I start to become lost; I can't make sense of the situation. I’m deeply bewildered, filled with mixed emotions. My head wants to explode. The details are too much for me to handle as everything that happened last night, everything that felt so special, was starting to become a curse, an event that changed my life for the worst.
I didn't know the Demon, let alone him being a rebel. A leader of some fraction I have never heard of. The moment I shared with him was a moment I can't forget. It was a once in a lifetime moment that now, in this situation, I wish had never happened.
I can feel his pure intentions, despite what this Arbiter is saying to us. I still believe that this so-called Demon is more than what he appears to be, but siding with him now, thinking he is a good person is not the idea that would get me and my mother out of this predicament.
“If I tell you information about the Demon, would you let my mother go?” I said to the Arbiter out of desperation.
“Well, that would be appreciated, but, if I may add, what about Reign?” He said to as he slowly tilted his head.
“Reign? What about Ms. Atalia?” I said to him with a curious tone.
“Well, I already told you earlier. She is involved with the Demon, remember?” He replied as he puts his chin on top of his hands.
“Well, I…” I said.
“That begs the question, are you actually telling the truth?” He said to me as he looks at me from the side of his eyes.
He stands up and walks behind my mother who was still lost in thought. He holds her on the shoulders as he slowly caresses them as if he were consoling her.
“Well, Mrs. Inara, what have I told you? You raised a terrible daughter. Lying to the law and shaming your hard work for her own personal gain,” he menacingly said.
“No, I didn’t!“ I said to him as tears rain down from my eyes.
“Wouldn’t you like to forget all about this? Everything that had happened? Why not start a new life?” He said as he fixes my mother's hair.
“I… No, I don't,” she as she wipes tears off her face. She removes the Arbiter's hands and makes an angry expression.
“Well now, Mrs. Inara, starting to get a bit of a temper, aren’t we? Not like you have much of a choice in the matter,” he says as he grabs his book and walks away from us.
My mother and I look towards the man angrily. The man checks his black book once again, nodding his head like earlier. He clicks his pen and writes something inside his book.
“With all the private information I shared to you moments ago, do you think you'd get to roam free? Of course not. Believe me, even if you had told me details about your links to the Demon and Reign, we would have still Realigned both of you,” he said to us in a threatening tone.
The Arbiter pulls out some papers that have been bound together with a stapler from his large book and throws it to the table. Along with the papers, he places a box on top of the table. I leaned in on the table and grabbed the box, I remembered that this box was the one Atalia gave me along with the brand-new rare guitar.
“You can't deny it any further, we also recovered this from your belongings back at your school. But what we found is tastefully surprising. An onyx beaded bracelet concealed inside that box inside your belongings. Onyx, the symbol of the Onyx Blade of Justice, Atalia Reign. Is this a sign of your indoctrination? Either way, your friends, your teachers, no one will ever remember you once we have Realigned you both,” he said with an eerie grin.
“Wait, I didn’t, that's not–,” I said to him as I my heart beats faster.
“No need to explain. The time for honesty and negotiation is long over. Read the papers in front of you, you'll understand. I don’t want to waste my time explaining such horrid details to you,” he said to me and my mother.
I opened the box and see a black and gold beaded bracelet. The black beads shine like pearls while the gold beads shimmer beautifully when hit by light. It looks expensive enough and it feels that it is. It has a bit of weight on it which tells me it isn’t cheap or some sort of plain replica like the ones we usually use.
I keep wondering why Atalia would give me such expensive gifts. Why me of all people? Did she not know that all of this would get me in trouble? Maybe she felt that I needed help or maybe she was just that nice. Either way, that's not important now.
My mother and I grab the stapled papers in front of us. Upon seeing what was written, we realized that we were in one of the most unprecedented situations of our lives. We trembled in fear as there may be no tomorrow ahead of us.
The paper is filled with paragraphs like a book or a newspaper article. The first paragraph is an introduction to what reads as “The Realignment Guidelines for All Head Arbiters of Ironhart City”. The paragraphs that follow explain the whole process. Apparently, Realignment is a procedure that helps a person be inclined to the laws of the Iron colony. With this procedure, it prepares each individual to once again join the productive community of Ironhart, assuring their highest productivity and allegiance to Extol, its laws and its beliefs. This sounds simple enough, so we read through the next parts which proceeded to explain the steps of Realignment.
