Inner City
Scott Norton Taylor
Copyright Scott Norton Taylor 2011
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Chapter 1
Callen sat in the corridor of the Family Administration Court, nervously waiting, swinging his feet back and forth. The seven-year-old looked out of place; orphaned in the lonely space. He stared at the double doors, wishing he could be inside. His parents were on trial, charged with being financially unfit to raise a child.
“I don’t understand why I’m looking at all this technical data,” the holographic Judge said, frustrated with the speed of the trial.
All city officials were holographs. The people behind the projections worked in plush, secure buildings well away from regular citizens.
“Your Honour,” the defendant’s lawyer said, “Every person in this city carries a crystal containing their personal scan. That’s over ninety million potential clients.”
The Judge interjected.
“We are dealing with a question of wealth. The defendants no longer have the assets to raise a child and their son is under nine years old. The law is clear about reassignment. What else is there to consider?”
Within the city, the average life expectancy was one hundred and forty years, and every generation could add at least ten more to that number. Overcrowding meant lives were at a premium. When a couple met the required level of wealth a licence to raise a child was granted. Millions of couples were working towards that end, and their businesses were flourishing, not going backwards. The Judge’s decision would bring pain to this couple; he knew that, but the law was the law, and this law served the community, not the individual.
“Callen is to be taken from you and reassigned to an eligible couple who meet the financial requirements.” The hammer fell. The decision was final.
Leona began to weep. Jonathan sat rigidly beside her; for the first time in his life, he didn’t comfort his wife when she needed comforting. They had lost their son. When they earned the right to have Callen, their business was enjoying spectacular success; now, a decade later, their business situation was so dire they were losing their son. They sat grieving. A guard stood behind them as the Judge issued his mandatory legal warnings.
“Callen is to be escorted from this building. You are to have no further contact with him. No record of his existence with you is to remain. If you contact the boy in any way, you’ll receive a sentence of fifteen years incarcerated public service. Do you understand?”
Leona continued to sob. Jonathan said, “Yes,” never taking his eyes off the Judge. Callen Carrus no longer existed; he had been erased from the official records and would, from this day, be someone else’s son.
Chapter 2
A neat woman with a painted smile entered the far end of the corridor. She walked to Callen. Her conservative, button down blouse gave away her government job.
“Callen,” she said from well down the hall. “Come with me, please”.
“I’m waiting for my Mum and Dad. They’re in there,” he said, pointing to the large doors.
“No, they’re not, sweetheart. Come now; I’ll explain everything.”
Callen gave the women a withering stare. She smiled, trying to look like a friend, stretching out her delicate fingers to encourage his trust. Callen launched himself at the doors. He pulled hard on the handles, but the doors hardly swayed on their hinges.
“Mummy! Daddy!” he screamed, clawing at the doors.
In the courtroom, Leona and Jonathan tensed to the sound of Callen’s cries. They took each other’s hands and squeezed tight. They listened to the child they loved wail in pain, knowing, legally, he was someone else’s to console. The woman led Callen forcefully down the corridor. He twisted and tugged, but proved no problem to the experienced court officer.
Callen was taken to an empty room and told to wait. A tall man came and talked him through legal protocols. Callen’s head was swimming in details. The more it was explained, the less he understood. All Callen knew for sure was he would never see his parents again. His mind flashed across the lessons from school about families; an icy cold fear gripped him. He wouldn’t let this happen. He would never accept reassignment. It wouldn’t matter who his new parents were or what the law said; he’d never give up the parents he loved. Another man took Callen to a dormitory and assigned him a bed.
“You’ll sleep here,” he said. “Your new parents will collect you tomorrow.”
Callen said nothing. He couldn’t let anyone know his thoughts. When they reassigned him, he’d go with the strangers and play at being a dutiful son, but at the first opportunity, he’d be away. He’d travel to his old home and reunite with his parents.
