I’m not worried about her. I’ve trained her well. She runs the place already, she’s like a little dictator with the other girls. I’ve told her to be softer with them, to follow the rules but remember they’re human, they all have broken hearts. Not because they came here, but because they’re girls from Green City.
Sabine
I wake up in Joseph’s house, and the morning light hits my eyes like a fist to the face.
I wince and turn my head, then move my arms and legs. Even my limbs feel tired. I’ve woken up in the same fetal position I remember I was in when I fell asleep, Joseph pressing himself into my back, his arm around my waist.
Joseph isn’t there. I rise from the bed, putting my feet gingerly on the floor. Strangely, my hips and thighs feel sore and I stand with difficulty. I try, but I can’t keep track of everything I’m feeling. The fact that I’ve slept through the night is astonishing and new. It must be the champagne he gave me again last night; I’m more sensitive to its effects than I thought. I don’t like it and I’m not doing that again, anytime soon, even if it makes me sleep. This kind of sleep feels wrong, as if I’ve stolen it from someone, and now I’m probably going to pay.
I move to the gently percolating bath in the corner of the room, sink under the water, and allow the sleep to be washed from my body. The hot, scented water doesn’t lighten me in the least. As I bathe, I fade into a strange vision of Joseph tying weights to my ankles and wrists, a belt of worries tied around my waist. He leads me out to the middle of a large, crystal-colored lake, and makes me lie down on the surface of the water. I’m dragged down to the bottom of the lake, while Joseph swims strongly back to shore.
The problem with insomnia is that everything feels like a dream, even being awake. It’s dangerous not to know the difference between dream and reality.
I dry myself off, get dressed, walk into the kitchen. Joseph is making an omelet.
“There you are!” he says. “You fell fast asleep. I thought I’d let you rest, so I slept in the other room.” He cracks open two cultured eggs, then scans his kitchen display to see what he should add to it—cultured meat, vegetables, or bio-lab cheese; the display will decide based on what Joseph has been eating over the last few days. “I haven’t been getting enough vitamins,” he says out loud. I know he’s talking to himself, not me.
The display beeps and an image of a pig appears. “Ham it is,” Joseph says cheerfully. They haven’t killed an animal in Green City in fifty years. All beef, eggs, in fact anything natural, is created in a lab with synthetic polymers, proteins, DNA. It’s how Joseph was able to have his liver transplant five years ago, and go on living as a healthy man.
“Imagine, Sabine, a hundred years ago, the only way to get a new liver was to take a piece of a healthy one from a close relative and implant it in my diseased one and pray that it took.” He laughs at the barbarity of blood and being opened up like an animal on an operating table with knives. Ancient history, he calls it.
“Aren’t you glad we live in today’s age? Nothing to it. A few hours being injected with the right formula and in a few weeks, I had a healthy liver again.”
“Did you never think about not drinking, not eating so much rich food?” I ask.
Joseph laughs so hard that his belly quivers. I blush, not liking the tone of Joseph’s laugh. It says I can never understand the world he lives in, a stranger to the liberties he’s granted just because of his status in Green City. Then he sees me glancing in the direction of his paunch and put his hand over it defensively.
“Darling Sabine,” Joseph says. “There is nothing in this city that isn’t available to me. Food, drink, drugs. Riches, power, pleasure. I’m in the taxation business. That means I am in the fortunate position of being the guardian as well as a consumer of things that people spend their lives working to attain and obtain. Why on earth would I restrict anything for myself, when science has given us every way of eliminating their consequences?”
Joseph calls me names like sweetheart and darling, expresses longing for my company, fusses when I have to leave, but I never feel that I’ve moved him anywhere deeper. I’m supposed to make him feel cared for and wanted, but I think I hold the same importance for him as an expensive suit, or a car. I’m there to scratch an itch that has nothing to do with his skin.
