Citadel: The Concordant Sequence

by Matthew S. Cox

  “But it doesn’t work.”

  She shrugged. “I know, but it’s like a memory.”

  “All right. Maybe someday I’ll find a TV for it. And that other thing.”

  “Controllers? It’s okay. I guess I can live without my games.” She grinned.

  Mala walked up behind them and set a plate of burritos on the table. “I’m going to try the test again. Maybe if I have the right vitamins from the Ponics, we can have a boy.”

  “Ponics?” asked Kiera, before biting her lunch.

  “Big, clean vegetables,” said Teryn. “Grown inside the Citadel. Most of the permit people work so they can get numbers to buy Ponics. Little grows out here, and what does is sickly.”

  “Oh… Hydroponics.” She chomped another mouthful of burrito and licked a dribble of bean sliding down her arm.

  “Hydro… ponics?” Teryn ate a quarter of his burrito in one enormous bite, earning a scolding look from Mala.

  “It’s where they grow things in liquid instead of dirt… the robot said there’s still technology inside the Citadel.”

  “Yes.” Mala nodded. “Their law enforcers are all metal men. The ones who give the tests are metal men as well. I could buy Ponics without a work permit, but I do not have a way to get numbers without working inside.”

  “They don’t trade stuff?” asked Kiera.

  “Sometimes, but there isn’t much they need or want from outside.” Teryn took a smaller bite. “You’ll pass it this time.”

  Her parents kissed. Mom hugged Kiera and headed off across the yard on her way to the middle of the village.

  Grr. Being unable to remember much more than bits and pieces of what happened before the tank left her with sudden doubt if that had been real. The life she remembered most―and still somewhat missed―didn’t make any sense for her to have been put in a cryogenic pod. That world hadn’t had a trace of pollution or war. It had to be fake, but why would anyone bother giving her a made up reality, especially one so perfect?

  “Dad… do people dream when they’re frozen? Why would they make me have a fake dream?”

  He mumbled, his mouth full, and held up a finger until he swallowed. “Good question. Maybe they wanted you to be happier, letting you have a nice world for a while?”

  “But why? It’s worse to wake up from that in… this. If I remembered the Earth dying and everyone about to die, waking up to this would’ve been much better. Am I stupid for feeling like those people were real? Like my friend Ashleigh?”

  “I can’t imagine what it was like to be in… vee-arr.”

  Kiera fidgeted at her poncho. “It felt so real.”

  “Are you unhappy here?” He looked at her, his expression going serious.

  “No.” She hugged him. “I’m really happy you adopted me. I’m only trying to figure out what happened. All this stuff in my head, and I don’t know what’s fake.”

  He ruffled her hair. “You’re smart. I’m sure you’ll succeed.”

  She puffed out her chest. “Yeah. I’m the Child of Earth, right?”

  Teryn’s laugh sprayed refried beans.

  17

  Cloudfall

  Kiera spent a few hours roaming the far end of her new Dad’s scrap collection, crawling among old ductwork, playing with random objects, and running around pretending to be the soldier character from the game. Passageways between mountains of junk resembled one of the early maps, and a length of pipe with a small metal box on the side made for a decent pretend rifle.

  After spending most of the day playing alone in her best non-electronic recreation of TCS, she decided to help out when Teryn got ready to prepare dinner. Her mother returned about twenty minutes before dark, looking worried. Kiera and Teryn sat by the cook fire in the front yard warming up the last of the beans for another round of burritos. Mala sank to sit on her orange cooler and slouched.

  “You passed,” said Teryn.

  Mala picked at one of the resistors sewn into the neckline of her dress. “I don’t know. I scored processing.”

  “Processing?” asked Teryn.

  “That’s what the metal man said. I need to go back in a week.”

  Kiera grinned. “I think you passed. I bet a real person inside the Citadel has to look at your test now, and it takes a while.”

  “I hope.” Mala accepted a plate from Teryn. “I am so tired of taking that test.”

  Kiera thought about her robotics class. “Yeah. I know how that feels.”

