‘I pledge my life to The Nation of this flag and to its Glorious Constitution, which gives Freedom and Liberty to all men. May our God bless The Nation and crush all of our Enemies!’

Like every school day hundreds of boy voices on the school-ground yelled the words of the Pledge simultaneously backed up by the automatic speaker. They had their hands on their heart and their eyes closed in adoration of the great Nation they were lucky to be part of. No student would ever dream of skipping it, so ingrained was it in their daily world. Not everyone was equally into it today though, Michael Adams for example only muttered the words absently with his thoughts elsewhere. Inside he was more concerned about what would be coming in the first 30 minutes of the school day than with the empty daily ritual of nationalistic pseudoreligious adoration. But alas for him, both were equally unavoidable, so the only thing that could be done was to endure both day after day.

As soon as the little ceremony was over, he and the other boys of the class of Science and Technology flocked together and followed a disagreeable man in a camouflage suit for the morning exercises. He brought them to a little training field and started yelling: ‘Be a Man!’ ‘Be a man!’ was also the answer that everyone yelled back, like a troupe of well-trained automatons. Every school day in The Nation had begun with these inevitable drill exercises, so even for the students of the Department of Intellectual studies there could be no exception to that. Most of the time it was just half an hour of exhausting gymnastics while undergoing a lot of dumb insults, but Instructor Jack clearly found it a very important thing to endlessly announce that he was going to make a man out of these boys, every morning again. In reality The Nation hadn’t been in a war in ages, and in fact it had even had no contact with any outside nation in over a century. But in spite of that he kept screaming things like ‘you weaklings, do you think that this girly ballet show will impress the enemy?’ from the top of his lungs as if they were training to attack a deadly enemy next week instead of just doing some kind of roughed-up sports exercises to start their otherwise uneventful school day. Michael hated the whole thing with every cell of his body, but he had been forced to accept the terrible morning drill routine as a normal part of school life, and after a while you get used to anything, especially if people around you act like it’s a normal part of life. Humans can be conditioned quite easily to almost any conditions if you start young enough.

After half an hour of being verbally abused and getting needlessly physically exhausted by Instructor Jack even before the actual school day had begun the school bell finally announced the end of the exercises. This meant that the students could change their clothes again to go to their actual classes for the rest of the day. Some of the other departments had even more drill exercises during the day to make a Man out of them, but luckily that wasn’t the case for the Intellectuals Studies students. Their status as a Real Man was already quite questionable anyway. Most of the boys in his class were Gammas and a few Betas, but never Alphas. Intellectuals didn’t really have a high status in The Nation, where everything depended on being a Real Man, and the hierarchy traditionally was a very important part of that. Anyone with one brain cell knew that manliness was the most important thing there could be in the world but on the other hand, if you looked at things practically, it was also clear that The Nation needed scientists and technicians and engineers too. This meant that officially nothing negative could be said about the ‘brainies’, at least not out loud by higher officials and teachers who weren’t paid to insult them as much as possible like Instructor Jack. But still, the students of more practical and manly studies could say anything they wanted to the brainies, as could their fathers, and so in practice they still were a bit of a laughing stock of the prosperous and masculine society of The Nation. And sometimes they even became the victim of actual violence, although Michael was often smart enough to avoid that. Learning how to avoid bullies was one of the most important things to learn in school, more important than the official curriculum, and he had always been a fast learner.

After changing clothes in the locker room Michael followed the rest of the Sci-Tec class to the Math classroom. It was a weird change to go from the daily drill to advanced algebra, but after a while it felt like the most obvious thing in the world. Later in the day he would have some chemistry lab practice and a workshop about robot psychology, all of which where subjects he loved. But no matter how interesting the classes were today he had other things on his mind than the different types of humanoid intelligence in machines of earlier centuries and redox reaction calculations. The last few days since his birthday had been quite a roller-coaster and it looked like things would only get worse from here. 'We have a surprise for your birthday. You’re ready to become a Real Man now. Expect some great news tomorrow when you get home!' That’s what his father had said yesterday. And that was rather worrying. Very worrying even. He knew what was expected from Real Men in The Nation, and it usually wasn’t much fun and sometimes quite painful, and at least it would be an enormous waste of precious time, focus and energy.

