The Dying

21

"Mother, Marcus," Margaret smiles seeing her mother laughing. Her smile drops as she remembers the reason why she came in here. "The woman that Marcus was supposed to take as wife? You need to listen to her and her mother. Marcus, you will need to do something about it." By the time she finishes she is wiping away tears.

"What is it, Margaret?" Aurora asks with some alarm. Margaret doesn't get very emotional and although the pregnancy has increased that it still isn't like her to cry like that.

"Please let me bring them in and they can tell you their story themselves. Her name in Felicia." Margaret tells them. They hadn't known her name and so they nod and told her that they would listen to Felicia and her mother.

Margaret ushers in not just Felicia and her mother, but two more children, a girl that looks to be about eleven years old and a boy that looks to be about eight or so. The mother is heavily pregnant as well.

"Hello, Margaret says that you have something we need to hear." Marcus welcomes them after Margaret introduces them to each other.

When no one says anything Aurora decides to start things off. "How is it that you were sent here when you had a child already?" This had bothered her. She doesn't like the thought that family would so easily send off other family members.

"I was married young. We were very happy, but since I was from a poor family and he was from money, they didn't like me. They tried buying me off, said that I was holding him back and that if I loved him I would leave him. I went to him in tears and tried to leave him. I loved him so much that I only wanted him to be happy.

"When he demanded to know why I was leaving I told him what his family said. He became furious. Refused to even talk to his family after that. We were doing fine, he finished school and got a job that made good money. I was about half way done with my schooling when I found out that I was pregnant with Felicia. Due to complications I had to go to online schooling and she managed to come out with out any problems.

"I somehow managed to finish my degree and take care of my daughter when my husband was killed. His family decided that since he was dead that I and my child should be sent here and they bribed the officials to take us even though I was able to fully support myself and my daughter.

"Felicia was four when we left."

"What about your family?" Marcus asks gently. He does his best to calm Aurora down. He too is upset at the woman's family doing that to her.

"My family died before Felicia was born. Even if they hadn't they wouldn't have been able to stop me from being sent here. They vowed to destroy me and they did. I found out they were behind the death of my husband. Although I was the actual target, my husband used my car that they had paid someone to tamper with. I was the one that was supposed to go off the cliff not him."

"That's not why I wanted you to hear their story, though. Monica, tell them about the journey here." Margaret tells them after Monica's astounding revelation.

"Please, we can't do anything if we don't know what we should do something about." Aurora says unhappily knowing that Margaret wouldn't have brought them to their attention if it wasn't something important.

"We were forced, not asked, to be impregnated when we came on board. We were told that we could either do it through artificial insemination or they would choose one of the males, either crew or those that were being sent like us, to have sex with us. They would choose, not us.

"If we told them we wanted to be inseminated they made sure that we were taken care of and once it was proven that we were indeed with child they would leave us alone. If we refused that option then we found ourselves drugged and with a male in our beds the next morning.