by Adam Steel
She considered the prospect of what would have happened if she had stayed behind and made different choices.
“She wouldn’t have been back at their penthouse.”
“She wouldn’t have drunk the wine.”
“Jon Li wouldn’t have been with her.”
“Jon Li would have been with Royale.”
“He wouldn’t have been Jon Li anymore. He would have been Mason Li.”
“She would have been removed from the equation; sent to the Genie Reactor to be fed into the infernal machine to help fuel the lights in Royale’s palace and forgotten by everyone.”
Ellie’s train of thoughts ran off the rails until she came back to the present.
She shivered alone, in the cold room. Jon Li had gone out to get them some food, or so he had said.
She had wanted to ask him a lot of things, but she couldn’t find the courage to ask him the burning question: “Did you sleep with Royale?” because she already knew the answer and his confirmation would only hurt more. They hadn’t spoken about the events that led up to their being in Union City and he had avoided her by spending all of his time meditating. He had quickly established himself a makeshift sanctuary in one of the side alcoves of the cave and had spent almost all his waking time in there, sat in the lotus position, in front of a lone candle. She hated the void that had developed between them, but she was at a loss as to how to fix it. She was almost glad when he had declared he was going out. The tension in the cave had been unbearable. She had felt angry at him. In her opinion his silence had made him seem cowardly. She had almost willed him out the door. The reality of how dangerous such a prospect had been had only dawned on her shortly afterwards.
“Going out for food?” he had said.
She thought that Jon Li was just as out of place in Union City as she was. What did he expect? To find a nice take-away somewhere down here? He’d be lucky if someone didn’t murder him down here in the dark, Ellie thought.
After he had left, she had realised that even though he was essentially ignoring her, she hadn’t been alone. Now she was. She found herself regretting the decision to let him go, but at the same time she realised that they couldn’t stay hidden in the cave dwelling forever. She wanted to go and find him, if only to be close to someone, but she did not have the courage to leave the cave dwelling and face the unknown darkness alone.
They had only had one visitor since they had been in their new home. Mother Esme had brought them a few meagre items from the store room to make the dwelling ‘habitable’. Habitable, in Union City terms, meant two blankets, a candle and a used bucket. Ellie had tried to look grateful. She had failed miserably. Jon Li hadn’t broken out of his meditation trance to say anything. Mother Esme had politely advised her that she was lucky and she should be thankful for what she did have. There were many other people who would have greatly appreciated the cave-dwelling.
Ellie had found it easier to be truly thankful when she had pictured the cell that she had been thrown into a few days earlier. As much as she hated to admit it, she thought that she was better than the Dustmen and she felt that she deserved to be treated better. Mother Esme had seen straight through her and it unnerved her. She had been humbled to find that there had been no resentment in the way that Mother Esme had spoken to her. There had only been a patient and calm understanding. Ellie had asked her if she thought the Dustmen were mostly good or bad people.
Mother Esme had answered her in a kindly manner: “Neither. They are just people like you and me.”
Ellie had found the old woman’s words reassuring. She had been sad when she had taken her leave. She had realised that she hadn’t asked about Aya. Her own selfishness had surprised her. She had been too busy thinking about her own troubles with Jon Li, to ask after Aya.
Footsteps approaching outside caused Ellie to sit up and dismiss her own selfish behaviour. The thick curtain, that covered the entrance to her dwelling, inched back. Ellie drew the dirt-caked blanket that she was lying under, up around her, like a shield. The thoughts of rapists and lurking strangers came into her mind again, and caused her to shrink back from the opening.
‘Who’s there?’ Ellie called out: it came out as more a whimper.
A hand appeared around the curtain and then a smiling face.
It was Abigail.
‘Hi! It’s just me. Mind if I come in?’ Abigail said cheerfully.
Ellie slumped back again, letting the blanket fall back into place: the relief was evident on her face.
‘Please do. I’m sorry. I just thought…’ Ellie replied.
Abigail stepped in and dropped the curtain back. She still looked remarkably clean, despite having spent the night with Lucian in his den. Ellie could only imagine how the two lovers had spent the night. She was envious.
