The World of the 7th Judge... in the words of its citizens.

Bronx (The Bronx), 7th Jurisdiction of the Boroughs

April 1, 2014 by Rachel Bostwick

The Bronx was one of the original five boroughs of New York City, famous as the home of the New York Yankees and one of the worlds most famous Zoological parks. Today, the Bronx is most well-known for being the home of the 7th judge. Alexander Jackson – today known as Lux – grew up in the Bronx before the fall. His mother was an elementary school teacher at Sts. Peter and Paul Parish school, his father was a nightguard/maintenance worker at the now-famous Electrolux Palace, then a night club for young adults.

After the fall, Lux and his father gathered many of the survivors into the Palace. There they worked together to survive, hunting, gathering food, putting out fires, keeping wildlife away, and salvaging what technology survived the breakdown of the NYC infrastructure. Few survivors remained, but over time the population grew. At first, those whole were sick or dependent died off in the harsh weather and lack of technology. Then slowly those who survived gravitated toward the Palace. The Bronx became the center of civilization until the council of the judges was established and the people distibuted more evenly over the five boroughs.

Today, the Bronx is one of the smaller of the seven jurisdictions. The Palace and the common market are the northern markers of civilization. Above the market few people reside and only a handful of businesses, most catering to New England trade caravans. The Bronx is home to some 5,000 souls – 2,000 above ground and approximately 3,200 below. Accurate numbers below are impossible, but a best estimate is offered. Visitors to the 7th jurisdiction are always welcome to stop into the Electrolux Palace – you will come for the beautifully preserved Beaux Arts style 20th century architecture; stay for the housekeeper’s renowned comfort cuisine.

Andrew Angelo Howard

April 1, 2014 by Rachel Bostwick

Andrew Angelo Howard is the oldest son of the 6th Judge, Dell Howard of the Harlem Jurisdiction. Since his 16th birthday, Andrew has been working as an assistant to the 7th judge. Andrew files papers, drafts contracts, manages the household budget, and oversees the judge’s messengers. Andrew takes his job as the 7th judge’s right-hand man very seriously.

Andrew was born in the 1st jurisdiction in the year 2107, six years after the fall of mankind. He lived in the Underground for the first three years of his life, until he and his little brother Perry were adopted by the Howards and brought to live in their home in Harlem. From his father Dell, Andrew learned history, logic, law, civics, philosophy, and literature. His mother, Apple, taught him Science, Math, reading, writing, and courtesy. He hopes to succeed his father as the judge of the 6th jurisdiction.

He wears blond hair to his shoulders and can always be seen in the formal dress of an elite citizen of the boroughs. He prefers red neckties and solid charcoal suits. His only concession to comfort are the well-tanned moccasins he wears, which are yearly birthday gifts from his mother. He has little time for games or amusements, and reads classic literature by the assist light of his pod when he can’t sleep.

“Ignorance of the law is no excuse… actually ignorance of any kind is no excuse.” – Andrew Angelo Howard

Friends and Children (prologue)

March 14, 2014 by Rachel Bostwick

Overgrown by
Joakim Olofsson

Friends and Children,

In the year 2101, humanity fell asleep. Most never woke again and the few that did scrambled to survive as the human infrastructure fell apart. Power grids failed. Food sources dried up overnight. Fire and flood raged unchecked. The remnant of humanity sat by a fire made of their possessions eating beans out of a can and telling sad stories.

Disconnected from safety of our power grids, we had no heat but what we could burn and no food but what we could steal from the dead. Generators helped us play at civilization for a time, but eventually the gasoline stores dried up. Batteries were used up and then tossed away by the hundreds, the thousands. We had no friends left but our solar-powered calculators and our pods. We could comfort ourselves with the music of the old world, but we couldn’t call each other up to say hello.

For the first five years, we looked for a savior, someone who had the knowledge to turn everything back on, but none came. There weren’t enough of us left. So we slogged along, always a little hungry, always a little cold, always a little lonely.

We died in desperation, one at a time, until there were almost none left.

We believed it was the end of the world.

