VOID by Taylor Pinderson (little red riding hood read aloud .txt) 📕

in my head to calm my raging thoughts but quickly lose track. Finally we come to a stop outside a short dark doorway. The boy looks over his shoulder, once again exhibiting forbidden emotion, fear, that we might have been followed. Satisfied with the emptiness of the hallway he stoops to enter the door, beckoning me with the flick of a finger. I follow and he shuts the door behind us. We now stand in the wall, a thin hallway stretching to either side of us like a crevice a mouse would run through in an attic. In front of us another doorway is revealed as W475 traces his fingers on the barely visible keypad beside him on the wall. We step through that last doorway and enter a brightly illuminated room. The room is cavernous, the ceiling stretching much higher than any room in this building, making me wonder if indeed we still are in the same building. There are low swooping lights attached to the ceiling like stalactites in the caves of the destroyers reign.
I know I know more than I should and I chide myself for comparing things to the reign of the destroyers, but since before I can remember I have been more than safely interested in them. My mind wanders to my father…
“We are here for YM345. He has been caught demonstrating qualities of love, anger, curiosity, disobedience, and selflessness in public areas and in the presence of his spouse and children. Because of the danger of these actions, for the benefit of himself and those around him, he is to be put to death immediately.” The Officer looks up from his script and his cold eyes wash over my father. I am six at the time, almost old enough to be taken to the sector house where I will be educated. My father puts his hand to my shoulder as if he is reminding me to be strong. “You are allowed a supervised five minutes for each family member in order to say goodbye. Effective immediately.” I am first. My father takes me into my bedroom and sits me on the bed. He stares into my eyes and I stare back.
I love my father’s eyes, the way the emotion swirls in turquoise fractals in the blue irises. He has always shown a dangerous amount of emotion. I admired that of him, his ability to be defiant without being afraid if he truly believed he was doing the right thing. I took after my mother, a scared rabbit in an open world, obedient to all those hungry wolves above her.
I see tears swirling among the emotion in his eyes now. Still he manages to keep his voice steady as he talks to me. “You can’t forget. Ever. And you won’t” I knew this was foolish because after our goodbyes they would inject us with a serum to clear our minds of the experience, but still his confidence comforted me. He stands up, “I love you.” I see the look of disapproval on the supervising officer’s face. “NO ONE can take that away. Don’t ever forget what I taught you.”
At this last word his voice catches but his wall of confidence remains standing. The officer doesn’t like this last statement and cuts our goodbyes short but my father has said enough. I love him too. And I won’t forget. I will never forget the lessons.
I still remember them, all of them. My father used to teach me about the destroyers from the memories of his ancestors, written down in little black notebooks that he had collected. I loved my father’s lessons. They were beautiful, all of his stories. They were told with such emotion, such longing, and were so different from the harsh stories told in the education centers.
Every time I think of my father, I think of the strange nickname he asked me to call him, one from the reign of the destroyers. Daddy. I didn’t forget daddy, I think now. I didn’t forget.

I snap out of my pseudo-reality and realize there is another man in the room. This one is tall with broad shoulders and distinct facial features. He looks younger than me, maybe around 85 years, only a baby really, but you can tell he’s the one giving orders.
“She’s another one Brian. What am I supposed to do with the simulation scores? I can’t keep deleting them and filing them as mistakes.” W475 has addressed the younger man with a name, not a number. I jolt and Brian must have noticed my reaction because his gaze softens. More emotion. My thoughts spin wildly as I try to make sense of my confusing situation. A name. Emotion. Illegal. Emotion.
“For god’s sake Alex!” another name. A destroyer’s expression. What is going on? “Make the stupid scores up! I have bigger things to worry about than your social status. Put the girl with the others and give a matching. We don’t have the space to keep her hidden for long.” W475, Alex, sighs and shakes his head not approving of his better’s opinion.
“I’m pretty sure if you lose me because of your lack of concern of my social status, you’ll have an even harder time as you worry about who will replace me.” He grips my shoulder and starts to lead me to one of the many openings in the wall, which I realize are halls, but not fast enough we don’t hear Brian’s retort.
“Oh yes. It will be difficult to find someone to match your exceptional skill of deleting simulation scores.” He chuckles after his rude, sarcastic remark, and I smile remembering my father. Alex must think I’m mocking him because he fixes me with a hard glare. I shut my mouth and think about my father’s eyes as we walk down the hall so he can put me with “the others.”
