Darklandia

by T. S. Welti

  I slipped out of the bedroom and kept my eyes focused on Mother’s face to gauge her reaction to the robe, but her smile never faltered.

  “Good morning, Mother,” I said, as I reached into the cupboard above the ration dispenser and pulled out a semi-clean glass. I placed the glass under the dispenser and held my thumb over the blinking blue light. The ration spattered into my glass and I guzzled it down eagerly.

  “Why are you wearing that robe?”

  “I got cold in the night.”

  My mother tilted her head and sniffed the air. “What’s that smell?”

  The ration dulled her sense of smell, but she could still smell the blood festering on my skin.

  I shrugged. “I don’t smell anything.”

  I tried not to appear too hasty as I skated into the living room and retrieved my tunic from the coatrack. I retreated to the bathroom to change. My heart thumped violently as I removed my robe and saw the reddish-brown blotches covering my abdomen, legs, and undergarments. Then I eyed the toilet—the only source of water in the apartment.

  I dipped a clean section of the robe into the toilet water and wept silently as I scrubbed caked blood from every inch of my body. I cried as I thought of the fountain in the detainee facility. The stones in the bottom of that fountain were cleaner than I. The Department of Felicity valued me less than those stones.

  I pulled on my tunic and stared at the blood-soaked robe and undergarments mounded on the counter. I wrapped the robe into a tight ball and stuffed it under my arm before I exited the bathroom.

  My mother was nowhere in sight. I scurried to grandmother’s room and jammed the bundled robe between the mattress and the back wall. I rummaged through my grandmother’s dresser for a pair of underwear and a camisole. I slipped on the underwear and stuffed the camisole into the seat to soak up the blood.

  Mother entered the bedroom as I pulled my hand out of my underwear. “What are you doing?”

  “Adjusting,” I replied quickly.

  “Where are your leggings?”

  “In your room.” I slipped past her to the other bedroom where I hastily pulled on a pair of gray leggings. “Have a good day, Mother,” I called out, as I held my sec-band inside the scanner and left the apartment wondering if the stink of blood under my clothing would make my Darklandia score go up when I served my hour.

  Of course, it wouldn’t. All the sleepwalkers reeked.

  16

  Not a single person, not even Professor Gage, mentioned Darla or her absence. It was as if she had never existed. The most disturbing part of it was that even if they had noticed she was gone, none of them were capable of showing any kind of emotion.

  “You ready for your training?” Nyx asked, as the subway car hurtled toward Upper Manhattan.

  “I’m nervous. What if I screw this up and Darla has to spend the rest of her life in Darklandia?”

  “It’s not your fault that she was detained.”

  “That’s easy for you to say. You’re not the one who inspired her to stop drinking her rations.”

  Nyx nodded. “You’re right. You inspired her, but you have to remember that you inspired her to do something good. The consequences of her actions did not match the morality of her actions, and that is not your fault.”

  I looked sideways, expecting him to be wearing that self-satisfied half-smile, but his expression was solemn. “Why are you so wise? How old are you?”

  “Your father taught me a lot in the four months I knew him. And I’m actually just a few months older than you. I was fifteen when I woke up and moved here from Chicago. Lux woke up first.” He stared straight ahead at the windows on the opposite side of the train as if he were watching the memory play out on a video screen. “She was attacked by a member of the Department of Community in Chicago. The last time I saw her before she fled she was so bloody and broken, I thought she was going to die. But she’s tough. She made it to the village and she came back for me with Jock just two months later.”

  A strange urge to reach out and grab his hand filled me like air in a balloon and I began to feel wobbly and awkward in my seat. I gazed at the subway window at the concrete tunnels rushing past to try to distract myself. Suddenly, he reached across and, as if it were happening to someone else, I watched him grasp my hand. My skin tingled where our hands touched. I swallowed the lump in my throat as he slowly laced his fingers through mine.

  I bit my lip to keep from grinning as the train thundered on, our fingers woven together like a basket holding a beautiful secret.

