Authors: Nolan Oreno
“I don’t know what I can do," Hollis spoke to the ceiling.
Asnee watched as the numbers on the wall fell below ten.
“You wait, just as I did," he said. “It’s all you can do until the path is shown to you."
“I should leave-" Hollis started.
Suddenly, the music lowered in volume and the dancers congregated to the center of the dance floor. From across the room, Saul raised his hand high.
“Hollis! Asnee! Over here!" he hollered. “Come join the rest of us like the social creatures we are!"
The journey across the room looked dauntingly great to Hollis just then, and he could feel his stomach bubble in the thought of walking across it. It was the same feeling he would get whenever he traveled deep into the desert. He felt unconditionally alone and insignificant, and it made him sick. He would soon faint if he dwelled much more upon the thought of it.
Asnee shook him lightly. “I want you to act, Hollis. You need to be happy right now. You need to smile for them and talk with them and congratulate them for their pregnancy. Take control over your behavior and act as if there is nothing on this whole Goddamn planet to be worried about."
He pushed Hollis toward the small cluster of people that huddled around Autumn and Saul. “It’ll be a piece of cake," he assured.
Hollis’ heart beat faster and sweat collected on his palms, and as much as he wanted to leave, Asnee kept pushing him further in. Before he realized it, he had joined the party.
8:50. 8:49. 8:48.
“Hollis, look, I want to show you something," Saul beamed, pulling Hollis away from Asnee and under his own arm. He held up a small piece of cloth and turned it about in the air. Sew into its center was what looked like an oak tree. No, it was
his
tree. It looked like a crude copy of the one he had found his daughter beneath on that rainy day in the garden in France, and it brought back unwanted memories.
“Do you see it? It's a colonial suit for the baby, our newest colonist. Jackie made it for us and look here- that’s your tree, EDN. She thought it was the perfect identifier for the baby. Renewal and hope, don’t you see?" Saul cheerfully shouted around Hollis to the encircling group.
Hollis stroked the stitched insignia and felt his body stir, but a look from Asnee settled him again.
Colonist Jackie Evans jumped in excitedly. "Of course, it’s not installed with all the protective hardware like our suits are, and the identifier doesn’t light up either, but I think it’s a fun idea for our newest member. Each thread is made with all the love I have to give for the little one."
Saul held the crude cut of fabric above everyone's head. “It’s great, Jackie. Both myself and Autumn want thank you with all our hearts. One day our child will be walking amongst us wearing this very suit. Thank you."
Saul neatly folded up the beaten rag and placed it on a table. “Well, it looks like your tree is the symbol of this new age we find ourselves in, Hollis. We all hope you’re making progress on it," he said.
The crowd turned to Hollis and he slowly nodded. “I am."
“That’s great to hear, isn’t it everyone? We have life growing all around us, and because of our dedication and drive, life will continue to keep growing. I am proud of all the work that you have shown lately, both in the colony and in yourselves. This is exactly why I decided to throw this party: to announce a new beginning for us. Tomorrow, with the help of our technicians, I will be reactivating the builder drones and continue planning work in the Refugee Settlement in the outer edges of our territory. Days ago, I surveyed the city to find most of it in ruins, but with your help, we can lay the bricks again and make a new home for ourselves. I know that we’ll need the extra living space, because in the years to come, we'll be having many more baby showers like this one. My child is the first to come to our great colony, and who knows, perhaps one day this will not merely be a colony but a society full of people and life and trees. This world will be ours in time, but we need to keep up the fight for it."
The colonists brought a thunderous applause to the ballroom.
“I want to raise a toast!" Saul yelled above it. “To those that we have lost, and to those that we will gain!"
Wine poured into overflowed stomachs.
Colleen Ralph stepped towards Saul from the surrounding crowd. She held her head down in respect. “Can I-" she started. “Can I listen?"
Saul smiled and moved aside, and Autumn brought herself forward. Colleen lowered herself to her knees and pressed her ear to Autumn's belly, listening to her as if she were a seashell in the sand. She could hear the soft stirring of a body in the water within, and tears rolled down her face.
“It’s beautiful," Colleen cried.
Autumn looked up to the colonists who all directed their gazes at her stomach. A strange sense of exposure came to her, but unlike before, she was embracing this feeling of nakedness. She felt beautiful, adored, and worshiped. Yet, even still, there was a kind of uneasiness about the eyes on her. It was a set of eyes in particular that made her feel this way. As she scanned the faces she had paused on Hollis, seeing the revulsion that showed on his face. As all the others looked at her with admiration and love, he looked at her with utter disgust. Suddenly, Autumn felt like she was no longer beautiful in her nudity and took a step away from Colleen. She wrapped her hands around her stomach as if she were suddenly carrying a heavy boulder that was pulling her down and drowning her.
