It had been two years. Two years of Alabaster and Syenite living on an island that is run by Orogenes. They were finally praised for having their powers instead of being controlled for them. This island represents the utopia of what Alabaster had been searching for; a place to live free from the systematic racism and oppression of the Guardians. This island provided a life where they were free. They were free to use their powers, free to fall in love, free to have children, and overall free to be more than what the Guardians had allowed. Alabaster and Syenite were able to enter into a relationship with Innon, a pirate captain, feral orogene, and second in command on the island. Both were finally able to be in a loving relationship. It was also on the island that Syenite fulfilled her duty of having a child with Alabaster. She birthed a son named Coru. Syenite, Alabaster, and Innon co-parented Coru, also an orogene. The island viewed Coru as their promising future. They lived this happy life for two years. It seemed that they had finally escaped the oppression that had been placed upon them as a result of being Orogenes.
 

Despite their brief years of “freedom” on the island, the island is actually an allusion. The location of the island provides no resources for actual freedom. The first issue with the island is that it lacks protection. Although it is separated from the rest of the continent, it fails to have any sort of border to keep those inside protected. The second problem with it is that the island is incapable of producing any sort of food. There is no viable soil to grow crops. The third problem with the island is that as a result of the invalid land, the islanders are forced to be pirates in order to gain access to food, materials, and any other resources needed to survive. The island is not an actual place of freedom, it is an illusion that they live in.

Life on the island was not actually freedom, it was Syenite and Alabaster biding their time until the Guardians found them. The guardians are the symbol for oppression, they are always in the back of Syenite’s mind, and just as she knew they would, they catch up with her. The oppressed cannot run from the oppressor. As much as Syenite and Alabaster were able to obtain their “freedom” for two years, they were still under the thumb of the oppressor. The end of chapter 22, and arguably the end of Syenite, sees the Guardians catch up with her. This leaves Syenite with no option for her life—either kill everyone around her, the Guardians, the islanders, and even her son, or go back to living under direct oppression. Syenite chooses the first option. She smothers Coru, giving him true freedom from oppression through death, as well as using her Orogene powers to tap into the amethyst in order to kill her oppressors, the guardians, and by default, the islanders. 
 

Syenite sees death as the only true freedom from oppression. This mindset is similar to the systemic racism that is faced today. The guardians were slave owners and are now police officers and racists. The orogenes, Syenite and Alabaster, were slaves and are now people of color. The “freedom” that the island provided is one that people of color have been familiar with for hundreds of years. As slaves that freedom looked like escaping to the North where it was promised but not always enacted, and even if they were free they did not have the true freedom that white people possessed. In today’s world that “freedom” looks like the law giving people of color equal freedom to white people but is actually a world full of racial profiling that ends in murder by police, not getting the job, or being victim of hate crimes… all for the color of your skin. Just as the Orogenes cannot control that they were born that way neither can people of color. Systemic racism is prevalent throughout The Fifth Season just as it is today, it gives the illusion of freedom without actually making anyone free.


This is encoded text of this scene:
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Works Cited
Jemisin, N. K. The Fifth Season: the Broken Earth. Orbit, 2015.