They had booked the big and plush Hilton Chicago Grand Ballroom for the press conference, and set the stage perfectly to showcase something of this size.
Devon turned to face the cameras with a smile that seemed to be reassuring instead of condescending. He stood six feet tall and had the square jaw of a superhero. His dark silk suit shouted that he was a man with more money to spend than he knew what to do with.
In reality, Devon was personally rich, and he’d been an investor in a number of the companies before Carl and Big Ed offered him the front position on Complex A. Now, like Big Ed and Carl, he had money in all the companies.
Devon and Carl and Big Ed had gone over every word of Devon’s speech and planned out where they thought there would be troubles. Devon was as prepared for this as he could be.
Devon started the conference with all the basic thank-yous that the press had come to expect, then made a motion and a drape moved back beside him to expose the model of Complex A.
Big Ed’s stomach twisted.
Carl said, “That thing is truly ugly, you know.”
Big Ed said nothing. To him it was a thing of beauty, a thing of his dreams.
The model looked exactly as the four buildings did from the street. Four building frames connected on varied floors over the streets. Big Ed had to admit, it did look half-finished to the normal eye. But he hoped the world would love the look as much as he did when this press conference was finished.
Then Devon started to talk about the violence on the streets, the children dying for no reasons, and behind him on a huge screen images from newscasts flashed past, detailing out quickly what everyone already knew: The streets were not safe for a normal family to live and raise children. Period.
“So how does a building complex like this help the crime issue in this and other cities?” Devon asked as the news feed stopped.
He paused for perfect effect. “In Complex A, we give families a completely safe place to live, to raise their children, to shop, to work, and have their children go to school. All without fear.”
There was a murmuring among the reporters, looking first at Devon and then at the framework of the four buildings.
Devon smiled and moved a step over to the model. “Notice how the building is up on its frame with nothing on the two ground floors but the central core?”
He tapped the empty space on the lower two floors and a knocking sound echoed over the quiet. “There will be bulletproof glass all the way around the base of each building. The only way into each building complex will be through a series of doors leading to a security station in the center of one building. No guns or drugs will be allowed in any building. Everyone entering the buildings will be scanned and searched. No exceptions.”
Again the crowd of reporters started to erupt, but he held his hands up for silence and surprisingly to Big Ed, they honored him. Devon was good, of that there was no doubt.
Devon pointed to the two floors that spread through all four buildings and were closed in except for windows. “On the third floor will be grocery stores, clothing stores, and a few restaurants. The fourth floor will contain schools for all levels, from preschool through high school. The residents of the four buildings will be offered jobs in all aspects of the businesses and schools on the two floors and they will be paid fair wages.”
Devon pushed on before anyone could interrupt. Big Ed and Carl and Devon knew this was a critical point. Devon had to keep going now, or all was lost.
Devon pointed to the next two series of closed-in floors going upward. “These will contain community areas, indoor parks, playgrounds, and so on.”
“Then he pointed at the top five closed-in floors. “Of course the roof will be open park area and gardens, but the five floors below will be hydroponic gardens watered by cured wastewater in each building. Each building will grow more than enough fresh food for all residents year-round and be able to sell the extra to local markets for a profit.”
“Don’t stop now,” Big Ed whispered to the big screen and Carl only nodded.
Before the reporters could break in, Devon pushed forward. “The third floor from the top will be laced with wind turbines and electrical storage areas. Since the wind in Chicago seems to always blow one way or another, there are over three hundred various sized electrical turbines that will generate electricity around the clock.”
Big Ed could tell that Devon now had the full attention of the reporters trying to grasp an entire floor of electrical-generating wind turbines.
“On all areas of all four buildings,” Devon said, gesturing to the outside areas, “that get sunshine at any time of the year, the sidings are designed to be solar panels gathering electrical energy. Between wind and solar, each building will generate so much power, it will not only supply all the energy needs of the residents, but each complex will sell power back to the main grid. Each building will sustain itself from the power sold and make a profit after city and land taxes—”
The room exploded in a thousand questions being shouted all at once.
Big Ed glanced at Carl.
Carl smiled. “Here we go. The key to all this is now. We’re either going to save this city or go broke very quickly.”
Big Ed just nodded, almost afraid to speak. He wanted to sit down, to make himself relax, but he just couldn’t do it. Everything turned on what Devon was going to say next.
So he just stood and stared at the screen, his hands at his sides.
The reporters were shouting, but Devon just stood and smiled, holding up his hands for silence. When he could finally be heard he said, “I’ll answer all your questions shortly, and we have packets with all the details to hand out to everyone to make sure all facts are correct. But…you haven’t heard the best part yet.”
The reporters all fell silent.
Devon smiled and pointed at the model. “Aren’t you wondering why the building is nothing but a frame?”
His question sort of just hung there.
Big Ed had hoped for that exact reaction.