Yes, certainly, technically he was a man, or a boy, or whatever you call a biologically male human being of eighteen and a bit more than a week, but everyone knew that that was not enough in The Nation to be a Man. It was never enough. You had to act like a Real Man, whatever that even meant. And he himself would never be man enough, just like almost everyone, even though no-one ever admitted it of themselves. But for him it was more than clear that he wouldn’t measure up, he was just a brainie after all. Not man enough for his father even, or for the Real Men in The Nation who bossed the rest around, and who were completely contradictory and impossible to follow anyway. He wondered if not thinking things through was another characteristic of Real Manliness. Be strong! Always be the best in everything! Have no feelings! Hunt for women! Don’t ever let a woman dominate you! Especially the last one would be the worst thing ever and was considered extremely shameful, but the only woman he ever saw was his mother, so the only people who dominated him were men, which was quite humiliating too. Ironically the only thing all that talk about manliness ever did was to make him feel ashamed for his own sex.

Luckily he was still a very successful brainie and a good adapter to hostile circumstances, and so Michael had become quite good at surviving in this extreme environment. Over the years he had developed a lot of coping mechanisms to survive as a smart but not very aggressive kid surrounded by fanatic believers in the importance of Real Manliness above all. He’d been able to get out of the violent sports groups apart for the morning drill, and get into science, technology and programming classes which were the safest place for someone like him. Not that manly maybe, but still essential to society so he should be looking forward to a great future of some kind away from the noisy baboons. At least that’s what they said, but never without second thoughts that were visible on their face. It was as if a brainie like him was some kind of tolerated alien. And if his school results wouldn’t have been so good even that wouldn’t have been the case. But he was the best of his class in both math and programming, and one of the best in natural sciences, so no-one could really tell him he was worthless. Everything considered he was relatively lucky.

He looked at the new badge on his chest, which told everyone he was no longer a Teenager, but officially an Unmarried Adolescent Man now. And above all it showed people his new rank in society. Everything in the Nation was divided in classes and grades and level, and people were often segregated by them too. Men were divided into 5 classes which had a lot of subclasses. His father was an alpha class 5, and had always wanted his sons to become alphas too, even though it had always been clear his second son wasn’t Alpha material. Michael wasn’t really interested in anything Manly, didn’t try to compete with anyone, and usually just hid away with a book, safe from all the wary looks and humiliation. He had been the disappointment of the family when he had been sorted as a Gamma at his first sorting ceremony at age fourteen, to everyone's surprise but his own. Luckily had also been sorted for studying science and programming, which still could lead to a proper job that had some respect. But last week his bad luck had suddenly turned: The second sorting ceremony, the Monday after his eighteenth birthday, had been an even bigger surprise: Gamma class one. His father had been enthusiastic again after that, because he’d been the first class one male in the family ever. Uncle Calvin was a Beta class two, and that had always been the highest rate until now. He still didn’t know how to react to his new situation. He’d only worn the badge for a few days, and he had already noticed that it confused people. The gold star of a level one male, but only a Gamma? His mere existence seemed to screw with people's minds. So that was how his life was going to be, being good at the wrong stuff, and being bad at the right stuff to fit in. Which didn’t feel right for him anyway, because the system sucked and was toxic anyway.

