Right Instead of Left

Vera usually kept quiet, but tonight Marigold’s elaborate fantasy of metamorphism into a mosquito made her erupt with laughter. Marigold had been interned on Serapis for stealing and consuming nearly a gallon of O-positive from a blood bank on Earth.

Vera noticed Loy suppress a smile before narrowing his eyes and commanding, “Vera, enough.” Loy’s day job was maintenance. Hoping to be promoted to medic, he volunteered to lead therapy sessions.

The glimpse of his subtly curved lip and use of her birth name intrigued her. Until that moment, she had considered guards to be robotic conduits of the Coping Agency, deftly proselytizing the Ten Principles of Recovery.

At the end of the session, instead of taking her place at the front of the line, Vera circled the room—guiding her wall-fastened umbilicus along its track like a leash until she stood at the back.

Ward 11 Mother Annie appeared in the window of the therapy door, ready to collect the group. Loy pressed his finger to the needle prick on the security pad to authorize the door to open. Untethered by an umbilicus, he freely took his position at the back of the line behind Vera.

“Number 1, you’re out of order!” Annie barked at Vera before sighing. “Oh, forget it.”

The dozen inmates stepped left, being careful not to snag each other’s umbilici.

“Troublemaker,” Loy murmured as Vera exited, his breath warm on her neck.

The group marched to the atrium—humming with mothers and patients coming from the cafeteria, recreation center, and therapy wings.

The group entered the cell block, then stopped. Their path was obstructed by a new patient who had overshot her ward’s entrance. Her mother struggled to detach the rogue patient’s umbilicus via the extraction slat. She quickly gave up, muttering that the inmate “would have to learn the hard way,” as she led the girl backwards.

Vera watched the uninitiated’s saucer eyes recede into the doorway of her ward.

The group proceeded to their ward and waited while Annie pricked her finger.

“Number 2!” she ordered once inside—scowling at Vera.

Number 2, Marigold, pricked her finger on her cell’s keypad.

“Number 3!”

The women entered their chambers until only Vera remained.

“And finally, Number 1,” Annie snickered.

Vera presented her finger and disappeared into her room. She looked out through her cell window, and as Loy exited the ward his eyes met hers for a second too long.

In the cafeteria the next morning, Annie capped her wards’ umbilici with one-way nutrition valves. She watched closely as each patient attached their valve to the food dispensing tubes in the center of the table.

Annie left to eat with the other mothers. Vera felt rendered, lab-grown meat enter her stomach through the tube.

“I saw the way Loy looked at you last night,” Marigold said to Vera.

Number 3, Abigail, giggled.

“Is that so?” Vera asked.

“I wish he would look at me that way,” Marigold continued. “What I wouldn’t give for a taste of that sweet-scented blood of his.”

In the following weeks, Loy became increasingly distracted by Vera during therapy. Without his guidance, the group devolved into verbal chaos between the marginally rational patients and the outright insane.

Marigold, in particular, was prone to outbursts, reliving her blood theft escapade with aroused hysteria.

Friday night, the group waited for Annie to lead them to the weekend film showing. When it was Marigold’s turn to get in line, she sank to the floor like a disgruntled toddler and refused to get up.

Upon her arrival, Annie was livid. She ordered Loy to restrain Marigold while she detached her umbilicus for transfer to solitary.

Annie detached Marigold’s tube too early, and when Loy crouched down to apply vacuum cuffs to her wrists, she bucked forward and headbutted him.

As he swayed in agony, Marigold tackled him to the ground and plunged her teeth into his neck. Loy screamed as Marigold wrapped her limbs around his torso and sucked.

Annie wasted no time—she pressed the alarm on her wrist pad and drew the tasing spear from her belt. Annie touched the taser’s tip to Marigold’s buttocks and she collapsed onto the floor—jerking uncontrollably while frothing spittle.

Annie bent over Marigold and retrieved her own cuffs, expertly applying them as they released a puff of air and shrank into place.

“Number 1!” Annie beckoned. “Apply pressure to Loy’s wound!”

Vera knelt down and put her hands over the crude holes in Loy’s throat. Blood spattered out—his eyelids fluttered.

“Help me,” Loy croaked.

Annie tore a swatch of cloth from her sleeve and tossed it to Vera. Vera bunched it up and held it against Loy.

The therapy door opened.

Two medics entered, followed by two guards. The medics pushed Vera aside and applied a vacuum tourniquet to Loy’s throat.

As Loy was lifted onto a stretcher, the guards applied a sedation valve to Marigold and yanked her to her feet.

The party left the room—Loy and his attendants first, followed by Marigold and her captors, and finally, Annie.

“Wait here!” Annie commanded as the grim procession made its way down the hall.

The door closed.

Vera, still clutching the blood-soaked rag, bolted to the door. She peered through the window to see Annie round the corner out of sight.

Vera looked at the rag, and a radical idea struck her.

She balled the rag in her fist and pressed it to the needle on the door’s keypad.

The door shot open.

“Vera, no!” Abigail whispered.

Vera walked through the doorway and into the hallway. The door closed.

She turned back to see the ten remaining inmates, nervously watching her through the window.

In the corridor, Vera moved right instead of left for the first time.