I’ve never seen a dead person before. I always imagined they would look like someone sleeping, still and pale, but it’s not like that at all. The woman on the other side of the window is a mottled gray. Her mouth is hanging open and her tongue is a deep purple, her eyes are blank and glassy. I’m surprised and repulsed but more than that, I’m fascinated. People don’t die alone in their apartments. Not in Osiris.

Here, there’s a process for everything, death included.

At the end stage, people are taken to palliative care and made comfortable.

Death is a rare occasion in Osiris since the common cold and all manner of diseases and infections have been cured. Fatal maladies are rare as natural sunlight, just a faded mention in the network records, hard to believe, and even harder to imagine.

All one million Osirians live under a protective perimeter, and I glance up at it now, reassured by the safety of its silvery cocoon.

It’s a scary thought, that we are the last of humanity, but I try not to dwell on it.

I’ve just turned seventeen, so death isn’t a top priority.

Something that is top of my list?

The device clutched in the dead woman’s hands. I scrub away some of the window’s grime and peer closer. She’s sitting at a plastic table only a few feet away and I can tell she’s been there a few hours because the rigor mortis is wearing off and her head is starting to droop. The device’s screen is dark—but it’s uncracked. Its silver edges gleam in the light. I’ve never seen a device like this, and I’m itching to get my hands on it, to power it up and see what it can do.

I’ve heard rumors that these devices, the leftover technology from the old world, give you easy access to the restricted areas of the universal network, areas the Conservationists, our ruling government, don’t want ordinary citizens like me to see.

The trick, then, is getting inside the apartment from here. I’m twelve stories up, crouched on the fire escape of a building when really, I should be plugged into my mod-screen, back at Temporary Welfare Cooperative, or TemWel as we call it.

Instead, I’ve slipped out of my last class, intent on exploring the city.

I consider the half-open window in front of me. It would be easy to duck inside the apartment and take the device. I don’t have the woman’s permission to enter but she’s dead now, so technically, her living quarters belong to Osiris anyway. They’re considered common property until they’re scrubbed clean and reassigned to a new family.

The removal crew from Survival Services will be here soon to bundle her up and transport her to the morgue, packing up all her personals, including the device, into sturdy sanitized crates. When Public Property reviews the device, they’ll destroy it. A sacrilegious waste of old-world technology, if you ask me. A technology that may give me the key to finding my parents.

That decides it for me. I’m going in to get it.

The window slides easily when I give it a push, and a rush of putrid air gushes out, assaulting my nostrils and lungs. The stench is overwhelming for a moment and then the air clears and I can take a deep breath.

It’s easy, levering myself through the space and into the apartment.

I breathe through my mouth as I approach the woman sitting at the table. She looks gruesome this close, the grayish tint of her skin almost green, and I decide it’s better if I don’t look at her. And besides, the device is right there, its silver case beckoning me.

The metal feels cool between my fingers when I grasp it and pull. It sticks for a moment and then jerks free. The woman’s hands thump on the table, making me skitter backward and out of her reach.

“Easy, Arela,” I say to myself. “She’s not going to grab you.”

I try not to look at the woman, but I can feel her staring at me accusingly, as if she’s about to open her mouth and give me a lecture. It’s definitely time to get out of this apartment.

But first, I need to find the charging cord.

The device isn’t much use to me if I can’t turn it on. I step further into the apartment. A framed picture of our leader, Egelhard Sauer Senior, hangs above the threadbare sofa, a replica that adorns every apartment wall and office in Osiris. I don’t even need to look at it to know the sweep of his sandy hair, his penetrating gaze.

I think of all the lost items that end up caught under the sofa in the TemWel rec room, but when I lift the cushions, there’s no charging cord. A few more steps take me into the bedroom, where I find a white cord lying atop the faded dresser.  

My moment of elation is dampened when I realize the part of the charging cord I need to plug into an outlet is missing. No one keeps a useless cord lying around, which means the dead woman has the plug hidden in here somewhere. I start looking through cupboard drawers, then inside the bedside table.

I’ve moved on to the closet when the front door beeps and grinds open on rusty tracks.

I freeze, my heart thumping in my chest.

“Ooooh, the stench is gettin’ high in here,” a reedy voice says from the entryway. “Just the way you like them, Harry.”

“Shut up,” another voice, older and gruffer, says.

“You woulda thought she’d have called Palliative,” the reedy voice says. “She was old as dirt, she musta known it was coming.”