He sighed again. So what had his father meant? What would be the birthday surprise that would make him a Real Man? He was afraid of anything that had to do with ‘becoming a Real Man’. It’s not that he didn’t want to grow up, but why was it that everything connected to manliness seemed to make him a worse person than he wanted to be? Real Men had no feelings, but he surely had them. Real Men acted without thinking, he thought before doing anything. Real Men were aggressive and straightforward, he knew how to control his anger and liked to be diplomatic about everything. Real Men were dominant and always on top of things, but he didn’t care for the game of dominance and submission. Actually he loathed it. Real Men wanted a Real Wife that would serve them as some kind of slave, which didn’t sound interesting at all. He might like girls, possibly, but not in that way. He never met girls anyway in this segregated world, they were more like mythical creatures than anything else to him. But the whole idea of a Real Wife repulsed him. He would think that if you really liked, or ‘loved’ women as they called it you’d want more than a personal servant. His theory was that Real Men were so scared of women that they only could react to them with extreme dominance and by blocking everything female. This was quite silly to him, and a sign that Real Men were actually weak and pathetic creatures anyway. Years ago he had decided that if he ever had the chance to make contact with anyone from the female world he’d at least try to understand them, and if possible befriend them. This sounded alien and completely unrealistic to his Nation programming, but then again his ambitions had always been quite far out there compared to his peers.

And there was the possible answer to the mysterious surprise: He was eighteen. He had had his final sorting ceremony and was even graded a Gamma-1. He hadn’t realised before today that he could officially get a Wife now. Was his dad going to take him to a wife School to pick out a Real Wife? Could that really be it? He saw no other options, or rather, the other options were probably worse. His brain was good at sorting data, and the other options were eliminated already and the conclusion was clear: because of his good school results and rank, he would get a wife for his eighteenth birthday. Nothing more manly after all than having a woman in your life to control and boss around.

‘Shit’ he said out loud when opening his algebra book. It was a forbidden word, but at least it was very manly.

*

Michael looked through the school bus window, absently. None of the grey buildings really got his attention now. The school day had gone by quite fast, like a bad dream, and he was still worried about his dad's surprise. He sat on the usual spot, away from the attention of the bullies and next to the window so he could look outside to oversee the dull streets of Seventh City with their sparse traffic of mostly public traffic and here and there a hydrogen car or electric vehicle. Still deep in thoughts and glad that no-one was looking at him now he tried to order his chaotic thoughts again, which focused on two things. The first thing was his sudden popularity. It seemed like everyone had heard about his new rating overnight, and he had been receiving much more attention at school than had ever been the case, thanks to the badge on his chest. All kinds of random people had been congratulating him, or just glanced at him with a jealous look in their eyes. A class one Gamma was rare, but it certainly was not impossible, and suddenly he was treated like a king among the brainies. He’d always been part of the background as much as possible, but now he suddenly had to learn how to handle people who tried to be close to him because of his supposed status as a level one male. He remembered that kings always had to look out for assassins, and wondered if he would be gaining enemies too with his new status.

But the second thing still nagged to get to the foreground, which was the surprise he was going to get from his father. Was he indeed getting an appointment at Seventh City Wife factory already, so short after his eighteenth birthday, so he would finally be a Real Man that his father could be proud of? He knew he wasn’t going to get a car of some kind of weapon or so, and ignoring all the things instructor Jack did to the boys to make Real Men out of them, the only other possibility he saw was one he knew his father wouldn’t to: some men in The Nation had a tradition bring their son to a Love Bar as some kind of coming-of-age ritual, so they could have some experiences as a Real Man with the prostitutes. But his father wouldn’t go so far, would he? He was a Real Man, but not like that, he still had some morals and followed the rules of the Church closely. Or at least he thought he did. He was also sure that his older brother never had received such surprise, he would have known that. On the other hand his brother hadn’t gone to a Wife School to pick a girl only a few days after his eighteenth birthday either. But then again, his brother was an Alpha-5 like his father, not a Gamma-1. Everything about his story was different.

