When Ravenclaws Ruled the Earth

[tamarindchutney]

Original dystopic science fiction, written for an English project on The Scarlet Letter. I don't particularly like the ending, to be frank, because the whole thing was written to "prove" a very specific argument about Nathaniel Hawthorne's opinions and whether they were true or not, so deus ex machina reigns supreme, but it was still fun to write, and I'm happy with it inasmuch as it's my first time trying to argue any particular point with a story.

Title: The Absence of Light
Fandom: Original
Rating: R
Summary: In the near future, after a global catastrophe, high school students are tested at the end of high school in order to determine whether they should be granted the rights of a full citizen. Our hero, Sammael Thanatos, is a student on the lower end of the scale. Contains prostitution, terrorism, and standardized tests. Lots of standardized tests. 7829 words.

The Absence of Light

Sammael examined the hovercar, frowning. He had to put it back in working order, which shouldn't be difficult for someone like him. Sam was one of the better students in this mechanics class, and he did quite well in most of his other classes. It was because he was Motivated - he even knew how to read. The administration always talked about the Motivated Student, especially the Motivated Lower Student. You could do anything if you put your mind to it, he had always been told, even if you didn't have much of a mind to put to anything.

What Sam lacked in mind he made up for in effort. He knew, of course, that the United States Intelligence Quotient Test would not involve fixing hovercars or pressing clothes, but he wanted full citizenship, and if he was going to get it, he was going to pass that test. So he'd learned to read from the picture books in the local library, and he'd figured out how to type on an elderly and somewhat narcoleptic computer he'd managed to save up for.

At any rate, he was in class now, and he had to make this hovercar work properly. He consulted a blueprint he'd printed out at the library the night before, knowing full well that this was cheating; you ought to fix a machine with your hands, not with your brain. But Sam wasn't above a little cheating if it wasn't technically forbidden. The Middle Students got to use blueprints for their practical classes. The poor Middles, of course, were burdened not only with good practical classes, but things they might use if they passed the USIQ Test, like history and mathematics.

The Higher Students, of course, didn't need to be Motivated. They didn't learn anything about mechanics or cooking or pressing clothes; these things were unimportant for the future citizens and voters of the United States. Sammael knew the reasoning behind it, of course, but he still thought the whole thing was a bad idea. It just made more work for him; he might as well have been a Middle, but with no teachers in any of the Higher subjects. He didn't think it could be any good for the Highers, either. After all, the only way they could ever eat real food was to pay someone else to make it for them, which meant losing money. He couldn't imagine having to pay someone else to do silly things like fix this hovercar - why, all it needed was new wiring in a few places. Anyone could have seen that, and nearly anyone could have done it. He tucked the old wire surreptitiously into his pocket, knowing there might be some use for it at home.

Pleased with himself, he replaced the wire, then poked his head out from under the car to see how the others were doing. There was Belinda Buz, looking more than a little confused. She had grime all over her face and had, apparently, bleached one of her sleeves accidentally in the last class. It was rumored that Belinda had nearly qualified to be a Middle Student, but if she read as badly as she fixed hovercars, Sam wouldn't have bet anything on it. She had a tendency to stare off into space most of the time, and she never seemed to understand anything that was said to her. Most people found it easier just to avoid her, as she made them uncomfortable.

Leonid Lomov, on the other hand, seemed to have managed to complete his task several seconds before Sam, and was standing smugly by. He did not like Lomov, and Lomov did not like him. If Sam got a high score on a test in his Bus-Driving class, Lomov would cheat his way to something higher, and if Lomov finished repairing a hovercar first one day, Sam would cut corners the next day to finish before him. This was simply how things worked.

"Need any help?" Lomov offered, smiling unpleasantly.

"No thanks," said Sam. "I'm done. Did you realign the frontal valve chambers?" The words rolled off his tongue easily. What frontal valve chambers might do, exactly, eluded him, but the mysterious words had appeared on the blueprint somewhere.

The words worked like a spell on Lomov. "Of course," he said, though Sam heard more than a hint of uncertainty in his voice. "Everybody knows to do that," snapped Lomov impatiently. "I'm not stupid, you know." He turned and went back to his hovercar, probably to examine it for any signs of frontal valve chambers. Whatever those were

Not yet, thought Sam, though he knew that if he was going to pass the USIQ, Lomov might, too. The USIQ loomed over everyone at this age; the Lowers, Middles, and Highers were equally anxious to pass it, because anyone who didn't was deemed an Idiot and was not permitted to vote or hold non-menial jobs. Lowers, of course, were not expected to pass, but their teachers had never denied them the right to wonder about it, if idly, and Sam wondered, and wanted. Surely Lomov did too.
So he might be sharing his Citizen status with Leonid Lomov. Of course, he'd also be sharing it with most of the Middles and half of the Highers, but he didn't know any of them, so he didn't mind it. But Lomov... he wished he could do something about that.

