literature

Dystopia

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Daily Deviation

Daily Deviation

March 25, 2011
The suggester writes: Dystopia by ~serendipityprincess is masterful world-building and story telling, with a refreshing approach to familiar themes.
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Suggested by KreepingSpawn
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Literature Text

    Only 23 years from Then, and life is completely different. Today, human characteristics are highly sought, collected and sold like antiques at an auction. The number of Wildstock- those of us unlucky enough not to be genetically engineered- is dwindling. With the onset of cloning and affordable genetic engineering, few people see a benefit in natural selection. Unfortunately, due to the inherent risks of genetic homogeny, Wildstock have become an invaluable resource in the Empire. We are sought out and captured by bounty hunters, ripped from all we have ever known, and taken to the infamous Empire Markets. The lucky ones among us are sold to collectors, who value our raw emotions and unique genetics. The less fortunate are sold to medical facilities, used for the repair of aging Seamless.

      I was captured a little over a week ago by the best Hunter in the Empire. Since then, I have been resigned to pouting behind the stall of Banneker's Emporium in the Empire City Bazaar. I feel out of place here- I am out of place here. Empire City is magnificent, much larger than anywhere I've been before, but it bears the unmistakable taint of Seamless. The streets are too straight, the buildings too symmetrical. Even the trees lining the entrance to the Bazaar are identical. It's the same with the Seamless themselves- underneath their unnatural beauty, there lurks an almost frightening symmetry. Because that is their perfection: they all look the same.

      I'm startled from my thoughts by a newcomer to the shop. He's not one of the usuals, and I'm intrigued. He's a Seamless- I can tell by the unnatural violet color of his eyes- but something about him seems nearly Wild. Maybe it's the shrewd way he regards me, or maybe it's the half smirk tugging up the corners of his mouth, or maybe it's just wistful thinking, but some part of me thinks he's different. He browses for a moment before turning to me.

      "Where are you from?" His accent is strange to me, lisping and soft, "Or are you not allowed to talk to customers?"

      "I don't know if I'm allowed or not. No one's tried to talk to me," I reply, "Have you ever heard of Towander?"

      He scoffs, "Capitol of the Revolution? I should have guessed."

      "Hmm," I mutter as he turns to the shopkeeper.

      "Why is this one here?" He asks the merchant, pointing at me, "Wit? Beauty?"

      "So far all we've seen from her is a temper, and an abundance of self-confidence," The shopkeeper replies, "Not much suited to your fine tastes, Sir. She's not even delicate- I hear she was found in the desert after eluding capture for months."

      "The desert, hmm?" The violet-eyed boy glances at me curiously, "But she's from Towander?"

      "They all say that, don't they?" The merchant sighs, "Makes them more appealing to collectors. If you want her, you can have a good deal. She's been scaring off my customers."

      "I'll take her," the boy says, "What are you asking? An arm and a leg?"

      I laugh before I realize he's not joking.

      "Not quite that much," the merchant tells him, "Just that pretty heart of gold you've been flashing around the city."

      The boy sighs and unbuttons the top of his shirt. There's a click as he removes the chest plate he's had installed, and a whirring as he takes out the fashionable golden heart he's been using. To my surprise, their hearts are actually shaped like the iconic symbol of love. As I'm trying to determine the mechanics of their interchangeable parts, he pulls out a dingy red heart and places it in the slot the gold one very recently occupied. He snaps the chest plate back on and buttons his shirt as if this is an every day occurrence. Perhaps it is.

      He hands the metallic device to the merchant, who takes it greedily. The electronic device keeping me inside the shop is removed, and quickly replaced by a tiny monitor binding me to violet-eyes. My desert goggles are given back to me before we leave the shop, to protect my Wild eyes from the blinding sun. The Seamless have adaptations for this, but without proper protection from the sunlight, the Wildstock risk going blind.

      I follow violet-eyes through the market as he prattles about the beauty of Empire City. He says it's the grandest place on Earth, but all I see are matching girls in metallic tunics and trees cut into squares. I try to remind myself it could be worse. I could have been sold to a researcher, not to some teenage collector with a little too much money. Everything about this boy I'm with suggests wealth and excess, from his silky locks to his shining leather boots. Surely it could be worse. As we reach midtown and the buildings tower around me claustrophobically, I can barely think it could be worse. This is the heart of The Empire, the heart of everything I'm not.

      I must look frightened, because the boy stops and asks if I'm alright. I tell him of course I am, but he doesn't look convinced. We walk a bit farther before he asks me my name.

      "Seren," I answer, "Yours?"

      "Evander," he says, "Actually, Axel Evander. But Axel doesn't suit me."

      "Axel?" I ask skeptically, "Do you have a brother named Wingnut?"

      "No, but I do have a friend named Bolt."

      "Really?"

      He laughs, "No."

      "Oh," I'm somewhat disappointed.

      "If it's any consolation, I went to school with a kid called Gear. I don't think it was his real name, though."

