by G. C. Julien
“We found a mother,” I say, and the room lights up. But when I add, “And her son,” the women all frown at the same time.
“A boy?” someone says.
“As in, a male?”
“How old?”
“Where are they now?”
I raise a hand, and silence returns. “They’re being held in isolation until Mavis and Perula ensure they’re not infected with anything from the outside.”
They all nod, and I can tell the tea is settling well.
“He’s young,” I continue. “Fifteen.” I pause and clasp my fingers together over my stomach. “But that’s not important. What’s important is that he’s a boy who will soon become a man.”
The women are still slowly nodding, and it’s as though I’m talking to robots.
“The reason I’ve brought you here,” I continue, “is to allow you all to make an important decision today.”
They turn their heads from side to side, eyes wide and lips parted, almost as if the person sitting next to them might know something they don’t. I think confusion is also setting in because the women aren’t used to having the freedom to make decisions in Eden. I’ve always been the one to guide them.
“Do you want to allow the boy to stay?” I ask.
Whispered words are exchanged, and women are leaning into each other, their faces nearly touching.
“You know best, Eve,” says one woman, standing. “Why don’t you decide.”
“Yes, you decide, Eve.”
“She knows best.”
“She’s always guided us in the right direction.”
I wonder how much backlash I’d have received had the women not drank the Devil’s tea. They look happy now with their pathetic smiles and rosy cheeks. They stare at me from behind large sheep-like eyes and wait for me to speak.
I have them right where I want them. They need to be shown that free will is precisely what will destroy them. These women don’t know what’s best—they make decisions based on their feelings and nurturing instincts. I’ve heard the late-night meetings held in Division Seven’s courtyard. It’s directly beside Division Eight, the only isolated Division I often visit by myself. Over the wall, I’ve listened to the bickering and the frustrations shared regarding their insatiable desire to bring men into Eden. If it isn’t their sexual appetite blinding them, it’s their motherly instincts. Many of these women—especially the young ones—yearn for a man’s touch and want nothing more in life than to be mothers.
You would think that going to war with the male gender would be enough for them to despise men. But it isn’t. There’s a primal desire that I can’t seem to eliminate.
“I’ve always led you toward a better life,” I say, walking across the stage. “But today, I want you to decide.”
“What do you think is the best decision, Eve?”
I smirk—not intentionally but because this is as easy as taking candy from a kid.
“It isn’t up to me,” I say. “I wouldn’t want my decision affecting your lives in any way.” I watch them, tapping the tip of my nose with my index finger. “But do remember that this boy would be surrounded by female influence… by mother figures who could mold him into the ideal man.”
They break out into rapid nods again, looking at each other in deep contemplation as if my words stem from heaven itself. It’s only a matter of seconds before silence returns, and the most vocal of the women—the one whose voice I’ve heard gossiping over the wall at night—stands up and presses a hand over her hefty chest.
“We feel that the boy should stay.”
Bingo.
“Then I respect your decision,” I say. “After all, I’m here to ensure you all are happy and that your needs are being met.”
Watching them is like holding a piece of bloody meat in front of a pack of dogs—big eyes, stiff postures, and smiles stretched across their faces.
Some of them reach for each other’s hands, excitement filling the room as they bounce their shoulders and grin from ear to ear.
“A boy…”
“The first boy.”
“Can you believe it?”
I smile at them.
The boy will fail us—I know it. His primitive nature will eventually take over, and once it does, the women will come to realize that they’re nothing without me.
Eve – Flashback
“All clear, Beth.”
Bethany Lee, the leader of one of Washington DC’s most influential underground rebel groups, is sitting straight across from me, a glass of water in one hand and a blue gel pen in the other. She’s hunched forward, her leather vest rubbing against the table and her rounded shoulders giving her the appearance of a professional boxer. Her hair almost looks dark brown under the light overhead, but anywhere else, it looks jet-black.
The girl who just walked in is Shilo—Bethany’s watchdog. She scouts the area every ten minutes, and that’s on top of the other five girls Bethany has watching every entrance and exit, including windows, to our current location.
Several weeks ago, Bethany gave up on the underground comedy club—she said something about government officials being on our trail. We’ve since had to relocate several times.
Tonight, we’re sitting in someone’s basement apartment. The owner died two nights ago from a drug overdose. A rotten smell still lingers, but apparently, the family won’t be coming by until next week to gather his belongings, which makes this place our safest bet for the week.
“The government’s losing power,” she says, a shadow cast over the upper half of her face, her high cheekbones still prominent. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say she had native ancestry.
“Men are losing power,” someone says, and Bethany smirks at them.
She then smacks a fist on top of the coffee table, causing the warm strawberry-scented candle in the middle to dance from side to side. “We’re going to hit them where it hurts.” She looks up at everyone in the room—a total of approximately twenty people—and stiffens her posture. “Are preparations still in order?”
Mila nods and pulls out a slip of paper.
