Designation 261 (The Wholeness Project)

by Catherine Miller

  So she paced.

  And then she cried, for all that she had lost.

  Before finally her body seemed to have quite enough of her, and simply disengaged.

  It was cold when she woke, her mind muzzy and full of confusion. Her back ached, the pallet not designed for comfort, but she chided herself on being particular. She’d never been allowed to be at home either, for even if the bed was comfortable, it was usually filled with one too many siblings, elbows and knees all a jumble until sleep was more combative than restful.

  Her heart ached but the tears did not come, and for that she was grateful.

  She wouldn’t wonder if they’d been told of her death yet. There were more pressing needs to attend to.

  The cell—for she could not pretend it was anything else—was outfitted with a small lavatory, but it was out in the open, not even a partition separating that corner from the rest of the room.

  Her bladder insisted that she did not care, but she did. She had some small remains of her dignity intact. He might try to purge her of the rest of it, especially if he took to ripping more of her clothes, but for now it was worth the risk of an interaction with him.

  Maybe.

  She chewed at her lip, wondering if that was true, or if she was being overly ridiculous. But her nerves won out, and she rose. She was thirsty, terribly so, and she looked at the small sink, wondering if that water was safe to drink. She knew little about ships, had only spent time on the one that brought her from the home-world to the facility. But that one had a proper eatery, one she could go to on her own and not wonder if the sink-water would poison her.

  But standing there frozen by indecision would accomplish nothing. So she went to the sink and swished out her mouth before taking long sips as best as she could manage, though it seemed only to make her need more insistent, both in thirst and in her need to relieve herself.

  She shuffled out of her cell, pausing cautiously at the doorway. He could have come down at any time while she slept and enacted the barrier, and she lifted a hand to see if it came into contact with any sort of repellent.

  She winced, expecting a shock, a warning pulse that would caution her from trying again.

  Except there was nothing, her hand moving freely and her body afterward, the madman having heeded her request.

  She went out, moving toward the hatch, a hint of panic going through her when she saw the door shut tightly.

  So finding him directly was not an option. Which meant she had to call.

  Using that name that wasn’t a name.

  She remembered what he’d told her, about genetic materials and children being made, twisted into something else.

  It sounded more like horror-fiction than anything close to reality, but that still did not leave her with something proper to call him. Madman would not go over any better, but the numbers...

  They frightened her. Perhaps in his madness he had given them to himself, but even as she thought it, she knew that was not the case. And if it was true...

  It felt wrong to use it, even though she had been the one to request it for just this purpose.

  “Hello?” she called instead, raising her voice so he might hear her through the thick metal closing her off from the rest of the ship. “I... I have a question that... that is rather urgent.”

  It was becoming more tempting to use what had already been provided, but her skin still prickled, and she looked around again for a sign of someone being there, or maybe the little round orbs that were stationed around the Project’s facility that fed back to the security team.

  A lot it did for them.

  But she saw nothing, and she chided herself for being ridiculous.

  She was prepared to beg for something unnecessary, when there were plenty of other things that she should use his favours for.

  Freedom, being one of them, but she would not press for that. Not at the moment.

  “Hello?” she tried again, determining that if he waited much longer to acknowledge her, she would simply use the lav that was offered.

  But a mechanism in the hatch began to turn, the seal breaking with a quick puff of air.

  And then the madman was peering down at her.

  “What is your question?” he asked. He looked no different than he had before, and she did not know why that surprised her. Perhaps because she felt so haggard, and knew that it would certainly show in her appearance. She did not care if he saw her in such a state, but it did not seem right that he looked as clean and tidy as he had before while she did not.

  “Is there a lav that’s more... private?” she asked meekly, wondering if he would mock her, would call her ungrateful. Maybe it would even be deserved, but she could regret her insistence later.

  He blinked down at her. “You do not believe an entire level to yourself is sufficient privacy?”

  She wrung her hands lightly, and gave him as pleading a look as she could. “There is no door,” she tried to explain, accepting that he could call her a ninny, could call her any number of things, and that was fine, as long as he let her up. “Please?”

  But there was no mockery, just a calm, “Very well,” before he slipped from view.

  But the hatch door was open, and she expected that was as much invitation as she was going to receive, so she scrambled up the ladder as quickly as she could. The metal pressed uncomfortably against her bare feet, the impractical shoes abandoned in her cell, the first sacrifice to her pacing.

  There were still red marks along her heel and the sides of her feet, angry blisters protesting how long she had worn them and the pace of her walk. They were designed for elegance rather than comfort, to reflect the prestige of a company that had worked hard to earn its fine reputation.

  A company that was gone now.

  She quickly exited, the opening to the below still unnerving her. She looked at him, trying to convey her urgency through gaze alone, and she was grateful that he did not bother with conversation, instead leading her to a door, nearly invisible as it blended with the walls of the craft. “I do not know what you are familiar with, but I cannot imagine that it is drastically different.”

