VIRGINIA RINSED her hair one last time, hoping the timer on the water recycler would not go off before she could get all of the soap out. She grabbed her towel and made way for another woman who stood, naked and shaking, waiting for her turn. There was a clean pair of hospital pajamas waiting for her on her bed, and she quickly got dressed with her body turned away from the rest of the room. The weekly ordeal they made of bathing the group was humiliating.
Virginia wrapped her hair in her towel, glad at least to have had a shower. The nozzles only worked when the medical associates turned them on, and the once a week that they did turn them on was just not often enough. By then, not one person was without a hefty odor and slick, oily hair. Virginia splashed herself off using the sink water when she got the chance, but cold water and powdered hand soap did little to keep the filth at bay. It was mortifying to be herded into the bathroom by the medical associates in such a way, but it was over with for now and at least for the moment she was clean.
Emily took her time walking over to Virginia, shaking the towel over her wet hair and adjusting the fit of her pajamas. Both of them turned around and faced the far wall as the associates instructed the men to remove their clothes and line up for their shower.
"When we get out of here, I will never take my privacy for granted ever again," Emily said, resting her towel over her shoulders. "I bet this is how they treat prison inmates."
Virginia nodded grimly. "At least the ones who happen to have the wrong eye color."
Emily nodded her agreement. Her face went painfully sober as she suddenly questioned aloud, "I wonder if I'll still be able to work as a cashier associate at my booth? Deviants don't work as cashier associates."
Virginia suddenly had to apply the same question to her own job. Had so much changed about her that she was now no longer qualified to handle one of Communications-Corp's switchboards? She and Emily looked at one another as the same question hit them both at once: Would they be able to convince anyone, including their loved ones, that absolutely nothing about them had changed other than their eye color?
"My fiancé hates deviants!" Emily said, the reality of their situation finally sinking in. "My life is ruined!"
"My husband isn't too fond of them, either," Virginia said, denial forcing her to add, "I know he loves me, though, and I know my kids love me. I know that won't change."
Emily began to cry.
"Don't cry, sweetie," Virginia said, her throat knotting up. "Everything will be okay. You'll see."
Emily shook her head. "No. I don't think it will." She stood and turned.
Virginia reached for Emily's shoulder, but she brushed her aside. She watched as Emily walked in long strides, almost in slow motion, toward the medical associates standing in front of the bathroom door. Virginia wanted to get up and run after her, but she felt frozen where she sat, knowing deep down that there was nothing she could do. She watched helplessly as Emily signed her life away.
Emily turned back as she passed through the door, her eyes haunting as she gave Virginia one last pained smile. She crossed the threshold and the door closed behind her.
And then she was gone.
Virginia grieved silently as Olaf, a friendly older man, exited the bathroom and got dressed.
He hurried up to her, his hair and beard still dripping. "Where's Emily?"
Virginia looked down. "She left."
Olaf sat down, his body flushing. "Where did she go?"
Virginia turned back to him, the tears streaming from her eyes speaking louder than any words she might have to offer him.
"But why?" Olaf asked, his eyes welling up. "She was so young! She had her whole life ahead of her!"
Virginia shook her head, wishing that she had tried harder to hold Emily back. "I couldn't stop her," she said, trying to amend the memory of it in her mind.
"Damn it all!" Olaf cried, going to his bed and lying down.
Virginia surveyed the room, unsure how much longer she would be able to handle being there herself. There were now exactly four men and four women left, including her. She wondered if the medical management was simply counting on the group to give up, one by one, until no one remained. Perhaps those who persisted were doing nothing but prolonging the inevitable.
Virginia watched the camera sweep back and forth, flipping it off once as it passed over her.
The showers turned off and the medical associates left the room. The locks clicked shut. The last of the men dried off and got dressed. No one else seemed to care that Emily had given up. Few even seemed to notice that she was gone.
The locks clicked back open, and one of the medical associates who had just overseen the showers returned with the manager and two security associates. He had an order from Corporate, just downloaded onto his handheld computer.
