Earth -2.0

I have taken up residence in the corner of this room. The only windows are my eyes and the walls are the steadily built bricks of my calves and thighs on either side of this chair.

My throne. 

This is not simply a residence, it is a kingdom. My kingdom. An impenetrable one made not of steel and iron, but of eyes and ears and bones and skin. No one can harm me here, no one can pick me apart and tell me lies and break me into unrecognizable little pieces. I make the laws here. I police the streets. I am the judge, the jury, and the executioner. 

I am the alpha and the omega of the universe I have created as my habitat.

Although on the other side of my internal world I am feeling more and more like a pawn. The dark queen in a game I have never been taught how to play. Yet here I am, seated on a throne that is now nothing short of a prison, and the one person I have chosen to lessen my torture has become my tormentor.

Forgiveness. He is not asking me for it. No, as I finally allow my eyes to meet his across the room it becomes very clear that he is making no requests.

He is demanding it. 

It is not simply forgiveness that he wants, it’s forgetfulness. He wants for me to forget everything I am and everything I have seen. He wants my thoughts to disappear. For my tongue to tear itself loose and find something else to do.

He never asked me what I want. 

I want pull my brain out through my nose. I want to be the clueless lovesick idiot I was only hours ago. I want so badly to be blissfully ignorant, but he has robbed me of that luxury. He has allowed me no mercy, so I will yield him no comfort.

I chose him as a lover because he is a liar. He lied sweeter than the rest of the men that banged on my door and laid promises at my feet. I liked his lies best, they were the most farcical and perfect. He promised me a bed of primroses to sleep on twice per week. 

He promised to be my light in the midst of every polar night.

He lied so hard that I think part of him has started to believe it. That is the scary part. There are days now when he blinks at me like he has forgotten I am real, like it slips from his mind that I am not simply a figment of his imagination, that I am not a toy he can put down when he has finished playing. 

I chose him because I am a slave to stories.

I chose him because he asked the fewest questions and accepted the barest answers. 

He is across the room and at my side before I can decide to leave.

“Will you help me perform the ceremony this evening?” The Leader is staring into me now, seeing into my kingdom and raising a proverbial trumpet to begin the invasion. Concubines do not generally have the privilege of calling themselves queens, but we did away with that kind of ancient terminology decades ago. He generally refers to me publicly as a friend, a friend who lives in his home and shares his bed and entertains his guests.

Yes, I am an excellent friend.

The people gathered have already started to grow restless, all waiting for their leader to address them. 

The clap he sends through the air is loud enough to break the sound barrier.

“My father told me once that only the fittest will survive, and that the victors are the author’s of history.” I see nothing but faces set in eternal awe, taking Arthur’s word as gospel and nothing less. Most of them have little recollection of a world full of war and hate, just one final polarizing conflict that brought all people together. Polarized them into two groups.

Those who survived the death of the sun-

and those who did not.

They remember little of the history books from which Arthur steals his speeches. The father he praises eternally as his mentor was nothing more than a paranoid alcoholic who chose the correct paranoia at the correct time.

Like hitting a shooting star with a bee bee gun. 

It startled me at first, how they all forgot so soon what the world had been like. One day we were a normal populous and the next we were segregated to underground worlds where proper air ventilation and proximity to the pulsating warmth from the core of the earth provide a suitable habitat for human survival. Then I realized a more integral part of the human spirit, one more powerful than our quest for truth.

Our quest for peace.

We sacrificed truth easily in exchange. Our gathering began far before the final death. Scientists predicted for years that we were running low on time with our most valuable resource. Much of the world paid little attention, with the understanding that a full solar death would be unsurvivable. 

Arthur’s father, however, became an underground version of Noah. He started to dig tunnels, garnered support from secretly paranoid billionaires and traded labor and resources for a spot amongst the saved. Technology and years of planning allowed for the complex underground monstrosity to be built with every bit of creature comfort. People live in their own private residences (those who could afford to purchase one) and the workers “volunteer” their time and effort in exchange for food and shelter. Earth -2.0 is fully self sustained and runs on renewable forms of energy. It is a technological wonder and a point of pride for everyone who pushed past cynics and used the space to shelter from the environmental apocalypse.

“Earth -2.0 has spared us from far more than environmental disaster, it has given us a new chance at a better society. One free of those who are not willing to put in the work, commitment, and effort required to run a society of learners rather than warriors.” A few men in sharp suits are nodding intently, pointedly refusing eye contact with the servants standing just a few feet away, aware that they are indeed in the category of “warrior” as far as many residents are concerned. It is difficult to look past the fact that the residents rarely find themselves working, unless it suits their pleasures. 

“We welcome you this evening, to celebrate yet another beautiful year in our paradise, a beacon of light and life pulsing in the center of a dead world.” That comment receives a few head shakes, and a couple of wives pretend to dot away a tear with the corner of a hanky. “Ivy will do the honor of lighting our ceremonial fire this evening.” Arthur turns to me, all evidence of his earlier unease wiped from his face and body language. “Would you do the honors, my love?” My head pricks slightly at the overly familiar language, though I know the residents will simply assume he is being friendly. He is being friendly to his friend. The Leader has no need for permanent romantic companionship, he is too focused on bringing our society to the next level. He asked only for me to rid him of his temporary desire.

I still find it strange that I managed to convince myself that my volunteering somehow made me special, or wanted. Regardless I cannot refuse the fact that I chose this. I chose him and this world with the hope of a slight chance at redemption. 