Devon took a square block from under the podium and held it up for everyone to see.
“This is a modular, three-thousand-square-foot apartment,” he said. “It can be designed to contain two, three, four, or five bedrooms. It will have two and a half baths and a large kitchen and dining area. There are many designs to choose from for each one.”
On the screen behind him, suddenly different apartments floated in and over each other showing living rooms, modern kitchens, bedrooms, family rooms, and so on in many varied colors.
Devon smiled. “These apartments are the size of apartments many of the rich people of our fair city live in.”
He walked over to the model and slid the apartment block into one side of the building. It clicked into place.
Then Devon turned to the camera, looking suddenly very serious.
“Each apartment will be completely owned by a family. They will pay no electricity, no house payment, and if they choose to work so many hours in the shops or restaurants or schools or security or gardens or utility areas of the building, they will not even pay tenant’s fees.”
Before anyone could shout a question, Devon went on. “Their families will be completely safe inside their homes. All windows are bulletproof, as are all exterior walls. Each apartment will have a view. There are no halls in this complex. Each apartment opens onto a large open public area in the center of each floor. The apartments are only positioned around the outside of each floor.”
The room started to erupt one more time, but Devon used the command in his voice to silence it. “Please hold on for one more important fact.”
Right there, Big Ed knew he and Carl had picked the right man for the job.
“Each apartment unit for all of Complex A is in the first stages of production, built by a plant right here in Chicago. Each apartment will be modular construction, built in the factory to save costs, and then raised into place by cranes. But before we can get a family moved in,
the family must first buy the apartment. Of course, we know the families that need protection from the violence of the streets are the families that can least afford to move. And our desire is that every apartment be paid off completely on the day that every family moves in.”
Devon stared at the reporters. Then smiled again.
“We have over two hundred families signed up to move in now, with hundreds and hundreds more in the process. Complex A can hold around six hundred families. But each of those families need help, help from everyone out there who wants to see kids grow up without being shot, to live free of violence, to get top educations, and live to be productive citizens of this wonderful city.”
Devon smiled. “The apartments are going to be sold at cost to each family with no profit at any step. Let me repeat that. No profit at any step will come from the sale of the apartments to the families.”
He paused again for a moment, then went on. “And with the modular construction, the costs are very low. Some families have agreed to sell their homes for payment on an apartment, others who are only renting have no way to pay for an apartment. And that’s where we all can help.”
Again Devon got serious.
Big Ed waited for it, wondering if this was going to work or not, his stomach so cramped up he felt like he was going to be sick.
Devon looked into the camera. “Each family approved for an apartment in Complex A has been set up on Crowdsourcing Help to help fund the apartment.”
On the screen behind him, a URL address appeared in large letters for the site they had created just for this project.
“There are videos and background information on each family on each project. All the details are there. Also each family has a donation fund set up at all local banks to help as well. Any extra money raised will be moved to another family. No one will make a profit from the funds donated.”
Again, Devon paused and the reporters, shocked to their cores, all stood there silently, letting him finish. “For years we’ve all wondered how to save the children and innocents of this city. Now we have a way to not just sit in front of the televisions and wish we could do something. Now we can actually do something.”
He stared directly into the camera as if talking to everyone watching. “You can help a family get into a self-sustaining apartment and into a new and safe life, with great schools and great jobs. But many need your support.”
Devon looked around the shocked room. Then he really hit them with the final punch. “Over the next two years we will build at least two dozen more exactly like Complex A on the South Side of Chicago. All will be four-building-construction, all holding around six hundred families per complex.”
On the screen behind him was an artist’s rendering of the South Side of Chicago with towering complexes going off into the distance surrounded by green parks and wide roads. It looked almost like a scene from a science fiction novel instead of something that could happen in just a few years.
“The land has been purchased and the plans are under way for all of the new complexes. The buildings alone will supply over one third of all the power needs for the entire city.”
Devon let that sink in, then hit them with his final punch. “In the very near future, families in this city who used to be afraid to walk outside their own home will live in safety, their children will go to great schools, and well-paying jobs will be available to anyone in the building in all areas of life.”
Devon smiled. “Before I take any questions, I want to make one thing very, very clear. The residents of each building can come and go as they see fit, go to school where they want, move if they want. But no drugs or guns will ever be allowed in any of these buildings. At least the children in each building can play in safety, go to school in safety, and the entire family can live and work in safety if they so choose.”
Devon took a deep breath and looked sad and intense at the same time. “Maybe the day will come when the citizens of this fine city can turn on the news and not have to watch a story of an innocent child being killed. So please, support a family or two or a dozen, depending on what you can afford. The families of this city want to move to safety into buildings being built right in their own neighborhoods. They just need your help. Every dollar helps.”
Then he nodded and smiled at the camera. “Now I will be happy to take any questions.”
The conference room exploded.
