A belief in something larger than yourself, will always make your actions appear fruitless to the secular eye. A reasonable person will always wonder why a religious man will willing walk a path that place burden upon burden upon his feet and carry his collection like badges of honor throughout his journey instead of a life where he can afford to bury those burdens deep under his feet and carry with him instead actual badges in the form of a collection of nouns. And if that man truly understands what it means to be with His love, when asked he will always reply, “Because there is nothing from this land that I can eat, that will, with benevolence, tell me that I am already full.”
The quote came to Lincoln Garvey as he sat in the third row of the small church, staring at a man, no older than himself, as he asphyxiated the packed room, drowning the crowd with his emotion as it poured from his pores like sweat onto the box with a man in it he would never know. The experience reminiscent of a time a decade before, when he sat in the first row of a much larger church, watching his father’s attempts to wring water from his walnuts in order to show a crowd that he too was just as devastated at the loss of the man in the box that he will never forget.
It had been the first time anyone had seen Doughty Leon emote something other than fire. As a child, he was something of a devil. In fact, it was his behavior that would influence his brother’s name. It had been a running joke that Doughty had an allergy to water. He wouldn’t even mist when he would break his arm in three places, jumping from the roof onto the trampoline, right into the safety of the pool’s cemented edge. Him missing the water by nearly a foot, somehow confirmed to his doubters this phobia as a verifiable fact.
But it flowed from within him now, the thickness of the mucous obstructing his ability to breathe. And it was enough of a display for Lincoln to incorrectly peg Doughty as sensitive. And it wouldn’t be the only observation that Lincoln would incorrectly surmise on this day; safety being naivete’s hallucination. As he sat in the third row, watching this old boy liken his daddy to a God, it made him question his own mortality just then. Not really realizing that on this day in his life it will have been the closest to death he will have ever experienced; barring, of course, the predetermined day set in the unknowable future that will eventually become his last.
When the minister finished his sermon, Lincoln remained seated, completely taken with the billow of blonde that had begun filing out of their seats in an organized fashion and ebbing towards the front of the church in an orderly arrangement. It was quite a sight to be had, blondes in clumps of more than two--dirty, strawberry, golden and several other differing hues aligning themselves in order to take in a moment of silence with the casket and then onto share some words of solace with the bereaved.
The tone of their skin too came as a shock to Lincoln. It was if the glasses he was wearing, the ones with rose lenses, had suddenly become jaundiced. Lincoln couldn’t remember the last time he had seen a natural blonde in Territory Two, let alone a room full of the. The first secession taking most of the Whiter tones into Territory One during its establishment. But even after the hundreds of millions who would eventually migrate out of Terrie One over the subsequent years that followed in search of an ideal that could cajole their restless spirits longer than hatred, it still wouldn’t return very many back to Terrie Two. Even the ones that had remained faithful to Terrie Two during those times of upheaval, have been mixed so many times since then, that spotting a blonde in a crowd was like spotting a duck in a dollhouse.
And speaking of tones of skin and shock, although Lincoln was only a shade or two blacker than their lightest resident, you would’ve thought Lincoln had moseyed his way on up to the mournful, pussyfooting his way into their personal spaces and extending a bucket of fried chicken as a consolation for their loss the way the expletives ejaculated from their mouths every few keeks. Lincoln could feel their eyes as he sat there waiting for some kind of explanation as to why he was taken from his terrie in order to attend a funeral and because of this would never fully come to fathom just how close to physical harm he was in at any given moment and nor could he fully come to appreciate just how Sisyphean their trembling restraint truly was.
And it didn’t really register, until he was almost set ablaze, that their detestation with him didn’t have nearly as much to do with his tone of skin setting a toe in their terrie as it did with the complete and utter temerity in which he was publicly displayed but what they viewed as a traitorous prince’s blatant attempts to usurp a king. Lincoln had found himself a prisoner, inside a terrie whose hatred was quite literally skin deep during the middle of a coup. Yet if anyone had even remotely cared to ask him why he never once attempted to escape, as he had spent the entire day never having been restrained and was left loosely supervised on several occasions, Lincoln would tell you, almost emphatically, that it was indeed because he was full.
Ezekial Rose signaled to Lincoln as he rounded up Doughty, Devil, Arro, Stubbs and Rez, motioning them all to follow him in the path he was presently paving on his way towards the exit at the front of the church. Zeke coming upon Mother Leon, stopped briefly enough to kiss her on the cheek and to mutter something lulling in her ear in an effort to affirm to his skeptics his empathy for her loss. He ignored the gawks and whispers made by several of the Elders and their wives, as well as a particularly hardened glare made by Father Brandon, that had too began walking on the path of the seven, cutting a place in line above Doughty in order to affix himself to Zeke.
The air outside was quite warm for the circumstances which had weirdly affirmed to Zeke he had done the right thing by taking out Father Leon. Only rain is reserved for the righteous, he thought to himself, as he glanced at a still sobbing Doughty.
“I’m sorry, brother.” Zeke pleasured, as he threw his embrace at him. Doughty, who had fumbled the gesture at first, eventually finding his footing within its safety, had tried with difficulty to expel the rest of his moisture onto Zeke’s dapper shoulder before it could end.
“He was just here.” Arro said when Doughty pulled himself off Zeke. “Right here in this spot.”
“Went out fightin’” Stubbs recalled.
“Deed what he deed best.” Devil attested.
“It’s customary to tell you not to worry and that you will see each other again, but it also happens to be the opinion I defend. If that helps.” Lincoln added innocently.
