Chapter 4
For the past three years, I’d barely left the institute.
Now here I was on my own in the most important destination in the entire universe. Suffice to say, it was packed with aliens. Every person I passed appeared to be from a new and different race I’d never seen before.
If the people weren’t confronting enough, then the sheer megalithic technologically advanced architecture was.
The planet I disembarked on was arguably the biggest.
I’d been expecting an enormous densely populated city that stretched across the whole planet. That’s not what I found.
It was beautiful. Large glistening white buildings separated by bridges and lakes and gardens.
In the sky, you could see the other planets and security stations and bridges of Central.
I’d been in the future three years now, but this was decidedly the most futuristic experience I’d had.
It felt as if I’d walked into the concept art for a video game or somehow wandered inside a sci-fi movie.
I disembarked with a bunch of other passengers, but they quickly walked off, keen to complete whatever task had brought them here.
Me, I walked around in a bit of a daze for an hour or two.
There was so much to see. From hanging gardens to floating lakes, it was a wild trip for my eyes and my imagination.
It was also a distraction.
I’d already identified where the Central contract building was. It would be hard not to. It was the biggest building I’d ever seen. It was like a whole city back on old earth. The outside was made of undulating white sail-like constructions that glistened under the sun.
It took a damn long time for me to find the courage to approach the building, then even longer to go inside.
There were a series of security checkpoints leading up to the building, which I thought was overkill considering the number of security checkpoints I’d had to go through in order to get onto the planet in the first place.
Each time my implant would be scanned, and I’d be let through, often with a curious glance when the guard realized I was a newfound one.
It took about 20 minutes to actually get inside the building.
By that time my nerves had exploded. It felt as if live wires were crackling through my entire body. I was so jittery, I had to secure a hand onto my stomach and force myself to breathe lest I faint.
If I thought the outside of the contract building was incredible, then the inside was mind blowing.
It was that same odd mishmash of styles that I’d encountered in so much of the rest of the universe. The building was like a warren, with countless corridors and rooms branching off.
Occasionally a door would roll open to let someone through, and I’d catch a glimpse of the room inside. Devices would be strewn across tables, or neatly stacked along walls, with pot plants and artwork dotted everywhere, and aliens rushing to and fro.
In fact, come to think of it, there was artwork everywhere. Statues, vases, old contraptions. It was like walking through the greatest museum I’d ever seen.
It took me a moment to realize that the art wasn’t there for show. I saw an official-looking man in the regal attire of the Foundation leading two aliens to a room where they carted away a boxful of a hodgepodge of items from intricate statues to old engine parts.
These were all inheritances, weren’t they?
It took me a long time to reach the main reception area of the contract building. I hadn’t been lying when I’d said it was a small city. I saw people whizzing around on small hovercraft, but I had no idea where they got them, and I doubted anyone would give one to me. So I just had to walk.
Eventually, I found the line, and what a line it was. I swear it stretched for blocks. There was every imaginable alien, every imaginable color, form, and shape.
It should have been boring waiting there for hours, but it wasn’t.
Well, at least it wasn’t until he showed up.
It was when I was close to the front of the line that something happened.
The massive queue started to break apart, everybody muttering in their own tongue.
At first, I didn’t know what was happening, and I stood there and watched.
A man was walking down the enormous long hallway.
He was human, or at least he resembled a human. Tall, proportioned shoulders, a sharp jawline, and a piercing gaze.
He should have been handsome, except for that gaze.
It was like staring into the center of the Big Bang.
It was also exceedingly arrogant.
He was dressed in a well-cut black tunic with a high collar that showed off his trim neck and angled jaw. There were no decorations save for a purple pin on the left breast of his jacket. There was also a slim line of purple trimming around his collar.
He looked like an extremely trendy priest, well, apart from the death glare.
I stood there, and I stared at him until he walked right up to me.
“What are you doing?” he asked in a clipped, curt tone.
I turned bright red; I could feel my cheeks threatening to burn right off.
“Why aren’t you following customs?” Those piercing steely gray eyes narrowed.
I started to stutter, my blush becoming iridescent. “Sorry, did I do something wrong?”
“You are refusing to yield your position in the line to me.”
Everyone was looking at me, including officials.
“I…” I bit my lip and shrugged my shoulders. “Who are you exactly?” It was probably the wrong question to ask. Considering the cowed awed gazes everybody else was shooting this man, I shouldn’t be questioning who he was, I should just be getting out of his way. But the question blurted out of my lips before I could stop it.
He looked shocked but in a thoroughly arrogant way. I’d never met somebody more sure of themselves, more certain of their power and their right to hold it. He angled his head back and shot me a terrifying gaze. “I don’t play games.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that. It wasn’t an answer to my question; it was a random snippet of information. Great, so this guy wouldn’t want to play Monopoly with me, I’m glad we’d sorted that, but honestly, who the heck was he and what did he want?
