Bread and the Circus

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

My name is Nephele.  Nephele Cerveau.  Honestly, I hate my name: it’s a girl’s name, and it’s froofy even if I were a girl, which I’m not.  All the same, it’s the name I was given at birth, and if I’m going to die, I want my name to be remembered.

The transport shuttle made several stops after picking me up, hopping around the city, going from flitpad to flitpad to collect all the various dregs and wannabes that somehow passed the physical and psych exams required to get into the Circus.

All the tests to make sure you’re healthy enough to die.

Right then, before I can start to dwell any deeper on the subject, my gloomy thoughts are interrupted when this girl sits next to me – the last vacant seat, really, after she got on at the last stop before stellar launch – and gives me an apologetic look when she jostles me while sitting down.

“Sorry,” she apologizes, hesitates a moment, then sticks out her hand.  “I’m MaKayla, but everybody calls me Mac.”

For just a moment I consider the outstretched, brown-skinned hand before me.  Seeing red hair and dark skin like hers is a bit odd, even in the melting pot mélange of races that humanity has become since taking to the stars, but the main reason I hesitate is because I’m not the friendly type by nature.  I’m an introvert, and I like to keep myself to myself.  At least I do normally.  But then again, I’m heading off to death, so I guess all my self-preconceptions don’t matter that much anymore.

I take the offered hand and give it a gentle squeeze.  She returns the squeeze with a lot more vigor.  Contractual obligations of basic sociality aside, I resign myself to having someone to talk to for the rest of the flight.  Considering how much fun I was having being alone with my thoughts of death in the Arena, likely the painful sort, maybe it’s just as well.

“Neph,” I tell her, leaving off the rest of it, trying to make it sound a little more masculine.  “It’s supposed to mean ‘clouds,’ or something like that.”

“You’re from Highside,” she remarks, eyebrows raised in obvious surprise, though she lowers them almost as fast, trying not to make me feel uncomfortable.  It’s nice of her to try, I guess.  “I mean…well…I guess I just didn’t think…”

“It’s okay,” I reassure her, and then lean back, letting my eyes play over the rest of the passenger cabin.  The whole place is set up with two long rows of seats, four seats to each column, separated by a walking aisle down the middle.  A setup not much unlike a planet-based aeroplane, actually.  The seats are padded and surprisingly pretty comfortable, and there’s plenty of space between Mac, me, and the seats across the way, filled by a pair of shark-fanged Cobldp, probably mates judging from their closeness, paying way more attention to each other than anything else.  There’s enough distance on all sides that I can be pretty sure we won’t be overheard talking, at least as long as we don’t raise our voices too much.  “You wanna hear mine, then I hear yours?”

There’s a beat as Mac figures out what I mean, before she shrugs.  Backstories is what I mean, of course; what brought us both here, on a one-way flight to certain doom and potential wealth…for our beneficiaries, of course.

“Sounds fair,” she admits.  “I mean, what else are we gonna do?  It’s a long trip, and I don’t see any signs of an in-flight movie.”

“To get why I’m here, you’ve got to understand the economics of the Trans-Galactic Republic,” I begin, doing my best to get comfortable.  “You probably know most of it already, but bear with me: it helps to know the whole story before you get to my part in it.

“We call our government a republic because everybody gets a vote.  In theory.  On all the tens of thousands of inhabited worlds within the Republic, every single one of the hundreds of billions of people, from hundreds of different sapient species, gets one vote to use as they like every galactic standard year.”

“That’s the part everybody knows,” Mac agrees with a nod for me to go on.

“Here’s the next part, though, and everybody knows it, but not everybody wants to admit it: the Republic’s not really a republic.  It’s a plutocratic oligarchy.”

“Huh?”

“A plutocracy is a government ruled by the rich,” I explain.  “An oligarchy is a government ruled by a small elite group up at the top.  So a plutocratic oligarchy is a government ruled by a tiny number of super-rich people.”  Mac’s incredulous expression gives me pause, so I answer her expression with one of my own, silently asking her to hear me out.  She does, and I continue.  “In the Republic, everybody is allowed to sell their vote, and most people do.”

“My family never did,” Mac declares, but all I need to do is shrug a little to get her back into listening mode.

“That as may be, but as I said, most people do, from the lowest dregs all the way up to the middle class, and even some of the richest people as well when they can’t be bothered to use it themselves.  In exchange, they all get the necessities of life, courtesy of the private individuals and companies that bought their votes: food, shelter, medical treatment, and entertainment.  Lots of entertainment, of the highest quality.  Probably because it’s the best, cheapest way to help people forget how subpar the other stuff they get can be.  Seriously, if you can get a virtual reality feed that makes you experience a steak dinner, even though all you’re eating is nutrition blocks, or travel anywhere in the galaxy with a thought without ever leaving your vermin-infested living room, it’s not hard to see how important entertainment is in keeping the typical Republic citizen happy.

“The people who can afford to buy those votes know it, too.  And they know that they need those votes, or else bad stuff starts to happen.  See, the rich know that they only get to stay rich because the laws in place allow it.  And those laws get decided by the votes of Republic citizens.  Laws like who gets taxed, and by how much; the rules of property ownership; regulations of business practices; and, of course, inheritance laws.”

“You’re here because of that last one, aren’t you?” Mac asks, though I can tell it’s more a statement than a real question.