“There are rumors the Black Terrie has already found a way,” Zeke necessitated, “and word is they can predict your death down to the day.” He continued, supplementing in another ill-timed detail. Lincoln happened to be the only one triggered by the revelation which kindled a sense of reverence in Zeke as usually his scriptures within this crowd go transgressed.
“I woke up this mornin’ thankful for youse all. Without you boys I’s be lonesome.” Doughty smiled and surprisingly kept up the sentiment even as he glanced over Lincoln.
“I called you out here today,” Zeke inserted after he veered back on course, “because I needed to get something off my chest.”
“Now is really not the best time for politics, Zeke.” Arro interrupted aggressively. “We don’t need to hear any more about why we should all come together and rule.”
“Maybe we can save the consciousness stuff for after the walk?” Stubbs bargained.
“That’s not really what I meant, boys.” Zeke assured, “I’ve just been thinkin' lately. You are all more than my friends. You are my brothers. Divisions in our political views aside, there really is nothing I wouldn’t do for any of you or your kids. I hope you know that. And if not, I think I’ve come up with a good way to prove it. I want you each to have somethin'.”
Lincoln watched as Zeke paused and pulled from his pocket five keys each threaded in a loop with a red string and placed them around the necks of his friends. “This opens the safe in my house.” Zeke began, “If I am to cut you boys into my dealin’s, I figured you’d each need a key that would give you access.”
Doughty and Devil looked upon each other stunned, which Lincoln noticed in them first before the others, and watched as they pulled Zeke in for a cheery embrace.
“Ma Leon gone be tickled toothless. Her boys done got themselves ee-ploy-ment.” Doughty remarked.
“Say sah!” Devil added excitingly.
“Thank ya, Zeke.” Stubbs and Arro chimed as Rez smiled on. “We gon build you an empire.” Arro finished.
“We deserve it brothers, this world will be ours for the taking.” Zeke said without an ounce of exaggeration.
“Then we shall seize every inch of this ball.” Rez added finally.
There was an unintended moment of silence before the church doors slapped open and Father Leon’s body was carried out onto the shoulders of four of the elders in what would later be called his Letzter Spaziergang.
Back when this terrie was first being built, prisoners, Nationalists, and government officials came together and it would be the first time and the last time within this terrie’s bounds that colors would ever work under one brotherhood again. On a particularly warm day in August, a prisoner of darker complexion, near the very spot that Father Leon lay lifeless upon the shoulders of the living as a matter of fact, fell from the roof of the small church as he was reaffixing the cross. This man, who was born under the name Terence Givens, had been dubbed Domino by his fellow brethren as it had been a running joke that his two eyes were the only things White upon him. Domino had been so revered that on the date following his death everyone took a day off. Scientists, contractors, economists, Whites, Blacks, others filled the small church to the brim and gave him a funeral he didn’t deserve. His roommate in prison, a German man by the name of Thomas Müller, gave a eulogy that could level the castes. Every tear in that room was born from blood and not skin.
The church, located on the cul of Marshall Street on the western end of a housing colony, was the first of six streets on a parcel and the only street that was intended to be built without a tract of homes. Marshall Street, which rounded a corner south, became the single road that divided the five remaining streets in half before bleeding out into One Roade Drive, the central boulevard, where all the other streets of the terrie branched off from.
Thomas Müller and three others carried Domino’s casket as the other mourners sauntered along from behind in what they later called his “last walk.” From the end of the cul de sac, they marched a mile in distance, rounding the corner of Marshall, heading south, then onto One Roade Drive heading east, onto the place that would later become Danny Davola’s Mortuary.
Before the secession, Danny Davola had created a formula that could transmute a body into a substance comparable to metal and would cast your ashes into a monogrammed placard that one could hang in their homes or other places of worship. Domino, having often bragged about his lack of familial ties, as he was the one that severed them, was given the same end. His became a split letter D with the word “Domino” and the date of his death within the gap that was placed upon and that still hangs on the front of the church where he died. And it had been decided by the nationalists from that day forward, the plans they had for a cemetery across town would be scrapped. Instead, Danny Davola would be commissioned to turn your loved one’s body into a placard that would be secured to the outside of the building they were best known.
And it is this tradition that lives on in Terrie One even when you don’t. Father Leon was paraded around the bend from the church, onto the main boulevard, straight to Davola’s Mortuary. He was trailed by the many who knew him well, and Lincoln, while the others in town had closed their businesses and gathered upon the mile-long trail in order to pay their respects. It is Darlene now who creates the placards, using her grandfather’s recipe, that can be seen all around town. On homes, bars, banks and the like, Father Leon’s will be placed upon the outside of the Lodge, located just down the road from the Mortuary, where he and the other Elders handle the terrie’s affairs.
In this Lodge is where they gather now. Lincoln, all alone at a table that seats eight, listens on as they mix and mingle love and adoration within the stories they recollect about Father Leon. Lincoln watches something of a custom where the head matriarch of a family will first bring two containers of the dish they made to a small table that at its center seats Mother Leon. She is presented with a smaller covered dish, that Lincoln assumes will be the portion she is to take home, and is served enough to her liking from the significantly larger dish that is then placed upon another table that is located against an adjoining wall that the rest of the patrons can enjoy. Unbeknownst to Lincoln, these gatherings have the potential to go on well into the next day as every family in town will be there bringing heaping portions of their special dish and shouting their drunken recollections of the deceased into a microphone on the main stage. Father Leon’s will be no different, though Lincoln will not be around to see it to its end.
Rez sits down at the table causing Lincoln to smile after he glances up from the plate Zeke had insisted he make for him without regard for his dietary restrictions.
“Hey. Hey.” Rez smiled back. “Well, what do you think of our little town?”
“It’s the first terrie I’ve ever seen this intricately before and it is everything and nothing like I’d expect.”