  She nodded, not certain of that at all, but willing to try on her own if it meant keeping him from following her into the small space. The lights glowed at her entrance, the door shutting firmly behind her. Just as it should.

  Whether it would actually prevent him from entering if he wanted to, she didn’t know, so she found herself hurrying anyway. There was no ‘fresher, but she did not think she wanted to undress completely in any case, so it was of little matter. Water would do just fine in the meantime, though it would do little for the matted mess of her hair. She’d had a comb in her bag, tucked beneath the desk that was currently nothing but rubble.

  She shouldn’t dwell on those things, especially when the madman might still be waiting outside the door. It didn’t matter that he had destroyed most all of the articles she’d had to her name with his vendetta. It didn’t matter that a few were precious mementos, pieces of a home she likely would never see again.

  She had felt marginally better after she’d washed herself off as best she could, but the turn of her thoughts made her despondent, and it was a reluctant hand that patted the door again, uncertain how to get it to move, but unwilling to cause a ruckus in the process.

  It slid open, allowing her to exit, and the madman was indeed on the other side. He took in her appearance, the damp parts of her hair where she’d attempted to subdue it, the splashes of water that dribbled onto her clothes when cleaning necessary bits.

  She felt overly exposed, and wanted him to stop with his intensive study, so she found herself snapping at him instead. “It is very rude to wait outside the lav door.” That had been drilled into her almost from infancy, the importance only mounting when there was so many of them sharing a single lavatory between them.

  If he was offended at her tone, he made no show of it. “You will need new clothes,” he mused, nodding to himself a
s he did so, as if her opinion didn’t matter. It wasn’t that she didn’t want something else to wear, but for him to decide that on top of everything else...

  To take the last vestiges of a job that was meant to change everything...

  He would likely toss her uniform into the refuse bin where it would be promptly incinerated, just like he did the rest of the Project.

  He glanced up at her, taking in her expression. “You disagree? You prefer tatters?”

  She swallowed, rubbing her hand down her skirt and grimacing when her hand met skin rather than fabric all too quickly. “It’s not that,” she hedged, wishing she could ask him for a meal rather than waste time on what was likely just her being sentimental and ridiculous.

  She wasn’t ignoring what he’d said before. About... about what the Project had been working on in the darker recesses of the facility. Of the babies they had made without parental knowledge. But it seemed too big a concept, too horrible to be considered. She’d been seduced by the white lined halls, the pretty emblem, the smiling doctors that were always quick to assure that they were there to complete families.

  And that was part of the trouble. Because they fulfilled that. She saw it daily.

  And she’d taken pride in her work, of being a part of something grand and important.

  She was being punished for that pride.

  Because she doubted he would allow her to keep even a scrap of admiration for the company he claimed had created him. Not by the end.

  “Then what is it?” he pressed, folding his arms over his chest. The action was stiff, the hands not quite going properly, and belatedly she realised he was mimicking the posture she had taken. She dropped her arms to the side quickly enough, if only to stop him from continuing such an inadequate imitation.

  She sighed, wondering if she intended to be honest, but deciding it was pointless to be otherwise. “This is all I’ve got left, that was... mine,” she confessed, knowing he wouldn’t like it. The infinitesimal pull at his mouth confirmed her suspicion.

  “Hardly yours. Should your position have been terminated, they doubtlessly would have required it back.” There was a hardening to the lines of his face, as if the statement had made him thinking of something else, something painful, and she almost wanted to pry, but restrained herself. She didn’t like when people tried too hard to intrude on her private thoughts, on her undisclosed pains, and if nothing else, she could model for him what it was like to respect someone’s history and their right not to share it simply because it was asked of them.

  She swallowed. He wasn’t wrong. As freely as it had been handed to her during orientation, it could have been just as easily rescinded. But there was no one to take it back now, and everything else on this ship would have to be asked for, perhaps even begged for. Food, water, heat, clothing...

  She wouldn’t have to ask for these clothes, tattered or not.

  But she could see from the set of his mouth that he did not intend to allow her to remain wandering his ship with a remnant of his enemy blazoned on her upper arm. And if she thought too long on what he’d told her, what he’d shared, perhaps she did not want to be wearing it either.

  Clairy shifted awkwardly, her thoughts too jumbled and conflicting. “What did you have in mind?”

  He walked back to the hatch and despite her reticence, she followed him down below, all too aware that he would only need to glance upward to get a mortifying view of her legs.

  She did not think she’d ever taken a ladder so quickly before in her life.

  He did not turn to the galley as she’d almost expected. She’d heard replicators could do much, but perhaps it lacked the programming to provide clothing as well as broth.

  He went to one of the sealed doors and punched in a long string of codes before disappearing into the room beyond. She took a hesitant step forward, uncertain if he intended for her to follow, but a morbid curiosity kept her moving.

  The room itself was little more than a depression into the bulkhead, a storage compartment more than a room. But there were stacks of clothes nestled into the shelves, surrounded by...

