Let her go.
She’s just one person.
We can save so many more.
I shuddered. The unsaid words tasted sour in my mouth, the place I would leave them to rot. I had sounded just like my father. I managed to meet Stephanie’s eyes and gave her the smallest of nods. I didn’t know the girl, but that didn’t mean she was any less important. I didn’t get to sacrifice her for anyone. That wasn’t my right.
Maybe that was what Stephanie had finally realized as she watched Henry die. Maybe he meant more to her than some cause, and the council had taken him from her. She realized too late what I had learned long ago: I didn’t belong to anyone. I didn’t belong to any country. I didn’t belong to any rebellion. I only belonged to myself. My choices and who I fought for would be entirely of my own choosing.
Stephanie brought the girl’s hand to her chest. “No,” she said.
The inspector narrowed his eyes. Clenching his jaw, he looked back at the chosen one. “Very well, then. We don’t need them.”
“Please, she was just being nice. Don’t punish her for me,” Rachel begged, tears streaming down her scarred, imperfect face. The chosen one pulled her by the arm, dragging Stephanie along with her. Stephanie didn’t fight back. Whatever solider she had once been was gone. She had given up the last bit of it to get me here.
At first, my fears were quelled. The chosen one simply ushered the two of them off to the side as the inspector continued to go down the line. Eventually, a few others, including the elderly woman, were also placed in Stephanie’s small group. Once the inspector had looked everyone over, each of us was asked to show our identification numbers—the numbers the council had long ago lasered onto my wrist.
258915
The inspector’s aide pinned a piece of paper to each of our shirts, which proclaimed our number for all of the spectators to see. Men began to huddle into groups in front of us. The aide passed out green cards to each of these families. Groups of men who had lost their mothers and sisters to the illness that threatened to destroy our species. We were what were left. Replacements.
Once each group was prepared, the inspector nodded toward four burly men who waited near the small cluster of women isolated from the group. In unison, the men stepped forward in front of Stephanie, Rachel, and the other women. Each of the men placed one hand against their collarbones. Stephanie turned her head to me and gave a small smile.
And then she closed her eyes.
A wild surge of energy burst through me, and it took everything in me not to run to her and grab her free hand in mine. She still held on tightly to Rachel’s hand. The chosen ones placed their palms under the women’s chins, and with the cluck of the inspector’s tongue, they snapped their heads back.
A girl beside me fell to the floor in a faint while others cried. I saw dark spots in front of my eyes, and I wondered if I was near passing out myself. I had seen chosen ones snap necks before. It seemed to be their specialty. But it was also some weird sort of embrace. They stood behind their victims and wrapped their arms around their necks.
This had been something different. Carried out with the least amount of human contact possible. Women murdered because they did not meet some unknown standard. Murdered because they had been found wanting.
James.
I whispered his name over and over again in my head. It was the only thing that kept me from attacking, from clawing their faces off, from joining Stephanie. James was here, and I would have to play my part to find him.
To save him.
The creators lined up before us, and then the bidding started.
I was auctioned off.
…
This was how I came to be in the service of the Harper family. Once they paid for me, I was taken out back behind the headquarters with Reagan, another girl who was purchased along with me. Shoved forcefully against the wall by the eldest son of the family, the younger brother grabbed a hose. Not the kind used to water plants, but the kind I had been told was carried on the back of trucks once. These trucks would rush to fires and use the traveling water source to put them out.
These trucks would have gotten a lot of use during my lifetime.
Terrance and Richard Harper, the sons of the newly inducted head of the council, turned the hoses onto us. The water burned and pounded against my skin. Regan, who was barely a teenager, stumbled to the ground and covered her head.
“Get up, your dirty, dirty girl,” Richard yelled. The Harper brothers enjoyed themselves way too much.
That night, as Regan cried herself to sleep, I gingerly touched the multitude of bruises that covered my body from the painful pressure of the water. There was barely an inch of me that was left unscathed. I had been a victim. I had been hunted. But before now, I had never been property.