The Girl They Sold to the Moon Read Free Page B

interior lights flicked on. A door opened at the far side of the container.
    â€œMove it out,” said a bull.
    As they stepped out, a female aid slapped a dollop of cream between their legs. They walked through an umbrella of spray jets that shot a mist of perfume over their bodies, which stung the sensitive flesh. The next station contained a row of seated aides, equipped with eight-inch pistol-grip injection needles. Tilly could already hear the girls screaming from the punctures. Two girls bolted from the line and ran down the hall. Bulls intercepted them and carried them kicking and screaming through a side entrance. Another girl fainted, but a bull revived her and frog marched her to the end of the line.
    â€œDo you know what this is?” asked Tilly, wide-eyed.
    â€œImplants,” said Dorothy, and her demeanor began to crack. Perspiration appeared on her upper lip and her eyes looked dilated. “The chip on the end of the needle is driven into the leg and stapled onto the leg bone. It sends out a radio frequency or something, so they know where you are at all times.”
    As if anybody could escape from this place
. When her turn came, Tilly stepped up to the aide’s chair and braced her right thigh.
    â€œPersonal Code number,” said the aide, looking like a ghoul with a horribly stretched face and protruding teeth.
    â€œUh…” Tilly flipped the tag up and read it slowly. “S-9-5-5-5-3-6-5.”
    â€œFunny, you don’t look like a nine.”
    Tilly clenched her jaw.
Neither do you, horse face
.
    The needle drove into her leg, nearly to the hilt. Tilly bit down on her tongue against the sharp pain. It felt as though someone had hit her leg bone with a hammer. She heard a click, then the aide withdrew the needle, slapped an alcohol patch on her leg and shoved her forward. “Next!”
    â€œBroken catheter on station five—reroute the line,” said an aide. A pitiful whine followed, then, “Arrrgh, you’re killing me!”
    Tilly tried to shake the pain from her leg, feeling it numbing. The urge to scream out was strong but she doubted she had the breath to do so. Some of the girls looked back in her direction, their faces brimmed with tears.
    Tilly clenched hands with Dorothy in a feeble attempt to reestablish some kind of humanity. But even that simple gesture was nixed when a bull came up behind her and placed a sting rod between the cleavage of her buttocks.
    â€œBreak it up, you two. Single file only.”
    â€œIt just makes me feel better,” said Tilly. “You’re scaring us half out of our minds.”
    â€œI’ll count down from three…three…two—”
    Dorothy straightened Tilly out and pushed her ahead. The next station comprised a row of curtained cubicles. When Tilly entered, she saw a padded incline bench and foot stirrups. A bull made a brusque motion with his baton for her to enter. Her legs nearly gave out as she approached the bench. She slid onto the foam pad, biting her lips, shaking uncontrollably. A young male sat at the foot of the bench, dressed in a white smock and wearing plastic gloves. When she squeezed her eyes shut, a tear rolled down her cheek. She recited her code number when the bull asked for it. Hands invaded her, probing the walls of her vagina. She wanted to cry out, damn her father, damn FTALC and all else in the world. But she endured, and what took mere seconds, seemed like hours in a slow, humiliating inspection. The young male examiner said, “You’re good to go.”
    Tilly slid off the bench and limped to the slit in the curtain. She turned back, cursing through the side of her mouth, loud enough for the guard to hear. “Bastards.” She had just endured a clumsy pelvic exam administered by a
teenage
boy. She felt helpless to know the reason for it, after having been laser-scanned and X-rayed. Surely they would have found anything abnormal with those