The First process of the Realignment procedure is Reprogramming. In this process, the subject’s mind is to be reprogrammed to suit the need of the city and its laws. The subject is to be under heavy doses of a special chemical known as Hippolatomine which induces the person to deep sleep and numbing their bodies, assuring to not feel any sense of pain or discomfort. It also helps the neurons slow down so that they are easier to identify and reengineer after a few minutes of being under the influence of the chemical.
Once the subject is induced to deep sleep, they start the surgery to reengineer the hippocampus of the brain. They open the skull and proceed to expose the brain. Once the brain is exposed, they take out every existing declarative memory from surface to sub surface levels, tracing them up to the long term and short-term memories which are found elsewhere in the brain using electricity. This process is done with a procedure called electro-declarative eradication which uses electrical impulses to remove memories that the Arbiters deem unnecessary.
They leave the Spatial memories mostly intact with all the necessary routes but remove any underlying memory associated with it such as names of people you were with or a very fond experience. Basically speaking, memories or emotions towards certain individuals. Spatial memory affects too much of a person’s ability to properly function, so they do not tinker too much with it but regardless, the whole procedure assures that the Arbiter’s have full control over a subject’s mind. When all the necessary memories are removed, the brain can be prepared for re-initialization.
Upon reading the twisted first part, I dared not to continue and threw the paper away to the middle of the table, but the Arbiter slammed his hand on the door as he screamed, “Continue!”. I grab the paper back shakenly as I continued reading the next paragraphs.
Re-initialization is the second step to the Realignment process. As I read through this, chills ran down my spine. It is too vile, too evil, regardless of how many times you read through it. First, they leave you inside what they call “Screening Room” that runs you through a specifically developed program that presents all 287 Sevenite laws.
They inject you with Eugeroics that would force you to be awake throughout the 42-hour run of the program. They feed you through tubes that provide the basic nutrients for your brain to function and attach a catheter to you as you are strapped in a chair. The program runs the subject through every law from top to bottom and taking you to a deep dive of the laws and their importance to the development of the Iron civilization. I can only imagine the feeling of being awake for such a length of time and to have information forcefully hammered to your mind, it's inhumane, truly and deeply evil to its core.
This last paragraph only justifies that these procedures are evil to their roots. After the nightmarish Re-initialization, the final step is the Reinstitution. This is where each subject is to take an examination about all 287 Ironhart Sevenite laws and has to answer each of them correctly. If the subject fails even once, this will prove that the Re-initialization process was a failure, and the subject has to start all over again
“Oh, my, oh my, your reactions sure are what keep me so invested in this job. The fear, the panic, the “I can't believe this is real”, looks on your faces, it just gets me every time. The delight of fear and fright from the faces of those to be realigned is my dose of happiness,” he said sadistically as he kept clenching on to his book, trying to maintain his grip as he giggles.
“Now let’s move on to the more serious matters. You have about 15 hours to be able to spend bonding with your present selves. We wouldn't want to keep you waiting, but we're currently running through some of our more “closer” colleagues and the Re-initialization machines are fully booked until later this evening or maybe even tomorrow morning, who knows, really,” he added with a despicable smile.
He leaves the room and slams the door shut. I stand up and run to my mother. I hold her hands and kneel beside her chair as I cry. She’s looking up towards the light coming from the fluorescent lamp. She holds my hand tight and looks down to me, her eyes burning with passion.
“I thought everything right now was about your father. I thought that I was brought here because his secret was out, and I felt so scared dragging you along with it. I kept my peace with his disappearance as we had already prepared for whatever happens. But before he left, he told me one important thing,” mother said to me with worried eyes.
“What is it?” I curiously asked her.
“To never let you fall into the wrong hands, to give you a happy, normal life, but I failed him. Don't worry, I won't let anything bad happen to you, I promise. I'll get you out of here, mark my words,” she says with grit as tears fill her eyes.
“What’s wrong, Mother?’ as I clutch her hand ever so fondly.
“I’ll tell you everything I know, I’ll tell you his story the best that I could with the time we have remaining,” she said to me as she clutches me tightly with her hug.
“About whom? About Father?” I asked her with deep interest.
“About the man who reignited the light of justice and spread the wings of freedom. He had to show the city that he was back so that those people who were lost and felt alone would have a spark; to help awaken the true colors of peace, truth, and justice, to rekindle the streak of patriotism and valor, so that everyone knew that he has risen from the ashes,” she said to me.
“What are you saying, Mother?” I said to her.
“The rise and death of a phoenix,” she said.
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