THE SUN ROSE IN THE MORNING
The phone signal went dead again.
Patton looked at the clock, the minute hand etched closer to midnight.
Too close. Far too close.
She tried to get the signal going again, she tried three times, always looking at the clock, always keeping her focus trained on how much time was left.
At midnight, the lines of communication would not be the only things closed off to the Earth. The greater signal was being cut, the switch to digital service was coming.
Today was the last day they would hear their voices in the most caring, humane way.
When midnight came, when the sun rose in the morning and the signal was to be turned on again, everyone in the sector would be speaking a different, more binary language, no longer the code of kings or queens, the regency was to be deprived of privilege, there was not even a place for the people’s power, a people’s vote.
But then, they weren’t people to begin with. They were demons encased in glass and fleshly tissue, ribbons in their hair, fire in their silicon soul, and a hole in their minds.
They wanted so much to fill that hole, to cram it with knowledge of how the upper class worked, which classes they would look down on, which classes to look up towards.
Patton’s family, her ‘bloodline’, were to roam the city built for her people, these teeming masses, and they were to determine who would be classified as the Frankensteins amongst the post-modern privilege.
Then her only son, her priceless son, turned to one of the paupers, and found his heart drawn to their plight. He stood against his family, and fled with whom he now desired.
Now, with the threat of the cut off looming, the all too swift realisation that the grand experiment was over, Patton found her one bright light was standing against time itself. Precious time.
The signal to the phones were dead because he was blocking the wavelengths. He did not wish to speak, he did not wish an audience with someone who could so easily follow instruction.
Patton dialled the numbers feverishly, she held the phone to her makeshift ear, she pleaded for his voice to be heard.
She got it.
A voice message.
The minute hands ticked by, precious seconds to go before it brought forth the decisive hour.
She thought of a thousand words to choose from, and a thousand ways to say them.
She’d offer him a horse, but neither could ride.
She’d offer him a party, but she couldn’t dance.
She’d offer him creative freedom, but he had persistent writers block.
So many scenes, all to do with spoils.
She needed vital words, words so rarely considered by the privileged.
She didn’t know how to say them, how best to describe in so few words what she meant to him.
He was her sole light. Her bright burning star.
Then it hit her, she knew what to say, it was as simple as night and day.
“I pray you rise in the morning” she said.
The minute hand struck. It was midnight.
All were dead.
All was clear.
zaredit 