The Era

The outside world was unknown to her, but she could see a glimpse of it through the window in his room.

He stepped in front of her to calmly close the door to the room past his desk in the office. But she’d already seen a glimpse of the beyond. Dhristi did not understand what she had just observed, except that viewing it was forbidden. The tendrils of electricity flashed and she heard banging in the distance and the door shut with a click. She didn’t know why The Protectors forbid her and her family from going beyond the compound. It had always been that way. As long as anyone could remember.

With a startle, Dhristi realized that he was still talking to her. “Forgive me. What?”

His ancient brow furrowed with irritation. “I said, your attention to detail has been lacking for the last week. If your performance does not improve, we will have to consider recalibration.” His tone was drenched in disdain and condescension.

“Of course, Sergeant Major. I will improve my outputs immediately.”

His scoff of dismissal was incredulous as he lowered his head to return to the panel of screens set into his desk.

“Thank you Sergeant Major. Have a good day, Sergeant Major.”

He did not respond, but merely resumed clicking on the response pad, so she spun on one heel with a squeak of her rubber boot on ceramic tile. She hustled for the exit. Just as her hand grasped the doorknob, his course and gravely voice called out across his office, reverberating off the stalactite ceiling. “I am sure I don’t need to remind you of the consequences of curiosity.”

She gulped down the bile that had sprang up from the depths of her empty stomach. “No sir. Of course sir. Have a good day sir.” The involuntary bow she gave him felt like a vice grip on her spine. She quickly opened the door and stepped out to the clammy heat of the atrium. She quietly shut the door behind her and walked swiftly past the receptionist filing her nails into talons.

“So what did Sergeant Major have to say about the outbreak? Are we all doomed to be recalibrated?”

“Keep your voice down! The Protectors might hear you!” She hissed at her arrogant brother’s smirk.

He spun the back of the chair around across from her in the cafeteria. His golden mop of hair flopped over his face as he sat down on the orange plastic. Dhristi noticed that it was too long for regulation again but reminding him to cut it always ended in a fight so she simply shook her own copper mane in resignation.

“I don’t think he’s aware of everyone involved. He was lecturing me about my productivity. But that’s not the most important thing! That big iron door behind his desk was open when I went in. There was this huge rectangle that looked like the hallway displays except It was moving!“

“What?! Like a wall view screen? Tell me exactly what you saw.”

“It was like the displays in the hallways except it wasn’t the usual blue background with green. There was steam blowing around and these sparks of electricity were flying across the screen. There was the sweetest smell on the air, Like the cold of the refrigeration unit mixed with something like the floor cleaner but without the chemical nose tickle! I don’t know how to explain it. I knew I wasn’t supposed to see it but I don’t know why!”

“Dhristi. Are you absolutely sure?”

“Yeah. It was weird, Aahir. There was a crackle in the room and all my hair stood on end as the electricity flashed. It was like sparks off the radiation machines down in the forge except it didn’t seem connected to anything. I heard this booming in the distance like a low drum beat.”

“Dhristi. I think we have to tell Dhana.”

“Hey Losers!” Adil walked out of the kitchens, wiping his hands on the apron protecting his gray jumpsuit, “Dhristi, did you get something to eat?”

“Hi Adil! Guess what Dhristi saw in the Almighty Sergeant’s office?”

“Aahir! Shut up!”

Adil chuckled at the sibilings’ bickering.

“Peace. There is no need for this hostility. First we eat. Then we talk this out, yes?” His good-hearted chuckle warmed Dhristi’s cold stare. She couldn’t stay mad around Adil. His kind amber eyes left her legs feeling like gelatin and his even temper always contrasted with Aahir’s arrogance. The fact that Adil was the only man that Aahir would listen to helped as well.

The men sauntered off towards the kitchen in search of left overs that Dhristi was sure Adil had just put away. Dhristi grabbed her view screen and sketch pad to stuffed them into her hip bag. She followed them, trying to conjure up that sweet smell from the sergeant’s office again.

Later that evening, Dhristi scuffed her boots on the tile as Adil escorted her deep into the cavern to see Dhana. Adil smiled as she dodged a stalagmite in the center of the passageway.

“Watch where you’re trudging!” Growled a miner covered in grime heading up the incline past them. His face appeared as black as the cavern from the layer of soot.

“Sorry, sir.” Dhristi muttered, stepping out of his way to let him pass. Adil chuckled under his breath. “What’s so funny?” Dhristi glanced at him, moths fluttering in her now full belly.

“You’re always so polite. It’s like you’re afraid someone might notice you.”

“If no one notices me, no one can take advantage of my incredible wit and brilliance.”

“And clearly your humility.” Adil said with a laugh that rebounded down the cavern’s hall. “Here we are.” Adil pointed towards the ornately decorated stoop of Dhana’s home. The symbols painted across the metal door were foreign to Dhristi but beautifully made with melted down silver and copper. The draft chimes hanging on either side of the door frame were made out of scraps of metal and delicate gemstones. They rattled slightly as Adil stepped up to knock.

