Out of Sight (Progenitor Book 1)

by Matthew S. Cox

  She glanced at the word inmate down her right arm. “Do I need a new jumpsuit?”

  He chuckled. “That won’t be necessary. They all have that on them. Just be glad you’re not in an orange or red one.”

  “Some of the women back there had orange ones. What’s that mean?”

  “Adult.” He winked. “The red ones are for violent offenders.”

  “Why does it have to be pink?” asked Sima.

  Marr tapped at the holographic screen a few times, swiping pages to the left. “Probably because it’s so damn bright it can be seen from outer space.”

  She laughed.

  “Okay.” Investigator Marr faced her. “Now for the boring part.”

  “Boring part?”

  “You’ll be staying here until the ship leaves in a week or so. Unfortunately, I have no way around that policy. However, the accommodations will be better than what you’ve been used to.”

  She folded her hands in her lap and trembled a little. “A prison cell?”

  He nodded. “It’s not that bad. Think of it like a private room. No one will hurt you, and it’s only a week. Then you’re on a whole new planet with clear skies, open fields, and whatever else is up there that Earth no longer has. As a PCD, you’ll have access to Dreamland, so it won’t be too boring.”

  “PCD?”

  Investigator Marr smiled. “Protective Custody Detainee.”

  “All right.” She shrugged. “Not really much choice, right?”

  “Well, we always have choices. Some are much better than others. You made the right one.”

  The door opened and the same two women walked in.

  “Officers Ahmadi and Mahmoudieh will escort you to medical for a check-up, then to your room,” said Investigator Marr.

  Sima stood. “Okay. Thank you.”

  He got up as well, walking out from behind his desk to put a hand on her shoulder. “This is a great chance for you to start over. You didn’t deserve what your mother did to you, and nothing that happened, except maybe running in to grab food packets”—he winked—“was your fault. Go up there and live. Forget this mess.”

  “I’ll try.”

  Officer Mahmoudieh, the slightly taller one, pulled handcuffs off her belt.

  Sima glanced back at her and whimpered before shooting a pleading stare at Marr.

  “Hey,” he muttered. “I’ve seen a lot of Outcasts in your position. A lot of young women. You’re only like the third one who considered Magdalena as bad as death. You’ve got a good soul in there. I know you’ll be okay.”

  Sima’s eyes accused him of betraying her as the woman cuffed her hands behind her back.

  “Since you’re still technically detained for a bunch of charges, bogus as they may be, it’s policy when moving you around the building.” Marr hardened his gaze at the two officers. “She’s volunteered for the Progenitor project, so treat her like a kid in protective custody, huh? I hear she wound up in high security posture again, it’ll be someone’s butt.”

  The women nodded.

  “Best of luck, kid.” Marr sat back in his chair. “And I’ll pay Mag a visit tonight and check up on that Flora you mentioned.”

  “Thanks.” Sima looked down as the women escorted her out.

  A few hallways later, they brought her into a medical room with two other women in white smocks plus an old man in a lab coat. As soon as the door closed and locked behind them, Officer Ahmadi removed the handcuffs and nudged her over to the exam table.

  The doctor, the older of the two women, ran a bunch of tests on her while the senior tech (the old man) kept giving her injections with an air-hypo. Sima spent an uncomfortably long amount of time in only her underwear getting poked, prodded, and scanned. By the time they let her put the jumpsuit back on, she had a headache, runny nose, and her bones ached.

  “Umm,” said Sima.

  The doctor looked at her. “Yes, child?”

  “I feel horrible.”

  “That’s the vaccines hitting you a little hard.” The doctor patted her on the shoulder. “You’ll feel a bit rough for a few hours, but it’ll all clear up soon.” She looked at the officers. “Let her skip lunch if she doesn’t want to eat, but she should have dinner.”

  They nodded.

  “All set then.”

  Sima slid off the exam table, but her legs collapsed. The doctor caught her before she crashed to the floor. Draped in the woman’s arms, she muttered, “I can’t feel my legs.”

