Indentured Bride by Yamila Abraham

by Yamila Abraham
     
    Copyright © 2016 Yamila Abraham.  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.  All characters depicted in this work are over 18 years old.  
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    Tabitha cut the ridge of a saccus nut with her laser and then waited for her vision to stop blurring.  She separated the shell as carefully as she could with her trembling fingers.  Then she tried to nudge free the malleable core.  This is when things started going dark.  She closed her eyes and rocked gently in her seat.  If she tried to keep working she’d rupture the core.  She had to wait until the room stopped spinning.
    “We are very concerned about this slave,” a robot said.  Its tinny voice sounded as though it came from the other end of a tunnel.
    “This one was getting gene therapy.”  This was her foreman Merit, and that meant the cruel alien was right beside her.  Tabitha wondered why she wasn’t getting zapped with a tr’sark , the shock sticks all her masters wielded.  Then it occurred to her to wonder why she’d heard a robot.
    “Experiments on slaves are prohibited,” the robot said.
    Tabitha forced her bleary eyes to fix on it.  The unit was thick and black, as though made from cast-iron.  One large antenna was on its boxy head.  Its limbs were thick rods with visible wires and hoses.
    “This was done prior to the treaty,” Merit said.  Tabitha looked at her next.  Her foreman was a female Hax-Rah , with red and purple hues on her skin.  She had an overbite that made her canines stick out from her top lip.  All the slaves in Tabitha’s block called the homely woman ‘Walrus’.
    The robot leaned closer to examine Tabitha with its long eye-slot.  “Are you saying this slave is still suffering the effects of your experiments three months after you ceased performing them?”    
    “Yes,” Merit said.
    Bullshit.   She’d been given an injection of something that burned as it seeped into her arm that very morning.
    “Slave, when did the Hax-Rah last conduct their experiments on you?”
    “I don’t remember,” Tabitha said.  The words were spat out quickly since hesitation would likely be a punishable offense.  She glowered at the metal thing with her fading vision.   Who the fuck are you, anyway?
    Merit grinned.  “She doesn’t remember because it was so long ago.  Isn’t that right, slave?”
    “Yes, serat .”  This time she stumbled with her affirmation.  She nearly fainted onto her work station but managed to catch her own lolling head as it sank.  What the fuck had they done to her?  It had never been this severe before.
    “She requires medical treatment,” the robot said.
    “She’ll be fine in a day.”
    “The treaty requires you to provide all slaves with adequate care when they are unwell.”
    What treaty?
    “She just needs rest.  Isn’t that right, slave?”
    “Yes, serat.”
    “You are dismissed from your workstation.  Return to your bunk.”
    Damn it.   Would she be punished for getting to leave work early?  Merit was probably going to give her a fire-lash the second this robot—whoever he was—left the compound.
    She braced herself on her metal table and tried to stand.  Her eyes widened.  There was no strength in her legs.  The room was still spinning and the edges of her vision were growing dark.  She saw Merit sneering at her with one fang