“Did the baby kick?" Jackie asked. “How does it feel?"
Autumn tried to find the right words to appease the onlookers. “It feels-" she began, overcome with a rush of heat and dizziness. “It feels- I think I need to sit down for a minute."
She quickly found a seat behind her at a table and leaned backward, tilting her head up to see the hanging banners swaying and sparkling beneath the dim lights.
“It’s okay everyone!" Saul rushed forward. “These types of things happen during pregnancy."
The colonists mumbled and a few looked horrified. “She shouldn’t be dancing so much!" someone yelled from the masses. “She didn’t drink any wine did she?" another asked.
“No, everything is fine, isn’t it Autumn?" Saul pushed. Autumn nodded through rapid breaths. “She only needs a minute."
“We need a fucking doctor!" a shout came. “Where the hell is Novak?!" said another. “It's been weeks!"
Saul fought for control over the horde. “We still haven’t found Novak, but don’t worry. I’ve been studying pregnancy and the correct methods for safe childbirth in our databases for hours at a time, every day. I’m well educated in the subject, and I can and will deliver the child if it comes to it. We don’t need the doctor anymore."
The people frantically looked around as if Dmitri Novak could be found in that instant. Some started to pace about and tremble. Fear was returning. Saul knew he needed to contain the situation and fast. He could not have a panic on his hands, not after all he accomplished with them.
Before the crowd broke into a frenzy Autumn stood up, knowing what would come if she did not. She flashed a forced smile. “See, everything is fine. I only got a little winded from all the dancing, don’t worry. The baby is still kicking and everything. I trust Saul in keeping the baby safe, and you should too," she said. “He’s gotten us this far."
The crowd calmed and the festive atmosphere returned, but Hollis remained clenching his fists and teeth.
“Just as I said, everything is fine. And look!" Saul said, pointing to the clock on the wall. “Just in time too!"
The people turned to the numbers on the wall and watched them as they fell.
1:01. 1:00. 0:59
“Let’s count it down!" Saul screamed.
They read the numbers excitedly. At the number fifty the colonists grew listless and energized. When the clock reached thirty they became aroused and disorientated. At ten they felt the flash of hysteria and insanity.
Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One.
The number zero came and with it the music started to play again and the people cheered.
“Happy new year!" the room roared.
All but one chanted the words. In the last minute of the clock, Hollis Reyes escaped from the ballroom and made it to one of the observation decks branching from the Hub. He lifted the blast shield surrounding the wide window and gazed intensely out into the night at the raging sandstorm that stirred in its darkness. He watched rocks twirl in the amber clouds and kick into the glass screen. He hoped the glass would shatter and the storm would swallow him whole, but it never did, and he remained safely inside with everyone else.
More than anything else, it was the faint smell that kept him coming back. He stayed standing in the bedroom’s center and refused to go back through the door from where he came. He kept his eyes closed, and the light out, and breathed the scent that coated the air around him. He held onto the smell as long as he could, tasted its familiarity as it rushed back memories, and then breathed out again, long and heavy, only to refresh the flavor a moment later. It was a taste that he knew well, and yet even with all the time in the world, he could not possibly describe its contents. In one intake, it smelled sweet, and then in another, it was bitter. At other times, it was something else entirely. He gave up on trying to define its most intimate features because each time it changed and the lines that outlined it blurred. It was the same with Allah, his God. If someone was to ask him to describe the face of Allah, he would say he knew it well, and yet the details alluded him. He was a faceless face. An undefined definition. Asnee knew that the details did not matter, but rather the experience of it all. The wholeness. So he thought no more about it and simply continued to breathe in the air.
The smell was a smell of the past and of a girl who dwelled somewhere within it. It was the smell of cloud-breaking sunsets on the coast of the Arabian Sea with her in his arms and the waves licking their sandy feet. It was the smell of her pulling him towards the Taj Mahal and their agreement that they will live there, together, once the war had ended and the colony on Mars was finished so that they may grow old together and die together in their old age. It was the smell of their first conversation at a colonial banquet in a grand hotel in a grand city. It was the smell of their first fight in public and their first secret romance hidden from the news cameras. It was the smell of her, Janya, and still it lingered there in her bedroom on Mars, even after she left him many months ago to return to God. Still, she stayed, like the light after the sunset.
