Watchers

By Mae Orwell

A disgraced senator’s son and a resourceful orphan are thrown together on a sadistic reality show in this dystopian trilogy for fans of The Hunger Games and 1984.

A decade after a violent attack on American democracy destroyed the federal government, a private police force emerges from the chaos to take control. Along with the Watchers come cameras, fines and 24-hour surveillance that shatter both privacy and freedom.

Watcher eyes are everywhere and the nation is at their mercy. But when a new reality show promises to restore a little freedom by putting ordinary citizens behind the camera lens, they jump at the chance to control something in their lives – even if it’s other people.

By the time Daniel and Sasha land on The Elimination Game, dozens of contestants have played and lost, and the game’s true nature turns out to be far more monstrous than anything the Watchers have done. Daniel and Sasha must work together to escape because the only real prize is getting out alive.

Watchers is a 2018 Watty Award winner and two-time Wattpad Featured Pick enjoyed by over 60,000 readers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lisbon Press
• Release date: Sep 30, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463126240

Mae Orwell

I write comedic, near-future sci fi for fans of Douglas Adams and Aldous Huxley. My debut series, WATCHERS, is 1984 meets reality TV.

Book preview

Watchers

Watchers

Book One of the Watchers Trilogy

Mae Orwell

Lisbon Press

Copyright © 2017 by Mae Orwell

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Contents

Live Stream #271

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Live Stream #272

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Live Stream #273

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Live Stream #278

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Live Stream #281

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Live Stream #282

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Live Stream #283

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Live Stream #284

Also by Mae Orwell

Next in the Series

Fighters: Chapter 1

Note from the Author

Acknowledgments

Live Stream #271

The computer screen switches from an old television test pattern to video of a shabbily dressed woman. A stretched-out rubber Elvis Presley mask obscures her face.

She is sitting in a small, dimly lit room with one corner of her desk visible in the frame. It is littered with soda bottles and wrinkled fast food bags, giving the impression that she does not leave this space very often. The only other thing that is visible in the shot is an Emoji Movie poster on the wall behind her.

The woman adjusts a microphone, moving it closer, and we hear a slightly muffled version of her voice through the mask. It is slightly atonal and lethargic as she begins the broadcast.

"Good evening everyone and welcome to another episode of Dystopia Today. I'm your host, Elvis Splorch, and I've got a special treat for you today.

We've been following Sasha and Daniel, our favorite couple in the Elimination Game house, for the last five weeks and y'all have been pestering me relentlessly to dig into their backgrounds. As you know, contestants don't exactly audition and many of you have been asking for the story behind America's favorite indentured lovers.

One of you even managed to deliver a letter to my house, which is impressive since we all know the United States Postal Service has not cared for snow or rain or heat or gloom of night for years now... but it was creepy as hell and I'd like to take this moment to kindly ask all of you to refrain from looking up dear old Uncle Elvis in real life.

Thanks.

Anyway, I heard your pleas. I spent days and days digging through old surveillance footage all over the city and I found that sweet, sweet background information you've been asking for."

Elvis holds up a small external hard drive, waving it teasingly at the camera, then continues.

There are eight hours of video here, all queued up and ready to go live at the push of a button. Are you ready? Are you hungry for it?

The comments section below the video lights up with the barely literate ravings of people who have nothing more to look forward to than the life stories of a couple reality show contestants. They've already cleared their schedules from now until Kingdom Come and they want it.

Elvis sets down the hard drive and crosses her arms in front of her chest with a sigh.

Here's the thing. I can't show you this video yet, she says, genuine discomfort edging into her voice. "I can't afford to show you this video and I think you all know where I'm going with this.

My donations page is currently sitting at $10. That $10 is what I have to live on this week, and it's what keeps the lights on around here. Do you realize what the McDonald's Dollar Menu costs these days? Let me tell you, it ain't been a dollar in a long time.

So here's what we're going to do, and I want you to keep in mind that you're forcing my hand.

I've got this footage all ready for you and I'm going to push that 'play' button just as soon as we get my donation page up to $100. That's barely enough to keep the McDonald's on the table and the Splorch lubricated, but I'm willing to make it happen because I love you guys. But until we reach the $100 mark, you guys are going to be watching a live stream I found of the day room at the Lower North Philadelphia Assisted Living Facility."

The screen abruptly switches from the self-styled Elvis to a grainy black-and-white feed of a room in which five or six elderly people are sitting around, not doing much of anything. The comments section explodes with objections as a ticker appears in the bottom corner of the screen, showing Elvis's ransom goal.

On screen, three wrinkled old women sit in recliners so plush they're nearly swallowing their occupants. They stare blankly at a point just below the camera, and by the glaze of their eyes, it's probably a television just out of frame.

