Cold Soul

The outside world was unknown to her, but she could see a glimpse of it through the window in his room. The glimpse was all Crystal remembered from her childhood, but she held that single frame of memory in her soul like a solitary ember cast from the hearth.

According to the Chief, nothing lived out there. A stretch of desert sand and dry carcasses baked beneath a murderous sun. Just the graveyard of bellicose nations burned by their own barbarity, frozen stiff in a nuclear winter that birthed an atomic summer. Nothing of value had survived out there, especially not for a Cold Soul.

Only the Dome kept humanity alive. A million gallons of refrigerant pulsed through its plastic veins, bringing life and low temperature to the Dome’s ten thousand residents. The piping laced the ceiling in a tangled web of gushing, gurgling liquid that converted solar energy into soothing coolness. Every time Crystal heard the familiar slosh, she dreamed of a world filled with fresh air and silence.

In the Dome, you adapted to the cold, unless you didn’t. Most people got along fine in the subzero temperatures. Their rosy cheeks, blue-white eyes, and pale complexions seemed built for this world.

Not Crystal. She was a tan-skinned, black-haired Cold Soul, and thus resigned to a life of triple-layered parkas and tribal exclusion. In more savage times, they would have exiled people like her, people who were different. Now they just pretended she didn’t exist.

Crystal knew the logic. Her body had failed to evolve. She needed the insulation to survive, because otherwise her blood would stop pumping and her brain would stop thinking and she would die. She was already cold enough without the simple requirements of the Dome. Therefore, a Cold Soul.

She knew their thinking was broken. She knew that couldn’t be the truth. But the paralyzing chill of the Dome slowed her mind to a crawl, and she couldn’t argue. She could barely form coherent thoughts half the time, and when she could, only one sentence forced its way through the frozen surface.

I need to see that window again.

* * *

At the ripe age of fifteen, every Dome resident became an adult. They were ready to bear the burdens and privileges of full life, joining the ranks of engineers and laborers who kept the refrigerant running. The year’s Emergence had arrived, and with it the typical pomp and excitement of another festive ceremony.

Crystal’s parents didn’t want her to go.

“It’ll be embarrassing,” Mother said, chipping shards of soapy ice from the parka she’d just washed. She wore a sleeveless blouse, and her breath billowed steam into the chilly air.

Crystal rubbed her arms, an unconscious gesture borne from a lifetime spent in the cold, and paced the ten-step length of their apartment. “Embarrassing for who?”

“For whom,” Mother corrected. “And for you. They’ll pass you over. It happens every time.”

“You don’t know that.”

Without looking up, Mother nodded toward the room’s only bed. Father lay under the covers, staring at the ceiling, his mouth shuddering silently in residual shivers. Crystal had inherited his eyes, his skin, and his debilitating curse.

“Don’t do that,” Mother said.

“Don’t do what?”

“You know. Brood. It’s unbecoming.”

Joining her mother at the table, Crystal plucked her lucky ice pick from its belt holster and stabbed a frozen pair of undergarments. The ice splintered, spreading hundreds of microcracks across the surface, but the layer didn’t break.

“And what,” she asked, punching tiny three-pronged holes in the ice, “isn’t unbecoming?”

“That’s a double negative,” Mother mused.

“My life is a double negative,” Crystal muttered. With a final thrust of her pick, the ice gave. She brushed the pieces into the recycler and folded the undergarments as best she could through her thick gloves.

Mother tsked as she grabbed another parka from the stack of clean clothes. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

Crystal banged her hand against the plastic tabletop, finally drawing Mother’s eyes away from her work.

“Can you say anything, I don’t know, encouraging?” Crystal asked, fighting to swallow her frustration. “All you do is talk me down and tell me to change. But you don’t tell me how to change or what I should become.”

Mother raised her eyebrows, her lips parting in a tiny o.

“Well?” Crystal shrugged. “What do you got?”

Several seconds passed before Mother found a response. “All I do?” she asked, her tone still light and conversational. “Surely you’re exaggerating.”

Groaning, Crystal grabbed her ice pick and started poking holes in the frozen shell of her father's shirt.

* * *

After some careful cajoling, Mother extracted a promise from Crystal that she would stay home during the Emergence. It was one of Crystal’s better lies, and she allowed herself a small smile after Mother and Father left the apartment for the ceremony. Father leaned on Mother’s arm as he hobbled on stiff legs, his black-haired head wrapped in a double hood.

When Crystal stepped into the hall ten minutes later, a wave of supercooled air washed over her, prompting uncontrollable shivers. Out of some small kindness, the Chief allowed Cold Ones to live in apartments only twenty degrees below freezing. It was paradise compared to the rest of the Dome, though Mother often complained about the balminess.

