The Girl They Sold to the Moon (2 page)

Typical
, thought Tilly. Reducing people to profiles, numbers, and calculations to determine their worth. That's how products were sold, just like a can of protein slurry. She wondered if there wasn't some pervo or sloboholic sitting behind those scanner screens, ogling the cute little bodies, scribbling on notepads, tabulating all these data points. No way did she feel she deserved a ninety percent rating. She knew a way to find out.

“Just out of curiosity,” said Tilly, “where did I get a point deducted?”

Frampton glanced at the screen and smiled. “Facial profile; the nose is a tad large. Half a point for that. Another half point was deducted for your, let's say, upper torso…a bit underdeveloped, as far as age, weight and frame. You should be ecstatic; those were physical attribute deductions. You score a perfect ten for your talent and intelligence.”

Well, he did have her measurements down, she admitted. Or the Know Everything Database (KED) had tallied her numbers accurately enough. Still, routine scanning always left her feeling violated.

Frampton read from a small folder. “Financial hardship has been proven for a one hundred and twenty day loan-out. Should you default on your settlement at the prescribed end of the loan-out, you will be charged an interest of six percent, compounded daily until your account is paid in full. You have waived the insurance policy that covers accident-injury. Therefore, you qualify only for standard medical care provided by Family Trade and Loan, should there be an injury upon the premises of the work facility or during transport. This contract is binding and complete, subject only to changes and amendments deemed reasonable by FTALC. Should you default payment of the loan, your ward will be impounded and full custodianship assumed by FTALC. While still in the possession of FTALC, the ward will be eligible for the next scheduled labor auction. Do you understand these terms or have any further questions?”

“I want to change the assignment duration, or whatever you call it,” said her father. “I want six months. You said she was a nine, so I'm entitled to a longer loan period. I know
that
part of the contract.”

Tilly stood up and turned on her father with balled fists. “We agreed to four months, father! You know about the
rich uncle
who is paying for my boarding school? That was the cover-up so I could be back home for break. My friends weren't supposed to know anything about this. You promised!”

“Be quiet and sit down,” said her father. “I'm the one in trouble here. I'm headed for Federal prison. Six months is nothing. You'll be getting free lodging, free eats, and I'm sure, an O-J-T education. You have no right to demand special conditions. I've given you the best years of my life. None of this is about you.”

“Oh, yeah?” she said, seething. “What about my reputation? How am I gonna live it down if my friends find out about this.”

Her father's eyes became slits. “Don't back-sass me. You're still my daughter and under my control. Sit down and behave yourself!”

She sat down, her arms crossed in front of her. She found it hard to catch her breath.

Frampton typed out a sequence on the touchpad. “I've made it known that a change to the contract has been requested and entered. A six-month duration has been stipulated by the custodian and granted. His audio request serves as his signature, and is now a matter of record.” Frampton rose from his chair and stepped up to a wall safe. “The only legality we have left, Mr. Breedlove, is the method of your payment—should it be Imperials or regular tender?”

“I think the Imperial is still sliding like the Euro. I'll take cash on the barrelhead.”

Frampton removed a thick envelope from the safe and turned. “Are you sure? The Imperial might rebound with an upsurge in the economy.”

“Hah! Not in our lifetimes. I'll take the cabbage.”

Frampton counted out $90,000 and shoved the pile toward her father. Her father recounted the stack, then folded it neatly before tucking it in a money belt. Frampton pushed a blue panel button on the desk, then shook her father's hand with vigorous pumps. “It's been a pleasure. I hope our association culminates in success on both ends.”

“Yeah, pleasure.” Her father gave Tilly a peck on the forehead. “Now you listen to all the instructions from the staff. Ace those classes like you always have. I'll see you in six months. I'll tell your friends that
rich uncle
wanted to keep you during break and spend some time with you. Most importantly, keep your yapper shut and ears open.”

Tilly let out a gale-force sigh. “Dad, you know how you are with gambling. Don't blow it. Pay the back taxes so I can come home. If you default, I swear to God I'll hang myself.”

“Will do, bright eyes. Take care.” He gave Frampton a snappy salute and skipped to the exit. “A million things to do,” he said as he left with the slam of the door. Just then, a large man wearing a one-piece black latex suit entered. The man wore a FTALC security patch on his breast, a riot helmet with a gold visor, and held a sting wand in his gloved hand. He took up a parade rest stance near the door and glanced once at his wrist-held Omnicomp. Then, with a monotonous regularity, he began to thrum the wand on his thigh.

Tilly's heart crashed in her stomach while she watched Frampton run some hard copy documents through an automatic rubber-stamping machine. The financial officer looked cold and calculated now, as though he'd won some great victory. When he reached into his desk, he brought out a chain necklace with a tin tag attached to it. He gave it a light toss at her. She caught it deftly.

“Wear that at all times,” said Frampton, avoiding eye contact. “Memorize your personal code number. You'll be asked to repeat it.”

She slung it around her neck, flipped it up to look at it.
9S555365
. She tucked it inside her top with a trembling hand. “I don't suppose you might tell me where I'm going. You know, my work assignment?”

Frampton gagged, and then spit in a cup. He wiped his mouth on his suit sleeve, a sleeve stained multiple times from the same disgusting habit. “Your dossier indicates an entertainment position,” he said. “Probably dancing for the Prairie Dogs…and I'm not supposed to tell you that.”

Dancing for the Prairie Dogs. Dancing, as in strutting around naked and wobbling my bare-ass body parts for men like you?
Then she thought about what men like Frampton could do to her or want to do to her with such a job
.
But where were the Prairie Dogs?

“You mean out in the mid-west?” she tried.

Frampton chuckled. The security guard coughed.