  Weapons.

  Lots of them.

  She could not even identify most, the blasters obvious in nature. Others were spherical, some metal, others seeming almost liquid as they shone from their transparent containers.

  “You will stay there,” he commanded, not turning from his perusal of the clothing, but clearly very aware of her trespass beyond the threshold.

  She well understood his caution. The moment she recognised the main purpose of the room, her thoughts filled with what she might do if she could access one of the weapons. Was she prepared to use it against him? Possibly. Though knowing herself, it would be more threat than real intention to harm.

  Shame lanced through her for that. He’d killed so many, clearly without regret or remorse, and she should be willing to hurt him in exchange for her freedom. She doubted any court would blame her for it, few would condemn her, yet when she tried to picture it, tried to imagine pulling a blaster’s trigger, of hurting, of killing...

  A shudder ran through her.

  Perhaps it would come to that. When fear and deprivation got the best of her, when his cold manner gave way to outright abuse. But to rush forward, to aim an unfamiliar weapon at him and hope that it worked?

  He turned, holding a garment that apparently met with his approval, and eyed her speculatively. But he did not look at her form, but rather her expression. “Plotting already?” he asked, his voice low and calm, as if he had intended to show her this place, had wanted to see what she might do when faced with the tools of which to defend herself.

  But defence could still be violence, and she felt sick, her earlier hunger spoiling in her stomach, and she took a stumbling step backward, unable to stand looking at all of it for a moment longer.

  The madman followed, eyeing her carefully, garment still in hand.

  The door shut behind him, the pressurised seal hissing in confirmation that it was locked away again, her opportunity locked away with it.

  “What was the point of that?” she asked, her voice tight as she rubbed her hands against her too-short skirt. “Why would you feel the need to show me all those things?”

  The madman blinked at her placidly. “I was retrieving the clothes that you needed. If you saw anything else, perhaps you should learn to keep you attention where it is of most benefit.”

  She chewed at her lip. He wasn’t wrong exactly, but she did not think he was being entirely truthful either. He’d wanted her to see his armament, perhaps to intimidate her, a promise of what was to come, or perhaps to show her a moment’s hope and then rescind it again.

  But what good would that do? He made it very clear that she was locked out of the computer systems. The lav door had responded, yes, but that was likely a motion sensor rather than anything more complicated. If, by some fluke, she was able to overpower him, could kill him, she would not be able to signal anyone for help. She would not be able to alter course. She doubted she would even be able to work the replicator, so she would exist only on the water from the taps to fill her belly.

  Until she died.

  “You do not look pleased with my selection.”

  She frowned, as truthfully, she had not even realised he was extending it toward her. The fabric was dark, and relatively shapeless, but she did not care. It almost felt familiar, in its way, like what the workers would use at home to tend the fields. The heat of the day would insist they wear minimal clothing, but the overseers’ would demand plenty of cloth to protect against the sun’s rays.

  She reached out and took it from him. “It’s fine, thank you.”

  “So polite,” he commented, and she did not know if he meant to embarrass her, but he managed well enough.

  The fabric was thick, her fingers catching over some of the more prominent fibres as she skimmed across it. “Would you prefer I not be?” she asked quietly, wondering why he had brought it up unless it ac
tual displeased him.

  “No,” he answered simply. “If you require your privacy,” there was no mistaking that tone for anything but mockery, “then I would suggest using the ‘fresher.” He went to another of the doors and opened it. “There is only this one,” he informed her. He did feel the need to state outright that they would be sharing it, but he didn’t need to.

  Suddenly her attempt at cleanliness seemed wholly inadequate now that there was the prospect of a proper wash. “Will... I will be able to eat afterward?”

  He stared at her, not giving any sort of reply either way, and she did not know if that was his answer, or merely a prompt to rethink her wording.

  She swallowed, already weary of his games, and tried again. “May I have something to eat once I’ve changed? Please?”

  A low nod. “Yes.”

  She thought of asking for particular foods, but thought better of it. She shouldn’t get greedy, despite the rumbling in her stomach insisting that more broth was not going to be sufficient.

  She made quick work of the ‘fresher, grateful that it was nearly identical to the ones she’d used while stationed in the Project’s facility. She didn’t dwell on the loss, only allowed the ‘fresher to do its work, scrubbing away the last vestiges of that place, leaving only behind pinked skin and a nervousness in her stomach about what the rest of the day might bring.

  She brought her undergarments with her, the best she could do given the circumstances. They seemed clean enough when the drying cycle had finished and she went to dress, grateful that she had anything at all.

  They were delicate things, and she doubted they would last for too long after daily washings in a contraption not actually intended for fabrics, but it was the best she could do.

  She felt dwarfed by the uniform, but perhaps that wasn’t the proper word for it at all. There were no patches, no emblems to suggest it belonged to anyone in particular. It was a practical piece, meant for function rather than aesthetic, but she had to roll up the legs and sleeves more times than she cared to consider.