DAY FIVE:

Sarai stepped off the White train and onto Platform Six.  The brown jumpsuit itched around the collar, the straps of the pack bit into her shoulders, and the heavy boots made her walk awkwardly until she got used to them.  She was the only passenger at this last stop.

The platform stood against the mouth of a long tunnel.  She was as close to the Boundary shield as a person could get.  A woman in a white uniform stood near the entrance of the tunnel waiting for her, a tablet cradled in her hand.

Crossing the shield was a careful and deliberate process, Lionel had told them during orientation.  To preserve the integrity of the shield, mass crossings were prohibited.  People had to cross individually, at different spots, spaced out at different times.  As Sarai approached, the woman consulted her tablet.  She confirmed Sarai’s name and citizen ID.  She kept her eyes on the screen as she ran through a checklist of routine questions, tapping the tablet with each answer Sarai provided.  When the checklist was satisfied, the woman asked Sarai to repeat after her, stating that the choice to leave was her own, she had been duly informed of the risks inherent in leaving the Boundary, that there could be no guarantee of safety outside the shield, and that she was not being threatened or coerced into making this choice.

With the confirmation process completed, the two women stood on the platform in silence.  The woman looked at Sarai with a mixture of curiosity and melancholy.  When she spoke, her voice was soft and low.

“You’re so young,” she said.  “Are you sure you want—” she caught herself.  “I’m sorry.  You’ve already confirmed your decision.  It’s just… are you sure?”  She unexpectedly leaned forward and spoke in almost a whisper.  “You know… it’s just… no one ever comes back.”  She reached to touch Sarai’s arm.  Sarai stepped back a little, gripping the pack’s straps.  She felt a rush of emotion she couldn’t immediately identify.  It was a pressure in her chest, like she was being held down under a heavy weight.

She took a deep breath.

“Maybe I won’t, either,” she said to the woman.

The chimes rang 13:00.

The woman straightened and motioned to the tunnel.

“This leads to the shield barrier,” she said, in her official voice.  “When you get there, you will have to push your way through. It is hard, but passable.  If you change your mind, the recommendation is to continue through and then attempt to return rather than turn back midway.”

“How do you know that?”

The woman gave a small shrug.  “I don’t.  It’s what we are supposed to say.”

Sarai looked down the long, dark tunnel, then took a final look back at the Boundary’s interior.  She adjusted the pack, inhaled, and started down the tunnel.  She glanced back once.  The woman gave her a small wave.

The tunnel stretched into darkness.  Overhead lights provided pools of light at regularly spaced intervals.  As she continued she could feel something like a static charge in the air.  She saw a shimmering and swirling field at the end of the tunnel, and soon found herself on another platform that butted up against the wall of the shield.  She could feel the energy moving through her body in pulsing waves, but there was no sound other than the scrape of her feet on the platform and her breaths.

Sarai looked at the smooth surface of the shield for several moments.  Carefully she pressed her hand against it.  Patterns of energy swirled around her palm.  It felt like a wall made of some dense but soft material.  She pushed harder, but her hand made almost no progress.  She put both hands on the shield and leaned in, but the wall resisted her.  She tried again, pushing with her fingertips.  Now her hands sank into the energy field like they were digging into loose sand.  She pushed harder until her forearms were completely encased in the shimmering wall.  Stretching her fingers and wrists, she found she could move, although her movements were sluggish.  Sarai took a deep breath, found purchase on the platform with the grips of her boots’ soles, and pushed her way in.

She was immediately swallowed into a milky white morasse.  Once her whole body was through the wall, it was easier to move, but very much like moving through water.  She could breath, she found, but sparingly.  She couldn’t tell what her toes were digging into, but each step was a labor.  Her arms waved back and forth in front of her and found nothing to grasp, but the motion seemed to pull her forward.  All around her there were only twisting and sparkling patterns of energy.  She tried counting her steps but found that to be a poor way of judging distance.  Every time she exhaled she drew in less breath, her lungs becoming constricted.  The pressure around her was constant and she was exhausting herself with each struggling step.