“I know what you mean. I had seen several before I came here,” Rez recalled, “and I still haven’t adjusted yet.”
“Your family moved around a lot?”
“My father and I did. Not really by our choice to be honest. My daddy was a scientist, worked for Terrie 10, he became the face of the blame for some experiments he had helped conduct that accidentally got leaked to the public.”
“Project Green Thorn?”
“You’ve heard of it?”
“I'm sorry.” Lincoln mumbled reticently.
“Can’t really say I’m surprised. After he left Terrie Three, Terries Two and Ten refused to accept him back due to the nature of his felonies. Hell, so did Terries 87, 109, 51, 96, and 22 when they eventually found out what he did. So we tried Terrie One. Between you and I, we aren’t really Nationalists but have been able to stay here relatively unbothered under the guise we have leanings in that direction. Besides, they’ve been good to us. So, I am kinda proud to claim here as my home anyhow.”
Lincoln nodded tacitly. “So, what do you do here? For work?”
“My father is a chemist. He creates…um…”
“Don’t worry, Rez. I am no government official today. That’s for sure.”
“He creates drugs, cures, and other things. I find the people who need them.”
“Do you like your job?” Lincoln asked intrigued.
“To be honest, I do. A hundred years ago, we never would’ve been able to do anything like that.”
“It’s quite a different time, huh?”
“It sure is.”
“If I can ask, what’s he working on now?”
“He just finished a weapon. There's a plant they discovered in Terrie Eleven whose buds are poison.”
“Aren’t poisons common?” Lincoln wondered.
“Well, yes. But this one acts in a more meaningful way. It behaves like an accelerant, I guess. Reacts to a certain chemical found in human tissue and burns hotter than fire. Leaving barely a trace. It’s something we've never seen like this before.”
“Is there a cure?”
“Of course. One thing my daddy learned working for Terrie Ten was that you never, ever release a toxin without first having a cure. What’s really strange is that the root of the plant, along with some other material is the antigen.”
“Oh.”
“Can you picture it? One plant that is both a sickness and a cure? Anyway, we recently came into a plant with the roots still attached. If we can keep it alive, we can reproduce the results. Zeke thinks there is enough profit for both Terries One and Eleven to thrive.”
“Profits?” Lincoln encouraged, hoping he’d keep talking.
“The profits it has generated in Terrie Eleven’s first month was triple their exports from the last three years combined. Naturally it has been hard to come by, since the results couldn’t be duplicated from the toxin itself and there is no other region that we knew about, other than Terrie Eleven, where the flower grows wild.”
“Quite interesting stuff.”
“It is. Zeke hopes that Arro, Stubb and the others will help us rebuild. Something their fathers, the Elders, have never been able to successfully do since they were elected.
"I see."
So, what’s your story, Lincoln?”
“I’m a Petitions Analyst IV which is just a technical way of saying Manager. I work in Terrie Two. I’ve been there all my life.”
“Never had any yearnin's to leave, huh?”
“When I was younger, my mother got sick. Kinda placed all my dreams of adventures on hold. I didn’t think I was the kind of person who could live with the regret if I left.”
“And how is she now?”
“Alive and well. Thank you for asking.”
“That’s so good to hear.”
“Yeah. It all worked out.”
“So, your adventure starts and I mean no offense by this but I believe there are much safer terries out there for those looking for an adventure who happen to also look like…well you.” Rez paused after careful consideration.
“I believe it.” Lincoln’s smile reassuring Rez he wasn’t offended. “But trust me, I’m completely safe here.”
“You believe that?” Rez said with the appropriate apprehension.
“I do. My grandfather used to tell me, "today will not be a day of fear." Been kind of my motto ever since.”
“Your grandfather is Landon Garvey?”
“That’s him.”
Rez’s face lit up. “He’s kind of a legend. In several of the terries. Even in this one.” He emphasized. “The only Black man they talk about with reverence in the schools here.”
“As good of a man as he was, I kinda find that hard to believe.”
“It’s true. We have a holiday here that was created for him.”
“Founder’s Day.”
“You know it?”
“I’ve heard about it.”
“Of course Father Marshall grew worried it wouldn’t catch on if he called it Garvey Day so he called it Founder’s Day instead but was insistent it included him.”
“Father Marshall is Zeke’s grandfather?”
“Yep. And there is a festival in 22.” Rez continued with no regard for any tangents to the subject.
“Well, that one makes more sense. He spent the latter half of his life trying to understand the science of the ancients.”
“I really liked 22.”
“Yeah. The Astrology Terrie was one of the ones on my list to visit.”
“Shit, being a Garvey, they might make an effigy of you if you do.” Rez and Lincoln both chuckled aloud.
“You want to hear something odd?” Rez asked rhetorically. “When they kicked my dad and I out, the Counsel told us we had a higher purpose and suggested we come see Terrie One. I know it’s still not taken very seriously in some parts of the world but those words have always kinda stuck with me still.”
Lincoln inadvertently placed his palm over his sleeved forearm, a detail only Rez noticed, and kept silent. After a few moments in that state, Rez cut the quiet with some shuffling to his plate and chair and excused himself, awakening Lincoln.
“It was really nice meeting you, Rez. I haven’t gotten a chance to talk to anyone like that since I’ve been here.” Lincoln spoke ingenuously. Rez turned back to Lincoln briefly, offering a smile in place of a reply to the words he wasn’t sure Lincoln actually meant before resuming his walk.
