Modelland

by Tyra Banks

  A gondola-type roller coaster car appeared on Desperada’s side of the wall. “Take this senior ex-Modelland citizen down to her brace-faced teenage fellow!” Gunnero commanded. A large crane picked Desperada up by the collar of her uniform and placed her in the seat of the contraption. A U-shaped bar lowered in front of her, securing her in. Then the car zoomed away. “Here’s hoping your boyfriend is into discarded Modelland cougars!” Gunnero teased.

  Thunder rumbled. Lightning struck the wall again, sending shock waves of electricity through it, reversing the transparency. And then a second rumble, far deeper in tone than thunder, shook the entire wall and the ground beneath them. Girls flew right and left as a wave traveled across the solid ground beneath their feet.

  Gunnero smiled, then pointed into the distance at the O. The BellaDonna statue glowed, its arms outstretched, vibrating violently. Ci~L just stood there with a foreboding look in her eyes as everything started to crash to the ground around her. Tookie somehow knew that Ci~L, in tandem with the BellaDonna, was responsible for the devastating tremor. Debris was falling everywhere. Everywhere but on Ci~L.

  The Bellas all screamed and ran wildly, looking for places to duck and cover. Tookie and the Unicas found shelter under a large wooden table. They huddled there for what felt like forever as potted plants, tree limbs, chunks from the D, even dead birds that had apparently been struck midair, came crashing to the ground. The earthquake lasted three long minutes, until finally, the shaking abruptly stopped. The area looked ravaged and war-torn. Face bushes were uprooted. Statues lay in pieces on the path. The liquid gold in the M plaza was a sooty black. When Tookie looked over at the distant BellaDonna statue, it was no longer there. But immense footprints, each the size of a car, tracked through the once-golden plaza, straight to the M building.

  Gunnero turned to address the girls. “The sun’s about to come up and show off those dun-colored faces of yours. Make sure you slap on lots of concealer to cover up those dark half-moons under your eyes, witnesses.”

  Everyone trudged back to the D except Tookie, Shiraz, Dylan, and Piper. They stood at the wall, staring blankly at the spot where Desperada had climbed over. In the distance, Ci~L stared at them staring at the wall.

  “We can’t leave this way,” Tookie whispered, turning to eye Ci~L. “We have to find another way out.”

  Shortly after they returned to the D, Tookie selected a green pen from her journal and began to write in Oktooberfestian.…

  Ci~L,

  I really don’t understand you. One minute you’re beating yourself, the next you’re rocking and chanting, then you turn into a blackmailing devil with the BellaDonna, and just now you faked concern for Desperada. I’ve wondered if you are mentally disturbed, but now you’ve truly confirmed just how sick you really are.

  I was once told by a supportive Triple7 Intoxibella who seems to have just up and disappeared that people who hurt others are hurting even more themselves. You must have been talking about yourself. Is that what the sacrifices are about? Are you a broken, barren soul, feeding on suffering to maintain your flawless existence?

  Your maverick ways, your renegade fight … it’s a booby trap, a gimmick, an illusion, so you can strike your victims while they’re distracted by your unpoetic gibberish.

  I’ve already been the victim of evil here at Modelland, you know that. In fact, I LIVE with it, literally, and she is bathed in a glowing Lumière as I write you. But THAT evil, as hurtful as it is, I kind of understand. THAT evil is living a lie and grabbing on to the handlebars of dear life to maintain her fantasy for an existence. While yours just seems selfish, pure evil for evil’s sake.

  I thought you were an inspiration, Ci~L—most of the world thinks so. So you’ve broken my heart in more ways than one. But the Unicas will beat you at your own game. We are getting out of here; we won’t be more of your victims.

  “Where the hell is Ci~L?” they all ask. When I get away from this place, the first thing I’m going to do is tell the world what a phony, evil, sick bitch you are.

  32

  THERE IS NO, HAS NEVER BEEN, AND NEVER WILL BE

  The morning sun had come quickly. The rays of light cut through the fog that hung low over the mountain’s post-earthquake debris. Huge tree roots had been yanked out of the ground. Broken bricks from the D were strewn everywhere. As Tookie exited the D, the feeling in the air was funereal, as if they’d all attended a burial ceremony for someone who had died much too young. Even though everyone hadn’t witnessed the incident, the plaza was still atwitter with rumors and speculation.