“That obvious, huh?” I chuckle, and see her sheepish nod.  “Yeah, that sums it up pretty well.  Times were tough all over when the last holdouts of the Human Empire caved and joined the Republic.  I was six when that happened, and Dad died suddenly from the strain on his nerves from trying to navigate our money over into the new economy.  Mother didn’t know any of the things I just reviewed for you, and isn’t any good at money games anyway, and so it was only a matter of time before our savings started to dwindle, despite all of Dad’s forethought and financial planning before his collapse.”

“Things weren’t so good for us either,” Mac recalls, looking at the window just past me, even though all it showed was an image of a starscape flitting by (an artificial projection, since faster-than-light travel is really just a big boring blur).  “I was six, too, and we all had to move into the big city, even though there was plenty of room everywhere else.  They said it was to protect our planet’s ecology.  Maybe they were right, looking back on it now, but I still hated the move, and the ugly little apartment where we all had to somehow fit.”

“Dad’s death got Mom to start drinking,” I continued, looking down, not really knowing what to say in response to hearing from someone whose life had been a lot tougher than mine.  “Me and my kid brother, we had to make due.  Mostly I ended up in charge of getting us both educated, and I think I did all right, considering the circumstances.  Weird how you hate school when you’re forced to do it, but when it’s so hard to get, you move the planetary alignment to seize what fate denies you.”

“Maybe not in such extreme terms,” laughed Mac.  “But…yeah, that’s how I always felt about it.  Getting books, real books, was always tough after the move.  I never loved libraries more than when I had to fight for a place in line to visit them, figuratively, and then the literal kind of fight to make sure the yobos around my neighborhood wouldn’t go picking on me or my brothers just because I liked to read.  Eventually I had to hide my reading just so I didn’t have to go home with b****y knuckles every day; it kind of made Dad upset seeing the stuff he’d taught me used so much.”

“I never had to fight much,” I admitted.  “Not the literal sort you mean, anyway.  But I learned how all the same.  Fencing, mostly, because it seemed like the sort of style a noble should practice, along with a little soft-style self-defense.  The romantic in me, I guess,” I add, rubbing the back of my head self-consciously.  “We had tutors, and we also had a nice school that we attended, and we grew to prefer to spend as much time out of the house and away from Mom as possible.  From her, and her swift descent into full-fledged alcoholism.

“Last year, Mom finally got cleaned up, mostly, but of course it was far too late by then: we were on the verge of total bankruptcy.  No offense, but when I saw the vast gulf yawning before me when I looked down from our ivory towers, and realized that I might have to descend into those Tartarean depths in the all-too-near future…well, the thought chilled me.  Then it chilled me even more badly when I thought of my younger brother having to cope with life at Rock Bottom.  Or my mother.  They’re both delicate souls, artistic and gentle and easily damaged by the vagaries of life.  Given my options, death seemed almost welcoming, rather than having to see my loved ones broken on fortune’s rack.  But I suppose I’ve never been the strictly suicidal type, gloomy moods notwithstanding.  Ah, but selling my life in exchange for the continued fortunes of my family, now that…that seems worth it, at least to me.”

“My story’s not too far off from yours,” Mac said, her expression having grown softer at the mention of my brother.  “I’ve got seven brothers, and I’m the only girl.  They told me I was the smartest of us all, and maybe that’s true, at least as far as grades went.  Not smart enough to get into a school on the upper levels, though, one of those places that makes sure you get a job as soon as you graduate, the sort of job that gets you set for life with one of the big money players.  No, I got my chance, and I flubbed it.”

She looked down at her spread hands, sighing and shaking her head at regrets over the might-have-beens of her past.  It was a feeling I knew well enough myself; regret is the most bitter of vintages, but at least it’s not so vile when you can share it with someone who knows its taste as well as yourself.

“Guess I just took a look down, like you did, and saw how close to Rock Bottom we already were.  Sure, Dad and Mom were still healthy and working hard, and my oldest brother, Alonzo, was fresh into the workforce, doing computer work at the same place Mom does her job, but…”

“Just one step away from the edge,” I supply.  “Just one little nudge.”

“Yeah,” she agrees, scowling at her past.  “All it would take was one big disaster, or a couple smaller ones, and we’d have to start selling our votes just to stay alive, or starve to death in the gutters of Rock Bottom.  I could see the possibility pretty clearly, and I didn’t like it one bit.  My family’s proud, in our way.  We’ve never sold our votes, not ever, no matter how tough times got.  If we ever started, well, it would be like giving in, surrendering, telling the rest of the universe that we weren’t as tough or smart or good as we thought we were.  And once you do that, even if you somehow claw your way back up from Rock Bottom, it’ll always stick to you, always be there in the back of your mind: that one nasty moment when you just couldn’t cut it.”

The ice broken, our fears shared, it wasn’t so hard to keep talking, neither of us quite so concerned with keeping our voices down anymore.  After all, it’s just chatter, nothing too personal.  I think the conversation was about some books we’d both read when we were younger and not so world-weary, though it wasn’t especially memorable, except by the way the talk made us both feel.

Somehow, on my way to Hell, I’d stumbled upon a twin to my own soul.  A fellow sufferer in these times of harshest trial and near-certain demise.

More importantly, I’d found a friend.

I think the feeling was mutual.