after he dropped off his deliveries.

  Six years later he was still on the job, only because it allowed him to earn his synthetic oblivion in the form of little ampoules, unobtainable from any other source, something no other line of work would have allowed him to get. With those, he could numb down after missions, forget his past, forget his present and pretend for a while that the world did not exist. It had not seemed to matter in the beginning, only being an extra convenience, but over the years it had become his sole motivation, and his only pastime outside of missions.

  ***

  “Listen, we need to make a decision here.” Peter’s voice broke Alex’s reverie, yanking him back to the present. It was not much of an improvement.

  “How long do you reckon we can stay here? I mean before someone notices,” said Alex.

  “Someone already did notice,” replied the young guard. “In fact, everybody knows now, they must be on their way. I discarded all traceable equipment, but my last known location was right next to the tunnel’s entrance. I wasn’t thinking clearly at the time.”

  “How much time do we have?”

  Alex was now sitting upright. It’s unbelievable. The boy brings the whole army down on us!

  “This was meant to be a quiet night. The rest of my unit is on leave, this is why I was on duty alone. The next available unit must be some fifteen minutes away. We’ve been here for a little over ten minutes now. We still have time to move. But we need to know where.”

  “Right. They’re going to use the tunnels.”

  “Yes, but only one way. I heard you people use these tunnels and stay undetected all the time. There are so many unused passages, perhaps you could take us up your way? It would be the fastest!”

  Alex was not going to give up his route plan. It was absolutely vital that those routes remained undiscovered and taking a guard through them was probably the surest way to get himself into trouble, even at the HQ. He would have enough to explain once they arrived, without further complicating the situation.

  “No,” he said, “that is the worst possible way. We need to take a surface route. While your troops are underground, we can make it safely to the woods.”

  “The woods are half a kilometre away!”

  “We can run for it.”

  �
�Right…” Peter was still not convinced. “It still seems safer down here.”

  “We don’t have time for that!” Alex was growing impatient. “The next train leaves in thirty-six hours. The transit— I mean the African needs to be processed way before that. Even now we are running late. The surface route is straight, and a lot faster.”

  Alex’s lie was based on the truth. A safe-train really was leaving in thirty-six hours, and they did need to process each transit at least twenty-four hours before departure, but he had no idea where the surface routes were, if there were any at all.

  He never really left the tunnels on a mission except for making first contact. Still, he was not willing to give up what he knew about the tunnels, this he considered critical information.

  “Train? You transport them on trains?” asked Peter, his voice betraying genuine surprise.

  “Yes. One delivery every four weeks. Freight fast-trains are the best option, they barely ever stop.”

  Peter whistled in approval.

  “That sounds like a huge operation!” he said. “I always wondered what the trains carried back, after dropping off the supplies. I mean, there isn’t much produce that the inlands would need from us, is there?”

  Alex smiled.

  “Maybe it’s not produce they are after. But we need to hurry up now!”

  Chapter Five

  The two white men were arguing between themselves. Jumaane watched in silence for a while, trying to make sense of it all, but he could not wrap his head around all that happened, it was all too fast, too irrational. Everything is upside down! The world is a crazy place! They are all mad! First the soldier wanted to execute them both, and now he and the other captive had brought Jumaane into a prison cell that had not even got any windows, and begun arguing between themselves! What are they talking about? If they wanted to kill him what were they waiting for? What good was it for them to lock him up here? He had never done any harm to them. He had never harmed anyone. He stole food, yes, but never hurt nobody! And the heavy man with the light coloured hair, how did he become a captor? How am I now a prisoner of the captive? He was a captive before!

  Nothing made sense. He felt the cold dampness of the cell deep in his bones. He knew dampness, the forest in Africa was always wet and often raining, but there it was always warm. This place was cold, this weather was good for no man. Maybe it was good for the white man, but not for him. He huddled up and kept his knees as close to his chest as he could, trying to keep himself warm. His ankle hurt where he had landed after jumping off the wall.

  It was stupid to build walls like that. Why would they want to keep people out? Maybe there was a war? They might just want to protect people, not to go where there was fighting. And there were also soldiers going about with machine guns. It sure looked like a war-zone.

  Europe was a disappointment. It had always appeared in his dreams as the land of promise. People said there was no fighting there and everyone could live without a worry. It was a white man’s land, and white men always seemed to know what they were doing, they were said to be good at keeping order, but this place was nothing like he had imagined it to be. Africa was devastated and dangerous, and now Europe turned out to be the same. Still, there had to be peace somewhere. He was not a young man, but he could not remember the last time he was not afraid for his life, even though his village back home was considered safer than most places he had heard of.

  The local militia were cruel, but they had protected the people from other armed groups. Their leader—who called himself ‘the general’ and always wore a flat red hat, going about with two machine guns to show how much more powerful he was than his soldiers—was a wise man despite his roughness. He made sure that the village provided the fighters with livestock and grains, and in turn he protected them from armed robbers, and from the Western tribal fighters, who regularly raided the land. And yet, their presence meant living in fear. They often kidnapped women, or killed the men just for the sake of showing their power, and eventually they were the ones who brought about the destruction of everything Jumaane ever had.

