* * *
I tried to put the encounter out of my mind, but it kept creeping back unbidden. Eos’ words kept echoing through my head, treacherous as a snake. Freedom. Choice. Those lofty concepts seemed so inconsequential when compared to the all-important need for survival. Regardless of the sacrifices it entailed, I couldn’t fathom how could anyone find death preferable to life.
One other thing was bothering me, as well, and that is what ultimately brought me to the highest levels of the citidome that night. Here—without the ever-deepening buffer layers of rock or mudbrick that shielded most of the city, where the threat of solar radiation was at its greatest—was the place the geroi locked the dissenters. Those who violated the Contract, who could have no hope of appeal. Who would serve the collective greater with their deaths than with their lives.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt warm on Iamos, but the air in the upper levels was bitingly cold, far more than I was accustomed to. Even with my insulated clothing and the System regulating my body temperature, I felt goosebumps dance across my flesh. I sucked my breath in through my teeth. It was a wonder that the prisoners didn’t freeze to death up here. Perhaps some of them did. It had never occurred to me to ask.
My presence in the prison was not remarked upon. The ranks of the Enforcers in Bright Horizon were not particularly numerous, and we each had a variety of assignments that took us everywhere in the citidome. The System recognized our genetic code, so no doors in the city were closed to us.
I found Eos huddled in the corner of a dingy cell, curled tightly in