Ch. 1

"Rosie, where are you going with this?" Evan kicked the body in front of him to the side. There were more now than when he had been seven, but then again more and more people were losing hope, plugging into their pictages instead of reality. Preferring to see what the world of the past had for them to enjoy than worrying about the horrors of today. "You can't rise up, you know that." The guy he kicked grunted and pushed himself to the closest brick wall, out of the way.

Rosie turned on her heel to face him and cocked a red eyebrow. She was the only person Evan had ever known to have red hair. "What do you mean, of course we can. We just have to be, you know, super smart. Like, FEC Prox bound smart." She cocked a smile at him.

Evan wanted to pinch his nose and work away the headache he could feel growing. "Rosie, if you hadn't noticed, I'm near the bottom of our segment. I'm just barely keeping above the carnivore's sweep."

"Maybe so, but if you start to put in the work now, by the time we graduate you could easily be in the top. The key is to focus on what is important and what they want."

He could feel the headache growing larger. "They don't care about any of our subjects, Rosie. The only segments they pay attention to are the ones that used to be giant cities or surround the main base. Or senators kids. But that's about it. Money above smarts."

"We have to focus on science, on math. People have done it Ev. They've done it, and we can too."

He shook his head, but continued to follow Rosie to the foster house they slept at. No one actually lived in any of the houses that remained standing, they were just used for sleeping mainly. Unless you had someone to keep watch and then there might be a couple mouthfuls of FEC ration blocks. Only the kids left over from riots and sweeps would actually be in a couple houses, all overly watched by the carnivores to make sure no one unregistered would be going in.

Since he had been seven and the carnivores had made that first big sweep when Growth Zone 298 had been established, they had rounded up all the kids and separated them into three different sections of the city. Three sections well away from the supposed areas the underlords controlled or rather what the carnies thought they controlled. Both he and Rosie had been assigned to the third section, so shared a home and school with twelve other kids. There had been more at one point, but natural reproduction was severely controlled and their numbers quickly dwindled once the kids reached fifteen, or sixteen or so. Always a girl first, then closely followed by a boy.

When he was little Evan had only cared about losing a pair of shoes and having to scrounge a new to him, yucky pair from a dead body with feet similar to his own. And hopefully they would be boy shoes. Now, at thirteen, he had to worry more about curfew and making sure Rosie wouldn't yell at him for something stupid. Again. It had been happening a lot more recently.

"I'm good at history, Rosie. And Gym… and maybe lunch if it doesn't taste super moldy. Not Math and science. I can tell you the whole history of the FEC, how they found Prox and all the rise and fall of the different presidents then business guys, then the FEC. Oh, and I can tell you about what they liked to watch and the weird separate technology they had." He brought up his pictage with a thought. "Which still seems really weird. I mean, why would you want to have your techy separate? You'd be able to lose it so easily." He blinked the holoscreen in front of his face away. "I mean, you lose your socks every day."
"Do not, and you're changing the subject." She poked him in the chest. "But that's exactly what I mean. All those things you just mentioned? Go one step further and you get into the science of those things, which leads to science today which leads to being important to the FEC."

What if I don't want to be important? Evan thought, but didn't say. He barely let the thought form in the first place. Pictages being what they were, micro-computers implanted in the brain at or close to birth, the FEC could and routinely easily did sweep through what people were looking up, in to or anything that might be against them. Easy ways to figure out who would be getting closer and closer to not caring about anything but staring at a pictage all day every day.

"Still though, it seems….hard."

"It's supposed to be hard, duh. It's school and school is hard."

Evan grumbled something about being annoying and wanting to stay with what he was good at.

Rosie rolled her eyes. "It's not going to kill you to try."

He sighed. "Fine. I'll try, happy?"

Rosie's smile almost broke her face in two it was so large. "Thank you Evan!" She hugged him around the waist. "And just in time too. I told Mr. Henri that you'd be joining in the extra math and science courses coming up with me." Her wide smile took on a little evil, bratty twist.

Evan felt a little pit open in his stomach and the blood drain from his face. It was one thing to say he'd focus more on math and science, another thing entirely to know Rosie had signed him up for extended courses. "You didn't."

The evil smile took deeper root. "Oh, yes. I. Did."

"Rosie!" He grabbed for her but she scooted just out of reach and laughed at him.

"What? You said that you would study harder with me, and that's pointless if we aren't studying the same things." Her face fell a little bit. "Are you mad at me?"

Evan stared at her. He had been mad, but as soon as her face fell and she asked that feeling just, disappeared. He didn't know if he would be able to keep up with the rest of the class and that scared him. But when he saw Rosie's little side smile he couldn't help but want to go along with her crazy scheme. "No, I'm not mad. Not anymore."

Rosie's grin magically reappeared, except a little cockier, "I knew you were going to say yes. If only for my winning personality." She turned around and started walking again.

"Yes," he grumbled, "the thing that always gets us into trouble. You're oh so 'winning personality'."

"What was that?" Rosie called over her shoulder.

"You're a pinnacle of virtue and goodness and everyone should look up to your shining example." He called forward to her.

"That's what I thought." He could hear the probably now permanent grin in her voice.

He started to follow then paused in his step, "Hey, wait up for me, Rosie?"

She turned back again, frowning. "Where are you going?"

"Nowhere. Nowhere important. Why? You don't have to know everything about me." He felt suddenly defensive.

She frowned, "Ev-"

"Gotta go!" He turned to the right and started running to one of the alleys. "Tell old gump face I'll be back by dinner time!" He gave a half wave.

"Wait, Evan!"

"See ya!" He disappeared into the darkness created by the two crumbling brick buildings.