Chapter 1

Friday, February 23rd, 2029

JOHN

My bedroom ceiling isn't the first thing I expected to see next, but I guess it probably should have been. I cough from my throat being so dry. I feel like I swallowed the whole Sahara whole.

Calm down. It was just a dream, a bad dream, but a dream nonetheless. I shake my head and slap my face a few times. To my right is my window overlooking the freshly-snowed-on side yard of my home. I'm looking to make sure that the snow is undisturbed and the world isn't crumbing around me. Of course it isn't, but until I checked...

It's a pretty thick sheet of snow out there today—we've been getting more and more each winter matched only by hotter and hotter summers. It kind of sucks. I mean, at least it's scenic—there aren't any footprints in the snow just yet—that means that the Hanson's dog next door hasn't gotten the chance to romp outside yet. She frequently makes her way into our yard to my dad's chagrin.

My heart has slowed thinking about that goofy dog's big smile jumping around in the snow. It pains me a little inside that all of this will melt and be replaced again when we could just rather stick with this one perfect time. That's life, I suppose. Can't change it.

My name is John Baker, I'm sixteen years old. I live in a small town in New York called Queensbury. Contrary to popular belief it isn't all skyscrapers and muggings here. I think it's rather nice at least. It's scenic and the people around here are really nice.

I get dressed for the early day of school—I'm usually up early for school anyway, but today seems to be even more of that. It's 4:40 according to my alarm clock. I don't see myself getting back to sleep without thinking about that dream.

My clothes aren't anything flashy—just some blue jeans with a black shirt with this cool band's logo on it. They're called Des Wombat and I'll admit they play some pretty gritty stuff. Normally I don't do songs too rough, but I've got a penchant for the singer. He used to do backup vocals for this other group called Undergr4nd. They're electronic, so it's definitely a big tonal change for him—and he does more suit the heavy style, but it's inspiring hearing him do both sides.

I take the clothes in arm and walk to the other side of my room and on my desk facing the wall I see remnants of last night's dinner. Frequently these home dinners live in my room instead of the dining room with my parents. Well, actually they will live in my stomach, but not always. Sometimes it just sits there until I decide I am sick of staring at it wanting to do something about it.

To my mother's credit she isn't the main reason why I don't eat downstairs, but she doesn't do anything to stop the reason that is. The reason is my dad if you didn't pick up on that right there...sorry, that was a bit too sarcastic even for me. I get it out in my mind because I don't like being smart with people. Dad tells me that being smart with people leads to nothing good.

Oh.

I know that some people might see smart and think of like...intellectual. No, my dad means sarcastic. I don't know why he doesn't just say that, but that's what it means. Learn from my mistakes.

I turn back around and open the door with my free hand. Living on the second floor of my house has its advantages, like how I can get a good view of the side yard's snow nice and early, but facing directly opposite of my parents' room every time I wish to leave is not one of them. It's been okay thus far, though. I guess I'm just paranoid for the future problem.

I walk across the hall and open up the door to the bathroom, my feet freeze instantly against the cold-wood floors. Gosh I make the effort to nearly hop inside the nice carpeted bathroom. I close the door behind me and run my free hand through my messy brown hair. It's not as long as you'd think when I say that, but it's a mess at any real length, so messy it is eternally. Right now it reaches down at the nape of my neck and that's about how long I normally like to keep it. There's enough there to matter.

My eyes are a different story, though. Those bags under my eyes? They're designer. They're a dim gray—I'm instantly reminded of clouds passing through the sky. I know you're gonna think I'm a little weird for saying this, but sometimes I like to think of myself as a cloud—just kind of passing along in life.

Passive, that's how normal people call it, John. Sorry, I meant to say passive.

I shake my head and move to turn on the shower and strip down. I let the lukewarm water pour onto me, over me, and what feels like through me this early in the morning. Normally I'm up asleep for another hour, but nights when I have vivid dreams like that the morning sun becomes my best friend.