Callen took an age to fall asleep. He lay in darkness, terrified of tomorrow. It reminded him of a holiday taken beyond the city walls, to a sister city by the beach. Callen looked to the barren, inhospitable land below from his window seat. Movement on the ground left him paralysed with fear – he was looking at Savages, Outlocked moving across the barren wasteland. Callen had always suspected the stories of these people were made up, but here they were, in the flesh, as real as anyone.
Callen cried out in fear. Others craned to look out their windows to see the savages below. Callen’s parents did their best to assure him the Outlocked could never harm him; they were wretches, condemned to live a poor excuse for a life in the exiled wastelands. They’d been shut out hundreds of years before after causing dissent and threatening the economic survival of the job creators in the cities.
“There’s no way they can get through the wall,” his parents assured. “That’s why they built it, to protect us.”
Callen stared in disbelief. He’d have the story of all stories to tell his friends when he got home; he’d seen the monsters every child chilled to in so many horror movies.
The sight of the Outlocked so close to the resort city wall frightened Callen enough to stop him falling asleep that first night. He lay shaking in darkness in his hotel bed. Every time he closed his eyes the terror of the savages gripped him. His parents would come when he cried out, but they struggled to ease his fears: What if they were cut off on holiday? What if the Outlocked attacked? What if the horror stories came true?
His parents assured him the security systems would never let that happen. As long as they stayed inside the walls of the city, the savages could never harm him. Callen’s parents held him tight in their arms, and this helped him drift to sleep. The memory of that moment, of being held close by his parent, gave Callen the peace he needed to fall asleep on this night as well.
In the morning Callen woke and was taken to a shower and rudely scrubbed by a woman wearing rubber gloves and an apron. The task left him humiliated, but more was to come. They took him, still naked, to a doctor’s surgery where they strapped him to a full-length chair. The chair whirred to life, stretching him out until he lay flat. He tried to turn his head to see the instruments, but straps around his forehead held him in place. There was no colour in this room. There was no colour in any of the rooms he’d been in since coming from the court building. A doctor's hologram flickered to life next to him. Even this ethereal image wore white. Callen lay on display, strapped down, embarrassed and vulnerable. The doctor, a young woman, let her holographic twin manipulate controls on a panel causing robotic arms to buzz and whir to life. Instruments on long metal rods examined Callen under the gaze of the distant doctor. Measurements were taken without explanation and then finally, after being probed and prodded, the doctor typed her notes and issued an off-hand comment.
“You’re going to make some lucky parents a wonderful son,” she said, before powering off, causing her image to disappear. The restraints snapped open, and Callen jumped from the chair. The door to the room was ajar. Callen timidly peered
out. Had they forgotten he was naked? The woman who scrubbed him saw his face peeking around the door. She immediately re-entered, taking him by the hand.
“Can I have some clothes?” Callen whined. The woman looked astonished.
“You’re about to get a whole new wardrobe if you’d just be a little patient.”
Callen had no choice but to walk with the woman down the hallway. He was thankful there was no-one there to see him.
They entered another white room. Callen sat on a cold plastic bench moulded into the wall. His hands stuck fast to his lap. The woman in white left for a moment and then re-entered wheeling a large plastic cage. Callen stared at it, convinced it was to wheel him around on parade. The woman swung open the door to reveal clothes. The large mobile box was a wardrobe displaying, shoes, socks, underpants, pants, shirts and jumpers.
“These are for you, paid for by the Helfners.”
Callen looked bewildered. He’d never heard of the organisation.
“Your parents,” the woman said in response to his confused expression. It was all too much for Callen. In less than a day, his life has been turned upside down and shaken. The woman left the room. Callen put his head in his hands and took a moment to catch up to all that was happening. He held back his tears and sniffled slightly, before moving to the cage to dress. He took his favourite labels and put them on.
Once happy with his appearance he walked from the room and was instantly met by the woman in white.
“Good,” she said. “We’ll get the other clothes sent to your home later today. Your Mum and Dad are waiting. I think they’re a little excited.”