Frampton cleared his throat. “Prairie Dogs are miners—diggers. That's what they call them at Tranquility Harbor, anyway.”

She swallowed hard. “Is that anywhere near Long Island? Or maybe New York?”

Frampton blinked. “You're about two hundred and forty thousand miles off, Sunshine.”

Tilly did some swift mental calculations then stiffened. “You're not talking about the Moon settlement. Not the Moon!” Now she knew who the Prairie Dogs were--just the type of men who would take advantage of her.

“That's the place, Sunshine. You'll be just one more hamster in the giant Habitrail.”

Tilly knew she would not be singing in a choir or dancing in a stage play. They were shipping her off to the Moon, to dance for men that never shaved, showered, or spoke a sentence without using a cuss word. She had a girlfriend who'd told her that her mother had said that the miners were all a bunch of thugs. She thought it incredible that they would put a teenage female in harm's way like that.
Thugs
. If things got out of hand, she vowed to open up the first pressure hatch she found and step outside.

“It's not so bad,” said Frampton. “Those hardworking brutes could use a cute little cheerleader like you to brighten their day. I know
I'd
love it.”

She felt bile rise in her throat. Then she began to make high-pitched wheezing noises. She always did that before she vomited.

Tilly stood in a long line of other Sunflower females, kids aged thirteen to nineteen. The long corridor consisted of a series of stations, cubicles enclosed by portable dividers. Further down the corridor, Tilly spied a large silver container that looked like a walk-in refrigerator. She heard animalistic squeals coming from the vicinity of the structure, and after a moment, realized it was the high-pitched cries of girls. She drew a ragged breath. It seemed like her ankles would buckle at any moment. What, by all that was holy and decent, could make kids cry out in fear? Classical music, piped in from ceiling panels, suddenly raised in volume and masked out the cries.

Tilly began to count the girls behind her. All of them wore street clothes. Most had their heads down; some whispered; a few clasped hands and stared ahead with open mouths. She counted sixty-two girls before the bodies blurred into an indistinct mass. Guards were evenly spaced every twenty girls or so. Counting the one ahead of her, they totaled five. Although they had their crash visors down, they appeared to be all males, judging from their height and body mass. They all held sting wands by their sides.

“They call the guards, bulls,” said the girl behind her, “in case you were wondering. I'm Dorothy Prospect—S7 from Sylvania, New Jersey.”

“Nice to know you,” said Tilly, turning around to look at the redhead, who had an attractive, makeup-free face, with a height two inches shorter than Tilly's five-ten. “You've gone through this before, then?”

“No, just heard about it from a couple of kids who served out their terms. The lucky ones get picked up. You have pretty hair. If it's dyed platinum, they'll cook it out to your natural color. Better take off any pelvic jewelry, too. You don't want a bull's fat thumbs down there. The line should move after a buzzer.”

Tilly shivered. “Thanks for the warning. I'm clean. Couldn't afford any bling in the projects, anyway. I'm naturally light blond, so they'd better keep their hands off it.”

A buzzer sounded overhead. The line pushed forward. The bulls waved their sting wands. “Just walk through and present your right forearm,” said the nearest bull. “Don't slow down—keep up with the flow.”

A plap…plap…plap sound came from behind a partition. A few shrieks split the air. Tilly walked around a corner and received a popgun vaccination in her forearm before she could blink. She gasped and massaged the spot. They removed her Omnicomp from her wrist that contained her DNA cube and bio/history wafer.

“Remove all wearing apparel,” came the order over a speaker.

The girls stripped down at the next staging area, amidst a chorus of groans and protests. Some of the girls refused to disrobe in front of the bulls. They had their clothes removed by force. Tilly shimmied out of her clothes, not wanting the same treatment. She damned those eyes behind the gold visors, but kept her face straight and mouth shut. One girl, tears streaming down her face, peed on the floor. They hauled her out of line and took her through an unmarked side door.

“Where'd they assign you, Dorothy?” asked Tilly, her voice cracking. She shook her forearm several times, trying to relieve the pain.

“They wouldn't tell me. I heard rumors about some Arab sheik importing a workforce of about fifty Sunflowers. If I'm going that way, I'll end up in housecleaning or washing dishes. They might even have me swabbing out toilets. How ‘bout you?”

“Mining colony—Tranquility Harbor. She lowered her voice. “They said I'll be dancing for the Prairie Dogs.”

“The flippin' Moon?
Major
way. Aren't you a little young for that, even with the no-touch rule?”

“I'm seventeen—legal age. They're going to do whatever they want with us, whether we like it or not.”

They removed all their personal jewelry at the next station. Several adult female aides unclipped, yanked, and unscrewed the baubles. Tilly had to wait until the line moved on, since she wore nothing of value except for the requisite tin tag around her neck.

Next they entered a large refrigerator-looking container, forty feet long and twelve feet wide. Twenty girls were herded inside. The door closed just as an overhead speaker boomed, “Hands stretched to the ceiling, eyes closed.” Everyone obeyed, amid moans and whimpering. No bulls remained with them. Strangely enough, the cramped box resembled the inside of Tilly's container home, save that her home had cutout windows and steel dividers that sectioned off tiny rooms.

“I think this is delousing,” said Dorothy.

The next moment brought a series of bright strobe lights that Tilly saw even through her closed eyelids. She looked down, chancing a peek at the floor. Next she felt a hum and vibration that reached a high-pitched intensity, followed by an electronic snap. Her pubic hair disappeared in a flash and puff of acrid smoke. She jumped. Her under arms and legs burned with a searing heat. She bit her tongue down against the pain.

Silence. The interior lights flicked on. A door opened at the far side of the container.

“Move 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.

“Do you know what this is?” asked Tilly, wide-eyed.

“Implants,” 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.”