Behind them, there are two hunchbacked old men sitting at a table with a checkerboard between them, but they both appear to have forgotten that there's a game in progress. One is staring at the empty nurse's station across the room and the other is picking at the hem of his shirt with a shaky hand.

It only takes a minute for the ticker in the corner to jump from $10 to $15 and Elvis says over the elderly live stream, "That's more like it, folks. We're not here to watch the relentless march of time - we're here to forget about that. Keep the donations coming and we'll be watching Daniel and Sasha in no time... and let me assure you, it's juicy stuff!"

The ticker jumps again, this time from $15 to $23.

Chapter One

The view from this camera is of a street corner, businesses along the main road and a run-down residential neighborhood on the other.

The camera must be mounted high on the corner of a building based on the angle, and it's equipped with both night vision and sound so it must be a newer one, from the second Benson administration.

These surveillance cameras popped up in cities all over the country almost ten years ago, part of the privatized police force's Watch now, ticket later policy. No one could argue that this non-interference approach to crime brought instances of both police brutality and cop killings down to almost zero overnight, so  everyone agreed the ever-watchful eyes of the new bounty hunter-style police force was a small price to pay for an end to the violence.

It must be very late at night, or very early in the morning, because there are no cars and no activity on the main road. After a minute, the camera picks up some motion on the residential street and pivots to capture it.

A middle-aged woman with stringy hair and a short skirt despite the cold approaches a parked car and bends over at the window, no doubt putting the Watcher behind the camera on high alert.

Here's an opportunity to fine a prostitute, one of the easiest ways for him to make his commission. If he's good at his job, this woman will have a drone on her within minutes and it will trail her until he gets the footage he needs to issue the fine.

Sasha Bright has been sleeping fitfully lately. It feels like no matter where she lays down, there’s never enough room. Her neck is always bent at some unnatural angle and her knees are forever tucked into her chest, unable to stretch out.

And then there’s the cold - November in Philadelphia is no joke and it will only get worse as the winter progresses.

She was lucky to find the old Kia Soul that she’s sleeping in tonight, with its doors unlocked and its seats already folded down into an inviting bed - evidence that she isn’t the first person to check into this particular Kia Motel.

She was even luckier to find it parked in the same spot a few nights in a row. At least until it’s inevitably towed away, she has a place to sleep that’s off the pavement and out of the bitter cold wind. That’s important when the nights are getting colder and the ground is beginning to freeze - those are the little things she never thought she’d need to be grateful for back when she had a home, a warm bed… parents.

The fact that the cargo area isn’t quite big enough to lay down without getting a stiff neck really is a small price to pay for the luxury of being off the street for a few nights. She knows she shouldn’t complain about it, and that’s why she keeps her thoughts to herself as she tosses and turns her way through the night in the back of the Kia.

Tonight, though, she’s startled out of sleep around two in the morning when someone raps on the window.

Sasha jolts and smacks the crown of her head violently against the wheel well, cursing and looking up at the source of the sound. Her heart is already beginning to beat faster, adrenaline preparing her for any number of scenarios - a Watcher who's come out from behind the cameras to fine her for trespassing, another homeless person itching to fight her for her sleeping spot, an addict looking to rob her of the few dollars hidden in the lining of her jacket…

But when she sits up, she finds her friend, Jane, staring back at her.

Sasha wipes the sleep from her eyes and opens the door, stepping onto the street and wrapping her arms around herself as the wind nips at her. She wouldn’t trade that old jacket for anything, but it’s not much in a Philadelphia winter. She’ll need to start accumulating layers soon if she’s going to survive another one out on the street.

Hey, Sasha whispers, her eyes going to the camera nearby.

If the Watcher behind the lens hasn’t deployed a drone to fine the two of them already, he probably isn’t planning on it - probably assumes a couple of bums like Sasha and Jane don’t have money in their electronic accounts anyway, and that assumption would be correct.

But they have to keep their voices down regardless. This is the kind of neighborhood where someone can abandon a car for a few days or a week without anyone raising any objections, but it isn’t the kind that’s above calling the Watchers if an early morning conversation between two vagrants becomes an irritation.

In her three years on the street, Sasha has learned a few things - in no small part thanks to Jane. One of those things is that the people who are living on the edge, like the ones in this run-down neighborhood downwind from the factories, are the ones with the lowest tolerance for any extra irritation in their lives. They’re so worn down from just trying to survive, they’re likely to break if just one more thing is added to their plates.

So Sasha whispers as she asks, What's going on?

Jane doesn’t normally quit working until the sun starts to rise and as Sasha shakes the last of the sleep fog from her head, she notices how haggard and agitated her friend looks. The strap of her Mary Jane heel is broken, laying limply across her ankle, and goosebumps stand up on her bare legs, but she doesn’t look like she’s feeling it.

