A comfortable prison
Is a prison none the less
No one talks about the war.
It was long and bloody, they say. Many brave men lost their lives, but it's all over now, they say.
We won, they say.
It's been 75 years of peace. All that fought are dead in the ground, or old and put away. The first peace-time generation are decrepit and useless, waiting to die as their memories fade. After that; ignorance. Blissful ignorance. Turning their back on history because that's what they were told to do. That's all they ever do: what they're told.
Who were we fighting? What were we fighting for? How did we win? Did we even win?
We survived, alright. But not like a phoenix from the ashes. Like a sick dog, sucking up the end of our resources, driving ourselves to our own graves. Out with the old, in with the new. The sick, broken, colourless new.
Our health isn't what it used to be. It was never stellar in the first place, but what can you do. When generation after generation is suffering silently from the fallout of an event that doesn't even officially exist anymore, treating it becomes difficult.
The biggest problem is pregnancy. Ah yes, the miracle of life. Getting the little fuckers out just isn't the same anymore, they tend to leave a bit of a mess in their wake. 18 percent of them kill mother dear. God bless America.
So, what do you do? You need children, but you often lose a working member of society in the progress. It will be years before the child is old enough to work in order to replace their parent. What do you do?
Solution: blame the child.
Think about it. If you give the child a strike, they carry that for the rest of their lives. They have one less chance than everyone else. That's pressure to stay productive, to work harder. They become obsessed with making themselves useful; after ten, twenty years, they earn back the losses they caused. Ingenious, really.
So what about those children doomed to live the "slave life"? Well, some of them blow their two chances. Poor kids.
Strike Two
6 year old Anna doesn't know what the lever does
Her brother Inias is bringing her home on the train. Inias doesn't like Anna, their mother's death was her fault. That's what the government men told their father when they took Anna and striked her. Stupid little bitch.
He wouldn't tell her what the lever did. The sign is old and faded. She just wants to know.
"If you want to know so bad," he whispers, "Why don't you pull it?" And naive little Anna does just that. The train screeches to a halt, an alarm begins to ring. Inias grins at her. "Stupid little bitch." It's her own fault for being born.
She cries for days afterwards, scratching and scratching at those ugly black mark.
"Stupid little bitch," she sobs. "Stupid little bitch."
8 year old Lisa doesn't like her hair
Her step-mother likes it long, curly. She says it makes her look pretty. It annoys Lisa.
"Can't I get it cut? Please?"
"No, Lisa. This is how you will wear it, all long and beautiful."
"Why can't I have hair like Ben's?" Her brother's hair is short and spiky, much nicer than Lisa's. Mrs Braeden looks horrified.
"No! Ben has boy hair, you have girl hair. No go clean your room."
Snip. Snip. Snip.
Hair covers the bathroom floor. Long black curls, lying around in heaps on the pristine tiles. Lisa meets her own mirrored eyes. Short tufts of hair stick out of her head in every direction. She loves it.
Mrs Braeden makes sure she hits Lisa somewhere people can't see before bringing her to be striked.
9 year old Gabriel can't help himself
It just looks so good. A fresh cherry pie, sitting there on his neighbours window sill. He can smell it, it smells like what his grandpa used to make before he died. His mouth waters. He hasn't eaten pie in years, his parents are completely against the idea of eating for indulgence. Eating is for obtaining the proper nutrients to work and be a productive working member of society. Gabriel just wants a taste.
A taste turns to the whole pie.
Stealing. Lying. Breaking and entering. That's what the report his neighbours filled out says.
Must have been some damn good pie to strike a kid over.
13 year old Sam finds it in the library
Libraries are for working. For absorbing information. It is full of textbooks and practical manuals. Pleasure reading doesn't exist anymore.
Sammy learned to read when he was 5. His teachers told dad this wasn't a bad thing, but to be wary. Monitor him, they said. Make sure he doesn't do anything he's not supposed to. They wouldn't want to strike him again.
He looked through the dictionaries and etiquette guidebooks. He's bored, so bored. On whim he pulls out an atlas of the Reformed American States. He doesn't expect to see a cylinder jammed in the back of the shelf. He looks behind him, the library is empty.
"This is a bad idea," he mutters. He takes it anyway.
Pages and pages of handwritten words. Thousands and thousands of words. People don't tend to write much anymore, Sam has never seen so many words in his life. By the light of his bedside lamp, he begins to read.
"When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton..."
Sam Winchester has discover a new world. A world of hobbits, of wizards, of elves and dwarves and great men. A world so different from his own, full of life and adventure and beautiful, colourful words. He's in heaven; he reads for nights in a row, never wanting to stop.
"...Then shouldering their burdens, they set off, seeking a path that would bring them over the grey hills of the Emyn Muil, and down into the Land of Shadow.
Here ends the first part of the history of the War of the Ring."
"What? Wha-" Sam couldn't breathe. It wasn't over, it couldn't be. There was so much left of the story, so many things he needs to know. He didn't even know what the story was called, who wrote it. He wanted to keep it, treasure it forever, but he knows he had to put this wonderful handwritten book back where he found it for the next person to find it.
