Mo’s wife, Marina, who was also the daughter and only child of the Chair, came out through the gate smiling brightly and greeted them as they arrived.
“The old men are still charming but getting slow. We girls need to do our run too,” Marina teased. The two men, along with Marina, entered an expansive walled courtyard that was well landscaped and had a simple but serene ambiance.
Marina went into the house as the men sat at an outdoor table.
“I heard from Councilman Drago last night that he overheard the Chair ranting about the Victorians joining the Half Moon. I hope he doesn’t pull the plug,” said Parker with a concerned look.
“Please!” Moey declared, eyes cast upward as if looking for relief from a higher power. “It has taken so much to get this far. I will choke him myself if he tries to stop it.”
Parker looked alarmed, eyes widening.
“I know, I know. Okay, let’s take this up later,” Moey said as his hand gestured toward a large door at the far end of the courtyard. Just then, Marina came out with two large clay cups of steaming coffee. Coffee was a rare commodity, and very few had access to it, but as the Chair’s daughter, Marina had access to virtually anything available, no matter how scarce.
Moey and Parker thanked her, and Moey kissed her cheek as the two men walked over to another big door off of the main courtyard. Moey pulled a hidden key from a hole in the wall, unlocked the massive wooden door, and pulled it open. They entered another courtyard, which had a large, raised planter in the center, and surrounding it were many doors and windows that opened up onto the courtyard.
This courtyard was neither serene nor beautifully decorated. It was more functional—even industrial. One man was across the yard, and sweat poured from him as he worked a large hammer on some red-hot steel, forging it into some intended shape. He was outside of a building that held a large furnace used to refine metals. Through a large, open sliding door, one could see the activity within the building. Two men were wearing darkened lenses and protective leather aprons as they poured white-hot, molten metal into long, flat molds.
This large courtyard and its surrounding buildings made for an impressive design and fabrication operation, where Moey spent most of his waking hours developing new materials and products. It is also where he went to have private discussions because the sounds of the hammering, sawing, and grinding, as well as the fanned flames raging, would drown out any conversations.
As Moey pressed Parker for more details about the conversation, the magic for which Moey was well known was going on all around them. Moey had mastered the mysteries of alloying and metal working, and his shop was capable of making corrosion-resistant steel and hardened aluminum. In terms of metal working, Moey had built and perfected a heavy-duty rolling machine, but it was top secret because any kind of rotating machinery involved the wheel. Even Parker was not privy to viewing certain equipment that was kept in a secret area. Only a few trusted technicians were aware of the machines in this secret area. Moey was well aware that his understanding of the wheel should be kept a secret for now.
Besides the rolling machine, Moey had other rotating machinery that could cut, drill, and turn metal. Looking back on it, he now realized why something as simple and useful as the wheel didn’t exist. He chided himself for having not realized things that were now so obvious to him—things such as language. Everyone could speak and write English. But what was the history of that? If it could be written, why was there nothing written dating back more than a few hundred years to explain where English had begun and where people had come from?
Moey wondered whether he would have realized on his own that some things just didn’t make sense. But that question was now pointless. Because he now had answers to those questions and many others that he’d never thought of and probably never would have.
Another workshop of importance within Moey’s compound was the material lab, where he created special fabrics from hemp. He had also invented filament made from oils extracted from seeds, and these filaments were useful in that they repelled water. Also derived from oils, he had created a new material, which, when compressed with hot air, would harden into a light, springy, waterproof material—the type of material he was now testing in his prototype running shoes. As he and Parker paced the inner courtyard and drank coffee, there was a knock at the big door separating the two courtyards. A worker ran over and opened the door, and Marina came barging in.
“There is a military runner with a summons for you to go see my father at once.” Moey’s blood ran cold as he walked toward the door. “Good luck, my darling,” she said with a worried smile. She knew her father to be a tyrant, but she had never been afraid of him.