And it was, in a way. But I’m sorry – I won’t bore you with the details. You’ve heard this story already from your parents and from your friends and from your teachers.

You will remember, then, that thirty years later, one small civilization budded in the ruins of New York City. In those days, most of America was wild and largely uninhabited. There were clusters of men near the safest places – the Nova Lenape in Jersey. The Old Order Amish in Pennsylvania and Ohio. They say, that a great peaceful commune once domesticated the mild jungles of San Diego. I have no way to confirm this, but also no reason to doubt it. For the most part, empty suburbs and burnt hulls of cities dotted America’s landscape. We had no power sources and no king. But in New York, there were still people, enough to love and steal and kill. Enough to be classed and ruled. And so a council of seven men presided over the boroughs as judges, decreeing right and wrong. Who was allowed to reside in safety and who had to leave. Who could work in peace and who had to hide in the shadows.

I was born at the same time that the judges convened. My mother and I, we were among those who lived in the shadows.

Today I will tell you the story of a man named Alexander Jackson, though history simply calls him Lux. Lux was the 7th of the judges, a single man among the council. The youngest. The least learned. The roughest of hands. The simplest of speech. He was a working man who sought to rebuild the Bronx with common sense and his own hands. Eventually the justice of the boroughs – and the fate of the world – would depend on him.

But first, he became my father.

And that’s the story I am going to tell you today.

-Summer

S.E.H.
July 4, 2176

The Last Firefly

November 26, 2013 by Rachel Bostwick

Haven’t you ever wanted something so badly, that you knew having it would change your life forever? That happened to Grant a few years ago, shortly after Summer and Lina moved underground into the barrio he and his mother live in.

A short from the world of The 7th Judge

It was, as far as anyone knew, the very last firefly.

Summer had shown him a picture of a tiny beetle with a glowing behind in one of her mother’s fairytale books, and he’d been captivated. Since then, half of her art had been populated by swarms of the little lights, and together they wondered what it must have been like to seem the lights dancing around them in the old days. Grant couldn’t read, and Summer’s mother was the only survivor he knew personally who could. That made research tough, but he started by asking question of the old folks.

“Yes, I remember fireflies. No, we called them lightning bugs. We used to drive upstate to see swarms of them hiding in the low hanging branches of the willows. We’d fly through the the velvet dark in bare feet and catch them in our fingers. We let them go right away of course.”

“Firefly? My pa bought me one, but I broke it only a week later. He ‘bout killed me.”

“We smushed them against the pavement to make a glowy goo.”

“If you watched one in your hand, it had a kind of Morse code. It was calling to its friends to come and save it.”

“We caught a million of them in ball jars to make lanterns for the tree house.”

“My neighbor had three of them, and she let me borrow one, on its chain. My uncle caught me with the light on and I had to give it back, but it was worth it.”

All Grant could tell for sure was what he and Summer had learned from the book – they were bugs. And they had lights in their bums. It wasn’t much to go on. It sounded like they had once flocked out in the country, but people must have domesticated them or androidized them or something. He got the best description from Jerky Joe – it was he who had broken his within a week of purchase, but he remembered it in great detail. Jerky Joe was only in his fifties and he always had the best memories of the world before. He described the silver filigree and the swamp green light. He told Grant how he trained it to follow him around in the woods and it helped him light his way home. His face lit up while he was speaking, as if the memory of the firefly was casting its warmth over his countenance even now.

Grant had to find one. Had to. He was tired of traipsing through shadowy tunnels, pointing the assist light of his pod into spidery corners, never knowing for sure what was crawling around his feet. He loved exploring, but he hated the dark.

So he started asking around about a little velvet box with a winged lightbulb on the outside. No one had seen one. He bribed a few of the urchins with a pouch of Joe’s jerky and a handful of shinies to start scouting around in some of the apartment buildings. He picked the richest apartment building that had big enough places that kids might’ve lived there once, and he started looking. This particular building hadn’t been cleared yet. The prospect of searching it was gruesome but full of promise. For every bed with a skeleton about the same size as him, his chances of finding a firefly increased.