* * *

About a week later, Sammael took the test. As a Lower, he had the option to skip it, since he wasn't expected to pass anyway, but he thought he might have a chance, and anyway, Citizens Class A got the better jobs. It was something of an ordeal, but he managed to slog through the questions with much guesswork. The day after he'd taken it he had off from school, but he wasn't getting any rest. Their building's aged furnace, from decades before, had finally given out, and while everybody else complained enough about it being too cold, nobody, including the landlord, had done anything about it.

So Sammael decided to venture down into the depths of the furnace room to see if he could do any good. Someone had kindly left an old radio on the floor, so as he worked he listened to the only channel it would receive, a news channel.

"...and as yet another explosion rocks Los Angeles, Gershomite dissidents take responsibility for this and prior attacks. The Gershomites, a group of disgruntled former Citizens Class B, have been steadily stepping up the levels of their attacks since mid-August. This time, authorities were informed of the danger beforehand and the area was covertly evacuated. Had it been populated, loss of life would have been staggering. As it is, millions of dollars of damage have been done and there are still at least five hundred people missing, with another three hundred injured in the blast. The leader of the Gershomites, a man who goes only by the name of Archelaus, demands that the government allow even Citizens Class B to vote in elections. City leaders are not commenting at this time.

"Meanwhile, radiation levels in Europe are steadily dropping; the city of Paris could be habitable in several decades, say some experts. Efforts to rebuild the Continent's ecosystem via cloning are underway in several laboratories -"

"Sammael! Sammael! This envelope came!" The news was drowned out by his mother's voice. As he turned, he saw that she'd run down the stairs, clutching an envelope with the words USIQ.

"Let me see," he said, taking the envelope and tearing it open hungrily, as though it were an oyster which might or might not contain a pearl. Pulling out the paper inside, he stared at the paper, squinting to make out the words in the dim light. If they'd had a real computer, he'd have gotten the results in an email, of course, but theirs couldn't have handled anything like that.

As the text resolved itself into words, he skimmed it, and realized, with some shock, that he'd passed. He looked at his mother. "I passed the test."

Her face lit up. "I knew you would; always knew you were smart, even if those school people didn't. I told them, but they -"

"It doesn't matter what they think anymore," he said triumphantly. "Can I get the ID card today?" He was excited; it was a new ID card, a new identity. Not Sammael Thanatos, Lower Student, but Sammael Thanatos, Citizen Class A.

"Of course," she said. "It's better that you get out of this cold building into a hoverbus than freeze here." She pulled a few coins out of her pockets. "You can take the bus that stops down the street; I think it goes to this address."

"And after I get a job - a good job, I mean - we can get a new furnace, right? Or move to a whole different building, even." Caught up in the possibilities that money might offer, he barely noticed as he pocketed the hoverbus fare.

"Don't get too carried away," she admonished. "We won't go putting on airs like those van Kaams from down the street who won the lottery. They got a house and lost it in a week to hungry debtors."

"No, of course not," said Sam. "Nothing like them. Still... it'd be nice to be warm all winter."

"There's a good reason for winter, Sam," she admonished him. "It's so we appreciate the spring when it comes - and who knows, maybe it's just come. Good luck, and smile for the picture!"

He didn't think he could've helped it.

* * *

When he got to the address on the letter, he found that the building was filled with a mass of people, all intent upon some business that was very important, at least to them. Pushing his way through the crowd, he managed to stagger up to an information desk.

The woman at the desk directed him to the elevators, which then deposited him four floors up, into a slightly quieter area. Presenting the man at this desk with his current ID card, he said, in his politest tone of voice, "I just passed the USIQ. Can I get a new card?"

The man, without bothering to look at his face, boredly took the card. "Name?"

"It's there on the card," Sam said helpfully.

"Name?"

He sighed. "Sammael A. Thanatos."

"Somebody spelled Samuel wrong on this card," muttered the man, frowning.

"It's Sammael, sir. Not Samuel. Sammael."

"Damn parents these days, don't even know how to spell their own kids' names," he muttered, typing "Samuel A. Thomas" into the computer. Sam didn't bother to correct him, as Thomas was a nice enough last name. "Were you a Middle or Higher student?"

He blinked. Didn't any Lowers ever pass the test? "Lower, sir."

"What? Didn't hear you."

"I said I was a Lower, sir," said Sam, speaking louder.

The man stared at him. "You trying to joke around?"

He shook his head solemnly. "See, my parents, they were Lowers, their parents came after the Disaster and they didn't speak any English, of course, and then my parents got shunted into Lower because they didn't know enough, and then they raised the standards and I -"

"Do I look like I care?" demanded the man. "There are must be a million kids in this city coming into this building every day for new IDs. They either lost 'em, or they got 'em stolen, and all they have is their pre-test ID. And some of 'em might be real, but most of 'em aren't, but we gotta check every case or else the lawsuits pile up. And here you come in, and you don't even bother to make anything up!" He stood, looking down at Sam, who clutched at the counter nervously. "What are you, kid, stupid?"

