Chapter Text
“What brings you here, Rue?”
“Well, last night I went to sleep like usual, but sometime after I fell asleep something….happened.”
“Please be more specific, Rue,” the Doctor prompted.
It was a simple phrase Rue was used to hearing in school or from her mother, as she had always struggled with her articulation, but in this instance she was at a loss for how to adequately explain the event.
“I’m not sure how to describe it, but it was like I was awake again. And I was in my classroom at school with my friend Jules. It was only she and I in the room, which was strange. I remember trying to tell her something. Something important but I can’t remember now what it was. And Jules kept looking away or interrupting me, which she doesn’t ordinarily do. I became frustrated with her, because she wouldn’t listen to me and I needed her to listen. I don’t know why it was so important for her to listen.”
As she described it, the feeling of frustration and desperation flooded back to Rue and she struggled to remain focused on relaying the incident to the Doctor. The memory of the event, whatever it was that had interrupted her sleep, had been clearer when she first awoke, but now the details were difficult to recall.
“And her hair looked different,” she continued. “It was loose, hanging around her face instead of braided like usual.” That detail in particular stood out in Rue’s mind. “The experience was like a memory, but different because I know that has never happened before. Then all of a sudden I was in my bed again, still in my sleeping clothes. The conversation with Jules, it felt very real, but I don’t think it was, I never left my bed. It felt almost like the conversation happened while I was sleeping. Sorry, that’s the best I can explain it.”
Rue looked down, shuffling her feet restlessly as the Doctor silently wrote something on a notepad.
“Have you ever had an experience like this before?” he asked.
“No.”
“Did you take your pill yesterday morning Rue?”
“Yes,” Rue replied, confused. “Of course.”
“And this morning too?”
“Yes.”
The Doctor nodded and made another note.
“Thank you, Rue for reporting this incident. The health center will adjust your pill dose so you won’t have another experience like that. You will receive the new dose tomorrow morning with your family unit’s usual pill delivery. To prevent anything disturbing your sleep tonight, a pill will be delivered to your dwelling with the evening meal delivery which you should take as soon as you’ve finished eating.”
A new dose? All the pills that her family members took looked identical in size and shape. Rue had never heard of someone needing a dose adjustment, although she supposed such a detail wouldn’t likely come up in conversation. Still, her Health Maintenance class had never addressed this possibility. Had this happened to any of her friends?
“Don’t worry about it,” the Doctor added with a smile after spotting her concerned face.
“What if it happens again?” she asked.
“The dose adjustment will prevent a recurrence,” he stated simply. “If it happens again, you should return here to report it,” he added, seeming to sense her need for more explicit reassurance.
She wanted to ask what it was, what exactly had happened to her, and why it happened, but restrained herself.
“You may go to school now,” he told her. “We will notify your instructor that you are on your way and provide an explanation for your tardiness.”
“Thank you.” Rue stood and slung her book bag onto her shoulder, exited the building, and retrieved her bicycle from the rack out front.
The morning bike ride to school usually entailed pleasant chatter with her neighbors and classmates Jules and Alexandra. Sometimes it was a rushed affair as she tried to catch up with them after waking up late. Today however, with work and school having begun almost an hour ago, the street was almost completely empty and Rue rode slowly, contemplating her visit to the health center. She couldn’t help but feel slightly dissatisfied.
She shook her head, trying to clear it, and laughed softly to herself as her mother’s common refrain, “don’t dwell on it, Rue” entered her mind. Upon arriving at the school, she scanned the row of bicycles to find the one with the small metal plate declaring Jules as its owner. She wheeled her own bicycle into an open spot next to it.
“Hello Rue,” her instructor greeted her when she stepped into the classroom.
“I apologize for the interruption,” Rue rattled off automatically.
“We accept your apology,” the class responded uniformly and Rue slid quickly into her seat.
Jules offered her a small, slightly questioning smile as she passed, which she pretended not to see. From her desk, two behind and three over from Jules’, Rue studied her friend, searching for any tiny change in her that might provide some explanation for what had happened last night. But Jules looked the same as always, with her hair neatly braided. Forcing herself to pull her eyes away from Jules, Rue caught Alexandra, who was sitting next to her, watching her with a mildly curious look on her face. Rue hurriedly directed her attention to their instructor, but knew she wouldn’t be questioned since calling attention to another’s deviations from the norm was considered rude and Alexandra of all people would never transgress that commonly accepted boundary.
Jules however, was another story, and wasted no time when class broke for midday meal.
“Where were you this morning? Did you oversleep again? I waited at the corner for you.”
As a restless sleeper, Rue struggled to wake promptly in the mornings and certainly couldn’t muster the kind of effervescence Jules always possessed.
“I apologize for making you wait,” Rue offered, using the standard courtesy phrase to stall a bit.
“I accept your apology,” Jules answered with a touch of impatience.
“I stopped at the health center,” Rue admitted. “I slept poorly last night.”
