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obscuring or removing
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Chapter
One
Obedience
should not then be seen as an act of subjugation to authority, but rather a voluntary agreement between free individuals to ensure mutual survival through state-organized,
collective co-operation.
-
The Responsible Citizen’s Collective Continuum Manual
Seated in the immaculately-maintained morning commuter
train, Christian stares, transfixed, at a handwritten message scrawled on the, otherwise
pristine, subway wall.
“History is Changing”.
The passenger train doors close with a hiss and overhead
lights flicker as the train slowly pulls away from the station. When Christian looks
again, the writing is gone. He sits, blinking , in his highly-polished, molded-plastic
bench. Slightly jostled by the motion of the train and the here-one-minute, gone-the-next
message.
Christian looks around to see if anyone, besides
himself, saw the momentary apparition but his fellow passengers are oblivious, quietly settling into their pre-assigned seating.
The well-mannered passengers are the embodiment of calm, dressed
neatly in their state-approved, black and white monochrome palette. The only hint
of color, besides the occasional lipstick, being their numbered identity markers:
necklaces for women, wrist-bands for men, which match the number on their seat and
the color of their designated commuter section.
Surely, Christian had been seeing things? Perhaps,
afflicted by what the Center for Impulse Analysis would call an “Unproductive
Synaptic Formation”? But what concerns Christian most isn’t the cryptic nature of the message, it’s the appearance of an
unauthorized thought, in an unauthorized location.
It says right in the “Responsible Citizen’s Collective
Continuum” Manual that: “subway walls are
reserved exclusively for the Productive Synaptic Re-enforcement of the properly
integrated citizen”.
What did it say about his civic commitment that he
perceived, if only in his mind’s eye, a desecration of one of the explicitly-stated,
communal strictures of the Collective Continuum?
Christian looks around him again. He quietly considers
his orderly, perfectly-maintained and impassively-correct fellow passengers
with sudden affection and grave concern. An unfamiliar mist rises in Christian’s
eyes and he heaves an inadvertent sigh.
A quiet sound, but one that draws darting looks
from conspicuously unturned heads.
Ignoring the air of tension around him, Christian
lifts his left wrist and pushes the central button on the biometric personal
data device implanted in his arm. The LCD screen lights up and a young woman,
with an impassive face speaks directly to Christian from the screen. “Good
morning. Please state the nature of your report.”
Christian takes a deep breath, draws the data
device closer to his lips and states clearly, but in a low voice, “I am a
threat”.
The young woman’s face registers a slight frown.
She addresses him in a curt but polite tone, “I was unable to process your report.
Please speak in the pre-authorized volume”.
Christian clenches his jaw and looks around, shame-faced.
He clears his throat, then in a loud and resonate voice declares, “I am a
threat.”
Passengers around Christian scatter, like soap on
an oil slick, to the farthest recesses of the subway car.
The young woman on the screen nods and consults a
data screen just out of frame. She speaks calmly, “I see that you are on the
115 headed toward Victory Center.” She looks directly at Christian again. “Please
remain where you are. A threat extraction team will intercept you at the next
stop and escort you to the nearest Adjustment Center.” Then, with sincere gratitude, “Thank you,
Responsible Citizen, for your diligence
in serving the Collective Continuum.”
The screen goes blank. There is no sound, other
than the gentle rhythm of the passenger car.
Christian stares at his hands, conspicuously alone
among the abruptly abandoned seats. He quietly accepts the looks of fearful
distrust cast upon him by his fellow passengers. Their stunned silence is shattered by the sound of
squealing brakes as the train eases into the next station, followed quickly by
the hiss of the automatic, hydraulic doors.
Christian steels himself then stands to
face the elite, armed-to-the-teeth, military extraction team now swarming into
the suddenly cramped subway car. He puts up no resistance. Within seconds, Christian is shackled, drugged from
a single-dose, nerve gas capsule popped under his nose and carried away,
unconscious. Suspended, boneless as a rag doll, between the two marching columns
of his highly-armored escort.
There is blackness…then.
