“But… there are so many more of them... It’s not just about us… There are thousands of lives to consider. Though the marginal benefit to society may be small, you must multiply it by the number of lives it may affect.”
“I know,” she said, looking down from the hypnotic dance of the flame. “I know all of that. It’s just that… sometimes it might be best to worry about ourselves for a change. I mean… this is it. Life is something special… Should we really risk it so easily.”
“We’re not going to die Maggie,” he repeated, as if saying it might make it so.
“It’s not that I don’t care, you know… It’s just… I thought it was something worth talking about,” she said, almost apologetically.
“No… I understand. I had the same thoughts. I thought about running away too.”
“But with her.”
Ember fed a piece of wax to the flame slowly, finally understanding the source of her sadness. “Yes, with her,” he admitted. “I’m sorry Maggie. I can’t help it.”
“I know Ember, I know.”
“It is best this way… It is best, I think, to fight for everything now, don’t you think?”
“There are two considerations… Whether or not the mission fails and whether or not we act,” Maggie said, laying out the framework more precisely. “If we act and it fails, we die. If we don’t act and it fails, we live, but ask ourselves ‘what if?’ If we act and it succeeds, we are heroes. If we don’t act and it succeeds, we are still heroes.”
“But by acting we may help in the success of the mission. The clauses aren’t exactly independent.”
“I know, but still… You once accused me of going about my life without thinking… without considering. I just want to make sure that whatever it is we decide to do, we do it for the right reasons—not because we feel like we have to.”
“I hear you. I understand the options and their payoffs. But… I still feel that this is the right thing to do. Like Sven said, it gives life meaning.”
“He loves her too you know.”
“Huh?! What? Sven?! Really?!”
“Yep. Definitely.”
Ember watched the flame flicker. “But you agree with me… It’s best to act.”
“Come on Ember, when was I ever the type of person to run away from challenges,” she said with a smile.
Ember smiled back. “I know things have been kind of crazy lately. Everything is different here in the Underground. I feel different. Time seemed to go so fast. Sometimes I swear that time goes at different rates.”
“Agreed.”
“No matter… In a day or two we will be back home in Erosa. Everything will seem better. It will be fun to show Kara… and Sven and Luna… to Erosa, don’t you think? I wonder what she’ll think of the Falls. I bet she’ll love it.”
“What about Rouge?”
A look of confusion and then understanding swept across his face. “Oh ya, I completely forgot about her. Something tells me that she already has another boyfriend,” he said with a laugh.
“Oh, I see… so you were a couple!”
“Haha, it wasn’t like we were trying to hide anything. I think she’ll just be happy to see me again. I think everyone will… They’ll be excited for the both of us. It will be a heroes welcome—we are rising from the grave after all. Onyx, Jade, Rouge, Violet, Ivory, Jet… All of them will be there.”
“It’s been so long. It’s funny how it seems so far away and yet so close.”
Ember cupped his hand around the flame for warmth. A smile came to his lips, foreshadowing to his sister a clever remark. “It’s funny how we idiomatically describe temporal concepts with spatial diction.”
Maggie began her laugh during his mid-sentence and so as to not feel like the energy was wasted, she terminated it with a guffaw. The whole effort, however, came across as disingenuous. “I wonder how the Underground population will interact with Erosa.”
“I think it would probably be best if we kept the populations separate for a bit.”
“If that’s possible!” Maggie expressed doubtfully.
“Erosa couldn’t possibly support even the smallest fraction of this place. They’ll have to venture into the rest of the forest. It should be interesting.”
“Ya… If all of this was under our feet the whole time, who knows what lies within the rest of the forest… or even beyond the forest! Let’s promise that if we get out of here, we’ll go explore the rest of the forest.”
“You mean when we get out of here,” he clarified. “And yes, I promise… but first we need to relax for a little bit,” he said with a laugh.
