06AAA0424 had led a very lonely life up until this point. Born to an unknown human mother via an unknown Elvin father she had been rejected by the humans from her mother's planet and left to die in their cell when they had been moved from feeding to recovery. Found by the guards she had been about to be killed when one of them came up with a more cruel fate.

Although she looked a lot like an elf there were still human features that gave away her mixed heritage. Unlike elves she was covered in the fine body hair of the humans and had their white eyeballs instead of the black of her father's people. She also had dark brown irises where elves all had bright colours.

One of the guards had a child of similar age entering the crèche system and decided it would be useful for his son to have a half-breed to bully. She pulled a few strings and got Four enrolled in the same community crèche along with other elven children of her own age. This at least gave her a nurturing environment as a toddler as the nurses made sure she lived.

Once the children were old enough for education they were trained in the ways of the clan. Two of the most important lessons being: The strong take from the weak, and anything not elven is an inferior being.

This led her to quickly being singled out as the victim in her class and she was ganged up on by even the weaker members. The strong helped the weak abuse the lesser. Children being lazy they soon had he doing most of the cleaning and homework for her class. They did, however, give her a nickname, Four, to save calling her by her full designation.

A clever and resourceful girl she did manage to get one over on her classmates occasionally. When the work got so much that she physically couldn't fit it all in a day she managed to stir up some dissention.

"Master, Asy'l, as I am unable to do everyone's homework and house work somebody is going to have to prioritise my schedule."

Asy'l was not the most powerful of the class, but he was close enough that the ego boost of being the one she turned to prompted his attempted coup. Gathering his followers he made his move on the class leader, Troj'Ati. Unfortunately Asy'l wasn't the only one Four had turned to for advice.

The resulting war left three badly injured children and twelve more with lesser wounds. It also got them off her back for a while. It seemed that the losers in a power struggle were greatly put upon by the victors. For a while, Four was only required to do the work of the winning faction.

Once the dust settled, however, the workload increased, but not too far beyond a manageable amount. Being incapable of doing everyone's work did earn her a beating every now and again.

This too she used to her advantage, goading Asy'l to hurt her so badly that she was unable to do any work for four days. This left the elvan members of her class having to do all the work, including her official share of the housework. This did not sit well with Troj'Ati, who made it quite clear that whatever happened to the half-breed it had better be able to do his work. It also left Asy'l permanently banned from using her services.

Eventually she graduated form the nurseries to the schools proper, where again she was the victim of bullying and abuse. Here, however, her greatest threat was showing the other children that she was cleverer than many of them. To be considered inferior to a lesser was to be humiliation indeed.

It did, however, limit how much of her peers' homework she could do as they wanted to be seen as being cleverer than her, and any work done by her was not up to the required standard.

When the other youths moved on to the secondary stage of schooling Four was just removed from of the system. The lowest job available was as a sewer rat. Small, nimble slaves, usually from race twelve, were given the task of patrolling the city's sewers, removing clogs and checking for damage.

Their other duty was to seek out and kill the creatures that lived in the sewers. No small task considering that many of these creatures were as tall as a Twelve, but with natural weapons. And slaves not being allowed to have weapons.

Four's way of countering this was to find a suitable club and to hide it before end of shift, so she would have it again the next day. Over time the end of her club became pointed, as she dragged it along the walls, and she could use it as a very crude short sword.

Eight years later and she was nearing the age when she would be used for feeding. Each day was another day closer to that terrible fate. Her supervisor implied that he knew how long she had left, but was enjoying not telling her. Though he seemed as surprised as she was when a guard did come for her.

"Clean yourself up, slave. You're coming with me." Was all the warning either of them got. As she rushed away, to comply, she caught sight of her supervisor challenging the guard, who just shrugged.

Once showered and in fresh overalls, she rushed back to where the guard was waiting. She didn't want to go with him, but knew that any dawdling would just get her extra punishment without putting off the inevitable.

"I am ready, Master." She announced, alerting him to her presence. After all, if a guard wasn't paying attention and left her standing around, it was her fault. And she might well get punished. The guard had grabbed her by the arm and, without a word, dragged her to a transport vehicle, where she was put in the slave section, with no windows or seating, and driven off.

