D-5111

Day 1

D-5111 woke with a sudden jolt, and a splitting headache. As she rapidly blinked, her eyes adjusting to the low light of her environment, she took the time to look around. She was dressed in an orange jumpsuit. She was lying on the bottom bunk in what appeared to be some kind of dorm, the room packed with bunks and about 20 other terrified looking women. Already the room was filling with panicked voices, shouting, and crying. The noise made D-5111 realize she had no idea who or where she was.

D-5111 bolted upright, her eyes wide as she began to hyperventilate.

Ohfuckohfuckohfuckohfuck…

D-5111’s mind scrambled as she tried to get her bearings.

Thinkthinkthinkthinkthink

Then, as if a switch had been flipped, a foothold appeared.

Patricia Walker…

She blinked and her breathing slowed.

I’m Patricia Walker…

From that mental starting block several more pieces fell in place.

I’m… 38. I was born in… Eugene… no… Corvallis, Oregon. I’ve been a Registered Nurse for… 15… 16 years…

Like water cooling to ice, her identity solidified within her mindscape.

I’ve been married for 18 years… my husband's a pediatrician… I have two children… A teenage son and a young daughter… their names… what are their names…

Patricia closed her eyes and concentrated. Name after name flew past her, but none seemed to fit.

Jason, Johnathan, June, Marco, Emily, Taylor, Billy, Cecil, Darren, Michele, Derek, Eric, Sasha, Jacob, Daniel, Troy…

The PA in the room pinged, ripping Patricia from the stream of names flowing through her mind.

“Attention!” A masculine voice called over the PA. “All D-Class personnel, please report to your dormitory common rooms for orientation.”

In the corner of the room, a door hissed open. One by one, the various women around Patricia cautiously filed out into the adjoining room. Patricia got to her feet, and shuffled along with the herd, ending up in a large room packed with men and women in similar orange jumpsuits.

“Ah, yes,” a voice called from the front of the room, over the din of close to 50 confused people mumbling to one another. Patricia’s eyes turned to the front of the room. Standing between two stoic guards was a slender woman with short blond hair. Next to her was a pudgy man in a lab coat, his eyes obscured by thick glasses.

“Your attention, please,” the woman called again, but the murmuring continued to fill the room. Eventually the woman sighed and pulled a small remote like object out of her pocket, and pressed a button.

The room was filled with a high pitched squeal, all eyes turning to the woman, and all falling silent as they covered their ears. The woman gave another sigh.

“That’s better,” she said. “Good morning ladies and gentlemen. I’m Morrison, the D-Class warden for this unit. This gentleman beside me is Dr. Tanner, our unit physician. By now you probably all have a lot of concerns and questions. Where am I? How did I get here? What happens next? Bear with me for the next half an hour or so, and I can promise you answers. This is your D-Class orientation.”

Morrison gave a small unenthused smile before she continued.

“Let’s start with the simple stuff. Where are you? Right now you are about two kilometers underground in a facility run by a large international research organization dedicated to the preservation of humanity. The research and field work done by this group has saved countless lives the world over, and expanded our understanding in every scientific field. Which brings me to answer why you are here.”

“On occasion, the research done by this organization requires human test subjects, and human interaction with our objects of study. As such, through an impartial lottery, you were all selected and brought here. For the next month each of you will be participating in one or more experiments. At the end of your time, your memory is to be wiped and you’ll be returned to where ever we found you. During that time, you will live here under my watch.”

Morrison scanned the crowd before her.

“I run a tight ship in my D-Class unit, but I think you’ll find me to be more than accommodating. Together we’ll get you through your time, get you out, and get you back to your lives. Am I clear?”

The crowd responded with a choir of yelled questions and shouted demands. Morrison rolled her eyes and pressed the button on her small remote yet again. The crowd fell silent in the face of the high pitched squeal.