Moey made his way from the shop area and toward the front entrance. He quickly changed out of his hi-tech running prototypes and into his basic sandals. Then, he came out to join the runner, and they set out toward the center of town. If one viewed Eden from afar, the Big House was the most obvious structure, towering above all others, and was located close to the lake. It was the Chair’s residence.
The runner’s name was Bobby, and the men knew each other well. Bobby was a bright, ambitious young man, and Moey pitied him in a way. He was one of the Chair’s personal guards and a military advisor. It was a position of importance and influence; yet, Moey felt that Bobby’s talent was wasted serving such a man as his father-in-law, the Chair.
Moey exited the main door and immediately started an easy jog, which he knew Bobby would appreciate. Men like Bobby, and, in fact, most men in Eden, except for the very old, preferred a slow run over a walk any day. It was a chance to stay sharp and keep one’s legs tuned. As Moey looked down from his street, which was elevated above the center of the city and in a remote outskirt toward the north end, he could see the familiar barge making its way out into the lake’s deep water.
The barge moved between the city pier and a special location out in the lake at least once or twice a week. It was the funeral barge, and it carried up to a hundred people plus forty oarsmen who propelled it back and forth. There could be only one or up to three or four funerals on a single trip, and family and friends could attend up to the full capacity of the barge.
This barge had just departed the dock minutes ago, and with the oarsmen putting in a strong effort, it took about twenty minutes to reach the designated area. The captain stood on a high platform at the stern; facing forward, he had a clear view of the twenty oarsmen on each side, as well as the direction of the barge as it plied the waters. It was slow going, given the weight, but steady. The captain called out commands to various sets of oarsmen, mainly to adjust power levels to keep the barge heading straight. In windy conditions, this was critical, but today was calm and peaceful, with a bright sun blanketing the chilly spring morning.
“Sixteen, twenty, easy!” called the captain in a loud voice from above. This told the five men in the bow on the port side to ease up their power output to make a slight course adjustment. The barge had no steering mechanism—only the oarsmen. Toward the stern, there was a fin on the bottom that helped keep the barge running straight, and it meant that the oarsmen at the bow had the most control over any change in direction. Minor corrections required only five oarsmen to respond. The captain could enlist ten or even twenty, if needed.
The oarsmen were powerful, well trained, and worked for the navy, as Eden had a fleet of barges and long canoes for control and security related to the Great Lake and outflow to the river.
This morning, there were two ceremonies taking place.
The first funeral was being held for a relatively young man who had fallen during a construction accident. He was laid out on a high wooden bench, with his family around him sitting on surrounding benches. Some of the women wept over their lost son, brother, or husband, consoled by other family members and friends.
The second funeral was for an elderly man. This man was still alive; yet, he was resting peacefully on a similar bench with a smaller, yet equally emotional contingent of loved ones.
This old man had tried his best to keep up his abilities, but a life of hard physical labor had taken its toll on his knees and hips, and a month earlier, he had failed to run the required two hundred yards at pace with the striding pace walker. He had one last chance to try again, but he knew it was futile.
He could barely walk at this point, so he decided to call it the end. He was in his late seventies, and although that wasn’t as old as many others, it was still a respectable age. He had been a good provider and family man and felt satisfied in a way.
The running commissioner at the test track had recorded the incident and set the date for his ceremony—one month later.
This one month had come and gone in the blink of an eye, and he had tried to savor every moment of it, showered by the attention of his family and friends and eating his favorite delights. Too bad he was in no condition to take that last camping trip out on the savanna with an open fire crackling at night under the bright stars. But he dreamed about it and half felt that he did make that trip after all. How grateful he was that dear Belinda, his bride, was not to meet her end by his side.
She had served as a military runner and, even to this day, could still stand her own ground on any trail with the best of them. He had urged her to keep it going for as long as she could. “Be there for the children,” he’d pleaded. Other women who chose a sedentary life of leisure were exempt from testing, but they had to share the fate of their husbands when their time came. Yes, how grateful he was for his strong Belinda.
