Page 4 of Because I Killed Him
“From which injustice do you wish to be freed, Heretic?” the Blue asks.
The executioner shoves the girl to her knees, and her head jerks forward from the force. She steadies herself, her eyes blazing as she looks up at the Blue. Before speaking, she rises, her legs trembling with the effort. “Fromyours,” she cries. “Your blood might be high, but truth is higher.”
The Blue tilts his head in challenge. “What is truth?”
“It’s order,” her voice swells. “If our world had any, tyrants like you would be the lowest of all.”
“You claim your blood is higher than mine?”
“Not my blood. Mybeliefs.”
Murmurs of outrage ripple behind the Blue, where hundreds of other high-citizens watch off-camera. The Blue silences them with a glance. Then he bows his head and slowly lowers himself onto one knee. “So be it, Heretic. You shall receive your order, and it will elevate you higher than Green, Purple, and Orange. You shall even rise higher thanBlue.”
He unfastens the jesses from the two-headed eagle’s leg. The bird screeches, its wings snapping open as it leaps from the perch and dives. The Heretic line breaks. Their screams clash as they scatter across the platform, ducking and rolling for cover. But the eagle is already locked onto its target. When the Heretic girl throws herself behind the guillotine’s beams for cover, the eagle swoops around and tears at her bare hands with its talons. Most of her fingers are shredded before she’s hoisted, kicking and screaming, from the platform. With a sudden burst of strength, the eagle lifts off, the Heretic girl struggling in its grip.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Dad growls, grabbing my hand. “You don’t have to watch this, honey.”
“Yes, I do,” I try to say, but no words come out. More than watching a Heretic execution, I need to see what happens when you challenge a Blue. Because starting tomorrow, I’ll be living among them.
The eagle’s mighty wings beat through the air. It soars higher and higher, so high it would vanish into the darkness if the broadcast drones didn’t track it. The Heretic girl never stops fighting. Even as the eagle’s talons sink into her shoulders and blood soaks the back of her dress, she keeps kicking, biting, and struggling. Then, with a ferocious shriek, the eagle releases her from its grip.
My stomach flips with her as she falls, twisting and turning. I tighten my grip on Dad’s hand and focus on the top of the screen, where a scattering of stars appears in the darkening sky. At the sound of a loud crack, Dad lets go of my hand. Instead of a body, I find only a streak oforange blood along the edge of the execution platform. The Heretic girl must’ve struck it before she fell onto the grass below.
Silence.
No one claps or cheers. Even Bogart, who’s hosted over three hundred executions, stands frozen, his face ghostly white, his mouth hanging open as if he’s unused to improvising. He probably receives a prompt through his earpiece from one of his producers, because he abruptly spins on his heel, faces the Blues, and performs the official Civilized World salute: two fingers for the virtues of civility and obedience.
All the low-citizens in the amphitheater follow his example.
Dad, too.
“Loredana,” he says, urging me to join in. My arm feels stiff as I press my index and middle fingers together, then raise my hand alongside Dad’s. Countless times I’ve used the salute to greet others, but this time it feels like more than a show of respect.
It feels like worship.
The eagle returns to its perch with a triumphant flap of its wings. Orange blood glistens on its talons, dripping onto the balcony where the Blue still kneels. I don’t recognize him, but the gold hammer pin on his lapel marks him as a politician, one of thirty-three Blue Representatives who advocate for high-citizens.
When the Blue finally rises, his shadow stretches across the amphitheater until it reaches the low-citizens below. All are still saluting. Their fingers tremble as they try to keep their arms raised, but no one dares to be the first to lower theirs.
Things weren’t always this way.
Dad says there was a time when we shared equal freedoms, when our merit-based system benefited everyone, and when no one held a monopoly on power. But at some point, the Blues began to outpace the rest of us. When oil reserves dwindled, they discovered new fields. When our technology faltered, they developed advanced methods to bridge the gaps. And when energy supplies ran dry, they didn’t just find alternatives; they pioneered entirely new systems of extraction.
No one knows how the Blues always managed to find a solution. Maybe it was luck. Maybe it was corruption. Hillaire thinks it’s because they’re tribalistic, more united, and more willing to sacrifice for each other than the rest of us.
Ultimately, though, I don’t care about the how. What matters is that the Blues’ contributions reshaped the entire Civilized World. They earned the title of high-citizens and were rewarded with superior genetic enhancements, elite positions in government and business, and a broader range of freedoms.
Some low-citizens, like Dad, cling to the hope of rebalancing the scales, while others insist there’s no point in fighting back. “We’ve already been conquered,” they say. And in some ways, they’re right.
The Blue gestures to the crowd with a sweep of his hand. “Proceed with civility,” he says. “And may you always be virtuous.”
Arms fall at his signal. Eyes flick to the Heretic girl’s body, broken where she landed. Only when the corpse is cleared away does the shock of her brutal death begin to fade. Gradually, color returns to pale faces. Hesitant smiles reappear, drinks are refilled, and cigarettes relit.
And then, applause.
It begins on the Orange level with one pair of hands, then another. The sound spreads like a gust of wind—ten people, twenty—until the entire amphitheater roars. From the ground floor to the Blue level above, the structure trembles beneath a thunderous show of approval.
I recognize this sound.
