The Territory (15 page)

Today was a
Newsflash!
day. You know, the sort of day when they interrupt all channels to broadcast some massively important news and everyone speaks in exclamation marks. Dad and I were trying to watch a comedy set in space. It’s pretty lame but we watch it together every Tuesday evening. It’s our father-daughter thing and a half-hour liferaft in a sea of revision. Dad even makes popcorn and we moan about what stereotypes we’ve become, but we both secretly love it. Each episode ends with Astronaut Tyrone staring into the camera and saying, ‘One week to go and counting.’ We always both join in and Dad does the worst impression you’ve ever heard. Accents really aren’t his thing.

Tonight was going to be extra special as Mum and Dad have just ungrounded me. Apparently they’d had this really long discussion and decided that everyone makes mistakes when they’re young and that it’s OK as long as you learn from them and don’t mess up again in the same way. The real issue they said was that I’d lied to them about where I was so I’m allowed out as long as I’m totally honest, and it’s to Daisy’s, Jack’s or possibly Raf’s (yet to be decided!), and it’s to study, and I’m back by 9pm.

But we didn’t get to watch Astronaut Tyrone’s semi-tragic mishaps after all because they’ve finally caught Archie Rycroft. Yes, the unbelievably dumb Archie Rycroft who’s been on the run for eleven months. The Archie Rycroft who managed to be the first freakoid to fail the TAA in three years. More used to fail at the start. Before the exam format changed. Before, I guess, loads of Ministers had freakoid children themselves. When Archie failed, people didn’t talk about anything else for two weeks. It wasn’t in the paper or in the Bulletins of course, but word spread and everyone in the First City seemed to have heard somehow or other. Lots of freakoid parents started going a bit crazy as they suddenly realised that they’d spent all this money but still hadn’t necessarily bought a nice dry place for their beloved sprog. Sending excess children to die in the Wetlands suddenly looked less totally good. Someone high up in the Ministry pushed through more changes to the exam format. More recall, fewer essays. Dad thinks he heard somewhere that that guy had a son in my year.

When the police turned up on Results Day, young Archie was long gone. His parents were sitting calmly in their huge mansion but Archie’s bed was bare. Norms try to disappear every Results Day. Of course they do. Why else would they have brought in the prison-like Waiting Places, which makes it way harder? But Norms are always caught. Quickly. And then shipped off. As punishment they’re not even given a basic survival kit. No iodine. No mosquito net. And if they run before the results are published, they’re shipped off even if they’ve actually passed.

But Archie Rycroft, of the massively rich and important and definitely inbred Rycrofts, miraculously avoided capture. And he was clearly not doing some massively cunning manoeuvres. Judging by his TAA score, there really aren’t many humans he could outwit. Possibly a leftover Neanderthal. Or the victim of a botched late upgrade. And everyone knew the police weren’t really looking that hard. I mean his parents weren’t even arrested.

This obviously made loads of Norms cross. And I mean riot cross. There were serious clashes between protestors and police.

That was back in July last year. Now eleven months later, they’ve found him. The policewoman being interviewed claimed that Archie had been living in a hole in the Arable Lands. Surviving off crops and insects. But he didn’t look that dirty. Or that thin. I mean he still had this gross little pot belly peeping out from under his t-shirt.

And then the presenter made the real game-changing announcement. From this year, freakoids as well as Norms would have to go to a Waiting Place to sit the exam and wait for results.

I laughed aloud as I imagined Hugo’s reaction. Ha ha – pack your bag like the rest of us! Dad didn’t join in. He just looked super-serious.

‘Interesting,’ he said. ‘I wonder what this is leading to. This is the first time they’ve even openly acknowledged that Archie Rycroft was on the run.’ He had his worried look on. His eyebrows always skulk together when he’s worried.

He can also be slightly paranoid.

‘Maybe there’ve been more riots,’ I said. ‘Maybe they knew they needed to find him this time and look like they were equalising things a bit. Before they ship the next lot of us Norms out.’

‘No one’s shipping you anywhere, baby.’ He tried to sound reassuring, but his eyebrows kept on skulking.

Just when I thought things might be on their way back to normal with Jack, this happens and I lose him again. I think he might even hate me a bit. All his anger, and I totally get this anger, has been funnelled into one massive blame plaster and stuck on my head.

After the initial announcement in Assembly, he avoided me in Physics and Geography and then when I tried to speak to him at lunch he had so much stress in his face that it actually turned it ugly – like one of those gargoyles you see on the oldest churches.

But it’s not like I knew what was going to happen at that concert, not like I knew that Kaio was going to go all off-script and Oppositiony. And normally Jack would have been in favour of anyone mouthing off against the Ministry anyway. It’s just that this time the consequences were so awful and so relevant.

At 7am this morning, the Ministry decided to abolish the SAM programme. Mr Daniels showed us the official video of the announcement. A guy who looked like he had an unhealthy amount of rat DNA in him stared into the camera. He wore a grey striped suit and over-ironed shirt and spoke in a voice that hundreds of little image consultants had clearly decided struck exactly the right balance between sternly authoritative and grandfatherly reassuring.

