Child from the Past

The child still remains a mystery to us.

It was two weeks into the month of Partners when she arrived. In the early hours of the morning when all the world still slumbered, I raced out of the Center doors and into the endless fields. Distant glimmers of the sunrise echoed across the horizon, and I, knowing the town would soon awake, made my journey in utter silence.

They had found her buried neath a sheet of tinted glass. So small, she was; pale-skinned and lone and deeply in sleep. At first, I had no idea why the old remnants of humanity would bury a young one under tiles of clay and dirt- it seemed frivolous to me, if that was even the word to use- and later on, she explained to me that the chamber was a "bed," in all technicalities. Flimsy bedclothes filled the bottom, hardly fit enough for someone as young as herself.

I knew all along that the Past Ones were a ridiculous people.

We managed to wake her once the sun had slithered into the sky. Her eyes claimed to be a bright, bright blue, something that even we, the sickly Operators, could see like the light of day. I knew from the way she stared fearfully that none of us were familiar to her. I knew from the way she stuttered that it had been decades since she'd talked.

And I knew from her horrified expression that the air was slowly deteriorating her lungs.

Ah. I know this must be confusing.

Whosoever manages to find this scrap between this year [XXXXXXX] and whenever time in the future, I suppose I must explain. Perhaps it will be talked in history books if society reverts to its hitherto state. My name shan't be mentioned (Operators have numbers instead of proper monikers), but I do say that I am the head Operator.

To stiff a scientific ramble, climate has dramatically changed since the Past Ones' time. Air molecules have gone from anything from carbon dioxide, helium, and other destructive gasses to strictly oxygen. The deoxyribonucleic acid in the veins of humanity now processes such an unimaginable thing.

This child, however, had lived so far behind our time that pure oxygen was like poison to her, and immediately we made an attempt to bring her to the Center.

I asked her name once we'd returned. For a moment, she seemed confident in her answer, but it soon dawned on her that she could not remember her name.

My stomach still churns with the thought. As the lead Operator, not knowing my own number would be an embarrassment to all, and as a child, I cannot imagine how awful it would feel to be unable to remember your own title. A name detains one's whole personality, and those who haven't a name haven't a personality.

From then on, the days dragged.

I stayed by the child throughout every test we ran. It was clear she was in constant pain, for her heart thumped achingly, erratically, in her chest and in her eyes was the shimmer of torment. But the assistants and I understood that we mustn't pause the experiments.

Instead, this look of torture prompted us to continue.

I have not yet concluded what happened her ailment. To this day, it confuses me. Either her childish nature began to show and she forgot her ailment, or it began to settle the more relievers we injected. Whatever way it happened, she started to smile more often than naught, and I noticed, despite being unable to remember her name, her personality shone brightly through.

I asked of her age, wondering if there would be a way to intersect her with the other Partners. Slowly, and after a minute or so of hesitation, she answered with a quiet, “I’m 7.”

To this day, I remember the first I heard her speak to me in her lighthearted, innocent voice. It was as if a new door had been opened; never had I heard a child speak directly to me, and never had they meant their words so genuinely. And it was clear that she wished to become well acquainted with me, and I was not opposed to the idea.

It wouldn't have hurt to question the child, and it would hurt even less to be friendly with her. I was not about to put out this opportunity to understand what'd happened to this young one. I, the lead Operator, knelt down to her height, just to see what it was like through her eyes, and asked, softly as I could manage, "Would you like to be friends?"

There was a momentary delay, and she, after considering, nodded her head, a smile gracing her features.

From then on, I made sure not to leave her side. I knew that it was hardly procedure for an Operator to become familiar with a child, but what other choice did I have? She was weak and horribly ill, though her attitude did not show much of it. Her temperature would rise and fall in fevers and chills, and there was an everlasting look of bleary fogginess in her eyes.

...I had hoped it would go away once the testing finished, but... it did not.

It stayed. Red edges rounded her eyes with an utterly painful sting. I could see that she tried with everything in her to remember the simplest of things- the alphabet, addition and subtraction, the colors of the rainbow- and it was wearing her down so much that she was constantly exhausted.

I wonder how it felt. Operators are said to have intelligence that surpasses everything in this world, so it is, not to be condescending, something I have never experienced before.

...Sometimes, far-off reader, I wished I could feel her pain, just to understand what it might've been like.

Several weeks after the testing had ended, the construction for the child's room was finished, and she was introduced to her new home. Scenery out the window stretched far and wide, encompassing all of the wheat fields, and the sun spilled warm light onto the carpeted floor. The walls were decorated with all sorts of colorful paintings and toys were strung neatly across the bright rug.

The moment she entered the room, her entire demeanor changed. She was so excited about having a small little cubby to herself that I began to feel bad for her. I watched aimlessly as she ran about, happy as a buzzing bee, wondering what it might've been like when she was last awake. How bad had the Past Ones really been?

I still do not know the answer to this.

But now I know that I am worse.

After spending several minutes examining every corner of her new room, she stumbled towards me and breathed a quiet "thank you." I gave a smile as the usual response, and she went on to imagine with her toys.

...Admittedly, I am precautious to continue. Perhaps this information will only ever be safe if it dies with me.

But as the head Operator of the year [XXXXXXX], it is my duty to recount all events before my resignation, and if anything, this is the chief.

The child, over an extensive period, became more and more comfortable with the idea of living inside the Operator Center and comforting herself in her own room. She and I spent most of our time coloring or drawing, since she would say most things whilst distracted with something else. I learned, over this time, that she had one brother, 4 years older than her, and two dogs, one small and one large. Sometimes she would tell stories of things that occurred before she awoke here, and oftentimes she would pause in the middle of these stories because of a forgotten event or quote.