      Through the tint of my goggles, I can see the mechanics in his eyes. It's strange to think the Seamless are actually humans; they seem so far removed from what I am. But they're the same as me, just version 2.0. I consider this as he leads me into a building no different than any other we've passed so far. I lift my desert goggles, but push them back down almost immediately. The stark white lobby is almost as blinding as the sun outside.

      We pass several people that seem to work here, and they all greet Evander warmly. He seems to be well-known throughout Empire City; even the merchant at the Bazaar had seemed to respect him.

      "You're different than most Seamless I've met," I tell him as we approach a gilded elevator in the back of the lobby.

      He chuckles, "How have you met any Seamless? You don't exactly blend in, do you?"

      "Everyone wears goggles in the desert," I shrug.

      We step into the elevator, and I try to fight a surge of panic rising as the doors shut. Luckily, this elevator does not shake or rattle, unlike any in Towander. Before claustrophobia renders me immobile, we reach the penthouse, and the doors open with a slight metallic clunk. We step out into a tiny hallway, and I notice there's only one door. Evander runs his hand down a fingerprint scanner, and the door slides open.

      I'm led into a magnificent room, open windows providing a view of the city. We're above most of the other buildings, and I can see over the wall insulating Empire City from the desert. One of the windows opens to reveal a glass balcony, but I'm not tempted to walk outside. I want to explore this apartment.

      The furniture is sparse and minimalist, mostly black to contrast the white walls. I believe Evander lives alone- his apartment, though not dirty, is somewhat chaotic. Pieces of metal litter the coffee table, and what appears to be a spare heart lies under the couch. The table itself is dusty, as if it is unused most of the time.

      "I thought you were a collector," It's more a question than a statement.

      "I am," he replies nonchalantly, "In a sense."

      "Where are the others?"

      "I have no idea," he says before walking into the next room.

      He walks back into the main room without his shirt, and I can see the different plates that make up his torso. I know Seamless aren't born like this, and I shudder at the thought of the pain it took to replace organic parts, one by one, with metal. He notices my shudder, and smirks. He scans the coffee table for a moment, and picks up what seems to be a key. He inserts it into a plate on his arm, and sighs.

      "Seems like a lot of work for immortality, doesn't it?" he wonders aloud. I don't think I'm supposed to answer.

      He's silent for a moment, then turns to me again, "Do you ever wish you were Seamless?"

      "Not really. I'm from Towander, and we're all like this. Until a few years ago, I thought everyone was."

      "How did you realize?"

      "I was playing outside Towander, and I met a Seamless. He was a hunter, two years older than me. We all wear goggles in the desert, so he didn't see my eyes. He thought I was Seamless, and I didn't correct him. He was interesting, and knew more about the world than I thought I ever would. We became friends for a while," I stop short, avoiding the memory.

      "Then what happened?" Evander asks, genuinely interested.

      I sigh, "I went traveling. The world's big, and there are plenty of safe holds for Wildstock. He showed up at a town I was in, and I was inside. My eyes are brown."

      Evander stares at me, absorbing this information, "No one else had noticed?"

      "No one else looked that closely."

      "You remind me of someone I knew," Evander tells me, studying my face, "A long time ago."

      "Your lover?" I ask sarcastically, walking to the picture window overlooking Empire City, looking out into the desert. Out there, somewhere, Towander is burning streetlights, the same but for my absence. Out there, somewhere, my Hunter is finding someone else to share his secrets.

      "My sister," He replies, sitting down on the couch, "One of them. When I first saw you, I thought you were her."

      "You have a sister?"

      "Two, actually," he replies, "They were twins. I haven't seen them in forever."

      "Why not?" I ask.

      He sighs and looks away, "They were Hunted."

      "Traitors?" I whisper. Seamless are generally wired into the Empire Reconnaissance System at birth, when their first microchip is inserted. The System maintains social control, and keeps the established order from toppling. Few Seamless would dare go against the System, but those who do are swiftly found out and Shut Down.

      Evander laughs ruefully, "Traitors? No. But I was."

      The shock must be evident on my face, because he continues.

      "I was Wild once," He says conversationally, "I lived in one of the Wild outposts in the desert with my family- my mom, my dad, and my two sisters. We were happy enough, I guess, until I got sick. They called in a doctor, my parents did, and I was told I had cardiomyopathy. My heart was going to swell until it burst."

      "Couldn't they do anything?" I asked, horrified.

      "Not for that. There was medicine in Towander that could keep me alive for longer, but Towander was so far away. My parents were going to go get it, but my sisters asked if they could go instead. They'd never seen the outside world. So they went, and along the way they fell in with bad company. They were Captured, and last I heard they had been sold to a research facility."

      "I…I'm sorry," I stammer, and I really am, "But…if there was medicine, how did you become Seamless?"

      "Oh, that?" he smiles, "I didn't want to die. One day, I simply got tired of my parents treating me as though I would fall apart any moment. While they were sleeping, I packed my bags and left. I met up with a caravan of Collectors, and struck up a deal. I'd win the trust of some Wildstock to help them out; they'd pay for me to become Seamless. They told me it would be excruciatingly painful, since I wasn't very young. I told them it couldn't be worse than it was then. So they agreed, we captured some pretty Wildstock in a satellite of Towander, and we replaced my heart the next month."

