Sapeulan Sap

They told me grand stories of this city. They said this city iseverything you could dream of and more. I never doubted a single story that came from here. I was always sure that they were true. Why would anyone lie about the Spire? Why would people fabricate stories of what goes on in the streets? No one ever talked about the slums of course, no one would go there. If anyone mentioned it they'd play it down. I remember one story the most and that ended up being the story that would spark my reason for heading to New Fulcra.

I was a young boy about 9 or 10 and was working the fields with my father, my brothers, my sisters, and my grandfather. We worked the fields of saffron just like their parents and siblings had and so on. It was simply the way things were done and we liked it that way. Lush fields in various hues of purple. They say that purple is the colour of the unsatisfied. I never longed for anything when we were on the farm, though. 

My father ensured we always had plenty to eat. We had toys and we have fun times in the fields as well, me and my brothers and sisters. The saffron picking had to be done by hand, it was a delicate undertaking and a lot of saffron had to be harvested to make it a spice worth using. 

One my uncle came speeding by the fields on a hovercycle and we were all ecstatic. No work was done while uncle was out in the field, whizzing by and we all cheered him on. He looked so grand and rich, at the time he was not my uncle. At that moment in time he was an angel from a different place. He came from somewhere magical, on something truly mysterious to me at the time, and was thus sublime. 

He told us of the capital and how glorious it was. He said how anyone who went could find their fortune. I stroked the hovercycle as he spoke of the fancy men and gentle women as my father nodded and smiled. They were both happy, I realize now, but in different ways. My uncle left that same day on the hovercycle and wouldn't come back. I never saw him again, actually. My brother, Yutu, said he saw him a few weeks ago but couldn't have been sure. I didn't want to believe Yutu. It would mean that uncle had fallen from grace and that didn't fit in my world. I wouldn't allow it - nor could I.

Yet, here I am in my world as I slurp my soup in a crowded New Fulcria canteen. There are no big tables, just endless booths for loners to eat in. The tables are in the other canteen across the road. Hovercycles whizz by me every day now but they don't impress me anymore. I have one myself. It's waiting for me to finish my noodles which I pay for quickly before I get back on her to head back to work. The streets are jammed with hovercycles, on every lane, upper or lower. I prefer the lower lane, and so do many, many others. It's just too expensive to go into the upper lane which makes me wonder why I bought the damn hovercycle in the first place. 

No one at the shops tells you about the extra fee for driving in the upper lane. Never mind the executive lane. I look over to my side and see another hovercycle. Sleek, red, with a woman riding it with a full leather outfit that seems grafted to her skin. I give her a nod and she looks away, speeding off as I realize that I am at a standstill on a green light.

Once again I feel like I am angering people around me even though I cannot hear them. I can barely see them in their hovercars with tinted windows, their helmets donned as they take their hovercycles around the city. You can't see their eyes, you can barely see skin. 

Skin... I haven't seen anyone else's skin in a long time I realize as I am at another red light only two intersections further than before. Real skin, I mean to say of course. I have touched synthetic skin only last week as I caressed the mannequin some would call a sex doll. I call her Solace, since she is all I can lean on some nights, or days, or ever. It just feels like I cannot tell anyone back home how it really is here. I don't want to disappoint them. 

I told them I would come to New Fulcria and lead a great, fancy and amazing life like uncle did. I wonder again if Yutu really saw him looking down a trash can near the slums. He said it must have been him, but he ran away before Yutu could see him. As I pass another intersection I enter the business park of New Fulcria to go back to my job, the alleged source of all my happiness if you were to ask my parents. 

They were so happy I could join the intergalactic company in insurance there is. It was safe and sound and would last, plus they had great benefits for retiring. It saddened me that they looked that far ahead and I could barely look past my sheets some days, struggling to get out to head into the jam-packed office. The cubicles can be private if you want, you simply press a button and it encapsulates you in it's folds. 

The reality is of course that everything is seen and watched. The privacy is for work. It is to get rid of distractions because distractions cost money. I find myself leaving my cubicle open all the time. Around me when I am seated I see them closed off, windows tinted just like the cars and cycles outside. I peer over to my colleague to my right yet she has her cubicle closed again, as always. I haven't spoken to her in ages. I take all my courage and knock on it.

"Hey Jana, how was lunch?" I ask and knock, very gently. The cubicle opens and Jana is not in it, but a young man with wavy hair, big glasses and a thin face. He smiles at me in his business 101 clothes and neat tie.

"Oh hi! You must be Alen! I joined last week. Jana got promoted and is now on the 93rd floor."

"Ah." I say, disappointed that Jana would leave. Disappointed that she would leave without saying anything. 

"Can I help you?" The young man asked without introducing himself. I shook my head and close my cubicle to the dumbfounded young man. I couldn't handle looking at him further when I expected Jana. 

Work flew by and I headed out to the corporate shopping centre nearby. All shops approved by corporate of course, and many of them with discounts specifically for us! This was a lie, of course. The discounts just lowered the price for poor corporate peasant's slightly so that we could afford the knockoffs that the wealther corporates did not want, or the elites did not care for. I do my shopping in the super-duper-market and though it is packed to the brim with people, there is never a queue. You just walk in and walk out with your shopping, as you pay all at once when you leave. I often catch myself pretending to shoplift for fun. 

I try it again today, and the elderly woman who sees me do it just shakes her head. I put the item I stole back, a toothbrush, and leave the store. The cinema has a long queue outside of it, with couples hand in hand waiting to watch the next blockbuster. I stop to stare at one of the ads. It shows some starlet or other looking off into the distance to her left, and some handsome stud but smaller staring off to his right whilst in the background there are explosions. What really catches my eye is the flower on the woman's chest. It is a saffron flower. It's three stigmas reaching outward and capture my mind completely. I feel very disconnected from all around me, and though there are many people going back and forth, all I can think of in front of the theatre is the saffron fields. The smell of it as it was all over my hands and clothes. The sight of the purple fields.

I notice that I feel something that I had not felt in a long time here in New Fulcria. A sense of belonging. I belonged in those fields, it was something that felt natural and I could feel it calling out from inside of me. I stepped closer to the ad as people passed me, to get a better and uninterrupted look at the flower. Yes, it was a saffron flower and yes, I could not deny that I wanted back. I needed to go home.

I packed my things and put them in the hovercycle, a small suitcase would suffice for a small trip. I wrote my boss I would be sick tomorrow, some bad food. As I travelled through the city all the red lights seemed to be trying to stop me from leaving. 

Don't go from New Fulcria! The future is here! Everything you want, everything you desire, New Fulcria can provide! The ads screamed at me with their offerings. Sacrifices to me, their god, the consumer. I would not bend, or balk. The buildings got smaller the farther out of New Fulcria I drove. Soon the buildings were a "normal" height of 3-4 floors. I told myself that when - if - I come back, I will find uncle. I will meet up with Yutu and tell him how I really feel about New Fulcria, my job, everything. 

The large spire, the centrepiece of the miraculous city stared down upon me as I raced out of the city. I felt elated. I stopped at a charging station and looked back as I charged the hovercycle for the trip. The spire and it's surrounding stalagmites seemed to be attempting to race each other to the sky to get higher and higher. I laughed out loud. They are going the wrong way!