Hello! I wrote this story for my English literature class. I had to write an Orwellian narrative to speak out against today's society. I really loved doing it since 1984 is one of my favorite novels ever... And I wanted to share it with you. It might be interesting after all!
By the way, English is not my first language! I'm French, but I wrote this story in English since it was for my English class.
WARNING: Some descriptions may hurt your sensibility. A bit of selfharm.
FOUR MONTHS AND TWO DAYS
Dawson entered the almost empty laboratory. It was only filled with large tables on which there were microscopes and bottles of chemical solutions. Followed by the dark blue-eyed man who welcomed him in this weird place, he went forward in the room and approached one of the tables. Some papers had been left on it, and he tried to decipher the rather unreadable handwriting in which some chemical equations had been written.
"Well, Mr Dawson, this is your new place of work. Welcome here!"
Dawson looked around him with a sceptical expression on his face.
"Don't worry, sir. You'll get used to your new job. By the way, I have been told about your incredible skills in chemistry and all your achievements concerning medicines. I hope you'll do something even better for us" the weird man said in a confident tone. "Well, I think we're done. Your new colleagues are going to explain to you more precisely everything you will have to do here. Have a good day, sir."
He exited the room and Dawson was left alone in this unknown laboratory.
For two hours, he tried to understand the reason why he was suddenly hired to work there. He read some of the scientists' sheets of paper, he looked at the liquids in the test tubes, trying to recognize them in order to know what was realised here. Suddenly, the gates burst open and a young-looking scientist wearing a white coat came into the room.
"I guess you're the new one, uh?" he asked with a thick British accent. "My name's Jonathan. You can call me Joe, I don't mind" he added as they were shaking hands. "And you, who are you?"
"I'm Edward Dawson. It's a pleasure to meet you. I hope we'll get on well" Dawson forced a polite smile.
"We will, for sure" he vaguely answered. "Anyway. Edward, I guess you don't know anything about the lab, do you?"
"Not a single thing. Mr Finn didn't say anything about it, except that I was so lucky to be there. I don't know why, actually, I was pretty good in my previous lab."
Jonathan burst into laughter that seemed incredibly forced and Dawson, feeling ridiculous, shifted uncomfortably and slipped his hands into his pockets.
"Edward – may I call you that? – you are going to work in one of the most prestigious labs in the whole country. You'll be with the most brilliant scientists of the world. The thing is, if you're here, you're considered as one of the best, which is a great honour. And the country – I mean, your country – needs your skills."
"I'm not from Great Britain, actually" he corrected. "And what is with this state laboratory? Why is it so important? What's the deal? What do I have to do here?"
He was talking very fast and was losing his calm. He had been in there for almost four hours now, and he still didn't know anything about his new place of work.
Actually, when his old boss told him that he would be working in London from now on, he didn't think about it too much. He was way too overwhelmed with his dying girlfriend to care about his mutation. What's more, it was a way to escape his past and the memories of his life with Aileen, because, even if she was still alive at the moment, Edward knew that it wouldn't last and that he could give up on hoping. Moving to London felt like the right opportunity to move forward: he no longer wanted to stay stuck in the ghosts of his past, which would never help him get over with bad memories.
However, now that he had left Ireland, he felt incredibly regretful of being here. He no longer felt at home, as if he suddenly became homeless. He was alone in a place he couldn't manage to feel familiar with. He didn't think he could ever feel this homesick, yet he did.
Everything looked so freaky and unrealistic in London: CCTVs decorating each corner of the streets, posters of Garrett Brent – the British Prime Minister for twenty years so far – everywhere, with his pale skin, his big face (topped by a few short grey hair) and his narrow grey eyes. It was so far from Ireland. And even though he knew that the political regime of Great Britain had changed a lot during the two last decades – since United Kingdom had split apart and North Ireland had become independent – he never thought that it would be so oppressing. Great Britain was changing: it no longer was the old island it used to be, gathering England, Scotland and Wales. Now, Great Britain was one all-powerful country, without any distinction between England, Scotland and Wales. Garrett Brent basically being from England, he had decided that England should remain though, whereas Scotland and Wales were not worth remaining. That's how Great Britain had turned into England only, though a lot of people kept calling it Great Britain. That wasn't a problem, as long as they didn't forget that their Prime Minister was Garrett Brent.