Shame it never makes it back.
"Alright, class, listen please. 6 of our students were found with drugs in their possession. Protocol dictates we must search each of your belongings on the off-chance more of you were invloved. Bags on desk."
Sam closes his eyes. Fuck fuck fuck. It's over now. They're going to take his story, they're going to destroy the world of Middle-earth. He couldn't protect it. Who knows how many people had read it and carefully put it back, how many people wouldn't be able to.
That's when Sam Winchester fully understands. When they take the cylinder, when they drag him out of the room, when they strike him, when they burn the pages in front of him; he understands. This is a pity, vengeful society. A destructive, poisonous, cancer on humanity. He understands.
And he breaks out of his mould. He sees past their illusion. He chooses free will. He chooses to fight.
12 year old Michael finds Isiah while coming home from school
He's so small, only a baby. Squirrels are dying out, people don't care. What good are squirrels for anything? Just a species of rodents that have survived despite the odds. So everyone just ignores the pitiful, trembling little thing on the side of the path. Except Michael.
It barely has any fur, its belly is pink and trickling blood. It looks like it's given up. He takes off his jumper and scoops it up, running all the way home.
Michael gently wipes at the cut with salt water. It has stooped bleeding, it doesn't even look that bad, but the squirrel is still trembling. He wraps it up in a blanket and puts it in a box.
"I'll put you back as soon as you're better," he whispers. After a minute he adds, "I'm gonna name you Isiah."
The squirrel has been with Michael for three week and living off warm milk and yogurt. He feeds Isiah whenever he can, hides him from his father. Three tiring, troublesome, happy weeks. Michael has never been responsible for a living thing before, he enjoys it. He comes home smiling every day, even if he knows that once he's big enough Isiah will have to go. Maybe he has a little squirrel family waiting for him to come home.
He's feeding Isiah when the front door slams.
Michael freezes. His father is never home at this time. Never. It'll be fine, he tells himself. He never comes up here. Michael and his father share a minimum amount of interaction.
Footsteps coming up the stairs.
No no no.
"Michael," a voice calls.
"A-a minute father."
"Now, Michael." He scrambles to put Isiah back in his box, straightening his shirt before leaving his room.
"Yes, father?"
"What were you doing?"
"Homework, father."
"Hm," he old man mutters. His breath smells sickly-sweet, Michael holds his breath. "Do you know what happened today, Michael?"
"No, father."
"My pay was cut."
"I- I'm sorry, father."
"I have not remarried within my designated mourning period," he says bitterly, barely concealed rage simmering beneath the surface. "Until I replace the woman I love, who you killed, with some new whore, I will not be getting full pay. I still have a quota of one more little bastard to produce." His father gets uncomfortably close to his face. "So, if you couldn't tell, Michael; I have had a piss-poor day. So I don't," he raises a hand and strikes Michael across the face. "Appreciate," he shoves his son to the ground. "Being," a boot hits Michael in the gut. "Lied to." He reaches down and grabs the boy by his shirt, pulling him up to meet his eyes. "Now," he spits, "What were you doing?"
Michael opens his bloody mouth, whether to come clean or lie again neither knows, when an unmistakable sound can be heard from his room. A high pitched chittering, aggressive. His father's eyes go dark; he drops Michael to the floor and enters the room.
"Michael," he calls out behind him. "Wait in the living room."
Michael is sitting on the couch, desperately holding back tears. His father walks slowly down the stairs and puts something down on the coffee table. It's Isiah, his little neck snapped. Michael sobs, clutching his mouth.
"I will have respect in my household, Michael." He grabs the boy once again and leads towards the door. "Otherwise I will have them take you away. This is your last chance, Michael. You wouldn't want to be re-educated, would you?"
15 year old Benny wanted to see the lights
It's all Grandpa's fault really. Him and all his stupid stories. Benny knows he shouldn't have climbed the water tower, but he couldn't help it.
"Why you look down on this city at night, Benny, you can't see the dirtiness. Can't see the ugly greys and blacks. All you can see is lights, bright and beautiful, like stars. It's the closest you'd ever get to stars anymore, son. All we have left to wish on."
He just wants to see the lights. There's only once place he knows high enough to see the city from. So he climbs it.
It's so cold, but Benny doesn't care. He keeps going, clinging to the ladder as he climbs higher and higher. He gets to the top and closes his eyes. What if it's not like I imagined? What if I can't see them? He opens them slowly. What he sees takes his breath away.
Better than I imagined, he thinks, gazing at the white glints over the city. So much better. He reaches out, as if he could touch them. He thinks hard for a few seconds, then makes his decision. I wish I could see the stars.
"Well well," a voice beside his says. Suddenly Benny can't see anything, he's blinded by a flashlight. "Big mistake, boy. Down we come now."
Grandpa doesn't say he proud of him. Doesn't say he isn't. Doesn't pass, judgement, doesn't even look at the fresh black strike. The old man only has one question.
"Did you make a wish?"
A slave is a slave
Whether they know it or not