      "But if you could have your heart replaced and still be mostly Wild, why didn't you?"

      "My sisters had just been Hunted. A half-Wild boy would have been quite a phenomenon indeed. And, if you're not aware, cardiomyopathy does more than just destroy your heart. After all that time of being the weakest boy I knew, I wanted to be better than everyone else. I wanted to be perfect. And Seamless was the closest thing to perfect I could find."

      I just stare at him, studying the spinning mechanisms inside his eye. It's dim now, with the only light coming in from the window, and I know he can see better than I can. Maybe he has a point. I'm trying to hate him for turning on his own kind, but I can't bring myself to despise him when I can almost see his side of the story. One of the things about Wildstock that the Seamless are quick to correct in their own kind is their penchant for bad decisions.

      "No one's perfect," I tell him finally, "I don't think you ever can be."

      "Maybe not," he agrees, "But I've tried so hard, I always hoped I was pretty close."

      "Your heart of gold," I say questioningly, "Did it work figuratively as well?"

      "Of course," He tells me, "It's the only one in existence. But the shop-keeper doesn't realize that once you possess it, it wants you to give it up. It wants you to help someone, and it wants to get away."

      "Are you sorry you traded it?"

      He looks up to the ceiling, then back to me, smiling, "Put on your goggles."

      I do as he says, pulling them back over my eyes. He stands up and walks to the door, motioning for me to follow him. We make our way back to the lobby and out into the streets of the Empire. We weave through back alleys with questionable characters, down long stretches of open road, and through the bazaar.

      The bazaar is entirely different at night- it's almost an entirely different world. The Seamless schoolgirls are replaced by grotesque yet strangely beautiful women in various stages of becoming Seamless. The loud merchants are replaced by shady men in cloaks, and the pets and livestock are now unearthly creatures I never knew existed. Everyone whispers and keeps to themselves. Evander looks around nervously, as though he is searching for someone who can't be found. Suddenly, he grabs my arm and pulls me away into a boarded shop.

      There is a man waiting, and he smiles at Evander, revealing two rows of overly sharp teeth. Evander pulls him aside and they whisper for a moment, looking over at me conspiratorially. I don't think to be afraid, though perhaps I should. They step apart and Evander drops something sparkling into the man's hands. Money? Jewelry? I can't discern in the pale moonlight.

      Evander walks back over to me now and embraces me. I feel him slipping something into my pocket before he whispers, "Just trust him," and slips out of the building.

      The man tells me to come with him, and I do, heart pounding in my throat. We follow the route I was forced to take on my first day in this city, backwards, all the way to the Empire Gate. The guards at the gate are bored, and barely notice as we walk past them and into the night. The desert air stings my exposed skin, and I rush to put my gloves and scarf on.

      "We part here," the man tells me, handing me a satchel and map, "The next Wildstock Satellite is marked, and there should be enough food and water to last you a week. There's silver contacts in there as well, if you'd like to be on the safe side."

      I thank him warmly, and begin walking. I follow the line on the map until I'm too exhausted to go any farther. As I'm setting up a campsite in what appears to be an abandoned schoolhouse from Then, a piece of paper falls out of my pocket. I pick it up and unfold it, struggling to decipher the tiny handwriting in the dim light of my campfire. It's a note from Evander: a single sentence, and the tiny chip from his hand keeping me near him. I flick the chip into the fire, then slip the note back into my pocket, smiling.

      As I tumble into sleep, I hear Evander's voice in the back of my mind, repeating those four words: "Gold is heavy, anyway." I wonder what he meant of it. I'll never be able to ask him, but perhaps I don't need to. Today, I met a hero. Tonight, I'll dream of Towander, and by next month, I'll be home.
The first in The Dystopian Accords. I'm kind of proud of it.
Series tag: (Explained in Utopia)
After a nuclear holocaust destroys life as we know it, humanity is on the brink of extinction. Illness from radiation is devastating the population, and many people have become sterile. The populace is divided into two classes- There is no stable government, and the future seems bleak. That is, until the mysterious Anaxander Steel rises to power, creating the totalitarian new nation known as Empiria. With her rises the "enigmatic" Daire Valentyn, her second in command, who promises his new inventions "will make us perfect." Ethical boundaries are pushed, familial ties are broken, and water may be proven thicker than blood as Anaxander brings progress and hope to a world in need. Important questions arise as a new world order is formed with Anaxander at the helm: Can she be stopped? More importantly...should she be?


Edit: Oh my god, a daily deviation? This was totally unexpected. The series tag has a tie-in to this, but I guess I need to actually post the first story in this series for you to understand it. :/
Uhhh I guess if you like it, check out Glass?
[link]
And now, Utopia:
[link]
I'll try to get back to everyone as soon as possible! Thanks for the support. :)
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