Callen had remained brave for a long time, but hearing strangers referred to as his Mum and Dad was the final straw. The floodgates opened; tears poured down his cheeks. Within seconds he was reduced to a sniffling, snorting, hyperventilating mess. The woman in white looked awkward, but this quickly turned to compassion in the face of Callen’s tears. She hugged him close.
“It’s all right, sweetheart, come on now. You’re going to be fine,” she said in a soft, soothing tone. Callen calmed. His shuddering breath eased. The woman stood back slightly and smiled at him.
“You have to be brave. The Helfners are going to love you. You’re a lucky young man.”
“I don’t want new parents. I want the ones I’ve got; they want me too, I know they do.” The woman’s expression changed to concern.
“But, you’re only seven,” she said. Callen stared at her.
“You were taught about families at school. You know how children are re-assigned.”
Callen did know, but that didn’t make it easier to accept. He reluctantly nodded that he knew the law. The woman showed relief. Had he not known, for whatever reason, she would have been facing a difficult situation. The woman began brushing a few stray fibres from Callen’s clothes.
“See if you can’t cheer yourself up. The last thing new parents want to see is their child crying.”
Callen ran the back of his hand across his face, smearing away his tears.
“Good, boy,” the woman said. “Let’s go and meet your mummy and daddy.”
She led Callen into a room of colour - a room of synthetic seats and viewer screens, a room of sound and activity and expectant mothers and fathers. Raegher and Annie Helfner sprang to their feet as a digital voice announced their number. They raced across the short space, threw their arms around Callen and hugged him like he was their long lost son, which, in a way, he was. Callen suffered the smothering without a word.
The trip home was uneventful. The transporter followed the route entered in the computer, locking onto the magnetic tracks, leaving Raegher and Annie free to tell Callen their plans for the rest of his life. Callen nodded and changed his focus from one to the other, all the time watching the passing streets, frantically trying to map the direction of his old neighbourhood. The Helfner’s unit was almost two hours drive from the administration buildings. By the time they arrived, Callen’s head was spinning with landmarks and turns and all the while the incessant chatter of his new parents continued.
On their arrival, Callen was given a tour of the split level unit before being shown his room. The walls were bright yellow. A bright blue bed with bright red cupboards made it even more vibrant. A mobile of the solar system hung from the light, casting planetary shadows around the room as the finest breeze set the orbs in motion. When the Helfners left to prepare dinner, Callen looked around the room, checking cupboards and drawers, his mind quickly back to the problem of how to escape this new family and go home.
Dinner was a feast. It was all synthetic, but far more nourishing than anything natural. The ham and vegetable simulate came and went, then the sweets - processed ice cream pie with a crust of chocolate biscuit all covered in fudge so thick it stopped running as it cooled. Callen’s appetite had not suffered over the past twenty-four hours. He happily had a third helping to the delight of his new parents.
After dinner, Annie and Raegher escorted him to bed and repeatedly returned to check on him before going to bed themselves. Callen waited for their bedroom light to go off. He threw his eyes open many times, in a torturous battle with sleep. After a long wait, he got up and silently inched down the hall to his new parent’s room. They were asleep. Callen went back to his room to look through his wardrobe. He found a backpack perfect for what he had in mind and loaded it with anything that might be useful. Once packed he gently opened the bedroom door and slipped out of his unfamiliar bedroom.
Quietly he climbed down the stairs, stopping at the kitchen to add food. He looked at the chocolate fudge sitting left over in a container, useful or not; he’d have that too. He closed his bag and went to the front door where he quietly left the unit. He rode the lift to the ground floor. He began to relax, his confidence in his plan growing. He’d have the whole night to search before anyone knew he was gone. Callen opened the door to the building. A screeching, high-pitched wail let out, making him flinch, He looked to the alarm with horror. A flashing light above the door lit up his face with its intermittent piercing blue beam. Callen cringed at his stupidity. How could he forget the alarm? Every building in every modern city had one. He’d just lost his head start. Callen began to run.