Then something happened.  Her outstretched hand broke through and her fingers wiggled freely.  A moment later she could bend her elbows.  Almost choking on her constrained breath, she ground her feet harder and pushed forward, feeling her body slip out of the dense energy field and falling down.

A searing white light blinded her and she tumbled onto a hard and uneven surface.  She felt pain in her palms as she stuck them out to break her fall.  She sucked in lungfuls of air, her senses flooded with smells and tastes she had never experienced.  She began coughing and rolled on the ground, kicking her feet until she felt she was clear of the field.

Slowly her eyes adjusted.  Her coughing subsided.  She regained her bearings.  She sat up.  The shimmering wall of the shield pulsed before her, but it looked different now.  It was not emitting its own light, but reflecting it from another source.  And there was no longer silence. A cacophony of hisses and creaks and snaps and groans sounded from all around her.  The smells of dirt and wetness and plants and other things filled her nose.  So many strange and sudden sensations rushed in that her brain needed a moment to sort them.  

Through slitted eyes she looked around her.  She was sitting on rough ground, strewn with small rocks and greenish plants growing up through the dirt.  She climbed to her feet and looked at the wall she had just exited.  It looked the same, with no hole or rent to show her passage. She brushed the dirt off her hands and laid them against the shield.  There was no softness.  It was like laying her hands against concrete.  She pushed first with her palms, then with her fingertips.  The wall implacably refused any attempt to penetrate it.  She tried several places, but the shield was unbreachable.  Sarai stepped back, looking at the wall.

Passage through the shield was difficult, but possible, they had said.  No one came back because the world outside the shield was too beautiful.

Sarai stared.  Passage was possible, but only one way.  It was a shield, after all, meant to keep the world out.  The truth hit her and checked her breath.

No one came back because no one could.

She stepped back, careful not to trip over the scattered rocks and clumps of plants.  Her gaze rose up the vast surface of the Boundary shield to the sky.  Her breath returned and she gasped.  No toneless white sky ribboned with pulses of energy like inside.  Above her was a soaring vault of blue in hues she had never seen.  Rich and deep and unending.  In the sky a blinding glare caused her to raise her hand and shade her eyes.  The Sun.  That must be the Sun.  After a moment she could discern fluffy white things of an almost vaporous nature, like steam, but denser, moving slowly across the sky.

Her eyes dropped from the entrancing blue dome to the trees around her.  But these were not like any trees she had ever seen inside.  Their trunks were massive in circumference, and they soared dozens of meters into the air where their thick branches splayed out, each one adorned with glossy green leaves.  They swayed in the breeze, leaves rustling and the trees themselves creaking.

Sarai marveled at the richness and vibrance of all the colors and textures and smells of everything around her.  Even the dirt looked amazing.

She started when she noticed other movements in the branches above.  Creatures that somewhat resembled chickens, only these animals were dark, sleek, and quick.  Their wings fluttered and they moved from branch to branch as if they floated in the air.  Their black eyes fixed on her in curiosity. Their beaks were long and sharp, and when they opened them a sound came out like a chicken’s, but louder and high-pitched, like an alarm.

“Birds,” she said, her first words outside the Boundary.  “You are called birds.” She waved at them and laughed.  “Hello, birds!”

Sarai looked around for a sign or marker—something that had been placed by the others who had left.  They would certainly want those who came after them to follow and find them, to join them in the new outside community.  

She paused and listened.  The birds were still making their noises, but had settled for the moment to chirps and clicks. Beyond them was another sound.  A familiar sound.  It sounded like the turbines in the fish hatcheries powering up.  It started low and increased in pitch and volume.  Then there was a definite thump, followed by what sounded like a long hiss.

Some kind of turbine.  Some kind of engine.  Something manmade.

Sarai turned her head, listening.  Which way?

It seemed to be coming from in front of her.  She could see a gap in the brush, and what looked like a trail leading away from the wall.  Beyond the barricade of trees and bushes, the steady thrum beckoned her.

