A/N: To the three people who reviewed, thank you so much! To everyone else, please, please, please, please, please review! I'm still nervous about the story, so let me know what you think, please, I beg you!
Disclaimer: The Giver and everything associated with it is still Lois Lowry's and not mine.
The meeting is over and I now have much to ponder. One woma- I mean older female, named Brooke seemed to take the position of leadership upon herself. One item decided upon at the meeting was that we would do away with the terms of boy, girl, woman, and man. It was more scientific to say male or female.
"I think that our top priority in our new community should be the needs of the people," she said excitedly. "That means we will have to rely heavily on science to build what we need to create a smoothly-run community."
"Wait a minute," I said. "Every possible resource in the world is gone. How are we supposed to build homes and other buildings without yellow bulldozers or any other means of mining? Not to mention, I'm certainly not the world's best – oops, well this is the world, but I hate math and science! How can I help design and engineer a city?" I blurted out this last part and heard murmurs of assent all around the tiny campfire we had managed to build.
"I will answer those questions in a few moments. But first I would like to make a proposal concerning the nature of our new community."
"Why do we need to rally as a community in the first place? Why can't we all just live our own lives?" another female named Kendra asked.
"Surely you must realize that our only chance for survival lies in interdependence? We are the last humans left on earth! We have a duty to ourselves and our fellow community members to unite and use the resources we have to survive!" No one seemed to be able to disagree with that logic, so it was decided that we were all stuck together till death do us part.
"Now as for my plan… democracies, republics, communisms, imperialism, monarchies, all of them have failed us. They're the reason that most of the world is dead and barren, because they chose to plunge us headfirst into nuclear warfare. While I certainly am opposed to anarchy, I believe that we should not base our system of government on any of those models. Instead we should make a list of rules that will govern us all. Courtesy will be of the utmost importance. If one of the minor rules is broken, the transgressor shall apologize and present him or herself for chastisement at once.
"What if a major rule is broken?" a male named Lee asked.
"Then the transgressor shall be released from our community," Brooke said icily, with a chilly steeliness creeping into her gray eyes.
No one wanted to ask what release could possibly mean. After the destruction of the earth, no one wanted to take a chance of being thrown out of the only oasis and radiation free zone. I suddenly realized, with some amusement, what Adam and Eve must have felt like in the Garden of Eden. It was ironic; they were supposed to be the first humans, and now we were either the last or the first of a different sort.
"There shall a council of Elders in the community who shall hand out Assignments and Match spouses," Brooke continued.
"You mean arranged marriages? And what's this about assigning jobs? What happened to free will? What happened to living in the 21st century?" I thundered.
Brooke sighed exasperatedly.
"Alan, people choose wrong. Look where we are and think about why we're here. It's because leaders who were supposed to protect us failed; they made the wrong choices! Ordinary citizens like you and me have to be protected from making the wrong choices. This will be the new 21st century! You all seem to have objections to my plan. This time we'll let democracy reign. All of you will share your plans and then we'll vote. Who's first?"
Everyone shifted and looked at each other uneasily. Let someone come up with something else, I desperately thought. Anything else. I couldn't explain why, but something didn't seem quite right to me. There was more to this plan than Brooke was letting on, I knew. But what could it possibly be? As everyone separated to find a private area to spend the night I thought about it again. What could it could it possibly be?