The Land of Darkness

Chapter 1

“Devin!”
This was the first thing I heard this morning, my mother’s voice. I heard this voice coming
from the room next to me with a faint flickering light. In short, I lived my life in darkness. Well, I
think I must say two darknesses. One of these darknesses is bearable but the other one kills me
and my fellow 5 million citizens of this country everyday. I live in the fourth district, one of the
poorest of the 8 districts that make up this country called Analia. Thinking about my miserable
life, I got out of my bed and went to see why my mom called me. When I went to the living room,
there was Kristoph standing under the only light bulb in our house. He came to tell me about the
yearly lottery held by the government of Analia. This year, there were only around 2,000 from
my district of 200,000 people participating in this lottery. This lottery is specifically designed to
rob more money from us, the poor, for feeding the Capital with some sweet extra bucks. There
were only 2,000 people participating this year because of the famine and depression that swept
through this country like a hurricane last year. No one can now afford paying 50 dollars for the
lottery and even if they did, they wouldn’t be relying on the miniscule amount of chance of
getting to live in the Capital. However, a friend of mine and her family defied this probability and
moved to the Capital about a decade ago. I’ve never heard from her after that. Anyways,
Kristoph and I decided to test our luck and spend the last bucks we had to buy a lottery ticket.

On the freezing eternal winter night of 26th January 2384, Kristoph and I were standing in front
of the public TV screen of the district where the lottery winners will be announced. And to our
disappointment but not surprise, neither of us was the winner. We just wasted 50 dollars each
for nothing. That would have been 1 month worth of food for our families. And the yearly ritual of
playing the history of this great country of Analia played on the 100 meters TV screen. After
around 20 years of hearing the same thing every single year, I knew all of the lines by heart.
“Until about 200 years ago, our country was thriving. We had everything we needed: coal,
carbon, uranium, and whatnot. But disaster struck after that. Almost everyone on Earth, which
had a population of about 10 billion people, died. We, the sole survivors, built this country which
now has a thriving economy. We must feel pride in our hearts while knowing that our country is
100% run by solar energy. Even though our missions to mine asteroids have failed in the past,
we managed to find another way to keep humanity alive. However, like with all good things, this
system also comes with a sacrifice. A sacrifice the country as a whole has to be a part of to
keep humanity alive.”
That’s a line that I hate in this speech. It’s not the country as a whole who has to sacrifice, it’s
just the Districts.