Lincoln’s eyes rescanned the section of the room, just off the main stage, and found Arro. The red string that had casually hung out of Arro’s jacket pocket that Lincoln noticed when he was talking to Rez was gone. Arro, who was in the middle of a conversation with an older gentleman, had not even noticed its theft. Lincoln’s eyes reclaimed Stubb’s hand once more and watched him dangle what he could only presume was a different key with a red string, above Arro’s pocket and ease it down the smoothness of its satin-lined center, careful to keep the string exposed. Then he was caught.
Stubb’s eyes connecting with Lincoln’s, sitting alone at the far end of the room, was the skipping stone that sent a sequence of somatic ripples that reverberated in each of their chests. But only one pair of eyes would break contact, Lincoln’s, while the other pair pleaded for a second chance.
Lincoln picked at his food some more, serious with his consideration this time about eating the brick-sized block of cheese he had scraped off the top of his lasagna earlier. It would take a solid 7 minutes before his eyes would even consider glancing up from his plate, and even then, they steered well away from the stage and its surrounding parts.
Zeke appeared like a magician and offered Lincoln the beer he had held firm in his hand, which Lincoln graciously accepted without thought. Zeke excused himself with a promise to return shortly, that Lincoln made sure he did not break and watched; Lincoln releasing his breath when Zeke returned with another bottle of beer and sat down.
“We’re going to head out.” Zeke announced. “To my house. Mother Rose and I have a few questions and then this evening I will take you home.”
Zeke paused with unplanned finality since Lincoln wouldn’t offer him any signs or syllables that one usually uses to reflect thoughts. There was a flavor to Lincoln that engulfed Zeke’s tongue, on just the tip, that he tried but could not place. It was foreign because it had been unfamiliar to him. The pause unsuccessful in its purpose of helping him recollect. Zeke ignored the suspicion and took a long swig from his bottle prompting Lincoln to mimic the behavior as though he were Zeke’s twin.
With the bottle to Lincoln’s mouth, his eyes connected with Stubb's once again. Stubb had not moved from the spot Lincoln had seen him last, and it looked as though his attention hadn’t waivered from him either. There was a smirk upon Stubb's face that gave Lincoln a bit of dread but then, with complete unpredictability, as if the parting of the glass from his lips broke the gaze, Stubb walked out the front door and left.
The drive to Zeke’s house had been quick and painless for Lincoln, considering its start. Zeke, who had walked from his house to the church that morning as it was just down the street, had to borrow some keys from a young boy called Dayton Samuels much to the displeasure of Father Oxley who had overheard the exchange and had drunkenly proclaimed he and Zeke go outside for a second round. Traitors and usurpers the only clean words that Lincoln could make out as Zeke assured Dayton he would return his car to him on the hour.
Lincoln grew surprised when they turned back onto Marshall Street and pulled up to a gate near the corner. There was only one house on the street and it had been shrouded by high walls and enough trees it was almost impossible to tell. The house closer to the corner than the cul, had been built back far enough to have made Lincoln wonder, as he marched behind Father Leon’s casket earlier that morning, why they had used a spot that appeared to be abandoned for his wake.
Zeke rolled down the window and the mossy gate that faced them opened upon his verbal request. They drove up the long drive, that on the other side of the foilage, had been parted by a sea of neatly trimmed green lawn edged in all races of flowers. They passed another road along the drive that trailed off in a direction Lincoln had began to piece together was the jail.
On the night of Lincoln’s arrival into Terrie One, after having been released from the trunk of the car by Zephyr and Zeke, he was taken inside a building that resembled a guesthouse surrounded by tall trees. He was placed in one of three small rooms with bars for doors that looked nothing like any police station, real or imagined, he had ever seen and had remained there until the funeral. The walk to the church that morning through a wooded path that exited near the cul de sac, was nothing more than a hop, skip and jump away.
Zeke parked upon the circular driveway just before a large, single-story, bricked house that was almost as long as it was wide. Lincoln was quite taken with its design. This house, the only standing structure that Lincoln had seen since he entered Terrie One, that was modern and remotely comparable to those found in the ghettos of Terrie Two.
Mother Rose was waiting at a large wooden table that, at its center, had freshly iced lemonade squeezed into a pitcher and some glasses with a sliver of lemon and sugar coated around the rim. The room, located just off the entrance, had intricately placed wood paneling on the walls that differed from the wood on the floors. Zeke motioned for him to sit down as Zephyr whisked through a sliding wooden door that up until that point had not appeared to be there. She placed two trays upon the table, one of savory and the other of sweet and then disappeared for a quick minute before returning with some smaller plates, napkins and cutlery. Lincoln extended his hand to Mother Rose, which she firmly shook before sitting down in his chair.
“Help yourself, Lincoln. You’ll find that everything before your eyes has not been made with any milk. Unlike the food I had hoped you managed to avoid at the Lodge.”
“That is so kind, Zephyr.” Lincoln’s stomach emitted as he filled his flushed cheeks with an assortment of treats.
“You are so welcome.” She winked, still attempting to sway him with her charms.
Mother Rose looked at Zeke and they silently coordinated which of them should start. “I met your grandfather once,” Mother Rose said winning the toss, “when I was a little girl.”
Lincoln looked up from his plate as she went on. “When the secession began, Pa Marshall saw this as a monumental achievement for mankind. A new America where the like-minded would converge and contribute their gifts towards the benefit, at the very least to their communities, but what they had always intentioned was the world. He and a few others were made Elders of the terrie. Pa saw it as a way to implement some of Landon’s ideas after he was gone. He never intended for it to remain a place without other races. He thought with some time, the true bigots would branch off and form their own terries while the others would see that colors weren’t the cause of many of the afflictions to the White experience.”
Zephyr poured Lincoln a glass of lemonade, after studying his eyes, and placed the glass in front of him, which he silently inhaled as Mother Rose carried on.