“Yeah, we’re going to be a little more organized than that, folks,” Morrison replied. “Right now you will each report back to your bunk where you will wait for Dr. Tanner and his aides to perform your orientation physical. After that, my associates will be here to answer your questions in an ORGANIZED fashion, first come first served.”

“And what if I fucking don’t!” A man stepped forward from the crowd. He was bald and easily stood two feet taller than Morrison. “You can’t keep us here! We’re not prisoners, you have no right to…”

One of the guards quickly closed the distance to the man and silenced him with a stun baton. The room fell silent as the guard quickly threw the man over his shoulder and took him away.

“Alright then,” Morrison replied. “Now that we are all on the same page, let’s get started.”

The various men and woman, or D-class, as Morrison called them, began to head back to their bunks. Along the way, Patricia turned to look back at Morrison and Dr. Tanner. She was shocked to find the two of them already watching her. Morrison smiled and gave a nod of familiarity.

"Humanity thanks you for your service," Dr. Tanner said, and injected her with small syringe…

A brief mental image flashed across Patricia's consciousness. She blinked, and shook her head. Dr. Tanner and Morrison still were staring. Patricia quickly turned away and hurried back to her bunk.

Day 5:

Patricia sat in the dormitory common room at a table, along with two of her fellow D-Class. The first was a young man in his early twenties with long red hair and a mark on his left eyebrow where there had once been a piercing. His jumpsuit was labeled D-2960, he spoke with lisp, and his name was Derek. The second was a short, stocky woman in her late forties with dark skin, and a shaved head. Her name was Annette, though her jumpsuit was labeled D-3106, and she remained silent, nodding occasionally as if to grant her approval of everything.

On the table before Patricia was a sheet of paper with a string of names written upon it:

Husband: Sid, Sebastian, Sean, Dean, Derek, Rick, Rich, Ray, Roy, Roland, Nolan Son: Jeff, Jason, Jacob, Jake, Jack, Mack, Michele, Mitch, Morgan

Bradly, Brice, Blake, Bobby, Robby, Ron, Tom, Tucker Daughter: Cecil, Cierra, Sarah, Sasha, Sandra, Sam, Sally, Sydney

Kaitlyn, Katie, Kara, Lara, Lisa, Lilly, Lana, Leslie

Diane, Anne, Anna, Alana, Alison, Elise, Erica

Patricia chewed on the end of her pen and sighed.

“Still having memory problems, dear?” Annette asked, looking over Patricia’s list.

“I just…” Patricia sighed again, “I’ve finally got my husband’s name back, and am narrowing down on my son’s… but I just can’t zero in on my daughter…”

She put the pen down with a defeated chuckle.

“If she knew I forgot her name she’d never forgive me…”

“You’ll get it in time,” Annette replied. “I know you will. Besides, not like you have much else to do in here.”

“Yeah…”

Patricia frowned as she looked at her list. Her memory was like a half finished puzzle. She could tell what the image was, but a lot of the detail was still missing. She could remember how much Nolan loved his job, that putting smiles on the faces of children always put a smile on his, but drew a blank as to what his face looked like. She recalled how he’d call her by pet names, but couldn’t remember what those names were. She remembered that her son was in high school, but not the grade he was in. That he was a theatre techie, but not the most recent show he was in. She knew her daughter loved video games, but not her favorite one, that she was into music but not what her favorite band was. Patricia knew that she was a floor nurse, but not the name of the hospital she care gave at.

Her head slid down to rest in her arms. There it remained for close to ten minutes, hiding the fact that tears were forming in her eyes.

The door to the common room then opened, and all eyes turning to watch as three D-class who entered. The one at the front looked rather shell shocked, while the one at the back avoided all eye contact and heading straight to her bunk room. The group that had left for testing that morning had originally consisted of four individuals.

“Oh shit…” Derek whispered. “Jane isn’t back… that makes three so far… What the hell are they doing…”

“I’m sure they are fine, sweetie,” Annette replied. “Probably just a few bumps and bruises. Science can be dangerous, I’ve been told.”

