AllFreeNovel
Share Us
At school, there’s not even an attempt at normality. In second period, the teacher doesn’t call the class to order but simply disregards us as she taps away on her deskscreen. Halfway through class, a citywide announcement on the intercom is made: because work productivity in the city has fallen so drastically, the announcement of the lottery numbers has been moved up a few hours. In fact, it will now be broadcast live in a few minutes. “Have your numbers in front of you,” the announcer ends cheerily, as if everyone hasn’t already memorised them.
Instantly, delirium breaks out in the classroom. Students rush back to their seats, eyes fastened on deskscreens.
“Are you ready for the lottery yet?” the news anchor says a few minutes later, all aplomb abandoned in his excitement. “I have mine right here,” he says, holding up a sheet of paper with his numbers. “Tonight might just be my night, I woke up with a feeling in me.”
“As did every citizen of this great city, no doubt,” chimes in his co-host, a slim woman with jet black hair. “We’re all so excited. Let’s go now to the Heper Institute, where the numbers are about to be picked.” She pauses, her finger reaching up to her earpiece. A feral glint invades her eyes. “We’re getting word now of a surprise. This is a whopper, folks, so sit down.”
In the classroom, heads snap back and then lurch forward. No one says a word.
“Instead of having the Director pick the numbers, the Palace has decided a captive heper will pick the numbers.”
Somebody snorts loudly; several students suddenly leap onto their desks.
“You heard that right, folks,” she continues, and her voice is wetter now, with a slight lisp. “We’re getting a live feed . . .” She pauses again. “I’m hearing that it’s coming from a secret location from within the Heper Institute. Take us there now.”
Instantly, the view of the newsroom switches to that of a bare, cavernous indoor arena. No windows or doors. Placed in the centre of the arena is an empty chair. Next to it, a large hemp sack and a glass bowl. But nobody is looking at the sack or the chair or the glass bowl. All our eyes are fastened on the blurry image of a male heper crouched in the corner.
It is elderly and wiry, but its stomach is fat-marbled and protrudes disproportionately to its thin frame. Hair plasters its arms and legs, and the sight of the hair sends a river of lip smacking through the classroom.
The videocamera zooms in and then out on the heper. But clearly the camera must be running unmanned, on autopilot. If anyone were in the arena with the heper, the heper would have been devoured within seconds. The newest wave of videocameras – weighing a relatively spry two tons – is capable of autozooming, a technological advancement unimaginable just a decade ago.
The camera zooms in now, capturing the heper’s uncertainty as it gazes upward at something offscreen. Then, as if instructed, it gets up and walks to the chair. There is indecision in its every step, caution. Emotions pour nakedly off its face.
A student shakes his head violently, drool trapezing outward, some of it landing on me. Saliva pours out of our mouths, collecting in small pools on desks and the floor. Heads are half cocked sideways and back, bodies tensed. Everyone in a trance and a heightened sense of alertness.
The news anchors have been silent.
The heper reaches the chair, sits down. Again, eyes bulging wide, it looks offscreen for direction. Then it reaches into the hemp sack and takes out a ball. A number is printed on it: 3. It holds the ball up to the camera for a second, then puts it in the glass bowl.
It takes a moment before we realize what’s just happened. The news anchors break their silence, their voices wet and blubbery with saliva. “We have the first number, folks, we have the first number. It’s three!” Loud groans all around, fists crumpling sheets of paper. The teacher in the back of the classroom whispers a cuss.
I stare down at my own paper: 3, 16, 72, 87. Coolly, I cross out the number 3. Only a few classmates are still in the running. It’s easy to spot them. Their eyes are sparkling with anticipation, drool running down their exposed fangs. Everyone else is unclenching now, muscles relaxing, mouths and chins being wiped. They slump in their chairs.
The heper nervously reaches for another number.
16.
More groans. I take my pen and cross out 16, a slight tremor in my fingers. Must hold the pen tighter, get my fingers under control.
As far as I can tell, that last number took out the remaining contenders in the class. Except me. Nobody has noticed yet that I’m still in the running. I kick out more saliva, let it run down my chin. I hiss a little, cock my head back. Heads flick towards me. Before long, a crowd has gathered around my desk.
The heper pulls out the next number.
72.
There is a momentary, stunned silence. Then heads start bopping, knuckles cracking. My next number – 87 – is chanted like a mantra. Somebody runs out, tells the adjacent classroom. I hear chairs scraping against the floor; moments later, they come flying in, crowding around me. Drool splatters on me from above; a few are hanging upside down from the ceiling, staring down at my screen. News flies up and down the hallways.
My heart, like a claustrophobic rat in a cage, is out of control. Fear grips me. But for the moment, no one is looking at me; everyone is fixated on the screen. Something is wrong with the heper. It’s shaking its head from side to side now, almost violently, eyes wide with fear. A naked, overwhelming display of emotion. A fruit suddenly falls from a small opening in the ceiling. A red fruit, and the heper leaps for it, devouring it within seconds.
“So disgusting,” somebody says.
“I know, I can barely watch.”
The heper takes a few steps towards the sack, is about to pull out the last number, when it pauses. It drops the sack and retreats to the far corner, where it crouches, hands over ears, eyes snapped shut. For a second, it lifts its head and stares offscreen. Then its eyes widen with fear, and its head shakes violently. It pins its head between its knees.
“It doesn’t want to pick the last number,” a student whispers.
“I told you,” my teacher says, “these hepers are smarter than they look. It somehow knows these numbers are for the Hunt.”
The screen blacks out. The next shot is of the newsroom. The anchors are caught off guard. “Looks like we’re having technical difficulties,” the male anchor says, quickly wiping his chin. “We should be back on air shortly.”
But it takes more than a few moments. Video of the heper picking the first three numbers is looped over and over. Word spreads ar
ound school about me; more students crowd the classroom. Then more news: another student in the school is still in the running. As I pump out more saliva down my chin and jerk my head in staccato fashion, I make some rough maths calculations in my head. The odds that I have the last winning number are 1 in 97. That’s just a little over 1 per cent. A comfortingly low chance, I tell myself.
“Look!” someone says, pointing at the deskscreen.
The TV channel has shifted away from the newsroom to an outdoor location. The male heper is gone. In its stead is a female heper, young. This heper is sitting outdoors in a chair, a hemp sack and glass bowl on the ground next to it. The image is glassy and shiny, as if a glass wall stands between the heper and camera. Behind the heper, distant mountains sit under the few stars that dot the night sky. Unlike the other heper, this female heper is looking not nervously offscreen, but directly at the camera. With a collectedness in its gaze, a self-possession that seems odd in a captive heper.
Some of the boys lurch up on desks. A female heper is known to be the choicer morsel of the two genders. The flesh meatier, fattier in parts. And a teenage one – as this one appears to be – is the most succulent of all, its taste beyond compare.
Before the hissing and drooling kicks up again, the heper is already reaching into the sack. It calmly removes a ball, holds it with outstretched arm towards the camera. But it’s the eyes I’m looking at: how focused they seem to be on mine, as if they see me in the camera lens.
I don’t need to see the ball to know the heper has picked number 87. An explosive hiss curdles out from classmates, followed by a phat-phat-phat of smacking lips. The congratulations begin: ears brought down to mine, rubbing up and down, side to side. A minute later, between ear hugs, I glance down at the deskscreen. Amazingly, the heper is still holding the numbered ball up to the camera, a look of quiet defiance imprinted on its face. The picture starts to fade out. But in the moment before it does, I see the heper’s eyes moistening, its head slanting forward ever so, hair bangs falling over its eyes. Its defiance seems to melt into a sudden, overcoming sadness.
