She didn’t want to die. The taste of blood in her mouth terrified her and, though she knew that the blood only came from a couple pulled teeth, in another hour it would come from the rest of her body. Their body, she corrected herself. After all, it wasn’t hers. It had never been hers. That’s why she was here in the dungeon.
Dungeon. That wasn’t the right word. Dungeons were dark, cold places, gray with enclosing stone walls which echoed the squeaks of mice and the groans of the dying along with the whispers of their last words. This could not be a dungeon. The walls and floors were an off-white, cleaned five times a day, the surgical instruments were sanitized hourly so that they blinded her with their silver sheen, and even the computers were dusted regularly with wet cloths so that no part of outside could come in. It was not dark. Florescent lights ensured that there was no part of the room unlit and, just in case, there were lights that hung over her body so that the technical operators wouldn’t damage her as they did their work. There were no mice. The only living things that were allowed to enter were the operators, after they were thoroughly sterilized.
She was the only dirty thing in this room.
Wincing, she glanced to the computer screens. She was attached to the computer. Wires had been attached to her wrists, her fingers, her toes, her spine, her shoulders, her knees, her mouth, her nostrils, her nipples, her clitoris, her brain, her liver, her heart, and five feet away the computer beeped happily, analyzing the data. On twelve of the screens, there were charts. They displayed the status of her body in a rainbow of colors, going up and down as a graph as she went up and down as a human. And so on.
The operators didn’t look at these screens. They glanced at it, but they didn’t understand the charts. Instead, they looked at the middle screen. At the moment, it said this:
SUBJECT IS IN STEADY HEALTH
HEART RATE: 177 BPM
BREATH RATE: 43 BPM
CONDITION: STRESSED
NEXT HARVEST: 00.00.20.05.11
Her eyes watered at the last line.
She wanted to scream. She wanted to ask, “What next?” but her mouth was numb. They numbed it before they took out her teeth. They pierced a needle in her gums and when she tried to scream, they injected the drug. It was embarrassing. It made her drool. She couldn’t stop. They had to take out an instrument to suck out all the water. Then they pulled out her teeth, looked at the computer, and left. She guessed the computer told them to.
The computer ticked on. She winced and tilted her head to the right, trying to look away from the screen, but it was no use. She couldn’t move--they had strapped her in too tightly for that and she would be forced to look at the screen until she died. They had designed it like that on purpose, she remembered, though the memory seemed fuzzy, as if she had heard it from a scratched record rather than from Dr. Montgomery’s lips. Dr. Montgomery’s lips. She smiled involuntarily.
She remembered his face clearly. He had a round face, almost like a baby’s, and he had two crooked front teeth. When she had first met him, he gave her a shy smile and told her that he had been in a bit too many bar fights, though she was not to tell anyone. Drinking was illegal for doctors, but she had liked drinking and she liked Dr. Montgomery, so they had gone off perfectly well together. And then...
The charts on the computer screen shuddered and the screens exploded into color until the colors ate each other up and everything was black. The middle screen that held her status swelled up and morphed.
YOU’RE AWAKE.
And she was disappointed. Bitter tears drowned her eyes and her mouth tasted like bloody cotton. I am awake, she thought and the thought made her lonelier than ever. I am awake and soon I will die.
The computer screen flickered and then the words changed again.
YOU ARE NOT ALONE. I AM WITH YOU.
She closed her eyes tightly.
When she opened them again, the computer was normal, beeping out its monotonous tones. Nineteen minutes till next harvest. She tried to think of what would be taken out next, but the thought was unbearable and the computer started to give high-pitched beeps, indicating that her heart had started beating at an intolerable level. A robotic arm swung over and immediately put an oxygen mask on. She breathed.
She must have passed out, for when she woke up, the technical operators were swarming over her, even though the screen clearly stated that there was still fifteen minutes till the next operation. She felt sick. A couple of masked faces looked at her. Then a man touched her neck and found her pulse. The action startled her--that’s what computers were for. But when she looked at the baby face of the man, she knew why he had done it.