Earlier this morning, he, Belinda, and their entourage had reported to the building near the pier. He’d recalled that throughout his life, he and his friends, like most people in Eden, had gruesomely called that building “the Fish House” because of its purpose and the ultimate fate of those who entered. It was used in so many jokes he recalled. But they were always related to other people—those poor bastards.
Now, it was his turn. Suddenly, he felt fearful as he hobbled up the steps. But his sons, nephews, and grandsons steadied him, and he settled his mind. Once inside, women in blue robes took him by the arms, smiling, speaking to him affectionately, and offering compliments. This did ease his mind. They sat him in a big, comfortable chair. He sank into it.
He had never sat in such a perfectly comfortable and luxurious chair. One of the beautiful women in blue told him it was the same chair that was used by the Chair himself.
He relaxed. Another woman gave him a cup. It was a beautifully carved golden goblet. He heard her say something about delicious berry juice, but his mind was wandering, already looking for its new place in the afterlife. He barely sensed himself drinking the juice. But yes, it was lovely. He knew it wasn’t just berries, and he was glad for it. His wife and children were now close to him, caressing him and saying all of these wonderful things.
He smiled, and a tear welled up and suddenly found its way down through the lines in his weather-beaten face as he drifted off for the last time.
“Waayyyy up!” hailed the captain, and the oars came out of the water in unison and hovered above it in perfect formation. “All down!” he commanded, and the oars slapped down into the water with a mighty clap. “All hold!” he announced, to which the forty oars rotated in the water and dragged the mighty barge to a halt. Eight of the oarsmen climbed up to the deck, where the parties were gathered.
Two of the men each picked up a heavy stone, through which a hole had been chiseled and a rope inserted. They placed the stones between the legs of the two men—one dead and one asleep—and tied the rope securely around both ankles.
The captain had climbed down from his perch above and was now wearing a large ceremonial robe.
“In the name of the Chair and the good people of Eden, I now give you over to the Great Lake so that you may return to the earth from which you came.” Crying elevated at this point, and one woman with the party for the younger man seemed panicked, not ready to see him off, and her family members had to restrain her. The eight oarsmen picked up the young man first, four on each side. The table upon which he had lain had handles and lifted off its stand.
The oarsmen walked straight ahead to the bow of the boat, which had a wide slot in the gunwale. They set the board on the gunwale and stood straight up, facing out to the lake.
The captain called “Salute!” and the eight oarsmen each pounded their chests and shouted “Salute!” They repeated this two more times in rapid succession.
“Set him free!” commanded the captain. The oarsmen tilted the board, and the young man slid gently into the deep water.
The ceremony was then repeated for the old man, but not before the captain examined him to make sure that he was still unconscious. As the final words instructed the oarsman to release him, somewhere in the back of his mind, the old man felt a refreshing chill and various sensations of sights and sounds. It was familiar. He dreamed of diving into the Great Lake as a boy and rising swiftly, breaking the surface with a gasp from the sudden jolt of the cold water.
Instinctively, when he hit the water, he held his breath—a subconscious response from a life of swimming and playing in these waters. But, then, it was time to breathe.
Something wasn’t right as he choked on his first breath. He suddenly awakened in a panic and struggled, pulling with his arms, but he continued to sink deeper and deeper.
His body struggled and flailed, his eyes wide open in terror. But he needed air oh so badly. He exhaled again. He needed precious air, for which there was now no replacement.
There was water … only water. With one more breath and a jerk throughout his body, he suddenly went still and continued the inevitable descent to the bottom.
Some people, including the Chair, his top commanders, and Moey, knew full well that people were not “transitioning” peacefully in these waters. Many years ago, the barge had used an area of shallow waters to perform the burials on the living elderly. This was before they had the drug, and people needed to face their deaths by drowning, eyes wide open, from beginning to end. It required more military personnel to handle cases in which the subjects were not cooperative.
Family and friends were not allowed to go on the barge because it was all a very unsettling affair. Once the person had been dropped into the water, it was not that uncommon for them to reach the bottom before drowning and still have the presence of mind to untie themselves and make it back to the surface. In this situation, they would haul up the person, knock them out with a stone hammer, and repeat the process.
