Total pages in book: 44
Estimated words: 41151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 206(@200wpm)___ 165(@250wpm)___ 137(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 41151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 206(@200wpm)___ 165(@250wpm)___ 137(@300wpm)
I am lying on Shah’s chest, dripping his seed. We are talking softly the way people do when they have coupled. I want to know more about him. I want him to know more about me, or I would, if there was anything to know about me. I am nothing more than what I seem to be. I am a product of the Colony. So I ask questions of him, hoping to understand him more, and maybe my captivity more too.
Shah is holding me as I lie on top of him, one hand on my ass, clutching me possessively and keeping me in place. It is quiet, and it is calm, and in that quiet calm, my mind’s natural curiosity begins to reassert itself. I never asked questions in the Colony, because I always knew the answers, because nothing ever changed, and everything was already decided.
“I read once in an old story that all ships have names. What’s this one called?”
“It’s called Margaret’s Revenge, or the Revenge for short.”
“Who was Margaret?”
“My mother,” he says. “She was one of the first fully-trained workers in the Colony. Before they initiated the drone training, workers were just normal people. That’s why all that area down at the docks exists. People used to live their lives there. They shopped, they drank, they socialized. They had families. That all changed once the Elites realized that allowing their workers to have social lives and familial bonds made them less effective.”
Shah’s smart, legitimately intelligent. He doesn’t always come across that way because he’s usually too busy coming across as aggressive and sexy.
“When I was fifteen or so, my mom went to work one day and came back a different person,” he says. “She stopped loving me. She stopped caring about what happened in the home. My dad had died in a factory accident a few years earlier, so I was left to fend for myself. About three days later, she told me she was going to send me to the boarding facilities. I ran away instead. She didn’t notice. And that’s when and how I learned to look after myself. That’s when I started my gang. A lot of people in it now have been in it from the beginning. I met Malik when I broke into his home.”
I laugh.
“I wish I could have seen that.”
“You really don’t,” he says. Then he laughs as well.
Shah
Years ago…
I’m hungry. And angry. And I’m going to take what is mine. They’ve started to build a wall separating the Elite homes from the worker apartments. They say it’s for security. I guess it is. It’s designed to keep people like me out.
There’s a house that could fit about fifty workers in it, but I bet it only houses four at most. Mom, Dad, and two kids. That’s how Elites live. Always two kids. Workers get to have one. Or they did, until the recent birth control act.
Once you get past the wall there’s no real security anymore. Elites don’t like to be reminded that they’re oppressing everybody else, and they definitely don’t like seeing armed men walking around. Makes them feel like they’re in prison, and they can’t have that.
There’s grass outside the house, space for kids to run and play. Worker kids play in the street. It’s hard not to compare every single instance of unfairness I see. When I come to these privileged places my only regret is that I can’t steal everything they have at once. I’m reduced to what I can carry and what will sell down at the docks.
The good news is, one haul from a house like this will keep me fed for a month, and it’ll help take care of the small but growing number of kids getting kicked out as obsolete. I’ve been thieving for almost three years now, making a name for myself. They come and find me to help them survive. I do what I can, but there's more all the time.
The worst crime a worker can be accused of is being useless. A lot of us are useless to the Colony. Especially boys. Women make better workers.
Nothing about this house was designed with keeping an intruder out in mind. I scale the wall easily and clamber through an open window. This time of day, the houses are usually empty.
This room isn’t empty. There’s a woman around my mom’s age in there. She’s wearing a chemise and trying on earrings. She sees me right away, a worker climbing in the window. Her scream carries easily outside the house. She whirls around and throws a tissue box at me. She thinks I’m here to ravage her. She should be so fucking lucky. I’ve never had to force myself on a woman, and I’m not going to start now.
I bounce back out the window. This is a fuck up. She’s going to call security, and they are going to light the wall up. I can’t get back to the docks now. I’m going to have to find somewhere to hide. Somewhere in very unfriendly territory. Anybody who sees me is going to turn me in.