The Emergence would hold no surprises for Crystal. She’d heard the stories of Cold Ones who couldn’t receive the Spark, to their public and long-lasting shame. She would be no different, but the ceremony wasn’t her reason for going.

The auditorium was a sprawling, high-vaulted chamber that barely fit the Dome’s inhabitants anymore. Miles of plastic piping crisscrossed the main wall, covering every exposed inch of steel except for a tiny window set back at the center of the stage. Many years ago, the Chief had installed an iron panel over the window, secured with a padlock for which only he held the key. This was his room, as the Dome was his Dome and its inhabitants his subjects.

Crystal wove through the crowds, some of whom spared her a brief, confused glance. They were right to be confused; Cold Ones generally gathered on the balcony at the back. It was warmer there.

The odds of Crystal’s parents finding her in the throngs of people were next to zero. She pardoned and apologized her way to a prime spot near the stage, stopping near a few teenagers she vaguely recognized. They glared at her, their eyes shooting frozen daggers, but she ignored it. She’d had worse.

“Please turn your attention to the stage,” a metallic voice squawked through the loudspeakers. “Now presenting: the Chief.”

Peals of thunderous applause met the man ascending the steps at the side of the stage. The Chief was enormous, a musclebound specimen with the double blessing of brawn and brains. Above his sleek black trousers he wore only a ceremonial stole, a tattered olive-green piece of fabric that nearly matched the color of the refrigerant bubbling overhead. Crystal clasped her gloves over her ears, as much to shut out the sound of the pipes as that of the applause.

The Chief had ruled over his people for nearly thirty years. His wisdom had led them through famine and plague, and his physical prowess had imposed peace in the Dome by virtue of strength. With a genial wave, he greeted the acclaim of the masses as he stepped up to the podium and microphone set directly in front of the closed window.

It’ll happen, Crystal thinks. He’s got to open it.

“Welcome to the Emergence,” the Chief boomed. The ancient speakers sent his voice echoing across the chamber. “Join me in welcoming our young ones to maturity.”

For all its pomp, the Emergence was a simple affair in execution. The line of fifteen-year-olds – nearly sixty this year – would kneel at the Chief’s feet and receive a blessing. Then they would be sorted into their chosen assignments, the jobs that kept the Dome from boiling over. The time-honored tradition was older even than the Dome’s tenuous record-keeping.

As the first girl mounted the stage, one of the teenagers next to Crystal shoved her forward. Surprised, Crystal nearly lost her balance, leaning against the side of the stage. She looked around and realized, to her horror, that she was surrounded by fellow fifteen-year-olds. She was in line to meet the Chief.

Her stumbling had carried her between the rusty metal railings that guided the participants onto the stage. She’d cut in line by accident. Behind her, half a dozen boys and girls in short sleeves shuffled along, forcing her forward.

“Excuse me,” Crystal said, trying to move back. She merely earned another shove for her trouble. They wouldn’t yield to a Cold Soul, not on the day of their Emergence.

The first girl was kneeling in front of the Chief. He touched her shoulder, whispering a few words, then placed his hand on top of her head. Something like fire flushed along his arm, through his fingers, and into the girl’s head. She shuddered briefly, then stood, facing the crowd with a delighted grin. They roared the approval at the first Spark.

Above all else, the Spark had cemented the Chief’s leadership in the Dome. No one else could impart the blessing that gave strength and vitality to their people. Without the Spark, their society would wither and die in the cold. Every leader the Dome had ever known possessed the ability to share the Spark with others.

The line grew shorter. Crystal’s heart beat in a staggered frenzy as she drew closer to her eternal shame. Cold Souls never received the Spark. Those who tried found only embarrassment and dishonor as the Spark rebounded from their bodies.

Crystal blinked and found herself next in line. As the tall boy ahead of her received his blessing, she placed one heavy boot on the first step and took a deep breath.

She could run. She could hide. But she couldn’t escape the shame. And that window was so close.

Crystal took the stage. The chamber fell silent, and she felt every eye on her, piercing the layers of insulation and digging into her soul. Their accusing stares felt colder on her skin than anything she had ever experienced.

The Chief met her with a gentle smile, but his eyes held the same icy contempt.

“A Cold Soul,” he whispered, away from the microphone. “Why do you try?”

Tears welled in Crystal’s eyes, only to freeze on her lashes. She said nothing, but knelt at the Chief’s feet.