Sam floundered for a moment, searching for something to say to this. He shook his head quickly. "No... I'm - I'm not - I... I passed the test! It's on the letter, here!" He held the letter out, and the man grabbed it and inspected it.

Wondering whether he was checking for fingerprints or watermarks, Sammael stood by and watched as the man went over every centimeter of the paper, squinting. Finally he snapped, "I'm taking this to my supervisor."

What seemed like hours, but was probably only several minutes, passed as Sam waited for the man to return, but finally he did. "Clerical error," said the man importantly, sitting back down at his desk again. "You didn't pass. Don't worry about it. Next!"

Sammael blinked. This couldn't happen. It couldn't. He knew all the test results were calculated and sent out by computers. Clerical errors shouldn't happen with something this important. "But sir..." he began.

"I said next," the man said. "In English, that means you get out and make room for someone who has a valid reason to be here."

He was obviously having a bad day, so Sam saw no reason to shout back at him, even if he did manage to come up with something clever, which, seeing as there had been a clerical error, was probably impossible for him to do anyway. If there had been a clerical error, that was. It didn't make sense. How could a clerical error happen in a situation without paper-pushers to make it?

Shrugging mentally, he wondered, bitterly, if perhaps these intelligent people who'd actually passed the USIQ had ingeniously invented a computer program that made clerical errors.

Sam trudged back to the elevators, glumly. On his way out of the building, he nearly bumped into someone he knew. Lomov.

"Hallo, Sammy," said Lomov.

Sam cringed. Everybody had a nickname they hated, and Sammy was his. "Hi, Leo," he said, smiling weakly. "Here to get an ID?"

"Yup," said Lomov. He was annoyingly cheerful. "You too?"

"Oh, I already got mine," Sam lied. "The test was easy, wasn't it?" He'd had horrible trouble on some of the reading questions, and he'd never been taught half of the math.

"Too easy," Lomov bragged. "They'll let absolutely anyone vote, I think."

"Yeah," agreed Sam. "Oh, I think I saw my dad's car; don't want to keep him waiting!" He nodded a quick goodbye to Lomov and hurried away before he had to put up with any more unpleasantness.

Standing at the bus stop, he shivered; under his thin jacket and scarf, he was freezing. Crossing his arms to keep warm, he leaned against the building.

"S-sammael Thanat-t-tos?" He heard a thin, shivering voice, and turned. It was Belinda Buz, teeth chattering and lips turned blue by the cold, and no wonder; she was wearing short sleeves in the middle of winter, without a jacket! She must be dimmer than everyone had thought, decided Sam.

"Um, hi, Belinda," he said, edging away from her slightly. She was the class leper, after all.

But his lukewarm greeting seemed to have the opposite effect on her. "It's so c-cold out here," she said enthusiastically, seizing on a topic of discussion. "I hate it, don't you?"

"Yeah," said Sam, staring straight ahead.

"So, what are you doing down here?" she asked.

"Getting an ID card."

"D-did you p-pass the test?" There was disbelief in her voice.

"Not really," he said glumly. There were advantages to having a class leper. It wasn't as though she was a friend, after all. He could tell her anything he liked. "Clerical error. I got a letter saying I did, and I didn't."

"Oh, I got one of those, too," said Belinda sympathetically. "Probably they let people like us send the letters out." When he remained silent, she added, "You know, stupid people."

"We're not stupid," said Sam bitterly. "We're just unlucky."

"Or both," said Belinda glumly.

"I hate them! I hate them all! Idiots! All of them!"

For a moment, Sam didn't know who the ranter was, but then he recognized the voice; the smug and on-top-of-things Leonid Lomov, of course. Once he was within viewing distance, he stopped and stared at Sam. "What are you doing here?"

"I saw a car that looked like my father's, but it was really someone else's," said Sam. "Did you get your ID?"

"No," said Lomov. "They think I failed the test. Say it was a clerical error."

"That happened to me, too," said Belinda. "But I was surprised when I got the email, anyway. I mean, I never pass anything."

Lomov frowned at Belinda for a moment, apparently thinking. "Who's she?" he asked Sam.

"Belinda? From Mechanics?" he supplied.

"And Dry Cleaning and Table-Waiting," added Belinda helpfully, "only I think Sam's in a different Dry Cleaning class. Aren't you?"

"Advanced Dry Cleaning," said Sam. She was calling him Sam, as though she knew him; he couldn't help but stress his advancedness.

"Yeah, we're in Remedial," said Belinda, half-apologetically. "Oh! Did Leo ever tell you about the time he bleached a tuxedo white?"