‘The highly regrettable events of last week’s concert,’ he began, my heart already in my mouth, ‘have led the Ministry to the unfortunate but inevitable conclusion that the cultivation and elevation of artistic and literary talent at the expense of the solid skills of scientific reason and critical thinking has allowed a dissident element to emerge in our society.’

Daisy and I looked at each other. She mimed incomprehension as she’s not great with three syllable words at the best of times, but a knot was already forming in my stomach. I knew where this was going.

‘The destabilising and terrorist-sponsored actions of first Frankie Lebore and now Kaio have shown that, as scientists have long thought, an over-active right-brain is frequently linked to an unstable and unsound mind. To this end, the Ministry, after consultation with leading figures in education and the High Priest, has decided to abolish the SAM programme and require all young citizens to obtain a minimum 70 per cent in this year’s TAA. As the detention and resettlement of Archie Rycroft and the universal application of the Waiting Place scheme has demonstrated, the examination system is fair and impartial, applying equally to all candidates, regardless of colour, class or creed. No special treatment is given to Childes and likewise no dispensation should be awarded to non-upgraded individuals on any basis. Thank you.’ And with a crackle, the rat man was gone.

Dad wasn’t being paranoid. Producing Archie Rycroft had just been part of the game. He was a pawn like the rest of us. I almost felt sorry for him. But I didn’t have time for that. All my thoughts were with Jack. This meant it was all wasted. All that time Jack had spent drawing, sketching, planning: wasted. Time he could have spent revising: gone. I just wanted to wrap my arms round him and tell him that I’d help, that I’d coach him, that I’d never let anything bad happen to my best friend. But he was already out of reach.

And what was really annoying, not that annoying is a strong-enough word, is that when the rat said, ‘leading figures in education,’ Mr Daniels’ chest puffed up all proud-looking, boasting about his involvement. Well done headmaster, that’s another life you’ve put at risk. You must be really proud. In it for the kids.

So do you want the good news or the bad news? Dad always says give the good news first and then sting them with the bad (or in his case, the bill) later.

The good news:

1) So far, touch wood, no policemen have turned up at home or at school looking for me or Raf so it seems they can’t be hunting down people from the TV footage of the Kaio concert. First thing this morning at school I saw a guy in a suit I’d never seen before loitering in the Maths block and I started having heart palpitations, but then someone said he was from the computer company and was there to mend a Port.

2) Jack seems to have finally gotten round to forgiving me. I accidentally on purpose tripped Hugo over during football and he made such a piteous yelp as he fell that I couldn’t help laughing and Jack, momentarily forgetting that he was mad at me, ran up and gave me a high five. He then remembered that he was supposed to hate me and looked confused for a bit, before giving in to the forgiveness vibe. I’m so pleased. Jack’s been around forever and it’s like my axis is knocked without him. I’m going to study with him every other day now until the exams. I could tell Mum and Dad were really torn when I told them this. I mean they totally trust that I’ll study and everything when I’m with him. With two weeks to go I’d have to be a total denser not to.They love Jack like he’s their own. And they know that he’s much more likely to pass with my help. But they also know that I’d cover the stuff more quickly if I were by myself.

3) Uncle Pete isn’t coming to stay after all. He’s got to give some very important lectures (yeah, right) so we’ll have to cope without his horrific presence for a few more months.

4) Amanda still wasn’t back at school today. That makes nearly two weeks she’s been off. It also meant I could sit through double maths without having to watch her drool all over Hugo. Once, I swear I actually saw a bit of saliva drop out of her open mouth. Super grim. Tom Williams has started taking bets on what’s up. The options so far are:

• She’s got a really bad spot

• She’s pregnant

• She’s got some hideous infectious disease.

I put one Gold on option two but I’m crossing my fingers for option three! It would totally serve her right if she got something like leprosy and her nose fell off. It’s so unfair though. There’s no way a Norm could ever take this much time off this close to the exam, no matter how ill they were. I guess she’ll just upload some catch-up program and shake-shake-shake-eye roll – there you go.

The bad news:

Daisy’s been grounded now! Talk about malcy. And it’s until the end of the exams! Her mum found her results card for the recent tests in her bag and threw an epi fit. She then had to go and lie down from a migraine, decided to do this on a sofa in the lounge, moved the sofa so it was further from the light and uncovered the bloodstain on the wallpaper from Daisy’s party. That’s when she decided to ruin Daisy’s life. I’m not even allowed to go round there. Apparently I’m not such a great influence after all. Now Daisy’s got a tutor every evening and we’ll only get to talk at break. Her tutor’s called Gil and according to Daisy he’s a total neek. He’s got bad acne even though he’s probably about twenty-one and greasy, limp hair with visible flakes of dandruff. Even grimmer, he’s got a spindly neck with a massive Adam’s apple so he looks like he’s swallowed a ping-pong ball. She says he does this lame swallow every time before he speaks which makes his Adam’s apple bob up and down as he does a ‘gugh’ noise. Her mum’s so stupid. If she’d got Daisy a hot tutor, she’d do loads better, just to impress him.

I think Daisy’s getting properly scared by the exams too. She’s losing weight. She’s always been thin, but now she’s got hollows under her eyes and her cheekbones jut out even more than before. She’s talking about the Wetlands as if she’s going to be sent there. Which she can’t be. I won’t let it happen. But she says she’s running out of options.