Justice for the working class

The country I live in has been oppressed for years ever since the war for freedom was lost. In this controlling era, we are not taught history or anything about the past, only given roles meant to be filled to keep the higher-ups content. The working class has been mind-controlled robots from occupation, spouse, to even their life span. From what I’ve observed, people dressed in white have been chipped by the higher-ups; only meant to fill out the role given to them on their ID cards. The ones dressed in blue are the middle class who still have their free will and are meant to keep an eye on those dressed in white. I’ve become aware of this since my chipped malfunctioned, due to my vision of the past war.

Last night’s vision consisted of me feeling pain from a gunshot on a fiery battlefield, before I blacked out. I remember writing, in blood, a note that I placed in a heart shaped locket that was hanging around my neck. I can’t recall what I wrote, since then I've been incognito as a janitor at the hospital(my assigned occupation) while trying to figure out ways to escape this place and find answers to what happened back then to now. After almost a month I’ve formulated a plan to get outside the walls and find the location from my vision. I intend to steal pills from the hospital I work at and drug one of the guards to pose as them.

I start my usual morning routine of getting dressed in white uniform and eat the daily provided meal on my front step. There aren’t any stores here so no one makes purchases or a paycheck, everything we are given is what we only get to use. I eat in a hurry so I can rush to the hospital. I need to steal some sleeping pills so that I can drug a security guard during the morning shift to escape successfully to the outside.

When I get to my locker, I notice a slight change on my chore list. They want me to work near the newborns? I grab my cleaning supplies and go up the stairs to the sixth floor, and if you’re wondering I do have to lug all my cleaning equipment up and down the stairs. But I see this as an opportunity for me to build up my strength. I reach the floor and I nearly drop my mop. The babies they're so life-like. This was the first time I’ve met someone in the working class who was like me. I walked closer to the glass, I could feel a tear fall from my eye despite me feeling nothing but joy, and I looked at all the newborn babies unchipped. This is what life should all be about, having a chance of freedom and choice.

I made a run for the pharmacy once I was sure the coast was clear there was no sign of people or security cameras. I started to scan the labels on the bottles for words like sleep, hallucinations, or lethargic; I found Eszopiclone and hoped it's good enough to knock out a guard for a few hours. I slip a couple of pills into a napkin and place them in my sock. I exit the room and finish the rest of my duties for the day.

How can I avoid work tomorrow? Fake sick? As I exit work, I try to think of a plan to avoid work without attracting attention toward my absence. I could sleep improperly to get neck pain? It wouldn’t be too severe for me to be monitored or raise suspicion.

That night it was hard to fall asleep, but my plan worked as I had a crick in my neck the next day. Since I couldn’t fall back asleep I decided to just go to the hospital despite the time being so early still. The hospital’s front is empty and I walk to what I can only assume was the front desk with a lady wearing blue sitting behind it.

“Hello, can I have some assistance for my neck?” I ask. She looks me up and down before glancing hard at my neck. “Cause of pain?” She asks.

I reply, “I’m not sure I just woke up to awful pain in my neck.”

“Okay, hand over your ID card so I can view your health history”. I hand her my card and she scans it and types something at her computer. She slides it back and points to the clinic. “You’re Angela Lee, age twenty one correct?” She asks. I answer with a yes and she responds, “You’ll get treated over there, If you're still in pain after your treatment you’ll have to be out of commission for the day.”

“Okay, and thank you” I walk off towards the clinic doors.

Thankfully my plan works and I get the day off. The doctor told me I would have to rest all day and I should be well again soon. My neck feels better already thanks to the meds, but I can’t let them know that.

I move on to the next phase of my plan and throw two pills into a cup and hide the other cups at the water station. The plan fell into the play since the pills knocked him completely out fairly quick. I grabbed his keycard and stole his uniform, don’t worry I didn't leave him completely nude he was wearing briefs and a tank. Either way, I still hid him back at my house and placed him in my bed. Can’t be too sure some guard won’t peek in my room later. I toss on his clothes, braiding my hair and hiding it into the cap. I return to his station and wait until everyone is off the streets. I go to the exit door and sigh in relief when it unlocks.

