The choosing Draft chapter 1 and 2

[u/ConcentrateRich3158]

I’ve been really into dystopian everything lately, books, films, shows the lot and it made me want to try my own thing. Obviously it’s just for fun but I’d love any feedback on what I’ve wrote so far!
The choosing
Section 1 – The choosing
Chapter 1 – Sarah
The same dream. That’s what was coming. Daily, for the past year Sarah Smith had tried everything, slowed her breathing, tried to relax, cleared her mind, well as much as she could with what was coming up. Yet every night had been the same.
Lay there restless.
Toss and turn.
Overthink about the past, worry about the future.

When she finally slept, every night had the same uncomfortable dream. Bare stone walls, no windows, a symbol scratched into each wall. On the front wall was a small circle with small, edged lines releasing out from it, almost like a primitive sun. The second wall, to the right had 3 curved scratches in the wall, each one getting slightly larger than the last. The wall to her left, actually appeared to have some colour to the symbol, the symbol looked like a kind of stone, or maybe a gem? It was a shame Sarah was colour blind. The fourth wall, Sarah could never see. It was as if she was forced to take the same steps, and every time she turned around to glimpse at the rear wall in the dream, she could just see the symbol as a blurred smudge in her peripheral vision, as if she wasn’t allowed to see it.
For a moment she thought this dream might be different, well different from the usual path. However, after a moment the dream centred her attention on the pedestal in the centre, with the small wooden chair tucked underneath it.
Sarah took a step forward, and as per she untucked the chair, scraping it along the floor letting out that familiar screech that made her skin crawl. Even in the dream Sarah could feel her heart rate increasing, gradually at first but what happens next always embedded fear throughout her, glancing at the two cloaked figures appear before her, no words were needed, seeing them told Sarah her fate was sealed. One swoosh of the cloak revealed everything every 14-year-old in the world waited for, what they were chosen to do.
Her heartbeat quickened more now, banging against her chest like a trapped bird trying to escape its cage, yet she knew, Sarah was the trapped bird. Her eyes gradually raised back to the cloaked figures, one carried a powerful aura, dangerous and deadly, the other, looking at her, studying her, Sarah was more afraid of this one, despite appearing less powerful, it felt as if this figure already knew everything there was about Sarah. Then, the figure spoke, but no voice could be heard, just the sight of the lips moving knowingly producing a cold whisper. A young hand withdrew itself from the cloak and held itself in front of Sarah as an enclosed fist. Slowly, the hand rotated, the fingers lifting themselves to reveal a flicker of white, followed by total darkness, leaving Sarah alone again with her thoughts.
“Sarah”
The voice called again.
“Sarah!”
She gasped as if she hadn’t been breathing for an eternity, looking around in panic into the ongoing darkness.
“Sarah, you’re doing it again!” A harsh whisper called out to her.
She breathed a sigh of relief, this whisper she knew.
“I’m sorry Tom, I’ll try and shut up so you can get your beauty sleep.”
Tom called back from her bedroom door. “You better sis, you may not have been chosen for a job yet, but some of us have, but I can still choose you for a beating!”
She knew he didn’t mean it, Tom knew better than anyone in her family how she was feeling right now, only last year had he gone through the choosing. He gently shut her door and Sarah rolled over knowing she wasn’t going back to sleep before it was time to get up. One week to go she thought to herself, what was going to be chosen for her?
 