I clutch a cup of coffee in my hands as I watch him bend, move, reach for dishes. An image comes to my mind, unbidden, of him crouching over me the same way he’s hunching over the counter. Of him watching me as intently as he watches his eggs cooking in the pan. Of his leg touching my thigh, his knee between mine. It’s the first time I’ve had thoughts like these, and I’m not used to them either. They evoke a sensation in my body that is unsettling and electric. I drop my head, hoping Joseph can’t tell what I’m thinking.
Joseph hands me a plate with my breakfast on it, but I push it away and put my coffee cup down. “I’ll eat later,” I say. “I have to go. The car is going to be here any minute.”
For the first time, he doesn’t protest. He sits down and starts to eat, as if I’ve said nothing. He barely glances at me as I go to his bedroom to anoint myself with gold silicon, my fingers trembling. An inexplicable tension ignites in my body. I’m certain I’ve missed a few spots, but fear and fatigue make me careless and clumsy. Hopefully it’s enough to fool the scanners. Not even machines are foolproof; science is only as good as its gatekeepers.
I stumble out of the bedroom, my veil askew. I need to hurry, I feel as though there’s a train rushing through me. “I have to go,” I say again to Joseph, wanting to avoid the familiar struggle between going and staying.
Immediately, he pushes his chair back, stands up, sees me to the door, without reluctance, which surprises me. Joseph holds my arm for a moment, lifts the veil back from my head to look deeply into my eyes. I’m reflected in their depths, falling backward. He’s infinitely tender as he replaces the veil on my head, straightens it, and then kisses me on the lips.
“Go, Sabine. Go now or I won’t be able to control myself.” He laughs at his own confession. It terrifies me and I don’t want to know why.
I lurch through the lobby of the building and make it onto the street outside. At this time of year, it’s hot enough to strip paint from buildings, incinerate small flowers, boil cultured eggs on your car.
I glance around frantically, but the street is empty. There’s nobody on either side of the road, which works to my advantage.
But then a wrenching, sharp pain tears through my abdomen: I press my hand to it and gasp at the pain, ten times worse than period cramps. Where did it come from? I was fine just moments ago. There’s a strange soreness in my back, too, but nothing in comparison to the tumult inside my belly.
Sweat beads on my forehead. My ears are ringing, my face is turning hot. My sight grows dim. Am I dreaming that the black car drives up just at that moment, stops a few feet from me? If the car idles more than a few minutes, the heat of the engine will register on the scanners; they’ll send an Agency car to investigate. The level of threat is too high; the algorithm is triggered to abort the mission.
I float down to the ground like a flower wilting slowly, its head bowing to gravity. I slip a little as I fall, my limbs splayed out around me. I’m beyond knowing this now. I’m gone from this world, and it is the second time I’ll sleep so deeply in a space of twenty-four hours, as if I’m trying to catch up with the last twenty-four years of my life.
Lin
She sat in the rose garden with Reuben, at the end of another night. The sky was overlaid with thick clouds, the sun struggling to break through. They were both silent but satisfied, unneedful of words to maintain the connection between them. The high walls around the garden added to the illusion that the world could not intrude on their momentary refuge.
Reuben had his arm around Lin’s shoulders. His usual restlessness had ebbed away, leaving the essence
of the man behind, what he would be like all the time without the demands of the City and his job.
Lin wondered to herself, Is this what it feels like?
Just as she was about to lean her head on Reuben’s shoulder before kissing him goodbye, her device let out an urgent beep, followed by a pulsing that grew stronger with every second. This wasn’t the usual alert to announce the arrival of the car. This was something different.
Lin took out the device and pressed the key to display the message. As she read, Reuben watched her face change expressions and her skin drain of all color.
“What’s wrong?”
Her hand was at her mouth, and for a moment she couldn’t speak. Reuben had to shake her before she could tell him.
“It’s Sabine. She was out last night with...ith Joseph. She was supposed to be picked up right now.”
