“I know it already looks clean, but I’ve been charged with the task of making the tiles as reflective as mirrors. All of them.”

            “Why?” she asked.

            He shrugged. “Because I have the nasty habit of getting myself into trouble…”

​

“You’ve got a real nasty habit you seem to have picked up, K,” the captain said eyeing N-2-12 impassively.

“Only one?” he said in a slight growl.

“Disobedience. Things would be extraordinarily different for you if you just learned to submit like all the other slaves.”

“But I’m not like other slaves,” K stated. “Am I?”

 

After six hundred years of slavery, most Hy-Mun are submissive in their position as slaves to the Alte-Ra. Not so for K-11-7-4. It’s his eighth transport aboard the train, The RASTABAN, which is abnormal. Then again, nothing about K follows the norm. From his bad habit of sassing his superiors, to the way he picks fights to defend other slaves, it’s no wonder he’s been traded so many times.

But K suffers from more than just delinquency. He has blanks in his memory, and they’re driving him insane. It doesn’t help that he’s been having strange and horrific dreams. Now, there’s some girl in his head calling for him to find her. So, when a possible chance of escape presents itself, he’s torn.

            Does he stay put to face the torturous punishment for his latest defiant act? Or does he take the risk he’s convinced is suicidal?