by Paul Stewart
‘Come with me, York,’ he says.
We cross the room to a door on the far side. It slides open with a soft swoosh, and we step through.
‘Hot swarf!’ I gasp.
I’m standing in a towering atrium. Ancient trees grow from floor to ceiling, and there are hanging troughs, packed with flowers and trailing plants, attached to cables so fine it looks as though they’re suspended in mid-air at every level.
Beyond the atrium is a wall of brightly lit-up visiglass. It’s some fifteen storeys high and stretches off in both directions as far as I can see. Elevators are attached to its front, travelling both up and down and side to side. Each storey has a visiglass ceiling and floor, and is subdivided into what seem like countless individual rooms by visiglass walls.
And it’s weird. Through these visiglass ceilings and floors and walls, I can see what each one contains. The inner workings. It’s almost like my recon-sight’s working again. There are comp-stations, info-decks, power-units, holo-banks, sleep-pods, trough-gardens, rec-halls, screen-rooms, medi-cabins . . .
And a whole lot of people.
Not mutants, but humans like Travis. Like me. Hundreds, definitely; maybe thousands. They’re at every level of the massive dome, occupying every space; working, resting, playing.
Travis turns back to me. ‘There’ll be time to look round later,’ he says and, taking me by the arm, he leads me through the atrium garden, where a work-gang of gardeners are weeding the flower beds and trimming the shrubs.
We come to one of the elevator points. Travis presses his hand to a circular pad moulded into the visiglass. I look up to see an elevator speeding down to us. It slows as it approaches, then glides to a stop. The door slides open, and we step inside.
‘Level fourteen,’ he says, ‘twenty-four, seventy, ten.’
A woman’s soft voice repeats his destination.
‘Affirmative,’ says Travis. And we’re off.
I’ve braced myself for going up, and when we suddenly speed to the left, it takes me by surprise and I stumble. Travis steadies me and I grab hold of the safety rail. Room after room blurs past. Then we stop again, and this time we do go up – and so fast, my stomach lurches and my knees bend. Beneath me, I can see the floor recede as we climb higher and higher, until I’m feeling so dizzy I have to look away.
Travis is grinning. ‘Pretty impressive, eh?’ he says.
I grin back. ‘It’s amazing,’ I say, but am aware of the tremble in my voice.
Fourteen floors up, we come to a stop for a second time, but the elevator door doesn’t open. Instead, we set off, horizontal again, this time heading inside the stacked banks of rooms and chambers, down a long square tunnel.
We’re travelling more slowly now. Other than a low hum, there’s no noise in the elevator, but I catch glimpses of what’s going on all around.
Swimmers in a pool below me. A bev-counter above, with men, women and children at tables or propping up the bar. Three men working at a silver machine that’s dispensing some kind of pills to my right. Then a bank of sleep-pods; some of them occupied, some empty. A man at a comp-screen. A woman at a mirror, brushing her hair.
It’s creeping me out being able to see everything like this. Back at my old home in the Inpost, I had places to hide away. To be on my own. To think about stuff. Here, everyone’s on display.
Travis doesn’t seem to even notice.
‘There’s no privacy here,’ I say. ‘Doesn’t that bother you?’
‘Bother me?’ he says, one eyebrow raised. ‘Why would it bother me? I’ve got nothing to hide.’
I let it go. Moments later, we come to a smooth halt.
‘Twenty-four, seventy, ten,’ the voice purrs.
The door opens and Travis ushers me into the room beyond it. I look round, still wondering what I’m doing here.
From what I’ve seen so far, this is one of the larger chambers in the dome. Broad and deep, it extends upwards two storeys, the ceiling formed by the frame of the geodesic dome itself. Given its size, there’s not much furniture in it. There’s a large desk at the centre of the floor. Behind it is a chair, its high back towards me. A stool. An info-stack.
And all of them looking like they’re floating in mid-air.
I don’t think I’ll ever get used to the see-through floors in this place. I’m dizzy. My stomach’s clenched. I know the visiglass is thick and strong, but I can’t help feeling I’m just about to plummet down through the air.