  But he remembered the rumours about the white man’s country where you could see no soldiers, no guns, and there was never any fighting. He was not sure whether to believe these tales. As much as he knew about the white men, they were just as bad as the militia. He had never seen a white man without a gun, yet many locals thought of them as their only hope, and Jumaane found he needed hope to survive as well. Europe had become his hope, a land of promise, but now that he was here, all of that hope had vanished.

  He watched the other two. They were arguing, but they did not look violent. Jumaane’s thoughts became more confused, the hunger he became. He had not eaten for days and had very little food for the past several weeks. The spasmodic pain from his abdomen was now clouding his mind. Perhaps they cannot agree what to do with me. One of them wants to kill me, the other wants to lock me up. Maybe he is a slaver, and he wants to sell me later.

  He was exhausted, his nerves shattered. He felt his eyelids close shut. He struggled to stay awake, he was afraid to lose himself in sleep. Who knew what would happen to him when he woke up. If he ever woke up. He still heard the distant voices of the white people. Sometimes they stopped talking, but then they started again. He must be a slaver… Jumaane slipped deeper into sleep, but he could not completely let go of his consciousness. His mind was too exhausted to wind down, he floated between dream and reality. He heard distant voices, the thought of slavery still echoing in his head. In a half-dream, he saw the white soldier among the white slavers in Africa, and his disturbed mind relieved the day when his life was shattered into pieces.

  ***

  The armed men of the local militia had come that day, burned down the crops, and the hut; they had wanted the people to get moving. They had said the white man was coming, and they had to move as fast as they could, leaving everything behind. But nobody wanted to listen. The people struggled, they did not want to leave their homes. Somebody said that the white man would bring them help as they had helped them before the war. One of the villagers somehow seized a gun and threatened the leader of the militants. That was when the massacre started, the militia began to kill everybody in sight.

  Jumaane tried to hide his family in a recess they had used as a dry storage in the wall of their hut. He was sure he could lie low, and wait for the madness to end, and then they could all go on with their normal lives. He was just covering up the opening when an armed man appeared at the door.

  “What are you doing there?”

  “I go, I’m leaving, just leave me in peace, please!” said Jumaane, moving away from the hiding place.

  Looking at his expression the armed man sniggered.

  “Let me see what you hide there, you filth.”

  He hit Jumaane on the face with the back of a heavy hand, and spat after him as he fell to the floor. The man then uncovered the recess. Jumaane’s wife was holding their children tight, still covering their mouths so that they would not scream.

  “Look at that. And you wanted to rob me of the pleasure.”

  He whistled, and immediately two more of them came in. One had a machete in his hand, the other held an automatic weapon.

  “Start with the little vermin,” spat the first man.

  “No!” Jumaane wanted to jump on him, but a second blow sent him to the ground again.

  “No, no, no.” The armed man’s voice was derisive “You will watch!”

  Then he turned to one of his men.

  “Tie him up!”

  The other produced a thin rope and tied Jumaane’s hands and feet together. He could not move.

  “Where were we…?” said the leader, almost casually.

  What happened after had burned deep into Jumaane’s mind. He watched them mutilate his children. He watched them desecrate his wife. Then they beheaded her lifeless body. He tried to wriggle out of his bonds, he screamed until his throat was burning, he kicked, and tried to hit his he
ad against the floor in his last desperation. One of the militants then seized him, and pinned his body down, kneeling on his back, while lifting his head by forcing the handle of a machete in his mouth, and pulling on it with what felt like inhuman strength.

  The man’s weight was unbearable, Jumaane could not breathe. In the end, he could not even scream or cry. He watched the scene with widened eyes, taking in the picture, not knowing where he was, or whether any of it was real.

  When they dragged him out of the hut, he was no longer resisting. Everything was burning, there were corpses scattered between the buildings and he could hear gunfire from every direction. He closed his eyes but he could still see his family lying there, violated, frozen in blood. He let the men drag him out, just waiting for the moment he would be shot.

  Suddenly, one of the troops began to shout. Seconds later more of them were shouting and he heard the roar of engines. Jumaane lifted his head and saw trucks and armoured cars arriving, with white soldiers hanging from them on all sides. They all wore clean uniforms and moved in an organised way, it was like nothing he had ever seen before. They were shooting at the militia, who fired back. The black troops were soon outnumbered. Most of them were killed, the rest fled into the woods.

  Soon the guns quieted down. The white soldiers collected all the survivors, men, women and children. They rounded them all up and tied their hands together. They cut Jumaane’s bonds on his feet, but left his hands tied up. One of them brought some long chain, to which they fastened their prisoners in a row.

  Jumaane was at the edge of the group and the trees were so close. He watched the soldiers approaching, busy with tying the others together. He knew he would soon be tied to them as well, but he would not live as a slave, he would rather die as a man! Everything was gone, there was nothing to live for, but his instinct awoke all the same. It had been an impulsive decision to run for it. Nobody had cared much to chase him, he had heard a few gunshots, but it had soon been over.