“It was Landon’s and Pa's vision that people would cease to be a cog in another conglomerated machine. Unless, of course, they were happy in Terrie Two.” Mother Rose chuckled under her breath.
“After each race who had wanted to segregate themselves did, they envisioned a world where their skills, not colors, were requirements. People would be recruited into terries for a particular skill set and others would learn skills more aligned to their higher purpose than ones they may have once chosen for financial gain. Scientists could come together and form their own terrie and, working in creative collaboration, do pure research uninhibited by grant funding. But that vegetarians could also come together and build a community without meat. Live a simple life more aligned with their beliefs. And that also…”
“102 and 65.” Lincoln interrupted.
“I beg your pardon.“ Mother Rose interjected.
“Terrie 102 is a terrie with a high concentration of theorists. Terrie 65 is vegan.” Lincoln mumbled sheepishly after realizing what he had done.
“You know all the terrie’s?” She asked him unbothered.
“All one hundred eleven.”
“And their laws too?”
“Most of them.”
“That is quite a skill set for your terrie, Lincoln. I wish Pa were around to meet you now.” Mother Rose smiled.
“Do you know much about Terrie 11?” Zeke couldn't help but ask with fascination.
“Just that it’s the only all-Black terrie and that my grandfather spent the remaining part of his life there.”
“What about Terrie 13?” Zeke said veering back on course.
“It’s Terrie Four’s base of operations. Amazon, Ribbit, Tinsel, all your major factories are based there with smaller shells in each city to assist exports.” Sensing that was not the detail Zeke had purposed; Lincoln inserted another. “It also is the only entrance into Terrie Four.”
“Have you seen Terrie Four?”
“Only once. We were invited by the founder of Switch as a thank you for amending some of their paperwork. We got a tour of his factory. We learned how he makes the light sources that are heat sensitive. He gave us some products that weren’t available to the public yet and we attended a dinner party at his house. Still the best fish I’ve ever eaten to this day.”
“There is no other entrance into Terrie Four?”
“No.”
“How do people join?” Zephyr wondered curiously.
“You can’t. They recruit you. You can’t even get close enough to Terrie Thirteen’s gates. They’ve got technology you wouldn’t believe.”
“And they were allowed to do that?”
“They have more money than the government. They only owe about a million on their dues which they send a check for, yearly, in the amount of $2.56.”
“Why?” Zephyr gasped.
“As you may know yourselves, average yearly dues range from $150,000 to $3 million with other stipulations that benefit the government based on the main sources of terrie skill. My guess is that by paying all but a million of your secession costs was a way to show Terrie Two they overtly agreed to their rules but that implicitly, there would be nothing they could do to punish them if they should so choose.”
“$2.56! Almost not even worth the postage these days.”
“Dues are based on a complicated formula that assign a rated variable to factors such as population count, ability to repay and exports, meaning what the terrie as a whole produces to the world for income—with a greater emphasis on that first variable. Typically, the more people you have within a terrie that can be taxed, the higher the dues. Conversely, the bigger the dues, the sooner your terrie will be freer of the government’s shackles. Terrie 4 has a population count just over twenty with some of the richest men and women in America begging to be accepted as citizens. The formula finds its fault with exports greater than a billion dollars in revenue and completely fails to configure in incomes in excess of a trillion. Although Terrie Four accounts for 78% of America’s wealth, twenty people taxed on a million dollars calculates to $2.56.”
“Glad to hear not much has changed in this world.” Zeke said gruffly. Lincoln took a few more bites of his food during the silence.
“There are laws against entering another terrie’s bounds right?”
“For most terries it is illegal and each division has their own punishments. The infamous story of Terrie 14 comes to mind as an extreme example.”
“Say the President wanted to increase dues?” Zephyr posed another question.
“Its been proposed 18 times over these eighty-sum-plus years. But never went anywhere. Theoretically, any new bill that would effect all one hundred eleven terries would have to be passed in the House of Representatives first, then to the Senate, then to the President, which is where all previous proposals have died, and finally the people. The older terrie’s contracts specifically state that dues are never to be increased unless a terrie has defaulted and that no new laws that effect the terries can be implemented without a popular vote within that terrie’s bounds. The newer terries don’t require a popular vote to pass a bill and their dues have added an administrative cost that accomplishes what they set out to achieve with increased taxation. Simply put, its much more expensive to create a terrie now than it was eighty years go with half the benefits.”
Lincoln used the remaining silence to finish his plate while the three Roses deliberated amongst themselves before determining they had been done with their examinations. Mother Rose waited for Lincoln to meet her eyes before she would ask one last question.
“Outdated opinions on the races aside, what do you think of our terrie, Lincoln? I’ll remind you that I grew up under a man who idolized a Garvey. Honesty is preferential in your answer.”
“Outdated views aside,” Lincoln said with seriousness, “it wasn’t what I was expecting. Terrie Two is modern. It’s efficient. With the exception of yours, most of the houses in Terrie One are the same ones that were constructed 7-8 decades ago. Your exports are inconsistent. It lacks directional leadership. Most of your operational population left 50-sum years ago and the ones who remain appear to have become too complacent within their traditions. From everything I understand about the times before the secession, they were tired of government corruption, they were tired of unnecessary laws and taxes, they were tired of slaving away 40-plus hours a week for jobs that didn’t fill their pockets, their gas tanks or their souls. I sat in a lodge today, listening to the same complaints your father and hundreds of millions of other people risked their lives to change. I knew my grandfather well, Ms. Rose, and you are absolutely right in his visions for how he saw each terrie functioning. And if your father even felt half of what Grandpa Landon did, you would know that I am right in my perceptions. If your purpose is to become viable as a terrie, then you must make yourselves more desirable. If I had to make a single suggestion, it would be to recruit people into your terrie than can generate exports, even if it is of the unethical variety.” Lincoln said turning his attention to Zeke.