Once they discovered the drug, everything changed, and the process was all humane and peaceful. But, still, they did not allow family and friends to attend, because those in charge of the process were amazed to find that, in some cases, the subjects would still end up back at the surface. So, someone came up with the idea that if they went out into deeper waters and used heavier stones, the people who were put overboard would have no chance of untying themselves.
Once it was proven and there were no further mishaps, the Chair allowed this institutional killing to become a family affair. It seemed to improve people’s outlooks and attitudes because they were not aware that the drug was not very effective and would almost certainly give anyone a front row seat to their own death. Moey himself proposed and then performed a study, taking a hundred soldiers, varying the dosages of the drug, and dropping the men into the water for half a minute to see how many came up awake.
Those who awoke would just swim up, while those who didn’t would need to be hauled up. It turned out that dosage didn’t have a great impact. It was more of an individual reaction to the drug. The drug was very effective for about a third of the subjects tested. Another third probably wouldn’t wake up until they started drowning. But there was a third who would wake up almost instantly.
The entire ritual was a carryover from the Nomadic times, when the elderly who were no longer mobile would wander out into the wildlands and take a drug made from poppy extract to put them to sleep. They would either be killed by wolves or would freeze to death and then be eaten by the wolves. Either way, this particular drug was very effective and was still used for the same purpose in Victory to this day. When Ramius departed to settle Eden, he had thought of everything— or so he had believed. In many ways, he was still steeped in the nomadic beliefs and traditions.
The first time that someone had died, which had occurred a couple of years after the settlement of Eden, it had been an accidental death. The young girl had eaten a poisonous mushroom. This is when it had hit Ramius, who’d asked himself, What will we do with our dead? His answer had been to use the lake.
The fish, which were abundant and varied, would do a fine job of processing the deceased in much the same way that Victory depended on the wolves. But, then, it had struck him: what about the disabled? He had forgotten about the poppy extract. He’d then sent expeditions covering the entire range of their territory, but the poppy simply had not been found.
They’d been too far south. Even in Victory lands, well north of Eden, they’d had to venture far to the north to find the poppy, and they had somehow learned of its utility in the distant past. Nearly all the idealistic and adventurous sorts from Victory who’d had the will to leave and make a new life in Eden had been young—much younger than Ramius and his confidants. So, in a twist of irony, Ramius himself had become the first elderly man to become “disabled,” which meant that he’d no longer been able to run.
He had long given up on his pursuit of the drug. He’d been so busy and preoccupied that it had slipped his mind.
Then, he’d suddenly been faced with his own mortality and with setting the example that would preserve the balance needed for survival.
It hadn’t occurred to him that given their new way of life, with the means of food production that had resulted in a chronic excess of supply, maybe the disabled could continue to live. Through all of his insights and brilliant revelations, this particular ritual had somehow been hard-wired into his psyche as being completely necessary for survival. Thus, he’d made the ultimate sacrifice. He’d set the ultimate example.
With all of his subjects looking on and his son now already ascended as the new Chair, Ramius and his wife, Ana, had ordered soldiers to take them out on a raft, only to pole depth, and to tie a large rock around their ankles. They had then perished of their own free will. Ramius had told his son, Ramius Jr., that he believed that drowning was fast and involved only a short period of discomfort. The senior Ramius had learned the truth of this firsthand but had been unable to share his discovery. But he had gotten one thing right: his gesture had had the desired effect, and drowning had since become the prescribed method of offing the elderly.
It wasn’t until many years later that Ramius Jr. himself came up with a new drug that would provide relief from the anxiety that almost always preceded the task of drowning oneself. Ramius Jr. was certainly motivated to come up with this enhancement before his own time, and yet he was no genius and certainly not a chemist.
There was no small amount of speculation and conjecture with regard to this new potion and how he had come to possess it. Whatever it was, the recipe and its ingredients were akin to state secrets, which was a situation that still existed under Christopher. Only Moey’s shop knew how to make it, which was based on information that he had received directly from Ramius Jr. before his death many years ago.