I picture the blonde girl—Sarah—and Iris. Okay, phrasing...um, I didn't mean that. I'm sorry. I meant the moment when she shoots me—with the gun! Gah, forget it. I try to explain it and it just sounds wrong. Iris said her name was Sarah when she said that she had to put aside her feelings. I try to think if any of the books I've read recently could have influenced such a line. Who is she? I can't think of anything remotely similar—last book I read was about space. Then why can't I just let that be it? I know if I told anybody about it I'd be shrugged off. I mean, how many people have ever said in their life, "No, this was really different! It felt so real!"

I'd even shrug it off, but there's something about all of this that I can't shake. The way things play out—the fact that Iris appears. I mean, I don't even talk to her at all. What about that guy she was crying over? Just what is it all about? I'm brought out of my thoughts by a rasping on the wall beside me. My parents' bedroom is directly beside the bathroom and it must be my father telling me in his own special way that I should as he puts it, "Hurry my ass up, don't waste the hot water."

I turn the handle and grab a towel. I dry myself off and dress quickly.

I'm just about to head downstairs after dumping my dirty laundry in the bin but stop when I remember I left my watch back in my room. Sure enough, on my end table lays my Pulsar Mark II Watch. It's a remodel of the world's first digital watch and it's apparently one of a kind, a gift from my father. I treasure it because it's only one of a few presents he's actually given me—this was a few years back for my birthday. I've worn it practically every day I've been able to. It's got this really slick silver design that is practically spotless to this day. It's digital and right below the time it has a little engraving.

J+K.

I'd asked my father when I was younger what it'd meant, but he's never been able to give me an answer. There are two little buttons on the side of the watch. The first one doesn't seem to do anything when pressed, but the second changes the display into several different options. The first is a compass that always points to true north, the second reads how high above sea level I am, then it continues on to read the latest on news reports, find out the current temperature and it can even project holographic displays onto flat surfaces.

There's one other display option, but I'm not quite sure what it does other than show a random number. Right now standing in my room it shows a 153 on it. I've seen it once at school drop to 79 and even once before that it's gone so low to 32. It's totally random it seems in how it functions and I've no clue how it works or what it's trying to track. It's not like there's a manual or anything out for this thing for me to look up.

I grab the watch and slap it on my wrist. It connects and fits automatically. I grab my wallet beside the watch and toss it into my pocket. Downstairs my parents are fighting again. I try my best to ignore it.

"Why don't you just leave if you're so unhappy!" My mother would say.

"Why don't you get off my back, bitch?" My father would reply.

I'm silently praying I can just slip through unnoticed. I get to the door and I'm about to open it-

"What'd I tell you about using all of the hot water? The damn thing was cold as fuckin' shit when I stepped in!" My father slouches and hobbles over to me. He may have put on a bit of weight, but he still towers over me. I'm practically a twig while he is this huge monster of a man. His morals are of a monster, too.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to," I say, lowering my gaze to the floor.

"Sorry doesn't get me ready for work, now I want you to cut your shit," he growls.

"I'm sorry, sir," I say.

"You should be damn well more than sorry! I need the lawn mowed and you can start it right when you get home as a punishment."

"Peter, you know you can't just force work on him right after school just because he took a shower," My mother says.

"You stay the hell out of this," My father yells, shaking his head and turning around and pointing to my mother. "Bah! Fuck it! I'm heading out." He pushes me out of the way.

My mother shrinks to the emotional size of a raisin. I'm out the door quick enough to see my father slam the front door to the car shut behind him and pull away in a rage. He doesn't care whether he's driving on the sidewalk or the street. To think, if he didn't go to the bar nearly every morning I could realistically get a ride to school instead of walking for nearly an hour.

I look down at my watch. It used to be weird waking up this early for school since I've started walking the last few years. I don't mind the walking so much now, especially since I get the time to my own thoughts.

My parents weren't always like this. My father didn't go to the bar nearly every morning and stay nearly every night. My mother and father were like pretty much like any normal couple when I was younger.

Of course, back then everything needed to be perfect for them. They were hyper-focused on me always doing my best at everything I could; my grades, social activity, everything. I can't really tell you which time was better, to be honest. I was cast to be the perfect little mold that they'd expected to be the prodigy and make them known as the parents who raised that prodigy. Ever since I can remember I was pushed by my parents to do my absolute best. I, of course, didn't object. After all, how could I? I was their special little puppet. I did everything to make them happy.

