The Line Book One: Carrier Read Online Free

dead.
    Fucking asshole!
    The man stood and motioned to the door. “When you leave here, you have seven months to bring your replacement. If you miscarry or abort the babies, this deal is null and void. Do not run. Each girl on the Line is implanted with a tracking chip, so we’ll monitor where you are. We have your palm prints on file to approve your transactions. Should you fail to return by the time of your children’s birth, we’ll come for you and for them. The reception nurse will see to some credits and clothing to get you started on your way.”
    “Seven months?” That seemed like such a short time and an eternity all at once.
    “Correct.”
    I stood. It was happening too fast. They were going to dump me on the curb? Right now?
    The man walked past me and opened the door. As I approached I accidentally brushed his shoulder. He jumped back like I’d stung him.
    I was too shocked at his reaction to comment.
    “Don’t touch me!” he spat. A tiny trickle of spit popped off his lip and landed on my face.
    I internally shuddered at his saliva on my cheek but didn’t flinch. I was used to strange men and their odd behaviors. Just then my memory sifted through the many faces of men who’d come in and out of my appointment room and all the questionable things they’d done in my presence. Not one was a face I ever cared to see again. Not a single, solitary one.
    Ever.
    “Right,” I said before I turned my attention to the reception nurse.
    The man closed his office door, leaving me on the other side. I never wanted to see him again, either.
    It occurred to me I didn’t have much of a choice.

Chapter Two
    The first thing I noticed once I was outside the building was the stench.
    Garbage.
    It smelled like an overflowing trash can full of day-old food scraps, left to rot in the hot sun.
    I shielded my eyes with an arm. It was blindingly bright too.
    Outside the Line headquarters was the bustling world of Central sector. Cement sidewalks full of moving people. Electric taxicabs lining the streets, tall and dilapidated buildings as far as the eye could see, dirty water gushing in the gutters, and trash. Piles of it were everywhere, lumped on the curbs, stuffed in the doorways of the dirty and peeling buildings. Since plastic had been outlawed years ago, garbage was collected in burlap sacks and stacked in the streets. Inside Auberge, the landfills had long been full, and dumping over the wall surrounding the territories was forbidden. After several generations of this, heaps of garbage now sat everywhere for rodents to chew, which sent the stinking contents spilling everywhere. The overflow of garbage had reached a critical level. People were drowning in their own filth, with nowhere else to put it.
    And it stank like hell.
    My stomach soured. It seemed like my sense of smell was twice as strong as normal, or perhaps the stench was twice as bad. Regardless, I couldn’t stay there all day, standing in the doorway of the Line, gagging. Despite the escalating panic clouding my thoughts, I started walking.
    Down the street were apartment buildings of every kind, stacked together like dishes in a sink. I glanced at the street signs and clenched my shaking hands into fists.
    I hadn’t been out of doors in nine years. And here I stood on 10th Street. Just that morning I’d told Peni I would see her later.
    I never had the chance to say goodbye.
    I glanced at the people outside the apartments as I moved down the block: women, men, children. Some sat on stoops. Some hung out their windows and watched nothing. Some walked around, looking lost.
    I tried not to stare.
    People. Real people. Not appointments. Not nurses. Not guards. People.
    Did they know what was happening in that building I’d just exited?
    Did they care?
    I wondered what they would think of a pregnant girl from the Line. I wondered what I thought of myself.
    It was a warm and sunny day. Which was a good thing too, considering all the Line had given me to