“We’re all going to die down here!” Derek returned. “You don’t kidnap people and force them to help you if it’s just baking soda volcanoes. One by one, we’re all dead.”

All eyes in the common room were now on Derek. A guard was approaching to end the disturbance, but stopped when Derek held up a hand to indicate that he would cool it.

“You might as well say goodbye to everyone now, because when your name comes up on the test list you’re gone,” Derek whispered and then walked off.

Patricia watched him go with a frown, then looked over to the large testing schedule posted on the far wall. Her and five others were scheduled to participate in two days. Patricia looked back at her notepad.

"Any luck so far?" A security guard asked, a warm smile on his face. Patricia shook her head in reply.

"Shame," the guard said with a shrug. "Keep at it though, I'm sure you'll get there."

Another image flashed through Patricia's mind and vanished. She cringed slightly then opened her eyes. She sighed, picked up her pen, and continued to work on the names.

Day 7:

Patricia sat in a metal folding chair in what could best be described as a special kind of shooting range. Along the length of the range were a series of ten alcoves, in six of these were D-class sitting in chairs. At the far end of the range, out of her sight, was a target. A man in a security officer’s uniform was at the other end of the range. Two revolvers and a set of eighteen bullets were spread on the table in front of them. Patricia gave a weak smile and wave to the D-class in the alcove in front of her, a teenage boy, around her son’s age.

“It’s going to be okay…” she said softly to him. The boy gave a sharp nod. "Whats your name?"

"B-blake," he stuttered. Patrica nodded.

"Call me Pat," she replied and then chuckled. "Heh, you know, Blake is my son's name."

The boy gave a soft smile.

"We'll be fine, okay?" Patricia continued. "Understand?"

“Agent Wilson,” a male voice said over the intercom. “Please load the object with the first set of ammunition, and fire at the target.”

Silence filled the room for a few brief minutes, and was then interrupted by six shots fired in slow succession. Patricia opened her eyes and let out an unsteady breath. The boy across the aisle was keeping his eyes tightly closed, and was shaking nervously.

“Agent Wilson,” the voice called again a few minutes later. “Please read the imprints on the second set of ammunition, and load the non-anomalous revolver.”

“Gabriel, Sarah, Theodore, Emily, Blake, and Patricia,” Agent Wilson called out.

Once again the room filled with silence, followed by another six shots in slow succession. Patricia gasped. The boy across the range was crying.

“It’s going to be okay.” Patricia mouthed through her shaking. “It’s going to be okay!”

“Agent Wilson,” the intercom blared a third time. “Please read the imprints on the third set of ammunition, and load the object. Fire at the target again.”

“Gabriel, Sarah, Theodore, Emily, Blake, and Patricia,” Agent Wilson called out yet again.

Patricia and the boy locked eyes in the silence. Then the revolver fired.

Bang.

A muffled yell.

Bang.

A scream.

Bang.

A dull thud.

Bang.

A sharp yelp.

Bang.

Patricia watched as the boy across from her flew backwards, a large hole in his head. His chair tipped over with a loud clatter. Her mouth hung open.

“Oh god…”

Bang.

Patricia felt like a truck had run into her shoulder, and she too was knocked out of her chair. While the pain was immense, she couldn’t make a sound. Instead she stared at the ceiling, wondering what exactly it was that had happened.

Before long, medical personnel were carrying her and three other D-class away in stretchers. Several men and woman in lab coats inspected the contents of the other alcoves, mixed expressions of regret and unease upon their faces. Blood seeped into the main aisle.

"You're going to be alright," a medic said as a team carried Patricia away. "Just a scratch, we'll get you patched up.

This thought lingered on Patricia's mind for awhile. She couldn't hear what the medics around her were saying, though it seemed comforting. Eventually she closed her eyes. Then began to scream from the pain.