‘You just thought perhaps I was one of those ‘undesirables’ out there, coming in to see you?’ Abigail sniped sarcastically.
Ellie looked guilty.
Abigail adjusted her hair, and smiled again, dispelling the sudden tension.
‘Well, I wouldn’t worry about that too much. Mr. D. takes a dim view on any of his men that do things like that,’ she replied, and raised an eyebrow.
Ellie looked puzzled for a moment.
‘Mr D? Oh, you mean Drago? Why would he care?’ Ellie scoffed.
‘Because he’s got an interest to stop that kind of thing going on. You see, his daughters live down here. All nine of them,’ Abigail exclaimed.
Ellie’s eyes widened in surprise.
‘Nine! He has nine daughters down here?’ Ellie questioned.
Abigail nodded, and said, ‘Yup. He’s a big believer in starting again, you know, keep on going and all that. He just don’t quit. Nine. All by different women. Who knows, maybe he’s trying for a son?’
Ellie mused on the prospect and changed the subject.
‘Yes…perhaps. I’m sorry. I thought you might be Jon, he’s been gone a while…’
Ellie’s face turned pale at the suspicion of what Abigail was doing visiting her.
‘Wait. There’s nothing wrong is there? Nothing wrong with Jon?’ Ellie pleaded urgently.
She had a mental picture of Abigail in a CURE Officer’s uniform and arriving to give the bad news to a relative that their loved one had been found dead in some ditch. Her mind went into overdrive and she felt very cold inside.
Perhaps he’s dead. Someone could have murdered him. Worse, he could have killed himself. He hasn’t spoken in three days. Maybe he was planning it. I can’t believe this. He can’t be dead! she thought despairingly.
She pictured Jon Li sitting next to Aya and mirroring her state of catatonia. Two dolls sitting by the firelight, never to move, or speak, again. Her bottom lip began to tremble as the thoughts raced through her mind. All of her scenarios seemed plausible, but Abigail dispelled all of her concerns with a rapid shaking of her head.
‘No, he’s okay. I can assure you of that. He’s with Mr. D. right now. But we’ll get to that in a minute,’ she replied.
Ellie was about to question her further when Abigail crossed the chamber and plopped down on the white sofa. It made a ‘whooshing’ sound as the air escaped from it.
‘Bit low - this,’ she quipped.
Abigail’s heels dug into the floor. She was wearing leather boots laced up to the thighs and a very short pair of black shorts over black, lacy tights. Her top was skimpy and black and she had with her a handbag made from black velvet. Ellie looked at what she was wearing herself. The dirty blue shirt and light blue cotton trousers, were soiled and torn in places. Her flat canvas shoes were coming apart at the seams. She looked over at Abigail and noticed that she was also wearing a necklace, which had been made of black boot-laces. A small bone dangled from the centre of it. She was staring at it.
‘Bird gave me this,’ Abigail said, fingering the white wish-bone of a long dead, and eaten, bird. ‘Cute ‘eh?’ Abigail remarked.
‘It’s…different,’ Ellie
managed.
‘Abigail tossed her a glittering metallic object and instinctively she caught it. It was her watch: the one which her father had given to her. She turned it over in her hands, before strapping it back onto her wrist. She was surprised to see that it still worked.
The time was 7:05 p.m.
She felt better for knowing at last, if it was day, or night.
‘I got that back for you. He said he was sorry for taking it,’ Abigail finished.
Ellie felt guilty for misjudging one of the Dustmen, again. Abigail’s and mother Esme’s words, had made her feel small and prejudiced. She thought that with mother Esme, it had been un-intentional, but with Abigail, she had been sure that it had been meant to make her feel that way. She thought that Abigail was punishing her for living in Utopia and for thinking that she was better than everyone else.
‘Thank you,’ Ellie offered humbly.
‘We’ve all got our places down here,’ Abigail continued. ‘I’m one of Drago’s informers. Me, and the others have been trying to work out just what the Mason’s plans are. We work on the inside, trying to sabotage their efforts to find these people and to try and get the truth out. Everyone has to try and do something,’ Abigail explained.