“Hold on,” he said, his voice sounding husky through his facemask. “Just a couple more hours. You wanted this, didn’t you? You said you wanted to help. You said you would do anything.”
She whimpered.
Dr. Montgomery leaned forward and stroked her hair with his latex fingers. “Everybody’s scared when they first start out,” he said kindly. “But you’re helping out many people. Those teeth, they will go to someone who really needs them, whose gum disease is so bad that he can’t even wear dentures. You’re saving his life, you understand?”
Her eyes watered. His breath smelled like tuna fish.
“You are a wonderful woman for doing this,” he said in a whisper. “A hero. It will hurt, but it always hurts before the glory of the new age. Do you understand?”
She couldn’t nod, but that didn’t seem to matter. He seemed to understand. Besides, they had talked about this before. She couldn’t back out, not now. He backed away from her and signaled to the technical operators, and everyone left the room. Ten minutes left. They had to prepare their instruments for the next harvest. The computer shuddered again.
YOU ARE A HERO.
She glared at the screen, tears coming to her eyes.
THEY WANT ONE OF YOUR LUNGS NEXT.
Her stomach dropped. Only one?
The computer screen changed.
THEY WANT YOU TO KEEP YOU ALIVE AS LONG AS POSSIBLE.
She knew this already. That was part of the contract. She had signed that contract, she knew what the terms were, she knew that the operations were risky, but she had wanted to help... there were too many people dying for a lack of organ, for a lack of research, for a lack of parts...
But she didn’t know she was going to die!
A whimper escaped her throat. The computer screen flickered off, almost as if it wanted to apologize, but didn’t know which words to say. All the screens were blank. They were black, the only black things in the room and she stared at them, hypnotized.
YOU ARE NOT THE FIRST.
That sentence did not make sense. She stared at it, reread it a couple of times, but it did not make sense.
HE’S HAD OTHER WOMEN BEFORE YOU.
And just as she read it, the screen flickered off and returned to its normal readings. More technical operators came. They glanced at the screens, punched a few buttons, and immediately she could see her body sprawled out on the biggest screen possible. Her stats were on one of the smaller screen. But what hypnotized her most were the silver instruments in their hands. They set them down, removed some of the wires on her body, and positioned the camera so it looked directly at her chest. Dr. Montgomery came in. One of the technical operators glanced at him.
“Any anesthetic?”
“No,” he said. “Not allowed.”
The technical operator shrugged and grabbed a tiny, silver saw. “As long as she doesn’t scream.” And with that, he sliced her open.
She saw everything. They sliced her open, making sure to peel off her skin back, and she saw them open up her ribcage. She saw them tie off the tube that went from her lung to her larynx and she saw them take out the lung. And she felt everything.
When it was all over, she whimpered and tilted her head to Dr. Montgomery. But he was too busy concentrating on her lung. It was pink and it had collapsed. He was attaching an artificial breather in it so that it would keep it working.
“Mrah!” she cried. He glanced at her.
“Not now,” he said. “Not now. There is too much to do.” And with that, he put the lung on the cart and wheeled it out. The technical operators followed him out.
The computer chirred and her status became once more on the big screen. The next harvest was in three hours. She groaned and tried to move.
THEY WILL TAKE YOUR KIDNEY NEXT.
She glared at the computer screen and tried to ignore it. The letters shifted again.
HE WILL CONTINUE TO TAKE ONE AT A TIME UNTIL YOU ARE DEAD AND THEN HE WILL TAKE ALL.
Tears came to her eyes. There is nothing I can do.
The computer turned blank. And then, hesitantly, the words came up:
I CAN KILL YOU.
No.
The computer chirred and once more her status beeped on screen. She closed her eyes. She couldn’t move, and for once she was happy for that. And the pain would only get worse.
The lung. Think about the lung, she thought. The lung would go to someone who would need it, somebody who needed it desperately, much more than she needed it. Perhaps it would go to a young woman, maybe in her twenties with severe asthma... she didn’t know. She didn’t know what they would do with it. She had no say in it, not now.