Big Ed muted the television and dropped into his chair, trying to catch his breath. There were going to be a lot of people who hated this idea. But in time, he could imagine many neighborhoods between the tall buildings being parks and open lands instead of war zones. The families who wanted to sell their homes were selling homes to corporations who would hold the homes and in time clear the land for parks.
It was going to take time, but this was a new century. No one said that they couldn’t invent a new meaning for the word neighborhood.
Carl started pacing, the phone to his ear. Then suddenly he laughed sort of high and insane-like and hung up.
He sat down in the chair beside Big Ed, stretched out and stared at the ceiling, smiling.
“What was that all about?” Big Ed asked, staring at his friend. He had never, in all the years of their friendship, heard Carl make that noise.
“Break out a bottle of the best and most expensive wine you got,” Carl said, his eyes closed as he shook his head slowly from side-to-side.
“Why?” Big Ed asked.
“Because in the first two minutes after we announced, forty of the family Crowdsource accounts got completely funded. At this rate, the first building will be funded completely by tomorrow. And by the end of the week, we might have Complex B. funded as well.”
All Big Ed could do was smile. He sat back and stared at the screen where a year before he had watched children dying, and wondered what he could do to stop it.
Now six hundred families would be moving to safety very, very soon. And after that another six hundred.
They hadn’t saved the entire world, but it was a start.
A damn good start.
Introduction to “Heaven Backwards”
Lisa Silverthorne has published more than fifty short stories in the fantasy, science fiction, and horror genres. Writing has been her lifelong passion. She is fascinated by the magic of ordinary things and frightened by the darkness in all of us. Somewhere between those extremes is our humanity, the place where her explorations in fiction begin.
Lisa came at her story from a very similar humanistic position as my own for the anthology: “I wrote ‘Heaven Backwards’ because I’m sickened by the atrocities committed against women across the globe: honor killings, gang rapes, mutilations, and forced marriages to men three times older,” she wrote. “Women represent half the population, so saving the world must include saving women. So much of this violence stems from religion, and it happens everywhere, not just in Third World countries. So, I chose to set my story in the U.S. because it happens here, too. I wanted to make it harder to dismiss the violence by saying, ‘Those kinds of things don’t happen here.’”
Her vision of a future America, brought to the very brink of extinction by irresponsible stewardship of the land, combined with backward, inflexible mindsets, is a damning prophecy of things that may come if beliefs do not begin to change soon.
Heaven Backwards
Lisa Silverthorne
The old, rusty thermometer burned crimson in the noonday sun, reflecting rivulets of gold light off its metal frame as a rare breeze rattled the compound gate. And something else that made Raela’s heart race with hope. Outsiders. Signs of life beyond this place.
Spring burned with a vengeance across the mid-south desert, the Mississippi only a plodding stream through seared landscapes that had once grown corn and soybeans like kudzu. Once, it was at least a mile across, but now Raela and her sisters could walk across it. If she had been allowed to go outside Nevaeh’s gates. But for women, it was forbidden. Brother Keith said it was the
only water in a hundred miles—except for the demon town to the east.
One day, they’ll come to take our water, our food, he insisted at every reading of the Word. They’ll wear the Mark of the Beast, and they’ll seek your everlasting soul. Be ever vigilant in the Word.
Little flutters of light spun off the bent metal like dust devils across the baked, red clay as three outsiders approached the gate.
Was that what butterflies used to look like?
She knew about butterflies—and outsiders—from notes in Mother’s book of the Word, tiny, forbidden ink scribbles in the margin. And the words, one day they will come and I will be free. According to the Book, outsiders wore the Mark of the Beast. But Mother told Raela in secret to pray for outsiders. When Raela asked why, Mother had said, because we are weak.
She missed Hara, the woman she called Mother. At forty-four, she’d been the oldest woman in the compound. Until a few weeks ago, when she had vanished. Raptured away, said the Elders. They said Raela should be joyful for her deliverance.
The warning bell clattered its ancient, tinny alarm through the quiet compound.
Terrified, the littlest children scattered toward the women’s dorm, rushing toward Raela and her sisters, clinging to their skirts as boys peered out the windows of their school near the gate (where Malikye should have been this morning). Little girls stopped hanging wet clothes on nearby clotheslines and stared.
Brothers and Elders rushed out of their dorms, two sprawling buildings on either side of the compound, rifles in hand, ropes of ammunition draped across cotton shirts. Beards tangled in rifle straps and worn body armor as they formed a silent line in front of the gate, weapons raised, wide-brimmed straw hats akimbo, steely gazes unwavering as mouths pressed into rigid lines.
Raela hugged the rough wooden planks of the women’s dorm, heat and fear burning her cheeks beneath her Holy veil as she watched the three unarmed people standing at the gate. She’d been watching for her son, never expecting to see outsiders.
Fiction River: How to Save the World Page 17