“You know… it’s funny… or sad, rather… but I think that part of me is dead,” Maggie explained acceptingly. “I don’t think I can go back to the ways of the old. I have heard and seen too much. I can no longer accept blissful ignorance.”
“I can’t tell whether I did you a favor or not,” he said, trying to be cheerful.
“Well… I’m not exactly thanking you now am I?”
“No, but you’re not exactly yelling at me either,” he said with a laugh.
“No, I suppose I’m not…”
“I just want some explanations… and I suspect that grandfather Azure, and the rest of his council, have a lot to give.”
“See Ember, this is all I wanted… Everything seems to make so much more sense when I talk to you. Somehow everything seems better now.”
“Good, I’m glad,” he said, leaning in to hug his sister but tipping the candle instead. As the candle fell horizontal on the ground, the melted wax along the apex surrounded and, rather dramatically, extinguished the flame.
“Ember?!”
“You have to be kidding me.”
“Ember?! Matches?”
“Nope.”
She scooted up next to him. “And that’s why we should have kept both candles lit,” Maggie admitted.
“Yep.”
Ember and Maggie tried to continue their conversation but they found the blackness too oppressive. It was as if each word was a spark, and each sentence a shower of light, immediately and completely at ends with the intolerable darkness of their surroundings. Though Maggie tried to keep calm, she quickly became obsessed with the idea that someone from the Abyss was going to sneak up and stab her.
“We’re completely helpless here you know,” she explained.
“It’ll be okay Maggie, let’s just try to stay calm,” Ember said, feeling a bit anxious himself. “It’s probably only been an hour and a half… Imperium will be no better.”
“At least there will be lights in Imperium.”
“That’s true,” he admitted.
“We’re stuck now, you realize that don’t you? We can’t go back now, even if we wanted to. If we try to go back, we’ll get lost… and die of starvation… or worse.”
“It’s alright, we were already committed,” Ember explained.
“I know, but still… It would’ve been nice having that option all the way up to the very end. Hey, do you remember the way Milo left… It was very strange… He seemed very disturbed… And remember, that he has my knife?! What if he is here… right now… waiting…”
“Helllllloooooo!” Ember bellowed, trying to make an echo. “See, no one.” All of the sudden the sound of muffled footsteps came from the distance.
“Did you hear that?!” Maggie said, instantly rising to her feet.
“Yes!” he admitted with alarm, as he rose up beside her.
“Go away! Whoever you are, go away!” Maggie screamed. There was no response.
“What do you want?!” Ember cried out, but still, no response.
Maggie and Ember stood silently for a few minutes, their ears desperately trying to scan the landscape for the smallest of sounds. The fear and anticipation proved unbearable, leading Maggie to quickly suggest going down the tunnel.
“I know it’s a little early, but…”
“Okay,” Ember said, feeling around for the entrance to the c
entral tunnel.
“Come on,” Maggie said, pulling her brother in the correct direction.
***
The path was long. So long in fact, that both Maggie and Ember had considered, on multiple occasions, the possibility that either Milo led them astray or that they had entered the wrong tunnel. Since the poor air had made breathing an arduous task, however, they did not stop to discuss their thoughts.
Though the diameter of the tunnel was large enough to comfortably accommodate two standing travelers, Ember, and particularly Maggie, felt increasingly claustrophobic. They held hands throughout the journey, using their free hands to feel ahead for any upcoming obstacles—which they both chronically felt was right before them. Each twist and turn, each upward and downward deflection, of the tunnel seemed to justify their fear, bringing them new anxiety and disorientation.
Just as Maggie began to fear that they had travelled too far to turn back, a light appeared. “Ember!” she exclaimed, vainly pointing in the direction of the light.
“I see. We’re here. This is it,” he said, hypnotically trotting towards it. Maggie followed, breaking into a slow and tired jog.
***
Maggie was the first to pop her head outside of the tunnel. She peered around cautiously and then slowly pulled herself to the surface. “Come on,” she said, helping Ember up with her hand.