"What?" Lomov frowned. "I certainly don't remember doing that," he said quickly.

"Perhaps it was somebody else, then," she said softly, staring at the ground. Before Sam could ask what had happened, he realized that the hoverbus had floated silently up to their stop. They piled in silently, Lomov mercifully not calling Sam on his lie about his father's car. Glad of the warmth in the bus, they simply sat for a few moments, passively watching the world go by through the bus windows. Lomov shuffled out of the bus after a few stops, and Sam yawned widely.

"Do you think it was a clerical error?" Belinda asked softly, startling him.

"What?" Startled, it took him a moment to react.

"Do you think it -"

"I heard what you said," he said quickly. "Of course it was a clerical error. Why wouldn't it be?"

"Well..." She fell silent for a moment, then started up again, all her words coming out in a rush. "Maybe they don't want people like us voting at all. Maybe they're afraid we'll feel sorry for the Gershomites."

"They?"

"Everyone who knew they would pass the test. Everyone who had a chance. Everyone who was practically born with a Class A card in their pockets."

He stared at her. "You think there's a conspiracy to make clerical errors?" he asked.

"...it doesn't make sense," she said. "Computers do all of the calculations on the tests. Real people only come into it when we get our ID cards, and everybody knows they make computers that could do that job."

Sam watched her. He'd never actually talked to Belinda; he'd never been aware that she could form complete sentences, or might have anything interesting to say. "So... the clerical errors were on purpose?"

She bit her lip, squirming in her seat. "I know people who think that."

There was an uneasy silence.

"They're not all that bad, really," she added. "They just get bad press."

Yet another silence passed. "...what?" Sam demanded.

"Bad press. It's the government. Well, not the government, of course. Just the people in it."

"Of course," echoed Sam uncertainly.

"And if we're going to get a new government, we're going to have to vote," she added.

"Yeah, we're... what?" he asked again. He looked around the bus; no one seemed to be paying attention to them. "Are you a Gershomite?" he hissed.

Cautiously, she repeated his gesture of looking around. "...yes. Well, no. I mean, a little, maybe. Not officially. I don't really do much," she finished, weakly. "Just a little fundraising."

"Fundraising," he echoed. The image that suddenly came to mind was one of Belinda Buz going door-to-door selling cookies and hideous plates with cats on them so that the Gershomites could buy explosives. "You do fundraising. Right."

"Well, everybody needs money. Archelaus feeds his soldiers well. And I get some of the cut too, on good days."

"Do you... know Archelaus?"

"Of course not," she said, and now she was the one who sounded fed up. "The man's running a revolution across an entire continent. How could I have even met him? Anyway, he's in hiding, and I'm not." She bit her lip again, for a moment. "Are you interested?"

"In what?"

"Joining," she said. "Joining the cause. You just tell me and I'll bring you to meet some of the boys. They need people who are good with machines, and people who can read. You can read, right?" He nodded. "Good, that's good. You won't have to do anything dangerous, then."

"Can you read?" he asked.

She grimaced. "My sister was a Higher and my little brother's a Middle. We all read earlier than we needed to. I just didn't pass the preliminary testing. I never pass anything."

"Good thing you're not doing anything dangerous, then," he said.

She glared at him. "I do Fundraising. I know you won't have to, but I do. That's dangerous enough. And this is my stop," she said, standing, "so I'll see you at school."

He watched her get off the bus, numbly, before realizing he hadn't even told her he was interested.

That didn't eclipse the fact that he was, however. It sounded dangerous, no matter what she said. But it also sounded interesting. And maybe if he saved up, he could make up for not having a real job.

* * *

After school the next day, Sammael followed Belinda to her meeting with the Gershomites, walking quickly so as not to be late. The area they came through was strewn with broken glass and the remains of plastic bags and food wrappers. The occasional dead rat would come into view, lying glassy-eyed on its side, looking more solid and real than a live rat ever could. This was not, he realized, the best part of town. As it was, Sam rarely came into contact with the best parts of town, but were there a top ten list of bad neighborhoods in the city, this would probably be at least fifth.

"Um... where exactly are we going?" he asked hesitantly. He wasn't sure he wanted to know anymore.

"Shh!" she hissed furiously. "I should be using the Ali Baba method," she said.

"The what?"

"I should have blindfolded you and led you here," she explained. "They teach us to do that. I don't quite remember where it is from here..."

Now on the verge of panic, Sam cleared his throat. "Well, um, maybe next time. This isn't exactly the best place to be -"

"Lost?" Sam spun around, and found himself facing a tall, sickly-looking man, stubble-chinned and pale. He wore ratty clothes that, regardless of the color they'd started as, had apparently faded to a dull grey-brown.

"Oh! Jonathan, you scared us!" Belinda said, apparently relieved. "This is Sammael. He wants to help."