“I wouldn’t want to die in that place either,” Harry says as they move farther into the apartment.

It’s unfortunate that everything in Osiris works so efficiently and that everyone is on time. If the cleaning crew had been just five minutes late, I would already be gone, not trapped in this bedroom. The closet is large enough to hide in, but I decide against it. They’d only find me when they clear out the woman’s clothing.

I eye under the bed, shivering in revulsion, unable to bring myself to crawl under there with the dust bunnies and odd socks.

I peer around the edge of the bedroom door at the two men in gray hazmat suits. They’re levering the woman off her chair and into a black shiny bag.

“Last one for the day,” says Reedy Voice. “You going to the Underbelly?”

He’s talking about the notorious nightclub visited by Ministry members and the few citizens who can afford the entry fee.

While the men are distracted by the body, I slip across to the door and press on the panel that powers it open. It squeaks as it slides on its tracks.

“Hey!” Reedy Voice shouts. “What are you doing in here?”

Instinctively, I turn to look at him and his eyes dart to the device in my hand. I’m caught. The door’s only a third open, but I cram myself through the gap and pelt down the corridor. My heart rate accelerates faster than the exertion dictates, and the rush of adrenaline makes me lightheaded. 

“Come back here!”

Footsteps pound behind me and when I glance back, I can see the blotch of Reedy’s red face through the hazmat’s clear face plate.

He looks ridiculous but determined, lumbering after me in the cumbersome suit.

“Harry, take the elevator and catch this little thief at the bottom,” he shouts over his shoulder.

The emergency exit at the end of the corridor is my only way out and I bang through the swing door and hammer down the stairs. Reedy enters the stairwell seconds after me and I can hear his huffing and puffing behind me, but he’s not quitting. I have to give him credit for sticking with the pursuit. Most adults would have given up by now.

When I reach the bottom, I’m two flights ahead of Reedy, so I pause at the exit and peer into the building’s lobby. It’s empty. I sprint across the tiled foyer, and when I’m halfway across, the elevator doors ping open and Harry lunges out, his gray suit filling my line of sight. He leans forward to grab me as I pass, but I drop to my knees and slide on the tiles underneath his outstretched arm. I pop back to my feet, spin through the front door and sprint down the sidewalk. I skid around the closest corner—and stop short.

A few citizens on their evening commute stare at me curiously, so I straighten my green shirt and slip the device into my pants pocket. It’s easy enough to blend in when everyone is wearing the same green uniform.

“There she is!” Harry shouts from the other end of the street.

Damn.

I always forget about my hair. If I’d been born with a more normal hair color, and not red, it wouldn’t be such a problem. I’ve always liked the fact that my hair is different, but this is an unfortunate repercussion I’ve not considered before now.

Even in their suits, the two men are gaining on me with their long-legged strides, and unless they run out of stamina, they’re likely to catch me.

As I duck and weave through pedestrians, I see the sign for the mono station, and make a hard left up the stairs. The credit scanner beeps as I push through the turnstile and dodge onto the last mono, just as the doors sweep closed. Harry and Reedy tumble onto the station platform as citizens veer away from them. I grin at them through the glass.

They glare back, stone-faced, but there’s nothing they can do now.

At the next station, a crowd of people disembarks from the mono car, and I follow them out. I’m shadowing the man in front of me as he jogs down the stairs when I hear the swelling shouts of a crowd. Everyone on the staircase stops.

Craning my head around to see what’s happening, I see the street is full of people, chanting, thrusting their fists in the air.

The news of these protests has been streaming for weeks now, but from our rec room screen, they look two-dimensional and benign.

Standing here on the stairway, the air feels electric, sending a jitter of apprehension running down my back.

“WHAT DO WE WANT?”

“FREEDOM.”

“WHEN DO WE WANT IT?”

“NOW!”

“WHAT DO WE WANT?”

“CHOICE.”

“WHEN DO WE WANT IT?”

“NOW!”

The mono car has already departed, and I can’t risk waiting for the next, not when Harry and Reedy might be on it. There’s nowhere to go but into the midst of the chanting rally. It’s easy enough to trot down the last set of stairs and slip through a gap in the crowd. Immediately, the surge of body heat and clamor sweeps me up.

“FREEDOM. CHOICE. FREEDOM. CHOICE.”