Around them, on all sides was the dense cover of green bushes—so green, in fact, that it almost looked as though they were from the forest. For the first time in nearly a day, there was enough light to fully see color, and both Maggie and Ember relished in it. The verdant leaves were so rich and so fertile that it almost seemed excessive. Life with all of its colors and richness seemed somehow extreme and posh.
Ember peaked his head through the branches and then reported what he saw. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?!” she repeated, still enjoying the light and fresh air.
“Nothing.”
“What do you mean ‘nothing?’”
“Take a look,” he instructed.
Maggie obliged. The image at which she stared was an empty paved street. Confused by the expansive black path, the likes of which she had never seen before, she stood up and turned around. “Hey Ember, there’s something! Looks like a house.”
Ember followed her as she stepped over the bushes and onto the mysterious asphalt. “Where is everyone?”
“What is this place?” she said with perplexed awe.
All of the sudden, Ember felt a forceful impact along his calf. “Did you feel that?” he asked, as he brought his hands down to examine his leg.
“Feel what?” she asked as something sharp but dense collided with her left shoulder.
“It feels like… a tight ball…” he said as he pulled a needle from his calf. He intended to show it to her for further consideration, but instead quickly grew weak and fell to his knees. “Maggie… I can’t… It’s growing,” he said of the spreading feeling of paralysis.
He crawled forward futilely, his eyelids becoming increasingly heavy. He heard Maggie collapse to the ground and turned round to look at her, fighting against the inexorable heaviness of his lead-like eyelids. Instead he saw a pair of dark black boots.
Chapter 24: Metaphysical Ablation
Ember Oaks did not know for how long he was staring at the plain white ceiling, but he knew that he was awake. His was a complete immobility—the sort of absolute paralysis that affects, in full, the body but not the mind. He did, however, retain control over his eyes. He thought of his sister, of Sven and Kara, of Luna and Styles, of life, of death. These thoughts descended into questions and those questions descended into words, and finally those words descended into the ineffable—the uniquely indescribable qualities of emotion—the incommunicable umbra of the abstract and ill conceived. In the dim fogginess of his mind he perceived of ideas of substance and significance, never quite close enough to fully glimpse directly—always fluttering away before their conception, disappearing before existing. And then, the recurring inundation of rapid sequential irrationalities—the kind that so often plague the mind during spells of intolerable anxiety. The fear, the apprehension, and for what? Of what?
And then, just boredom. The boredom of sheer inescapable nothingness. Total nothingness. The ceiling, which wasn’t so much white, as it was colorless, was illuminated completely and uniformly by the fluorescent glow from some hidden object. The space, which by virtue of its monotony may be more appropriately considered a vacuum, was mind numbing. No tiles. No cracks. No shades. Just the utter, unendurable sterility of a plain even landscape.
Ember closed his eyes, expecting to find a substantive somethingness in the convivial richness of darkness. There was no such sojourn. White. Black. One the absence of the other, and vice versa—diametrically opposed in spectrum yet so mercilessly similar in effect. The extremes, so easily accessed yet so maddeningly impossible to combine in part. So close, yet so far. So similar, yet so opposite. How is it that both amount to nothing?! I might as well be dead.
And then the haunting realization that, no matter how hard he closed his eyes, the same plain ceiling remained—ceaselessly staring back at him. Shutting his eyelids may achieve, in effect, limitation, redefinition, and isolation of a new universe, but it could not, no matter how hard he tried, change the external—his true reality. Always, the plain ceiling remained.
An unseen door creaked slowly open. Then came the sounds of footsteps followed by the click of a door closing. “Good evening,” a strangely familiar voice said delicately, walking towards Ember’s paralyzed corpse, which now seemed to Ember no more a part of him than a random inanimate object. “I am going to push a button, and when I do you will regain control of your motor function. But I want you to behave yourself. Do you think you can do that for me, Ember?” the man asked rhetorically as he positioned his face above Ember’s gaze.