Do I? he wondered, but before he could decide, the street-fiend known as Jonathan had motioned them into an alley. "It was getting late," he told them, glancing over his shoulder. "Wouldn't want you to bump into any dangerous criminal types. They might try and sell you cigarettes. Should be ashamed, those people." He grinned widely, showing very few remaining teeth.

They followed the man into a grey building with broken windows, and he led them down some uneven concrete stairs into a room lit only by a dim orange lamp. "Sit down," he ordered, and Sam collapsed into an armchair, only to find that the seat cushion had all but fallen out.

From this precarious position, he looked around to see where Belinda was going, but she seemed to have vanished from the room. This couldn't be good.

"So," said Jonathan, inspecting him in the dim light. "Sammael. Must be fun spelling that for the Geniuses up there. What do you want?"

"Um, well, I was sort of... I mean, I passed, the, you know, the USIQ -"

"The Genius test. Yeah. And you got your little email -"

"Letter, actually."

"- and they told you that you could shove it, because you were stupid and you're never gonna be nothin' else but stupid."

"...sort of, yeah," said Sammael. While in other situations he might have agreed on principle, he now agreed with the man instantly, mainly because he didn't know what kind of trouble he might get into if he disagreed.

"So you're angry. So you want to do something about it. Am I right?"

Sam nodded numbly.

"So. Basics. Sammael. Means 'poison of God.' It's a good name. They think they're gods, y'know. Geniuses. Smart people. They think they about good and evil. Like gods."

"...yeah," said Sam, hesitantly. The man was obviously insane, and possibly violent. Damn it, where was Belinda? He was getting frightened, and she obviously wasn't afraid of this madman.

"So, what're you good at?" Jonathan asked.

"...stuff," said Sam descriptively. "Well, I mean, mechanics, and stuff," he amended. "And reading. I can read."

"Can you fix a hovercar?"

He nodded. "Real good at it, too."

"Can you pick a lock?"

"I can take it apart," said Sam, "and I know how they work."

"Electric locks?"

"Probably," he said.

"You know how to work a computer?"

"A little bit," said Sammael.

"How 'bout a gun?"

There he had to cringe. "We didn't cover those..."

"D'you know how to fix 'em?"

Sam shook his head. "Nope."

"Bombs?"

Again, he shook his head.

"You ever tried to find out about those things?"

Sheepishly, he shook his head again.

"Good," barked Jonathan, making Sam jump, though what with the sunken seat cushion, he didn't get very far. "Don't go looking for information on those things anywhere but underground. The government can trace lotsa things, and every time one of us idiots gets to thinking about bombs and guns and things, BAM! There's your face on the news, with a number to call and everything, and next thing you know, you're behind bars. Now, we'll put you in with one of our monetary liberation units, and you can help 'em hotwire hovercars and get into stores. You do know how to hotwire a car, right?"

He nodded silently.

"Good kid. Now go back home; Bella'll bring you to your next meeting."

Sam managed to pull himself out of the sunken chair, and headed towards the stairway, but then he stopped, and turned. 'Monetary liberation' sounded a lot like it fell under the umbrella of fundraising to him, and he thought she'd said he wouldn't have to do that. "Er, is that what Belinda's doing? Fundraising?"

Jonathan laughed hoarsely. "Fundraising? Is that what they call it now? Naw, not her. There's easier ways to get money. Go home, kid. It's probably past your curfew."

Sammael didn't like his tone of voice, but decided not to argue, and picking his way carefully up the uneven stairway again, he wondered what exactly he'd gotten himself into.

* * *

He soon found out that Gershomites were nothing like the people in his classes; he had neither the time nor the inclination to make up any stories about frontal valve chambers that needed realigning. Your position was based on how much money you'd grabbed, how many bombs you'd planted, and how many bodies they tallied later on the evening news, and there was little point in politicking simply for safety's sake.

His first robbery was a small one, a seedy little pawn shop in an unsavory neighborhood, and he'd been with two other seasoned thieves who could have done the job just as easily without him there. It was a typical for them; the authorities rarely realized that the group was behind such petty crimes, and so wasted their time chasing after unaffiliated bums.

Gradually, though, he learned to put hovercars together from the mismatched parts of broken cars. The results of his labors looked bizarre and ran unpredictably, but that they ran at all was something of a miracle to him, and any effort to help the Cause was accepted by the Gershomites.

It was about this time that he realized exactly what Belinda had meant by "fundraising," though of course it had been difficult not to realize when, on the way to a meeting, he passed Belinda, her arm around an older man he didn't know. She made no sign that she knew him, and as he watched, wondering if he'd mistaken someone else for her, they walked into a sleazy-looking motel.