“Gone are the days where people’s ifs outweigh their haves. No matter the God-sized hole in your heart, there is a collection of people in a terrie out there who can help you fill it. But I will tell you this, hatred, although a powerful motivator, is unsustainable long term. I know you know this to be true firsthand as it is the reason why most of your functioning population left. There aren’t any more handouts issued by the governments. Even the simplest of terries require for their citizens to pull their fair share otherwise risk being sent to terries: convict, junkie or decrepit. You don’t have to take my word for it, but at the very least, fill the hospital. We send quite a few government-employed medical staff to your terrie every month and unfortunately not all of them can share the same outdated opinions on the races.”
Lincoln left the rest of his feelings on ice, fearing he had been too forward already. Mother Rose thanked Lincoln for his honesty and saw herself out. A phone call rang shortly after her departure. Then Lincoln asked if he could use the restroom after that. When he finished, Lincoln opened the door to find Mother Rose blocking the exit of the bathroom with her wheeled chair. She grabbed Lincoln’s forearm with her wrinkled fingers and pulled him downwards in order to make sure he had every chance to hear her clear.
“You really do have quite a skill set. You are a valuable resource to your community, Lincoln. Your grandfather would be proud. I hope you can see this as a testament to his legacy. So, I beg of you, turn around and go home now.”
"Did my grandfather say anything to you, when you saw him last?”
“He did. But I suspect that you already know what that is.”
“Then you would know my presence in your terrie should’ve already told you it’s too late.” Lincoln retrieved his arm from her leathery grasp and slipped past an opening that had been created when she fell back.
“Please don’t take my child.” She said with one last shakened plea.
“Consider your child already gone.” Lincoln finished rounding the corner of the entry.
---
Lincoln sat on the edge of the cot with his head down and his fingers interlaced between his knees. He had been placed in a different cell this time, this one closer towards the door, that sat opposite another just like it so that the bars of one looked out into the bars of the other. Before this, Lincoln had been almost convinced that he would actually get to go home. Until Zeke had told him that it wouldn’t be too long now that he only needed to return the Samuel’s car and run a quick errand but that afterwards they would be gone.
His first night there, he could hear muffled voices but saw no faces since the cell was positioned down a long hall towards the rear. But he could sense them much clearer now. A man and a woman, relatively young in ages, both Black; the man having been there the longer than the girl.
“Where do you live?” Lincoln heard her ask him.
“11.”
“Wow. Been tryin' to get in there. They say they don't need anymo' nurses. What do you do? If you don’t mind my askin'.”
“Transports.” He sighed again.
“Sounds fancy.”
“It’s not.”
The man stepped up to the bars and signaled to Lincoln. “Hey. Hey you?” Lincoln lifted his head in acknowledgement and realized he was not a man but a boy. “They let you out of here today? Why? Who are you?” He continued on.
“They want something from me.”
“Don’t give them shit.” The woman pried. “Nothin' but a bunch of racists. They don’t want us here yet can’t keep a nurse around. So I gotta be bused in and out of this shithole each month just to wipe their brown asses.”
Lincoln and the boy looked upon each other as she raged on. “They gotta lot of nerve. I get hit, kicked and spit on, yet their asses browner than mine. Fuckin' mud butts.”
The woman retreated to her cot after an intense moment of silence and pulled a snack from her purse, which she didn’t share, the crinkle of the wrapper the only reminder she was in the cell at all.
“Did they feed you?” The boy asked Lincoln after a long while.
“Yes. Very well. You?”
“Once earlier. Haven’t felt well since. Your name?”
“Garvey. Lincoln Garvey.”
“I’m somebody too. When my father finds out what they did, there won’t be a much of a Terrie One left.”
“How long have you been here?” Lincoln wondered.
“Two weeks?”
“Wow. Have they told you what they want?”
“Figure it’s to make a trade.”
“Trade for what?”
“Gypsynium.” The boy stated in such a way that he assumed was common knowledge by now. “It’s a plant.” He clarified succinctly.
“What does it do?”
“You put it in someone’s food or drink. Four hours later they dead. No way to identify the body.”
“How long ago did you eat again?” Lincoln asked connecting the dots.
“Three and a half hours…” The boy trailed off.
There was a sound of a door being opened which prompted the boy to push his cheek up against the bars in order to get a closer look. While Lincoln dropped his head back down.
“You’re gonna just kill me?” He heard the boy ask in an emotional tone. "Do you even know who I am?”
Lincoln waited for the other voice to break the air but only the boy repeated his pleas again.
“C’mon main, I know you know me. I promise you don’t want no matters with Eleven so just run me the cure.” He tried exchanging emotionality with bravado this time.
Stubb ignored the bargains made by the boy and sidled up to Lincoln’s bars instead. Stubb slipped his hands through the opening and extended a vial to Lincoln. After some consideration, Lincoln took it from his hands, unscrewed the cap and placed the liquid to his lips.
“Drink up.” Stubb grinned with sarcasm.
“The beer earlier. The one that Zeke offered me. You smiled. That’s when you did it. But how did you know he’d give it to me?” Lincoln clarified further after Stubb appeared bewildered at his question. “The gypsynium.”
“I think you’re confused.” Stubb demented. “I don’t know what you think you saw earlier but I can tell you all is not what it appears.”
“Why kill the boy?”
