Chapter six
After nine days the memory stamp was wearing off, and now Sam could recall almost everything that had happened to her since she'd arrived here, and some of it made her very angry. The one thing that she hated the most was that she had been violated! And not only that, the doctor had just informed her that she was pregnant!
"You had no right to do that to me!" Sam screamed, thrashing on the examining table. She was bound to it, otherwise she would have probably throttled Dr. Frasier and her assistant without even a second thought.
"You came to this facility illegally. You passed yourself off as something you are not; I could tell after the first hour that you weren't really a doctor. Then you were given an opportunity to serve one of our most esteemed leaders, and you threw that opportunity back in her face."
"But you don't understand. It's true I don't belong here. I'm from an alternate reality," Sam told her in a pleading voice. She hadn't intended to tell anyone the truth, but now she felt she had no other alternative. She was being used as a guinea pig in a genetics experiment, and Jack was….well, she wasn't sure where he was anymore. All she knew was that she had to find him and get out of there!
"Honey, I've heard a lot of excuses before, but I have to admit THAT one takes the cake!" Janet said, laughing. "Now, I want you to get some rest."
"But I don't want to rest! I want to go home!" Sam yelled, struggling uselessly. The doctor quickly injected something into Sam's arm.
"There. I've given you something to help you relax. I can't have you hurting yourself and that precious embryo you're carrying."
"Janet, please," Sam sobbed as the drug took effect. Sam felt her eyelids getting heavy, and then she fell into a dream-filled sleep.
***In her dream she was giving birth in a room enclosed by glass windows, and outside the room people were lined up to watch. Among them stood a man whose face she could not see, but she knew instinctively that he was her baby's father. Sam struggled to get off the delivery table, to run to him, to beg him to help her. She didn't want the birth of her child to be like a sideshow at some sick carnival! But she couldn't stop what was happening, and Janet….this warped copy of her lost friend.…just kept yelling at her to push. Suddenly Sam heard a baby crying, and even though she tried, she couldn't see it. Instead she saw a woman carrying a small bundle from the room, and then Sam couldn't hear her baby crying anymore. Her child had been taken away from her, while she lay there unable to prevent it. She felt heart-sick and devastated.***
Sam woke up in a cold sweat to find herself in a small, quiet bedroom, tucked into a clean, comfortable bed. She was no longer restrained, and so she got up and went to the door, padding over to it in her bare feet. To her surprise the door was unlocked, so she opened it a few inches and peeked out. In the next room there were three young women, and they were sitting at a table eating and talking quietly. These were not the same women she'd shared a room with the previous few nights, and a part of Sam wondered what had happened to those women. But she didn't dwell on them for long, as the dark haired one turned and saw Sam.
"Hey there, sleepy head! Come and eat your breakfast before it gets cold," she said, gesturing to Sam with one hand.
Sam went over and sat down at the table where there was a covered plate of food, which apparently was intended for her.
"My name is Samantha. Who are you?" Each woman took a turn introducing herself. The brunette's name was Charlotte, the middle one was named Rosa, and the youngest woman's name was Amie.
After introductions, Sam dug into her breakfast, and soon she had eaten every last bite. She also emptied the big glass of milk provided for her.
"It looks like someone's eating for two," Charlotte observed in a sing-song voice, laughing at Sam. The other two women joined in.
It was then that Sam first noticed their swollen bellies. She seemed to be in some sort of housing for pregnant women. Sam was in shock. She had gone, almost overnight, from being a soldier and a scientist to being nothing more than a baby-making machine in some sick, twisted experiment intended to rob men of their masculinity!
"Yes, I guess I am," Sam agreed. It still seemed strange to think of herself as pregnant, although a part of her was beginning to like the idea. But even so, she had more pressing matters on her mind right now, and the main one was locating Jack.
"Say, do you know what happened to Chairwoman Jennings' male servant? I heard he was dismissed."
"Which one? She's had five in just the past year," Charlotte told her, rolling her eyes. The other two women giggled appreciatively.
"They usually get assigned as a slave to someone else, or they get sent to the mines when no one wants them anymore," Rosa informed her.