  Nyx released my hand as the train slowed. He took out his lumen again to punch in his commands before we exited the subway car.

  “Why do you always do that when we get here?” I asked, as I waited by the exit doors as he slipped the lumen back into his pocket.

  “I’m hijacking the video feed so the cameras on the platform show me leaving the station instead of going through the door to the village. I programmed that door so it’s only accessible by our sec-bands. No sleepwalkers allowed.”

  He didn’t take my hand as we exited the train and, by the time we reached the door marked No Access, I was convinced he could smell the blood through my tunic. I tried walking a few paces behind him in the tunnels so he wouldn’t walk into my scent, but he kept slowing his pace to walk next to me.

  He stopped in the middle of the curved tunnel. “Are you okay?”

  I nodded, but he didn’t look convinced.

  “There’s something different about you today,” he said, and he looked me over. Maybe I was imagining it, but I swore his gaze lingered over my bloated abdomen.

  I had to keep myself from blurting, “Yes! There is something different about me. I’m losing gobs of blood by the second. I may die!” Instead, I shrugged. “I think I need a shower.”

  His eyes widened as he stepped forward, closing the gap between us. “I’m such an idiot. I should have asked you if you wanted to take a shower yesterday.”

  He reached for my hand again, but I tucked it behind my back.

  “Sorry. I’m just… filthy. I don’t want you to….”

  “You don’t want me to… what?”

  I stared at his boots then at mine. “I don’t want you to smell me.”

  His fingers grazed my jaw as he lifted my chin. “That’s not your fault, either.”

  We entered the greenhouse and found Gray picking the last tomatoes from a vine, which grew wildly around a cone-like structure in the center of a dirt plot. She twisted the fruit and tossed it into a basket hanging from the crook of her elbow with such swiftness.

  “Hey, G,” Nyx called to her and she turned around with a smile so wide it broke my heart to think that soon she would be reluctantly executing some sort of secret mission for Hispa. I hoped so hard that whatever it was, Gray would be safe. “Lux will take you to the shower before you start your training.”

  “I’m going to leave on time to serve my hour tonight, aren’t I?” I asked, as we walked along the corridor toward the conference room.

  “Of course. You need to keep up appearances.”

  We entered the conference room and found another banquet style feast on the tables, but only Lux and Jock were eating.

  “Well, if it isn’t the computer hacker and the brain hacker. You guys make me so proud,” Lux said, as we approached.

  “Hey, I need a favor from you,” Nyx said, nodding his head toward me.

  “I need a shower,” I said, feeling as if a direct approach might be better with Lux. “It’s been a very long time since I’ve had a government-approved shower. I reek.”

  Lux and Jock laughed at my candor and Lux rose from the bench. “Alright, Stinky, let’s get you washed up so you can start your training.”

  My nerves coiled inside my belly as we strolled through the corridors. I had never taken my clothes off out of the apartment. We turned left twice until we reached a narrow community shower room with four stalls. Chest-high walls separated each shower stall. The stalls were equi
pped with a showerhead and a bar of soap, which looked different from the bars of soap issued by the Department of Community.

  Lux reached into a cupboard near the entrance and handed me the towel. “Make it quick. We’ve got a lot of work to do. Especially on your expression of fear.”

  “Wait, Lux.”

  “What?”

  “I… I need a change of clothes, and… I’m bleeding.”

  She blinked a few times before she responded. “Oh, sorry. I totally forgot about that. Well, I’ll get you a change of clothes and some… stuff for the blood. Go ahead and take your shower. I’ll be back later.”

  How humiliating for both of us. If this was how darklings had always lived, I could see how they would need a drink that made them feel happy. I slipped out of my tunic and wrapped the rest of my blood-tinged clothing and my grandmother’s blood-soaked camisole in my tunic. I didn’t know how I was going to explain the change of clothes to my mother, but I didn’t care. It had been three weeks since my last shower.

