Kat's Era by Amy Fawcett and Taran Chahal (read aloud books .TXT) 📕

Japanese

In this book there are two Japanese characters; Kimi and Hitoshi. Sometimes, when they talk to each other, they use Japanese terms. Here is a list of these terms and their meanings!

Nii-san = Brother

Nee-san = Sister

Imouto = younger sister


Dedications

This e-book is dedicated to our English teacher, Mr Shepherd, for his disbelief 


Kat’s world was dull, grey and cramped, the entire population living on one third of the earth because the old worlds leaders and millionaires had the other two thirds for themselves. The first generation to live like this had resisted and tried to fight back, but they had been disorganised and weak. They had been wiped out and so Kat’s ancestors, like every other human on this third of the planet, were grown in a lab.

Kat was awoken by the three gunshots, fired from the roof, four floors up. She groaned and rolled out of bed, still in her crumpled uniform from last night. The other girls in her dorm were doing the same, splashing their faces with cold water and packing the last things in to kit bags. Kat’s couldn’t open her eyes as they were all gummy from a bad dream. Suddenly she heard the door fly open and something heavy hit her, she slumped backwards on to the floor, surprising her attacker.

“Kitty Kat! Wake up, wake up!”

The voice turned whiny, and Kat forced her eyes to open, just in time to see a giant peach looming over her face.

“Open wide Kitty Kat.”

Kat obeyed and allowed her friend to drop the peach into her mouth.

“You shouldn’t eat upside down Kat”

Kat sat up, scowling at Lily. Lily just squished her cheeks.

“Cheer up kitty Kat, I don’t want to be stuck with a killjoy for the whole trip.”

Kat forced a grin and thought about their trip, five days on a boat to study sea life, and her grin became real.

Like many of the other children, this would be her first time outside the Wall. What would it be like? She was shocked out of her daydream by the harsh voice blasted from the speakers in the upper left corner, furthest from the window.

“All children in sector four and eight to report to the roof in five minutes, any latecomers will be left behind.”

The message was repeated twice, and there was a mad scramble as the other five girls, (six including Lily) grabbed their bags and their shoes. They stampeded to the door and burst out into the damp and badly lit corridor. They paid no attention to the flickering lights or the puddles in the corner, it was just the norm, to be expected, orphans like themselves were lucky to be in school. They joined the sea of other children filing from the other dormitories, and rushing up the stairs, they flowed like water and came pouring out of the double doors, with so much force they collided with the children from sector eight flowing from the opposite side of the roof. However much force was pushing them though, they stopped several meters from the Master. He didn’t like getting close to the orphans, they disgusted him, to him they were a waste of space, but the governors had promised – a few more years of work like this and he was guaranteed a space on the other side. He made it clear that anyone who broke the rules or misbehaved was dealt with; the children were all too familiar with waking up to find someone new in the dormitory, often to replace a close friend who had disappeared.

Kat looked around, taking her time; this was only her second time on the roof. It was magnificently high, yet still dwarfed by the newer, better buildings. On one side she could see the Wall, almost blocking the sunlight, and casting a black shadow across even the tallest skyscrapers. Her eyes scanned the edge till they saw the metal bridge that connected their building to the next realized that there was a whole network of them leading to the Wall. Lily nudged her and Kat knew her friend had seen them too.
As they started to walk in pairs – as the bridges were narrow- there was a muffled sneeze that broke the silence. The Master, though over a hundred meters away, stopped. The bodyguards that never left his side, almost walked into him. One of them, the bigger of the two, though both were well over six feet, walked through the space left for them as the children parted. He got to the boy who had sneezed. He towered over him. The boy whimpered. All it took was a small shove and the boy was over the low railing and falling. The bodyguard got back to the Master’s side and continued walking, as though nothing had happened.

The children followed suit. It was better to pretend you hadn’t seen; that way it was easier to sleep.

The height was disorientating, and soon pretty much all the children were feeling sick with vertigo, with the exception of Kat and Lily, who had stopped looking down long ago. Suddenly, the Master raised a hand and fired two shots in to the air. They punctured the fuel tank of a passing magnocab, engulfing the section of the bridge which Kat was standing on in fire. A few moments passed and the explosion died, leaving a cloud of smoke and falling debris hanging around the children. They held in their coughs - to be killed now, when so close to crossing over the wall would be unbearable.

