“Why didn’t he come himself?”
“Are you kidding? It took him four years to get out. You think he’d want to come back here, risk getting lost? Maybe he thinks I’m full of shit when I tell him I know where you are. Maybe he thinks it’s a trick to get him back into the mines.”
Clay couldn’t take his eyes off the photograph. Tears made pink slash marks through the dirt on his face. “How do I know this isn’t a trick?”
“Can’t help you with that, kid. That’s up to you to decide.” He pulled a piece of paper from his pocket. On it was drawn a map. “Here’s where we are now,” he said, pointing. “And here’s where you wanna go.” He traced his finger through a convoluted maze of tunnels, criss-crossing and switching back on each other, all rising steadily to the surface. “Once you’re in this area, you can dig your way out. That’s the main thing, kid. You still gotta dig yourself out. Otherwise, if you follow me on up to the main entrance, they’ll cry foul and toss your skinny ass back down to the bottom.”
Clay took the map. Studied it. Used his fingernail to mark his current location.
The man gently pried the photograph from Clay’s hand and pocketed it.
“Can’t I keep it?” Clay asked.
“That’s not the way it works.” The man turned, looking up the dark maw of the tunnel from which he’d come. “I have to go now.”
Clay nodded. His eyes went back to the map.
“What should I tell him?” the man asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Should I tell him you’re coming?”
Clay didn’t answer. He stared at the map, the narrow hand-drawn lines like thin dark worms on the paper, the trembling light of his helmet making them dance.
He’d been in the tunnels for so long now, kept to himself so much he didn’t know whom to trust, wondered if trust was merely a commodity of the past, discarded like so many glass bottles and cans and bullet shells. The inside of his mouth tasted of bitter bone dust.
He didn’t know what to do.
Ten hours later, he had traversed most of the map. At least he thought he had. He couldn’t be sure. The map was hard to follow, the proportions off. He’d passed only a handful of other miner’s, most of them resting against the tunnel walls, their eyes glazed over, the pupils wide and hungry for light. He passed a fresh corpse, only the feet sticking out of a collapsed wall, as if the remains of the long ago dead had devoured him.
He trudged forward, his body aching, his heart racing. It was hard not to let the excitement eat him alive, hard not to sprint ahead. What if this was a trap? Just one more twist in the game?
The map ended. He looked ahead, following the dim cone of his helmet’s light. Had he made a wrong turn? He saw nothing beyond the light. He stood still. Tried to quiet his own breathing. There were no other sounds. Not even the far-off echo of the other miners’ picks connecting with the tunnel walls. Not even the drip of moisture as gravity sucked it hungrily from above.
Where do I go? he wondered. What’s left?
He stepped forward. Stopped. Turned around. There was nothing. Nothing. He looked at the tunnel wall. Reached out and touched it. Felt the debris crumble beneath his fingertips.
He closed his eyes. Thought of his father waiting on the surface. Is he standing over me? An earthly angel above this dehumanizing crust?
He made up his mind. Stepped back. Hoped his father would be proud. Lifted his pick in the air. Took aim at the tunnel wall, his cage, his prison, and swung.
Over and over again, he swung. The earth crumbled around him. He kicked it away. Kept swinging. The earth fell in great clumps. The air was thick with dust. He quickened his pace. Clink! Clink! One swing after the other until his muscles burned, his head spun with the lack of oxygen, yet still he kept swinging.
He struck higher. His father, the one he’d glimpsed in that picture, filled his mind. Beckoning him. Urging him forward. Swing! Clink!
And the earth caved in around him.
The earth swallowed him whole.
He was encased in it, like a caveman frozen in ice.
He pushed his hand forward, the only part of his body that could still move. He sucked in the stale, rancid air, bits of dirt and decaying bone entering painfully into his lungs. Don’t panic, he told himself. Don’t panic.
Think. Take it one step at a time. Slowly. Methodically.
He forced his left hand forward, the only appendage he could move, through the putrid soil. A shard of glass from a broken bottle cut into the base of his palm. Coarse dirt embedded itself deep beneath his fingernails. The pain was intense and he wanted to scream, but he couldn’t even do that.
He remembered the copper penny he had found. Would some miner in the future pry it from his rotting bones?
Find a penny, pick it up…
He struggled once more for breath, inched his hand forward, feeling the skin peel back, exposing raw nerves.
Father, he tried to whisper, but could not.
When he inhaled for the last time, dirt filled his mouth, and his bloody fingertips felt the sting of fresh air.
He had won.
Mr. Blue
Mr. Blue had always been Mr. Blue. At least for as long as he could remember. He did not remember any other life. Not his arrival on the train, nor his stop at the Melanin Alteration Room, nor the pneumatic elevator ride up. He did not remember the days in the isolation room as his dosage of Happy and Sad pills was perfected, nor the slight discomfort that had occurred. But as soon as his dosage was correct and the contentment process began — none of it mattered any more.
And although he didn’t exactly remember marrying Mrs. Blue, it seemed she was as natural a part of his life as anything. Like a pill on the tip of his tongue. As good a match as any.
The wonderful thing about living on the forty-first floor of building #812 was that every possible biological desire was fulfilled and every urge was accommodated. For one thing, everywhere the eye could see was an orgasm of color. The eye couldn’t help but be pleased. There were enough visual stimuli to satiate an army. All the citizens of the forty-first floor were free to come and go from their rooms as they pleased. They could gather in the commons room. Gather in each other’s rooms. In the dining area. The hallways. The rumpus room. They could gather in the view room and watch the ColorMaster on the television all day long if they so chose.
They could eat when they were hungry. Take Happy pills when sad. Sad pills when the happiness became too much to bear. They could have sex whenever and wherever they felt like it; there always seemed to be someone ready and willing to perform the act. Strategically placed vibrating phalluses were abundant for the women, and masturbation tubes were always ready for the males. It didn’t matter whom it was done with, either, all jealousies having been genetically removed.
What more could a person want?
Nick Johnson was a Controller who lived on the sixth floor of building #812. He was assigned eight Melanin Enhanced citizens. He distributed the Happy and Sad pills via pneumatic tubes and measured the amount of sperm collected and distilled in the masturbation tubes. His main job was to watch his charges on monitors and make sure they were content at all times.
Contentment was the number one priority of a Controller.
The problem with Nick Johnson — being a Controller and not being as constantly content as the Melanin Enhanced — was that he had retained the traces of a sense of humor. What an embarrassment! In the Controller Recruitment Act of 2005, potential Controllers were courted with the promises of free will. Free this, free that… Although it sounded good at the time, the Controllers often looked upon their charges with a certain envy. A certain longing.