"Or, if they're handsome, young and fertile, they're chosen to donate sperm, so that we can make beautiful babies!" Amie cried, obviously happy with her situation. Sam noticed that the other two women also looked pleased, a fact that made Sam's blood boil. These women's rights had been taken away, and yet they acted like they were perfectly fine with it!
"Why do you ask?" Charlotte asked Sam, her expression one of concern.
"Oh, it's not really important. It's just that I'm a friend of his… his sister," she said, quickly adjusting her story to fit the norms of this anti-male society.
"Well, you can be sure he was dealt with fairly. General Taylor uses the mines only as a last resort," Charlotte assured her.
Sam was glad to hear that, although she wasn't certain it was the truth. And what kind of mines were they? So far no one had been able to tell her.
"What kind of ore do they get from the mines?" she asked curiously. The three looked at her as thought she had two heads.
"How should we know? It's not our place to ask such questions. Surely you know that," Rosa admonished her. Sam thought all the women here seemed to be living in denial, or they were just plain stupid, but of course she didn't say so.
"So tell me, what are the rules around this place? Are we allowed to leave here?"
"Yes, we can go anywhere on this level we want, and we can go down to the lab by ourselves for our checkups once a week," Charlotte informed her.
"And once a week we get to go topside to sit in the sun!" Amie exclaimed with childlike enthusiasm.
Sam smiled at her, but her heart wasn't in it. She didn't see how this young woman could be so happy under these circumstances. They were prisoners; couldn't they see that?
Soon a female servant came in and picked up all the dirty dishes, while the women moved about the room, each choosing something different to pass the time. Amie sat at a computer, playing games; Charlotte was crocheting something using soft pink yarn; and Rosa was strumming an acoustic guitar and singing softly. Before the servant left the room, Sam asked for and received a cup of herbal tea. She sipped it slowly, while she listened to Rosa's songs. Soon she found herself near to tears.
Even though the songs were intended to be romantic ballads, they seemed sad and only added to Sam's feeling of hopelessness…both for herself and for these women and their babies. Not one of them knew who the father of her child was, and not one of the children would ever have a relationship with his or her father. It was just so unfair and horrible that Sam became even more determined to escape. Even if she couldn't get to Jack, she was going to get back home somehow. Maybe then a contingent of marines could be sent to rescue him. But first she needed to get out of here and find Merlyn's device!
That afternoon Sam announced she was going for a stroll, when in reality she intended to do much more than that. To her disappointment, one of her new friends insisted on going along. But after she thought about it for a minute, Sam decided she didn't mind if Amie went along, since she thought it might make her snooping appear more innocent.
"Amie, how do you get to the medical lab for your physical, if you don't have a pass key for the elevator?"
"Oh, that's easy! We just use the stairs! They're right back there," she said, pointing.
"Show me!" Sam thought that maybe she'd do a little exploring downstairs today too, and she thought it would look less suspicious if she took along a friend. What she really wanted to do was go down to the isolation lab. So when they got to the stairwell door, she opened it and stepped through.
"Samantha, you can't go down there until it's time for you to see Dr. Frasier," Amie said, looking very nervous.
"Why not? What harm would it do? I just want to see if there are any babies in the nursery. You'd like to see them too, wouldn't you, Amie?" Sam asked, guessing this might be a topic that would entice the younger woman.
"Yes, I would, but…"
"Then come on!" Sam took Amie's hand and pulled her along, descending the flight of metal stairs. But when Sam reached the second level down, she stopped and tried the door that led into the corridor where the isolation labs were located. It was unlocked.
"Samantha, no!" Amie squeaked, but Sam put a finger over her lips and shushed her.
"I just wanna take a quick peek in here," she said as she grabbed Amie's hand and tugged. "If you come with me, I promise we'll go see the babies next," Sam swore.
"Okay, but if we get caught, I'll tell them this was all your idea," Amie threatened.
"That's fine with me," Sam assured her. "Just be quiet and don't touch anything."