  “We gave you a standard detox shot, to take care of a few of the common issues Outcasts tend to pick up. It’s a potent antiviral, antifungal, antimicrobial agent, though it does have a relatively strong muscle relaxant effect.” The doctor handed her off to the cops. “No need to restrain her for at least an hour.”

  “Right,” said Mahmoudieh. “She’s a bag of jelly.”

  The officers each took her by one arm, but after a frown of disapproval from the doctor, Mahmoudieh picked her up and cradled her sideways like a child.

  I thought doctors are supposed to help people get better… not make them sick. “Ugh.”

  She blearily stared up at the ceiling passing by as the woman carried her. An elevator replaced the plain white tiles for a few minutes, then more hallway. Finally, they deposited her in a cell that looked much like the last one, only about twice as wide. This room had a cloth mattress with a thin blanket, and even better—a toilet. Officer Mahmoudieh set her down reasonably gently.

  Sima passed out before the door shut.

  11

  The White Room

  Sima sat on the bed, back against the wall, a foam pillow wedged between her head and the concrete. This cell at least had a basic terminal that allowed her access to a library of fiction novels via holographic display, and limited connectivity to Dreamland. She couldn’t send messages or call anyone, merely view educational archives or movies. Unfortunately, the damn system knew her age and wouldn’t let her access any really interesting sounding media.

  She’d taken the flimsy plastic shoes off after the first few hours, and three days later, hadn’t left the room once. No one had even opened the door. Only the small hatch had moved, someone outside passing her pre-packaged meals in big clear plastic cartons. No one had ever asked for the empties back, and the room had no ORC bin, so they wound up sitting on the floor by the wall.

  Being kept in solitary confinement would’ve been maddening if not for the ability to read or watch movies. However, as twisted as the thought sounded, this locked room with a soft bed, working toilet, and reasonably decent food three times a day made her old Crash feel like prison. This almost amounted to a decent existence.

  For seventy-two hours and change, her world had been a white cell, retina-burning pink jumpsuit, and the floating electronic display. She’d had fried chicken, shawarma, mystery meat with peas, green beans, Salisbury steak, hummus, mac and cheese, salmon, turkey in gravy, French fries… a whole bunch of other foods she hadn’t touched since she’d been little. And some (like the salmon) that she’d never had before at all.

  The idea of leaving Earth terrified her, but whenever the quiet isolation of her cell got under her skin, she’d think about her narrow escape from the Scathers. She’d much rather be locked in here than be anywhere near them again.

  A double knock at her cell door startled her into yelping.

  “Nuvari,” said a husky sounding woman.

  “Yes?” she asked.

  “You’re to be transported to the Progenitor in a few hours. I’m sure you can’t wait to get out of that little room.”

  Sima glanced around at the walls. “It’s not so bad, but yeah.”

  “Do you want a shower before you leave?” asked the woman.

  “Are you going to watch?”

  The guard chuckled. “Are you going to hurt yourself?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll say I believe you, so no… you can have a partition.”

  Sima shut off the e-reader and stood before p
ulling on the plastic shoes. “Okay. I’d like a shower.” Not like wearing the same clothing for three days straight bothered her, but an opportunity to get out of the little room couldn’t be wasted.

  A loud clank came from the cell door, followed by a hiss as it slid open to the side, revealing a stocky woman no taller than her. The officer’s dark blue EGSF jumpsuit had sergeant stripes and the name: Bäumler, E.

  Sima approached the door and turned her back, putting her hands behind herself.

  “Ach, we don’t need to do that. Yer a shippie, aren’t ya?” asked Officer Bäumler.

  “Yes.” Sima turned to face her, eyes wide the same way they got whenever someone gave her glint. “Oh, thank you!”

  The stocky woman nodded. “C’mon.”

  Sima walked with her down to the end of the corridor, around a corner, and to the fourth door on the left. The room looked similar to the first one she’d been searched in, only the shower here had a privacy barrier around it. A large plastic can stood by the table, upon which sat a sky blue jumpsuit and a new sports bra/panty set so white it hurt to look at.