“What’s the matter? Is she all right?” Reuben had heard about this man, how he was enamored of Sabine, who was like steel, Lin had said, she wasn’t interested in that sort of thing with a Client. And so far, Joseph had kept his hands off her. Reuben believed the young women could adhere to the no-sex contract, but it was no surprise the men grew tired of it. And what girl could withstand that kind of pressure, if a man truly wanted her body?
Lin shook her head. “She wasn’t there at the pickup point. The car left without her. She never came back.”
Reuben knew he had to act fast, before Lin put herself in danger. As she jumped up and began to stride towards the gate, he caught her and held her back. “Go home. Go to the Panah right now.”
“How can I?” Lin was incredulous. “I can’t just leave her there. I have to go get her.”
“I’ll do it,” said Reuben. “Just tell me where he lives.”
From The Official Green City Handbook for Female Citizens
The Gender Emergency is in its last years; we are fully on the way to recovering the population numbers of Green City before the War. You have been crucial in boosting the numbers up to normal levels, but we still need your efforts and your devotion in order to stabilize and secure Green City’s future. Your sacrifices will not go unrewarded; your pain will not have been in vain. When you can look upon a city bustling with girls, you will know that you had a direct hand in turning this dream into reality. If you willingly give your bodies to us in trust, we are honor-bound to return your trust a thousandfold. This is our promise to you as full citizens of Green City. Rebelling against our generosity, on the other hand, is synonymous with transgressing against society and will be answered with reeducation as deemed necessary by the authorities. So be mindful you do not even come near the limits of rebellion, in thought or in action.
Julien
As he walked into the hospital, Julien Asfour tripped on the same crack in the floor he’d been complaining about since he first started work at Shifana Hospital six months ago.
His toe caught well and truly in the crack, he lost his balance and landed on the floor on his hands and knees with a sickening thump. A current of pain shot all the way up his wrists. A violent blush galloped from his ears and chin to his cheeks and forehead. Two nurses standing nearby hid their grins, then hastily looked the other way as he got up with a grunt and dusted off his hands, grimacing. His knees would be beautifully bruised tomorrow.
The youngest doctor appointed to the best hospital in Green City, Julien was mindful of his reputation as a medical prodigy: he had graduated first in his class, winning a gold medal for pioneering a cancer treatment that sent medication through nanopores right into the lung cells. He couldn’t afford to show any sign of personal weakness, or vulnerability. He was being watched by his superiors, by his professors, by his former classmates. Maybe the Leaders, quick to reward exceptional performance, might keep an eye out for his progress. If he did well, who knows where he could end up in five or ten years’ time?
His name was Asfour, the ancient Arabic word for finch, the most ordinary of birds. Finches were not showy, they didn’t sing like the nightingale or distinguish themselves with honor as birds of prey. They were Green City’s most popular pets, one or two in almost every home, living in cages for most people’s amusement. Julien had always identified with the tiny creatures, thinking himself ubiquitous and sturdy, nothing out of the ordinary.
As he dusted himself off, making a note to warn Maintenance for not yet repairing the broken tile, a nurse came running up to him.
Julien waved the nurse away. “I’m fine, I’m fine.” Then he saw the worry twisting the man’s face like crumpled paper. “What is it?”
“Dr. Julien. There’s an emergency! I can’t find any of the senior physicians. Dr. Falak is already in surgery and Dr. Seremian’s off today.”
A few doctors were away on scheduled leave, but a mystery stomach flu had sickened some of their replacements and the hospital was struggling to keep up with the flow of patients. Julien’s shift wasn’t due to start until the afternoon, but he thought he might make himself useful in the meantime.
He frowned. “Has Dr. Bouthain been informed?”
“Bouthain’s at a conference. I didn’t know who else to go to.” The nurse was already a few steps ahead of him, urging him onward. But why was he signaling Julien away from the main emergency hall and down a corridor that few people used at this time in the day?
