Hope's Revenant

Utopia stands as the death of hope. – Spanner Kinmuto, Civilization’s Demise

"He’s in here.”

Lya stooped through the doorway into the wan lighting inside. Whatever technology the Discord used, whatever coating on the windows that muted the natural light of the sun, it was no wonder people were depressed.

“What is his testimony?”

“The usual: nothing brings him pleasure – he has lost his enterprise.”

Lya rolled her eyes internally at the word. “Enterprise” had derived from the idea of motivation or animation, but she felt it more in its other sense. Enterprise, a business transaction, the way it had developed under the Swags. People spun their wheels, ran from meaningless venture to meaningless venture, and then opted out when boredom took dominance. Like checking a box. Signing away their lives. Literally.

They were so deceived.

Not that Lya would let her sentiments show on her face – doing so would destroy her charade, and this young man’s life might depend on keeping her mask up. Adopting her most serene tone, Lya’s words sang like a flute. “The penitent must ponder alone,” she instructed, stilting her compassion so that it came through as artificial.

“So I cannot see him again, Blix Bayan?” the man’s young companion wondered.

“You may,” Lya reassured in her cool tones. “He needs only a few moments.”

“Are you sure about this, Lender?” the youth – who had reached his sixteenth year at most – begged his friend, seemingly only a few years older.

“Please, don’t cause me more pain,” the young man, Lender, moaned from his recline on the bed.

How, with nothing to harm them and no suffering, did these people come to such despair? Lya would never understand it. She had known a mother. She had known about her father. She had lost one and could not find the other, and that reality ached with desperation. This young man, though, held no desperation.

Only despondency – always despondency.

Once the younger man had left the room, Lya scooted her chair close to the bed. With eyes of expectation, “Lender” peered up at her, hopeful. It was as if these

people did not understand the nature of hope. Hope was knowing that your father was alive, and determining that you would one day find him. Hope was believing that your mother had merely transformed from the physical world into a world beyond, where one day Lya would see her again. Those things were hope.

Craving death? That was an abomination.

Pouring all of her persuasion into her gaze, she leaned toward Lender and opened her lips to sing.

“The present moment flies,

And bears our life away;

O make Thy servants truly wise,

That they may live today.

Since on this wingèd hour

Eternity is hung,

Waken by Thine almighty power,

The agèd and the young.”

Even after a dozen or more of her little encounters, she never fully expected the shock on the faces of the people she visited. They did not know song. Had never heard a human voice sing, from what she could tell. Of course, the LECTORs “sang” in their temples; they opened their mouths and played music from the voice box inside their throats, and the music was haunting. Haunting and soulless.

Something about the human voice, cadenced and modulated into a melody and poetry, carried a power lacking in the LECTORs’ songs. The music moved people, transported them into a stratosphere of existence previously unavailable to them.

In a way, her ability overwhelmed Lya. Whenever she realized what she possessed, she vacillated between gratitude and fear. How did she merit such a responsibility? The power was almost divine, to lift people from whatever empty reality the Piteous inhabited and carry them into the transcendent. She both loved it and hated it, grateful that she was gifted to aid these poor souls and pained that they had not known the beauty their whole lives, that it might prove too late for the brilliance to effect its work.

Today, though, proved one of the good days. Lya watched the effect take place over a mere few seconds as tears sprung to the man’s eyes.

“This churning inside me, this ache…is it death?” he wondered, and Lya’s own eyes grew moist.

“I hope not, friend,” she pleaded, still using the terms of the ANGELs, though with imminently more genuine concern. “I hope it is the beginning of life. You may still choose not to Relent, and I will offer you a chance to alter your existence rather than end it.” As she persuaded him, her cool tone warmed, and the man looked more closely at her.

“What are you?” he demanded. No ANGEL’s eyes could offer so much pity.

“If you choose not to Relent, you can upload your request onto your panel. If you have more questions, come to the east gate, and someone there will help you with your concerns. Look for the bees on a market day. This is a special program,” she insisted. “If you speak of it to anyone, it will no longer be available.”