"What do you mean 'you're not from England'?" Jonathan frowned. "Garrett Brent doesn't care whether you're from England or not. If he wants you to be here, then that's where you belong."
"Whatever. I'm Irish and no one can deny it" Dawson stubbornly replied as Jonathan wanted to argue. "Now, would you mind explaining to me what we are supposed to do here?"
Joe sighed in exasperation and rolled his eyes. He went closer to a safe, he unlocked it by typing the password as if he were a robot, and grabbed a bunch of keys. Edward threw an eye into the safe to see its content, but surprisingly, the keys were the only things that were kept in there. Dawson's paranoia growing much bigger, he tried to convince himself that it was probably not that big of a deal. The keys were certainly just locking a room full of toxic solutions that could be found in every lab, and it was safer to put them into the safe if something, like a burglar, happened.
"Follow me" Jonathan ordered.
They walked through several corridors until they went down into the cellars of the building. Edward felt shivers running down his spine as they passed in front of the locked doors. Everything was dark around him, there were just dim lamps above him, reflecting his shadow and his colleague's one. As the atmosphere wasn't freaky enough, it seemed to Dawson that he was hearing low voices behind the doors. It was like they were whining and whimpering, but he couldn't distinguish the words they seemed to be saying.
Jonathan finally stopped in front of a door and turned around to face Edward. His dark brown eyes were shining like obsidians in the dim lighten corridor.
"Here we are, Edward. When the door is opened, you couldn't go backward anymore. And if you do, you couldn't see the world anymore" Joe solemnly declared. "Our experiments must be secret."
"How is it possible in a state laboratory?" Dawson frowned.
"Because government itself wants to keep it secret. Garrett Brent wants it to be secret. And we can't go against Garrett Brent's will."
Dawson nodded in agreement, even though he wasn't sure to understand the exact meaning of Joe's assertion. Or maybe he didn't want to think that what he had understood was the truth.
"Well, Edward, are you ready?" Joe asked worryingly as he was pushing a key into the lock of the door.
He was biting his inferior lip and his hands were violently shaking. Dawson wondered about his sudden change of mood: he seemed so confident when he first met him, and now, he was so weak, so miserable.
"Edward?" he called one more time.
"I'm ready" Edward said calmly and coldly, looking straight in front of him and expecting for the door to open.
Jonathan unlocked it and opened it. The whining voices attacked Edward's ears and the bright light that lit the cell hurt his eyes. But as he threw an eye into the cell, the pain he was feeling disappeared, and instead, he felt shock, disgust, incomprehension and fear running through his brain. Although the silhouettes he was staring at in horror had probably been human beings sooner, all he could see was unhuman figures. The naked women and men were thin as rakes, they barely had hair on their heads and on their bodies and most of all they weren't free to move. They were unchained.
Dawson's childhood nightmares of being chased by skeletons barged into his thoughts. They were becoming reality right in front of his eyes, unless the skeletons couldn't move and he no longer was the victim.
Unable to close his mouth, but as well unable to speak, he turned to face Jonathan, who was looking sternly at the men and the women. They were no emotion in his eyes. The hardness of Joe's facial expression disconcerted Edward, who was feeling nauseous. How could he be so numb? How could he work there and keep looking at himself in the mirror without being disgusted of what he was doing? Still remaining silent, Dawson waited for an explanation – even though no explanation could make him accept the horror he was facing.
"This is what you'll have to do from now on, Edward" Joe coolly announced to his new colleague. "This is what we all do. This is the only way to stay alive-"
"And so what? Do you think you can do such a thing to protect your own life?" Edward shouted, moving his arms around him. "Do you think you have any right to do this?"
"You don't understand..." Joe sighed.
Dawson felt his blood boiling inside his veins and his jawline was hardening as he was trying to contain his anger, even though he was clearly infuriating. They didn't have the right to treat human beings this way. He didn't want to become the partner in crime of those disgusting misdeeds he couldn't accept. He didn't want to have blood on his hands and feel guilty to go to work every morning. He didn't want to be associated with such a sickening regime he didn't belong to.
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, so that he didn't see Jonathan's horrible face anymore. He desperately needed something to sooth him down but nothing could ever work, now. He just discovered real horror. It was nothing like in the movies or in the books. It was real life, not stories. They were real persons, not actors. There was no plot twist that changed everything, there was no way out, there was no ally. Only despair and disgust.