In the meantime, he was finding good stuff. Great stuff, trade-able stuff. Christmas? Done. Art supplies for Summer, a couple of still-legible books for Mrs. Layce, a beautiful cameo brooch for mom. When he had to sell the brooch to feed the family for a month when mom was laid up with a stomach sickness, it didn’t even phase him.

And then he found it. He hadn’t really believed he would, certainly not in the first building that he tried. And even if he did, he didn’t believe it would still work after sitting in a box (or worse – around the neck of it’s owner) for thirty years. But now he held it in his hands. He loosened it from the clasp and it hovered in the air before him. He took a step away and it followed him. He wanted to dance. He wanted to leap. Instead, he scrambled down eight flights of stairs – the firefly hot on his heels, the black velvet box clutched in his fingers – and flew toward the subway tunnel. He took the stairs two, three at a time. He slowed to a fast walk and the firefly caught up with him. It passed in front of him, about three feet, at eye level. His pod was tucked safely into his pocket. The glow of the firefly was twice as bright as the assist light and he didn’t need to point it. When he made a turn, he simply had to quietly direct it with his voice. It obeyed him better than that mutt he’d taken care of last year. He made it home in half the time. He ran his fingers along the dull stone wall to find the end of the door. He tapped the safety knock – four short taps then a slow slide. He almost didn’t bother, he just wanted to bust in and show his mom what he had found. But he didn’t want to give her a heart attack, so he knocked.

No answer.

He tapped again.

Nothing.

“Mama?”

He pushed the door open, jiggling it slightly to get over the rough patch of carpet. Mom wasn’t in the livingroom. He walked through the archway into the dark bedroom. The firefly followed ahead of him and lit the whole room.

“Grant…” she said. She was laying on her fleece on the ground. She hadn’t covered up with the blanket, and her nightgown was scrunched all around her as though she were tossing and turning. The swampy light of the firefly cast death shadows over the contours of her face.

“Mom, why aren’t you up?”

“I – I get Lina.”

He put the firefly away under his pillow. Mrs. Layce was fetched and herbs were administered, but the fever didn’t go down. There was nothing else for it. Mom needed antibiotics and she needed them fast. They hauled her up to the city hospital. Medicine was administered immediately – no one in the Bronx would ever be turned away due to lack of coin – but she wouldn’t be allowed to leave without paying. Or being sealed into employment. And Mom was so proud of her unbranded arm.

It didn’t take long to find a buyer for the firefly. A rich guy paid him enough coin to get Mom out of the hospital and home with a month’s worth of medicine that would clear the sickness right out of her body. Everything would be fine. There was enough left to buy a sack of colorful beads for Summer and a new pod for himself – one with a better assist light. He bought a better dog, too, one that would chase ahead of him and keep spiders away.

Summer took the beads and gave him the warmest of hugs. He couldn’t bring himself to tell her about the firefly – how he’d been so close to having one for himself. Maybe she would have understood. Maybe she would’ve helped him search another building. There were always more apartment buildings. Some were cleaned out, some were just as full of promise as that one had been. But he just didn’t have the heart. Besides, he had to do a lot more work with Mom recovering. Somebody had to keep food on the table. She fussed at him to get out and have fun more often, but as long as Summer traveled with him, hunting for food was fun enough, anyway. Always had been, always would be.

At Christmastime, Summer presented him with a gift – a loose bundle wrapped in brown paper and secured with twine. He pulled it out and gasped. It was a beautiful wool-lined cloak – the kind you really needed to be treasure-hunting in January in the Bronx. And Summer had decorated it all over with beautiful silver and green beads in the shape of tiny fireflies.

She passed him a little folded piece of paper. He opened it. It was a picture she had drawn of the two of them, walking through some dark tunnel – it could have been any tunnel, really, dark and mysterious. He was wearing the cloak, she was standing beside him holding her pod and pointing the assist light into the darkness. The light was pointed at a box with the lid open just the tiniest bit. You couldn’t see what was in the box – but that was the point, wasn’t it?

He squeezed her hand. “Want to go looking for treasure?”

She smiled.

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