16 - Cello
Outside the window there's a jungle of grey concrete and flashing neon lights. I will never get used to living in a big city where the sky is constantly being cut apart by towers. People here live amongst so many other people, they have to dress and groom themselves bizarrely just to express some fleeting notion of individuality. Inside this city, Heign Valley is a nightmare on a different scale.

I combed through the city's neighbourhoods today, and while everything seemed dreadful in my eyes, there were places even I found charming. In Heign Valley there's no room for charm. This is the place where hope dies. If there are other places like the Zephyr where energy pools, this place would be the pool of human darkness. Only despair, pain, and desperation can be found here, only broken dreams, broken homes and broken hearts. The people here have sunken cheeks and missing teeth, they're rotting in their flesh, loitering on street corners without any particular purpose, like the living dead. Most of the stores are out of business, and those that still operate have their windows and doors protected by laser bars.

The Doorstep Lodge is no exception. I squint down through the green laser gird over the window and look at about a dozen skeletal people on the street. "What happened to them?" I ask Syianne, she seems to be knowledgeable in all things city-related – like the rail cars.

"Some of them are substance-users, but most of them are Blankheads." She joins me at the window to see where my gaze is directed.

"Is that what they're called?" How did they become like this?"

"They're people that had had their minds obliterated by the Council," she answers.

"The Council does that?" I can't withhold my shock. I remember when I was a boy riding the train into Maral for the first time, I was utterly horrified to learn that if someone misbehaves on the train, they can be thrown off even while it's moving.

"That's how they deal with severe crimes in this region," she says simply, as if this is the most natural thing in the world. "Don't you have criminals out west?"

"Yes, and they're put in prison."

"Obliterating people's minds is considered more efficient and humane. Technically they're housed, but they're allowed to wander off. The police round them up every couple of days and make sure they get fed, but this way they're as harmless as stray cats and after five years when they become conscious again, they remember language, some of them even remember basic skills like cooking and sewing, but it's like they're new people. They get new names and there are programs that help them begin new lives. It's better for society rather than to have people who are criminals forever."

"It's like a death sentence," I muse.

"Only without taking away life."

"Why are all the stores here so fortified then?"

"Blankheads tend to wander in wherever they see an opening and take things they find. No one wants them around," she explains. She casually touches my arm. "Are you hungry?"

"Famished." I also have a throbbing headache and my eyes feel sore and swollen. I can't remember when I last cried so much, but after an awkward half-hour we moved on from that embarrassing incident. I guess we both agreed to pretend it never happened. I nod in the direction of the door, there's a blare of music coming from downstairs, I could feel the bass through the floor.

"My treat."

*

Downstairs it's dark, crowded and noisy; the air is filled with smoke and the smell of booze. I've only seen places like this in movies. Subconsciously I grab hold of Syianne's hand, not to protect her, more to protect myself. The people here seem large and threatening. Most of them are men and resemble the loathsome train stewards. I don't know what I'd do if I get separated from her. I can't have anyone challenge me here, not when Risa is so ready to have another taste of human flesh.

I find an empty table and we sit. A moment passes and a scantily dressed waitress waltzes over, slipping two menus in front of us. I squint down at the words. There's barely enough light to read by and I look up at the waitress who is hovering nearby. "We're really hungry," I shout over the booming music played by a very angry band on stage. "What's the best thing to eat?"

"That'd be the Plagin steak," twills the waitress. "It's a large steak baked with mushrooms in a wrapping of dough -- it's big enough for both of you." She leans over my shoulder coming uncomfortably close and points out the steak on the menu. The price looks reasonable enough, especially since I haven't had a real meal all day. "Okay," I say without looking at her, because if I do, I'm bound to see more of her bosom than is polite, "we'll have that."

She senses my discomfort and straightens back up, writing our order on the pad. "And to drink?"

"Water."

"Bubbly or still?"

I look at Syianne. "Bubbles," she says.

I shrug. "Me too then."

"Okay!" says the waitress, she looks up from the pad and smiles at us. The angry band finishes their song and come off the stage; a few blue lights are lit around the bar. "Anything el – Oh my God, you two are so adorable! Did you dress up for the concert?"

"Dress up?" I look at my clothes, then I look at Syianne. I managed to shower and change, but neither of us would ever be considered dressed up for anything, except perhaps a pyjama party.

"You stuck Jewels on, right? Like Leolan from the Third Eye, I'm so excited they're performing here tonight!"

"I'm so excited too," Syianne says. I'm still confused.

"I tried to stick one on too, but I couldn't get it as dead centre as you guys did," She blinks at our faces, "but I'm pretty sure Leolan's Jewel is black, I can't tell which colour you've stuck on."

"We couldn't find black so we just went with clear ones." Once again, I witness Syianne's superb skills; it's as if anything she says can suddenly become the truth.

"Hey, can you stick mine on like you did yours?"

"I didn't stick them on, he did." My head whisks towards Syianne – what is she doing?

The waitress turns to me. "Oh, then can you?"

I hesitate, she makes a puppy face. "Please?"

"Well, it's really," – I search for something to say, I can feel how my face is probably turning red – "really dark here."

She grabs my arm. "Then let's go to the kitchen for a second." She turns her gaze back at Syianne. "You wouldn't mind if I steal him away from you for a bit?"