Asnee could hear the sounds of the party still echoing down the halls of the Hub and finding their way through the cracks of Janya’s isolated cabin. He stuck his fingers into his ears so that he could drown out the late-night noises. He wanted to forget all other senses to be with one. To be with Janya.
Asnee smiled, assured by some unseen force that their dream palace was there waiting for him, somewhere lost within the sands of time, and so was Janya with it. The palace would come, he knew that much, but first he needed to do one last thing on Mars before he would search for it and for her. Before his journey, he needed to help a friend in need, a friend who was there for him when he was lost himself and needed to find his way back home. He had to return the karma and make things right. Asnee needed to direct his friend through the heavy storm that was coming. It would require all the help he had to give, and perhaps even more. He needed to find Hollis Reyes.
Asnee turned about the room one last time, taking in all of the things Janya left behind. The room was just the way she left it. He had demanded it to remain untouched to the others. Her possessions cluttered the floor and remained authentically her. Asnee believed that if nothing was moved or tampered with then her memory could never truly fade away, and he made it clear that no one was to enter the room but him in order to contain her purity. But he had begun to see the foolishness in this way of thinking. The better he envisioned the palace waiting for him, the less he stayed attached to this material world and the things within it.
Embracing this revelation, Asnee began to move about the objects that lingered in her room. He picked up trash from the floor, organized her wardrobe, and put her belongings back on shelves and in drawers, happily lingering on old photographs of Janya in her childhood and with Asnee on Earth. Once the floors were cleaned, Asnee moved to the bed that still held her imprint. Her warmth. He stroked the waves the rippled in the bedding.
“Goodbye for now," he whispered.
He straightened out the sheets and tucked them into the sides of the mattress, coming to terms with the coldness of the uninhabited blankets. In the midst of doing so, his fingers contacted something beneath the covers. It was cold and plastic and well hidden. He pulled it out of the sheets for inspection.
What Asnee found was an ovular device, white in color, and on its front a small electronic dashboard. The digital screen was slightly cracked, making it difficult for Asnee to read the small text that etched across the screen.
[POSITIVE]
Screams pulled the sleeping boy through worlds and back to the red one. He was cold and wet and naked and coughed for fresh air. The ground settled back into place and he was in his room again. Was he the one screaming? His door violently rattled across from across the space. Slowly becoming aware that the noise would not cease, Hollis leaped from his sunken bed, slipped into the skin of his colonial suit, and made his way to the breathing door.
“Hold on," Hollis pushed through his coarse throat, fighting back an alcohol-induced headache.
He motioned the door aside and Asnee met him on the other side with a serious gaze.
“Come with me," Asnee enforced looking up, slowly. “Don’t ask any questions, just come."
Hollis complied without objection. “Yeah, sure," he replied tiredly. “Just give me a minute to wake up."
“No, it has to be now," Asnee said. “We need to go.”
Confused and intrigued, Hollis followed Asnee out from his room and into the halls of the Hub at a brisk yet collected pace. Asnee kept his head hung low and showed unreactive to the things around him. He appeared to be listening more than anything else, and it was who or what Asnee was listening for that made Hollis wonder. At the innermost point of his cavity, Hollis felt something stirring, something that he had not felt for a long time. He felt danger, and not just for himself, but for everyone in the colony. Perhaps it was the way Asnee walked so quickly or spoke so intently, but either way he had never seen his friend show so much paranoia before, even during the days following Janya’s death. Hollis knew that something bad had found them and just when things started to look as if they were getting better. As his mother would always say,
debajo del agua mansa está la peor corriente
: the worst currents are hidden under gently flowing water. The surface was calm, but below there was something brewing, and Hollis could feel the current tugging at him as he followed Asnee to the Decompression Room hatch-door.
In unison and in silence, the two attached the bulky exosuits from the nearby lockers around their colonial suits so that they could travel safely to the outside. They locked-in their helmets and stapled the oxygen packs to the plates on their backs. Matching steps in their heavy boots, they entered the Decompression Room, Asnee leading the way. The steel heels of their boots stomped over the dried blood that was caked into the cracks of the tile; it was the Commanders blood from the month prior. Asnee flipped the emergency latch with his fist, and after a few moments, the oxygen left the space around them and the exit was opened before them. They lead themselves up the steep ramp and out onto the vast desert that stretched endlessly to the sunrise.
They took themselves away from the Hub and onto a familiar path. Together, they helped themselves up the hill that rested near the exit chamber and towards the burial site. At the hill’s peak, two pieces of wood protruded from the sand, half-hidden and half-exposed.