The crowd is usually much thicker than this. In the comedy club, we reached maximum capacity: a total of 150 women. But I think Bethany is worried that too many women may make it easier for government officials to track us, which is why she limited tonight’s crowd to a select few only. I don’t blame her—I’d have done the same thing.
“It’s getting tough,” Mila says. “The White House has already fired all its female staff… Congress is all male. The US military is all male. We’re losing our connections.”
Everyone stares at her, and for a moment, although I don’t like the idea of my little sister involving herself in a rebellion, I’m proud. She’s come a long way, and to see her take part in something so big is awe-inspiring in many ways. I know there are dangers to what we’re doing, but ever since the riot in New York City, everything’s gone to shit. The women of the world are enraged beyond belief.
We can’t just sit around.
Instead of listening to his people, President Price signed an executive order to cut health care for women. In a speech he recently gave, he said something along the lines of, “Until women submit themselves and stop rioting, we will continue to treat them as foreign outsiders. They will not be given access to any of our country’s benefits or protections.”
And what did that do? It made things worse. Homemade explosives go off every hour in various cities across the United States. President Price has even called in all special forces to help fight the rebellion, but the problem is, they don’t have enough men—we outnumber them. They might control the government, but we control the cities.
Countless marriages have fallen apart because men are brainwashed by the news, led to believe that without women, none of this would be happening. So, what do they do? They turn on their wives, their girlfriends, their mothers and try to convince them that this entire rebellion has been blown out of proportion.
Schools have been shut down, and traffic is at a standstill with car parts and debris littering the cluttered roads. You wouldn’t even know you’re in the United States. Aside from city skyscrapers and glass buildings, everything looks like a third-world country.
And all of this could have been avoided had President Price agreed to put an end to government-assisted abortions and let us live as people and not as objects to be controlled by men. He is tearing this country apart by spreading hatred, sexism, racism, and fascism. I never thought I’d follow in my mother’s footsteps—never thought I’d become a feminist—but enough is enough.
I’m at the point where I am prepared to die if it means that somewhere down the road, this country will be salvaged, that peace will return. Because from where I’m standing, this life isn’t worth it anymore.
“I think we should reconsider our original plan,” Mila says, pointing at her slip of paper. “We can’t prepare an attack from the inside if women aren’t working there anymore.”
There’s a vibration in my pocket, and I look up at Bethany.
“Sorry,” I say, and I get up to answer the phone, even though I don’t recognize the number. I can hear Mila going on in the background, something about taking drastic measures, but the moment I hear Ophelia’s voice, everything around me fades.
“O… O… calm down. Talk to me. What’s going on?”
I haven’t heard from O in over six months. I assumed she got her cell phone plan cut. Her voice is quivering, and she’s breathing heavily.
“Eve, he’s here. The fucking asshole found me.”
“Found you?” I ask. “Where are you? Where have you been this whole time?”
She lets out a long sigh, and it sounds like she dropped her weight against a wall or on a couch.
“I’m at my mom’s place with Lucy,” she says. “I had to leave—I just had to.”
“I wish you’d said something,” I hiss into the phone, and several eyes in the basement roll up at me. I turn away and sneak into the bathroom with my hand pressed against my other ear.
“I’m sorry… I didn’t have time,” she says. “I tossed my phone and came straight here. I thought I was a goddamn lunatic, Eve. A lunatic. I thought I was being completely paranoid and overthinking the whole thing. But he’s here! In Bruntonburg. Who the fuck comes to Bruntonburg? There’s nothing here!”
“Bruntonburg,” I repeat a few times. I’ve heard the name. “Where is that again?”
“About twenty miles south of Washington,” she says. “Goddamn it, Eve. What am I supposed to do? He knows I ran. He’s gonna kill me… He’s gonna fucking kill me. Why else would he come here?”
The guy’s obviously a psychopath, so I believe her when she says he’s going to kill her.
“Take a breath,” I say, and I fight to catch my own. I sit down on the toilet lid and crane my neck back, my eyes fixated on the yellow-stained ceiling, then down at uncapped needles lying on cracked tiles around the toilet.
What a dump.
I turn my attention to the shower curtains. They’re see-through with weird duck-like designs on them that almost look like guns.
That’s it.
“O,” I say, “give me the address.”
“What, why?”
“Just give it to me.”
She gives it to me, and I punch the information into my cell.
“Hold tight,” I say, “and whatever you do, don’t leave the house.”
She doesn’t even have time to say goodbye because I hang up and slip the phone into my pocket. I open the bathroom door in a full swing, and everyone looks at me. Mila’s lips are parted, and her glasses are hanging off the tip of her nose.
“What’s up?” she says.
“It’s O,” I say, and Mila stiffens.
Ophelia’s always been a family friend, and Mila loves her like an aunt, the way Lucy thinks of me as her aunt.
“What’s wrong?” Mila says.
“Jason found her,” I say, and Mila stands up.
“What do you need?” Bethany asks, leaning back in her chair.
I look at her and then at Mila. “A car, and maybe a gun or two.”
