You have all heard the warnings about the edge. We have been told its winds are a song that will hypnotize us, and by the time we awaken from that trance, it will be too late.
ââIntangible Gods,â Daphne Leander, Year Ten
WE LIVE ENCAPSULATED BY THE TRAINS. They go around in a perfect oval at all hours, stopping for thirty-five seconds in each section so the commuters are able to board and depart. Beyond the tracks, after the fence, thereâs sky. Engineers crafted a scope so that we can see the ground below us. We can see tall buildings and other sorts of trainsâsome of which disappear underground or rise onto bridges. We can see patches of cities and towns that appear stitched like one of Lexâs blankets.
Weâve never been able to craft a scope advanced enough to see the peopleâit isnât allowed. Weâve been banished to the sky. Iâm told they can see Internment, though. I wonder, what must we look like to them? A giant oval of the earth with rocks and roots clinging to the bottom, I suppose. Iâve seen sketches of what Internment looks like as a whole, and itâs as though a giant hand came down and took a piece right out of the ground, and here we are floating in the sky.
When I was a child, I used to think about the day Internment was ripped from the ground and placed in the sky. I used to wonder if the people were frightened, or if they felt fortunate to be saved. I used to imagine that I was a part of Intermentâs first generation. Iâd close my eyes and feel the ground under my feet going up and up and up.
âMs. Stockhour,â Instructor Newlan says, âyouâre dreaming with your eyes open again. Page forty-six.â
I look at the textbook open before me and realize I havenât been keeping up with the lesson since page thirty-two.
âI donât suppose you would care to add to our discussion.â He always paces between the rows of desks as he lectures, and now heâs stopped before me.
âThe festival of stars?â I say, but Iâm only guessing. I have an incurably wandering mind, a fact that has given Instructor Newlan much cheerful cause to torture me. The chorus of chuckles from my classmates confirms Iâm wrong.
âWeâve moved on to geography,â Pen says from beside me. She glances from me to the instructor, curls bouncing around her cheeks and creating a perfect ambiance for the look of contrition on her face; if Instructor Newlan thinks sheâs sorry for speaking out of turn, he wonât give her a demerit. He likes her; sheâs the only one left fully conscious after his geography lecturesâsheâd like to work on the maps when sheâs older. He gives her a wry glance over his glasses, flips my book to the correct page, and goes on.
âI do realize that itâs December first,â Instructor Newlan says. âI know weâre all excited for the festival of stars to begin, but let us remember that there is plenty of class work to be done in the meantime.â
The festival of stars is a monthlong celebration, and in the excitement and preparations, itâs common for students and adults alike to daydream. But while the rest of Internment daydreams of normal thingsâgifts and requests to the god of the skyâI dream of things that are dangerous and could have me arrested or killed. I stare at the edge of my desk and imagine itâs the end of my little world.
After the class is over, I wait for Basil before I move for the door. He always insists on catching the same shuttle to the train so he can escort me home. He worries. âWhere does your mind go?â he asks me.
âShe was thinking about the ground again,â Pen teases, linking her elbow around mine and squeezing against me. âI swear, with all your daydreams about the ground, you could be a novelist.â
I will never be disciplined enough to write a novel, not like my brother, Lex, who says Iâm too much of an optimist to have any artistic prowess.