The Expiry Date

Chapter 1

The man is looking me right in the eye , his gun is positioned on my forehead.

He wants to kill me.

He will kill me . And I will be reduced to a pale , expressionless statue with blood pooling around her. And my metal arm will be my only epitaph, passed down to another unfortunate human being on the way to his or her doom. But my biggest and only regret  will be dying before my expiry date.

The tip of the cold barrel presses further into my forehead. I'm going to die.

"Cor wake up"

"Cor it's time we leave."

"COR !"

I open my eyes and find Lem standing above  me " Wake up princess" He says tossing a set of grey clothes on my head. " Where are we going ? I've hardly slept." I groan as I drag myself from the cot and crawl to the bathroom. The shower fortunately has warm water which washes away all the dirt , grease , oil and stars know what else and since I'm a mechanic it could be almost anything . " We're going to Magistra  Alietris's mansion to deliver the weapons and the rebus screen." 

I can't help but sigh, another mansion. More torture. More glares but more ration to keep us alive until our expiry dates. I look at my pallid complexion and at the black tattoo on my neck it says ' LSWM 13890 DATE: 24. 12.150E.A' . It has everything about me , my number ( there are no names in our world), my district,  occupation and of course my expiry date . 

I come out of the bathroom and find Lavi asleep on her cot and Lem stacking white boxes and wrapping them with a cloth and encasing them in a Sbox. " Awake all night wasn't she ?" I ask pointing at her direction as I code the Sbox . "Yup so were you last night ." Lem says looking at me with affection. "You should try doing that, since you appreciate our night time work so much." I say smirking in his direction as he bends down to pick up the Sbox .

" Whatever." He rolls his eyes, Lem works pretty hard but never misses sleep , I on the other hand can go without sleeping for two days. Like I did two days ago . 

Lem is waiting outside with the Sbox smiling at the car waiting for us . "Seriously ? A car what are we delivering Lifesols?"  "Apparently she values her weapons. A lot. " Lem says settling into the car , I follow him inside the posh thing. I think we would be the first cyborgs to have this luxury. 

The driver like us is a Cy and starts the car without further ado silently taking us to hell. ]

I glance outside it's not very glamorous , factories , worker's quarters , a few ration depots, warehouses and a few dying trees and all of it in  depressing shades of grey  , black and white. I look at myself , I'm wearing a grey shirt with sleeves rolled up, black pants and lace up boots. I belong to this place with my white skin , stark clothing , black hair , grey eyes and my metallic forearm. 

I am in awe of the Magistra's house it is as big as the building we live in and there are fifty of us in our building and only one crazy lady here. Unlike it's surroundings the house is painted red. Lem and I look at each other conveying our amusement and disgust at the house through our eyes. We are led in by a polished white door into a white hallway. It is so white that it hurts my eyes,  What is wrong with this woman ? Can't she have normal choices like the rest of us ? Well she can't because she is a Hu and we are Cys .  

We come to a purple door at the end of the hallway and Lem opens the door exposing us to the horrors within.