"Not at all. He's my twin brother," she says with a shrewd smile.

"Oh my God, you two don't look anything alike!"

"We get that all the time."

I'm glaring at Syianne, even as the waitress – she's rather strong for such a small girl – pulls me out of my seat and drags me away, I'm glaring all the way to the kitchen.

The last I see of her, Syianne is laughing her head off.

*

The waitress's name is Minty, she's seventeen and going to graduate high school soon. She looks like a doll, with her blonde hair parted into two pigtails and her hot pink tight top and short skirt the same colour as her lipstick. By the way she dresses and touches me I know she's more experienced than I am. She manages to get all the basic information out of the way before we even reach the kitchen

She hands me a black piece of drop-shaped plastic that's supposed to be her Jewel and a tube of special glue for skin. I fumble with it, making sure to smear enough of the stuff to make it hold. "Stand still," I say and then, catching my breath and biting my bottom lip, I stick the supposed-jewel on the centre of her smooth forehead, careful not to touch her skin, though my thumb does graze the spot where I place the plastic and it's unusually rough.

The result looks nothing like the real thing. "Wow!" she exclaims. "Yours just breaks the light like a real diamond! Where'd you find that thing? It's so pretty."

I feel wrong lying to Minty somehow. She's cute, and clearly the sort of silly girl who just blindly trusts people. "I was born with it."

She continues to stare and smile, I realise that she still doesn't get it. I try again. "I didn't stick mine on."

"I knew it was her! It just looks really perfect where you have it and no offence, but a boy would never manage that."

"Hey, I got yours in the centre!" I say, "But no, my sister didn't stick them on either."

She takes a mirror out from the pocket of her tiny apron and examines my work, and also her eye make-up. "Really? Then who did?"

"No one did." I sigh. "They're real. We're real Jewels."

She looks up at me, laughs and shoves me playfully. "Get out of here, you can't fool me."

"We've already fooled you because you think we're not real."

She freezes and blinks several times at me, until finally I see the truth sinking in. To my surprise, she looks distressed; she clasps her hands over her mouth. "Am I going to die?"

"No," I answer sharply. "Why would you die?"

"Because we touched!" She shakes her head, takes her hands down and appears to calm down. "Wait, how old are you?"

"Sixteen."

I sigh and take her hands and I know by now that this counts as flirting, even though I don't really intend it to. "It's okay, nothing can happen to you."

She seems to accept this. "You're sort of super cool," she says with a smile.

I nod. "I'm also very hungry," I say and point my thumb in the direction of the door of the kitchen. "So I actually have to eat."

"Oh." She takes her notepad. "Oh my God, I totally forgot." She grins up at me. "Why don't you go back to your seat, I'll get you your order." Then she takes a step towards me, rises onto her toes, grasps the back of my head and plants her lips on mine. "And then I can be dessert," she whispers in my ear and goes away.

I stick my hands into my pockets and even though I'm deeply shocked about some random girl smooching me out of the blue, I find my way back to our table.

Syianne takes one look at my lipstick-smeared face and snickers as if she planned the entire thing.

*

I'm relieved that it isn't Minty who brings the steak and bubbly water to our table. While my age establishes the fact that these kinds of encounters should excite me, they also make me feel extremely uneasy. My relationship with Lane was hardly what anyone would refer to as an adult relationship. It is particularly hard to have an adult relationship when neither of the counterparts are adults.

The steak is hard and dry and I'm not quite sure what animal it was when alive. The dough wrapping is undercooked and the mushroom sauce is too salty. We're too hungry to care, but my jaws have to work overtime to try and grind the meat into something I could swallow. Syianne gives up on it after a while and simply eats the undercooked dough coating with the salty mushrooms.

While we're sawing at the supposed food on our plate, a fat man comes onstage. "It's what we've all been waiting for!" he seems to gobble the microphone. "Ladies and Gentlemen, for the first time in Heign Valley, the winners of this year's Lottria Rock Festival, give a warm welcome to the THIRD EYE!"

The crowd erupts into crazy cheers; I guess this is what they mean when they say 'the crowd went wild' in the newspaper. I pause my chewing to stare expectantly at the stage. Funny, I can't remember reading about Lottria Rock Festival this year, or ever hearing about a band called The Third Eye. Though something occurs to me, and I turn to Syianne, "Which one of the black jewels is Leolan?" I ask with my mouth still full of half-chewed steak.

"Probably that really handsome young one," Syianne nods towards a bunch of screeching high-school girls who are crowding near the stage shrieking that they love Leolan.

I take inventory of all the Black Jewels I've seen this morning, one in particular comes to mind: the spike-haired one with the earrings who asked me about my Alprine, I could easily picture him playing in a rock band –

"Wait!"...

Syianne and I both say at the same time; we freeze and slowly turn our heads towards one another. My eyes are wide and I can't seem to blink them. "We should go upstairs," I say through my mouthful of steak.

Syianne nods sharply.

I spit the stuff into a napkin, throw three modes and a tip of thirty deans on the table and we're off, making our way towards the stairs. It's harder to move now that the Third Eye are about to come onstage, we're walking against the current of people who are streaming in. Behind us we hear the guitars begin to whine and the drums make the floor vibrate.