Revolution in the Underground

by Michaels, S. J.

  “Yes, I heard,” she said with a light giggle.

  “Hey, what’s with your name anyway? ‘Styles?’ Where’d that come from?” He did not respond. Maggie had always been particularly vulnerable to the stringency of silence. In many respects, it was worse than a terse rebuttal or derisive tirade. It made her feel like a non-entity—a creature whose words and thoughts were so insipid as to not warrant recognition of any kind. It was for this reason that she was always so quick to respond to questions—be it through word or through expression. And should the intended recipient of someone else’s question not reply within a timely manner, Maggie often took it upon herself to respond for him or her, even if she did not have an appropriate answer. She was, however, growing accustomed to Styles’ ways, and elected to not let him bother her. “Hey, Styles?” she said, hoping that she would have better luck with a new topic, “what do you think would happen if someone from my home came looking for us? You know, if they came to the Underground after us?”

  “If they came through the same entrance as you did… they would have been captured and subsequently killed without anyone’s knowing.” He smiled sadistically as he heard a faint gasp behind him.

  Maggie was inundated by waves of guilt. The thought of being the cause of someone else’s death made her throat tight and raw. The sign that Ember had made from rocks in the forest—the very sign that once brought her hope of salvation—now promised only tortuous guilt, and she wished, more than anything else, that its symbol be expunged from the face of the Earth. What killed her most was not knowing how many people, if any, had perished pursuing her and Ember’s rescue. For a brief moment, she wished that she had never been born. “You don’t think we would have heard anything?”

  “Probably not. They would have kept it under wraps.” He paused for a moment, and then added cruelly, “There’s no telling how many of your people died because of you.”

  At that precise moment, it struck Maggie just how unprincipled and intrinsically unkind he truly was. Previously she had excused his ways as willful indifference but now she saw plainly that she had done him too much justice. She at once hated his face and resented its handsome features, which she found terribly mismatched with his ugly heart. Although Maggie had never despised a person before, she was certain that she despised him. She did not know for how much longer she could continue the friendly façade. At this moment, however, she decided to maintain the masquerade, but the phoniness made her sick to her core.

  “Don’t worry Maggie, I’m sure everything will be okay. Don’t listen to him,” Luna said, leaning over to give her a hug.

  Emboldened by this reassurance, and just now made aware of the suspicion she should use to regard Styles, she decided to try to extract information. “What exactly do you get out of all this? Why go through all this trouble?”

  “Isn’t it obvious,” he said.

  “No, not at all.”

  As he rose from his squatting position a shadow crept over the left side of his face so that he appeared malevolent as he spoke. “It’s the power. It’s the control. I’m going to bring the entire system crashing down on their heads. I am going to make them rue the day whence they tried to control the likes of me! The dominance, the authority, the supremacy—it is for me alone to have!”

  Maggie was hit by such an amalgam of emotion that she wasn’t sure what to say or do first—smile to probe for sincerity, jolt backwards to express disgust, or gasp out of the terror of the dramatic realization of his madness. She did all three. “You’re crazy! You’re a maniac!”

  He laughed aloud and stretched his right arm forward and made a clutching gesture with his fingers, as if to grab the world. “And there’s nothing anyone can do about it. Not you. Not your brother. And not the totality of the Underground.”

  “And why should we believe that you will free your people? We will not fight along your side just to have you replace the existing establishment!” Maggie thundered with a feeling of indomitable righteousness. She felt, at this moment, that Styles was the face of the enemy.

  Styles turned and knelt down to resume his work, leaving Maggie to half wonder if he really meant what he had said. There was something about the way he spoke—there was a flare of honesty in his voice—a flare that rose up despite his will to suppress and hide it.

  “My people? Oh no, they are not my people. But you have nothing to worry about. I have no interest in usurping anyone’s role. My purpose lies external to this pit.” There was malice in his words.

  “And what purpose might that be?”

  “I will live for ever.”

  “But you can’t!” she yelled, as if his confidence was an affront to the very fabric of her reality.

  “You can’t. You will die and subsequently be forgotten. I, whether in this manifestation or in spirit, will live forever.”

  “But how?!”

  “Legacy.”

  “And should that be a good or bad legacy?!”

  “That remains to be seen.”

  “Would a good one not be preferable to a bad one?!”

  “I suppose it would.”

  Maggie shook her head in disbelief at his indifference. “You’re crazy.”

  “As you see,” he said, as if it were the culmination a long-winded dialectic, “you have no need to fear me, for I have no need or desire to remain here in the Underground. Of course, that would be exactly what I would say if I did.”

  “Yes it would.”

  “But would I remind you of the fact that it is what I would say?”

  Maggie paused to translate. “Yes, I suppose you would.” Styles smiled at thought of Maggie’s confusion. “So… the lives of all these people… tens—no, hundreds of thousands of people… they’re all just incidental beneficiaries?”

  “You could say that.”

  “And should you have the opportunity to leave without freeing the Underground, would you?” He did not respond, but it was for the better because Maggie didn’t want to hear the answer. “And what of your moral system?”