"After due consideration, Corporate has decided to give you two options." The medical associate cleared his throat, glancing down at his computer screen. He punched in a code, bringing up the downloaded file. "Corporate is interested in a study on live subjects infected with what we have named retrovirus HD-1, to study your antibodies and develop a vaccine. All those not interested in participating in the study will be euthanized."
Virginia and Olaf glanced over at one another in disbelief.
The medical manager stepped forward. "We'll need your signatures on the appropriate forms, so if you could all come forward in an orderly manner."
Olaf winked at Virginia, then suddenly sprang out of bed and grabbed the man in the next bed over. He yanked the man to the ground and put him in a stranglehold, and then braced himself for the security associates' attack. "I'll see you all in Hell!"
Olaf's attack put the entire room into a panic, and the medical associate ran into the center of the room in an attempt to back up Security. The medical manager tackled a woman who ran ahead of Virginia in an attempt to escape, and by the time he turned to secure the door, Virginia and three others had already scattered.
The medical manager slipped out the door and locked it, making a mental note to let out his personnel as soon as the building was secure. "Security breach!" he yelled, running after a young man who was unfortunate enough to have slipped out last. The manager stopped at an emergency alarm station, catching his breath as he sounded the alarm.
"I need backup here!" the manager yelled as he chased the young man to a dead end. He tackled the young man, knocking him off his feet, and all nearby personnel moved to assist in his capture.
Virginia slipped unseen into an unlocked utility closet. The small room had a washer and dryer, bins of dirty laundry, and cleaning supplies arranged on open shelves. Knowing the search for her would be thorough, she considered her hiding places. If she simply knelt behind the dryer she was sure to be found, and the same likely went for hiding inside the hot machine. She hurried to the vent to the central heating duct, but found it tightly secured. She snatched a putty knife from a nearby shelf and used it to pry off the screen, then carefully slid off the vent and slipped inside the tight area, slamming the vent back into place behind her.
Virginia quietly wriggled back a few feet, then froze as she heard the closet door open. She heard the security associate step through the room. The man checked the washer and dryer, and then poked through the piles of laundry. Virginia held her breath and closed her eyes as he peered through the vent, straining to see as far into the shadows as he could. After only a moment, the associate moved away from the vent and left the room. Virginia took a deep breath as the door shut behind him. She waited a few minutes to ensure he hadn't left just to get reinforcements, and then she worked her way back up to the vent.
She looked around the room, trying to determine whether she had any chance at escape. There didn't seem like any way out. She could dig through the dirty linen on the chance that there was a pair of scrubs hidden in the bin, but she didn't think that would be very likely. Even if she did find some type of medical associate uniform, her eye color would give her away before she could get down the hall.
She slid back as the door opened again, and she could just see into the closet as a sanitation worker came in with a rolling mop bucket.
The skinny young woman pushed the bucket into a corner and began a load of laundry with a groan. The washing machine was loud as it filled with hot water, the sound echoing through the narrow duct.
Virginia slid back up to the vent, getting a better look, and she realized that the sanitation associate was a deviant. Without another thought, in one quick motion, Virginia knocked out the vent and slid out of the duct. She slammed into the surprised young woman, pinning her against the far wall and covering her mouth.
"I need your help!" Virginia cried.
The sanitation associate nodded, and Virginia slowly let her go.
"You have to get me out of here!" Virginia continued. "I'm being held against my will!"
"You're one of the virus victims?"
Virginia hadn't expected such a question to come from a sanitation associate, and she gave the deviant a suspicious eye. "How did you know?"
The young woman moved to a bin of clean sheets, picking up as much of the unfolded pile as she could hold. "Get in."
Virginia got into the bin, and the young associate dropped the pile of sheets over her. "Sit tight." The young woman dug into her pockets, pulling out syringes, test tubes, and a few other objects she had stolen from the medical offices, and stuffed them under the pile. She finished loading the washing machine and then deftly rolled Virginia and her laboratory supplies out of the closet.
She rolled the heavy bin to a service elevator and quietly accompanied the load down to the basement. She rolled the bin to the folding piles at the end of the corridor and lugged the laundry off Virginia.
"Thank you so much!" Virginia said, climbing out of the bin.