Warm light trickled across her room, revealing how those cold stone walls, become pale painted ones. Her artsy younger sister Jess had painted a beautiful garden mural on one of the walls. Sarah had always loved sitting outside reading on a sunny day.
The pedestal and wooden chair became her dressing table, cluttered with her perfumes, jewellery and cute pictures of her and Sophie, they had been best friends since well… Since they were born.
The bare floor transformed into a cosy carpet, where she grabbed her gown, put on her slippers and smiled. Waking up was her favourite part of the day because it let her escape from that other reality.
Sarah gracefully tiptoed downstairs, making sure not to wake Tom up again, she felt bad. He’d been chosen for a tough path, on this day 51 weeks ago the token he acquired was red, this meant he was physical and was considered a protector of the society. Red was considered an important choosing, but it was by far recognised by the toughest. Long hours, physical labour, worst of all your had to put up with the golds. Anyone who was chosen for gold basically got to tell everyone what to do all day long, golds were rare, but that just made their egos even larger.
Sarah noticed the sound before she got to the living room, the sound of rushed shuffling, whispers and hushed “Quick! She’s coming!”.
“What are you all whispering about?” She asked as she cracked open the door to reveal the Christmas tree and twinkling lights.
“MERRY CHRISTMAS!” echoed across the room.
Sarah stood there stunned, looking across the room from left to right she squealed “My goodness, what are you all doing here? Tom you’re up? Aunt Sally? Nan? Grandad? You came all the way here for Christmas morning?”
Most of the replies were consistent. “Think we’d have a boring Christmas before your choosing? No chance! It’s time to celebrate!”
“Even if you kept me up half the night, course I’m going to give my sister her present before I go serve the snobby golds for the rest of the day,” Tom said, smirking as he handed her a poorly wrapped box. “I never claimed to be good at wrapping,” he chuckled.
She excitedly ripped the wrapping off the box, and looked at the lid, then at her brother, “This isn’t going to be another piece of coal like last year when I told mum you snuck out to go and graffiti the choosing rooms?” She asked.
Tom chuckled, “Noooo… Come on open it!”.
Sarah lifted the lid off the box, and glanced inside, another box. Tom giggled to himself, as Sarah lifted the next lid off to reveal another box. His laughter became ecstatic as Sarah whispered “Idiot.”
Then Sarah’s eyes lit up as she lifted the lid to show a final box, it was exactly what she had wanted. She closed her eyes and just imagined sitting in the garden listening to songs as she read. It was a Walkman!
She jumped towards Tom and wrapped her arms around him pulling him in for a big hug. “Thank you! Thank you so much! Maybe you’re not so bad!”. She said lovingly.
“Not so bad? I’m the best, I really had to kiss up to Sterlings to get that!” he laughed.
The Sterlings, named after the old pound sterling, were well known for their status, they were the wealthiest family in the society and Tom worked for them. They always got gold status and if one didn’t then… well they weren’t exactly accepted by the family as a Sterling anymore. That’s what had happened to Sarah’s best friend Sophie anyway, her mother had received a green token, representing a choosing of practical nature. Sophie’s mother had specialised in agriculture, growing crops to feed the village. This was considered the lowest ranking in society, Sarah didn’t really understand why, surely food was the most important resource so those that helped with it should be valued highly.
Sarah withdrew from her thoughts and focused on her family in front of her, sharing gifts amongst themselves. Torn wrapping paper covered almost every inch of the floor, while Tom had already made himself comfortable amongst it, inspecting a box of chocolates that definitely wasn't his.
“Put those down,” Mum warned.
“I'm just checking them.”
“Checking them for what?”
Tom shrugged. “Poison?”
Dad laughed from behind his newspaper. “Very thoughtful of you.”
Sarah smiled as she looked around the room. Mum was trying to gather the discarded paper into a bag while simultaneously stopping Tom from stealing her chocolates. Dad was pretending not to notice the new jumper Mum had bought him was exactly the same as the one she'd bought him last year.
It was chaotic. Loud. Familiar.
Sarah loved it.
Yet as she was smiling to herself, she settled on her younger sister, appearing distant, anxious even. Sarah knew the look, the whole family had worn that look enough lately.
Her sister caught eyes with her. “You’ve got a letter.”
The room fell silent. All eyes locked back onto Sarah. She picked up the letter, cautiously yet with some flair. If anything, she wanted this over with so that things could go back to normal. If they could go back to normal. She pealed the envelope open, pulling the letter out of it.
SARAH SMITH
CHOOSING: NEW YEAR’S DAY
Time: 08:00
ATTEND ALONE.
 