  “I hear it’s the BellaDonna’s doing,” Bibiana whispered as a clump of girls walked to class.

  “I think she enjoys tormenting us,” Chaste added. “Every time a Bella ages, I bet she gets a huge shivery thrill up her stony spine.”

  “There is something malicious surrounding Modelland!” said Kamalini.

  “Maybe bad curse!” Shiraz said.

  “Yeah, that’s why the mountain is so deadly,” Bibiana suggested. “I bet that’s why no one who tries to get to Modelland survives. What if demonic dead Bellas live there?”

  The group of girls approached the area of the wall where Desperada had made her leap. The air there had a solemn feel to it, the temperature at least five degrees cooler than anywhere else in Modelland. Already, girls had placed bouquets of flowers and trinkets at the base of the wall to honor Desperada’s memory. A handmade sign read DESPERADA, FOREVER YOUNG TO US. Piper lit a candle.

  As they stood before the wall, Tookie noticed something. She brought her hand to her mouth. “Look!”

  The wall had reconfigured itself to create a collage of Desperada before jumping and after. The image of her before she crossed the divide was made of smooth, lineless, polished stone. But the image of her after she’d crossed was constructed with weathered and cracked wood.

  “Is like a warning to the rest of us,” Shiraz said morosely.

  “Sickening.” Piper turned away from the distressing art. “I wonder how long it will be on the wall.”

  Dylan looked up and down the barrier. “I wonder how many others have jumped and if the change hurts.”

  “How are we going to get out of here now?” Tookie whispered to herself.

  Suddenly, four tones sounded, and the outline of Guru Gunnero’s face appeared as a hologram. “This is a recorded announcement from Modelland security,” Gunnero’s face said. “Attention, all new Bellas: report to the M building immediately. Enter through the north ZipZap.”

  Tookie and her friends froze and exchanged worried glances. The M building. Where she’d heard they were all going to be experimented on and sacrificed. Why of all places are we being summoned there?

  Whatever it was, Tookie knew it wouldn’t be good.

  Two columns of expressionless Mannecants guided the Bellas through the M building’s doors and past a guard station heavily manned by Modelland security. Tookie looked at the hulking brutes standing guard and wondered how she had managed to sneak past them the day before. The whole ordeal was just a blur now.

  Gunnero met the anxious girls in an annex and led them down the glass hallways of the M building. Mirrored doors opened into a cramped rectangular meeting room. The walls were made of alternating slats of mirrors and patterned glass. At the front and back of the room were items Tookie remembered from her last visit: long tables holding all kinds of optical devices from jeweler’s loupes to microscopes, monocles to viewfinders, magnifying glasses to antique eyeglasses to prisms.

  Her eyes settled on the wall in front of her. All kinds of shapes drifted past. One section of glass looked like a rooster crowing. Another section looked like a harp. Another looked like an eye. But then one eye became two. Slowly, the eyes opened slightly into slits. They looked just like the eyes of the BellaDonna statue. And they seemed to be looking directly at Tookie.

  The slatted wall in the front of the room opened. Persimmon entered and walked to the podium. A hush fell over the crowd.<
br />
  Persimmon began her usual speech. “May I present to you the most beloved of the beloved, the chicest of the chic, the definer of all things beautiful, and the esteemed leader of all Bellas lucky to be led …”

  There was a loud sigh. Tookie glanced over and saw Guru Gunnero standing in the corner, his arms crossed over his chest. As Persimmon said the words, he moved his lips silently, mocking Persimmon, or perhaps the BellaDonna. Tookie wasn’t sure.

  “I present to you the BellaDonna of Modelland,” Persimmon finished.

  The eyes in the wall protruded until they were three-dimensional. They blinked once, then twice. But instead of being full of rage, these BellaDonna eyes were downturned and filled with tears.

  Then the eyes grew lips for top and bottom eyelids and began to sing in a quavering but mellifluous voice:

  “Modelland was once her home … home … home,

  But foolish lust we don’t condone … done … done.

  Now a cursed and cracked gemstone … stone … stone,

  Modelland is not her home.”