She stopped for a moment and took the water canteen from her pack.  Her throat was a little itchy, probably from the struggle to breath during her breach of the shield.  She took two sips and it felt better.  She stowed the canteen and adjusted the straps of her pack.  She looked up at the strange birds who were still peering unblinkingly down at her and waved her hand.

“Goodbye, birds,” she said.

She poked her way cautiously along the trail.  Although if it was a trail, it had grown up from lack of maintenance.  The bushes slapped and snagged at her jumpsuit, but the heavy fabric protected her arms and legs.  The trail descended gradually and soon the large trees began to thin out and the bushes got smaller.  She emerged into a sunlit open space much larger than any common lawn she’d seen.  It was completely covered in a new kind of plant.  It was like grass but much taller, above her knees.  The grass was multiple shades of green and yellow, and in many spots there were shoots rising even higher, topped with colorful flowers.  Darting over the lawn were insects resembling the bees that pollinated the orchards.  But the bees from inside were small and slow-moving.  These creatures were larger, faster, and black with bright red spots.  Something else, like heavy motes of dust, floated in the air just above the grass, drifting and settling and stirred again with the gentle movement of the wind.

The cycle of roar, thump, and hiss was louder now.

Oddly, the lawn seemed to end at the sky, although it was clear the lawn could not extend more than a couple hundred meters.  For a moment she felt a stab of panic at the idea that it did end at the sky—that the whole world was another dome just outside the one she had escaped. She slowed her breath and thought it through.  She reasoned that the land beyond the lawn must slope downwards.  Simple perspective prevented her from seeing farther.  Of course.  She started forward.

She coughed.  Her throat was dry and scratchy again.  She decided she would take another drink when she reached the other side of the lawn.

As she walked through the tall grass, she chose her steps carefully.  The ground was uneven and tangled with dead grass and roots that clumped in places like discarded clothing.  Her movements caused the insects to fly away briefly, then return to investigate her with a loud buzzing.  The floating motes thickened as she brushed past the flowers and she noticed her legs and waist were soon coated with a layer of yellowish dust.

Sarai coughed again, hard enough to make her eyes water.  But no, her eyes were watering anyway… and they began to itch also.  She had been in one of the chicken hatcheries once when a small fire had broken out.  The flames had been quickly contained, and everyone got out safely.  But Sarai had come out coughing and with watering eyes from the smoke.  And now there was a pain in her chest she didn’t recognize.  Another cough, more drawn out because it was difficult to draw breath.  One of the large, ugly insects hovered near her face and she reflexively waved it away. The movement threw her off stride, and she tripped over a clump of brown roots and landed on her knees.

Sarai realized she had not tripped on just roots but something else.  It looked like brown cloth. Thin tendrils of white roots had crawled around it, but it was clearly fabric. She reached out and pulled at it.  It was a tough material like her jumpsuit, and the more she tugged the more she saw that it was a jumpsuit.  Looking further into the piles of grass and roots, she could also see the lump of a pack.  The fabric tore under her fingers and something smooth and yellowish peeked through the rip.

Bone.

Sarai had never seen a human bone before.  She had heard a description from Cal about a coworker in Water Supply who had slipped and hurt themselves in such a way that the broken bone poked through the flesh.  She had left the common room, hand over mouth in horror, as Cal was relating the incident.

She pulled back more of the cloth, exposing more of the bone.  She coughed heavily and wiped her nose, which was running as wetly as her eyes.  Her pulse hammered now in her chest.  She willed herself to relax, even though it was harder to draw a calming breath.  Looking around she spied the thick, ribbed sole of a boot poking out of the grass.

Sarai clambered to her feet, wiped her eyes, and resumed walking.  Midway across the lawn she stopped and knelt, taking her canteen out of the pack.  The water slipped down her throat but did not relieve the itching.  She took another sip and spewed it out as another cough racked her chest.

Lying just ahead of her she saw another jumpsuited form and pack. Roots covered the cloth even more fully, appearing to pull it into the ground.  This one looked to have lain longer.  The cloth had broken down, exposing whiter bone, and grass grew up in the gaps.