  At the confused look from both of them, she explained about having to take the same difficult hundred-question exam in that robotics class over and over. At least, it had felt like she’d taken it numerous times before. Maybe the simulation only had so much content, and it kept resetting.

  Did I repeat the entire school year like sixty times? She cringed.

  After dinner, they sat together on the back porch with a nice view of the forest. Teryn took an e-tablet out from under the cushion, and read her a story about a bunch of tween witches trying to stop a demon (who had possessed their principal) from destroying their school. He stumbled over a few words, but she kept quiet and listened. ‘Real Dad’ started to feel like ‘Bio Dad’ and Teryn like ‘Real Dad.’ Did he ever read to me? He might have… I can’t remember.

  A little while past dark, he announced bedtime.

  “How does that thing have power?” asked Kiera.

  “Got a little solar panel hooked up to a battery. Can get 110-volt AC for about two hours off it… then it’s gotta bake in the sun for a day or two. I made a charging wire for the reader. Power to one pin and the negative to the metal bit. Darn small stuff. It’s amazing that the ancients could make something so small, but I bet there’s even better in the Citadel.”

  Mala hugged him with Kiera caught between them. “If I did get a permit, I’ll look… but my numbers are going to food before toys.”

  After hugging her parents, she went inside and climbed up to her bedroom. She’d decorated it with a few flowers she’d picked from the edge of the woods and two brightly colored panels from the sides of old PC cases. One white with zigzags of red, the other black with a weird little creature on it that appeared to be a yellow pill with eyes. The Supernova 2 held a place of honor in the middle of the top shelf.

  She stretched out on her mattress, closed her eyes, and had no trouble falling asleep.

  Once she’d finished cleaning up the breakfast dishes the next day, Kiera headed with Mala to the left side of the house where the garden spread out below a huge tarp held up by metal poles and rope. Gutters made from sliced-open PVC pipes surrounded it, carrying rain a safe distance away so it didn’t poison their food. They examined the plants, plucking off any vegetables that appeared too shriveled. According to Mala, the bad ones sucked energy away from the rest of the plant and would make more vegetables die on the vine.

  The chili peppers grew the best, looking almost like what she remembered. The tomatoes resembled red prunes, undersized and wrinkled. Scallions didn’t do too bad, but the poor potato plants all looked rough. They didn’t dig any up to check, and spent most of their time on the cucumbers and corn.

  “Your friends are here,” said Mala, smiling.

  Kiera looked up.

  Four kids stood by the wall, staring at her. The two boys and the Japanese girl she remembered, but not the older black-haired boy in a cloth skirt who had to be about thirteen. The eldest also wore a necklace of circuit board fragments on a thin cable, maybe an old mouse wire.

  “They’re not my friends,” muttered Kiera. “Not yet, anyway. They don’t even talk to me… just stare.”

  “Why don’t you go talk to them?” Mala gave her a light pat on the rear end. “Maybe they’re hoping you will?”

  “The vegetables….”

  “I can finish this. Go and play if you like.” Mala winked.

  Okay. Fine. Let’s talk. Except for the few days where she had nothing to wear, she never considered herself a shy person. She marched right up to
the wall, standing opposite the other kids, and put her hands on her hips. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” chimed the seven-year-old boy with blond hair.

  “Hello.” The other girl smiled.

  “She can talk,” said the brown-haired boy about her age. He still wore the cloth tied around his middle that wound up resembling something between a tiny bathing suit and a diaper.

  Kiera rolled her eyes. “I thought you couldn’t talk. You’ve been watching me forever.”

  “Stuff makes bangs here,” said the small one.

  “Can I touch your hair?” asked the other girl.

  “It’s just hair.” Kiera leaned forward.

  “How is it red?” The girl pet her like a cat.

  Kiera held her arms out to either side, making her poncho drape wide. “The great Sky Spirits took me as a baby and dipped me head first into the river of roses.”

  Three of them gasped in awe, but the oldest squinted at her.

  “I’m teasing.” She dropped her arms and laughed. “It’s always been this color.”

  “What do we call you?” asked the boy in the cloth scrap. “I’m Osc.”

  “Oscar?” asked Kiera.

  “Your name is Oscar?” The blond boy blinked.