  “Take everything off and chuck it in the can.” Officer Bäumler pointed at the blue jumpsuit and clean underwear. “That’s for you, after you’re cleaned up.”

  Her cheeks warmed with blush, but not quite as bad as before. At least this room didn’t have windows to the hallway. Sima stripped, tossing everything into the can before hurrying around behind the privacy barrier. She showered, neither rushing nor taking excessively long. This stall had a hot air dryer, so once she finished washing, she basked in the downblast of hot air until her hair had no trace of dampness.

  Timidly, she crept out from behind the barrier. Officer Bäumler sat at the chair behind the table. She glanced over enough to notice Sima peering around, nodded once, and turned her full attention to a handheld electronic device.

  Sima streaked across the room and rushed into the new underthings before grabbing the blue jumpsuit, exposing a pair of foam sandals underneath. Her new jumpsuit lacked words on the sleeves, but also had too-short legs, leaving about half her shins exposed. She picked up the foam shoes, dropped them on the floor, and stepped into them.

  “All right.” Officer Bäumler put her device back in a belt holder and stood, smiling. “I do have one small bit of bad news for you.”

  Dread turned Sima’s eyes into platters. “What?”

  “You won’t be able to eat before going to the ship. Like everyone else on board, you’ll be spending the voyage asleep, and they can’t have any food in you for that.”

  “Asleep?” She blinked. “Seriously? How?”

  Officer Bäumler shrugged. “I’ve no idea how that stuff works. You’d need to ask one of the techies on the ship. All I know is that the trip will feel like only a couple of minutes to you.”

  “Oh.” She shrugged. “I guess that’s cool, right? Won’t get boring.”

  The officer escorted her back to her cell and locked her in with a, “See you in a little bit.”

  Sima sat on the bed, her head filling with random memories of her time on the street. She savored a few happy moments, but most frightened or saddened her. “Well… at least I won’t wind up being floated.” She closed her eyes. “Sorry Draz.”

  After a few minutes of silence, she became restless and paced. The foam slippers made soft pops as they snapped up against her heels. Her stomach growled, loud enough to echo off the walls. She hadn’t been too hungry before, but being told she couldn’t eat made it worse.

  Perhaps a half hour later, the cell door opened. Officer Bäumler motioned for her to walk out. A taller, muscular female officer with short dreadlocks and dark skin offered a pleasant nod of greeting. Her nameplate read Eke, C.

  “Hi,” said Sima, with a halfhearted wave.

  “Well, this is your big moment.” Bäumler smiled. “Finally free of this rat’s nest.”

  “If it’s so good, why aren’t you going?” asked Sima, trying not to sound sarcastic.

  “Too old.” The thick-bodied woman shrugged. “They wouldn’t let me. I don’t have any skills that’d be useful up there.”

  “Neither do I,” muttered Sima as she followed them down the hall.

  “You’re young,” said Officer Eke in a surprisingly feminine voice compared to her powerful stature. “There’s plenty of time for you to learn skills.”

  Sima wasn’t quite sure if she should feel like a kid being taken care of or a prisoner under escort. She stared down at her feet for a few seconds. “They’re not gonna like force me to have kids with some random guy, are they?”

  “You’ve got quite the imagination there,” said Officer Bäumler. “No, dear. Nothing of the sort. It might not be Earth, but there is still society.”

  They took her to the elevator, downstairs, and to an underground garage where a blue-and-grey EGSF gee-vee waited for her. Unfortunately, she had to ride in the cage part, but they didn’t restrain her.

  Officer Bäumler drove. Sima stared out the window at the grimy walls of the city. Every now and then, she spotted a storefront or vendor that made her remember various people kicking her out of their places, cursing her for being poor. Sometimes she’d find a nice one. She’d coasted along on a fair bit of charity at first, being twelve, but the older she became, the more people regarded her with dark glares that wondered what she would steal instead of radiating pity.

  A simultaneous sense of loss and revulsion filled in her stomach, killing her hunger.