Day 13:

Patricia finished her recovery quickly, and had been returned to the D-class quarters as soon as she was deemed medically fit to resume testing. Upon her return she found that the initial crew of 60 was now down to 52. Annette had undergone some test that left her catatonic on her bunk, leaving Patricia and Derek alone at a table as she looked over her list of names.

Husband: Sid, Sebastian, Sean, Dean, Derek, Rick, Rich, Ray, Roy, Roland, Nolan Son: Jeff, Jason, Jacob, Jake, Jack, Mack, Michele, Mitch, Morgan

Bradly, Brice, Blake, Bobby, Robby, Ron, Tom, Tucker Daughter: Cecil, Cierra, Sarah, Sasha, Sandra, Sam, Sally, Sydney

Kaitlyn, Katie, Kara, Lara, Lisa, Lilly, Lana, Leslie

Diane, Anne, Anna, Alana, Alison, Elise, Erica

Jane, Jill, Jesse, Jenifer, June, Juniper, Lilly, Lavender

Maggie, Megan, Margaret, Melissa, Maria, Mary

Sophie, Cindy, Candy, Lilly

She drummed on the pad and paper with a small smile. Two down, one to go.

Bang!

The vision of the D-class boy’s head exploding from a gunshot wound blasted its way to the surface of her consciousness, then just as quickly vanished.

Patricia shook violently, one hand nearly snapping her pen in two, the other clinging to the edge of the table for life. She slowly opened her eyes and relaxed as the thought faded, realizing that Derek had been talking to her the whole time.

“I’m a goner…” Derek finished.

“How’s that?” She asked.

“One way or another, we’re all dead. The experiment they had you help on was a glorified execution. They melted the skin off Haley’s face, and I think Donna said that Annette was basically sucked molecule by molecule into a hole in the wall, then reassembled across the room. You don’t kidnap sixty people, lock them up 2 miles underground, and just let them go…”

Patricia grabbed Derek’s hand and squeezed.

“We’re going to be alright,” she said. “Its just going to take a little luck. We’ll get out.”

Derek scoffed.

“Maybe for you…”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Six of us go into an experiment and all but one of them receive serious, if not fatal, gunshot wounds. Your luck is a step above mine.”

Derek looked at her with tired eyes.

“Can you just… do me a favor?”

Patricia nodded. Derek handed her a folded piece of paper.

“If you do make it out… can you give that to my boyfriend… just some closure…”

“Of course.”

“Thanks,” he replied with a weak smile. He then stood, stretched and walked away. Patricia watched him go with a sad frown and turned back to her list of names. She wearily scanned them and scanned them again. After a while she smiled. At last she remembered her daughter’s name.

"Finally get it?" Dr. Tanner asked with a small grin, they were completing their weekly counseling session.

"I did," she replied excitedly, showing him the name Lilly, circled on her list. "I finally did."

"Oh…" Patricia mumbled as this most recent flash danced out of her mind. She blinked and quietly looked around. Dr. Tanner was approaching the table.

"Afternoon, D-5111," he said. "Care to join me for your counseling session?"

Day 19:

Patricia stood in a largely empty testing chamber with two other D-class. As of two days prior, the last of the pieces had fallen into place within her mindscape, and she recalled who she was, and what it meant to be her.

She recalled her husband, Dr. Nolan Walker, the pediatrician who would sometimes affectionately call her Patty-cakes. She remembered her son, Blake, the theatre technician who had recently been made stage manager. She thought of her daughter, Lilly, and how she’d spend hours in the park near their house playing games on her Gameboy. The puzzle was complete, and she was terrified that it may fall to pieces again.

“All D-class, please pick up one of the candies on the table.”

A feminine voice over the intercom shattered Patricia’s self-reflection, and brought her attention back to the matter at hand. On the table at the center of the room were three bright pink and red hard candies. Patricia looked to the others. One was the tall bald man who had been shocked by a guard on the first day of their confinement. The other was a slender androgynous person with short blond hair. Patricia shrugged and took a candy. The others followed in kind.