My father was fired from his job when I was thirteen. I couldn't tell you what he did to be honest, but he took it pretty hard when it happened. He began drinking more and more. Everything changed. He has a new job now, but it's bagging groceries at the local Wal-Mart.

Soon after, my parents began fighting and they had completely focused on yelling at each other that I've managed to slip through the cracks and have a life of my own. That is…when I'm not at home at least. That's the only real downside to this whole side of it.

I'm no longer just the quiet kid who did everything everyone told him to do. Now I'm the quiet kid who gets bruised up at home and takes long walks to school at six in the morning. Well, at least the quiet part is still with me, that kind of stays.

I don't mind, I avoid a lot of drama in public at the very least.

The wind is bracing as I step out onto the sidewalk. I regret not bringing a coat, but I'm not really willing to walk back inside and face the impending talk with my mother, it would be the fifth this month, so I press on.

I put my hands in my pockets and look around as I make my way down the street. The snow trickles down. It's still moderately dark, but it's really all sorts of pretty outside. I pass by the Hansons's house next door. The Hansons were a nice bunch of people. I don't really ever see them outside of their house. I think they're running their own independent business from their home now—much better than most of the businesses out here, anyway.

Companies and businesses have a really tough time staying afloat in this kind of economy because the collapse of our government about sixteen years ago. Of course, your token schools and businesses like Wal-Mart aren't going anywhere anytime soon, but the less funded companies and businesses have all but been wiped out.

I'd only been an infant at the time and in the years since then this country has been as stubborn as ever to hold onto society. A lot has changed in the world since I was born. I have been told that it was very doomsday-like in the immediate years following and people had evacuated entire cities and hidden out in bomb shelters underground. I don't know how much I believe that, but everyone else seems to. Although, I hear that we on the east coast are taking it better than on the west in general. Some places like Denver have been leveled completely.

Things changed once more in 2027 when England, the country that's ruled over us since the end of World War II, sent over someone to pull us in by the reigns. His name's Oliver Avery, and he's surely done what he promised. He took his role as the supreme power for America. With no surviving bill of rights he had no trouble doing what he pleased once he regained his power.

Our news isn't so good. Distant states have become more of legend rather than just a few hundred miles distance. The closest I'd come to hearing anything about another state in the news was when I'd read on my watch that last year Avery relocated the capital from Washington DC all the way to California. I think it was so he could try and rebuild the west coast. He even got a full scale work force under him and they even removed the Statue of Liberty from Ellis Island—that's also been shipped out to California.

It's two years later, and ever since then society has pretty much all begun to return to somewhat of a status quo. And only that because he made a countrywide declaration of the task. That hasn't changed and even now I haven't heard of anything about places like Kentucky or Denmark except for what I'd learned in school, and even then it's only rumor and speculation.

People who leave don't come back, that's what happened to my neighbors on the other side of the Hansons—the Garrets—they'd packed up and left a couple of years ago and nobody here has seen neither hide nor hair of them since. A lot has happened in two years and since then we've managed to get a balance in our education. He keeps our side of the country in check with the use of District Officers in different parts of different cities.

They're there to make sure we don't have any plans to revolt and keep our education level and the like. They're like the senators and other representatives back before all of this. You hear the name of who's representing you and then some tidbits of what they're supposed to do.

I try not to think about it too much, but it doesn't always work out. In the end it is just a bunch of depressing political nonsense. It really ruins the view of what we have here, today. I've learned in these last few years that the world is magical early in the morning. It feels like time has stopped and is begging to be appreciated. The whole planet can just take a breath and relax.

I pass by some of the store fronts as I enter the main way into town and most of them are obviously locked and closed up as the sun hasn't even fully risen yet. The wind seems to pick up as it seems determined to ruin my point. It whips past my face leaving my cheeks stinging. I cross the street and can see the foundation of my school off in the distance. Off of Quaker I cross onto Aviation Ave, climbing the large hill that leads up to the campus. I make it to the top and gaze out on the sign right in front of the school, "Queensbury High School" Time to begin the day proper.