“Face the graves, away from the Hub," Asnee said to Hollis. “So it looks like we’re praying."
Hollis obeyed, growing even more concerned, and turned his back to the sprawling underground complex that was the Hub. “What’s this all about, Asnee? What’s with all this secrecy?"
“I found something. Something big," Asnee responded through the crackle of his helmets intercom, unable to steady the wobble in his voice. “We couldn’t talk about this anywhere near the Hub. I think the surveillance systems have been active and someone’s watching us. I don’t think it’s safe there anymore."
“The surveillance system- active?" Hollis squeezed through his dry throat. “You’re not making much sense right now, we’ve been locked out of the entire program since the Commander’s death. Only he had the clearance to use it. Maybe you need some sleep, it doesn’t look like you slept at all last night."
Asnee tilted his head downwards. “I don’t think either of us got any sleep last night, Hollis, and it might be for the very same reason."
Hollis decided it better to keep his mouth fastened. He motioned Asnee to speak.
“During the party last night, after you left in your drunken rage, I went to Janya’s room. Being in there with all of her things eases the pain a little. I often go there to think. For a while, after her death, I went there to try to understand why she did what she did, filled with anger and hate and regret. Nothing seemed to make any sense, no matter how many possibilities I considered, so what could I do but give in and accepted her death as a random act? I shouldn’t have. I should have kept searching. I should have never given up on her. Accepting her death was the worst thing I could have done because I knew deep down all along there was a reason behind it. There is a reason behind everything, Hollis. Looking at it now, I think I was just too scared to find out the truth."
“Okay, so what did you find?" Hollis asked.
Asnee exhaled. “I found the answer," he said. “In her room, hidden away. The key."
“What key?”
“A pregnancy test."
“A pregnancy test-" Hollis started. “You’re saying Janya was pregnant, with yours?"
“No, that’s just it. Me and Janya hadn’t been close like that since we left Earth. Our relationship here had been going through a lot of problems, understandably. The stress of the job got to our heads, and we didn’t as much touch each other for the longest time. It was a rough patch, I understood that, but I knew we could get through it once the colony was built and our families came to join us. We could try to live normal lives. We still loved each other so much, that much I know, but after we lost contact with Earth, she grew further away from me. I was reassuring to her at first and gave her space, but when the bruises and cuts started to appear I couldn’t stand by any longer. I thought she was doing it to herself. I thought it was a phase or something that she could get over with some time. I mean, we were all were dealing with our own shit. I didn’t ever think-"
Asnee stopped to touch the older and more battered of the two wooden spikes. “I’m sorry I didn’t see it before. I’m so sorry."
“What didn’t you see? What are you trying to tell me?" Hollis urged, frustrated and frightened.
“It’s all so clear. The child wasn’t from me, and the bruises weren’t from her. All of her problems started right after contact was lost with Earth, right? Nobody here took the event well, as nobody in their right mind would, and we all had our moments of insanity, but that’s not to say some regressed further into the insanity than others. I think someone in the colony couldn’t handle what happened and acted out beyond anything any of us could imagine. This monster was forcing Janya to do things. Horrible things. Abusing her and hurting her. He may have been doing it to other girls in the colony as well, I don’t know, but this explains why Janya began to act the way she did and where the bruises came from, but most of all, why the pregnancy test was in her room in the first place, and why-" Asnee froze.
Hollis maintained the conversation. “We can’t know for sure that the pregnancy test was Janya’s and not Autumn’s. There’s no way to prove even the most basic information of your theory. But let's say the test was from Janya. I can’t comprehend anyone doing something like that. I know the darkness has shone in all of us lately, but there are no monsters here. I know everyone here like a brother and a sister, just as you do, and I can safely say there’s no one here that is so evil to go so far. Even when facing extinction, we still kept our sanity. We were all trained extensively to be emotionally stable and flexible in the possibility of Earth's destruction."
Asnee shook his head. “That’s just it. I believe it wasn’t just the act of a single madman. It was provoked."
“Provoked?" Hollis asked, becoming even more confused.
“The more I thought about it the more it makes sense," Asnee said. “This place is like a disease. It infects our minds and bodies so that we fulfill what it ultimately wants from us."
“Asnee you’re speaking nonsense-"
“No, I’m not. Think of how our society here was designed for us. There are eleven women, all young and attractive and in good health. There are also eleven men of nearly the same age and physicality to compliment them. Admittedly there’s nothing seemingly bizarre about a fifty-fifty blend of men and women in the colony, and, in fact, it’s only fair not be favorable to one gender when representing all of humanity. But there’s something more to it that we overlooked."