She struggled up and pushed forward, coughing and swinging her arms at the insects that were surrounding her.  They darted effortlessly away from her swatting hands, appearing to take some measure of her.  A couple landed on her jumpsuit and paused, as if tasting it, or the yellow dust it had collected.  They flitted away quickly.  One bold insect shot in suddenly and landed on her cheek.  She slapped at it and felt a stabbing pain in her face. The insect squirmed beneath her fingers and she pulled it away and threw it down.  A painful welt was already rising on her flesh, burning as if scalded.

She staggered forward, coughing and trying to breathe and trying not to trip again.

Roar… thud… hiss…  The sound of the turbines grew louder with each step she took.

When she reached the edge of the lawn she saw she had been correct.  The ground dropped away as the grassy expanse ended.  There was a sloping stretch of sand and smooth stones littered across a beach that led to a body of water.  And the water…

It took a moment for Sarai to process what she was seeing.  The water was yet another shade of blue she had never known.  Like the sky but not like it at all.  It roiled like some great machinery was stirring it below the surface.  To her left and right, and as far as she could see ahead, the water stretched endlessly.  It expanded all the way and blurred where the sky came down to touch it.  It was not an illusion.  It was water Sarai could not see the other side of.

It was an ocean.

Where the water met the sand and rocks, it pulsed in and out in a regular rhythm.  As it rolled to the sand in frothy white waves, there was a rising roar.  Like a turbine winding up.  The waves landed on the shore with a heavy thump, and drew back out, hissing as the flow receded and the water was sucked into the sand.

Roar.  Thud.  Hiss.

Sarai stumbled down the slope.  The grass did not grow here, only wiry clumps of yellow plants that looked like straw.  The insects did not follow her, either.  The pain in her cheek spread to her jaw, as did the swelling.  Her breathing came in ragged gasps, as if torn from the air.  Down on the sand she clawed at her boots, fighting to loosen the straps and pulling them off. She yanked at the front of the jumpsuit until the buttons popped.  Her bare feet sank into the sand, slipped over the smooth stones.  Coughing and heaving, she lurched towards the line of surf rolling onto the shore.

At the beach’s edge she fell to her knees again.  The water that swirled over her feet was shockingly cold.  It slapped against her legs and sprayed up to her face.  It tasted sour and salty.  Sarai stared out across the endless ocean with amazement and awe and so many other things she had never felt before and couldn’t describe even to herself.  She silently begged her laboring lungs and failing heartbeat for a few more moments.

This is not a poisoned world anymore. It healed while we lived beneath the shield. It grew back without us.

She understood now.

The people who left every season did not inherit this world.  They stepped out into one they no longer fit in. That was why no one ever came back.

But it was beautiful. More beautiful than the stories could tell.  More beautiful than Sarai had ever imagined.  And the most real thing she had ever seen.

Sarai dug her fingers into the sand, feeling the grit and wetness.  Her breathing trailing to whispers before fading away.  As she slumped over, her eyes stayed fixed on the glittering water she could not see the other side of.

* * *

Delilah looked around the pod, noted the sole bed, and smiled.  It would be nice to finally have a pod she did not have to share.  The others who lived in the housing unit seemed nice enough, including the man who said his name was Cal.

Delilah saw the tank of water on the cabinet, and was surprised to discover it had little fish swimming around in it.  As she approached it, they darted to the surface as if in anticipation.

“What is this?” she called over her shoulder, loudly enough for Cal, who was in the common room, to hear.

“Fish.  She kept them.”  Cal responded flatly.

“For what purpose?” Delilah asked.

“None.  Too small to eat.”

Delilah looked at the little fish swimming around in the tank.  She tried to imagine a use for them.  After a moment she picked up the tank, careful not to slosh water onto her floor, and carried it into the common kitchen.  She tilted the tank over the sink and let the water run into the recycle.  The fish tumbled into the sink, swirled around for a moment, then vanished down the drain.