Suppressant Failure

The hydroponics bay hummed with the low drone of circulation pumps and the soft hiss of nutrient misters. Niesa Dray wiped her hands on her thighs and checked the pH levels on the third tank again. The readings were stable. They had been stable for the last several checks. She adjusted the flow valve anyway.

Her shift ended soon. Twelve minutes, maybe less.

That cold knot in her stomach had been there since morning, a tightness that no amount of methodical work could loosen. She had told herself it was nothing. The suppressant vials were hidden well, tucked behind a loose panel in her quarters where no one would look. Safe for two years. They would be safe now.

But she had checked them nearly a week ago. Six days was a long time in the damp of the lower tunnels.

The shift-change bell rang. Niesa set down her tools with exaggerated care, wiped down her station, and signed out on the wall terminal. Her fingers moved automatically. The knot pulled tighter.

She took the long way back to her quarters, through the main corridor where the overhead lights were brighter and the air was drier. Couples passed her, some walking arm in arm, others with the easy familiarity of shared quarters. A few women wore the loose tunics that marked them as night-roster. They moved differently, she had noticed. There was a confidence in their stride, an openness that she had always told herself she did not want.

Her door sealed shut behind her, and she stood in the small space that was hers alone. The room was six strides long and four wide. A cot, a locker, one small shelf. The panel she had pried loose two years ago.

Her hands were steady as she crossed to the wall. She knelt, worked her fingers into the gap, and pulled. The panel came free with a scrape of old adhesive.

The vials were there. Her last supply. Three of them.

The first one she touched was wrong. Not the smooth, cool glass she expected. It was tacky. She lifted it into the light.

A thin film of moisture coated the surface. Inside, the clear liquid had gone cloudy. A faint sediment swirled at the bottom. She grabbed the second vial, then the third. Same result. All of them. Cloudy. Ruined.

The moisture from the walls had seeped in somehow. The seal had failed. The suppressant had degraded.

Niesa sat back on her heels and stared at the vials in her palm. Her mind went blank for a long moment. Then the calculations started. No more suppressant. No way to get more. The colony controlled all medical supplies. If she went to the infirmary, they would ask why she needed it. She had no answer that would not expose her.

She was fertile.

Twenty-eight years old and fertile and the colony would know within the week. Her next cycle would confirm it. The Seed Hall would flag her automatically.

Niesa closed her eyes and saw the cubicle. She had walked past the Seed Hall a hundred times. Seen the women waiting in the anteroom, some calm, some trembling. She had told herself she would never be one of them.

The ruined vials went back into the hiding place. She replaced the panel. It was a useless gesture, but it felt necessary. A burial.

Sleep did not come that night. She lay on her cot and stared at the ceiling and tried to think of a way out. There was none. The colony was sealed against the surface. The tunnels led nowhere. The only way out was through.

At dawn, she reported to the Seed Hall.

The anteroom was empty at this hour. Lights dim, the air thick with the smell of clean linen and something else, something metallic and warm. Niesa stood at the counter and waited.

Overseer Tamsin Holmes appeared from the back office, a tablet in her hand. She looked at Niesa with the flat, assessing gaze of someone who had seen this moment a hundred times before.

"You're here early," Tamsin said. "Not your scheduled day."

Niesa's throat was dry. "I need to register."

Tamsin's eyes flicked down to Niesa's abdomen, then back up to her face. "Suppressants fail?"

Niesa did not answer. She did not need to. The silence was confirmation enough.

Tamsin tapped her tablet. "Name and colony ID."

"Niesa Dray. Seven three two."

The tablet beeped. "You're in the system now. Fertility status confirmed. You'll get your first window assignment within the hour."

Niesa's hands were cold. "How long do I have?"

"Your first window will be tomorrow evening. Seven to eleven. Four hours. You'll be assigned a cubicle. The rules are simple. Any approved male may approach you during that time. You can't refuse. You can't leave early. You can request a different cubicle for your second window if you prefer, but the first is always standard."

Niesa nodded. Speaking was beyond her.

Tamsin looked at her for a moment, something almost like sympathy in her eyes. Then it was gone. "You'll get a packet with the full regulations. Read them. Follow them. It's easier if you don't fight it."

"I'm not fighting," Niesa said.

"Good." Tamsin turned to go. "Report to the Hall at six thirty tomorrow. Wear something you can take off quickly. You'll learn the rest."

The empty anteroom held Niesa long after Tamsin had disappeared into the back. The lights hummed. The smell of linen and metal clung to her clothes. She walked out into the corridor and the colony was the same as it had always been. People moving, voices echoing, the machinery of survival churning on.

But everything was different.

Back in her quarters, she sat on the cot. The panel was still loose. She had not fixed it. She stared at the wall and tried to feel something other than the cold dread that had settled into her bones.

Her work came to mind. The hydroponics bay. The rows of leafy greens and climbing vines that she had nurtured for three years. She was good at it. She knew the nutrient mixes, the light cycles, the pH tolerances. Purpose lived there.

But purpose did not matter to the colony. The colony needed bodies. It needed children. It needed the Seed Hall running at full capacity to replace the ones who did not survive the surface scavenging runs, the ones who died in the tunnel collapses, the ones who simply wore out.

Niesa had known this since she was old enough to understand. She had just hoped to delay it long enough to find another way.

The panel came open again at her touch. The vials sat there, cloudy and useless. She picked one up and turned it in her fingers. Stolen from the medical supply room two years ago, when the suppressants were still common. Hidden well. Stretched thin, using half doses, skipping days, measuring out her freedom in tiny increments.

And now it was gone.

She set the vial down and closed the panel. She would not look at it again. There was no point.

The packet arrived at her door an hour later. A thin folder with the Seed Hall seal on the front. Niesa opened it and read the regulations with the same methodical attention she gave to her work.

Free-use rules. No refusal. No preference. Diversity requirements. Rotation schedules. Hygiene protocols. Medical checks.

She read it twice. Then she folded it and placed it on the shelf.

Tomorrow evening. Seven to eleven.

She lay down on the cot and stared at the ceiling. The knot in her stomach had not loosened. It had grown roots, spreading through her chest, her throat, her limbs. She tried to breathe through it. Tried to think of it as a procedure. A task. Something to be completed and endured.

But her hands were shaking.

The men who would come. She did not know their faces, their names, their hands. She knew only that they would be approved. That they would be healthy. That they would use her because the system said they could.

Her eyes closed and the darkness behind her lids was no different from the darkness in front of them.

The colony hummed around her. Pumps, vents, distant voices. She was one of them now. She had always been one of them. She had just been lying to herself.

Niesa turned on her side and pulled her knees to her chest. The cot was hard. The blanket was thin. The hours until tomorrow evening stretched out like a tunnel with no end.

Sleep did not come.

She planned instead.

Go at six thirty. Wear the tunic that was easiest to remove. Keep her eyes on the wall. Count the minutes. Survive it.

That was all she had to do.

Survive.

And then survive the next one.

And the next.

Until there was nothing left of her to survive with.

The thought should have terrified her. Instead, it felt like a strange kind of peace. A certainty. The system would take what it wanted. She would give it. And in the space between giving and taking, she would find a way to exist.

She did not know if that was hope or surrender.

She suspected it did not matter.