Consensus: Part 1 - Citizen

010

After a full night's sleep, Rena got up early, showered, and put on the dress that she only wore on special occasions. Birthday parties. After-school events. There weren't many opportunities for her to dress up, and even fewer that she actually participated in.

But I'm trying a new approach, she reminded herself.

When she walked down the hall and into the kitchen, the rest of her family was already at the table eating breakfast. They too were dressed up. It was Sunday morning, and Rena hadn't gone to Consensus with her family in over a year. She'd argued that weekends were her only opportunity to sleep in, and her parents decided not to force the issue. It defeated the whole point of agreement. Since then, their normal routine was to eat a quick breakfast and leave quietly. Rena usually woke up to an empty house.

"Rena?" Marshall set down his spoon, eyes wide with concern.

Everyone turned to stare.

"You look nice," Clarine said. "Does this mean what I think it means?"

Rena nodded. "Together ... right?"

Clarine smiled.

"We have to leave in a few minutes," Marshall said. "Why don't you grab something to eat before we go?"

"OK." Rena already liked the feel of this new approach.

After breakfast, the family walked two blocks to the nearest transit station. Rena carried Suzanne the whole way so her mom could hold Gareth's hand, something Clarine didn't get to do as often as she liked. They passed dozens of other families along the way, all dressed up and heading to consensus like the Waites. It was strange and comforting at the same time to feel part of a larger movement. To Rena, it felt like walking to school in the morning, and in a way, that's what it was.

A school for all ages.

They had to wait ten minutes before the correct transit pod arrived at the station. Others came and went during that time, but they were the ones spiraling inward to the Center or outward from it. Rena's family could have taken one of these and ridden it for one revolution, getting off at a station about ten blocks inward, but it was faster to wait for one that ran through the radial tubes across the city.

Like the majority of the transit network, the switching station tubes were transparent. When the pod arrived, the sound of compressed air transitioned to a hum of electricity. One form of propulsion took over for the other as the pod diverted from the main tube and came alongside a moving walkway. The doors opened and only a few people stepped off. Then the waiting crowd moved quickly to fill up the pod before it reached the end of the loading/unloading zone. Fortunately, they all made it into the first pod.

Or else the Waites would've had to wait, Rena thought with a grin. Dal would have made fun of her for such a lame joke.

Fifteen minutes later, Rena and her family stepped off the transit system and walked another block to the community hall, a one-story, concrete building. Their pace slowed as they merged with dozens of other families moving up the front walkway and into the building through numerous metal doors that were propped open.

The lobby was even more chaotic, as citizens spotted others they hadn't seen in a week. Whereas everyone had been walking in the same general direction outside, they scattered in a hundred different directions now, crossing each other's paths and bringing the flow to a standstill.

"There's Kirti," Clarine said, still holding tight to Gareth's hand.

"You should go say hello," Marshall suggested.