Fragments Gallery
The Wall
I love this hillside. Things are slow here. Calm. Now, at midday, the sun is warm on my face and a cool breeze gentle ruffles my hair. It is peaceful here; I wish I never had to leave.
From here I can look out across the plains and see miles upon miles of moving wheat. I can also see the world out past the wall.
That wall has been out here for generations upon generations. It marks the end of the safe lands, the lands not covered with radiation. Long ago a war made much of the world uninhabitable that wall marks the beginning of the danger zone, or so we're told anyways. Some of us don't believe that old story anymore, now we believe the wall is the symbol of a corporate lie that we have been fed for generations. Some leave, they climb the unguarded wall and escape; they are never seen again.
The corporations that rule us say that those who run perish in agony caused by radiation poisoning. Those who doubt say that the corporations want us to stay so that we remain under their thumb, their willing slaves.
I worry this is true.
From here the lands look the same over there, but I know that the radiation damage, the blight, doesn't start right away. There is some distance between it and the wall so the blight is out of sight. Logically I guess I could climb the wall, go check and then come back if the land really was poisoned. However I doubt I'd be the first to think of that which leads to the question; why have none returned? You'd think that if it were safe someone would have come back. Just like you'd think that if it were not safe many would have returned.
But no person has ever come back over that wall.
Still when I stare out across that wall I wonder; would things be different on the other side? Maybe it could be safe? Would my life be better? I want to go, but I fear the outcome.
So instead I languish here; wanting to leave this life but fearing to try.
I wonder if I ever will be brave enough to climb that wall.