There was a chance, of course, that she would live thorough this. A chance that Dr. Montgomery would stop it from going too far, and she might be a cripple, but she would at least be alive. And that would make all the difference... that would make all the difference...
She didn’t mean to doze off. She wanted to enjoy her last moments and she didn’t want to sleep through them, but pain and exhaustion had taken its toll and she slept. When she woke up, the technical operators had come, along with Dr. Montgomery. They had been talking:
“Didn’t she like drinking?” one of the technical operators had asked. “I heard that she was a drinker.”
“Not enough to destroy her kidneys,” Dr. Montgomery maintained firmly. “They’re perfectly healthy and I’m sure she’ll love to have them donated to some poor old woman on dialysis who needs another one. She’s very generous like that. She wants to do the right thing. They all do. We need more people like her.”
“Yes, yes,” the technical operator said, “but when are we getting to the main?”
“How do you mean?”
“Her eyes, her eyes. Didn’t some billionaire want them?”
A strange feeling, not unlike fear, shot through her and she was glad she couldn’t scream. Her eyes! She closed her eyes tighter and pretended to sleep, hoping the computer wouldn’t betray her quickening heartbeat.
An awkward silence followed. “We’ll get to them soon,” Dr. Montgomery finally said. “Next harvest, maybe. But don’t talk about it here. It’s indecent.” A moment later, she felt a soft touch to her feet. “Wake up, honey,” Dr. Montgomery said. “It’s time for another harvest.”
She opened her eyes.
This harvest was a blur and though she hated watching her gut being opened with a saw, it seemed nothing in comparison to her eyes. Her eyes! And not even somebody who really needed them, but somebody who could afford having her opened, who could afford the cost of ripping out...
Maybe the billionaire really needs them, she thought desperately. Maybe the billionaire really needs them and can’t see and he’s always wanted to. It must be horrible to be blind. Nobody should live like that. But she knew it was more likely that the billionaire had seen the sparkle in her eyes and desired them for his own. Maybe he would give them to his wife. After all, it would be unethical for him to love another woman, not if he already had a wife. It would be easier to just take what made her desirable and put it in his wife.
She looked at the screen. Kill me! she thought.
The computer whirred and the screen turned a thoughtful black. And then the words formed.
IF I KILL YOU NOW, HE WILL STILL HARVEST YOUR EYES.
A fresh wave of despair rushed through her. You must not let him take my eyes, she thought. Anything but that!
The computer remained blank.
A whimper escaped her throat. He had said... didn’t he say that he would take her eyes next? And that wouldn’t be the last. She would live through that--they would make sure of that--and then they would rip out everything else. Everything. Her organs would be taken out, her skin would be peeled off, and all her parts would be whizzing around the world. Even her bones would be broken apart for stem cell research. She had known this. But her eyes! Her eyes!
Of course they wouldn’t be considered essential, she thought bitterly. Of course they would take them out next.
She turned to the screen. She was not alone, she remembered. That had been one of the first things that the computer had told her. And she had dismissed it. But somehow, the fact that she would never see the computer screen again, that she wouldn’t be able to see its words, however horrifying they were, again terrified her beyond anything else. She swallowed.
Can you tell them I’ve changed my mind? Can you tell them I want to live? she thought.
TOO LATE.
Her throat choked up and she wanted to cry. And she couldn’t do anything. She was strapped on the table, with no teeth, no extra lung, and no extra kidney. The contract had been signed; the courts would never consider this murder. And soon everything else would fail and she would never be able to see again. The last sight she would ever see was the computer screen, dutifully displaying the picture of her eye getting removed, the only sign of color in this sparkling white room.
She blinked the tears from her eyes. Can you display any other things on the screen? Something from outside?
The computer whirred thoughtfully until it blinked and a picture of an eagle soaring above the mountains came on screen. Someone else would be able to see them with her eyes. Someone else.
She shivered. Kill me now. I’m ready.
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