  I turned the silver knob on the shower and the water leaked out, a slow dribble at first, then it sputtered violently and coughed a shower of warm water at my chest. I realized I hadn’t undone my braid and I quickly yanked out the blue ribbon and tugged the locks of hair loose.

  The warm water streamed over my face and hair, rinsing away my filth and my fear of being nude in a strange place. I grabbed the bar of soap and scrubbed every inch of skin I could reach. I worked up a luxurious lather in my hair and giggled as the suds ran down my face and stung my eyes.

  “You look far too happy.” Lux’s voice sounded a bit far away, as if it came from around the corner of the shower room.

  I rinsed the soap from my hair and face and glanced around. She was nowhere in sight, but a fluffy white towel lay folded on the low wall separating my stall from the next. I dried my body and wrapped the towel around my hair then changed into the tunic and leggings Lux had laid beneath the towel.

  I stared at the small, purple package sitting on the low wall. It had to be for the blood, but I had never seen anything like it before. I peeled the package open and unfolded a cottony absorbent pad.

  “You dressed?” Nyx’s voice called from around the corner.

  I adjusted the pad and smoothed my new tunic. This was the second time someone had nearly walked in on me with my hands down my pants. It was almost enough to make me want the drugs in my old ration back; the drugs that stopped this repulsive gush of blood.

  “Now I am,” I shouted, hiding my bundle of dirty clothes behind my back as he entered.

  He had a strange look in his eye as he walked toward me with his hands behind his back. “I wanted to give you something before you begin your training.” He reached one hand out to me and opened his fist. Sitting in his palm was a gold pin adorned with a red star.

  He pinned the red star to my sleeve and my chest swelled with another forbidden emotion: pride.

  “It was your father’s,” he added, as he stepped back and looked me over. “Come on. I’ll take you to Lux’s room.”

  I followed him through the corridors until we reached a door next to the conference room. “Thanks,” I said, backing into the room to hide the bundle of clothes behind my back.

  “You smell really good,” he said with a reassuring nod before he turned and disappeared into the conference room.

  Someone snatched the bundle of clothes out of my hands and I whipped around to find Lux tossing the clothes into a hamper in the corner of her sparsely furnished room. Except for the hamper, a single bed with a plain white blanket, and a bedside table, the room was austere. She didn’t even have a mirror. The only color in the room was the red on her lips.

  “Excuse my humble offerings,” she said, as she plopped onto her bed and patted the mattress for me to sit. “It helps me remember why we’re here.”

  “Why are we here?” I asked, as I took a seat next to her.

  “We’re here because they want to erase our identities, wash away our emotions and our opinions. That’s what this room represents. The blank slate the Department of Felicity turns the sleepwalkers into.”

  “A blank slate where they can write their own story, inside Darklandia?”

  Lux pointed at me. “See, I knew you were smarter than you looked.”

  I didn’t know if this was a compliment, but I took it as such and smiled broadly.

  Lux shook her head. “Stop that. You can’t let flattery have that kind of effect on you.”

  I tugged the corners of my lips down with my fingers, but this only made me want to smile more. “Sorry.”

  “Yes, keep apologizing. Sleepwalkers love to apologize for everything.” She pulled both her legs onto the bed and crossed them in front of her so she was facing me. “Lesson number one: When you feel an overwhelming emotion or display of emotion coming on, take three deep breaths and count to twenty. If that doesn’t work to derail you then get to a safe place, somewhere you can express your emotions in private. Got that?” I nodded and she continued. “Great. Now, don’t tell Nyx I told you this, but I heard from Jock that Darla is probably going to be executed tomorrow.”

  “WHAT?”

  “Okay, you failed your test for lesson number one. We’ll come back to that later.”

  “That’s an awful thing to say,” I said, a sudden swell of rage burning inside me.

  “Awful is a filter word,” Lux replied, without offering an apology as she watched the anger boil inside me. “Lesson number one. You can do it, Sera.”

