Breeders

1

I wake suddenly to the sound of my sister crying.  I sit up slowly and look over at the corner of the room where she is huddled against the wall sobbing, softly.

I push the covers off myself and tiptoe towards her.  I already know why she's crying. My sister, Maribel, is crying. Her friend has just come of age to become a breeder. She was taken this morning. It still seems like only yesterday we were all playing tag in the meadow beside our house, so innocent and young.  But now they're being forced into doing disgusting, creepy things with perverted men twice their age. 

I gently sit down next to her and put my arms around her in a hug. We sit there like that comfortably for a while in silence, until she sits up and eventually stops crying. "You okay?" I smile at her, wiping the tears off her damp cheeks. "Yeah." She sniffs, standing up and waling over to her small single bed.

We have a small house. Most the houses in our town are small, however ours seems even smaller than the rest of them. We only have three rooms in our house, the smallest belonging to my sister and I, It has hardly enough space to fit two beds in, but somehow we managed to get them both in. The largest room in the house is our living, and kitchen area. It's where my mother spends most of her time. Our town is quiet poor so my mother always cooks hearty meals for everyone, as most people have no food and even if they did, would have no idea how to cook it.  She goes to the market and gives out plates full of stew or pie. The people love her for this, and she's become a sort of idol for our town. 

Occasionally, she'll get hassled by some of the men who live here, she's a retired breeder which means she is still beautiful. There are only a few breeders who live here, my mother being one of them.  A young women called Rita was a breeder until she caught one of the many diseases we get here.  She was cured, however the governers no longer wanted her because she was "Not beautiful enough any more." She looked exactly the same. At one point, Rita became very poor and couldn't afford any food or anything for a while. After a while she started getting a lot more money. We were all confused for a while, until I heard the men talking at the market. She'd gone into prostitution. I think that's why the men are so interested in my mother nowadays, I think they'll hope she wants a little extra money that they'll be able to provide. 

I follow my sister over to her bed, and lay down on top of the grey, canvas sheets next to her.  I look over at her golden, blonde hair falling delicately around her face, her beautiful face. She has her eyes closed but I can still picture them,  deep, ocean blue.

She's only my half sister. We have the same mother, except Mari's father was a Breeder, mine's not, this makes me an illegal person and if anyone finds this out we'll all be killed. Mari's birth was planned. The government forced my mother to have a child with a man she hardly knew, a man who was deemed 'Perfect' by the government. I guess that's why she's so beautiful.

Sometimes I envy her, she's always the one who was noticed by the boys, everyone even. I was just her unattractive older sister. Even so, I could never not love her. She was never that into boys, and when I felt bad about anything she would always hug me. 

I shift closer towards her and put my arms around her again. They were probably going to take her away from me soon, to become a Breeder like her friend.  There was nothing I could do to stop them. I had to protect her though. I had to find a way to stop them from taking her. I had to create a plan in three days, the three days before her sixteenth Birthday.