I grip the edge of the desk. Look down at my feet. Below them is a storeroom where men and women in blue tunics are unpacking large boxes. And below them, a workroom where a couple of techies are dismantling one of the flying zoids. And below them, a work-station where three women are staring at holo-screens. And below them . . .
I hear someone clear their throat and look up to see the high-backed chair in front of me has swivelled round. A woman is sitting in it. She’s got thick silvery hair, tied up in three buns. She’s wearing a high-necked white tunic and there’s a thin tinted transparent band over her eyes – which are blue and intense and staring, not at me, but at something she can see in the band.
Then they refocus. On me. She flashes me a smile that reveals a set of perfectly even white teeth. And I look back at her, feeling a little intimidated, this weird hot-cold tingly sensation shooting up and down my spine.
‘You are York, I understand,’ she says, and the voice is soft and friendly.
‘I am,’ I say.
‘And you come from the Outer Hull.’
‘I do.’ I wonder how she knows.
She must have noticed my confusion. ‘The surveillance droids spotted you soon after your arrival in the Mid Deck,’ she says, then frowns. ‘Two of you. You weren’t easy to track . . .’
‘That . . . that was my friend. Belle,’ I tell her. ‘We got split up.’
She stares at me for a moment, then smiles again. ‘I see,’ she says, and she leans forward, her arms sliding across the top of the desk.
‘Greetwell, York from the Outer Hull,’ she says. ‘And welcome to the Sanctuary. My name is Crockett – Petra Crockett – and I am going to ask you some questions. Please answer them as honestly as you can.’ Her eyebrows twitch. ‘I shall know if you’re lying.’
The questions are easy at first. How old I am. What happened to my parents. Whether I have any brothers or sisters. But soon they probe deeper. How many live in the Outer Hull? Where do they live? I answer as best I can, and then she wants to know why they hide away, and how long for, and how we survive – and then we get onto the Rebellion, and killer zoids, and me being a scavenger . . .
The woman is so open and friendly that the unease I felt when I first met her is washed away. And it seems so long since I’ve talked properly to another human being, I find I want to tell her all about myself; to be accepted into this new world of order and stability that I’ve stumbled across.
‘These parts that you scavenge, York,’ she says, that smile of hers flickering on her lips. ‘You say that your people modify themselves with them.’
I nod. ‘If we get injured, yes. Zoid arms, legs . . .’
‘Robotic mutants,’ she says quietly.
She is no longer smiling, and I realize how lucky it was that Belle was not brought here with me. She glances at Travis, then back at me.
‘It is fortunate for you, York,’ Petra Crockett says, her voice cold and clipped, ‘that you have passed our genetic validation.’
‘The bev-counter,’ Travis says, and gives the destination number to the elevator.
He seems friendlier now, and I guess it’s cos I did OK answering Petra Crockett’s questions. As the elevator darts its way through the maze of visiglass tunnels, he points out various places I might find of interest.
‘That’s one of our gyms,’ he says, waving a hand towards a hall where twelve or so men and women are working out on machines. ‘There’s one on every level,’ he adds. ‘That’s a recycling depot. Nothing goes to waste i
n the Sanctuary. And that,’ he says a while later, ‘is a crèche.’
I find myself looking into a large room filled with about a hundred young children, both toddlers and crawlers. They’re all busy playing – with holo-bricks or info-pads; the more advanced of them scrambling over a climbing cube.
‘Note the thick red mat on the floor,’ Travis says, and I nod. I already had. ‘It’s cos little kids don’t like being on a visiglass floor,’ he explains. ‘Freaks them out, crawling over nothing.’
I know how they feel.
‘They won’t play anywhere else till they’re five at least,’ Travis goes on. ‘Then they’re fine with it.’
A couple more up-down-side-to-side twists and turns and the elevator announces that we’ve arrived at our destination. The bev-counter. The door slides open, and I’m immediately struck by a smell makes my stomach rumble.
We step inside.