I didn’t know what to do, so I stood there looking exceedingly embarrassed.
“Don’t pretend not to know who I am; I am an Illuminate,” he spoke through bared teeth now, and he gestured to the purple pin on his breast.
I looked at it, then looked at him nonplussed. “Oh,” I managed, “what’s an Illuminate?” Again, I should have kept my stupid mouth shut, but my lips wouldn’t oblige.
He either looked like he wanted to kill me or he’d seen the most curious thing in the universe, I wasn’t sure; this guy was hard to read. The only emotion I could pick up was arrogance. And in that second, he turned it on full bore.
He looked me up and down, his gaze not exactly flattering. “Where have you been that you do not know what an Illuminate is and how to treat them properly?”
“I’m a newfound one,” I stuttered.
“… I see. Well, here is a lesson you shouldn’t forget, newfound one. If you see this pip,” he pointed to the relatively plain looking brooch, “you move. No questions, no attitude,” he hissed. Then he brushed past me.
Attitude? He was the one accusing me of having attitude? He was the greatest bully I’d ever met!
Still, I shuffled backward, mortified, not by him but by the way everyone else looked at me. It was as if I’d committed the greatest faux pas this side of spitting in the Queen’s soup.
As the Illuminate walked away, he tipped his regal head back and didn’t once look my way. I was worse than insignificant to him: I was non-existent.
I blinked quickly and turned, taking a calming breath as I tried not to look at the accusatory glances around me.
Sometimes I thought this future was incredible – modern in every way imaginable. From fa
ster-than-light travel, to planets tethered together – they’d managed to achieve so much.
And then I was brought right back down to Earth. For all this incredible universe’s achievements, it was still riddled with outdated traditions. From royalty to whatever the hell that Illuminate guy was, there was still class inequity. Even in my day back on 21st century Earth, we’d been trying to make that a thing of the past.
As I looked around me, I realized how entrenched it was in the future.
Far ahead, the Illuminate strode, his head tilted back as he didn’t even bother to acknowledge the people shuffling out of his way.
What a jerk. Everyone else here may not be able to see that, but I could. I didn’t care what this guy did, but no one earned the right to treat people like that.
I stowed my mutinous thoughts as the lines reformed. It didn’t happen right away, though – everyone waited until the Illuminate was far out of sight, his polished boots echoing down the enormously long corridor.
When the lines did reform, I was shunted to the back. Various aliens kept shooting me accusatory glares as if I’d killed their puppies or something.
I meekly took my place at the end of the line, waiting around until some new people joined it who hadn’t been around to see my apparent social transgression.
As I stood there at the end of the new line, I stewed. I entertained every unkind thought about that jerk I could, then I moved on to how much I hated this universe.
If only I’d never contracted that virus 400 years ago, I wouldn’t be here now. I would have lived out my existence in the 21st century. I would have had a great life, I’m sure. Better than this, anyway.
Eventually, after what felt like half a day, I reached the front of the line. The single clerk who sat behind an enormous polished wood desk barely looked up at me.
I had to shout to be heard.
“Place your hand on the bio scanner,” the alien woman snapped.
I did as I was told.
A few seconds later she brought up one of her twenty arms and pointed down one of the twenty corridors branching off from behind her desk.
“Ah,” I began.
“That way,” she snapped, then leaned past me to wave on the next person in the queue.
I stood around for a little, unsure of what to do, but when everyone continued to ignore me, I shuffled toward the hall she’d pointed to.
There were no signs. I had absolutely no idea where I was going. She hadn’t said anything, either. For all I knew, she could have sent me back to the start of the line.
With a heavy heart and by now a rumbly stomach, I walked off down the hallway.
After a few lengths, the architecture around me started to change. Gone was the sleek white modern feel of the main hall, until I found myself in a narrow winding corridor interrupted every 20 meters or so with spiral staircases.
The design was a hodge podge and made me feel as though someone had taken an old castle from Earth and smashed it together with a space ship.
At least it distracted me.
I kept walking until I reached a checkpoint. A security officer scanned my implant and waved me on.
I tried to ask him where I was going, but he ignored me, turned, and started chatting to his buddy.
I caught a few snippets of their conversation. It was the same topic everyone in Central seemed to be discussing – the upcoming Illuminate wedding.
I hadn’t been paying attention, but as I thought about it now, I wondered if that jerk Illuminate in the main hall had anything to do with it.
If it was his wedding, I hoped he was getting married to someone awful who’d ruin his life forever.
….
Okay, that was mean. I’d been brought up as a good girl. But honestly, some people were beyond kindness.
I continued down the winding corridor, wondering if I’d reach my destination before I succumbed to hunger and thirst. If I’d known trekking through the contracts building would be like traversing a city, I’d have brought supplies.