“There will be a man who will come in here in about 30 minutes time and he will release a vial in the air that is intended to burn all of you alive. Your tissues will grow hot. You will begin to hear the inflating and bursting of the bubbles in your blood as you boil. Naturally, it will feel like you can’t breathe. The last thing you will smell is the stench of your flesh falling from your bones. And then, when you are finally gone, we will underpay someone to come scrape your sewage from our floors. Terrie Eleven took gypsynium and created a cold. Terrie One took gypsynium and created a cancer. Please overstand me when I say, the Elders in this terrie hate dark skin but Zeke has recently surpassed you Blacks in their hatred.”
“Zeke?”
“Let Zeke tell it, there is a disagreement between the young and the old about who should make the decisions from now on. Zeke fired first. You all are just casualties of war.”
“Then why give me the cure?”
“There is rumor of a prophecy. Now, I am not one to fool with the magic of man but I did come with a gift in hopes that when it comes to a certain one of the ticks on your arm, you will consider me.”
Just before Stubb’s left, he offered Lincoln a piece of advice on the house. “Oh and beware of Zeke and his tests. I am sure he has devised one for you too as he has done with all of his friends.”
Lincoln needed no further clarification on why he over the boy was spared. He instead adjusted the pillow of his cot and stared at the ceiling waiting for the screams and the smells to begin.
---
Lincoln kept his eyes on the road that whizzed by beneath him fading in and out of the story that Zeke had begun spinning about fate. Each time he would try to recall something new about the brief time he shared with the boy who burned—Could he have known these would be his last moments? Why must he die so that I could live—the more he was reminded that the world like the road whizzes on as if you were never even there.
“Do you want to hear a secret?” Zeke’s question thieving Lincoln’s attention for the very first time. “I killed Father Leon.”
Lincoln’s eyes widened, his gaze shifting from the road towards him, reassured Zeke that this time his stories wouldn’t go unheard. “Well, not me actually, but Rez did under my orders. Stuck a needle full of death into him that tricked an entire town into believing his body just suddenly gave out.”
“Why?” Lincoln stuttered. “Why would you do something like that?”
“My grandfather told me once that his grandfather had met a man who said he could power the world for free. Then he told me that his father had met a man once who was going to reveal to the world the powers that be. And when my grandfather, who was young then, asked what happened to these men. His grandfather told him that of course they would never let them live. He told me this story and several like it, whenever I would ask why he and the others did what they did. Over the years of listening to him, I’ve discovered just how important wisdom given to the next generation truly is.”
Zeke persisted, “They told us Jesus would come, to be good so that he would take us home. Then spent centuries trying to erase what they’d done. Hiding every remnant, altering what was written, anything to keep us from knowing the truth. They created laws them killed us for breaking them. Threw us in cages and convinced everyone around us that we deserved to be punished. Good people go free. So we obeyed. Worked for companies we never owned, bought homes we never controlled, paid debts we never owed. Lost our way.”
Lincoln kept his focus on the man in the driver’s seat as he made his point. “This is a new America now. If our leaders grow greedy we kill them. If they poison our food or our waters, we kill them. If they steal our retirements, we kill them. If they rig our elections, we kill them. If they stifle our savants, we kill them. If they interfere with our ability to thrive in any way. We. Kill. Them.”
“Why not just start your own terrie and be the leader?
“I did, I did try that. If you'll recall there was a proposal for Terrie 112 that Zephyr and I sent some three months prior.
"Okay but why overthrow and risk destabilizing a perfectly viable Terrie?” Lincoln continued worryingly aloud.
"Wisdom. We’ve tried it for hundreds of years being complacent. We will not be civilized any longer.”
Lincoln turned back towards the road. “So you tested him? Rez?”
“I tested them all.” Zeke began. “Killed Father Leon to soften Doughty and ignite Devil. His loss meant they’d be looking for a male to admire. Had Rez be the one to stick him to see how far he would go for the cause. Those keys you saw me give earlier to each of them, only Arro’s key works. Hell, I even tested Zephyr, my blood.”
“Only Arro’s key works?”
“Yes!” Zeke said jovially, “And the brilliant thing about it is none of them can tell me that’s a fact. If any one of them goes to open that safe without my permission, only to discover they can’t, I am really the last person they can come back to and complain.”
“So this is Arro’s test?”
“Yes.”
“And Stubb's test?” Lincoln inquired.
“Oh, his is soon to come.”
“All this to create a class consciousness? Ignite the people under a common fire?”
“Indeed.” Zeke responded proudly.
“What happens when you get what you want?”
“Simple, I lead. Until it’s time to pass the torch.”
“Then just give up all that power just like that?”
“Well, sure. Assuming the next generation is just as wise. But until then I know this much is true, under my rule my land will see better days and the youth will want for nothing.”
“Your people will remain unsatisfied for as long as they remain on this earth." Lincoln reassured him.
“They will have more than they’ve ever had.”
“And still want.”
“They will feel needed and valued.”
“Yet still want.” Lincoln said finally unenthused.
“You like the bible right? Even if the story were true, Adam and Eve could’ve survived years in the garden under bliss if there were no limitations to what they could eat.”
“If I put a math problem in front of you and asked you to figure it out, you wouldn’t erase the problem then call it solved.”
“Fuck does that even mean?” Zeke stated matter-of-factly.
"The solution to the problem cannot be-- God should've allowed them to eat from any tree in the garden they wanted-- because then the problem never existed to be solved. Especially since our entire existence has built its foundation upon this fundamental problem. We are a dissatisfied species. Curly haired people want straight hair. Skinny people want curves. Poor people want money. We have never been satisfied with anything we've been given only the things we've earned.
"So, what's the solution?"
"We yearn. We yearn for people, places and things. Problem. We understand. We understand we are already full. Solution. The world we know today can only never exist if Adam had only realized he was full."