Shuddering a bit, for Belinda's sake if not his own, he continued onwards to the subway station for the meeting. The Gershomites always met underground, in dark places, and you could always tell how long someone had been involved in the Cause by how far they would go to avoid the light. Some of the oldest in his cell wore sunglasses by night and day, and shied away from street lamps and florescent lights instinctively, and most had a sort of musty, mildewy odor that followed them constantly, when it was not mixed with the scent of gunpowder, dust, or blood.

It was gunpowder, dust, and blood that Sammael next learned about; Archelaus, regarded almost as supernatural by the others, had decided that their city was a hotbed of oppression. He wanted to expand operations in the city; to move beyond petty crimes and go for the throat.

Going for the throat meant blowing things up, of course. All that oppression and all of the Gershomitic rage, combined, was a pyromaniac's dream come true, and so everyone who could make things with tools was told to put bombs together, as many and as deadly as possible. No one was quite clear on where they were to be used, yet, but all would be put to good use; there was no such thing as too many bombs, according to Archelaus. The man, and, consequently, his followers, had many such mottos; the favorite among Sam's group was "Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups," a pearl of wisdom that had been found in antiquated pre-Disaster documents known only to a privileged few Geniuses.

About two years after he'd joined the Gershomites, his mother died in her sleep. As it was probably warmer wherever she was, and had more food, he did not take much time to mourn, only sold most of their things, made arrangements to have her cremated, and moved out, to live among those who fought for the Cause.

And in a few more years, when nearly every trace of his old life had vanished into the war machine of the Cause, he was called upon to use the bombs they'd built.

The target: a USIQ testing building in an area that was so far free of Gershomite bunkers, for while they had no qualms about throwing off the oppressors, killing their own was strictly forbidden. They would sneak in after dark, strategically place the bombs, then set them off remotely around midday when the crowds were largest.

Sneaking in after dark, however, remained problematic. Maps of the area showed no sympathizers near the building, though an adjacent flower-shop was owned by an unaffiliated and apparently blissfully ignorant Citizen Class B. That anyone still bought flowers in a world that let half of its people starve and freeze to death was a sign to Sammael that the country just wasn't worth all this trouble to save.

But one still had to try.

* * *

The night before the attack came, and as Sammael prepared, he couldn't help but notice how old he looked, how worried. It was what came of living such a stressful life, and all of it due to the horrors of the Geniuses and their pet government. It was lucky he hadn't been allowed to pass the test, really, considering what he might have become - one of them, or worse, a fool like the florist whose shop they were going to go through.

The mission was a small one; one person would drive the car and watch for signs of trouble, while another would shoot on sight any witnesses that might stumble upon their work. A third would take over the delicate task of breaking through the florist's basement into the basement of the USIQ building, then plant the explosives. Afterwards, they would make it look as though nothing had been disturbed.

Jonathan, who was now less a field agent and more of a paper-pusher, inasmuch as the Gershomites had paper-pushers, would be their driver. He had good reflexes, and his hearing was excellent from years of living underground in the dark. Belinda, who'd quit her whoring once she'd convinced their local leaders that she'd be of more use to them as a combatant, was to be their shooter if anything went wrong. And Sammael, who'd never killed anybody but knew how things worked, was to be their breaker-and-enterer.

Silence and the cold wind of the surface were their only company as Jonathan drove them to the florist's; the great hulk of the government building, a temple to the glory of oppression, loomed over them, and Sammael shivered as he eased the lock open. It felt as though the thing was watching them, though of course, any security cameras would be inside, and probably wouldn't be watched before the Gershomites set off explosion.

"It's creepy, isn't it?" he asked Belinda.

"Nah, just cold," she hissed. "You getting the lock open?"

"Yeah, I'm getting it open," he said, rolling his eyes. Pushing the door open, he motioned her inside, then closed the door again, softly.

They picked their way around the inside of the florist's; in here it was warm, and strangely well-lit. He felt odd, as though he'd just stepped into a different world. Seeing the great spiny cacti and the delicate orchids in their separate temperature-controlled containers, he realized that this was why people bought flowers. It was to remember what could be, to see that not everything was cold and starvation. If winter was there to make people appreciate the spring, so spring was there to reassure the world that winter need not last.

"It's beautiful in here," said Belinda, breathing in the perfumed air. "It smells like real air."

"Plants make air, you know," said Sam, half-remembering a book he'd read long ago, when he could still set foot in a library in the daylight, without being arrested. "I think."

"I thought air just was," said Belinda. "I don't think plants make air."

"No, no. All up to plants," he said. "Rainforests. That's why the air always smells so bad," he said. "The Geniuses are killing all the rainforests. Out of spite. Bastards."

"What do they make it out of?" she asked. "Air, I mean."

He was about to tell her that this was a very good question, when they heard a noise from above.

"What was that?" he hissed, remembering just in time not to shout.

"Shut up, Sam, if it comes down and makes trouble, I'll deal with it," she said.