The place is half full. There are people perched on tall stools at the counter or seated around small silver-topped tables. A couple of servers are working behind the counter, pouring mugs of froth-topped bev, or doling out bowlfuls of something green, which another couple of servers are loading onto trays and delivering to the tables.
The babble of conversation seems friendly enough. But as we walk through the diners it gets quiet, and people look up at me suspiciously. Some frown. Others look away.
‘You’re probably the first new face any of them have ever seen,’ Travis tells me.
‘Greetwell,’ someone calls.
We turn, and I see someone fair-haired beckoning to us.
‘We grew up together,’ Travis tells me as we head towards him. ‘Birth-pod, nursery, crèche, tech-school, security watch . . . York, this is Grant,’ he says when we reach him. ‘Grant, York.’ He smiles. ‘It’s OK. York has been validated.’
Travis says this loudly so the others can all hear.
‘So, Petra has accepted you,’ says Grant, shaking my hand. We sit down at the table. ‘Interesting.’
‘The Sanctuary is sealed,’ Travis tells me. ‘We have a population of three thousand, and that remains constant. It’s the number the Sanctuary can best sustain. Birthing takes place every three years, one hundred newborns each time, and we live to ninety.’
I frown. ‘What, ninety exactly?’
The pair of them nod. ‘We’ve got the tech here to make sure of that,’ says Grant. ‘No one dies before they’re ninety.’
‘And people who live to be older than ninety?’ I ask.
Travis laughs. ‘That’s not encouraged,’ he says – and I’m about to ask him what that means, when one of the servers arrives at our table. He’s holding a tray loaded up with three mugs, three bowls and a small plate with twenty-one coloured pills on it. Travis thanks the server, then turns to me. ‘Tuck in,’ he says.
I sip the bev. It’s sweet and salty at the same time, but refreshing. Then it’s time to try the green stuff in the bowls. I take a spoon and cut a bit off, put it in my mouth and it tastes of . . . well, nothing. Nothing at all. It’s just a kind of juicy, textured pap. I chew and chew, the stuff going from one cheek to the other as I try my best to swallow it – without success.
I look up to see that both Grant and Travis are staring at me. And when our eyes meet, the pair of them burst out laughing.
‘What is it?’ I mumble, mouth still full.
‘Soylent,’ says Grant. ‘A mix of soya and lentils.’
‘I’ll show you the grow-troughs later,’ says Travis. ‘If you’re interested,’ he adds.
‘And you eat this stuff?’ I say, finally managing to swallow it down.
‘You have to take the pills with it,’ says Travis. ‘For vitamins, minerals. And taste.’
He plucks seven of them from the plate, each one a different colour, then lays them out in a row. Grant leans across and switches two of them round, then the pair of them sit back.
‘I recommend you eat them from left to right,’ Travis says. ‘And swill your mouth out with the bev between pills.’
And I do so.
The first pill is pale blue. I take another spoonful of the soylent, place it on the top, then start chewing – and this time my mouth is filled with a delicious fishy taste.
‘Excellent,’ I say.
I take a mouthful of bev, then try the next pill. It’s brown. And meaty.
‘Now, that’s really nice,’ I say.
And so it goes on down the line. The green one tastes of succulent vegetables. The yellow one gives the soylent a rich creamy flavour, the dark blue a hot, herby taste that makes my tongue tingle, and the red – well, that’s really special. It’s like every fruit I’ve ever eaten, all rolled into one. Finally, there’s only one pill left. The white one. I place it on the last spoonful and stick it in my mouth. At first there’s nothing, but then it explodes into flavours – sweet satzcoa and strong bev mixed together, and popping with spices that continue until I’ve swallowed every last bit.
‘Enjoy?’ says Travis, who has been watching me closely.
‘Fantastic,’ I tell him.
‘Glad you like it,’ he says. ‘And it’s just a fraction of the tastes on offer.’
‘Yeah, you wait till you taste a purple pill!’ says Grant. ‘That really is fantastic.’
With the meal over, Travis takes me to my quarters.
‘Level seven, thirty-one, thirty-one, thirteen,’ the elevator purrs softly.