  I didn’t want to do anything she told me to do, but she was right. I had to learn or I would blow this whole operation by getting myself detained. I took a deep breath. Then I took another and another as she gazed at me intently, gauging my emotions through some kind of visual cues. I finished counting to twenty in my mind and, though I was still a bit annoyed with her, the fury had subsided.

  “Better?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. You’ll have to keep practicing, and I’ll test you on that again later. For now, on to lesson number two.” She reached across the space between us and pinched the skin on my forearm and twisted hard.

  “Ow!” I squealed, as I yanked my arm back and rubbed the burning red spot.

  “Sera.” She looked at me sideways, the way my mother did when I did something in a manner remotely resembling the way a darkling would do it.

  I stopped rubbing my arm and put on a plastic smile. “Pain? What pain?”

  “Is that sarcasm, Sera?”

  “What’s sarcasm?”

  She reached across and pinched my cheek, softly this time. “You’re so cute.”

  The rest of the training session consisted of going over lessons one and two over and over again: emotional reactions and physical reactions to pain, these were the two things the rations stifled. I had cried and laughed, been slapped and lied to a dozen times by the time Nyx entered the room.

  “I have to get you home.”

  I tried to contain my disappointment, which quickly disappeared as Nyx held out his hand to me. I grabbed his hand and allowed him to wrench me off the bed. But he didn’t stop pulling once I was standing. He tugged me toward him until our chests were touching.

  “What are you doing?” I said, as I pushed him away and he smiled, unfazed by my rebuff.

  “Well, you aced lesson three.” Lux clapped me on the back as she rose from the bed and collected the hamper from the corner. “No public displays of affection.”

  17

  My hour inside Darklandia was uneventful. I never made contact with my father or triggered the clones. The good thing was that when I entered the apartment near curfew my mother didn’t notice the slightly different tunic and leggings through the darkness. I had also made sure to remove the red star from my sleeve before I exited the subway car.

  I lay awake most of the night thinking of the way Nyx pulled me close to him. I kept imagining him naked in the community shower and suddenly Darla’s parents pressed agains
t each other in that tiny bed seemed innocent.

  No public displays of affection.

  This meant that what Nyx and I did inside the subway car was forbidden. We were just holding hands. It seemed harmless, if not perfectly magical.

  When I changed into my own tunic and leggings, pulled from our dresser at home, the musty scent of unwashed clothing felt like shackles confining me to this dull world.

  Mother cocked her eyebrow as I entered the kitchen. “Don’t you want me to braid your hair?” she asked, as I reached for a dingy glass in the cupboard.

  “No, thank you.” I held the glass under the dispenser and tried not to look at her. I didn’t want her to notice the slightly bloated appearance in my face, which had emerged with the bleeding.

  “There’s something different about you.”

  Fear burrowed into my belly and I thought of lesson number one. I took a deep breath then gulped my ration. “Really?”

  “Yes, there’s something definitely different.” Her eyes roved over every inch of me, taking in my clean skin and nails and the lack of grease plastering my hair to my scalp.

  I took another deep breath and forced my lips into a tiny smile. “I feel fine; just the same as yesterday.”

  “I didn’t see you yesterday.”

  Deep breath.

  “Are you sure you feel fine?” she asked, her voice sweet, though I detected an unmistakable tension in her words as she watched the deep rise and fall of my chest.

  “Yes, of course. I’m fine, Mother. I was just spending some extra time inside Darklandia. After what happened to Darla, I needed it.”

  “What happened to Darla?”

  She didn’t know? Or was she pretending? Was I even supposed to know what happened to Darla?

  I swallowed hard and took another deep breath. “She wasn’t at school yesterday. I don’t know what happened to her, but it can’t be good, can it?”

  Her eyebrow went up again. She didn’t believe me. “Have a good day at school, dear.”

  I had no way to get in contact with Nyx. I needed to tell him I was going to skip school. But where would I go if I couldn’t go to the village?