The Heartlock

“The Heartlock”

“Merry Christmas, sis! Happy new year.” The young woman’s face was so warm as she spoke. Her smile was like a thousand lights shining all at once. Her blonde curls bounced as she lifted a glass up. A jolly large man with glasses appeared too. So did another smiling blonde woman, wrinkles around her sparkling eyes, far more beautiful than words could ever say. “Happy new world I should say. I know they’re doing some important work in Haven. Save the planet, little sis. You can do it,” the young woman finished.

“Let me in. I gotta say something too!” said the man, his bearded face swelling in a grin. “Hi, sweetheart. Hope the big city was all it was cracked up to be,” he expressed jovially, his voice faltering a bit.

“Oh, don’t you start crying, honey. Our little girl is all grown up, you know,” the older blonde woman piped in. She turned to look at the person that wasn’t there. “Love you and miss you so much, my dear, Mara.” she said blowing a kiss. “Merry Christmas!”

“Merry Christmas!” the three cheered, waving. “Happy new year!

“Happy new world!” the young woman echoed one last time.

Their voices and images faded into the air. They were tiny ghosts floating from the open form of the heart-shaped locket. Mara shut the locket, turning it over in her hand to read the small inscription “Heartlock Hologram Lockets.” It looked like a very trivial device. It was probably a simple gift to her, but it was more precious than anything she could imagine. Something so familiar struck her when she saw those smiling faces in the recording and when she saw the locket’s shine. But she could never fully remember those days. She returned the locket around her neck and gazed down at the metal city. The riots burned brightly with fire and smoke. The drones flew overhead. It had seemed like such a utopia when she’d moved to Haven City. The stacked buildings tall as the sky, technology everywhere, and friendly people. It was all so very dreamlike.

Mara Williams wanted to change the world since she was young. The violent storms, rising seas, and shifting tectonic plates made her want to help heal a broken planet. She was young when the Watchman were created, living machines. They were to help the failing environment. They built a secluded Eden, a floating city destined to change the world. Mara was selected out of so many applicants to move there. She was barely out of college when she moved there, setting her sights on hope for the world. All of this was now a feeling of a vague knowledge of what happened before she arrived. She couldn’t remember her past life. The Watchman took control of everything. Working at the factory day after day, Mara felt compelled to obey their commands. She was content to obey. Every day was the same. Everything was quite peaceful. She could remember nothing different than this life.

It had been a quiet day like any other when everything changed. She was on her way to work in the city, wearing white like all good citizens, wearing her gas mask to not breathe the factory smog, feeling compelled to move forward by the pressure in her head. Suddenly a voice spoke to her.

“Reach into your left pocket, friend.” She stopped walking in the middle of the square. The pressure in her head continued but a voice had never spoken. It was something different. She felt like she had to listen. She reached into her pocket and grasped a metallic object. There she saw the locket. It looked so familiar, more than anything ever had. She couldn’t remember why.

“Open it. Open it and see,” the voice urged. Mara opened it to reveal the message. She saw those beautiful familiar people and didn’t even know their names. Her eyes welled up at seeing them. She stopped to look up temporarily to see everyone else standing in the street, staring at their own Heartlocks. Had they all been planted or did everyone keep them safe from the Watchman? The big screen in the square flashed suddenly with pictures of the world before Haven City existed. Mara saw colors she had never remembered seeing before. Warm and cold flashes, green trees, blue oceans, skies clear of smog. She saw pictures of birds, fish, people, civilizations from centuries ago, lands before the earthquakes split the world. A voice spoke to all at once in their ear chips.

“Now you all see what used to be our world. The Watchman took away your memories. These lockets hold all that remains of that old world. You all wanted to move here to Haven City to get away from a chaotic and uncertain world, to help make it better. You could never have known what you’d be giving up. The Watchman want to strip away the world to make it metal. They work their toxic factories to make more drones, more machines. They created a trap for humanity displaced by ecological disasters. They want you to think the world is better with drones monitoring you, you working for them, programmed to a fault, devoid of life and color. But they were wrong about us. We as humans made them out of metal and made them hunger for control. We can now destroy them. We can go back out into the world to take it back, find the other humans left, and find the families in those lockets. We can burn this city to the ground. We can leave.”