We step into a room that’s bathed in red light, and with visiglass walls that anyone can see in through. I don’t like it, but I’m so tired I try not to let it bother me.
There’s a long padded bench in the middle of the room, storage space to the left, a vapour-shower to the right, and between them, jutting out from the far wall, a black sleep-pod.
A glowing panel on the headboard reads Connor.
Travis goes over to it, deletes the name and replaces it with York.
‘You should sleep soundly, York,’ he says. ‘I’ve re-set the pod to your personal requirements.’
‘What happened to Connor?’ I ask.
Travis smiles. ‘You have replaced him,’ he says.
When I wake up, I feel wonderful. I’ve just had the best night’s sleep of my life.
I’m relaxed and clear-headed. My muscles seem soothed, as though they’ve been massaged while I was asleep. I roll over and the surface of the bed remoulds itself to my new position. The temperature is perfect, neither too hot nor too cold. I stretch and yawn, and the pod emits a gentle, refreshing breeze.
I think of my mission. To discover what caused the robot rebellion. I still haven’t learned why I’ve been brought to the Sanctuary. But maybe, just maybe, the answer lies here.
It’s what I need to find out . . .
I sit up. The lid of the pod opens up and I climb out. All around me, the Sanctuary pulses with life. I gaze through the visiglass walls at other sleep-pods, their occupants emerging, looking as well-rested as me. And it’s odd. No one looks back. No one seems aware I’m even there – which suits me just fine.
I guess it’s how they must deal with the lack of privacy.
Crisp new clothes are lying on a heated pad beside the pod. I put them on. Four levels down, I see the bev-counter is beginning to fill up with the first of the day’s diners. My stomach growls and I decide to join them, wondering what new tastes the pills have in store for me.
I walk to the door of my room and I’m trying to remember what the co-ordinates to the bev-counter are, when the elevator arrives. Its door swishes open and Travis is standing there.
‘Saw you were up,’ he says with a smile. ‘Thought you might need some help finding your way around.’
‘Thanks,’ I say, and step into the elevator.
‘Twenty-seven, twenty-three, eleven,’ says Travis, and it takes us to the bev-counter.
Blue, yellow, red pills. Explosions of taste on my tongue. Citrus. Smoked meat. Then something sweet and creamy to finish off with. It’s as deliciou
s as my meal the night before, and Travis smiles back at me, pleased to see how much I’ve enjoyed it.
Around us the other diners are relaxed and welcoming. It’s like they’ve accepted me. And that makes me feel so good. I sit back, warm, rested, well fed and happy.
Just like everybody else.
If only the whole of the Biosphere was like the Sanctuary, I find myself thinking. Perhaps it once was. Back in the Launch Times. I remember the hologram of the bio-engineer with his ancient flight-suit and flawless white teeth out there in the zones . . .
And with a sudden pang I remember that Belle’s out there too. And Caliph. Little Caliph, lost in the mutants’ lair . . .
Travis breaks into my thoughts. His face looks serious.
‘We are some of the last humans in the universe,’ he tells me, his gaze flicking round the crowded bev-counter. ‘We have to stick together.’
I nod. It’s what we used to say up in the Outer Hull – though this ordered dome of comfort and safety seems a world away from that.
‘The Sanctuary protects us, and we have to protect it . . .’
‘From zoids?’ I ask.
Travis shakes his head. ‘There are no zoids here, York,’ he says. ‘The force-field kept the Outer Hull rebellion from the Mid Deck. Our robots and droids are just that: robots and droids. Uncontaminated. Serving humans.’ He scowls. ‘But the same cannot be said of the Outsiders.’
‘You mean the mutants?’ I ask. ‘Are they human?’
‘No, York. They are not human,’ Travis tells me firmly. ‘Don’t ever, ever make that mistake. They’ve been contaminated, and there’s nothing they’d like better than to contaminate us.’ His voice trembles with emotion. ‘Which is why we have to keep them out.’
He fixes me with that intense unblinking stare of his, as if weighing me up.
‘I don’t know how much you lot up in the Outer Hull know about the history of the Biosphere,’ he says.