  “Whatever furthers the propagation of my existence—be it in idea, genes, or current form—is moral. My loyalty is to myself and myself alone,” he paused to see if his words took effect on her. “You are no different. Your altruism is nothing more than selfishness masquerading as selflessness. The only difference is that I own up to it. My views have the added benefit of self-consistency and my calculations are more complete. Yours are just a more inferior and confused manifestation of the same desire—the desire that fills all of existence, whether you like it or not.”

  “You’re wrong. I’m not like you. I’m not anything like you.” Maggie had enough of speaking to Styles and so decided to strike up a conversation with Luna. “And what about you? Why did you join the cause? What is your view of morality?”

  Luna had been sitting on the couch, pleasantly absorbing all the nuances of the heated conversation and was a little startled to become part of it herself. She spoke, nonetheless, with conviction of one who had already made her mind up. “People come and go. Leaders change, establishments fall, and new ones come to take their place. Nothing ever changes… and I fear, that freedom will not lift you from your existential terrors.”

  “Me?! Why single me out?”

  “Or your brother… or Sven… or Kara… or anyone here in the Underground… Including Styles. After all the fighting and all the searching, I’m afraid you will find that you are as lost as ever with nothing left to place the blame. I wonder if, for some people, these confinements are not a blessing in disguise.”

  “Luna! What are you saying?!”

  “Sometimes it’s good to have things be black-and-white. It is easier that way.”

  “Luna!”

  “People will suffer for this goal, and if attained should the world be at all changed? Will the corruptibility of man wash away over night? Will the burden of unknowings evaporate too? For me, I’m not sure it will make all that much of a difference.”

&n
bsp; “Luna!”

  “But of course, I should reckon that we are deserved of the opportunity. On the whole of it, it can scarcely be doubted that net happiness will increase… and though I suspect its increase may be more tempered than you expect, it is through this calculation that I derive my moral imperative. ‘The greatest good for the greatest number,’ I believe they say. As for my own part, I would very much like see what lies on the other side.”

  “Phew… that sounds a lot better… you were scaring me for a moment.”

  “Why should my thoughts scare you?” Luna now took on a strange, almost didactic tone, which seemed deeply discordant with her usual blissful and ostensibly juvenile mentality, which misleadingly appeared void of profound thought. “He is right, you know? In ways… but wrong in others. It is but a re-defining of the system—a zooming in or a zooming out. My view, being more holistic than his, is more agreeable with your own. I submit to you, however, that the distinction is largely semantic. It is a question of identity… of will… We all want things… Those who want and act towards what they believe is bad, are themselves bad. Beyond that, and I’ll leave you to analyze the other three permutations yourself, I do not know. If you hate Styles, hate him not because he is bad, but rather because he has different views than your own.”

  “What?! What are you talking about?! I don’t hate anyone.” Maggie was taken aback by her candor, and did not yet want to expose her true feelings about Styles. Whenever prompted with such open-ended questions, Luna usually gave such responses. It was, for this reason, that Maggie, as well as everyone else, usually kept their conversations with her light.

  “It’s okay, you know… a lot of people have that visceral reaction… they do not believe that someone should be hated for his or her own beliefs… but, should you not hate one who believes murder is just? Are beliefs not who we are? As people? As life forms? As freely calculating autonomous entities?”

  “I… I… don’t know… I don’t want to talk about this right now…”

  “And how about you? What is your reason to join the cause?” Luna asked.

  Maggie scratched her head, and then spoke calmly but disjointedly, “Well… I of course want to get back home… but I want to save everyone else… I… just want everyone to be happy. I know it sounds simple… and I know it’s not as well thought out as your views… but… I know it’s right… that’s it… I just want everyone to be happy.”

  “And you would kill others to reach that end?” Styles inquired.

  “I… I will not be killing anyone or anything… I… I just want everyone to be happy. I know it’s simple… I just want everyone to be happy,” Maggie was now repeating her own words and thoughts in a trance-like state, as if trying to lay the bedrock of her own moral philosophy with self-evident axioms.

  “It’s okay,” Luna said, leaning over to hold Maggie tight, “sometimes the simplest are the most profound and true. I too, just want everyone to be happy.”

  ***

  The black market was more crowded than Ember had expected. Though he had wandered through the fringe of the market with his sister on the first night, he quickly learned that he was unprepared for the chaos of the market center. On either side of the labyrinthine alleys was a multiplicity of store carts—so packed together, that structures behind them, presumably residential complexes, were rendered practically unreachable. So many had their own cloth overhangs that the narrow passage ways, save for a small line in the middle, appeared dimly lit—just enough to make out the items of purchase, but not enough to scrutinize the details or make out a face from afar.

  The stench was so thick that the thought occurred to Ember that if the light should have been more abundant, its vapors would have been visible. The noise was equally unbearable. Gratuitous solicitations and aggressive bargaining filled the air to such an extent that it was hard to dismiss it as background noise. Needless to say, this was not a place in which Ember could have his deep conversation with Kara.

  Sven, Kara, and Ember, channeled through the passage in a straight line, in that order, holding hands, with Sven taking the lead. Ember felt a bit like a child being dragged around by Kara, but he didn’t mind in the slightest. He was pleased just to feel her thin and delicate fingers and soft hands.