Bethany nods toward one of her watchdogs, and they move toward the candlelit table. The sound of heavy metal scratches the table’s surface, and in front of me are two black pistols—one with a silencer and one without.
“Granger here will show you how to shoot it,” Bethany says.
Granger, the girl who handed me the guns, pulls out a set of keys attached to a metal ring. She twirls it around her index finger, then drops it into my palm.
“Black Vexer at the back,” she says.
I look at Bethany—I don’t know how to thank her. I’ve come to view her as a mother these last few months. She’d do anything for us. She’s been more of a mother than mine’s ever been.
“How long are we gonna be gone?” Mila asks.
“Not sure,” I say.
“Shouldn’t we tell Mom?”
I stare at her. “You mean like she tells us when she disappears for weeks at a time?”
I don’t mean to sound so resentful, but my mom’s been absent lately. If she isn’t coming home with bruises or bloodstains, she doesn’t come home at all. We’ve found her in the hospital about six times now, and with health care recently cut for all women, I’m sick to my stomach every night when she doesn’t show.
She refuses to involve us in what she’s doing even though we’re doing the exact same thing she is. The only difference is we’re smart about it—we’re thinking things through. Mom goes out and joins any riot she can find. She’s so angry, and one day, it’s going to get her killed.
“Thank you,” I say, and Bethany gives me a gentle nod.
I don’t know what I’d do without her.
Mila picks up the pistol from the table and tucks it into the side of her pants.
“When we get back,” she says, “we’re killing the president of the United States.”
CHAPTER 26 – GABRIEL
Gabriel – Present Day
I stare at Castor as he shoves a piece of rat meat into his mouth. His lips, two shiny lines of pink, flap up and down underneath that big red-brown beard of his. He’s been letting it grow these last few weeks—not like he has much of a choice because we’re running out of water and the razor he has is dull.
“Good?” I ask.
He nods but doesn’t answer.
I wonder how long we’ll be sitting here waiting. Is it even worth it? Even if his daughter is in there, who’s to say we’ll ever get close to her? What if these women are so feral they’re willing to cut off our penises at the first sight of us? I wouldn’t blame them for wanting to, after everything that’s happened. But at the same time, how are we supposed to ever reunite in peace if the women are unwilling to see that not all men are the same? That there many of us who are genuine and who wouldn’t treat them like garbage.
In all fairness, I’ve known some pretty cruel women. It’s not only men. I wish people wouldn’t generalize an entire gender because of the bad ones.
I stare at the prison wall, then up at the overcast sky, wondering how much longer we’ll be forced to live like this. Rumor has it that Canada hasn’t been affected as badly as we have and that thousands of men and women have sought refuge in the north. And what about other countries? What about Europe? Why isn’t anyone trying to help?
The last time I read the newspaper—a torn black-and-white front page—the article went on about how the female population was expanding everywhere incredibly fast. So why is it that we’ve destroyed ourselves when other countries haven’t? Unless they have now… There’s no telling because there’s no electricity, no internet, nothing.
Maybe the whole world’s gone to shit.
Maybe there’s no getting out of this at all.
I look back at Castor, who’s finished eating and now sits with his head pressed against the bark of a birch tree. He has two hands over hi
s face, and he’s rubbing up, down, and through his hair. He’s probably thinking about his daughter.
“Have enough to eat?” I ask.
He doesn’t look at me, but he nods.
“We need to build shelter,” I say. I step over a fallen branch; my boot crunches through leaves and twigs.
His head rolls up and his dark eyes catch mine. He looks disgusted. “You think we’ll be here that long?”
What’s his problem anyway? Did he prefer following Adam around?
“Got somewhere better to be?” I ask.
He inhales a deep breath through his hairy nostrils and hits the back of his head against the tree. “I can’t just sit around, Gabe.”
I stare at him, then out through the woods. “So don’t. Get up and help me build a shelter.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
I step my other boot over the branch and cross my arms over my chest. “Then what do you mean, Castor? You think I want to sit around, too? Don’t you think I’m fed up with just surviving? I didn’t ask for this. No one did. But sitting around moping about it isn’t going to fix anything.”
His eyes narrow on me and he squeezes his jaw, and I wonder if I might have overreacted. Maybe I was a bit insensitive. The man has a daughter to worry about after all.
“You don’t get it,” he snaps, throwing his arms out. He stands up, then starts pacing back and forth, and bits and pieces of dead leaves and sticky dirt fly all over the place. “My baby girl, if she’s still even alive, would be twelve years old right now. Twelve!” His eyes go big and he stands there staring at me like he’s waiting for it to sink in.
I’m not entirely sure what he’s trying to get at, and I think he realizes it because he keeps going. “The last time I saw her, she was seven years old. I’m missing all of her special moments. She’ll be a teenager soon, and I’m not even around to help her through it. She’s my baby girl, and I have no idea where she is, how she’s doing, or if she’s even alive. Do you have any idea how hard that is for someone?”
His shoulders are hunched, and his mouth, which is missing several teeth, hangs open.