The Constant Star (12)

THE STORY SO FAR

Siff stands warily in the dark of the evening. All is quiet and there is no-one in sight. She begins to think someone is trying to communicate with her. That yellow pathway…it led to a wall by some garbage next to the park…if she is caught, she will be in big trouble. But the hell of confinement coupled with her curiosity takes over: Siff grabs a jacket, pulls the hood over her head, and quickly makes her way through town.

Only the occasional pedestrian is out tonight, and none pay any attention to her as she walks briskly to the wall with garbage piled up. She doesn’t notice anything interesting or suspicious about the site. Just some rotten foods in containers due to be taken away. She moves some of the containers around wondering if there are any markings on them to give her clues, but nothing is to be found. If she risked all this for nothing…she pushes one container away from the wall to check for markings and finds a grated vent in the wall at ground level. There is a VR headset lying on the ground next to a piece of torn and crumpled paper. Siff reaches for the paper, something about it seems familiar. She picks it up and goes wide-eyed: a picture she drew of herself in the Chosen Ones environment, sitting against a tree. This page was in one of her journals she was forced to throw away. She turns the crumpled sheet and looks on the back, where someone has written the words ‘Not Alone’. She gulps in fear as she looks to the headset. It seems both items were slipped through the vent for her to find. Siff puts the paper in her jacket pocket, then picks the headset up and hesitates. What if it’s a trap? What if she’s being set up so her mother can have her arrested? What if it’s Noven again? She huffs and rolls her eyes at that thought, Noven doesn’t have the tech know-how to infiltrate the VR systems. Feeling a sense of dread anticipation, Siff sits against the wall behind the garbage and puts the headset on.

There are blinking lights and then it boots up. There is no artificial reality overlay, but a female voice does speak to her, “Hello Siff.” Her heart races, what is this? “Thank you for coming, I’ve been following you for quite some time.” The voice has an artificial quality, like someone is masking who they are, “Your thoughts and dreams are valuable, and they can come true. We have been waiting for someone like you, and now we are so very close to the right time.”

Siff gulps up the courage to ask, “The right time for what?”

“Freedom. Hope.” There is a pause, “Revolution.”

“No way. Uh uh. Nope.”

“Don’t run. You think you’re the only one who suffers under the system? How do you think I saved that paper you hold?”

“I…I don’t know.”

“Tell me about the lower levels, Siff.”

“It’s…all automated. We have systems and robots that keep the internal engines and ecosystem propulsors maintained.”

“That’s what I once thought as well. But you know as little as I did. Have you ever wondered why they send daily security squadrons to the lower levels? They aren’t policing the robots, Siff. We’re down here. And if you want to know the truth. If you want a cause. If you want something worth fighting for, come see for yourself.”

The vent grate pops open like a door. Siff panics and throws the headset to the ground. She gets up and runs home as fast as she can, while trying to avoid any suspicion from the sparsely populated evening streets. When she gets home she hangs her jacket up and heads into her bedroom. She begins to read yet again, burying her mind in “Mission Documentation and Purposes”, trying to forget that voice in the headset. And that vent behind the garbage.

8

<<Citizen#0022-48299735

Entry#21962

What are we, if not gods? We provide for our subjects, give them food, water, shelter, help them grow. We teach them from afar and lead them to their destiny. We have the power to give and take away, to save and destroy. We are prayed to, worshipped, longed for. What is a god if not all these things?>>

Siff wakes up the next morning still in her clothes, face planted on the screen of her homework. She groans and rolls over, shaking the cobwebs from her head and checks the time: 5:30 am. Dad will be leaving for work soon, maybe I’ll try the door again when he’s gone. How did that person hack into Janus’ systems? Its AI is supposed to be insurmountable. I am in so much trouble if anyone finds out. Oh crap I hear him coming.

Footsteps approach her door and Siff jumps back on the bed, eyes closed. She doesn’t feel like talking to her father today. She hasn’t felt like talking to him at all lately. They haven’t had much to talk about. Her mind always wants to question things that are unquestionable, and she finds not talking to be safer than opening up. The footsteps stop and she hears her door open a crack, “Have a good day sweetheart; I love you.”

Siff’s door closes and she hears her father walk away. She waits a few minutes to be sure and then gets up again. Walking into the kitchen she grabs a bite to eat and continues to read her homework at the dining room table. She glances over occasionally at the door, suspicion and curiosity slowly overtaking her nervousness. Who is contacting her? And why are they contacting her? And how are they contacting her?

It takes all of thirty minutes before she can’t resist checking the door again. Siff slowly approaches and sees the sensor trip, but the door does not open. She raises a disappointed eyebrow and begins to walk back

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