I tried not to let my spirits slip as I trekked on, reminding myself I would be picking up an inheritance soon. It could be anything, from a small moon to a box of my grandma’s old gnomes.
Finally, the corridor widened into a large room. Just like the main hall above, there was an enormous bench, this one made out of gleaming white metal trimmed with gold.
There was an alien man on the opposite side of the counter.
He didn’t look up as I approached. I was the only person in this enormous room other than him, but he didn’t register my presence at all.
It wasn’t until I’d cleared my throat for the tenth time and managed a timid, “excuse me,” that he bothered to roll his three eyes toward me.
“Can I help you?” he asked in the standard tongue.
“Ah, yeah, I was sent here by the lady at reception.”
He didn’t respond. He looked at me with those three luminescent eyes and appeared to wait.
“So, ah, do you want my biometric scan?” I hazarded through a swallow.
“I already have it.”
“O-kay… so what do you need me to do?”
“Nothing.” He turned to look at something on the sunken panel embedded in the smooth counter before him.
I stood there and waited.
And waited.
And waited.
Had I already mentioned how much I hated this modern universe? If I’d thought 21st century Earth had been beset by irritating, useless traditions and bureaucracies, I’d been wrong. Give me a lineup at a toll booth any day.
“… Ah, so what contract do I have?” I broke the silence.
“I don’t see why you’ve come here to ask.”
I blinked my eyes slowly. “Y-you, what? I, I was sent here from reception. I’m just trying to find out what contract I have. I’ve come here all the way from the Alpha System,” I began to babble, “to find out why the heck I can’t get a job with the government. The clerk at the applications office told me there was some kind of contract out on me and I’m here to find out what that is.” I pressed my lips together, realizing ranting would get me nowhere.
“You are a newfound One, yes?”
I nodded, stomach sinking. I was about to get another lecture on proper modern universal etiquette, wasn’t I? Maybe that jerk of an Illuminate would swan in to berate me too.
Instead of launching into a spiel about how ignorant I was, the alien looked confused for a moment. “Then you should go to the Identity Office to find out who it is.”
“Ah, sorry. I think you missed a step. Find out who what is?”
“You’re betrothed. You’ve come to the wrong office. I can only confirm your betrothal, I can’t tell you the details of who you are contracted to wed.”
I stood there. I didn’t move. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think.
“You must have been told upon waking as a newfound one. Your identity would have been checked.”
I must have looked like I was about to throw up. That, or faint.
The alien compressed his ridged brow. “You look unwell, human.”
“B-betrothed?” I couldn’t breathe. There was a lump stuck in my throat, and I knew I was going to choke. “I, I can’t be betrothed. It’s not possible.”
“Didn’t you know?” He gave me an enquiring look.
I stood there and stared at him as sweat slicked my brow.
“Ma’am, are you alright?”
“I… feel sick.”
“Have you received your latest space flu shot?”
I stared at him.
“Ma’am?”
“I, I d-d-don’t understand. How can I be betrothed?”
“A contract was created at the time of your birth,” he began.
“No, no, that can’t be. I’m a newfound one. I was born over 400 years ago!”
The alien rested back in his chair and looked thoughtful. “That is an extremely long time for a betrothal to run. There are two po
ssibilities – you have been betrothed to a member of a long-lived race, or you were betrothed only recently.”
“Recently? What? I… but why? How does that even work? I mean, honestly, what kind of a universe is this? I’ve never met the person I’m supposedly betrothed to—”
“There is no supposedly, ma’am – you are legally bound to them,” he interrupted.
I pressed my hands into fists, not caring as the nails dug hard into my palms. “I don’t care; this still isn’t right. Don’t I get any say in the matter?”
He looked at me impassively. “I do not see what the problem is. Most people are thrilled to find they are betrothed. It is an ancient and respected tradition—”
“It’s ridiculous,” I ranted.
The alien – who’d looked relatively kind up until now – frowned, his fat green lips drawing thin. “You are a newfound one, so you may not understand the traditions of the modern universe. However, you should still respect them.”
“Why?”
The alien’s expression suddenly grew slack.
“This whole thing is ridiculous.” I knew I should keep my tone down, but I couldn’t. All the stress and frustration were pouring out of me. “You know, I may be in the so-called future, but it doesn’t feel like it. Sure, you have fancy space ships, but your traditions are ancient. We got rid of class inequality years ago.”
The alien said nothing. Instead, he stared behind me, his three luminescent eyes opening as far as the skin would allow.
I should have clicked that he was looking at someone behind me, but I was too angry.
“I can’t believe I have to satisfy this ridiculous contract just to get a job with the government.”
“It is your choice whether you choose to satisfy it or not. A betrothal is an ancient and sacred tradition, and if you can’t see that, you are better off ignoring it and returning to your ordinary life,” someone said from behind me.