With those words, the youth returned to the room, and Lya found herself restricted of speech once again.

“Now may I say goodbye?” the younger man begged.

Now you may not need to.

“Blix!” came the urgent whisper from the nearby doorway. “Blix, you have to move – you’ve been inside too long!” He was obviously nervous because he had pulled the little pocketknife off the belt – filled with knick-knacks and utility tools – that he always wore.

She glanced up into Ricky’s black eyes and rolled her own greys. Somewhere, she had a father that she would find – she didn’t need Ricky to force himself into the role. “You may certainly speak with your friend,” she directed at the young companion to her patient, and laying her hand on his arm in farewell, she stood and made her way to the door. “You worry too much, Ricky,” she complained once she had accompanied her overseer outside. “I’ve been doing this for weeks now, and no one has caught on.”

“Look,” he soothed, though he maintained a tone of chastisement. “You may look the part, but you are not really playing the part. It’s only a matter of time before someone reports you for trying to stop a Relenting. Once they catch a whiff of your existence, it won’t take long to track you down. They have cameras and scanners.”

“But they’re not connected. The ANGELs and SENTERs have to go back to the Discord building to intake any new information. Worst case scenario, they get a basic description of me. How many of them look similar?”

“But do they have heartbeats? Will their scans show the same vitals?”

“There aren’t enough of them to test every human. Hold on a minute…” Lya ducked into the little barrack that had served as a waystation for people caught outside during the Deluge, before the dome. When she emerged, she had shucked the white floor-length robe for the tan and green garb of the Remnants. She finished tying up her hair and took her place back by her companion. “I don’t know why you always lecture me this way. You know nothing you say is going to stop me.”

Even in the gathering dark, she could read his disapproval. “Do you plan to get captured? Is that how you intend to find your father? I’m sure he will be glad to see his young daughter sharing a prison with him.”

“I’m not so young,” she countered. “And I doubt he’s in prison.”

“You are two years before your transition – I would say you are too young for this much responsibility.”

Lya ignored him, striding ahead of him as they pressed past the market crowd and through the gates. Of course, he had been right to rush her – the gates would close in less than a quarter hour – but that hadn’t been why he had pushed. He had wanted to stop her from playing an ANGEL. So many reasons he could have gotten mad at her, and he chose to complain about something good she was doing.

“Lya!” She could hear his footsteps rushing toward her, and he gripped her arm to turn her to face him. “You do your mother’s memory a disservice, playing casual with your well-being. She sacrificed so much to protect you!”

She jerked away from him. “You can’t guilt me into fear, Ricky. I know why I am doing what I am doing, and if I know one thing about my mother, it’s that she would approve of my saving lives.”

Of course, she had a point – Ricky knew that. Celia Kirksey had made illegal runs into the city over a hundred times. While she was there, she would always dig for information about Grant. All she could find out was that Grant had survived. He had survived, and he had been confined indefinitely. If the intel spoke true, he hadn’t been moved to a different city. Apparently, movement between cities increased the likelihood of cross-contamination.

Lya tended to scoff at the idea. From what she had read, letting the Remnant move in and out during the day would as likely carry the Curse. Besides, no one monitored the movement of the Remnant from colony to colony – they somehow saw the outsiders as all the same – and exposure from different colonies seemed much more prone to creating problems.

“Any signs of trouble?” Travers wondered as soon as they had crossed into the village.

Ricky shook his head. “No, but no thanks to Lya. She took way too much time in with the Relenter.”

“He has no idea how much is too much,” Lya countered, “since no one but my mother has done what I’m doing, and she was never caught.” Despite her irritation, the warmth of the lamplight shining through the various windows eased Lya’s anxiety with their familiarity. She didn’t wait to hear what else the men would say. Now that her mother and Eva had both died, she really didn’t have any female friends, and men just didn’t get her. At sixteen revolutions, she was too young to be either a prospect or a friend; they still treated her very much like a child.

A child who lived alone.

Once inside her dwelling, she gripped her pillow, pulled it over her face, and rolled on her side. Focusing on her breath, she forced herself to sleep.