Julien sprinted ahead of the nurse, turned the corner and nearly knocked into the young woman lying face down on a gurney, unconscious and unveiled. Her face, turned to the side, was clammy and pale, her breathing shallow. There were streaks of gold dust on her cheeks and arms.
Julien stopped short, staggered by the sheer impossibility of such a sight. “What the hell... who is this?”
“I don’t know,” stammered the nurse. “Someone left her outside the hospital, just dumped her on the ground and drove off. I’ve never seen anything like it, I didn’t know what to do.”
Julien tuned out the nurse’s babbling as he bent forward to help the young woman. It was second nature to him, to speak to her and see if she was responsive; to see if her pulse was strong or thready; to find out if her airways were obstructed. He was forming a list of possible diagnoses—brain bleed, overdose, electrocution—before he touched her skin to lift her chin and observe the rise and fall of her chest. When he pulled her eyelids up her eyes were rolling back in her head, pupils unfocused and unseeing. All this he observed in an instant, before making a choice that would lead to another and another, a tree of choices that could lead to either life or death.
“Miss? Miss! Miss, can you hear me?” Julien called out. She was unresponsive to his voice, the pulse at her wrist the weak thrum of swallow’s wings underneath his fingertips. The only signs of life: a heavy sweat on her forehead and the whisper of her breath on his cheek when he turned his head to watch her chest.
Julien ran the body scanner over her from head to toe, and an alarm immediately rang out. As he read the results, his throat tightened: she was suffering from a ruptured ectopic pregnancy, with possible—no, probable—internal bleeding. Her blood pressure had dropped and she was already in shock.
“What do we do?” said Mañalac, the nurse who had brought him to her. As their fearful eyes met, Julien realized that Mañalac had never dealt with a female patient before. In five years of medical school, Julien had treated only a few women for minor, insignificant problems: a chest infection here, a broken ankle there. Women came to the hospital to give birth, but the students were not allowed to see them or observe their labor until their final year, and that too only behind heavy walls of observation glass. Pregnant women were only handled by the most senior doctors. Their heavy stomachs were treated with the reverence assigned to only the most complicated, challenging diseases; the senior doctors fought among themselves for the prestige that came with treating them on a completely different floor of the hospital that was heavily monitored and guarded; regular workers never even
laid eyes on those women. Julien had yet to be given the opportunity to start his specialization in women’s care.
The robots he had used in all his surgery drills were constructed in exactly the same way as the female lying pale and unmoving on the table in front of him. Only the janitor or a training bot would have been more forbidden to help the girl than Julien and Mañalac. But today the surgical department was operating half-staffed, as Mañalac had said. It would be at least fifteen minutes before the proper surgeons could be notified, and by then the girl could die.
“We have to get her into surgery right now,” said Julien authoritatively, to disguise how badly he was quaking inside.
“No, Dr. Julien! We can’t.” Mañalac shook his head vehemently. An old hand at Shifana, he was trained to obey the doctors without question; however, he was even more well versed in the repercussions of breaking with hospital protocol. Hospital admissions were entered immediately into the city records; the use of all surgery rooms, drugs, and supplies were recorded, down to the smallest bandage. Putting the first cannula into her hand would set off a cascade of electronic tags that would lead right back to them.
Julien heard himself saying, “Do you trust me?” This time his voice was strong and sure, coming from a place as yet unsounded inside him.
Mañalac stiffened, as if insulted by the question. “Of course I do, Dr. Julien.”
“Then please, help me. I’ll answer for everything.” Could Mañalac see how much Julien’s hands shook? “I’ll handle the system. And don’t worry: I’ll take complete responsibility for everything.” Mañalac had to know he was lying; Julien waited for him to refuse the order. He looked over Mañalac’s shoulder once more, to make it clear that he already considered the girl his patient. He gave Mañalac a moment to realize that Julien would risk everything just to be able to see her open her eyes.
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