Beneath the Surface | ONC 2023

vi | ezra

THE SURFACE

MY BREATHING IS SHALLOW.

It only takes a moment for Fear to settle in, leaving me nearly no space to breathe and rendering my body crippled. Somehow, the sunlight above us still manages to cut through the thick glass around me, casting a rainbow fragment across my leg.

I force myself to take a deep breath, naming each color I see. Sunflower yellow. Scarlet red. Lavender. Emerald Green—as rich as Ivy's eyes. To my surprise, she's already watching me when I look up, her face contorted into an expression of apology. An expression that reminds me of the events of the last hour.

The broadcast that left the entire bunker speechless. The exposed lie of the girl I'd placed my hope in for so long. Seeing Ivy face to face for the first time, then letting Anger cloud my judgment. Watching as the two people I have left in this world were stolen from me. Seeing sunlight for the first time as my bunker got ambushed.

My home.

Even though it holds memories that I'd much rather forget, it's still the place that shaped me. The place that made me who I am. And now, I'm locked in a glass box on the Surface, unaware of what's going to happen to me next.

I check in with Ivy again, an unspoken connection between us beyond the facts of the situation. She's the one I was captured with. The one who saw Grant and Gracie be taken by Authority soldiers. The one person who was the start of my entire life falling apart. A tingling sensation slowly engulfs my right leg, forcing me to shift my weight.

And that's when I notice something else I hadn't on the way up. Stretching far above our glass prisons is yet another glass box, its sides disappearing into the solid ground underneath our cells. I point to the corner diagonal to Ivy's cell, moving my head side to side in an attempt to show her what I found.

She looks up, mocking my movements. Her body freezes after a moment, indicating to me that I'm not just imagining the other box. And that she wasn't a part of whatever's happening.

If this was all crafted by her—the war, the lies, the raid—why would she stage her own capture? Show up in my room with an apology on her lips? Guilt rises in the pit of my stomach, threatening to swallow me whole until a holographic screen materializes on the wall of glass in front of me.

Standing in the frame is the same man who invaded our bunkers, destroying everything the Garden stood for. The man that Ivy seemed to know. He has a slender build, much more than sorrow in his eyes. Something closer to Hunger and Rage. Like they've been lifelong friends of his. Like Monotony was to me.

His suit is crisp, with not a wrinkle in sight beyond the ripples that run across the holographic screen every few seconds. It's almost laughable, the way his world looks in contrast to ours. Through one of the frosted glass walls, I can make out the general shapes of a skyline, telling me there's an entire city of citizens that have been living on the Surface.

And letting us rot beneath their feet.

He clears his throat before addressing his unwilling viewers. Unwilling victims. "I'm sure you're all wondering what's happening to you, and we'll get to that in due time. First, I want to introduce myself. My name is Alexander True. I am the head of The System, an administrative society dedicated to making the world a better place."

Is this guy serious? Lying to people for a century is the exact opposite of making the world a better place. I'm sure if he was on the other side of things, he'd feel the same way. To know that I lost my parents under the guise of a dictatorship leaves my blood boiling. I force myself to listen closely, knowing Ivy's doing the same.