“Very well,” he said. Touching her shoulder, he muttered a few words in a language she did not recognize. Then he brushed her hair with his fingers. A wave of heat rushed over her, startling in its welcome comfort, but it dissipated as quickly as it had arrived.

And that was it. The Spark hadn’t taken root. Her Emergence had failed. Mother had been right.

“I’m sorry, child,” the Chief said, just loudly enough for the microphone to pick up his words. As if their chains had been loosed, a chorus of angry voices booed the Cold One from thousands of throats. Crystal looked up by instinct, her tears on display for the world to see.

Her parents stood in the middle of the crowd, Father’s tan skin standing out in the sea of rosy, pale faces. He stared with glassy eyes as Mother reddened next to him. Neither joined in the jeers surrounding them.

Up in the balcony, two hundred Cold Souls watched in complicit silence. They knew her pain, and they pitied her from afar, but they could not help.

“Open it,” Crystal whispered.

The Chief leaned closer. “What was that?” he said, his grand voice filling the auditorium as he moved the microphone closer to Crystal’s mouth.

She cleared her throat. “Open the window. Let me see the sun.”

Unpleasant laughter filled the chamber. To Crystal’s surprise, the Chief raised a hand to silence them. The crowd’s obedience was sudden and uniform.

“The Cold One desires sunlight,” the Chief says. “She needs a reminder of why we stay here. I will grant her wish.”

His bare skin glistening in the harsh white lights overhead, the Chief crossed upstage to the iron panel. Muted conversations filled the chamber, but Crystal ignored them. She watched the Chief, enraptured by the possibility of getting what she wanted.

“The world outside holds only death,” the Chief announced, carrying the microphone with him. He reached into his trousers pocket and removed a slender silver key. The schick of the lock sliding free silenced the scattered remnants of dialogue. The Chief opened the panel, revealing the window and what lay beyond.

Crystal’s eyes widened as she took in the desolate view. A parched landscape of cracked soil and blistering sand stretched to the horizon. Smothering the clear white sky was a nearly imperceptible haze. Above it all floated the sun, a wicked white ball whose tendrils had reached into the Earth’s core long ago and destroyed all life outside the Dome.

Unconsciously, Crystal stood to approach the window. She joined the Chief, gazing into that deathly land with fascination. A sinewy hand landed on her shoulder once more, and she looked up to find the Chief’s bemused smile focused on her.

“You see?” the Chief whispered, the microphone held loosely at his side. “Only death awaits you, Cold Soul.”

Crystal shook her head before she realized what she was about to do. Then she grabbed the microphone from the Chief and turned to face the bewildered crowd.

“It doesn’t make sense!” she yelled. Then, bizarrely enough, she began to spout the broken thinking that had taken root in her mind years ago. “If I am a Cold Soul, shouldn’t I belong in the cold? Why do I suffer here? Why do we all suffer? Why do I want nothing more than to be warm?”

The Chief snatched the microphone back before Crystal could continue her rant. “You are confused, child. Touched in the head. The chill has infected your fragile mind.”

But Crystal was no longer listening. She wanted to be warm, to feel the blazing sun on her cheeks, to strip away her layers and bask in the warmth of the world’s light. This would be her only chance.

Removing her lucky ice pick from its sheath, she attacked the window. The first jab sent microscopic shards of glass flying into the air, but Crystal knew that breaking through would be impossible. Like the rest of the Dome, the window had to be strong enough to keep out the fatal heat. A little ice pick couldn’t shatter several feet of glass. She tried anyway.

Her next blow sent sparks dancing across the landscape.

The Chief dropped his microphone, causing a deafening squeal of feedback through the loudspeakers.

Crystal struck again, still in the same spot. A patch of distant sand dissolved into pixellated blackness. Again. Spiderwebs of electricity snaked their way across the land and into the sky. Again. The death-white sun flickered and sputtered.

“Stop!” the Chief screamed.

Howling wordlessly, Crystal punched through the screen with her ice pick. The screen shattered in a flash of sparks, and the whole contraption crashed down to the floor at Crystal’s feet.

The room fell silent. The inhabitants of the Dome stared at the tall gap where the window – no, the screen – had resided. Crystal peered through the empty space, gazing into something entirely unexpected.

The world outside was alien to her senses. Green leaves, trunks of brown-black wood, and sparkling blue water filled Crystal’s vision. A heady, musky breeze wafted through the gap, carrying the unfamiliar scent of condensation and sweet rain. Overhead, a gentle, yellow sun bathed the whole scene in serene light.

Closing her eyes, Crystal extended her hand beyond the Dome, into the light of day. It was warm.