Amie followed along behind Sam, and soon they were standing at the door to the lab where Sam and Jack had arrived in this reality. As expected, Sam found that this door was locked.
"You can't get in there," Amie whispered. Then she watched in awe silence as Sam removed a fork from her pants pocket.
Sam bent some of the tines back and used the others to pick the lock, which was the old-fashioned tumbler type. On that the very first day, when she realized that getting back into the room might take some cunning and ingenuity, she had been thankful to see this old style lock on the door. Soon Sam had the door open, and she was stepping inside the room. The device still sat in the middle of the room, exactly where she had left it. Amie hung back in the doorway, trembling noticeably.
"Amie! Come inside and shut the door!" Sam hissed at her. When the girl didn't move, Sam went over and jerked her inside. Realizing she might have been too rough with the girl, she spoke to her in a soothing voice.
"It's okay, honey. I promise we won't get into trouble," she lied. "This thing belongs to me; I have a right to touch it," she explained, telling her at least a part of the truth. "Now stay right here! I won't be more than five minutes," Sam whispered. The frightened girl didn't say a word, but her eyes were as big as saucers, and Sam could tell that she was scared to death.
Sam quickly and expertly examined the device to make sure it hadn't been damaged, or that no part of it had been removed. Once she was certain that it was in the same condition as when she left it, Sam told the young woman that they could go. And after re-locking the door to the room, they made their way down two more floors to the infirmary level, where they easily located the nursery.
Sam and Amie stood facing the big wall of windows, looking in at the only occupants of the baby nursery. Sam was surprised to discover that the only two babies present were not infants at all. In fact, they were obviously over a year old!
"Awww, aren't they cute!" Amie exclaimed.
"Yes, they are. But I wonder why they're still here? Why aren't they with their mothers?" Sam asked aloud, as she watched the two babies playing inside a large play pen. It sat in the center of the room which also held several cribs and isolettes.
A voice behind the two women startled them.
"Because, sad to say, they are the results of failed experiments," Janet told them.
Sam was startled to see her, and for a few seconds she felt guilty that she had been snooping around. …until she reminded herself that this wasn't her friend. Her Janet would never have involved herself in something like this.
"But what about their mothers?" Sam didn't want to believe that their mothers had abandoned them, or that society in general had turned its back on them. What kind of sick place was this?
"You've met them. Charlotte and Rosa are their mothers."
"But I don't understand. Why aren't they raising their children?" Sam really didn't understand. Didn't they realize how important it was for a child to have a nurturing relationship with its mother?
"Their mothers are part of our program, and as such they have no responsibilities, other than to the babies they are presently carrying."
"You said these two children are the result of failed experiments. What did you mean by that?" Sam asked. Amie just stood behind Sam, clutching at her arm and looking positively petrified with fear.
"They've already showing signs of aggression, which is the one thing we thought we had prevented."
"What will happen to them?" Sam asked.
"I'm not certain. Male children are usually raised on farms, until they're old enough for jobs that require more brawn than brains, or for entertainment or breeding. All I know for certain is I can't very well go on caring for them here in the lab," Janet replied, looking through the glass at the two boys, who were playing with and chewing on the various toys at their disposal. The petite doctor tapped on the glass, smiled and waved at them. The boys looked up and smiled back at her. Then they began to babble and reach toward her with their tiny arms, as they begged for her attention. Janet put her hand flat against the glass, as if she wanted to touch them.
Sam recognized the look of affection on Janet's face, and she knew without a doubt that the woman had become fond of the boys.
"Maybe YOU should keep them," Sam suggested.
"Me? I can't do that! How would I get any work done?"
"Where I come from women not only have jobs outside the home, they also have children…and husbands," Sam told her.
"Oh, yes, I forgot; you're from an alternate reality," Janet said, smirking at Sam. Amie's eyes nearly bugged out of her head.
"Yes, I am. And I'd be happy to tell you all about my world…share technology with you, medicines, whatever you want, if you'll just help me get back home," Sam implored.
"A few days ago, I would have said you were crazy, but now I'm not so sure. Come with me."
TBC