Ellie caught her drift, and it made her feel even more useless.
‘What can I do down here? Everyone hates me and I don’t blame them at all for that. I don’t know what I can do to make it right,’ Ellie said in a faltering voice.
‘You can start by not feeling sorry for yourself,’ Abigail said harshly. ‘You could be dead. You talk and act like you might as well be.’ Abigail’s face softened when she saw the wounded look in Ellie’s eyes. ‘I’m sorry, but there’s no use sugar coating it. The way I see it, is you have two choices. You can sit here and starve. Or you can try and do something. That man of yours Jon Li? He’s a fighter. He could have just stayed in Coney City, or just sat down and given up. But he didn’t. He brought you here to us, and he’s brought us the key. He risked his own life to get it here. Now we have their secrets.’
Ellie said nothing and sniffed back a tear when she thought of Jon Li.
Abigail swung her bag onto her lap and took out two small cans. She threw one at Ellie.
‘Catch. Pressie from your neck of the woods,’ Abigail said, and slipped the pull ring off with a ‘pop’.
Ellie caught the can and looked at the label in the dim candle light.
It read:
Jo Jo’s’s
De-Lux Spritzer
Manufactured by C.U.B.
Drink sensibly
2% proof.
‘How did you…?’ Ellie started to ask.
‘Ahhhh see. I have ways and means,’ Abigail said, and tapped the side of her nose.
Ellie drank the contents thirstily and looked at the label of the empty can again and she was instantly transported back to the day she had met Bridget and Irene in Jo Jo’s’s café on Diamond Plaza. Her face changed to one of extreme sadness and she tried to change the subject.
‘So. How did you get involved in all this? You don’t look like you were born out here. How long have you been coming to Union City?’ Ellie asked.
Abigail took a long drink of her can and looking thoughtful.
‘A long time. I was born in Coney City. My folks, well, basically, they were loaded. We had it all. Penthouse in Sector One. We were one of the first ones in there. Well I guess you know all about that, right?’ Abigail added slyly.
Ellie looked embarrassed as she and thought of Jon Li’s fantastic penthouse.
‘Anyway,’ Abigail continued. ‘As I got older. I started to realise what a load of bullshit it was. Freedom and Equality and all that I mean. There we were, absolutely loaded, and there were people starving in the street while they built the other Sectors. I noticed they sorted out the nicest accommodation for the most important people first! At one point, I remember my dad saying that they should have culled more of the sheep when they were building the city. I think that’s how he put it as he sipped his champagne.’
Ellie wrinkled her nose in disgust. She couldn’t help but feel the pangs of guilt about her own well-to-do background. She herself, had gone to the best schools, and on to medical college. She had drunk in her own hypocrisy.
‘So, when I got older, I kinda thought, well screw this. I went totally off the rails. I hung around the poorer Sectors, met some real people, and I can tell you, they were far more alive than all the idiots in Sector One. To them, the view of Utopia wasn’t quite so rosy as it was from my parents penthouse window,’ Abigail said soberly. ‘My dad tried to keep me inside. He even set up some ridiculous Toff for me to marry. Well…When I hit sixteen I just left, ran away. He had half the city out looking for me. So I know what it’s like to have the CURE after you!’ she laughed. ‘What they didn’t know was that I wasn’t in the city. I went north into The Wastelands. That’s where I met my Lucian. He took me to this place. It was a lot different in those days. People used to live above ground, but years of TALOS picking these people off, has forced them to hide underground and live like rats,’ Abigail said bitterly. ‘Lucian woke me up to the truth. So when I went back, I wanted to try and help anyway that I could. At first, I smuggled supplies. I became such an embarrassment to my folks, that my dad offered me a lump sum of credits just to get out of his sight and never bug him again. I reckon I got a good deal out of that! He was a miserable bastard,’ Abigail said, and paused to take another sip from her can. ‘I just can’t see how anyone could live in such luxury in Coney City and not see the hypocrisy in Freedom and Equality can you?’ Abigail said, and jabbed at Ellie accusingly.