“Please consume the candy. Make sure to suck on it, and not bite it or swallow it whole.” The voice instructed over the intercom. The three D-class reluctantly complied. The candy tasted alright. Some kind of berry flavor that eluded certain description. Patricia ran it around the inside of her mouth, only stopping when the entire lozenge was gone. From the confused expressions on the faces of her peers, the other D-class had finished their candy as well.

“I mean… is that it?” The man asked. He looked toward the mirror along the far wall of the room. “Hello? What now?”

“Oh, shit…”

Patricia turned to the androgynous D-class to see them looking at their hands, their eyes wide in fear. Red bumps had begun to rapidly cover their body. Her years of nursing and being married to a pediatrician allowed Patricia recognized it at once. Varicella. She looked to the bald man to see that he too had begun to break out.

“Oh fuck! Jesus Christ!” The man began to scratch at himself furiously, dancing around the room like a marionette. The androgynous D-class was viciously picking at themselves in a corner, screams of pain mixing with screams of terror. Patricia looked down at her hands. She had yet to break out.

“Why not you?” The man shouted and began to cross the room toward her. “What did you do? Why not you?”

The man threw her to the ground before she could say “I don’t know.”

Guards entered the room and quickly subdued the man, escorting both him and the androgynous d-class out of the testing chamber, presumably to quarantine. A woman in a lab coat entered, still writing on her clipboard as she looked Patricia over.

“Immune?” The woman asked as a guard helped Patricia to her feet.

“Vaccinated, y-yes.” Patricia mumbled.

“Interesting…” The woman furiously scribbled on her clipboard. Then looked to the guard. “Take her back to Tanner and tell him we need to have a physical done.”

The guard nodded, and gestured for Patricia to follow him out of the room.

"You've got some luck, I'll give you that," the guard said, leading her back to the D-class dorms. She was covered in a thick paste, the remnants of the previous experiment.

"Guess if you hadn't been standing where you were, you'd have suffocated as well."

Patricia cringed, her hand brushing off a thick paste that was not there. When she opened her eyes she found herself standing in front of an exam room door. The guard gave her a small nod as he watched her pass the threshold.

Day 24:

Patricia and Derek stood within an enclosed clear plastic cage within a grassy field on the surface, along with nine other D-class. This was the final testing of the month for most of them. It was the first time any of them had seen the sun or plant life that entire month. Before them was a fenced in field. A similar cage of clear plastic sat open on the far side.

“Attention All D-Class,” a masculine voice called from an intercom within the cage. “In three minutes the doors to your enclosure will open. At that time, cross the field and enter the enclosure on the other side.”

Patricia felt Derek squeeze her hand.

“We’ll be alright…. Right?”

Patricia nodded. “Yeah… we’ll be alright.”

The door slid down and the D-class began to walk across the field, the enclosure door snapping up behind them. There was a slight breeze and the sun felt warm on their skin. A small, cautious smile came to Patricia’s face.

“So far, so good.”

When they crossed the halfway point of the field, a loud pinging became audible, followed by the sound of a circular saw running. Eleven sets of eyes turned to the source, a hovering disk with a rotating blade around its circumference. A small green eye could be seen watching them from the devices surface. A faded emblem of a falcon was printed below this eye.

“HALT,” the device said in a computerized voice. “RETURN ALONG YOUR PREVIOUS COURSE.”

The D-class looked to one another nervously, then back to the device. One of them, a slender girl no older than twenty, took a step backwards, crossing into the far half of the field. The devices eye turned red and flew forward with a high pitched whine. Patricia blinked. There was a sharp gasp and a splatter of blood. The girl’s upper and lower halves rested in two different locations. The disk flew upwards, taking off a man’s head along the way. The crowd quickly became a mob of yelling, flailing people, each scattering and sprinting towards the open cage at the end of the field.