The river of people seems to go on forever and I’m pushing against the flow, feeling as though there’s no chance of progress. The farther I go, the tighter they band together. I shove at them to make room, but everyone is so intent on chanting they don’t notice me. The citizens around me don’t seem to notice the perimeter sliding into a dark gray, our indication of nightfall. They should all be at home with their families now, eating dinner, just like I should be back at TemWel.

If I’m not there soon, I’ll be noted as missing, setting off alarms in the residence and causing way more trouble than I want to deal with.

“CURFEW IS IN EFFECT. RETURN TO YOUR RESIDENCE.”

The crowd screams back at the voice and I’m carried forward with the momentum. They are no longer chanting, just yelling furiously and I feel the orderly movement of the crowd change to a desperate struggle toward violence.

“BY ORDER OF THE CITY GUARD, DISPERSE NOW.”

The relentless monotone from the loudspeaker seems to incite the crowd. They rush forward, their shouts swelling into a riot of noise. I push desperately at the person in front of me, trying to stay upright, but someone elbows me in the side, sending the air rushing from my lungs. I grab at a man to my left, but he shakes me off and I stumble, almost tipping over. I’ve never been afraid in the city before, but I’m afraid now. Finding the end of the crowd seems impossible, so I change tack and veer sideways. If I can get to the edge, maybe I can find a stoop to gain some height and reassess the situation.

For a second, open space is before me and I lunge for it, but before I make it, something slams into the back of my head. My feet slip from under me and I fall to the ground.

My elbows hit the pavement, scraping away the skin through the fabric of my shirt. Someone kicks me in the ribs and a boot steps on my calf. Pain shoots through my leg.

It’s hopeless, fending off the stomping feet. All I can see are the dark and light of moving legs. Then a boot catches me in the chin and knocks my head back, so it cracks against the pavement. Stars burst across my vision.

If I don’t do something now, I’m going to get trampled to death. There’s no way for me to regain my feet, so roll hard to my left until I knock against something solid. I slap my hands down on concrete and haul myself up a short staircase and into a shallow doorway. The cool metal surface is soothing as I try to catch my breath.

Then I remember the device. I slap a hand to my pocket and sigh in relief when I feel its hard edges. It’s still there, along with all my body parts. Although, a thumping pain radiates from a lump in the back of my head, my calf muscle throbs, and the stinging of raw skin on my elbows hurts bad enough to make my eyes water. I want to inspect the damage but it’s completely dark now and I can barely see my hands in front of me.

I turn my attention to the crowd. Their bodies surge past me in the darkness, their voices rising in a collective shout. Even when I crane my neck out to peer down the street, there’s no end to the stream of people. I’m hemmed into the doorway.

No way out.

“DISPERSE NOW.”

A loud pop comes, then the slow hiss of gas releasing. The crowd pauses, the mood rapidly downshifting from anger to uncertainty, and then into fear.

“Stop Gas!” a voice shouts.

Bright spotlights appear, strobing the crowd, and I see people pushing and shoving, trying to escape.

A white cloud expands in the air, and people start dropping to the ground, motionless.

My throat tightens with anxiety. The gas is wafting directly toward me.

There’s only one option left. Up.

It’s hard to see in the flash of light and dark, but I can just make out the iron embellishments on the doorway. I grab the closest outcropping and pull myself higher. From there, I can reach a foot-wide outcropping of stonework running around the building’s exterior. It’s cracked and rough, but solid enough to hold my weight.

If I balance just right on the narrow ledge, I can avoid falling headfirst to the pavement below. That is if the Stop Gas doesn’t reach me. I’d probably survive a fall from this height, but it would hurt like hell.

Trying not to think about the gaping emptiness behind, I slide my feet along the ledge as fast as I can. The heels of my boots hang over the edge, and the open air sucks at me, but I dig my fingertips into the gritty bricks and use them to keep myself anchored to the wall. My progress feels agonizingly slow and my stomach drops when I hear the pop of another Stop Gas canister. I pause to peer around, a spark of terror lancing through me when I see just how close that white cloud has drifted.

The first tingle of acrid smoke tickles the back of my throat and makes me feel woozy.

I hold my breath and shuffle my feet faster.

My lungs are crying out for air when I finally reach the edge of the building, where I can turn the corner into a darker, narrower alleyway. My fingers creak as I lower myself onto the stone outcropping, hanging by my fingertips. It’s only a few feet to the street below, but my shin bones and knee joints groan at the impact as my boots hit the concrete.

I lose the air from my lungs for a few moments and then the adrenalin kicks in and I spring up out of my crouch, slipping into the alleyway, just another shadow in the dark.