Christian’s opiate-heavy lids flicker slightly. Slowly
and with great effort, he manages to pry them apart and look around him with
groggy, technically open, yet still functionally-unseeing eyes.
Through his slowly dissipating haze, shapes begin to emerge.
Christian can just make out the outline of a white coat and the hint of a
person behind the cold, smooth edges of an electronic medical pad. He blinks
hard to bring the intelligent, aloof and efficiently beautiful face of his
assigned doctor into focus.
Christian stares at her, stunned, not certain if
the vision is a product of an actual reality, or a result of the heavy drugs recently
administered. As a pre-caution, he holds his breath, afraid of shattering what
seems to him, a fragile moment.
“Mr. Porter? Are you back with us?” Her voice, as
well-modulated as her clinical expression, carries within it no hint of
personal attachment as she uses a handheld bio-reader to check his pupils and measure his other
vital signs.
Christian tries to sit up but finds he is completely
immobile. With only the movement of his eyes he discerns that he is shackled
to a medical table, outfitted with metal latches from head to toe. His gaze follows the easily more than dozen electrodes running from his exposed, all but naked body to a
beeping, quietly cycling, medical monitor.
A look of fear passes over Christian’s face.
The doctor sees his panic and her demeanor softens
slightly, “These restraints are only in place to help stabilize you during your
scan. You needn’t be alarmed, they are not a reflection on your civic commitment.”
She places her hands on his chest to quite his rising fear. Her touch returns him to a
state of calm.
The doctor flips a switch on the control console ,
“Here, maybe it will help you to watch the progress of your neuro-map.” Christian’s
eyes widen as a computer-generated, holographic image of his own brain fills
the room. He is hit by sudden wave of nausea.
The doctor sees this and turns to point
out a red, pulsing quadrant of his brain, hoping an explanation of the process will provide a welcome distraction. “You see this agitated area here? This is your prelimbic cortex
which registers fear response. It is connected to the basal and central nucleus
of the amygdala which sends “fight or flight” signals to your autonomic and endocrine receptors.”
The doctor speaks to
Christian over her shoulder, “In everyday functionality, this event would be cause for concern as the Collective Continuum has been scientifically and
socially engineered to eradicate animal fear response in the properly
integrated citizen. But these are rather extraordinary circumstances: you are in
unfamiliar surroundings, encountering previously unexperienced stimuli and those
indicators will be mathematically factored in to your final neuro-map analysis.”
The doctor turns
back to Christian with a reassuring smile, “So, you see, you can relax. You
will not be cited for these readings.”
Christian nods, but looks somewhat less than
reassured. A stifled gag indicates to the doctor that Christian is losing his battle
to control his nausea.
“Your nausea is perfectly normal. Seeing the inner-workings
of your own brain can be very disorienting to some subjects.”
The doctor moves quickly as she speaks. She checks
the status of his scan, waits for the progress prompt to read: “Complete”, then
grabs a stainless steel container and hits the “restraint release” button on
the table all in the same motion.
The metal restraints release and Christian
leans over the side of the table just in time to avoid choking on his own
vomit. The doctor offers him the container, but it’s too late.
She and Christian stare at her freshly anointed, chunk-splattered,
shoes.
The doctor gives Christian an exasperated look,
the hint of a smile pulling at the corners of her usually serious mouth. “You
will, however, be cited for THAT”.
Christian can’t help but chuckle as he rolls back
onto the table.
Though clearly sliding quickly toward unconsciousness, he
manages to ask the question that has been burning in his mind from the moment
he awoke. “What's your name?”
Barely able to focus, Christian fights the encroaching
darkness as he struggles to hold onto the image of her beautiful, now hesitant face.
Finally, she smiles and answers in a low, soft voice. “It’s Eva.”
Eva suddenly remembers herself and checks surreptitiously
over her shoulder, “I mean…(clears her throat) Doctor Bennett.”
Christian smiles, exhausted. “Eva.”
He passes out. Her name, more prayer than
statement, still lingering on his unconscious lips.