He sighed. Seventh City Wife Factory, the name alone made him cringe. Boys in The Nation went to a normal school, but girls went to a Wife School from the age of twelve, where they were trained to become a Real Wife. That is, if they were lucky: girls who didn’t have a father, or more rarely a brother or other guardian to present them to Wife School and to give them to their husband afterwards could never become a Real Wife. They would never even be graded, and would never have any status in The Nation at all, and just be a non-Wife. Very inferior jobs, or prostitution were the only things they could hope for. At least, that was what he had heard. He had never talked to any gradeless woman at all evidently. You didn’t talk to them at all anyway, that was indecent. Talking to any woman was indecent in most situations, and he hadn’t spoken to a woman that wasn’t his mother since he had been five or so.

The bus stopped, and absentmindedly he walked home from the bus stop. Boring lawns and grey tiles filled most spaces in between the houses, but at least there was one tree in this street, right before their house even, an old red oak. His mother always complained about the leaves every fall, but the City Council hadn’t listened to her complaints and requests to cut it down. She was a housewife, so it was her work to clean it up, at least that had been the rationale they had communicated. Secretly Michael had been glad that the tree wasn’t cut down, but he had felt angry about the way they had treated his mother. He knew nothing about it was wrong morally according to the norms of The Nation, and still the whole thing made him feel very uneasy.

Arriving home took off his clothes and shoes. He had concluded that the best way to find out what his birthday surprise would be was to be as confrontational as possible. That was his fathers style, and the way in which a Real Man with a bit of guts solves problems, not? His father was sitting in the kitchen with a warm bowl of soup that his wife had just given him. Sometimes eliminating the worse possibility is a good way to get to the actual truth, so when he approached him with a direct question. ‘You’re not going to bring me to the Love Bar to make a Real Man out of me, are you?’ His father looked up from his soup, puzzled. ‘What are you babbling about, son? Who said anything about that?’ ‘The birthday surprise that is going to make me a Real Man.’ He replied. ‘No, son, prostitutes are for weaklings and wimps. No real value for the money either. And the church says they make you go to hell.’

He must have sighed visibly, and he saw his father wondering if he would be revealing the secret or not for a few seconds before he went further. ‘No, I had a much better idea, Son. You are a class one male now, even if you are just a Gamma after all. First class one male in the family even. So I signed you up for a real quality wife at Seventh City wife Factory.’ Michael gasped. His prediction had been right all along. ‘A wife? For me? I’m only eighteen, dad. And I’ll have to study for years.’ ‘You’re a level one man. You need a Real Wife. And the engagement procedure takes at least a year for men under twenty before you can take her home and marry. Or don’t you like girls maybe?’ Michael sighed. Did he like girls? He wondered about that for a second. What did that even mean? He didn’t even know what he felt about girls to be honest, since he never had the chance to be with any girls since forever, how could he even know anything about liking them. ‘How can I know if I like girls if I can’t ever see them?’ He muttered bitterly. ‘That’s the best way, son! It’s only decent to not meet them. So you won’t be tempted to do indecent things. Wait until marriage like a good Man.’ Michael took his own bowl of soup and seated himself. ‘Who even thinks about indecent things? I just want to know how they are before I marry one. If I have to spend the rest of my life with someone there’s a lot more I need to know about girls than all that nonsense about sex. Aren’t wives another human being that comes to live with you for the rest of your life? How about getting to know more about girls before marrying one?’ His father ignored him. ‘You know the procedures. No meeting girls until you have one to marry. They are trained in a Wife School to better suit your needs as a man until you are ready. You choose the girl you like, and after that you’ll get the chance to meet her and you’ll only have to wait with sex until you’re married. That’s what God wants. You know what the Preacher says about that.’

Michael sighed again and turned to his soup. Nothing he would say could make any difference. He knew he couldn’t win this fight. He knew everything about this whole business was wrong, but he didn’t even have words to describe why. ‘You’ll be happy when you have a wife that’ll listen to you and do whatever you want, just like me and your mum.’ His father finally said. ‘Probably.’ Michael said absently.

Never had he felt so alone in his whole life.