Impossible Dreamers

Chapter 33 (degtwi-sag): Hostel

Liana opened her eyes, and for a moment she thought she was back at home in Seren-ila. She wanted to tell Herago about an idea she had, to do with the showing. She would go and find Herago later. Where would she find him? ...

The siren and the bright lights woke her to reality. She would not find Herago today.

Time to get up. Time to wash. To do this. To do that. Never just time to sit and think. Never time to try new things. Never time for ideas. Never time to enjoy. Never time to sit outside in the garden of the House of the Green Jewel and talk about nothing and everything. To be guided in learning by Piacho, basking in his curiosity.

Liana was in the big room that was now her home. Home? No, it was just a room filled with beds and lockers. Everything in straight lines. Dak rows, each with dak beds. Tagtwi-que in all. An unimportant number in Seren-ila, but to the Bartyronians it was 'a hundred', which was the number by which big things were always measured. Liana had to get used to this way of numbering, and if she was asked by a Barty she would say her bed was in the third row, fourth bed along.

She knew some of the people in this room. Jengara, Parema, Tolema. And, of course, Silmoa. Silmoa was in the bed next to hers – third row, third bed along. Herago wasn't here. Boys and girls had been separated. She had no idea where Herago was.

Although Liana knew some of the people here, they were not the same people she had known in Seren-ila. Not just because of the names, which had all been changed by the Bartys. They said this was because Seren-ilian names were hard to pronounce, but that didn't make sense.

Everybody was different from before. She wasn't the same person she had been, either. She longed to talk to her friends about the old life, but she couldn't. Only a few words here and there. A longer conversation would lead to punishment.

Punishment. That is what she was experiencing. Something that had been unknown when she grew up, but which was all around her now. Punishment. Physical punishment of electric shocks in her 'training', and in the factory, but the worse punishment was this – not being able even to talk about the past. Not being able to recall it with friends. To be silent for ever more about the showing, which she had been so nervous about beforehand, or the lazy days of talk and laughter. To slowly forget the feel of Seren-ila.

The past was slipping away from her, and from them all. Seren-ila was slipping away. Vanishing. Could it ever be brought back? If it was one of Herago's Impossibles that's what would happen. Something disappears over there, and then it reappears over here. But this was not an Impossible.

Of course, she could never be sure that other people felt the same way. Their lips were silent. But the eyes of the other girls in this living-place seemed to tell Liana that they felt as she did. When she could see their eyes. Mostly now, people looked away.

Liana was determined to remember Seren-ila. She would talk to Silmoa. Silmoa had loved Seren-ila more than anybody. So why was she walking around the factory with her shocking-stick? Liana really needed to know.

* * *

They had finished the 'training' which told them all they needed to know about Bartyronian life, so today they would be going back to the factory. But after they had washed in cold water, they were not walked to the factory as usual. Instead, they were taken down once again to the 'learning room' (where no real learning happened) for a 'special announcement'.

They were arranged in the same way as they were in the sleeping room, so Liana sat next to Silmoa. But there was no chance of talking to her. The woman with the long coat was there in front of them, and once again they were ordered to put on their 'helmets'.