My school's got an interesting story behind it. The land used to be an airbase about eighty or so years ago and it was one of the bases that helped defend against the German invasion of the east coast back in the second world war. They planned on setting explosives to destroy a good stock of our fighter pilots, but their efforts were all for naught as the Americans caught wind of their plan and actually used their own bombs against them. It was English intelligence that helped us catch on. You can say anything you want to about the English, but they were excellent at what they did, and maybe that's why it is so easy to see why they became the world's superpower after the war.

Once that happened the officials back here didn't take too kindly to being second place, so they tore down the airbase and converted it to a school to erase any memory of the English's help on American soil. Ironically, it's one of the first stories you learn about in our curriculum now. The building is so big that it's joined by three other buildings as well. There's the elementary school which takes in the kids from kindergarten to third grade. Then there's the intermediate for grades 4-5. Then you have the middle school, for grades 6-8 and finally we have the high school. The schools themselves have been updated to fit a new standard of education.

I stretch my arms out and yawn as I see the sun beginning to rise in the sky tinting the sky to a nice purplish color. The emerging sunlight reflects off of the snow as if it were ready to say "Hey! I'm getting ready to come out, you be sure to be as white as you can so you can reflect as much of me off onto these silly human's eyes!" I smile at the thought and chuckle. I instinctively look to my wrist and see that it is only about a quarter to seven.

Reaching the front door, I look up at the brick building. The building is supposedly the same as it was when it was built, but the tech inside and out's been upgraded for the modern day recovery. Perfect example is the keypad just beside the new glass doors. I touch the screen with my finger and three options pop up on the screen in little boxes, "STUDENT," "FACULTY," and "VISITOR." I press the box for students and the prompt for my student ID pops up. I fish out my wallet and flash my ID in front of the screen. Then a satisfactory ding sounds off and the doors slide open.

The doors themselves are supposed to be even stronger than Plexiglas—some sort of substitute called Leolucite. Nothing short of a tank is going to be busting them down.

I walk inside and the hallway branches out into an angled "V" shape. The gym lies right in front of me with the main office on my left. I follow the hallway down the bend.

The floor tiles are larger than most other buildings. I only know that because I've looked down at them more than anybody really should. When I was younger we had to walk on the lines that separated the tiles when moving from room to room so nobody would get lost. Well, you didn't have to be exact with it—the teachers just wanted straight lines. I took it literally, though, so I always walked with my eyes glued to the floor to make sure I didn't disobey. Still subconsciously do it every time I come in here.

Some patterns don't break easy.

The doorway into the auditorium is on my left once I pass the main office and two hallways extend out to the right to classrooms. There's a third hallway to the music and band rooms just past the auditorium doors and straight ahead is the exit to the student parking lot. I take a right down the first hallway and make it to my locker, number 423.

Lockers here have their own sort of security systems in place—although this one was set in place by the District Officers—something about them being paranoid about kids sneaking in drugs or whatever. They only work within school hours and are electronically paired with each student. When you're first entering one of the new school buildings you're assigned a locker for the whole four years that you're there. Mine's always been number 423. I don't really think it stops kids from doing those kinds of things, though—just forces them to do them in different ways, but I'm not in a position to argue against these policies anyway, so it doesn't really matter.

They use these scanners in ways left completely up to the students. You can either pick to have it scan your eye, or even a finger print or two. I simply choose to do the eye scan since it is much faster. The only complication we've had with this system was last year when this kid named Carl Bates was being treated for some kind of cancer—I think it was in his liver, and let me tell you that was quite devastating, but the medicine he was taking actually got rid of his fingerprints. It was called Xelo-something-or-other. Xeloda, that's what it was called. I remember it made his skin peel like he had a sunburn and it wiped his prints clean, so much so they couldn't re-grow.

He moved last year, I think it was because his dad died or something. He really had a poor deal of the hand. Anyway, his prints couldn't be read on his locker, and since he opted for the fingerprint scan he couldn't change it to his eyes, so the locker started sounding off all sorts of alarms and our District Officer was actually dispatched to our school. His name was Mr. Harde and let me tell you he was greeted with a cacophony of snickering and laughing. It seemed like too easy a joke in my eyes.