“Come in.” They heard called from beyond the door before his fist met steel.

“I guess she’s expecting us.” Adil said with a grin.

The door creaked open on a badly rusting hinge. The heat was so ambient this deep in the compound that Dhana’s home was stifling with the smells of smoke, incense and cooking oils. The onslaught of black and gray curls attacked Dhristi immediately upon entering the room, in a hug scented of amber, francensense and brimstone.

“Oh sweet Dhristi. My little copper pot! How are you, love?! How is the forge?! Are they feeding you enough down there? Is Dragan keeping his hands to himself? I told him I’d skin him alive if he messed with you or Aahir anymore! And how about you my dear Adil!? Have you got a finger band for my little Dhristi-Coal yet?! I’m expecting a matching any day now, you know! The canaries told me so this morning with their songs!” At the mention of the birds, the cage behind her erupted in tweets of joy and well wishes. “Oh hush you drumsticks! I wasn’t talking to you. No Tweetie! I am not bringing you more seeds! You’ve had enough today.” A particularly fat canary hopped across the bars of the cage, demanding more treats. “Well come in.Come in! Don’t want to let the heat up.” Dhana shut the door behind her granddaughter.

“Hello GrandDhana, How are you feeling?”

Dhana patted down her wild mop of curls. “Oh fine. I’m fine. But how are you? Why have you come? How was the outbreak? Any Protectors with broken bones I can pretend to mend?”

“Adil stifled most of it before the Protectors got involved. He offered sweet bread to everyone that sat down and held their tongues. So most everyone cooled off after that.”

“It cost me half my budget of sugar for the week!”

Dhana let out a warm hearty laugh that made Adil and Dhristi chuckle too. “Oh, I’d have loved to see Aahir’s face! He was just chomping at the bit for a fight when he came down yesterday!”

“Yeah, he got a little out of hand for a minute but once I grabbed him to scrub the pots he shut up pretty quick. He was cursing me to Magma Come though. I thought he might summon it from the depths with the curses he was flinging.” Adil continued with a worried expression, “But Dhristi was called up to Sergeant Major’s office shortly afterwards. I don’t know why they thought she was involved. She wasn’t even on the third shift crew! Why did he ask for you, Dhristi?”

Dhristi nervously picked at a button on her jumpsuit, trying to put off the inevitable.

“Well come on Dhristi-Coal. Out with it dear.”

“Um well…” stalling again. She looked up to her grandmothers kind chocolate eyes in panic.

“Ah!” Dhana slapped her knees, stood up and flipped a switch on the wall. Instantly an engine inside the wall kicked on and the fire under the stove roared from an ember to a blaze. The gear’s noise made Dhana have to move her lips exaggeratedly to be read instead of heard. She sat down and mouthed “continue dear!”

Dhristi emulated her grandmother by exaggeratingly telling her about the moving view screen.

Dhana watched her mouth intently. She stood quickly again, flipped off the switch to create deafening silence! In a whisper, “You saw what?!”

Responding also in a whisper, “I saw a moving view screen with sparks like the radiation units except they weren’t attached to anything! And the air smelled like a refrigeration unit mixed with cleaning supplies but without the chemicals. There were these swirls of steam rolling across the screen. My hair was standing on end, like I had touched a live wire and I heard this banging drum in the distance that I felt in my bones as real as my own heartbeat. The view screen was dark with blues and purples but they weren’t staying still they kept moving and moving, like water flowing but floating across the view screen. And I’ve never seen a view screen this big before! It took up his whole wall!!”

“You’re sure that is what you saw?!”

“Yes, Grand Dhana. But what I can’t understand is why I knew I shouldn’t be looking at it. It felt forbidden. Like watching the men in the forge with their jumpsuits down to their waist. Like I was going to fall down dead just for daring to look.”

“I remember hearing about something like this when I was a little girl. I think what you saw is called a Storming.”

“A Storming?”

“Yes. When the roofs were higher and our people lived above, the roof would sometimes get angry and throw a rage of water down onto the people who displeased it. But why would the Sergeant Major want you to see that?! He knew you were coming. Why leave the door open if he knew you would be there?”

“I don’t know. He didn’t even seem startled, like I was in trouble. He just said that my attention to detail had been lacking and that I’d need to improve or I’d be recalibrated.”

“Hmm…” Adil chimed in, “What if he did it on purpose? Gral, the chef from level 1 was telling me at Ration Day that Sergeant Major was sympathetic to the Miners’ cause and was intentionally feeding rebellion. I brushed it off as gossip until now.”

“Adil, I think it’s time to start The Plan. Tell the chefs at the next Ration Day to spread the word. We March the day after Ration Day.” Ghana had a gleam of rage in her usually kind eyes.

“Whoa! Granddhana! we can’t incite an entire rebellion based on something I saw. I’m not even sure WHAT I saw.”

“Listen here girl. What you saw is called a Storming and you saw it through A Window. You have never know the great roof called Sky and I mean to see it in my lifetime! We have rebelled for much less. And this time, we end this cycle of control. The Era of The Protectors is over