…
As it turns out, the others are a bunch of scared looking voids in a very crowded imitation of a sector room. Alex pushes me in, hard, and I stumble a bit. He mumbles a quick, “Make yourself comfortable,” And leaves me with only the memory of his swirling green eyes like my daddy’s.
I stare at the other girls and they stare right back. I don’t recognize any of them and don’t see any recognition flicker in their eye’s either. Finally, after and epoch of silence and tough looking girl clears her throat. If she hadn’t made a noise, I wouldn’t have noticed her at all. She was sitting in the corner, half concealed by one of the bunks which are precariously stacked on top of each other. Her hair is long and dark and sits in a braid draped over shoulder. Her face is average but pretty and her eyes are almost black. She’s short and her tunic is tattered. None of the girls in this room wear head scarfs and I’m starting to feel a little self-conscious of my own. I put my hand up to touch and I see the girl nod. Slowly I unravel the gray material and let my long wavy hair fall just above my navel. For some reason this seems to loosen the girls up and another girl speaks.
“So what’s your name?” my eyes widen and for a moment I don’t know what to say. The dark haired girls senses my discomfort, “That’s Sarah, always one step ahead.” She smiles, “I’m Alicia. That was Sarah. Everyone…” she looks expectantly around the room and slowly the girl’s pipe up and one by one they tell me their names. When they’re done, I find all their eye’s expectantly resting on me again. Again, Alicia speaks, “I bet you don’t have one. That’s ok. Here pick one.” She reaches behind the bunk she sits by and pulls out a think, canvas-binded book.
It’s thick and obviously from the destroyer era. We don’t use books anymore, but instead inform people by pamphlets or memos.
She hands it to me and it falls open by itself like it’s been opened a million times to the same page. I flip through the pages and I see that it’s just a list of names. Some names are highlighted with a bright yellow line. I point and am immediately answered. It’s a younger girl, with an innocent face, the one they call Meagan. “The highlighted ones are the ones already taken.” Her voice is quiet and I almost strain to hear her but her message gets across. Slowly I flip through the pages to find my name.
None of them speak to me, or seem to sound like something that would describe me like I think a name should. I pass through all the “A’s” then the “B’s” and so on. I feel like it’s been hours and I’m only beginning “E.” I flip and I scan the pages, flip, scan, flip scan. I get to the fifth “E” page and my eyes get caught on a name in the middle. “Emerald.” I whisper. It means green, or beautiful. Like my dad’s eyes.
The room breaks out into a hushed chatter, critiquing the choice of my new name. Alicia, who had moved behind me to read over my shoulder while I looked, nods her head in approval. “It’s official. We’ll call you Emmy for short.” She nods again and this time the rest of the room nods with her, murmuring my name over and over. I smile. Emmy is perfect.
Alex pokes his head back in our room, interrupting one of the girl’s wild descriptions for this place. They’ve been describing their adventures and rumors they’ve heard about this place. They’ve told me it’s a like an underground society, the Truth they call themselves, its people that show emotion but hide it.
The place we are in now is like the headquarters they tell me, a safe haven for those wandering Truths they find, or wandering Truths that find them. Alicia was in the middle of telling me her story when Alex’s face appears.
“She got a name?” the room nods and starts gleefully whispering again. He stares at me and I realize he’s waiting for me to tell him what it is. The room grows quiet so I can speak, “Emerald.”
“Emmy for short.” Someone cries out. He smiles and I love the way the warmth of it reaches his eyes, like green fire.
“Ok Emmy. Welcome to Truths cavern. Um…so, Alicia, take her to the dining hall and I gotta go figure out your matching.” He smiles again, “Any preferences?” I shake my head and he leaves. I notice the way Alicia smiles at him and my mind categorizes that reaction as love. I’m surprised how disappointed I am as I realizes all those smiles were meant not for me but for her. But I have to feel happy, though it’s not a familiar emotion for me, as I see the way she shines when she looks at him. I see the rest of the room looks more fondly on her as well. She shakes her head and beckons us and we march back down the hall to the dining area.
The dining hall is smaller than the room I first saw when entering this place. It’s warm and cozy and has kind of the family feel to it that most of us have never experienced before. I find myself smiling, finally able to share how I feel with so many other people. There are more newcomers than just those in our room and I hear a lot of different stories. There are so many different people from all over the united states, all sharing the same beliefs I do. There are also boys. They share their stories too with as much enthusiasm as the girls.
And everyone has a name. its overwhelming trying to remember everyone’s name