By this stage I was livid. Angry at everything. Incensed by how this could possibly be occurring in a future where they could cure almost every disease and travel to the furthest reaches of the universe.
Then I turned, and I saw him.
The Illuminate.
An entourage of reverent staff and security were holed up by the doorway, either too timid to come in or not permitted to try.
He stared at me, those awful piercing eyes boring into my soul. On any other day, I would have backed down, I would’ve mumbled my apologies and darted away like a minnow before the shark. Today wasn’t any other day. I’d just found out that without my permission someone had contracted me to marry them.
Despite the fact his gaze was as challenging as a gun to the head, I squared off my jaw. “Just because something is tradition, doesn’t mean it’s right.” Arguing with this guy was exactly what I shouldn’t do. I’d already seen how everybody else was treating him. He was either royalty or something more important. In other words, far, far above my station.
He shot me the kind of look that said I was nothing and knew nothing. “The Foundation has already given you much, newfound one, and they deserve your respect in return, not your ire. Presumably, you were brought back to life, and the taxpayers and citizens of the Foundation have funded you ever since. The least you can do is respect our beliefs.”
I could feel my anger melting away. I tried to hold onto it – if only because of the arrogant look glinting in his eyes – but I couldn’t deny his reason.
The future sure had given me a lot, and if the least I could do was whine less, then so be it.
That wouldn’t mean I’d drop this.
There had to be a way to fight this betrothal.
His expression was the epitome of disgrace, his lips drawn thin, and his piercing pale eyes narrowed. “If I were you, I would ignore your betrothal; you clearly aren’t worth such a sacred contract.”
With that, he turned and started talking to the alien.
I stood there stunned.
Then I turned on my heel and began to walk away.
“Wait,” he commanded.
Despite myself, I stopped, as if his words were like chains that locked me to the spot.
“You have forgotten your contract.” Without turning to me, he took something off the alien, then tossed it onto the ground by my feet.
Oddly, it was parchment paper.
Or at least I thought it was paper.
As I leaned down to pick it up, feeling sick from his dismissive behavior, I saw it was different to the parchment paper I was accustomed to.
It was flexible and light, but extremely strong. It was also embedded with holographic symbols, and as soon as I touched it, I could feel it was made of some unusual substance.
“It cannot be destroyed,” the man said without turning to me, “but it can be ignored.”
And with that, he ignored me.
I thought of turning around and giving him another serve, telling him that no matter how important he thought he was, he didn’t earn the right to treat people like that.
I didn’t.
I was hot in the face from embarrassment, and I could see the Illuminate’s entourage by the door shooting me death glares.
So I walked away.
I made my way through the judging crowd, and slowly ascended the winding staircases until I made it to the main floor.
As time passed, and my initial shock at his reaction faded, the reality of the situation set in.
My nerves started to mount, climbing up my back and diving into my chest with jolts like electric shocks.
By the time I made it through the labyrinthine building and out into the light, I was a wreck. My heart felt like it had switched places with a flighty bird.
Clamping a hand on my stomach, I had to force myself to breathe.
I walked over to the jutting platform that commanded a view of the sprawling city below. I clamped my hands on the smooth white rails, digging my fingernails into the metal.
Then I closed my eyes and tried to process what I’d just learned.
Ever since I’d woken up as a newfound one, there’d been a lot to learn. Life in the future wasn’t easy. But this… this was different. This was horrible.
I was betrothed.
Shaking, I brought the contract up and stared at it. At first, my eyes got stuck on a slowly spinning holographic symbol in the upper right corner. The blues and whites and golds of the Foundation insignia lulled my mind, but it couldn’t distract me forever.
With another rattling gulp, I jerked my gaze down to stare at the text. Betrothed was written in great big bold letters, it was even underlined.
Under that was a bunch of gibberish. Letters and numbers – strings of symbols I didn’t understand.
Apparently, if I took it to the identity office, they’d let me know who exactly I was betrothed to.
Which was a thought I hadn’t let into my mind until now.
Somewhere out there was someone for me. It wasn’t destiny, though. It was a contract. A contract bound me to them and them to me for the rest of our lives.
I crumpled a hand over my mouth, my lips indenting against my fingers as another wave of nausea and emotion washed over me.
Before I could tumble to my knees, I thought of what the Illuminate had said. I could ignore this. The arrogant jerk had pretty much told me that whoever I was betrothed to wouldn’t want me.
So what was the harm of walking away?
Sure, if I didn’t satisfy the betrothal, I’d never get a job with the government, but surely there were other things I could do in this universe?
Or maybe there was some way to annul the betrothal. There had to be legal loopholes. All I needed to do was calm down and think this through logically.
Oh, and tell somebody I could trust.
Mark.
It didn’t take too long until I unwrapped my hands from that metal railing and rubbed the fingernail marks from my palms.
Then I walked away.