Seneca Rebel
29

I HAD NO one. Not a soul. Only when I closed my eyes could the ones I loved visit me, the ones I had left behind for this. But it wasn’t all peaches and cream, these imaginary visits. My mom. Julie. Killer. My mom’s sweet patients and the people I knew from Café Firenze who always wanted to hear about my day. I pulled their faces to the forefront of my memory and it stung like a hard shower beating on a fresh sunburn. This wasn’t a life worth living if they weren’t in it. They wouldn’t take me back now. Nobody here cared about Doro Campbell, except for Reba, and I had sabotaged our budding friendship.

Exhausted, I’d fallen into a deep sleep right after I got home from sessions around five and now it was midnight. My schedule was way off. The lack of sunlight totally messed up my biorhythms. The normally dark circles under my eyes were pitch black, as if colored with chunks of coal. This wasn’t a look that cucumbers could fix.

I clutched my flexer like a security blanket. Flipped on B3, only to land on the news, of course. My parasocial relationship with Becky Hudson would grow tonight as all of my real relationships had been squashed. The lower third of the screen read, “Previously Aired.” I was surprised that the video of the crash was playing. If nobody seemed to remember this crash, how could it be that it was still being reported?

“Following the fatal flighter crash at the Key Bridge in the Aboves Friday night, officials are cracking down on the escalating Mojo Stick problem. The Seneca Senate has introduced new measures at the recommendation of the advisory committee which, if sanctioned, will mean that a zero-tolerance decree for Mojo sticks will go into effect by the end of the year.”

Seneca didn’t have jail or prison, which were at odds with the utopian, ‘one world’ system of government the founders had envisioned for this society. Instead, those found guilty by jury for engaging in criminal activity were banished to the Aboves, permanently. Nobody wanted to mess up. There was an extremely low crime rate here. Of almost one and a half million Senecans in Seneca City hubs worldwide, there had only been two dozen banishments to the Aboves. Not even a fraction of a fraction of one percent. Those chosen to be here were in many ways a self-selecting group, and once we had tasted the Senecan life, we simply didn’t want to go back. Sᴇaʀ*ᴄh the FɪndNøvel.ɴᴇt website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

My attention had veered away from the B3 News, but snapped back when the screen that contained crash footage was now filled with a photo of Dom.

“Officials have identified the stolen flighter pilot’s body as that

Seneca Rebel

of Senecan Dominic Ambrosia. B3 News can confirm that Ambrosia was flying recklessly under the influence of a Mojo Stick, and will be held accountable for a total of six deaths. Two more are still critically injured. Congressman Frank Wallingsford had these words: “Our prayers are with the families of the victims. These were utterly senseless deaths that Senecan leaders will tolerate no longer.”

I was enraged, full throttle. Sickened. I smashed my flexer down into the bed. Burying my head in the pillow, I screamed my face off, and kicked my legs wildly. When I pulled back from the pillow, I could barely breathe. I stood up on my bed and threw the pillow across the room. I jumped down and crouched with my knees on the floor, to pull out my record player and turn it on. Fingering through a stack of records, I stopped on Nirvana– Smells Like Teen Spirit.

I hadn’t listened to this record since I’d come here. Now was the perfect time. I put it on, cranked the volume all the way up. For some reason, this song always riled me up more than any other. Right now was no different. I was already provoked. Now I was really getting amped. This was my own form of mojo. I jumped back up onto the bed, grabbed my flexer and commanded it to a microphone. I belted out Smells Like Teen Spirit. This wasn’t just karaoke. This was my anthem.

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