  “Sing with me!” the BellaDonna shouted. She launched into the chorus again.

  Girls began to sing in uncertain voices. “Louder!” the BellaDonna screeched. Everyone belted out the lyrics. They sang through the chorus six more times, their voices rising with each line. Gunnero rolled his eyes and kept his lips firmly shut.

  The BellaDonna abruptly stopped singing and cleared her throat. Rustling could be heard throughout the room. And then she spoke.

  “My heart, which you probably believe to be a bottomless pit, bleeds torrents for the loss of one of our own,” she said solemnly. “Be damned, the shortsightedness of her lost soul, the young Bella’s sanity wrapped up in the meager charms of some civilian boy down the mountain. I hope it’s a nightmare that has haunted all of your dreams so you do not make the same imbecilic mistake.”

  Suddenly, the room went dark. Nervous murmurs rippled through the crowd.

  Dylan shrieked. “Someone’s breathin’ in my ear!”

  Tookie felt Dylan collapse on her shoulder. She nudged her and Dylan came to. Then Tookie felt someone else’s breath in her ear. “Who is that?” she cried.

  Simultaneously, girls all around the room were calling out in the same panic. It seemed like phantom breaths were everywhere. And then the familiar voice returned.

  “Leaving for a man! Leaving for a man! Leaving for a MAN?” the BellaDonna whined. The room trembled.

  The next time the BellaDonna spoke, she sounded like she was poised on the ceiling. “Desperation,” her voice continued, “clouds your minds, robs you of clear thoughts, makes you think that a man is the answer. He. Is. Not. In the civilian world, women are more valued for giving birth to babies than for giving birth to their dreams. Not here. Not now. Not ever.

  “In the civilian world, it is acceptable for a woman to settle, to subvert, to dilute and diminish her dreams if it’s to help, or to be with, a man. That’s somehow noble. Not here. Not now. Not ever.”

  “But Madame BellaDonna.” Even in the darkness, the voice was instantly recognizable. Zarpessa’s voice continued. “I don’t think it’s wrong to live for a man. Their intelligence is far greater than ours, and it is our duty to submit and love and—”

  “How dare you speak when I am speaking, and such nonsense on top of that!” the BellaDonna roared. “Where on earth did you manage to come up with that rubbish? So you would derail your life to be with a man, you would risk your face, your Modelland Intoxibella future, for that nonsense you call … love?”

  The room fell silent for a moment. Then, startlingly, small halting breaths rang through the darkness. Was the most beloved of the beloved … crying?

  “Love,” the BellaDonna repeated, “is an excuse to be stupid. When we come to Modelland, we say goodbye to love. We commit to succeeding at any cost. We relinquish our ties to our families, our friends. We sacrifice our souls to be one of the 7Seven. There is no, has never been, and never will be room for love at Modelland. Ever.”

  Is it really a mandate that we give those things up? Tookie thought. It seemed so … cold. Heartless. What kind of place is this?

  “But what about my family?” a girl’s voice rang out.

  “What about my best friend, Gingi?” another voice asked.

  “What about my momma, my sisters, my brothers?” sobbed Dylan.

  “Papa,” sniffed Shiraz.

  Tookie thought of the only person she’d left behind whom she dearly, truly loved. “Lizzie,” she whispered.

  And then Tookie heard the sound of loud sobs from someone she didn’t believe had the capacity to shed tears: Zarpessa. The BellaDonna’s banishment of love had shaken even her.

  Tookie reached out in the darkness and felt for her friends’ hands.

  “Tookie,” Shiraz hissed next to her. “I able to see.”

  “What?” Tookie asked, startled. It was so black in here Tookie couldn’t see her hand in front of her face.

  “Because of low light in Canne Del Abra. I almost seeing the BellaDonna!”

  Suddenly, Shiraz cried out. There was a loud thump. “You will not see what you are not supposed to see, little runner girl!” the BellaDonna’s voice resonated. Her voice was so close and loud, Tookie clapped her hands over her ears. The BellaDonna was right next to them! “Keep your eyes shut tight from now on, you hear me?”

  “Y-yes,” Shiraz whimpered.

