The Glass Needle
The room was white. It seemed to float above the city in a new age skyscraper, one of many glass needles pointed miles up into the faded blue sky. In this one glass needle, the room sat. Flat, modern, and square. The wall furthest east was about 35 feet tall –composed entirely of glass panes looking out over the city. The wall adjacent to that was another wall of windows –this time looking into the lives of the citizens of the city. Another 35 feet of monitors and screens, all filled with innumerable amounts of data and images. Sandwiched in between these two vast expanses of glass, sat the apartment. It was barren and modern. The walls and floors remained empty, unfinished concrete composite. The ceiling had all of the ducting and plumbing exposed, giving the whole room an industrial feel. Hidden in an enclave on the northern wall was the kitchen. The space had all of the bare necessities, plainly visible and utterly utilitarian. Metal and black gloss dominated the room. On the south wall was an ingeniously hidden Murphy bed, and two small openings on either side of the bed where light emitted. In the center of the room was her workspace, along with a makeshift “sitting area” for the rare times she had guests over. Her chair faced the perpetually glowing wall of video feed, allowing her to monitor it with cunning precision. On the left side of the chair was a small pad, with some controls for the video, a small keyboard, and a glowing red button. The red button was the only source of color in the room, other than what she was wearing, and even then, there were only two things in the room with color at all.
They used to say that one’s home reflected one’s lifestyle. Makes sense, and this woman was no exception. The woman who resided in the room wore plain white. She had a bright white, somewhat tight fitting turtleneck encasing her thin frame, with a bright red scarf wrapped around her neck. She was tall, pale and bony, and yet, she had a huge presence. When she walked into a room with another breathing soul in her vision, her ice blue eyes seemed to cut them into a million little pieces. She walked with an eerie grace, sometimes seeming to hover over to her destination without moving. Her name was unimportant. When she was recruited, she lost all sense of individuality. She was part of the machine. Expertly calibrated and scarily precise, the network of the machine let nothing slip by unnoticed. Her shift for the Eye was beginning.
She moved over to the center of the room toward the chair, as the Murphy bed behind her quickly receded into the wall, leaving only a memory of sleep. She sat down on the chair, her weight on the sensors triggering the video wall to flash a message of greeting to the woman. She proceeded to place her left wrist on the port. The computer seized control of her wrist and within seconds, her arm was intertwined with wires, and her veins were connected to the mainframe through a set of small wires peering out of her forearm. She was now under the watch of the Eye, like every other citizen in the city. While she scanned the screens on the massive wall, the wires in her arm bombarded her brain with data on every single person visible in the frames. The scenes on the screens were ghostly –hordes of people going about their daily duties, all strangely synchronized. It wasn’t hard to find the first problem of the day. Somewhere near the city gates, she spotted someone out of sync. The man she saw wasn’t wearing plain beige, and looked terribly confused. The Eye had no data on this man yet –he was so obviously an outsider that did not belong. She pressed the red button without hesitation and watched as seconds later, three men dressed in white armor came to take the man to the tallest glass needle.
Throughout the day, the woman weeded out potential problems throughout the city, along with the Eye network, keeping the city running like a well oiled, blindly obedient, thoughtless machine. Anyone who compelled her to tap the red button was quickly subdued and would be sterilized by authorities to prevent further danger. If they posed too great a threat, they’d never to be seen again. Wiped off the face of the city of glass needles. There she sat, in this chair, intricately wired into the framework of the Eye. She was detached, looking at the video with such a blank stare; any possible onlooker would assume her dead. She didn’t even blink, moving only to let air into her lungs. She was detached because of the red button. Years of tapping it had worn her sympathy and emotion dry. She no longer felt any sort of empathy when pressing the button. She had lost that long ago, and now functioned like a methodical machine, not even thinking, but rather knowing.
She continued with the routine until another abnormality sprouted. This one was different –what looked like a mother and daughter were walking in line with everyone else, but were not supposed to be near the city gates. The data the Eye pulled up on them confirmed her suspicions. She began to wonder, the first time thought had intruded on work in years, why the mother and daughter were heading to the city gates. Could they be trying to escape? Why would they do this when they knew the Eye was watching? She sat there for a moment, not knowing what to do, dumbfounded by the bravery of these two people. Her finger was over the red button, ready to push it, but her conscience forced her not to. The closer the woman and daughter got to the city gates, the more rushed their pace became. She knew the Eye was watching all three of them. The mother, daughter, and herself. She thought of the consequences of her inaction. The woman and daughter began a mad dash to the gates, shoving people aside to get out of their hell. The woman behind the screen held firm, not moving, still in shock. The Eye saw this.
As the woman and daughter were just escaping the gates, five armored guards dressed in white appeared within the room. The woman started to shed a tear, but before it was released to stream down her face, the Eye sent a massive shock through her system from the wires in her forearm. The wires connecting her to the mainframe were shocking her into submission, waiting for the guards to take her. The guards proceeded to take her away, farther up into the glass needle. Her red scarf was torn off in the process, and remained in the room with the button.