"Just so long as you stand in front of me," Sam said. They were back in reality now; no point in pretending otherwise. "Let's try and avoid it, though; where's the basement?"

"Who's there?" shouted a voice, half-yawning. They'd seen that the shop had two levels, but they'd assumed that the second floor was just a storage area, not an apartment. They heard the sound of someone stumbling down a flight of stairs, and a door burst open to admit a man in striped pajamas. "Who are you?" he demanded.

Quickly, as if by instinct, Belinda raised her gun and shot. The man collapsed with a groan, and humidity began to fill the room; the bullet had shattered the front of one of the glass cases of orchids.

"Oh," said Sam faintly. "He's ...dead."

Another groan from the floor told them, quite clearly, that the man was not dead, merely in great pain.

"What do we do with him now?" Sam whispered.

"I could... shoot him again," said Belinda shakily.

"No, don't. It'll..." Kill him. "...wake people up. There might be more people upstairs."

"Who are you?" groaned the man. "What do you want from me? If this is about-"

"Shut up," Belinda hissed at the man. "Look, maybe if you stay here -"

"What? Me?" Sam asked.

"No, the guy standing behind you," she snapped, and Sam glanced over his shoulder on principle. "Yes, you. If you stay here, and this guy shuts up, we can get him back to the base and they can patch him up. I've seen Doc Belvedire patch up big gaping holes in people in pitch black - well, not seen, but I know he's done it. No one will know it's not you, and even if Doc Belvedire notices, I don't think he'll tell anyone.

"I'll give you... anything you want... but stay away from... it." The man's breathing was labored now; it was fast becoming clear that whatever they were going to do, they had to do it soon.

"All right," said Sam. "I'll do it. I'll get back okay. What d'you think he's ranting about?"

She shrugged. "Search me. Actually, search the place; if there's any money, we could always use it. And... I want one of those little cactuses there."

"Take it," the wounded man said. "Cacti. Plural of -"

"Take him back before he starts up again," said Sam. "Go call John in and have him help you; I'll hide."

"Cactuses... they shot me and they say 'cactuses'..." moaned the man as Sam skittered into the stairwell.

After the voices of Jonathan and Belinda had faded, Sam ventured up the stairs. There was no one else upstairs; apparently the man lived alone. Looking for money, he found a folder full of papers, and as he read them, he realized that it the man they'd shot was Leonid Lomov, the little bastard. So he hadn't managed to pass the test... but he'd threatened suit after suit, and the government had finally realized they'd better do something to get him to shut up, apparently. Skimming the papers, he saw that they'd let him work - and be paid for it - at one of the laboratories that was trying to patch together the shattered ecosystems of Europe, destroyed in the nuclear Disaster of fifty years prior. They'd offered money, but Lomov had always had such pride that he'd probably turned his nose up at unearned capital.

A grudging respect formed, gradually. True, Lomov was a weasely little bastard, but so, in a way, was Sam; the difference being that Lomov was trying to help a long-dead continent and Sam was actually doing something about something. Granted, the doing of the something required shooting florists who turned out to be government researchers, but such were the ways of the world.

But wait - this laboratory was in Italy! Empty, habitable, but quite a long daily commute. Scanning the papers yet again, he discovered that they'd made provisions for that, too; a teleport, used only in extremely urgent circumstances due to the expense of transport and extremely painful process, would be installed in the basement.

Something like that would be worth more to the Gershomites than any mere USIQ building; clear evidence of the government-concealed information, and a teleportaton device to boot! And cactuses - no, they were cacti, he reminded himself.

Taking another breath of what Belinda had described as "real air," he decided that, as long as he was going to have to be here for the day, he might as well take advantage of all the luxuries available to him.

Yawning, he went upstairs into the apartment, hoping to get some sleep.

* * *

The next day he spent marveling at the daylight; it was so long since he'd spent a whole day in it, been allowed to see beyond the shadows that had, for so long, made up his daily life. To look at himself in his mirror, even, was an experience not to be missed; his face was pale and greyish, and his hair, which he had originally thought, with a shock, had gone prematurely grey, turned out to be streaked through with grime.

Leaving the florist's, the cold wind nipped at his cheeks, and as he walked, he saw the children coming and going in the USIQ building, some happy, and some troubled. If any of his Gershomite colleagues had been with him, they'd have nagged him to recruit some of the glummer faces right away, but Sammael refused to do that. This was his day, his life, his last chance at it, and he drank it in hungrily.

Then, of course, came the darkness, and he realized what a fool he'd been; of course they'd come back to finish the job - they didn't know what was in the basement, and, he realized with a start, he didn't want them to. He didn't want to go back to the Gershomites any more; he'd realized how bleak it was, like some land of death turned to life.

But he didn't want to live by the real government's rules either; if he was going to live, he didn't want to go back to a life of bitter cold and starvation. He wanted to go somewhere warm, somewhere with light, and real air. But where? Neither the Gershomites nor the Geniuses offered such things.