"Well, I wouldn't need my people to imagine a full belly, it will actually be true."
"A world of struggle is inevitable because no matter how good of a sinner you are, a single negative erases all of a positive's effort, each and every time. And it isn't until you realize the solution is not to remain hungry, negative, but to be full, infinitely positive. That you can ever come to truly understand that there will never be a negative large enough, there is nothing no one will ever be able say to you, that will ever convince that you are in lack again. An apple can only ever seem disgusting until you realize you will lose everything you will ever love just to taste it. But the only way to ever come to have this realization is to bite the apple to begin with.”
“So you are saying we should just accept our fate?”
“What I am saying is the only way out of this ouroboros is to realize we are not the tail getting eaten in all this but we are the head eating ourselves. Maybe it wasn’t you who ate the apple and spun us into chaos but you’ve, somehow, in some way, contributed to it since then. You did something wrong to someone once that you must reconcile to make right as does everyone else. So as you set upon your path of preservation, try not to duplicate any more sins onto anymore ones because as long as this world keeps turning, we’ll keep coming back trying to fix what we’ve done."
"Well, two negatives also make a positive dunnit? So anything I will ever do on this earth should only serve to cancel someone else's shit out." Zeke concluded with deep satisfaction.
"And that is why it will never matter how many empty bellies you fill today, only the full ones that will convince you are empty, tomorrow."
"And once again, you've lost me." Zeke smiled.
"Then let me clarify it for you. In order for your premise to be true, the only way something positive could ever come from you going along in this life continuing to be the dick that you are, assumes that every person you meet, every single one of those people in your Terrie that you plan to help, must also be dicks too."
Much to the pleasure of Lincoln the rest of the ride was in silence except for the brief time Zeke confessed out of spite that Terrie Two was not their intended destination. Lincoln’s refusal to object was the scratch to the itch that had been plaguing Zeke since lunch. They pulled up to the boundary and parked in the gas station lot across the street. Lincoln could see the blue sign illuminated from across the road with large, white letters that read: Welcome to Terrie Eleven.
A call came in through the car. Lincoln immediately recognized the voice as Arro’s. There was a brief exchange between them regarding an issue with the key. Apparently, Zeke had asked Arro to retrieve an item from the safe for him. Arro, who sounded confused by the instructions, had informed Zeke that when he went to open the safe he found it empty. Lincoln could tell by the way Zeke hung up the phone that he was quite pleased with himself for devising such clever tests. Lincoln, not wanting to humble such a proud man, decided to let him lay in his excess.
Zeke opened Lincoln’s passenger side door and led him to the trunk of the car. Inside there was a giant roll of stretch wrap designed to pack shipping crates and a letter-sized envelope that in large, bold letters read, “I AM LINCOLN GARVEY.” Zeke asked Lincoln to place his hands to his sides, which Lincoln, again without protestation, obliged. Zeke wrapped the cling wrap around Lincoln five times, placed the letter against his chest and continued wrapping twice more until he reached his neck.
“Do you want to know what I find odd?” Zeke asked directly. Lincoln remained silent in his response prompting Zeke to carry on.“ You never once asked why we took you. You never once asked what we wanted. And it didn’t seem as though you ever once feared for your life.”
Lincoln never once broke his silence nor his gaze as he turned his eyes directly into the ones staring back at him.
“What kind of person doesn’t want to know why he was taken? What kind of person in your circumstances, a Black man entering an all-White terrie, a man who almost died while watching a boy and a girl burn, how does that man not once show any fear?"
Zeke, although immensely intrigued to open yet another can of worms on the useless subject that is God, refused Lincoln another clever end to a rather interesting exchange and closed on his terms instead as he continued wrapping the shrinking plastic around the rest of Lincoln’s body stopping just short of his nose.
“Six decades ago, your grandfather risked his life to come back to Terrie One in order to share a warning with mine. I think in another life they could’ve been friends. But life has a way of bringing people together to complete a certain task only to rip them apart once again. When I think about coincidence, it’s the only time I believe a God exists and I was reminded of His presence when I met you because it feels like he is about to do it all over again. There is something that concerns the terries that is bigger than you and I. It is bigger than the ones on your arm. Unfortunately, it is bigger than the boy in that cell which I promise you I will get revenge on. Find Dr. McKnight, convince him to meet with the Roses, so that we may find a way to save the world that our Elders spent the last century trying to create. Now run along, little one. Make haste."
Lincoln walked across the road and placed two, even steps onto Terrie Eleven’s bounds before his face was lit up by the scopes of the guns and the lights of the men holding them. Even as he was tackled to the ground, a thick layer of mud caking the side of his face, he remembered the words of the night he saw his grandfather last.
On the evening of Landon Garvey’s death, he awoke a sleeping 17-year old Lincoln in the house of his estranged son. He told him that an adventure will await for him one day, that he must be patient before it could begin but that when it finds him, he must follow it to its end. Landon explained to his grandson that night that when that day finally came it will not be a day of fear and reminded him that only those with hunger in their hearts can ever be afraid of their next meal. Fear is a genetic flaw. Grandpa Landon always instilled in Little Lincoln. Fore it was only until, and not before, Eve offered Adam that apple that their true hunger in this world began.
Then Landon Garvey removed from his jacket pocket the pen filled with a mixture of henna and herbs. He drew six even ones on his arm and gave his grandson his last words.
“The first two,” Landon Garvey began, “represent the ones you are meant to love in this life. The second two represent the ones you are to save. The last two represent the ones you are to kill. Six ones in total to light your way.”
This work is created by, written by and belongs to Aecko and shared here for entertainment.