  Then the BellaDonna leaned in closer to Shiraz. So close that Tookie could hear her inhaling and exhaling. Her breath smelled sour, a little like Mr. De La Crème’s after he’d drank his weight in TaterMash. “You think you can run away, elfin girl?” the BellaDonna whispered in Shiraz’s ear. “With those stunted legs of yours?”

  Shiraz sucked in her breath. Tookie could feel the BellaDonna moving to Dylan next. “You’re full of attitude, fleshy one, but not even your sass can save you.”

  Dylan gasped.

  “A mind like yours is a terrible thing to waste,” the BellaDonna said into Piper’s ear next. “I’ll make sure she sautées it and eats every last drop.”

  All the Unicas made tiny whimpers. Ci~L is coming for them any minute, Tookie thought. This is the BellaDonna’s warning!

  Finally, the BellaDonna sidled over to Tookie. She planted her feet right in front of Tookie, and even though it was pitch-dark, Tookie could feel the BellaDonna’s eyes on her, glaring, boring into her, hating her. Tookie cowered, hunching her shoulders to make herself smaller. She was sure the BellaDonna could hear her heart rocketing in her chest.

  Without a sound, the BellaDonna vanished, but her words filled Tookie’s body, weighing her down. Tookie held on to her friends tightly. They had to get out of this place.

  Now.

  33

  THE MUTANT MUSIC MONSTER

  Back on the mountain, the Pilgrims had crossed into the second level of the barrier. The trek had begun to take a toll on their bodies in more ways than just the many injuries from the mountain’s terrors. Dark circles surrounded their eyes. Clumps of dirt clung to their hair, and their ashy skin was covered in bug-bite welts the size of silver dollars. They’d all lost quite a bit of weight, their clothes now hanging off their bodies, the bones of their spines jutting out from under their shirts. They walked stiffly, their muscles having broken down long ago. Occasionally, one of them stumbled and fell. It was taking longer and longer for them to stand up again.

  Creamy made an announcement to the crowd.

  “After the many near tragedies at the hands of our drowsy, irresponsible leader, I am now assuming control of this group.”

  Kamata’s head shot up from his crouching position. “Irresponsible? Lady, you do not know the Divide like I do and—”

  “Who is ready for a change?” Creamy shouted, cutting him off.

  The entire group tentatively raised their hands.

  “Mr. Kamata, you’re outnumbered. So you either march along with us or turn back to Metopia. Your choice,” C
reamy declared.

  Kamata looked at the ground and sheepishly whispered, “I’ll stay. I wanna see it finally.”

  “You’ve never even laid eyes on Modelland from the Divide? Not even from a distance?” Jessamine asked, scowling.

  “Um, no. This would be a first.”

  “I knew you were a friggling phony loser the moment I met your pathetic wannabe-ridge-raiding ass!” Jessamine spat.

  “Okay then, packs on and let’s go!” Creamy ordered the group in an authoritative voice, swinging her pack onto her back. Bellissima sat strapped to the top of Creamy’s backpack for the best view of the Divide.

  Lynne glanced over her shoulder. “Quick! Let’s hurry up before you-know-who comes back!”

  But it was too late. Hunchy’s arms suddenly split open the bush. He stepped through, wiping his mouth of what appeared to be blood. Lynne shuddered.

  The group continued their climb up the steep slope that would lead them to Modelland. Zone two was nothing like zone one. The air smelled of rotten eggs. And as they walked across the charred landscape, they came upon evidence of past Pilgrims: an old white sneaker, bitten in half. What looked like human bones, some eaten away by time, others relatively fresh. A leather jacket that seemed full. No one dared to check if there was a body inside.

  “What in friggling hell happened here?” Jessamine yelled.

  “They’re dead,” Myrracle replied innocently. Oblivious to the danger around her, she was still prancing as she walked. “They can’t hear you.”

  “I know that, you dumb whirling-dervish dancing fool!” Jessamine’s eyes blazed. “I don’t think I’ve ever met such an idiotic dimwit as you in my entire fourteen years!”

  Myrracle just shrugged, but Creamy stiffened. She shot Jessamine a dagger-sharp expression, then spun away toward Kamata. They began to speak quietly, out of earshot of the rest of the group.

  After a moment, Kamata cleared his throat. “Listen, everybody … if I may, Mrs. De La Crème …,” Kamata said sheepishly.