Sunset Rising

As we walked along the hall, I overheard many conversations. It seemed everyone was talking about the wedding and how Jack ditched Leisel for an urchin girl. And everyone was wondering who that urchin girl was. I pulled my hat down just a little lower.

Jack found the room he was looking for and knocked on the door before walking in. I was shocked by his boldness, but I followed him, trying to act with the same confidence. We entered a large storage room with shelving units lining the walls. A few sealed bins stood off to one side.

“What are we looking for?” I whispered.

“We’re looking to replace our chips. According to the map, the surplus chips are stored somewhere in here. I don’t know exactly where, though.”

I studied the shelves and quickly picked up on the pattern that organized them. The bins were grouped by size, and each group was in alphabetical order. I started with the smallest bins first, looking for the words “chip” or “sca

“I found a bin labelled ‘microchips,’” I said. I pulled the bin out and looked inside. There were millions of tiny chips in a protective bag, a pair of tweezers, and an implantation device with the word “Spritze” written on the handle.

“Perfect!” He popped open a drive on his table and, using the tweezers, took one chip and placed it in the drive. He closed it. “Who do you want to be? Name?”

“What? You can’t just change the chip?”

“No, I have to make us new ones. And we can’t be Jack and Su

“Well if we need new names, we might as well have new identities, too. You know, just in case we go u

I could tell by Jack’s wry expression that he doubted we would be down there long enough to need new identities. “You’re making it more complicated.” He tapped on his computer. “Laundry?”

“Fine.”

“And for me…” He continued to tap on his computer. “Definitely not sewage… Mines. I can work in the mines. So we need names. I’ll be Benjamin. According to the records, every other guy down there is Benjamin, so I’ll blend right in. And for your name… lots of girls named after the seasons… Summer, Winter, Autumn… weird, there’s no Spring.”

“The Cull happens every spring. Who’s going to name their daughter after that? Use Autumn.”

“Okay… so Autumn and Benjamin Jones are now employed, and they need a place to live.”

“What? We’re going to pretend we’re married?” I needed to live with my father. And it was bad enough Reyes saw me marry Jack on television without actually dragging a “husband” down to the Pit with me. How was I going to explain it was all a mistake while Jack was living with me?

“Well, technically we’re not pretending. We actually are married,” Jack said absentmindedly as he continued to tap away on his tablet. “And you’re not leaving me on my own down there.”

“Your presence will… complicate my life.” I hoped to change his mind. I was sure I could find someone to take him in so we didn’t have to live together.

“Boyfriend?”

I nodded.

“Don’t worry. I’ll stay out of your way.” Somehow I wasn’t reassured. “Okay, your chip is ready.”

Jack took a Spritze out of the bin and felt the back of my right hand until he found my chip. He placed the device over my chip and extracted it. It was painless. He fitted the new chip into the Spritze and injected it into the back of my hand.

He placed a new chip into his computer and programmed it.

“My turn,” he said, handing me the device. “Just press this button for extraction and this one to insert.”

I did to his right hand what he had done to mine. Jack took our old chips and crushed them on the floor with the heel of his boot. “There go Jack Ke

“O’Do

Jack gave me a strange look. “Sunset?”

“My mother named me Sunset because of the color of my hair. I always hated it… until now. Now my name seems like a gift she gave me… something that was special to her… and it’s all I had left.” I needed to shake off the melancholy that suddenly gripped me. I was still Sunset O’Do

“I remember that the night we met you were interested in a painting of a sunset. Why? Did the picture mean something?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. I guess I was wondering how my mother knew what a sunset looked like.” Why was I confiding in him? Why did I even bring this up? We were in the middle of an escape. “Forget it. We’re ru

“You lead the way.” Jack held the door open for me. The hallway was still busy, and once again we joined the moving crowd.

I was halfway home.

Chapter Eleven

The big steel double doors were our only way out of the Dome and into the Pit, and to get to them we were going to have to walk through main reception. The whole area was still in a state of pandemonium after that morning’s wedding debacle. Jack was hoping we could slip into a service elevator u

I followed the same path I’d taken that morning as a bride and approached the top of the staircase. I hesitated for a moment, the memory still fresh in my mind, but Jack didn’t miss a beat. He wrapped an arm around my waist and swept me along with him.

Traffic on the staircase was thick, but Jack didn’t let go of me until we reached the last step and began our trek across the busy room. Both steel doors were open for the servants wheeling carts back out to the kitchens. I noticed that none of them were wearing kitchen uniforms and then remembered the Pit was on lockdown. The bourge had to do their own work during lockdowns. I decided that we could easily act like we’d been sent to help. I led Jack over to the line-up of carts waiting to go and motioned for him to take one. I grabbed one and started wheeling it toward the door. I looked back and saw that he was following me.

I kept an even pace, resisting the urge to run through the doors. There was a line, and I realized with a sinking feeling that they were going to make us scan-in to pass through the doors. I stared down at my hand where Jack had inserted the new chip. I bit my lip, wondering if it would work. I was so close to being home. Just through those doors, then I could get back to the Pit. Beeps sounded up ahead as people passed the sca

One more to go, and then it was my turn. The person ahead of me sca

“Wait a minute,” said one of the guards as he walked toward me. For just a second, there was no doubt in my mind that I had been caught, but I couldn’t run. My legs were too weak and my feet felt like dead weights. “Sca