Lifelines

Chapter One - To Rule is to Serve

Author's note: A new science fiction story! Let me know what you think!

Catherine Charlet was eighteen years old when the first symptoms presented, as they always did. She was seated at the breakfast table, four days after her eighteenth birthday, when she noticed for the first time something strange.

"Ugh, Mum, do you hear that thumping? It's so loud," she moaned, slumping her head down on the smooth table.

Her mother, sitting next to her and reading the news on the display that made up the tabletop, gave a flick of her fingers.

"What thumping, Kit?" she asked, looking up.

"That thumping!" Kit, replied, hearing the sound continue, a regular thumping. It was not an irritating noise, not at all, for the regularity was comforting, but where was it coming from?

Her mother looked at her like she was crazy. "There's no thumping, Kit," she said, but she reached over and patted Kit's head anyway. "I just think you didn't get enough sleep."

"Don't you hear it? It's a-" began Kit.

But she stopped abruptly when she recognized the pattern of the sound. A louder thump, followed by a softer one. A short interval. Repeated.

Mouth open, Kit realized she was hearing her mother's heartbeat.

"Kit, are you all right?" asked her mother, worry creasing her brow as she looked over at Kit.

Kit didn't think so. She was either hallucinating or-

"I think I'm going to be sick," she gasped, holding a hand to her mouth and lurching out of her chair. She barely made it to the bathroom before she threw up in the sink.

Kit didn't go to school that day. Her mother made her stay home alone. Kit, whose nausea was not a sign of sickness but of fear, as a result spent the rest of the day out of bed and doing research.

Sitting in bed with a tablet before her, Kit ordered with a shaky voice:

"Information on Wardens, please," she said.

Immediately, the tablet glowed and a hologram appeared above it, the crest of the ruling class of Wardens and their Counselors. It was a that of a rearing polar bear, its jaws wide and its claws extended, looking fierce.

"Welcome to the Official Archive of the Ruling Class," spoke an automated, female voice. "Ad praeesse est prodesse."

Kit grumbled at the mention of the motto. It was the mantra of all Wardens and their Counselors, a latin saying that meant "to rule is to serve". It was the way the elites, the Wardens, justified their rule. They, as superior in intelligence and physical abilities, were therefore more suited to ruling than normals were.

Kit had never really disputed that fact. There were many who did, who thought that the Wardens were autocratic and could not understand the bond between the authoritative Wardens and their more subordinate Counselors. But Kit thought that the Wardens did a pretty good job of ruling.

"Um," she said, not quite sure what to search. "Can I have early symptoms of being a Warden?"

The holograph shifted until it displayed a generic picture of a man. "The qualities of a Warden mainly manifest a few years after the onset of puberty," it began. "Though Wardens are, from birth, more intelligent than their normal counterparts."

"Shit," said Kit, who was remembering that she was top of the class in every one of her subjects. She tried to calm herself with the fact that Wardens were phenomenally rare; one had a 0.001% chance of being a Counselor or a Warden.