Moey reflected on the past, the present, and his complicity in the system that he knew to be far from perfect. In fact, he was certain that the whole sordid affair was totally unnecessary and cruel. Many felt the same way, and there had been protests over the years. But Christopher had put a quick end to this, as his tyranny had grown as he had subjugated the population to his will.
Moey was routinely called upon to see the Chair urgently, so this was nothing out of the ordinary. Yet, there were more reasons for concern lately, and this made Moey quite unsettled. He even had a sudden feeling of panic, but he calmed himself, focusing on the cadence that Bobby had set as the two men glided their way down toward the center of town.
As they arrived and climbed the long stairs, Christopher was already at the top looking down with an expression of impatience etched on his face. He was pacing and appeared to be talking to himself as if rehearsing lines. To Moey, it didn’t look good.
“Saul’s breakfast, son! What took you so long? We need to call off the thing with Victory. I had a dream about it!” the Chair ranted as Moey climbed the final step. They walked into the building and toward the Chair’s chambers at the end of a long, wide corridor. The Chair had a discernible limp.
“A dream?” Moey looked puzzled. Actually, he was feeling no small amount of relief.
“They snuck into my chambers at night … assassins.
Vlad was there too. It has to mean something. Why is this important anyway? I don’t see any upside for us,” the Chair went on in his distressed state.
“We talked about this,” Moey said in a calm, muted tone. “There are many reasons, including trade. Remember the drug. We need that. You need that. You won’t want to be waking up under the lake.” Moey paused for effect. “Then, there is the iron ore. We haven’t good deposits here. Our only access is through their territory or by trading with them for it.
We have so much excess wheat, corn, and oats. They have none, and they are hungry for it. We have the upper hand. We need a military alliance to be more secure and buffered from the outside hordes. I can go on and on.”
“I don’t know. It just doesn’t feel like the smart thing to do,” replied the Chair, almost whining. “And Vlad is young; I’m old. He will think I am weak, and he might see an opportunity.
And let me tell you. You are supposed to be my successor. But now, you have befriended this … this nomad. Yes, Vlad the Nomad. The two of you will be thick as thieves, and I don’t know if that’s a good thing. Maybe you shouldn’t be my choice.”
Moey’s eyes widened.
“You never mentioned me as your successor. I thought I would be skipped in favor of the boys,” Moey stated with genuine astonishment. “I’m not particularly fond of the idea, sorry to say. Though I do appreciate your intentions.”
“You ungrateful shit,” the Chair snarled, crossing from Jekyll into Hyde, as he invariably did in almost any discussion.
“The boys won’t be old enough. How much time do you think I have?” His voice was rising with every sentence. He finally reached the door leading to his chambers and the guard who was stationed at the door. The Chair swung the door open, and the men passed through. His chambers were expansive. It had seating for an audience of thirty on one side, facing his chair, which was essentially a throne. But like everything in Eden, the architecture and appointments were basic.
Eden did not have a long history of construction and civil engineering nor abundant supplies of timber. What timber it did have was used sparingly for furniture, doors, and window shutters, not for major construction. Ramius, the original founder and Chair of Eden, was the one who had made an astounding contribution, which he called “reinforced concrete.”
There were three main aspects to it.
The first step was to make long, thin bars of iron, and they perfected the means to hammer out these bars to lengths of about six feet. They formed hooks at each end so that the bars could be strung together in chains of any length required.
The second related to the concrete itself. It required a variety of crushed rocks from the surrounding area that were mixed together with sand and fine gravel from the river.
The final element was the design and the use of molds that could shape the concrete into useful structural elements.
How Ramius came to know about concrete was a mystery to nearly all. Beyond these new materials, he introduced the principles of statics to make sure that the buildings were structurally sound. There was a big difference between the spans of roofs in private homes and those of large, public buildings. There had been missteps and tragic incidents years ago, especially during earthquakes, which were not uncommon. But the designs and methods had improved.