I did learn that Mr. Harde's also a detective in President Avery's police force. One of his badges he wore on his chest looked similar to some of our local detective's, so I did some digging at the library. Sure enough I saw that he is what they call a Rose Rank detective. I couldn't tell if that was high up or not. I assume that others around him would have similarly named ranks based on flowers, but how would a rose compare to say a lily? Or a petunia? It didn't make much sense.

Harde didn't look much like he'd be into flowers, either. He was reaching his late thirties and had long brown hair that reached past his shoulders. My father would kill me if he saw me with hair like that.

You one of them queers?

He wouldn't have said queers, it probably would have been ten times as worse. I don't care much for repeating it. He told me that once when I had the urge to go curly a few years back.

Now that I think about it, he did talk about Carl's hair. Before the cancer took it away he had a "bad case of the faggot hair". I'm pretty sure he was gay, but I think my father couldn't accept that fact and took it as a kid who wanted to look the part.

I feel for the kid. When he was locked out of his locker it took about an hour of explaining to Mr. Harde—even from the principal that Carl wasn't some criminal hell-bent on sneaking into his own locker. He was actually charged with larceny and conspiracy for violence before we even fully explained the situation.

That was the thing about Harde, he was a stickler for the rules even when it should have been obvious that things weren't so black and white. Carl was just a kid who was already going through a crappy time—and because of his rules he almost got sent to actual prison on top of it. I'm pretty sure that the way of juvenile delinquency centers are long gone.

Thankfully, Harde seemed to understand the situation by the end of it all. They had to get some special technicians in to effectively hack his locker to change the scanner to check out his eyes and then things seemed to move on from there.

Well, until a few weeks later and he just stopped coming to school after his dad died. Rumor says he went to North Carolina, but I haven't heard anything more than that.

Pushing the thoughts aside, I step up to my locker and I pull my head closely to the small pad on the outside. The little gadget beeps to life and then uses a green light to scan my eye quickly. The little screen goes green and I hear the tumblers shift behind the locker. I open it and grab my books and shove them under my arm. Chatter begins to flood the halls behind me as other kids start to enter the building. I shut my locker and head in the opposite direction and turn the nearest corner.

Another set of glass doors sit outside the stairwell to the second floor. There's a snapping sort of sound that pulls my attention away from the stairs as I walk through and instantly regret it as I slam chest first into someone rushing down. I turn around to see a girl sitting above me, rubbing her temple. I look down to see a few of her books are on the ground, but I'm only looking at them a second when I see her long and familiar blonde hair. It waves slowly and I bring my eyes up and see that same familiar face, those same dark blue eyes. She's the girl from my dream. She's Sarah. I shake my head and bend down to pick up my books, forcing my head to stay low.

"Oh! I'm so sorry! I wasn't watching where I was looking and I'm so sorry!" I hear her call out. She bends down and I can smell the faint aroma of strawberries bounce off of her hair and I close my eyes for a second.

"I-It's fine." I say, picking up the rest of my books. I stand back up and look away and I can tell my face is red, but the only thing on my mind is my dream.

"Are you sure? I think you-" She begins, but I'm making my way up the stairs before I can hear what she says. Why is she here?! I'm absolutely sure I've never seen her before that dream and how in all the name of anything does she end up here of all places? I'm walking out of the doorway into the second floor hallway and I can feel the blood slowly draining away from my face. I walk down the right side of the white-tiled hallway and stop at the third door on the right. Mr. Conte's room. Mr. Benjamin Conte is my Chemistry teacher. He's the youngest teacher in the entire school, only about twenty-two. He's rather short and his bleach blonde hair is kept short. There's enough of him there to matter. He's a pretty cool guy if you ask me.

I reach in my pocket once more for my student ID and then I press it to the pad. The screen goes green and sounds of approval. The lock disengages and I throw open the door. Inside I see that Mr. Conte is sitting at his desk, typing away at his computer. "Hello John, right on time as usual," he says, without even looking up from the monitor.

"What's the plan for today?" I ask, setting my books down.

"You'll see," he says and resumes typing.