At revelation. 

Yet the realization that this redemptive revelation is nothing of the sort is becoming a more difficult pill to swallow. 

The burning torch now tucked securely into my prayerfully small grip is suddenly feeling more like a temptation and less like a symbol of hope. The people wait patiently for the fire to be lit, to celebrate being the final spark of light left in the center of a dying world. 

I wonder suddenly what would happen if I just dropped the flame here, let it burn this whole mess to the ground, collapse the ceilings and burry us-

Arthur’s hands are wrapped around mine now from behind, my back against him and his breath hot in my ear. 

“We will speak after this meeting is over.” His voice is nothing more than a whisper in the midst of a bustling room, but the shiver it sends down my spine speaks to a much more immediate threat. 

The fire explodes up in front of us, the flame taking to the wood and fuel in seconds. The flames reach ten feet high at least, with smoke billowing up into the ceiling, waiting to be swept away by the carefully placed piping and air currents. The gnawing flames rip into my irises, blinding me with sparks and flashes of light as pockets of oxygen feed into the growing yellows and oranges. 

“I can’t do this.” I realize too late that I have spoken aloud. Arthur tenses next to me, fists clenching and releasing, jaw locked tight and eyes staring unwaveringly at the fire before us. 

The people have begun mulling about the feast, speaking in hushed whispers and laughing amongst themselves. They notice nothing of the battle of wills occurring before their very eyes.

I need to tell them what I know-

Arthur grabs my arm, half leading me and half dragging me down the hall and into a set of back tunnels. He says nothing as we make our way to his rooms, and I ask no questions aside from an off-handed comment about some incomplete construction along our path.

He says nothing.

“What do you want?” It’s the first set of words he has spoken to me since we left the meeting hall, and I cannot make sense of it.

“What do I want?” I shake my head, step back, assess the distance between myself and the door.

“Yes, what do you want in exchange for your silence and continued cooperation?” He speaks to me like we are discussing the weather, like it drizzled a bit today and we weren’t able to take the hike we had planned. 

“How long?” I ask him instead.

“How long for what, Ivy?” His frustration is starting to bubble up into something that feels more like slightly veiled violence.

“How long do you think you can keep this up? How long will be enough?” 

I can tell he did not expect this challenge from me. 

“This is not an act, this is our life. This is our WORLD!” He erupts from where he stands, jumping into a pace, hands digging through his hair and nails brushing across his scalp. “Regardless of what you have heard, nothing has changed.”

“Everything has changed!” My turn to erupt. “How can you look me in the eyes and tell me nothing has changed when I have found out that this world you have built is nothing short of a lie?” My voice cuts off at the end, and the knot in my throat is threatening my ability to keep speaking.

“Nothing has been a lie.” Arthur goes still, his whole body tensing and ice replacing the blood in his veins.

“The sun is not dead.” He says nothing. “There were rumors that the sun would die and your paranoid father bought into them full force. He found a bunch of rich idiots to buy into it just as much as he did and created this underground world with the delusion that it would be able to outlast a solar extinction.” His skin is losing more color with every sentence I speak. “He told the people that the sun would have one last burst of light and then plunge the world into a forever dark.”

I plop down into the nearest lounge chair, across the room from where Arthur now stands paralyzed. It seems he did not know the full extent of what I heard him discussing with his first officer. 

“It did. There was a burst of solar light, and all of these people came rushing down into this shelter. They thought they were cozying up to the center of the earth to avoid the catastrophic death that would be occurring above. Except the sun didn’t die, and we’re far from the center of the earth.”

There, I’ve said it. I’ve said the damning words that lay my hand flat.

“You’re mistaken.” Arthur’s voice is deathly quiet. 

“I am not. I heard you. These people live down here, following you blindly in this fucked up little sandbox you have created to play in, while the whole world moves on above without us.” I sink back, letting the pillows hit my back and support my neck as I stare up at the ceiling. “It was just a solar flare, larger than any we had ever seen, but nothing catastrophic. We have been down here for a decade worshiping our final sparks of light and flame, when we have simply been hiding from it.”

“We cannot go back there, not now.” 

“Why not? You don’t think everyone would want to go home, see the families they thought dead?” I stand now, the shock of his admittance hitting me like lightning. 

“We have finally created a perfect society, and I refuse to let it go to waste!” The venom in his voice is one I have no antidote for. The man I share a bed with feels eons away from this monster that stands before me. “No one is going anywhere. If you trust me on nothing else, know that is the truth.”

The threat he poses is no longer veiled.

“I must also warn you, Ivy, that strange things occur in places where light is so scarce. People wander down the wrong pathways, people get…lost.” His smile is nothing short of terrifying. “You wouldn’t want to get lost, would you Ivy?” My mouth is too dry to speak. I’ve taken things too far this has gone on too long-

His hand is wrapped around my chin before I have a hope of stopping him. 

“So please, answer my original question.” He shakes his head at the tear that slips down my cheek. “What do you want? What will help you forget?”

I have a choice to make. 

I can choose to be a different kind of light, I can use my knowledge to fight his darkness and dangerous secrets. His entrapment of the people who reside and work here. 

There is, however, no bonus for a posthumous prize.

I ask for a bed of primroses to sleep on twice a week.

I ask for light in the midst of this never ending polar night.

And now I will also ask for forgiveness every day for the rest of my life.