  In some way, she’d miss this place—or at least the familiarity of it. But she also hated it for everything it tried to do to her. Everything from her mother to the gangs to the everpresent threat of landing in the employ of Magdalena.

  That would never happen now. No matter what the future held for her, she clung to the relief and joy of that single idea. And what if Investigator Marr’s promise of adoption had been true? She’d get to lower her guard, be a kid again, have someone taking care of her. Not to mention, she wouldn’t have to worry about damned little kids soaking up all the pity. On whatever planet the Progenitor would take her to, she wouldn’t have to care at all about tiny brats. If they existed or didn’t, it would make no difference to her. Someone, whoever they assigned to be her parents, would care about her.

  She bit her lip, not having any guarantee new parents would be nice. But the odds went in her favor that they’d be better than her mother. Even if her adoptive father turned out to be super strict, she’d call that better than her real dad who couldn’t even be bothered to say a single word to her.

  Sima had never even seen him. Not so much as a single photograph.

  The gee-vee coming to a hard stop snapped her out of her mental wandering. A few minutes of city had slipped by unnoticed while she’d been lost to her thoughts. She momentarily felt cheated of those final memories of her old home, but decided it not worth the effort to ask them to drive around a little longer.

  Officer Bäumler opened the side door, allowing a brisk wind to billow into the vehicle. Sima squinted at the brightness of shining chrome outside and scooted to the edge of the seat to get her feet on the ground. The wind nearly stole one of her foam shoes, but she stomped on it before it got away, and scooted her toes back around the thong. Brilliant sunlight gleamed from a massive tower of metal that reached at least sixty stories into the sky. It took her a few seconds to realize that she stood in shadow despite the glare from the building.

  Sima looked up.

  A great expanse of metal stretched in both directions overhead, studded with thousands of winking lights and hazed by puffs of fog and cloud. To the right, the ship thickened, ending at four giant cylinders sprouting an array of long, pointy rods, but it stretched much farther to the left, narrowing to a flat-sided rectangular profile like the world’s largest box of chocolates stood up on the narrow edge. More pointy bits jutted out here and there. From below, the hull appeared dull blue, and had to be miles long nose to end.

  “Whoa,” gasp
ed Sima, almost falling over backward from staring at it, but Officer Eke braced a hand at her back.

  “Come on, we’re on a schedule.” Officer Bäumler patted her on the shoulder.

  Sima clenched her toes to avoid losing her foam slippers to the powerful gale as they crossed the shiny metal courtyard in front of the tower. A few other EGSF gee-vees parked around, likely having brought other young Outcasts here.

  “Umm, what about my stuff?” asked Sima.

  “Rags?” asked Officer Eke. “That’s all trash. You’ve got real clothing now.”

  “I had some money…”

  “Umm.” Officer Bäumler held up her left arm and poked a glowing bit at the end of her sleeve. A holographic panel stretched open. She pored over it for a few seconds before lowering her arm. “Your money has been transferred electronically to an account within the Progenitor’s system.”

  “Oh.” Wow. I thought they were gonna steal it. She blinked. Wait! I have electronic money? Only Citizens get e-MU. She grinned, hopeful that she might not only escape Earth, but escape being an Outcast.

  The women led her into a small lobby, devoid of people, and over to an elevator.

  A long ride within a plain silver capsule ended in a large room with hundreds of seats lined up in a manner similar to the waiting area of an airport. Only one old man remained, staring morosely into the distance as though someone he’d loved dearly had died. Cups, plates, and some trash items littered the floor, like the room had recently held a big crowd, but they’d all gone away.

  That’s kinda eerie.

  She followed Officer Bäumler down a wide, but short hallway that had bathrooms on either side as well as a row of snack-selling vending machines before it rounded a leftward corner to another room with a large observation deck. Floor-to-ceiling windows spanned the far wall, offering a clear view of the ship from about thirty feet away. Blue-grey metal bore the word Progenitor in black lettering taller than some houses. One doorway at the center of the windowed wall connected to a swaying tunnel of transparent plastic that spanned the 200 or so feet between the tower and the ship.