  Of the five senses, it was sight that most arrested Ember. As Kara and Sven dragged him along, he saw an endless variety of impassioned shopkeepers—each with the unshakable belief that his or her product was so good that the failure to purchase it was a most capital of grievances. The bulging eyes, the sweaty and slimy faces, the wagging finger, the look of entreaty followed by the look of offense, the fervent moving lips and subsequent showers of saliva, the scores of facial hair, the dirty ragged clothing—it all seemed to come together as one, despite its endless diversity. There seemed to be an endless range of products: metalworks of various kinds, dazzling gems and brilliant jewelry, colored liquids, foods, aphrodisiacs of doubtful potency, even eyeballs and fingers, as well as long lists of items that Ember didn’t even understand.

  Reaching the weaponry and armament sub-section of the black market required passing though a narrow spacing between two of the carts, and taking three flights of stairs downward. Although Ember, disoriented by all that was going on, did not know what structure he was now below, he suspected that it was the main market itself.

  The sub-section was only marginally better lit. There were four “stores”, each of more substantial size and structural integrity than the carts in the market above. They were not actual stores in the sense that they did not have walled-in structures, but they did have, by virtue of their weighty merchandise, an air of immovability that the carts above did not. It was also far less crowded—in fact the place was quite empty. So much so that it was again possible to have a conversation and no longer necessary to hold hands.

  “We are looking for these items,” Kara said carefully, puling out a sketch for the shopkeeper to see.

  In continuing contrast to the market above, the shopkeepers here were not solicitous. On the contrary they were proud, laconic creatures, that seemed at best indifferent to selling their goods, and at worst, unwilling to part with their items—as if selling were beneath them.

  The person to which Kara spoke was a gruff man with a walrus mustache and enough forearm hair to require combing. He stood tall with the posture of a proud man, and always seemed to gaze through squinted eyes. He spat into a pot on the ground, and, seeming satisfied with the resonant frequency of the twang he produced, said, “We don’t make that kind.”

  “Do you know anyone who does?” Sven asked.

  The man looked around at his competitors suspiciously, “No, I don’t think I do. No one makes those any more. What do you want it for?”

  Kara scrambled to come up with a justification, “Self-defense.”

  The man spat once more and seemed to grimace at her words. “I see. Ain’t no matter. People come here from all sorts of places… ya won’t believe what some of em’ tell me. Had one chap, just last week, who said he wanted a broadsword to slice his bread.”

  “Well… uh… yes… I see… can you perhaps show us to another, similar item?” Sven asked.

  “Well… if ‘self-defense’ is what you’re after, then you’re gonna wanna look at the items over here.” At the mention of “self-defense,” he gave a wink so conspicuous that it was noticeable even through his squinted gaze. “You’re gonna want this here long sword. Made it myself. Very light, but very strong and very powerful. A swift, clean blade, on that I give my word.”

  “Okay, we’ll take it,” Sven said, wishing to eschew the bargaining phase.

  “It’s not going to be cheap,” the walrus-like man warned.

  “And daggers? We need two daggers,” Kara said.

  The man pulled open a drawer and pulled out two items encased in metal scabbards. He evidently did not place as much pride in these items, probably, Ember surmised, because he did not make it himself. “Will that be all?”


  “Yes,” Sven said. He agreed to the exorbitant price with such willingness that the shopkeeper found it necessary to throw in a complimentary sheath for the long sword.

  On their way back, Ember’s eye fell upon a pair of thread wristbands each with a single matching bead. He fancied it as a gift he could share with his sister, and convinced Kara to buy it for him. Kara, feeling generous, also bought for Ember an Underground delicacy—a sweet, creamy fluorescent paste that they called Glow. As the transaction was taking place, Sven discreetly pulled out a small collapsable telescope and aimed it at the space above the pile of trash where Ember had said he and his sister first landed.

  It wasn’t until they had left the market that Sven told them of his discovery, “It’s not sealed.”

  “What’s not sealed?” Kara asked.

  “The entrance. The exit. Whatever you want to call it. The place where Maggie and Ember came from.”

  At first Ember did not know what to do with this information. He had not thought about leaving the Underground with just his sister since joining the revolutionary cause, and was a little bit disappointed with how quickly selfish thoughts filled his head. He did not want to appear over-zealous, lest he should give the wrong impression. Eventually more pragmatic concerns—ones he deemed, by virtue of their more objective nature, less reprehensible—came to mind. “How would we—”

  “I don’t know about the logistics of it… I don’t even know if we could reach it…”

  “It’s a trap… I’m sure of it,” Kara said with the voice of one who wished to dismiss further inquiries, but still remained interested.

  When they went to pick up Maggie at Sven’s house, Ember broke the news. Styles, it was observed, was noticeably agitated by the information—so much so that he didn’t even seem to mind that they picked up the wrong swords. Maggie also seemed interested with the discovery, but seemed more anxious to relax with the rest of the group at Kara’s house. It was quickly arranged that Luna would spend the night with Styles.