"Why?" he broke silence, quickly whispering.
"These men and these women help the state. Because if they weren't there, we could potentially kill innocents or people we really need, and it is just impossible" he recited as if he had practiced his speech before. "That's why they are here. Because they are meaningless and useless."
Brainwashed. That's what Jonathan was. Brainwashed by the state policy, brainwashed by Garrett Brent's wrong ideas, to the point that he couldn't even make the difference between the basic notions of good and bad.
"Why are they useless? Who are they?"
"Prisoners. Opponents. Enemies" Joe answered. "Do you see the one in the corner? He was a journalist. One day, he has written some freaking critics in his freaking rag about Garrett Brent. See? You can't go against Garrett Brent's will" he growled. "At the beginning, they were in camps. Working day and night, near to death. But Garrett Brent decided that they were not meant to work as other straight, honest and brave workers. Instead, he thought that they should serve the state, since they were against it. That's why he brought them in here: now, they are our guinea-pigs. We can check the quality and the effects of the drugs we make on them, to make sure they are safe enough. And if they're not safe enough, we don't mind. They are meant to die, anyway" he laughed nervously.
"What sort of drugs do you produce? What for?"
"Drugs to reach power. It works on the sporty. They develop way better skills during the competitions thanks to our drugs. And if it works as good on them, why couldn't we use it on other people?" he smiled madly. "That's why we are doing drugs. To be more and more powerful. So that the army, the navy, the whole country is getting stronger and stronger and we can beat and defeat anyone. So that Garrett Brent can be on top of the world. Great Britain is getting more and more powerful thanks to Garrett Brent and sooner or later, he will rule the whole world. Clever, uh?" he proudly concluded.
"You can't believe that you are acting the right way, can you? You can't think that you are doing something good, can you?" Edward murmured, still in shock, his dilated pupils gazing at Jonathan in horror.
"We can't go against Garrett Brent's will" Jonathan claimed.
OoOoOoO
For three months, Edward Dawson forced himself to go to work every morning. Every morning, he was wishing something would happen. Every morning, as he was walking by the streets and was watched out by the CCTVs, he was afraid that government would know his thoughts. For three months, he thought he was living in Hell.
But the nineteenth day of the third month, he made a huge mistake. As he was having lunch in a café, he was chatting with what he could call a 'friend'. Actually, it was hard to define who was a 'friend' and who was an 'enemy' in this country. Garrett Brent should have been an enemy, but he had to be a friend. Logically, people who should have been friends were enemies. Still, during his lunchtime, he was debating with this 'friend' about Brent's regime. And his inner thoughts, those thoughts he had hardly kept in his locked heart for three months, slipped out of his mouth. He was immediately arrested by the state police, patrolling in the town at any moment.
And he became one of them. He became one of the prisoners, one of the opponents, one of the enemies he had drugged for three months long. He was himself a guinea-pig. He was himself an unhuman skeleton. Every day, he was discovering a new form of pain, whether it was physical or spiritual pain. Every day, he cried for hours and hours. Sometimes, he didn't even know why he was crying. And every day, pain was more and more unbearable. At nights, he couldn't even sleep because of the drugs he had to take, and he had terrible awaken nightmares. Days after days, he was just a decaying body waiting for its end to come.
Therefore, on the second day of the fourth month, he decided to make it end. He hadn't forgotten about some of his habits when he was a scientist working in the lab. So as he went there to receive his drugs, he subtly stole a scalpel from the lab. When he was back in his cell, he patiently cut his skin. The scalpel blade penetrated his skin and cut his veins, the blood was flowing out of his body and was spilling over the floor. But he kept cutting himself until he felt his very last gasp coming. He had been so used to pain that it didn't actually feel like pain; it felt like pleasure. Pleasure of knowing he was about to be free. He was about to escape this miserable existence he was enduring – because it no longer was a life. He indeed couldn't go against Garrett Brent's will. But neither could he go against Edward Dawson's will.
The end! I was so sad when I ended it because I wanted to keep writing... But basically I had to do something two pages long and I wrote about six pages so I had to stop XD
Anyway, I really really really hope you liked it. It's not an actual fanfiction because it's not based on 1984 story, it's inspired by it. But I saw that there were several stories in the same fashion, so I decided to publish mine... Well, tell me what you thought about it ! Thank you for reading !