  “No… I’m Kiera. His name is Oscar?”

  The boy shook his head. “Osc.”

  “Oh.” Kiera shrugged.

  “I’m Peter,” said the oldest.

  “Sparrow.” The small boy grinned ear to ear.

  “I’m Mei,” said the girl.

  “You from ‘a Sand Strys?” asked Sparrow.

  Kiera blinked. “What?”

  Osc, the boy with the ‘wedgie shorts,’ smiled. “You’re a Sand Strider, right? From the other tribe.”

  “No.” She shook her head. “Orphan.”

  “Oh. Where do they live?” asked Osc.

  “Umm. Orphan’s not a tribe. A kid is an orphan if both of their parents are dead and they’re all alone.”

  Mei looked downcast. “Oh, sorry. Such sad. Make many cries.”

  “Many cries.” Peter bowed his head.

  Kiera ground her toe into the dirt. “Thanks… I’m okay now. I’m not an orphan anymore. I live here now.”

  “Can you play?” asked Osc.

  “Don’t go too far and be back for midfood,” called Mala.

  “Okay.” Kiera climbed over the wall and jumped down among her new friends.

  Peter led the way along the path, heading for the village center. Near the water collector, deep tire tracks marked the sand where a large vehicle had pulled in and later backed out.

  Kiera ran over and squatted next to them, her poncho draped to the ground. “What did this? There’s still trucks?”

  “The Passage,” said Peter. “It brings work-permit to Citadel, and returns in dark.”

  Kiera stood and walked along the tread for a few paces, before gazing off into the desert. The marks faded once the buildings and hills stopped shielding the ground from the wind. She muttered, “The Citadel still has technology.”

  “It!” yelled Sparrow, an instant before leaping into her from behind and clapping both hands onto her back. Laughing, he ran off.

  Tag? Seriously? She blinked. No video games. They want to play tag? Geez, what am I, six? She laughed, but decided to chase him anyway. Osc slipped in a mud patch left over from the rain, allowing Kiera to catch him for the tag. Sparrow had climbed onto the roof of a trailer to hide, while Mei relied on her speed. They ran around dwellings and tents, clambering over junk piles and up dirt hills. From the Gathering, Kiera knew the village had fourteen children not counting her. Aside from Peter, Osc, Mei, and Sparrow, the rest were all three or smaller.

  They split up to return home for lunch—or ‘midfood’ as her new parents called it—after Peter made her promise to come back so he could show her something. Kiera chatted happily of her adventures running around the village over a meal of dark brown paste smeared on bread. It tasted like beef and came from a plastic jar, so she assumed they’d gotten it from the Citadel. Probably from the trader who wouldn’t help her. He’d been friendly at the Gathering, but she still thought he was a butthead.

  After lunch, she ran off to meet the others by the water collector. The eight-foot tall column of twisted vanes whirred around in the breeze. Water droplets on the mesh of wires inside it gleamed in the sunlight, all trickling down to collect in the basin. She understood the reason for the giant umbrella over it now, keeping the toxic rain out of the clean water. After drinking a few handfuls, she wandered back and forth, waiting.

  Peter arrived first, still munching on a baked potato.

  She looked up at him, head tilted. “What did you wanna show me?”

  “You’ll see.” He winked. “Once everyone’s here.”

  “Is it dangerous or scary?”

  He scratched at the side of his head. “Yeah, it’s dangerous. But not if you’re careful.”

  “Okay.”

  Mei arrived next, jogging down the street, arms out to the sides flapping her cloth poncho, pretending to be a butterfly. Sparrow and Osc walked up a few minutes after her, both gnawing on sorry-looking apples.

  “C’mon.” Peter waved for them to follow and rushed off down the dirt path.

  Kiera jogged after him, still feeling like she’d stepped into a fantasy world at the sight of homes so close together on a ‘street’ only as wide as a footpath. No cars could ever drive around the west part of town.

  The kids weaved among scrap metal buildings, trailers, and a couple of long structures made from semi-truck trailers. Most had small gardens, some big enough to count as farms. All of the plants appeared to be struggling to exist. Those closer to the pine forest had healthier growth, and perhaps with the new pipe the people planned to build, the farms would get better.