“And what is that?"
“This place is not what it appears to be. I’ve been realizing it for a long time now and couldn’t bring myself to embrace it. In our eyes, this colony was a future and a hope for a new society without the sins of our old one. But to them-" Asnee spit into his glass visor, looking up at the blur of blue above him that was once his home. “To them this is nothing more than a gene pool. A carefully selected population to carry out the true intentions of the founders of our colony. Only the strongest of human genes exist here, from all parts of the world, so that they may replicate and replicate until humanity shows a new face. A face that will transcend its old genetic history into something more capable of survival and more inclined to evolve beyond our wildest dreams. It’s selective breeding."
Hollis looked at the massive sand-covered spiral complex behind them. “So what you’re trying to tell me is that we were all chosen for our genes, to form a new genetic line, rather than our for the skill-sets that make us better to colonize? That sounds ridiculous, of course they’ll pick the best of us because only the best of us can build this," he said, waving his hand to the colony.
“Both can be one in the same. Your skills, your aspirations and success, and your
spark,
like you said, is all that is defined by your genes. Everything that is you is defined by biology. They didn’t pick you just for your ability to create a habitable ecosystem but also for the brain that has the capacity to do so. Because we are the best at building we are the best at breeding."
“Okay, I’ll bite. So how does this relate to Janya? To the pregnancy test?"
“The sexual abuse that was brought down on Janya was caused by this world that was designed for us. The co-ed housing, the close hugging suits, the monotony of the architectural design, the blank walls and lack of entertainment, the needless alcohol and pregnancy tests which appear unnecessary for us to have in the first place, the genetic appeal of every colonist, the ignorance of our fertility when sending us up here- it was all crafted so that we unconsciously begin to breed. So that our genes pass on."
“That’s ridiculous. You think everyone was in on this cosmic whorehouse hypothesis but us? What about the Commander?"
“Well, the Commander probably had his orders from the ones who organized all this. Do you think he had his surveillance system conveniently deactivated at the time of Janya’s death because of coincidence? The Commander was probably here in the first place to facilitate sex and reproduction, but maybe the reality of it was far more than he could handle and he went over the deep end. And let's think about the role of the Computer as well. What’s its real job? To make us feel better or to push us closer together? Everything here has its function and its purpose and were all just trapped in the cogs of the machine."
“But, why? Why entice us with sex if our families were to arrive just after completion in a handful of years? Why all the effort in choosing twenty-two to breed when ships full of new inhabitants would be joining us every few months?"
Asnee turned with a blank stare. “That’s just it. I think it’s because they never intended to send any others. I think Adrian Minor and the other founders knew the Earth's atmosphere would not last long enough to carry out their promise. I don’t think they had enough resources to send more colonists before Earth was lost to space. I think they knew the very day the planet would suffocate. All along they knew what would happen. It was always meant to be this way, Hollis, and it was always going to be us. Only us."
Hollis could not wrap his mind around the idea that Asnee put forth. All that surrounded him, the technological grandeur, and human ingenuity, was it merely a platform for promiscuity? A trillion dollar brothel? It frightened Hollis to believe that it was not the evil in his soul that took him to Autumn’s apartment that fateful day in Paris, but rather it was the plan of faceless men in black suits long since gone. Perhaps they knew all along that he would betray his late wife Elena and his daughter Rosa. Perhaps they knew he would never see them again and laughed as he promised his daughter he would. His fate was sealed neatly within the blank envelope that rested perfectly on his laboratories desk, many years ago, beside the picture of Rosa at her first day of school, written for him to read and follow and act out as it was intended. It disturbed him to believe that his sins were not by his own choice but designed for him, for if that were true, absolution would be impossible and this Hell would be eternal.
“Me and Autumn-" Hollis began.
“Yes, you and Autumn. Autumn and Saul. Me and Janya. Jackie and Marcus. Alexander and Laura. Many of us have developed a relationship with another here, and more importantly, they are physical relationships. We’ve paired up just as they wanted. We thought all along that our activities were in secret and that the founders did not know. But they knew. They expected it, even when they restricted us against it."
Hollis turned to leave and think. He could not understand the string of theories produced before him and it may be he did not want to understand them in the first place. He stopped himself for one last piece of information. “You said something else. You said you think we were being watched. That the Hub’s surveillance is reactivated."