Patricia and Derek zigged and zagged across the field, the two sticking together and occasionally looking back. The disk took out a man’s legs from under him, sending his upper body sailing backwards. A woman near him tripped on the blood, the device severing her in length wise upon the grass. Patricia snapped her head forward and wheezed as she felt herself losing speed. They were closing in on their destination.

She and Derek then slid to a stop, a young man in front of them who nearly made it into the cage was struck from behind and carried for several yards before splitting in twain. The device then turned and appeared to gaze at the five remaining D-class that stood before it.

“Fuck off man…” Derek nervously laughed.

The disk sprang forward again and the D-class resumed their scattered sprint.

Patricia’s breath was ragged as she closed in on the cage. The sound of screams behind her indicated at least one of her peers was rather unlucky. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Derek sprinting in from the other direction. The whirling of the disk grew louder. Patricia gave one last push with her legs and jumped toward the cage. Derek did the same. She hit the ground with a heavy thud, and turned to see Derek had fallen just short, and was crawling forward as fast as he could. Patricia reached out a hand, grabbing his and began to pull him toward her.

A heavy metallic whine, and a loud bang.

Patricia fell backwards into the cage with Derek’s forearms in her grip, the young man toppling inside with her, the disk colliding outside with the ground.The disk eyed them for several moments, hovering in front of the elevator entrance. Its eye then turned green and it gently floated away.

Derek and her crawled to the back of the cage where the looked out over the nine corpses left behind in the afternoon sun. Eventually Derek began laughing. A shrill nervous laugh. Patricia turned to him to see tears in his eyes, as he gestured to the carnage before them. A few moments later, she began laughing as well. The elevator whined as it carried them back down into the earth.

Upon their arrival in the facility, Derek and Patricia were swarmed by medics. While the two of them could tell that they were being spoken to, their laughing drowned out any incoming stimuli. The two of them were placed on stretchers and carried away, passing a group of horrified looking scientists, some pale with fear, one crying, and a last one being yelled at by a furious man in a suit. Patricia could make out the words "slaughter" and "ethics" between bouts of laughter.

The laughter eventually turned to tears, as Derek and Patricia were carried away to separate exam rooms.

Day 31:

Patricia sat in an exam room, having just finished her exit physical. Her eyes were slightly glazed over as she stared at the floor. Of the 60 D-class that had started in her cohort, only 40 remained to see the final day. Of those, at least 20 had sustained serious physical or mental damage.

Hidden in her shoe was Derek’s note. He maintained that she should hold on to it in the event that something should happen to him on the way out. She doubted it would survive whatever it was that these people did once they wiped her memory, but she promised her friend she would deliver it, and so she had to try. On her lap was the notepad with the list of names.

Dr. Tanner returned to the room, looking at a large folder on his clipboard. There were several small vials held tightly in his other hand. Patricia watched him tiredly. Eventually he placed the clipboard down on a side table and gave her a soft smile.

“Congratulations, D-5111,” he said. “You made it. As we discussed during orientation, we are going to inject you with a chemical compound called an amnestic. It will remove any memory of this month from your mind. Then you’ll be free to go.”

Patricia nodded.

“Powerful stuff.”

“Very,” Tanner replied. “It’s not even the most powerful variety."

He then handed her the folder. Patricia eyed it curiously.

"Whats this?"

"Debriefing," Tanner said with a sigh. "For however brief a time it will be, at the end of each month we present the D-class with summaries of the outcomes of the experiments they participated in. It's a little watered down, and obviously we won't tell you everything. Still, you deserve to know what the sacrifice was for."

Patricia looked through the the folder's contents. A fair amount of it went over her head, she was no scientist, but she managed to get the gist of what was being said. Important discoveries made in such areas as "Anomalous projectile trajectory," "Spontaneous virogenisis," and the capabilities of the "Lanner Series Security Drone."

"Got plans on your release?” Tanner eventually asked when she put the folder down.

“Return to my family…” Patricia said softly. “Hope that I never remember this horrible month again.”

