The Price of Freedom

The Price of Freedom


Utopia was almost too good to be true, though so overly glaring not to be. We lived in its shadow every day, its towering walls looming over us, judging us…keeping the peasants out. The city was humanity’s future, and we were better left forgotten.

My people’s plight began before my grandfather’s grandfather, Chulkanian plague practically decimating us, forcing us into space. Nearly consumed, we discovered an inhabited Earth, with its boundless beauty and resources. Our people arrived in peace, and I suppose it was a testament to human kindness when they took us in, saving us from the brink of extinction. Even so, we were aliens on their world and ‘caste aside’, as some would say.

An awkward century or two, but the humans, in their advancement, walled themselves away. Prejudice, many claimed, though we were the ones who’d arrived without invitation. Perhaps we’d outstayed our welcome. Then again, we were never persecuted outright and had the freedom to rebuild our future. We even thrived at first. But our avarice, envious eyes and bitter desires, destroyed us once again. Protests became rebellion, an insurgency crushed so brutally by the humans, we’d never recover. Still, they spared us, despite our ingratitude.

Before my children were born, I’d lived a humble life, had never wanted more, at least until I saw the decoded feeds from inside the city – fortune beyond imagination. Utopia was heaven. Our slums were its hell, living off scraps of a society with too much. I ached for a plan.

I’d heard rumors of recombination, implanted genetic hybridization, activated to rewrite our code and pass for human, once inside Utopia. The right biotech in the right amounts would alter Chulkanian traits enough to pass for any of them, even under full medical scan. It only took a signature. My wife and children received the injection immediately, activated once inside the wall.

“Stay low. Patrol up ahead,” Verxyx cautioned and we hunkered down. It was illegal for us to be out past curfew. Still, if my family was ever going have a better life, have any hope for a brighter future, we needed to cross the city at night. Our guide had a solid reputation and was our ticket out. “Okay, move.”

We stuck to the shadows, down darkened alleyways and into the Pit, one of the few lawless zones in the sprawling slums. At least we didn’t have to worry about violations there - no patrols, the humans had given up trying – just plenty of stims, enough strip clubs, and too much booze. A free-for-all of vices, it was a necessary risk, to slip cleanly away.

Turning into the zone, Merra and I shielded our children’s eyes from the profanity, the debauchery, the worst parts of us on full display. And I didn’t expect to see other kids there, working the streets and scrounging for every credit while doing some of the most terrible things. It suddenly made my dreams for my own children so much more salient. A drunken revelry, the barfights, the smells, the corruption, it overloaded the senses.

“Not far now,” Verxyx led us through a gap in a tall barrier and back onto the open streets.

“Freeze!” Lights were suddenly upon us. Two human soldiers stepped from the glare. “You better have a damned good story, Chulkies,” one of them harassed. “Let’s see your ID chips.”

Reluctantly producing our wrists for scanning, Verxyx’s kept his concealed.

“C’mon,” the guard demanded, “identification.”

Verxyx’s hands shot suddenly forward, electricity erupting from paired suppression emitters. The guards dropped into a quivering heap of twitching smasms.

“This way,” he motioned, leading us down another darkened alleyway, ending in fissure with a sealed hatchway. Verxyx knew the code and the door swung wide. “Inside. First the kids, then your wife. A deal’s a deal. My people on the inside will get them set up with what they need.”

“Them?” my wife wondered, though I’d suspected she’d known, desperation thankfully brushing it aside. Merra turned accusingly to me, “What did you do?!”

"It was the only way." The price of freedom – one life for three, and perfectly forged digital documentation. I knew the consequences when I signed contract. My parts would be sold to the highest elites in Utopia, ingredients to brew an elixir called Nirvana, which produced an alluring high.

Verxyx pulled me back. “Transaction complete,” his scanner declared.

“Just make it worth it,” I wept as three pairs of human eyes tearfully disappeared behind the solid hatchway.