Hannah

We left the cabin at dawn, well rested from a good night’s sleep and carrying enough provisions to make it through the forest without any problems. To accommodate Cathy last night, Kevin had slept on one of the couches in the living room and Lisa had slept in the bed next to me so that Cathy could sleep in the bed next to Miranda. It was a harbinger of things to come; all of our plans and preparations were for four, the addition of Cathy to our group necessitated that we husband our resources that much more carefully. The feeling among the others was that we had packed plenty and providing for Cathy made no difference to our resource security. I disagreed. We were going to have to share our clothes with her, divide the food up into smaller portions, and Kevin had made it clear that if ever we encountered danger his main priority was to protect Cathy first. These were my last few days with my friends and Cathy was ruining them.

Using Cathy’s computer and Google Earth I had printed maps of the woods in search of the simplest route to Prospera. The maps proved not to be very helpful, going back the way we came by following the river upstream was the easiest route through the forest. Kevin and I walked together at the front; Cathy, Miranda and Lisa walked a short distance behind us. That first leg of the journey went by quickly, the terrain was smooth and easily traversed. By the time we stopped for lunch at a small clearing next to the river we’d made significant progress. Cathy had kept pace with us better than I’d expected her to and helped to collect firewood when we stopped. Kevin made a fire and used the pot and pan that we’d brought with us to fry meat and boil rice. Looking at the portions that he dished up for us I had to accept that Cathy was not going to be the drain on our resources that I thought she’d be. She wasn’t a drain at all, she ate the dry food without complaining and helped to wash up the utensils, the plates and the pot and pan when we were all done. She was enjoying being on the journey with us, which, after everything that had happened with Morgan and then Canada surrendering, I was happy to see. My feelings about Cathy were changing on an almost hourly basis. My memories of everything that she’d done for us and for me in particular kept cycling in and out of my mind, rendering me incapable of thinking of her as an unwanted presence. I knew that it was wrong to think of Cathy that way but I couldn’t help it, my instinct to protect Prospera from outsiders was overpowering, enough to make me at times forget the debt we owed to her and her parents. I felt ashamed of how I’d been treating Cathy; she deserved much better from me.

“I’m sorry,” I said to her contritely when we were sitting around waiting to start walking again.

“For what?” She asked me, her voice incredulous.

“For treating you so badly since you arrived at the cabin, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay; I know everything that you’ve been going through lately, so don’t worry about it.”

I didn’t feel I deserved to be forgiven so easily by Cathy; I accepted her forgiveness to spare the rest of our journey from any more unpleasantness. The others were relieved that détente had been achieved between us, Miranda in particular. She’d never been able to handle tension and conflict, especially when it was between people she cared about. Her face lit up in a bright smile when I apologised to Cathy and she accepted my apology.

We set off after lunch in much better spirits than we’d been in when we’d left the cabin. The journey felt more like an adventure being embarked upon by five friends and not a grudging trek. I stayed close to Kevin as I had before with the other three following closely behind us. We talked about Prospera; Cathy was still full of questions about the place and unlike when we’d been in the cabin I was okay with her learning about it. I shared with her some of the more controversial things about Prospera, things that I hadn’t even told the others about yet, like the forced abortions that were employed to keep the population number under control.

“WHAT?! How can they do that?” Miranda asked in horror.

“It’s what has to be done Miranda, overpopulation is a huge problem that’s best dealt with pre-emptively; look at what’s happening in the outside world: wars, refugees, famine and all sorts of humanitarian catastrophes, almost the entire continent of Africa has been declared a failed state because of demand for resources being so much greater than supply.”

“Who did your mother force to have an abortion?”

“Martha.”

“Martha! But she’s so nice.”

“It had to be done.”

“One more child wouldn’t cause the village to collapse.”

“It’s not about one more child; imagine every couple having one more child, or two more children, think about what that would do to our ability to support ourselves, we just about make it through the winter as it is.”

“There has to be a better way.”

“There isn’t; if you allow one couple to have one more child that they’re not supposed to have then everybody’s going to want to do it; we have to put the wellbeing of the village first because that’s in everybody’s best interests.”

“You’re talking like you’re one of them.”

“I am one of them; that’s why I’m going back.”

“You’re not one of them, you’re one of us; why don’t you just forget about going back to Prospera and come back to Huntingdale with us?”

“I’ve explained that to you, I have to go back.”

I had said to the others the previous day at breakfast that Cathy wouldn’t understand Prospera, the reality was that they didn’t either, at least not to the extent that they were willing to accept Prospera’s methods. Their time in the outside world enjoying the freedoms they had there made it impossible for them to appreciate the pressures that existed in Prospera that needed to be managed in a way that enabled life in the village to keep going on as always. Truth is I wasn’t entirely convinced of the need for the status quo in Prospera to be maintained indefinitely. I was returning to Prospera to talk to my mother and the other members of the governing authorities about reforming the policies and practices of the village based on my experiences in the outside world. I understood the risk that I was exposing myself to; the Google Earth images we’d seen spoke volumes about what they knew about the outside world in Prospera. There were some in the village who knew the truth and the village had remained unchanged. They weren’t going to be very receptive to what I had to say and there was every possibility I would face consequences for wanting to bring about change in the village but I felt I had to try. Things could be done in a way that was better for the people of Prospera; that liberated, empowered and enlightened them. As a child of Prospera that had been raised to believe in the philosophy of Prospera and to want the best for the village and its inhabitants I felt it was my responsibility to attempt to bring about change that pulled them all out of the darkness.