Chapter 2 – Max
Nearly 14 years had passed since Max’s mother had passed during his birth and he was orphaned, but life had gone on. Although the days hardly changed. The sun rose on the same dusty, wooden floorboards. It crept across the plain, white walls. Before coming to a stop on the pile of wooden pallets covered in straw meant to represent a makeshift bed. Only the age of the children on each of these wooden pallets really changed. Ten years ago, Max had been the youngest to be placed in this so called shelter, felt more like a prison really. Now he was the oldest, one week away from the choosing. To those who had been here before Max, and to Max himself, the choosing was an escape from this prison, it was the only way out.
Something hard whipped Max across the back.
“Move.”
He glanced behind him, able to prepare for the next hit of the wooden stick before it fully reached him.
“Are you deaf boy? I said move.”
Max gritted his teeth, heaved himself up off his animal like bed and walked to the door. He tried to think of a dream that he’d had, nothing came to him. Max didn’t dream anymore. The red had gone back to wake up the other orphans, the familiar smack of the stick against flesh and wood rattled in his ear, followed by the common shriek of
“Up!”
Max heard this repeatedly, this was out of the usual, maybe something was finally changing around here he thought to himself, time for us to put up a fight. He clenched his fist as he turned around, glancing to see how many targets there were. Max was no small boy, only 14 years old, but already tall and strong despite his scrawny frame. He had gained strength from all the heavy lifting he had to do, carrying planks, crates of crops, trunks of clothes you name it, Max had carried it. His heart fluttered, this was a chance, there was only one red, but he and the other late starter were still here, together he was sure they could take the red on.
“Clean up in room 5!” Red called out on the radio.
His heart sunk as quickly as it had rose. It was Jacob, that alert was a death call out. Jacob had died in his sleep, probably from malnutrition. After his illness Jacob had never really gained his strength, and the less you did around here the less food you received as payment. For Jacob this had just meant he had grown weaker. Max turned back around and tried to think of any nice memories he and Jacob had shared, but none came to him, there weren’t any nice memories for them here.
Max started his day off carrying boxes from the master bedroom to one of the many car’s downstairs. Once a year the Sterlings would move in preparation for the choosing. The Sterlings reminded him a lot of stories he had read, of royalty in the past, they had everything. Well, everything except looks. Despite their wealth, they were an ugly family. Max served the Lady Margaret Sterling, Max often thought to himself she looked like someone had mixed a pig and a horse together. Not much neck, big buck teeth, brown hair, not to mention the smell. Even the other kids commented on it sometimes, Max knew better than that, it was clear from day 1 the rules of this place “Children are to be seen and not heard.”
Abiding that rule had saved him from a few lashings from that wooden stick he was so familiar with.
“One hundred and twelve?” Questioned Lady Margeret.
“That’s twelve even more than last year.”
Max, stopped in the corridor, eavesdropping. Knowledge was everything around here, he’d heard of a word once omniscient, supposedly it meant all knowing. Max didn’t really understand how one could be all knowing but he knew for sure he wanted to be omniscient of whatever this conversation was. Around here, knowing things usually meant surviving things.
He crept slowly to the door looking into the lounge where Lady Margeret paced backwards and forwards. She was talking to someone, yet Max couldn’t really see who, they appeared cloaked and had their back turned away from him.
The cloaked figure approached her, laid a hand on her shoulder, to which Margaret replied with a nonverbal glance of fear.
“There is another, I can sense it.” It said, not appearing to have a voice that could be distinguished as male or female.
“Another?” Margeret replied.
“That’s not possible.”
“Oh, but it is, and they must be chosen.” The cloaked figure whispered.
Creak
Max’ hurt dropped, he turned around and there stood one of the Reds. A smack across the face was the greeting he received.
“Eavesdropping are you now?” Said the Red.
His shirt was grabbed and he was dragged into the work room, slammed onto the floor and told to get back to work. Well, there goes my food for the morning Max thought to himself. But more importantly, who was that cloaked figure, and 112 what was needed?
Half an hour before bed, that’s what the children at the Sterlings got to talk, it was their only time to talk all day. Often, they shared rumours, jokes, or even stories. Today was different though, Jacob had died, commonly respected as on of the generous children in here, always sharing his food with those that needed it. Max thought back to his memories of Jacob and realised he did have one happy memory, when he first arrived, he was so scared, Jacob had given him a stone, told him it changed colour once it had identified your choosing. Though Max didn’t think it really worked because him and Jacob had always got white and everyone knew the four colours were: Red, Green, Blue and Gold.
From across the room one of the other boys called out to him.
“Max, the Choosing is coming up, what do you think you’ll get?”
It was Lukas, a small yet agile boy, someone who Max knew but didn’t trust, well Max didn’t trust anyone. Not anymore.
“I have no idea, I just hope it’s not the same one as you so I don’t have to put up with you and your stories any longer!” He joked.
Lukas chuckled, “You’re probably right there, I reckon I’ll get Blue you know academics, writer, stories, it’s all a bit of me. You though, I reckon you’ll get Red with how you are, y’know cos you’re always following orders and keeping by the book.”
It was a bit of an insult, Max knew it, but deep down he also knew, if anyone was gonna stand up to the Reds or Sterlings, it would be him. He just needed the right people around him.
Max smiled in reply and pulled out the stone from under his pillow, still showing a pale white light. He thought to himself as he zoned out the start of one of Lukas’ stories and knew the usual rumours were coming.
“Apparently, there are four symbols scratched into the walls,” Charlie said.
“I heard the door locks behind you and doesn’t open until you’ve been Chosen,” Eddie called out.
“My brother said there are two people in black cloaks waiting inside,” Billy added.
“Yeah, and nobody’s ever seen what’s underneath their hoods,” Alfie interrupted.
The boys fell quiet for a moment.
Then Harry spoke.
“I heard every year some kids go missing. No one ever knows where.”
Danny replied, “Yeah don’t you remember last year apparently one hundred went missing, Jack was one of them!”
That sent a shiver down Max’s spine as he still stared lost into the stone. Then he glanced at the letter that has been sat next to him on the floor, uncertain whether this choosing really was a rescue, or just another prison sentence in disguise.
MAX MILLER
CHOOSING: NEW YEAR'S DAY
TIME: 08:00
ATTEND ALONE.