Yes, there were sudden advances put forth by Ramius, and there were also questions. But over the years, no one cared much anymore about how things came to be. People just enjoyed their lives in Eden. Moey was the one person in Eden who knew the many truths about the past. And he was also one of many who did not agree with the way in which the current Chair, Christopher, ruled over Eden.
On the other side of the chamber was a large table with seating for twenty-one. The Chair used this for all of his meetings big and small. The two men made their way over to the table and sat down, the Chair at the end and Moey to his right.
“Have you ever considered Marina?” Asked Moey, exhaling as if he had just jumped off a building. Moey knew that Christopher was so mercurial and unpredictable that he had ceased to worry about it and normally just spoke his mind.
Straight answers were something that Christopher craved, and he wondered why so very few of his people could give them to him.
“Are you kidding me?” Christopher glared with a puzzled look, his eyes wide. “She has the temperament of a lamb.”
“She is very intelligent. And a lot tougher than you think. Believe me, I can see the qualities you passed on to her.”
Moey took it a step further as he saw Christopher’s expression softening, evidence that he might be capitulating. “We have never had a major armed conflict, and we don’t survive out on the savanna anymore. A woman is feasible, in my opinion.”
Impatience and fury repossessed Christopher.
“Let’s just drop it. I have another thing I want to talk to you about. I am … Well, my knee and my hip. I can’t seem to … Whatever Parker is doing, it’s not working. I can’t run, damn it.
I was supposed to take the test last month. I can see the council members all mumbling to each other, licking their chops. I need to be able to get through that test—and soon. Otherwise, you will be taking over. Not the boys … not Marina.”
Moey saw a door opening behind the Chair; it was the door to his private quarters. Jacob stuck his head in as he surveyed to make sure he wasn’t interrupting anything. He made eye contact with Moey, who gave him a barely perceptible shake of the head—a clear sign that it was a bad time to interrupt. Jacob gently retreated and closed the door.
He was the Chair’s personal assistant, but he was also an effeminate man who seemed to easily elicit smiles from the Chair; hence, everyone knew that his role was other than that of an assistant.
“I have an idea,” confided Moey. “I have a device that I have developed, and if you wear it on your leg, you can pass the test. I’m sure. Only for the knee. I can’t do anything for your hip.” He referred to a hinged leg brace, which was a concept that he himself had not developed, but he had seen it before and knew how to fabricate it.
It was a combination of hemp bands, some hide materials, thin steel rods, and, most importantly, the hinges, which effectively took over the knee’s job in part, thus dramatically reducing the load on the ailing knee joint. Yes, Moey had seen it, but where, he would never say … not to anyone … not yet.
“What is it? And why is it not in my bloody hands already?” challenged the Chair.
“If people see it, they will consider it a method of cheating. More than that, once the design is seen and understood, others can make it, and they will. So, anyone will be able to have it. You need to consider that.” The Chair pondered these facts briefly.
“I will run in a robe; no one will see it.”
“That’s my advice also.”
“Very well. Bring it to me. I should like to try the damn thing. Should I use two of them?”
Moey shook his head. “That won’t help. As it is, it won’t feel very natural. But the main thing is that I need to fabricate it, and it will take at least a week. Making two will double that time. You need to put this issue behind you as soon as possible.
So, in one week, I will bring it. It will take you another week to practice with it. Then, you can take the test.”
“Brilliant!” exclaimed the Chair. “When you see Parker, send over that useless lump of shit. Maybe he can help me work on the hip. I want to be able to walk the savanna again soon. I do miss it.”
He was right. In their society, a leader who was confined to the palace and couldn’t get around to places could not be effective for long. A leader who couldn’t walk couldn’t lead. Moey knew very well that a number of solutions to such problems did exist. But he could not and would not reveal these in fear that society would somehow bend in unpredictable and dangerous ways. “I will go and get it started. And I will inform Parker as well. Thank you, Leader.” The Chair gave him a grateful nod, and Moey started out.
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