Classified: A New Life

Prologue: Day 7,118

Name: Emory Mason

DOB: 21/07/2002

CIN: D14R5721

Citizen Lifestyle Assignment Sorting and Sectioning (CLASS)

Result: Little

Emory stares at the letter in disbelief.

She feels numb.

Hollowed out.

She's always been good at hiding it, making the profilers say whatever she wants them to say. It's not hard, the questions are pretty straightforward, the answers easy to manipulate.

Or at least, they had been until now.

Her eyes burn, tears welling up, making the letter impossible to read--not that it matters now anyway. She'd been a fool to think she could manipulate the results of the most comprehensive, and thorough personality test ever conceived.

Although, she thinks, there was more to this test than the basic questionnaire she'd filled out every year at school. Those had been simple things, designed to help the teacher understand their class. The actual CLASS exam had been a different beast altogether. There'd been bloodwork, physical ability tests, cognitive assessments...much more than she'd been expecting.

She's always done well in school, and although she's no athlete; she's too small and underweight to really be able to participate in sports, she likes to think she's in good shape.

But in the end, it's the bloodwork that has given her away, her body has betrayed her in ways she hadn't anticipated--enzymes and hormone levels can't be fabricated, not without drugs, and a positive drug test before Classification is an immediate prison sentence.

"No..." Emory whispers quietly. Her life is ending. All her careful answers to the questionnaires, all the effort she'd put into studying and getting good grades to get into a good university...all wasted.

Her parents will disown her--they've made no secret of their hatred for Littles, they see them as inferior, a drain on the resources of society. All her friends are either Neutrals or Caregivers, but all the Caregivers are spoken for, and none of the Neutrals are at a point in their life where they can foster her until she finds a permanent placement. The only other Caregiver she knows is her roommate, Melody, but Melody's never said anything about having a little, so that might not be an option either--she might not even want one...

Emory might be able to continue her university education, but not without a Caregiver to sponsor her, and she certainly won't be able to live unsupervised, like the adult she's so desperately worked to become.

"No!" She howls, and crumbles the letter into a tiny ball.

Not that it matters, not really, every Federal, State, and Local agency already has her classification on file--the letter is really just a formality. She's had her phone on silent, delaying the inevitable as long as possible until now, but she can't hide from the results anymore.

That realization is like a sucker punch, knocking the breath from her lungs and tying her stomach into an anxious, aching knot.

She flops bonelessly onto the sofa, hugs a pillow to her chest, and sobs. The weight of her despair is crushing, the ache of her dreams being shattered winds around her chest like a band, squeezing the life out of her.

Emory fumbles for her phone, crying and shaking so badly that she can barely dial the number she needs.

"Hey, Emmy, I just got done at work, is everything okay?"