Her eyes, though… there’s a fire there that Sasha has never seen before. It scares her. Christ, has Jane gotten her hands on some kind of drug? Sasha didn’t think they were that bad off, taking drugs as payment, but maybe she’s been fooling herself.

Get in the car, she says, gesturing to the open door.

Jane shakes her head even though her teeth chatter as she speaks. I h-heard of a p-place.

The cold - or the drugs - give her a stutter. Sasha doesn’t know too much about street drugs but from the look in her eyes and the chatter of her teeth, she thinks it must be coke, or… God help them… crack.

Yeah? she asks, studying her friend. What kind of place?

She’s wondering if Jane needs a safe, warm place to come down. Not that Sasha knows of anyplace like that, but the Kia will do in a pinch. It would have been nice to get a full night’s sleep for once, but something always comes up and tonight, Jane needs help. It’s looking more and more likely that Sasha’s about to give up her nice, windless cargo space to her. She'll have to sit in the front seat until dawn, scrunched down to avoid the camera’s watchful gaze, and try to get a few more winks there.

It's a sh-shelter, Jane says. My last john told me about it ‘cuz I couldn’t stop shivering. He said it's a really nice one run by a priest. He doesn't even kick people out during the day when it’s cold.

He doesn't kick people out? Sasha asks, narrowing her eyes. She's made the tour of pretty much every homeless shelter in Philadelphia over the last couple of years and that’s unlike any she’d ever experienced.

They always kick you out during the day because they don’t want people hanging around, getting bored and causing trouble. What could a priest possibly want with a bunch of vagrants hanging around all day and night?

No, and he said they feed you and- and wash your clothes, and give you access to sh-shower facilities, Jane says. The more she talks, the more her eyes light up and she looks a bit better. Maybe she isn’t high after all - maybe she’s just really, really cold. Sasha can relate. Indoor plumbing, Sasha. Do you even remember what it's like to take a hot shower?

No, she says with a snort. Her last ‘shower’ involved a small handful of wet wipes she swiped from an unattended baby stroller at the park and a gas station attendant banging relentlessly on the bathroom door while Sasha tried to clean herself up in front of the sink.

Come with me to check it out, Jane says.

What, now? Even the most progressive, kindly homeless shelter in the country wasn’t going to open its doors at this hour - especially with Jane looking as crazed as she does. They're not going to let us in. We should wait until morning.

And wait until Jane doesn’t look like such a strung-out junky. Jesus, was it really just the cold that put her in a state like that?

Sasha tries again to usher her into the back of the Kia for some much-needed sleep, but Jane shakes her head.

I want to go now, she says. It sounds nice and I'm cold, Sasha. I'm tired of being cold.

You could warm up in the car, Sasha points out. She’s tired and cold, and tired of being cold, too, but Jane isn’t thinking clearly. That’s unusual for her and she needs to sleep off whatever’s wrong with her. Let's go tomorrow and get a couple hours of sleep in the meantime. The shelter will still be there in the morning.

Sasha takes Jane’s hand and she thinks it’s working for a second, but then Jane steps back up on the curb. No, I’ve still got a few more good hours to work. If you don’t want to go to the shelter with me, then I’m at least going to head back out and see if I can find a few more johns.

Okay, Sasha says warily. But don't go to that shelter without me. Promise.

Fine, fine, Jane says, waving her off.

Sasha watches her walk up the street, heading out of the residential neighborhood and over to a bar a few blocks away that has proved lucrative in the past. A small Watcher drone meets her on the corner, flying about twenty feet over her head and following her like a puppy as she turns and heads up the sidewalk.

Despite the desperate look in Jane’s eye, Sasha doesn’t worry about her - she knows what she’s doing and she deals with drones all the time in her line of work. They’re little more than mosquitoes to her, annoying things to swat away.

She’ll lose this one before she reaches the bar and it will never know what she’s up to. Even if it does manage to catch her in the act, her line of work doesn’t pay in eCoin, so what fines could the Watcher collect?

Sasha climbs back into the cargo area and lays down on her back, trying again to find a good position. If she props her feet on the center console, she can just manage to stretch out, but with no support beneath her knees the position starts to hurt after a couple of minutes. She rolls onto her side and curls up, the rough upholstery scratching her cheek as she tries to go back to sleep.

It would be nice to have a real shower and a decent meal, but what she told Jane was the truth - the shelter will wait until morning. There’s no reason to go in the dead of night when all the Watchers are bored and eager to fine anybody for anything.

Chapter Two

Sasha wakes up a few hours later, the sun just beginning to rise over the filthy city.

Her neck is just as stiff as she knew it would be, and it takes her a minute or