There was something that scared her the most out of forgetting, and I began to understand that lightly mentioning it would cause her to seize up.

Her name.

Pain would flash dramatically whenever she was asked of it; the scarlet definition around her eyes seemed to violently sting. She would stutter out syllables to try and help herself remember, and only when I told her that she was safe and alright would she calm down.

...My concern for her health began to grow when the assistants noticed that she wished to go outside. She must've already pushed past her experience when she first awoke, when the air burned her lungs. I knew that letting her play with the other Partners could be a possibly dangerous idea, especially because they knew not of who she was and she was much, much different than all of them.

Partners are used to Similarity. Children beyond the time of the Past Ones have all gone into Similarity, and there are now only minor differences to tell them apart. It is easy for us, of course, and for themselves, since they notice all of the minor dissimilarities in each other, but to the child, it might be shocking, and to them equally so.

Still, it was a chance for a new experiment with her, a new type of socialization other than speaking with me. I was against the idea for a long while until she asked me to play with the other children outside, and from there I gave in.

The assistants did their best to make her seem like she was a part of the Similarity, brushing back her hair and fitting her clothes and practicing how to speak politely with her. But I knew that she would never fit into the Similarity- it would be too much for her mind to process in such a short time, and the Past Ones simply did not function in that way.

One morning, before the day that she was to be sent outside, I cancelled the Similarity session and instead invited her inside of the Operator Room, where she often liked to stay.

I saw the happiness in her eyes when she looked upon the monitors lining the walls. Video images flashed in each of them, illuminating the otherwise dark room with a somewhat ghastly light. And I asked, gently as I could, if she would like to pick a name for herself.

It is customary (and has been since the beginning of time) for parents to name their child what they feel fit. But her parents were nowhere to be found, and I thought it only right for her not to have a number, as the other Partners, but to have a name, something to give her personality, something to give her inner light.

She thought for a long moment, and then looked up in amazement.

"Really?"

I procured a list in the earlier day of names. She read them to herself and stopped at the very last one, eyes widening.

"Carys..." said she breathlessly, amazed at the sound of the word.

I smiled.

"It means 'love'."

Bravely, she chose the name Carys, finding it "the best name in the world" (according to her words), and the next day, she bravely stepped outside the doors.

I was so concerned ("worried sick," as you might say) that I stood by her side all the while, my heart jumping into my throat with every breath she took. It was a few moments before she gathered the courage to walk toward the playground, and soon enough, I was watching her play with the others.

It seemed a miracle. I stood and stared in pure disbelief, wondering how she could adjust to the air so quickly, when all of a sudden fifty gasps echoed from the playground at once and I rushed from my spot at the door.

It was not a miracle at all. It only made everything worse.

Carys had collapsed into a fit of harsh coughing in the center of the playground floor. Blood spattered onto her sleeves as her lungs fought for air that she could breathe. The children, as if all one group, pushed and shoved against each other, terrified. They cried and gasped at the horrible sight, each staring at me with almost a sense of distaste.

Panicking is an aspect of humanity that still exists within the veins of the Operators.

And it is a fault that none can erase.

I, too, panicked, and the children watched in horror as their new, dying friend was dragged away from the outside and disappeared behind the dark doors of the Operator Center. There was a resounding slam, a shutter, and almost simultaneously, each of them began to sob.

Beyond that point, they never saw her again.

Carys's ailment returned that very day, and she was bedridden for several weeks. The pure oxygen had destroyed so much of her lungs that it was difficult for her to breathe at all; we had to feed air inside of her using tubes. The pain in her eyes returned, the red sting rounding them made its way back, and it was soon clear that this damage could not be reversed.

I spent many days in isolation.

The assistants begged me to say hello to the other children, to assure them that everything was alright, but I refused. It would make no sense to lie to them. Behind these walls, a child was slowly fading away, and to tell them that it was OK would a lie worse than the devil's.

The girl never recovered. Only enough to draw, to color, to look outside and watch the others play. Only enough to think of what life would be like. Only enough to tell me stories of the time before this.

Weaker and weaker she became every day. I was on the verge of cancelling the Partners program because of her incurable disease. There was no stopping what destruction had been done. She was dying.

...My time to resign is almost here.

No Operator has ever resigned before. It is not allowed. It is considered restricted amongst the assistants.

But I have no reason to continue my research. I have done enough; I have heard the words of time from the mouth of a withering child. I am resigning. And I will be the most hated Operator in all of history.

Carys died soon after she ventured outside. A fit of terrible coughing took her soul; scarlet red spread up her sleeves; the child with the name "love" was taken in a matter of moments.

She told me everything of the Past Ones. Of having pets, of being sick, of working in skyscrapers, of crossing the ocean, of complaining over presidents and monarchs and rulers, of sailing and of watching television and of going to school, of rockets shooting to the Outer and grazing the white surface of the moon.

She told of the world long-gone.

And now I know what our world- what the Operators, what the Partners, what the assistants and the attendants, what we all- are missing.

Love.

We no longer have love.

And Carys was the last memory left of love.

…I will not keep these files. The assistants have earlier said to “reset your password,” which I will undoubtedly do.

…If you, far-off reader, if you have somehow managed to recover this password in whatever time you live in, I hope that love has returned. I hope that love has not died away like it had here.

I hope that the story of this child named love still lives on.