And then he realized he didn't need to follow any Cause, didn't need to play by any rules. His path was open, his fate secure, his passage paid for and his ticket delivered. All he needed to do was let the teleport rip up his atoms and reassemble them in Italy. He knew how things worked. If Lomov could do it, why couldn't he?

But...

There was always a but. Always. Every situation had a "what about..." no matter how certain it seemed at first. And this was no different.

They were going to blow up the building. They were going to blow up the building, and the wonderful florist's shop, and the children, and then so many people would be cold - not cold for lack of heat, but for lack of life and light.

He would sit up and wait for them. He would sit, and wait, and talk them out of it, and if it didn't work, nothing would.

Hours passed, and once again, the familiar click of the lock being picked made itself heard. Waiting in the stairwell, he listened for the voices.

"All right, all we have to do is find him," he heard Belinda say. "They still think you're Sam, so we'd better get him down to plant these things."

"What exactly are you savages planning on doing?" Lomov demanded.

Sam chose this moment to step forward. "Nothing," he said.

"God, Sam, you scared me," hissed Belinda. "You're lucky I didn't shoot you!"

"Yeah, you are," Lomov said. "She's got good aim."

"I practice," said Belinda. Lomov shuddered; Sam hadn't the heart to explain that she practiced, as most of the Gershonites did, on cardboard cutouts. "Anyway," Belinda said, "d'you have the hole in the wall ready?"

"We're not blowing up the building," said Sam.

"What are you talking about?" she demanded. "They're orders from Archelaus himself -"

"Gershomites," spat Lomov.

"Shut up, Lomov," he snapped. "You're telling us all about Italy before we go."

"What?" Belinda demanded. "Italy? How are we going to -"

"He's working for the Eco-Euro labs," said Sam. "He nagged and whined so much the government gave him the job to shut him up."

"Have you been going through my papers?" Lomov demanded.

"Yeah," said Sam, absurdly pleased. "I have."

"That's illegal, you know. I could have you -"

"Yeah, Leo, sometimes we do things like that," said Sam, getting fed up with this. "We're criminals. Or hadn't you noticed, Mr. I-Have-A-Bullet-Wound-Through-The-Chest?"

"Actually, it only hit his shoulder," said Belinda. "If it got him in the chest, he'd probably be dead. As it is, he just can't move his arm."

"And it's my right arm, too!" mourned Lomov.

"Quit whining; I'm surprised Doc Belvedire didn't just take his scalpel and slit your throat," snapped Belinda. "He's been like this all night."

"He's probably just overtired," said Sam. "Can you sent Jonathan back to the base to tell them we're not blowing up the building?"

"Sure, we'll - tell them?" She stared. "Sam, you're nuts. We can't just say, 'oh, and by the way, we're moving to Italy and we don't feel like doing the job.'"

"Why not?"

"Listen, the teleport in the basement -"

"Woah, woah, wait," she said. "There's a teleport in the basement?"

"I told you, he's working for the Eco-Euro labs," he repeated. "One based in Italy, to be precise. So, in order to get to work, he's -"

"- using the teleport. Of course," she said.

* * *

John was quickly dispatched, and after the situation was explained to him, he decided he wanted to come along too, before the job killed him. He brought back a radio, and they commenced hurried negotiations with Archelaus himself. This was both an honor and a curse for Belinda and Sammael, both of whom had developed a sort of awe for their fearless leader - one which even a whole day in the sunlight could not quite erase. But a leader couldn't put a discontent follower to a good use, and rather than letting them stay in his service, Archelaus would rather they were out of the way, somewhere the government would never look to find suspected collaborators, and Italy hadn't been inhabited since the Disaster. He would agree not to blow up the building as long as he was allowed control over and access to the teleport. It led to a similar station several miles from any inhabited area so that the other researchers working at Lomov's lab wouldn't know the distance he'd traveled to get there.

And finally, Sam and Belinda and Jonathan, and a dozen other Gershomites who had tired of living underground like moles, were allowed to teleport to their new home.

A moment of intense pain, and Sam found himself in another place. It was just before sunset, and there was not another person in sight. Stepping out of the machine, he watched as Belinda materialized.

"Real air," he said, as she stepped down off the platform.

"Yes, real air. Are there any cacti around here?"

"I don't think so," he said. "But does it matter?"

Jonathan's tall shape coalesced. "Hurts," he muttered, then caught a sight of the sunset. "It's the sun..." he said, awed. "I haven't seen that for... for twenty years, at least."

"And the stars," said Belinda. "You never see the stars at night in the city."

"And there's real air," Sammael reminded them. "Real, honest-to-god air."

As another ex-Gershomite appeared on the transport platform, they pulled her over to their group. They were home.