FOR THE GOOD OF HUMANITY: Culling Kennedy
By
Edward Hyde (With kind permission from Symbri)
Sitting on the hard bench, Kennedy rubbed at her wrist, the thin strip of pale skin that the sun could never reach the only indication that her government-issue watch had ever been there. It was ironic. Despite not having worn a stitch of clothing for the past seven days, this was the first time she had felt truly naked. It was a strange thing to miss, the piece of mandatory technology which had delivered her death sentence, but it had been her constant companion for the past nine years. Wherever she went, whatever outfit she wore, whatever the season, there it was, its soft glow a reassuring presence. An indication that everything was okay. Until, of course, it wasn’t.

She remembered going with her mum to get her first fitted when she turned four years old. She had been so proud! It made her feel so grown up, especially when the nice lady who had fitted it for her had congratulated her with the words “Welcome to The System!” Mummy had one, so did all her teachers, and the children in the classes above her but she was one of the first among her friends to come of age and it had been a very proud and exciting moment for her. It had been changed three times since then. Twice when she outgrew the one she had been issued with and the thin metallic strap became too tight, starting to dig into her skin despite the degree of stretchiness built into the ones meant for growing youngsters which was absent from adult models which were generally issued at the age of sixteen, which had happened once when she was six and again when she was ten years old.

The third time had been just over a year ago when, for some reason, her watch had begun to glitch, constantly cycling through the colours as it did during its morning reboot but failing to settle all day, earning her the thankfully short-lived nickname of “Disco Queen” at school. Upon seeing that the issue hadn’t resolved itself during the day, her mum had taken her straight round to the local Department of Population Control office, the same place she had been for all previous fittings, where the technician had run some tests to rule out tampering, something which Kennedy had been hotly denying all day but was relieved to have confirmed, and put the issue down to a signal fault. He had then removed the faulty watch and issued her with a new one.

On all three occasions, her wrist had been bare for less than a minute while the data from her old watch was downloaded and the new one synced to her biometrics and government profile. This time, however, when the watch had been taken off, it had stayed off. Seeing the light go off as it was deactivated, even if it was the red light that had marked her for death, and the watch tossed along with dozens of others into a container to be wiped, reconditioned and issued to the next user had hit Kennedy almost as hard as anything else in the past week and she had forced herself to choke back a sob.

She had been at her weekly swim class when she had noticed the light on her watch change from green to red. At first she thought it was simply another glitch and continued swimming, expecting it to change back at any moment, but by the time she completed her next length of the pool, it was clear that there was no mistake. The lottery had picked her and she was an Animal now. No longer a person, just food. Meat on the hoof. She had clung to the edge of the pool, staring dumbly at the red light on her wrist, her brain refusing to properly process what she saw, until the teacher spoke, a strange question which seemed to make no sense.

“Oh, Kennedy!” She had exclaimed. “You too?” Puzzled, Kennedy had looked up and seen Bobby, a sweet and soft-spoken boy very close to her own age, perhaps a month or two older, standing next to the teacher with the watch on his wrist glowing red. Two in one class! What were the chances of that.

“Um, yeah!” she had replied, not really knowing what else to say. “I guess?” The teacher had then ordered her out of the pool like Bobby and, in a firm voice but without sounding unkind, told them to take off their swimsuits. They were Animals now and Animals did not wear clothes. Still in her slightly numb daze, Kennedy had complied without really thinking, pulling the straps of her sporty black one-piece over her shoulders and rolling it down past her newly developing chest then her belly and hips and finally pulling it all the way off the ends of her legs and wringing it out just as she would have done in a changing cubicle through force of habit. She didn’t really care about the other members of the class watching her, or the other patrons beyond their roped-off section of the pool. Most Summers her mum had taken her for a week’s holiday to a camp site with cosy little static caravans where nobody wore clothes and she rarely bothered with a bikini on the beach but Bobby seemed more shy, tugging at the waistband of his shorts rather reluctantly with his thumb and picking at the knot in the string at the front as if playing for time.

“Don’t forget Conversion Week last year.” Kennedy reminded him gently. “Everyone’s seen it all before.”

“I know but…” Bobby had tried to smile, blushing a little. A glance down showed Kennedy what his issue was.

“Oh I see!” she had put a comforting hand on his shoulder. “It’s okay. That’s just a sort of stress response. Nobody minds. Don’t worry about everyone else,” she had suggested, putting her other hand on his free shoulder and turning him to face her square on. Just look at me.” she told him, copying a technique her mum had used any time she was afraid when she was little. “Into my eyes. Focus there.” Bobby had done as she said, his blue eyes locking with her hazel ones. “It’s just you and me here.” she had told him. “Take them off.”

Impressed by this show of maturity and empathy, the teacher had signalled to the rest of the class to keep quiet and all but one or two had maintained a respectful silence as Bobby dropped his shorts, revealing the erection he had been nervous about people seeing.

“There.” Kennedy had smiled, continuing to speak in the same calm, soothing voice. “It’s done now. Over with. You will never, ever have to do that again. And it really wasn’t so bad, was it?”

“No…” Bobby had smiled weakly. “I guess not.” Kennedy was not sure where her composure had come from. She had still, at the time, not really got her head around what was happening to her but in the moment all she had seen was a friend who needed help and had done what she hoped would make things better for him.


To be continued...