Capture

Chapter 3: Process

Chapter 3: Process 

I never looked up at her, rather I stared at the table the whole time she interrogated me, and I never said a word. I didn't have anything to hide but still my small act of defiance was comforting my need for control of a situation out of my hands.

"Don't worry," the Natural woman said, holding my gaze until I dropped it to my hands. "We will find you your mate eventually."

I stayed quiet and twisted the plastic bracelet again.

"Well," she said, placing her hands loudly on the wooden table before pulling out a folder from her stack. "Shall we get started?"

I glanced up at, with what I hoped was a neutral expression. She was smiling at me with the open folder in her hands.

"So you are in fact Human Youth 626874187, is that correct?" She asked.

I held up the hand with the bracelet, the numbers encircled themselves. Honestly, we weren't around for the new identification numbers. Those came after the Exposure and after Mom...

"And you, and fellows Human Adult 626874189 and Human Youth 626874188, avaided Placement, yes or no?"

I stilled and thought. She already knew these answers. They had to have been written in the file in front of her since we had been discovered and pulled from underneath the house. What purpose did she have?

I sat up from my sloughed position and forced my shoulder blades into the back of the chair. Raising my head, saw her enhanced stare, and I understood. She was assessing me. Was I a leader, a positional problem for the Natural's rankings and someone that needed to be watched carefully? Or a follower, submissive and all but ready to reenter Natural society? My answers didn't matter. The facts didn't matter. I was all in how I said them.

The less of a problem I seemed, the less security was risked upon me escaping. I returned to my earlier position and nodded and shook meekly at all the right times.

The Natural slapped the folder back together and handed it back to the guard.

"Travis? Could you ready Camilla? From Sampling and Processing?" She called out to him.

Strangely enough she didn't turn or even glance in the male's direction. Her eyes glared down at me from across the table with hostility that came sudden for me when the guard let the room. Adrenaline was easy to come by in this building and the Natural tautly smiled when she smelt my fear.

I'd been apart of this Natural game before. She wasn't allowed to harm me unless I tried something, but scaring and intimidating humans was grade-A entrainment not even the higher ups in Placement could resist.

With another glare in my direction, she told Travis to grab another to help him, along with ordering me evaluations: mental and physical as if it was to punish me.

Two separate doctors that I was dragged to, with a brute on each arm and the toes of my sneakers rubbing the linoleum. I was a flight risk, but I was more appt to find a way to sneak out than use force.