I try to keep track of time as I walk through the forest. It’s been ten minutes so far. And if the forest in my vision burned it’d probably be restored by now. I hear a crack in the forest and stop in my tracks. Footsteps? I hold my breath and look around, through the trees I see a man and a woman dressed in ragged clothes in different colors. Outside guards? No, that can’t be it. I try to control my breathing and move care closer to them, still trying to stay unnoticed.

“Corbin you're being paranoid it’s probably just a deer”. A woman's voice?

“Don’t patronize me, Delilah”. A man shouts.

“Use your brain, how could someone from this city escape exactly? They’ve been chipped and kept in line all these years". The woman says, attempting to reassure him.

“Then leave if you don’t believe me”. He huffs, glancing around for me.

I misstep on a branch the two people hear. Before I can move they surround me. Damnit, they're armed. I can feel my heart pound violently in my chest.

“Hello, lovely day isn’t it” I wheezed. A long-haired man glares at me pointing a shotgun my way. A woman with greying hair stands beside him with a knife. They don’t respond to my comment. I speak again, “I’m not a threat, I was once chipped and I want answers as to what is going on in the city”.

The lady’s eyes softened, “You were chipped..?” I nod to her question.

“If you were chipped why are you wearing a blue uniform”. The man asks me.

“I could ask you the same thing about your outfit, but I drugged someone for their uniform to get access to the outside”. What I say grabs his attention.

I briefly explained why I left but not how. I wanted to gain their trust just enough to avoid getting shot. The man finally lowers his weapon and the lady follows, they look at each other again before speaking. “You remember the past? So that means you know a war broke out almost twenty years ago.” I nod. I also ask if they can assist me in finding where the location of the war took place. They agreed to a trade for the key card. We settled on an arrangement.

We reached our location and I started searching for my presumed corpse. Cozbi and Delilah look anxious and go off to do their own thing. I finally stumble upon a corpse with a heart shaped locket matching the one in my vision. As I grasp it everything floods in at once. I nearly passed out from all the memories being shoved in one after another. I remember everything now. I was a technologist leader of the revolutionary war. I clutched my locket before opening it. A crumpled paper falls out containing a photo of my past self and my crew who had fought bravely beside me. A younger version of Delilha and Corbin are in it. I flipped it and saw betrayal sprawled out on the back from my dried blood. It all makes sense why our freedom was lost, Corbin and Delilah betrayed and killed me. I can’t let them know about my plan to disable everyone.

I search the rest of my body for more clues. I stumbled upon a sphere device I had made in the past. Ah, it’s my robot friend Neo I had made when I was a technologist to hack all the brainwashing chips. Wait, that's it! I’ll use it to disable all the chips. I can end this war for good with us being victorious this time. I press its back button and Neo thankfully turns on.

“Hello, master”. The machine hums. I smile and hug my long-lost robot companion.

“It’s been too long,'' I said. I whisper my plans about disabling everyone’s chips inside the walls.

“Do you think it’s possible?” I ask Neo anxiously.

Neo hums for a while then dings a response, “I scanned our location, there appears to be a cell tower near the hospital inside the walls. If you can bring me near it I can disable all the chips in radius”.

I meet back with Delilah and Corbin and inform them I’ve found my locket and was ready to return before the guard I doped woke up.

When we reach the door I unlock it and hand them the keycard as we had agreed upon. I quickly rush inside and slam the exit door. I get to my home as fast as I can hoping my plan hasn’t been ruined just yet. Luckily for me, the guard was still fast asleep. I quickly dress him and get into my uniform. I drag the guard’s body back to his station and leave him leaning against the wall.

I make my way towards the hospital. I’ve been given a second chance at life to fix my past failures. As I reach the rooftop I can see the cell tower in sight. As I’m about to take Neo out of my pocket a loud ringing fills my ears along with sharp pain. I’ve been shot? Seriously again?

I groan and see Corbin and Delilah standing far behind me. Corbin walks towards me and says, “I didn’t believe it for a second but it’s you, Jacklyn”. Crap figured out I came back to live. Corbin and Delilah had worked alongside me during the revolutionary war. I’m not sure as to why but they betrayed me but it resulted in life for the working class to be mind-controlled.

“That was my name, don't wear it out more than you already have” I gasp. “I don’t know why you guys exactly did what you did to me and your own team, but I won’t let you see it through this time”. I grab Neo and throw it towards the tower. I hear another shot fire and am met again with pain in my side. Before passing out I hear Neo chime, “Upload successful”.