A few lonely days pass in silence. My father hasn't spoken to me since the fire. Besides our work in Combat Room 4, I've avoided Dean to avoid talking about the event.
This morning, as I'm sprinting as fast as I can down the track around those taking it at a leisurely pace, I receive a startling reminder.
[Incoming Message: HHP-MEDICT]
REMINDER--APPOINTMENT 0900
I push harder, swinging my arms wildly as I try to run fast enough to escape my misery.
When I arrive at the HHP labs, I'm led through the halls to our usual room. Dean appears beyond the little rectangular window. He sits on the stiff orange bed, his shoulders hunched over and his eyes studying a small object in his hands.
When I push the door open, he doesn't move.
Silence settles. I can feel the sickening goop dripping over us in the icy orange room.
He doesn't say anything. Neither do I. There is nothing left to talk about except for the string of accusations I want to tie around his neck like a medal.
Lifting his hand, he offers me the tiny object he's been holding.
It's a small, white, thin blossom from the orange trees on Level 2. Dean loves the nursery with warm sunlight streaming from mirrors and rows of barrels filling the room with color. We've spent plenty of hours secluded from the world in those fruit groves.
I take it between my fingers. There aren't many words we could add to the mess to make it better.
The head Maroon Coat enters. "How are you doing today, Captain Lorn?"
"Surprisingly horrible," I mumble.
"Wonderful. Are you ready to begin the next phase of the process."
"I guess." I exhale as he initiates the health analytics of my PAHLM.
He hums and mumbles something to himself, picking a syringe from his deep maroon pockets. He prepares the needle, squeezes my flesh, and injects the pink formula into my arm. Blood puddles over my skin when he retracts the needle and tosses it.
"Cheer up. This is an auspicious day! We are in the midst of quite possibly one of the greatest breakthroughs in human genetics. We will help you breed, Captain Lorn, and many unfortunate women of your condition for all the generations to come." He pats my hand gently.
The patronizing touch pushes me off my barely existent ledge. "Don't touch me."
"Those are the hormones talking." He brushes me off and taps away in his PAHLM. "She'll be back to her," he glances at us, "chipper self again soon."
I grit my teeth until my face aches. Dean shifts to my left.
"We'll all be glad to see you pregnant finally." The Coat pauses at the door. "You've stumped the HHP quite a bit, Captain. But we'll help you breed. We've always had our one hundred percent success."
"I'm not some sort of cow, you low-life. I'm a Captain of Earth's Militia and deserve respect."
At my side, Dean poises to strike if released. The air thickens with our outward aggression.
The Maroon Coat cocks his head to the side, as if the notion of deserving respect was told to a net by a butterfly. "Give it some time, Captain Lorn. We will begin the procedure shortly." The smile on his face fades as he exits the room.
I've been lowered to livestock. Breeder. They will breed me. Like I am nothing but organs and favorable genetic material. Like I'm not risking my life to lead two thousand civilians through unknown galaxies to a new future. What matters is the stuff that can hang to my uterus.
Dean's hand lands on my shoulder. I'm disgusted by his enormous hand and don't want it near me. It's this touch that got me into this situation. It's this hand that pinned me the first time and the second time and kept me panting into his lips while my family's livelihood burned through the slates on the floor. I shove it off.
"Leave me alone, Dean." I turn away from him.
I can feel his presence in the room for another ten minutes. I'm lost in my thoughts when I finally hear the door open and close behind him. When he's gone, I realize the flower is no longer in my grasp. It's on the floor, stem and petals crushed from the lingering strength of my clenched fist.
After another thirty minutes, the young Maroon Coat laden with acne swoops in with the next steps. He dresses me in a white cotton gown. I'm completely naked underneath. When the head Coat returns, he instructs me to lie back on the orange bed where two metal attachments extend from under the bed.
"Put one foot up on each side," he says.
A chill runs through my arms and legs. I swing one leg where my foot fits right in the cold stirrup. I swing the other leg over and sit there, exposed, my legs spread wide apart. Just like the check-ups. This is procedural. This is normal.
I freeze in place while he rummages around near my head.
Nothing good is coming next.
It's time to run. Run fast, Lorn. Run and don't ever go back.
So when I'm left alone in the room, that's exactly what I do.
YOU ARE READING
ARC10
Science Fiction[Book 1 of the ARC10 Trilogy] **Winner of the 2017 Watty Storysmith award** The President created an underground safe-haven for the survivors of the alien invasion. He built it to save them all from total annihilation. He protects them, feeds them...