The students stayed still in their pairs, their eyes following the Master as he walked to the wall. Drab grey metal plating over more drab grey concrete.

Kat’s eyes were not on the Master though; they were following the cracks and stains from the top of the Wall, running down to the very bottom. The top of the Wall was still so far away, and as far as she could see, there was no way over. Kat began to wonder if there was a door further down.

The path the students were following took a sudden dip into a steep downward gradient. She had been right.

The Master took a card out of his pocket and ran it through a small crack. He stepped back and the metal plating parted to reveal a door in the concrete. The smaller bodyguard opened the door and held it open for the Master. The Master stepped through and the children followed to an almost never ending, twisting flight of steps leading downwards.

Kat’s lungs and legs were burning, they had been going down these stairs for over an hour. They stumbled over the last step, their calves cramping, and a girl behind them cried out in agony. The bigger bodyguard, again, pushed through the army of children, stopping in front of Lily.

“Was that you?!” he barked in a deep and rumbling voice.

Lily shook her head, eyes full of tears. Dying to speak, but the harsh rules under which she had lived for so long had been burnt into her brain, perhaps Kat thought, beyond consciousness.

The bodyguard seemed to believe her and pushed her to the side, grabbing the girl behind her by the scruff of her neck. The girl whimpered and pleaded but the bodyguard pushed her head to the side. Everybody heard the snap; it seemed to echo in the silence. He dropped the limp and lifeless body, her eyes already glazed over. He moved swiftly back to the Master’s side, and they continued to walk through the concrete tunnel, with lights every so often on the walls. Everyone trudged through a tense and anxious silence, lost in their own thoughts. Everyone, that is, but Kat. Her keen ears picked up the sound of the Masters voice, whispering to his bodyguard.

“Sector 8 needs more time… on the second day, destroy the generator.”

“Day 2… but sir, are you sure that is enough?”

“Of course I am!” Snapped the Master, he regained his calm and spoke again, quieter, “Of course I am… and just remember, while one bodyguard is necessary, two is a luxury.”

Kat smiled slightly. Mutiny in the ranks, she thought.

Everybody reached the end of the tunnel; they flooded onto the harbour, breathing in the sea air. They stopped inhaling; the air was anything but fresh - there was the strong smell of mould, decay and burning. There were only two ships in the harbour, one was unloading battery cells, massive cylinders that took two men to carry. The other ship looked run down and unwanted, just like them.
☯

The sea of kids struggled onto the boat, it was huge, but as it was the first boat they’d ever seen, they’d nothing to compare it to. It was a disused cruise liner from the Carbon Era; back when they still used fossil fuels, but they had converted it to solar power although a number of the solar cells had been kicked in and covered in graffiti. The students swarmed through the cabins, fighting for the top bunks and the fanciest rooms. Kat, Lily and the other girls grabbed room 507, a large room with two double beds and a bunk bed, all rusty with age and misuse.

Just as they began to unpack their meagre belongings into the room, three gunshots sounded and the entire boat seemed to erupt with students as they all fought their way back onto deck.

It was clear that the ship had been presentable once – even luxurious although the state of it made it hard to imagine, the was a large pool to one side, and though once it might have been filled with glimmering, sky-blue, clear water, the it was filled with a noxious black substance, that gave off a strange warmth, as though it was somehow living.

At the back of the group of students, one small girl tripped up on deck and grazed her knee, letting out a little whimper as she did so. Immediately, the Master signalled to his bodyguards, and the girl was lifted and then chucked into the pool.

“As you can see, we do not tolerate swimming on this trip. It is not wise, and it will almost certainly end in death.” The body guard gave a wry smile and walked back to his position next to the master.

An acrid rotting smell filled the air, and the pool churned and swallowed up the girl as the guard spoke. No one looked away – they didn’t want to be shot for cowardice.

“Food will be served in the restaurant at 25 past 8. Until then, all students are to proceed to the bottom of the ship. It is made of glass and you will be able to observe the marine life from there.” Almost before the guard had finished talking, the students rushed off, to begin their observations.

Kat wished that she could have been shocked by the killing of the girl up on deck, but it happened so often that it