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Sunset District, Territory of the Free Partners of Utop, Los Angeles Realm of North America
Thursday, March 16, 2090
I dangled upside-down, arms roped to my sides, my skull suspended six feet above the grimy concrete floor of the Vipers’ drug factory. The blood pooling in my head and the burned plastic fumes had me wheezing and delirious.
In that haze, I pictured a rainy morning: Dad, Mom, and Kira stooped by my grave. Without me, they worked late nights to keep our repair shop afloat, only to lose everything to the Vipers—and end up begging in the streets. My throat tightened as an even darker image struck—my family huddled in a filthy alleyway, infected with Kebola, lying in a puddle of their own blood. Dead.
Ella. Enough. Those visions would become reality if I didn’t find a way to scheme the Vipers into granting me an extension on my debt. But my drug-fried brain couldn’t focus, too distracted by the bone-wrenching pain of being strung up by my ankles.
The surrounding chaos fought for what little attention I had left. Barrels rolled in lines like ants, their rusty AI-powered wheels groaning. A horde of Vipers roamed the factory, some dumping buckets of white powder into industrial mixing drums, all suited in black hazmat gear and skull-shaped gas masks, their red eyes glowing and twin hoses snaking from their mouths, making them look like grim reapers orchestrating humanity’s destruction.
Forked tongue flapping, Zee scraped the ground with a barbed baseball bat. The same one that crippled Dad in 2078. My weird photographic memory pushed a vivid replay of the night the Vipers crushed Dad’s knees, his quivering chin and shriek as the bat connected. Him wincing after each step for the past twelve years. His easy laughter dulled by his lost pride as Mom and I took over his workload. Unlike Dad whose knees got busted by the Vipers, mine were out of batting range. But not my face.
Zee’s slit pupil contact lenses and full-body tattooed snake scales signaled his lieutenant rank. “Mayron isn’t a patient man, Ella.”
Maybe Zee could be fooled into believing I needed more time to sell the pills—it was my first deal after all. I willed an impish grin. “Thanks for the pep talk, but I can sell H faster when I’m not tied up.” My voice came out rough—the factory’s fumes having sandpapered my vocal cords, chain-smoker-style.
Zee remained aloof as he snatched a gutting knife from the steel table and stepped closer. At his height, his slit pupils reached my upside-down face. “Such a 3D star look—smooth skin … cute nose … blowjob lips. Sucks if something bad messed that up.”
Sweat drenched my blouse and dripped down my throat and face, so much I had to shut my eyes to avoid perspiration from burning them.
Something screeched like a fork on a plate, and I flinched.
Through my blinking, sweat-burned eyes, I caught a blurry silhouette closing in on me: a lanky, green-skinned henchman.
Zee.
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Ly Ann
The Author and The Psychologist
Ly Ann has a Ph.D. in psychology and works as a clinician to offer children and adults neuropsychological assessments and individual psychotherapy.
You can talk to her on Twitter @lyann888.
Click below to learn more about her journey and see pictures of her.