"It's the least I can do," the deviant said. She extended her hand. "I'm Anne."
"Virginia."
They shook.
"Do you have anywhere to go?" Anne asked, checking to make sure that no one else was in the vicinity.
"I plan on going home."
"Do you think that's wise?" Anne collected the laboratory supplies, wrapped them in a pajama top she snagged from a laundry pile, and then stashed them behind a trash bin.
Virginia shrugged. "Where else would I go?"
Anne found a piece of scratch paper and a pen, and wrote down shuttle and walking directions to a remote location. She handed it to Virginia with a smile. "Ask for Ray." She shoved Virginia behind a pile of laundry and tried to look busy as a sanitation manager crossed the far corridor and then disappeared around another corner.
Virginia took the piece of paper. "How do I get out of here?"
After a moment of thought, Anne quickly wriggled out of her uniform and tossed it to Virginia. She kicked off her shoes. "I'm not sure it'll be a perfect fit, but it's all I've got." She began to dig through a utility drawer until she came across a roll of duct tape.
Virginia squeezed herself into Anne's uniform and forced her feet into the tiny shoes.
Anne tossed Virginia the duct tape and her shuttle pass, then crossed her wrists behind her back. "I can't look like a willing participant in this."
Virginia bound Anne's wrists behind her back and wrapped the tape around her ankles.
Anne dropped onto a pile of clean pajama tops. "The parking garage is down the hall to your left, and then up one floor. Now, tape up my mouth and get out of here."
"Tape your mouth?"
Anne gave a frustrated huff. "You want to make it look authentic, right?"
"Are you sure someone will find you?"
"Positive." Anne glanced down to the end of the hall, looking nervous. "Will you stop wasting time?"
Virginia reluctantly slapped a piece of tape over Anne's mouth. "Thanks again." She hurried down the long hallway, pocketing Anne's shuttle directions as she took the stairwell up to the garage. She found a direct shuttle line to Housing.
She took a long, deep breath as the shuttle rolled away from the platform. She wondered if any of the others who had escaped were also able to get away, hoping she wasn't the only one. She wondered how many more people would find themselves in her situation before Medical-Corp was able to come up with a vaccine or antidote, if either was even possible.
Virginia couldn't reach Housing quickly enough, and she gazed through the window at the heavy rain as the shuttle lurched along its track. It was dark and grey out, and heavy clouds blocked out the early evening sky.
She knocked on her front door, nervous but excited. She assumed George and the kids would be home, given the time, and her heart sank when she knocked several times and no one came to the door.
"Hello?" Virginia knocked again. "It's me!"
The door cracked open across the way, and Judith peeked out. Virginia turned, and Judith quickly shut the door as she noticed Virginia's deviant eyes. Virginia stood in the center of the hallway, unsure what to do. She decided to knock on the Rockwells' door just as William opened it, Judith huddling behind him.
"I don't have my key," Virginia said.
"You're dead!" William said. He couldn't stop looking at her eyes.
"They lied!" Virginia began to cry, more due to panic than the despair also seizing her.
Judith remained behind the safety of her husband, eyeing Virginia suspiciously. "I think we should call for a security associate!"
"It looks like Virginia," William said.
"Where is my family?" Virginia cried. "I just want to see my family!"
"They've been gone for a couple of days," William said.
"What do you think you're doing?" Judith slapped William on the shoulder, and she slammed the door shut.
Her gut telling her that security associates would soon be on their way to clear the floor, Virginia hurried to the stairwell. She passed a young woman slowly helping her young daughter up the stairs.
The little girl looked over Virginia and smiled. "Mommy! Look at her pretty eyes!"
The woman scowled at Virginia, yanking the girl up into her arms. "We don't talk to deviants, Angie," the woman scolded, and then the two disappeared through the door to the second floor.
Virginia hurried out of the building, running down the halls toward the shuttle garage. She dug out Anne's directions from her pocket. The shuttle changes led to an area where Virginia had never been before, but she wasn't sure if she really had anywhere else to go. Using Anne's pass, Virginia boarded the Line 270 shuttle, sat down, and closed her eyes.