  Peter headed out of the village along a trail into the woods. The ground changed from soft powdery dust to damp soil. A forest without chirping birds felt wrong. A sudden scamper of small boars in the distance startled her, but the others didn’t react. She ducked branches and stepped around patches of weeds, sticking as close to where Peter went as she could. It would be her luck that of all the thousands of plants to die off, poison ivy wouldn’t be one of them.

  The trail went down a long overgrown hill to a grassy ravine that had a line of mud running along the bottom. Kiera leapt over the muck, as did everyone else except for Sparrow who jumped into it with both feet. Peter followed the gully for a few minutes before moving to the far side and climbing it. Kiera grabbed grass and roots, planting her feet deep in the soil as she made her way up.

  At the top, Peter grasped her hand and pulled her up into thigh-high grass in the shadow of a huge metal tower. She leaned back, almost falling down the hill while staring at the lattice of steel that had to be fifty feet tall. Scraps of wire drifted in the wind, dangling from struts made of black segments, like a bunch of giant ceramic coasters stacked on top of each other.

  “Whoa.” She crept forward. “I think it’s like for power lines.”

  “What?” asked Peter.

  “Electricity.” Kiera pointed up. “Those wires used to carry electricity.”

  “Oh.” He grabbed Mei’s hand and pulled her up. “I guess. It’s not the best part.”

  “How’d the old ones catch lightning?” asked Mei.

  Kiera giggled. “They didn’t catch it, they made it.”

  Osc and Sparrow scrambled over the top, ignoring Peter’s hand while Mei stared at her in awe.

  The thirteen-year-old took the lead again, walking up to the base of the tower where a ladder hung. Without ceremony, he hopped on and climbed. Osc raced up behind him, as did Mei and Sparrow.

  Well, he did say dangerous… She bit her lip. After scooting across a wire to escape the dogs, this didn’t seem too bad. Kiera grabbed the warm metal rung. As soon as she touched it, a tingle spread down her arm and made her hair fluff. Eep! She let go. It couldn’t be electricity. None of the
wires connected to anything, all broken short and drifting in the wind. Again, she touched it, and again the tingle needled at her fingers. Lightning? Maybe the tower had a charge the way scuffing her feet on a rug used to cause sparks. She stared up at Sparrow. The younger boy had no fear whatsoever, and kept swatting at Mei’s feet to get her to go faster. Osc took his time going up, appearing to share Kiera’s distaste for heights.

  She shook her head. This is dumb. For no reason she could think of, she decided to climb. The hot metal rungs under her soles made her wish for the sneakers she didn’t have, left behind in the world that didn’t exist. When she neared the level of the treetops, a stiff wind whipped her hair to the side and made her poncho flap around like a flag. She clung tight to the ladder, squinting at the wind.

  The climb ended at a narrow catwalk about forty feet off the ground, below the wide arms that supported the wires. Fortunately, Peter didn’t continue trying to scale the tower itself, and sat on the grating, letting his feet hang over. Mei sat beside him, legs curled to the side, and clamped onto his arm. Osc also sat with his feet dangling, as did Sparrow. Kiera stepped off the ladder, but kept holding on to the side rails.

  Forest stretched out below, continuing for miles in a shape that resembled the top of a tree with the artificial river as the trunk. She imagined the water spilling into the Earth and the ground soaking up life like a paper towel.

  “Wow… It’s pretty.” Clinging to the railing, she twisted to look back at the village. The change from forest to desert was so abrupt it looked fake. She faced forward, mesmerized by the wavering trees that all leaned in the same direction. The hiss of the breeze among the pine needles soothed her.

  “Look there.” Peter pointed to the right.

  Kiera stared into the distance. The silvery-grey shimmer of the Citadel gleamed in the early afternoon light. From forty feet off the ground, she had a clear view of the immense pyramid. The tornado danced upon the flattened top of the structure, the top inhaling trails of fog from the cloud dome above. The constant circular wind matched the robot’s explanation. When she faced the Citadel, the breeze hit her on the left shoulder, pushing her hair off to the right.