It was Daryl. A foreign feeling overcame Ember. It was hate—complete and total hate. With every bone in his body, with every bit of his existence he loathed the face before him. The things he hoped for—wished would happen to that face—frightened Ember. He did not know that he had the capacity for such odium. And all of it came viscerally as if a conditioned response to external stimuli.
A strange rush came to and spread through Ember’s muscles. He thrust himself forward, thrashed his head violently—intent on carrying out some evil, vengeful deed—but restraints held him back. Two tight, thick, heavy straps, one on his forehead and the other on his chin, jailed his head, but allowed slight lateral rotations. The wrist and ankle restraints were looser, allowing for the complete range of motion, albeit on a short leash. Ember rammed his wrist against the bind, seething with anger.
“Ember! Behave yourself! Cut it out!” Daryl reprimanded.
“You… You… traitor!! How… could you?!” Ember shouted as forcefully as he could, foaming at the mouth. By alternatively contracting and relaxing his back and abdominal muscles in tandem, he was able to achieve a violent, satisfying outward arch. He slammed his back up and down, into and then away from the hard cold table, convulsively kicking against his ankle harnesses.
“Stop it!” Daryl commanded as he pushed another button. A sharp, indescribably severe pain stung Ember in the abdomen. He seethed up against it—convulsing twice as violently as before. Daryl zapped him again, but this time in his leg. Still Ember struggled, jerking his hands helplessly against the bondage with a newfound gusto. Then came a series of four or five sickening zaps, their loci running evenly along the longitude of his body. Ember fell down, momentarily constrained by the immense pain. “I told you to control yourself.” Ember breathed heavily as anger re-filled his reservoir. His pupils dilated. “Behave yourself, Ember!”
He lunged forward with even greater might and viciousness. Daryl shocked Ember up and down his spine, but Ember seemed immune to it. Saliva dripped from Ember’s lips as he surged upward. There was a pop from his left bicep, and then his right bicep, but Embe
r could not hear it through his hysterical screams and expletives. Though Ember perceived of the pain, he could not do anything but oppose it. He felt as though it was a fated struggle—one in which he had no more choice than breathing or even existing. In fact, if anything, Ember felt more like he was battling some invisible commander than Daryl.
Daryl zapped him again. And then again. And again. And again. And again. And soon, above even Ember’s haunting cries were the rapid, sustained, sequential sounds of debilitating shocks. Ember collapsed down on the metal table, immobilized by the pain that he brought on himself. What was worst, however, was the feeling of powerlessness, the feeling—the knowledge that he had been shocked into submission, that he had lost, that his fighting spirit had been stolen from him. He closed his eyes and panted uncontrollably as waves of pain overtook him. It was a while before the pain dissipated to tolerable levels. Ember whimpered feebly. “Why?” he croaked.
“Ember… Tell me, where do you think you are?”
Ember wept. “I… I… don’t know.”
“Tell me Ember. What’s your best guess?”
“I don’t know!” he shouted, intent on rising up again, but only able to muster a pathetic limp of his left leg.
“Tell me Ember!”
“I… don’t know! Stop yelling at me!” he cried.
“Yes you do!”
“A torture chamber?!”
“Oh Ember… You are not well… You are not well,” Daryl said with a disapproving tsking noise. He pressed another button, and suddenly Ember’s table angled upward, perpendicular to the ground. His harness tightened as three new metal ribs wrapped around his abdomen and chest. “This is a hospital, Ember. You are sick.”
“What are you talking about?!”
“You are being institutionalized. This is a sanatorium.”
“A sanatorium?”
“Yes… An infirmary for the insane,” Daryl explained, casually pacing to and fro.
Ember laughed, long forlorn tears streaming down his cheek. “You have to be kidding me.”
Revolution in the Underground Page 31