A flash of anger raced across Ellie’s features. She was annoyed by Abigail’s constant jibes.
‘If you knew, why didn’t you try and warn people?’ Ellie piped up: going on the offensive.
Abigail snorted in response.
‘Don’t you think I tried? Who would listen? What do you think I was doing with Aya? Telling her the truth sure worked out well, didn’t it?’
Ellie fell silent. She could see Abigail’s predicament. Everyone that Abigail told the truth too, would be in danger.
‘Don’t forget. We have to be careful, because we’re no use if we get caught. We influence that rag the Daily Informer, but we have to print it in such a way, that it doesn’t draw too much attention else the jigs up. The Masons let conspiracy rags like that run because it just makes the writers look nuts, and who pays attention to it? Nobody that’s who!’
Ellie recalled Bridget’s reaction to the rag, during their meeting in Jo Jo’s’s cafe. She could see that it was true. The articles in the paper had seemed totally unbelievable, but now they all made sense to her. People had tried to warn her too along the way. She remembered old Eric, who lived back in his glasshouse, and the weird poems that he had recited. She realised that Eric had known all along about the masons. He had tried to warn her in his own peculiar and autistic way. Ellie thought about what Eric had said. Eric’s words came clearly to her.
“They have been here all along. They have always been here. Beware the men with dark glasses.”
They were Eric’s words.
Simple Eric – No - clever Eric, she thought.
Ellie wondered how she could ever have been so blinkered and she recalled the night of the Masquerade Ball. Mason Royale had been surrounded by her body guards and she and Katcher had been holding crystal glasses full of dark red wine. Ellie realised that Eric had meant that the masons were holding glasses full of dark red wine: not wearing dark glasses. That had been his true warning. Eric had known that Irene had been taken by one of them.
My dear friend, my lovely friend Irene, Ellie thought, and sank back onto the blanket. Her anguish came pouring out in tearful jolts and stutters.
‘They killed Irene. My best friend, and her unborn baby. They killed her aunty Audrey as well. I found their bodies. They covered it all up you know. The CURE. They said that Irene and her Aunty were victim
s of some fictional murderer they made up for the papers. It was all lies. They lie about everything. They were just excuses to remove people. I went down to see the place where they do the forensics. I saw it for myself. It was a cover up. I know it was. I found things out at the hospital where I used to work. The ISIAH system was corrupt. The patients were being killed off, that’s what was happening. They weren’t treating people at all. If they weren’t any use to the system of Utopia, then they disposed of them. They weren’t just killing them. They were stockpiling fuel for that… thing they’ve built: the Genie Reactor. I’ve seen it. It’s vast. It must take thousands of people to power it!’ Ellie wailed.
Ellie got up, and stamped her feet in frustration. She struggled to piece together the evil plot.
‘They must be taking them from all over. But I don’t understand how they could do this. They must have been taking them from the psychiatric facilities too. Some of the clients from the hospital were being transferred to Blair Ridge at Eden. I’ll bet none of those made it. That’s where it all started with Irene. When she started asking questions about a patient, he just disappeared off the system. That psycho, Professor Victor Archer, must have been in on it, because they put him in charge. I should have told Jon what I found out but…I just didn’t trust him! I cut him out! It’s all my fault! If I’d have just trusted him, then he wouldn’t have gone to Royale, and we’d still be together!’ Ellie blurted out, and started sobbing.
Abigail’s expression softened.
‘Things have changed now. That’s what I’m here for. I’ve come to take you to a meeting. Mr. D has a plan.’
‘A plan? What plan? What do you mean? What can we do? We are nothing compared to the Masons. Nothing!’ Ellie faltered.
Abigail shook her head and said, ‘Nope. They think we’re nothing. But they’re wrong. If we want things to change, we’re going to have to fight for it.’
Ellie looked at her cautiously and said, ‘You’re going to try and kill them? That’s going to be next to impossible.’