“I can assure you that you will not,” said Tanner as he collected the notepad off her lap. “I’m afraid I’ll need to confiscate this, though.”

Patricia remained silent as she watched Tanner prepare the syringe and clean a spot on her arm. A few seconds later, the various shots had been injected, and Tanner had bandaged the wound.

“So how does this work?” Patricia asked as she rubbed the injection site gently with a finger.

“In about one to five minutes you’ll fall asleep. When you wake up, your memories of the past month will be gone. Pretty simple.”

“Can I ask you a question, then?”

“Shoot.”

“I’m not really going back to my family, am I?”

Dr. Tanner remained silent, he kept his attention on the clipboard on which he was writing.

“I figured as much…” Patricia sighed and laid herself down on the table.

“Humanity thanks you for your service,” Tanner finally answered as Patricia felt her eyelids become heavy.

“Fuck off…” Patricia mumbled, and finally fell asleep.

Dr. Tanner returned to the office he and Morrison shared. Under his arm was a basket of all the items the guards had confiscated from the surviving D-class. He sighed as he sat down at his desk, and began to sort the various paraphernalia. Morrison watched him from her desk across the room.

“Another month, another cohort,” she commented with a sigh. “How’d the recycling go?”

“Survivors are on their cots, awaiting orientation in the morning,” Tanner replied. He placed D-2960’s note in a small Ziploc bag and that was labeled “Notes to D-5111.” An additional six such notes rested in the bag.

“This is, what, twelve consecutive months for 5111?”

“Thirteen…”

Tanner placed Patricia’s notepad into a separate Ziploc labeled “D-5111 lists.”

“I’ve asked the other D-class Wardens,” Morrison continued, “She’s got the old record beat by about five months, it's truly amazing. One of the Ethic's reps is going to be swinging by later. They don’t actually have a protocol in place for when the D-class hit the one-year mark. It's… pretty impressive. Barely a scratch on her.”

Tanner paused and then nodded.

“Do you still have Kerrigan’s extension?”

Morrison froze and rose an eyebrow.

“Yeah… why?”

“Thirteen months as a D-class, barely a scratch on her. I think that warrants an inquiry by someone in Ana-Hums.”

"That still doesn't answer the question," Morrison snickered. "We've had plenty of D's with obscene luck before, you never had Kerrigan's crew look at them until now."

"Well, chances are that D-5111's going to be a little D-class energizer bunny, and keep going and going until the end of time. It's inhumane to keep on trying to feed someone to wolves this long… let alone a mother of two. If she's made into a skip at least, then she's not being prodded into the mouth of an eldritch horror every few days."

"D-5111 has children?" Morrison chuckled. "Huh…"

"Christ, do you even read the D-class files?" Tanner's brow furrowed in disgust.

"Do you?"

"Every last one," Tanner replied sharply. "Those people deserve to have at least one person know their story. Guess that's not you."

Morrison's expression became flat and she sank back into her chair.

"Save me the lecture," she eventually replied. "I've been doing this job for fifteen years. I've seen over two thousand D's come through here. Lots of sob stories. Lots of innocents. Lots of orphaned kids. Lots of widowers and lots of widows. You want to know each one, be my guest. I'll tell you this, though, thats a fine way burn out."

Tanner and Morrison locked eyes for several seconds before Tanner finally shook his head and shrugged.

"Kerrigan's extension?" he asked.

Morrison read the digits out loud and shrugged.

"It's your time to waste, I suppose."

Day 1

D-5111 woke with a sudden jolt, and a splitting headache. As she rapidly blinked, her eyes adjusting to the low light of her environment, she took the time to look around. She was dressed in an orange jumpsuit. She was lying on the bottom bunk in what appeared to be some kind of dorm, the room packed with bunks and about 20 other terrified looking women. Already the room was filling with panicked voices, shouting, and crying. The noise made D-5111 realize she had no idea who or where she was…