The crowd was silent at first. Then, suddenly started talking with each other. They got angrier and angrier. Mara watched as they tore apart storefronts, smashed the screens, and knocked the drones out of the air. The Watchman tried to send their harsh commands into their minds, but they ignored them. The androids stormed the square, only to be dismantled, their guns stolen and used against them. Some charged the factory, others started to plan the way out.

Mara stood in the square amidst the chaos, feeling confused and conflicted. She had been content here, but it wasn’t happiness. Those people in the locket were happy. Was it worth escaping the comfort of all she knew? She knew deep down she wanted to change the world when she came here. The Watchman used her. The city was never a place of hope. It was a place of destruction. It was a prison full of humans but devoid of humanity. Finally, she made a decision.

Mara ran. She ran with some others until they came to the city border. They looked across the gap down at the cliff. The floating city lowered as its power drained bit by bit. Mara had managed to jump to safety even as the metal men shot into the crowds, killing some of the ones trying to escape. In her jump, everything had slowed, the world a blur. Mara held her breath as her heart thumped in her chest. She landed, tumbling onto the dirt. She weakly lifted her aching body up, seeing a crack in her gas mask lens. Cool air rushed into it. She carefully unfastened it and took it off. Mara gasped in fresh air for the first time in her memory. How long had she been trapped in the city? She couldn’t remember. Every day had been the same until today. This was the day she was finally free. She watched the city burn as it sank further into the hole on the earth now below her. Was she the only survivor? The only one who made it out? She hoped not. Finally, at long last, Mara opened that Heartlock locket again to see her family, her tears filled with the joy at the thought of maybe finding them again. It was worth it. If she could get her memories back, the escape was worth it.

Her moment was short lived when she heard sounds behind her. She whirled around to see people in tattered clothes, small bits of armor and vehicles sputtering steam into the air. A gray-haired, bearded man with a flashing screen on his glove approached her.

“Mara Williams,” he said. She recognized his voice from the broadcast. “My name is Lance Heartlock.” Mara’s eyes widened and she almost spoke but hesitated. “Yes, I made those lockets. It was my company. Everyone would gift these with video message holograms in them to their loved ones. You all wore them at one time. The Watchman disposed of them in their garbage sorting areas when they wiped your memories and identities. My spies collected them and we planted them on the citizens we scanned to learn who they were. I guess the metal wasn’t detectable to the Watchman when it was in your pockets. It was the only thing they couldn’t control. You deserved to remember, Mara. You’re safe now.” Mara smiled warmly.

“Thank you,” she said tearfully.

“There’s more climbing out of the pit,” another rescuer called out. A few ran over to help other survivors. Mara felt relief like nothing else. She felt happiness, something she couldn’t remember being possible.

“Now I can find my family? They must miss me. Maybe they can remind me of my life from before,” Mara mused excitedly. Lance grimaced at her and furrowed his brow a bit sorrowfully.

“Mara, I’m sorry, but I didn’t tell the whole truth in that broadcast. I don’t know for sure if your family is still alive,” he responded.

“They might be! They’re somewhere,” Mara replied. “I wasn’t gone that long, right?” Lance frowned and tilted his screen towards her.

“Look, Mara,” he said somberly. In the reflection, Mara saw a woman much like the one with wrinkles in the hologram except this woman had long silver hair and wrinkles deep in her skin. Mara blinked in shock and disbelief as the reflection copied. It couldn’t be true. It couldn’t be. Mara touched and examined her face. She only saw youth in all the mirrors of the city. She never saw the truth of how many years had passed. She sank to the ground, feeling the stabbing pain in her chest of heartbreak sink in, knowing her entire life was stolen and her family was likely long gone. She sobbed into her weathered hands. Lance patted her shoulder to comfort her. “Mara Williams, you are free. You’re saved. You’ll be a part of the new world,” he said calmly. He gestured to the locket. “You have them forever now.” Mara calmed her breathing and wiped the tears away. As she felt the locket and looked at its maker, she couldn’t help but wonder if his invention was cruel or wonderful. She couldn’t help but almost wish to be back in Haven City, content in the chrome and white, safe from the wild chaos, in blissful unawares. That small part of her made her look back once more at the crashed blazing city in the sinkhole. At long last, she looked back up at the inventor who ended the city, who freed and enslaved her all over again, chaining her to a single memory of a dead past. All seemed clearer now.

“Thank you,” was her response. “I can only hope they kept remembering me even when I forgot.” She closed her eyes, smiling as the sun warmed her weathered face and spoke in reverence. “Merry Christmas, sis. And a happy new world.”