It wasn’t a lie Rue told herself, just a very abbreviated truth. Part of her wanted to ask Jules if she had ever had a similar experience to the one she’d had last night. After all, it was Jules that Rue had the strange nighttime conversation with.
Jules looked at Rue for a long moment, seeming to know there was more. Had the gaze come from any other member in the community, Rue would have found the eye contact deeply uncomfortable, as such scrutiny was typically avoided. But Jules had long resisted such norms.
From their earliest moments of childhood, Jules had received frequent chastisement for her lack of deference for community rules. Perhaps the most significant point of friction, had been her tendency to touch. Touching others in the community beyond the members of one’s family unit was routinely discouraged during the first few years of life. Developing control over one’s physical presence was one of the most important skills for young children to acquire.
As a clumsy child, Rue had regularly sustained minor injuries and, lacking in restraint as young children often do, the pain would make her cry. When this happened, Jules would reach automatically toward her, placing a hand on Rue’s arm, shoulder, or most often, her cheek in an attempt to stop her tears. One incident in particular stood out in her memory.
They were Threes, playing happily in the recreation area when Rue tripped and skinned her knee. Jules knelt beside Rue and took ahold of her hand, allowing her to squeeze tightly as the pain spiked and the tears began to flow. After the instructor had cleaned the wound, applied an ointment for Relief of Pain, and placed a bandage over it, he turned to Jules and gave her a quick smack across her hand with the discipline wand, a thin springy instrument used to administer a stinging reminder of the rules. Rue still remembered the precise words of their instructor:
“Touch is unnecessary and inappropriate Jules. Comfort your friend with your words.”
Jules had winced at the pain of the strike, but didn’t cry. She never cried, no matter how many strikes she’d receive for attempting to comfort Rue. Each transgression brought a swift and painful punishment, but Jules either couldn’t or wouldn’t correct the behavior. Anytime Rue was in pain, Jules was there softly patting her cheek or brushing a hand through her unruly curls. So Rue learned not to cry, so Jules wouldn’t get a smack. And eventually, Jules found more subtle ways to communicate with Rue, of which the intense gaze currently directed toward her was one.
Rue held her gaze, determined not to betray herself by looking away. Luckily, Jules had enough sense not to pry any further, and let the matter drop and the conversation at the table turned, as it so often did lately, to the Ceremony of Seventeen that was drawing ever closer. Rue fell silent and listened to the cheerful discussion of the group. Most of her peers had at least some idea of the possible career assignment they might receive, but Rue remained clueless. As far as she could tell, she didn’t have a strong aptitude in any particular area. That knowledge had caused her increasing anxiety over the past few months as her time as a child came to a close. The upcoming Ceremony would recognise her and her agemates as adults in the community as they received their career assignments and began official training.
Between the anxiety associated with the reminder of the looming Ceremony and the persistent confusion about last night’s bizarre event, Rue had even more trouble than usual staying focused for the rest of the day. Something else bothered her too. A lingering discomfort having to do with her visit to the health center, although she couldn’t determine what exactly.
She couldn’t put her finger on it until the next day when her family unit’s daily pills were delivered to their dwelling as usual with morning meal. It was the small container labelled with her name holding a pill just slightly larger than the one she’d always taken that allowed Rue to pinpoint the source of her unease. It was the question the Doctor had asked about whether or not she had taken her pill. Everyday for as long as she could remember, Rue had taken her pill just as her mother took hers, her father took his, and her younger brother Giovanni took his like everyone else in the community. Just as the morning meal arrived on their doorstep each morning, so did the pills. There was no reason why someone would not take their pill, there was no way to forget it.
Only the Newchildren, too young to swallow a pill, were exempt, but even they still received a small dose mixed in with their milk. Rue recalled one day when Alexandra managed to convince her to join her in spending their after-school volunteer hour at the Nursery. Having spent nearly all her hours there caring for the Newchildren, Alexandra was almost as competent as the Nurturers themselves. She had shown Rue how to prepare a bottle for a fussy Newchild that day, explaining the correct measurement of formula, the proper heating process, and finally, how to add the correct amount of the liquid form of the pill using a dropper. At the time, Rue hadn’t felt anything besides relief when the fretful child took to the bottle and finally stopped crying.
Now, the memory of that day held new significance in the realization that she herself had received those drops in her milk as a Newchild. She had never not taken the medication. The only time she could recall being conscious of the act of taking it was when she first received it in pill form as a Five. Rue had felt pride then, having finally mastered the ability to swallow a pill like her parents. But the novelty of it wore off quickly as it blended into her daily routine.
That simple question the Doctor asked introduced the possibility that a person could, either intentionally or unintentionally, neglect to take their pill. A possibility that, somehow, Rue had never considered. And it was that new awareness that prompted her to discreetly drop the pill into her pocket rather than her mouth while the attention of the members of her family unit was directed elsewhere.
Not until she was alone in the washroom after brushing her teeth did Rue remove the pill from her pocket. She studied it for a long moment before letting it roll off her flattened palm and into the sink, where the running water carried it swiftly down the drain.