Initially worrying that this was going to be her first visit to the feeding rooms, she quickly discounted that as they passed through the area they were in. Eventually the guard stopped at a door. Opening the door she was roughly shoved through and the door shut behind her.

In front of her was a multitude of humans. More than she had ever seen before. There must have been hundreds here and most of them seemed to be happy.

Overwhelmed by the sight and noise, and worried about what was due to happen, she sidled off to one side, ready to resume her customary role of unwanted outsider. Then a young woman came up to her, smiling, and held out her hand. Unsure Four held her hand out too, only for the woman to take hold of it and shake it up and down.

"Welcome to the leaving party, I'm Clarice. What's your name? "

"My designation is 06AAA0424, Mistress, though I am also known as Four, by the others." Pretty much everyone outranked her, and mistress was always a safe way to address a stranger.

The slight singsong of her voice caused Clarice Overton to take another look at this stranger, at which point she realised this wasn't a human.

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"Wait. You're one of them. One of the elves!"

"No, Mistress. I am a Zero Six, not a Zero One."

"Come with me." Ordered the young human.

"Yes, Mistress." Even more confused now, Four followed along. Leading her over to a particular group of humans Clarice addressed one of them.

"Lieutenant Andrews. We have a new addition to the party."

Looking up at her, from where he was sat on a bed, Four immediately saw his eyes cloud over as he saw her. A mixture of anger and fear. Quickly standing he addressed her.

"Greetings, Mistress. How can I assist you?"

Looking over her shoulder to see who this human was talking to, it took Four a while to realise it must be her.

"I am not a mistress, Master. I am a Zero-Six."

"Zero-Sixes are humans, like us. Not you." No 'Mistress' this time, but still with an air of cautionary respect.

"I am a half-breed, Master. My mother was a Zero-Six. Therefore I am a Zero-Six."

That caused his eyes to open in surprise.

"Please explain."

Four paused. Unsure what to say.

"I'll answer for her, Joe." Came a melodious voice from behind her. A voice she knew came from an elf.

Spinning and dropping to her knees and bowing her head to the ground.

"Forgive me, Mistress, I didn't know there were any People here." Her voice shaking a bit knowing the punishment for disrespecting an elf.

"Stand up, little one." Replied the voice, unusually gentle for an elf when talking to her. "Those rules no longer apply in here."

Glancing up Four could see the other humans standing around watching, none of them showing the elf the respect they should.

Nervously standing up she looked at the elf.

"How may I assist you, Mistress."

"You may relax, child. Today is the start of a new, and hopefully better, life for you."

Then turning to the male human, known as Joe.

"As you know my people use the lesser races for various things. One of them is, occasionally, sex. If a particularly desperate elf comes across a particularly handsome one. And as you've probably guessed we put birth control chemicals in your food, so you don't procreate."

"We had guessed that, Lana, considering how often Hanut and Hannah play together."

That got a laugh from some of the crowd that Four didn't understand.

"Okay. As you also know we are not infallible."

A word Four didn't know, which made an already difficult conversation much worse. She hoped she would not have to understand.

"Some members of the lesser races are more resistant to the chemicals. Usually that's the Zero-Eights, but others can be.

"In her case, her mother was one such. When the child was born her mother, and her mother's people rejected her and left her to die.

"She was then placed in our child rearing system along with our own young, as an easy prey for her class. The rest of her class, being pure born had no time for her, other than getting her to do their work, so she has grown up very much alone and unloved.

The looks of revulsion on the other humans' faces told Four that her life here was not going to be much different here. To them she would also be a half-breed, though it would be her elvan heritage that would be despised.

"When Val and Zahra won the freedom of all the ADH and DTU slaves, I looked up Four's mother to see if she qualified. Before you ask, she is the only half human here at the moment. As I was looking at the record I got a bit distracted and might have put the search parameter..."

More words Four didn't know, but the tone seemed playful.

"...In the result field and changed her settings. Couldn't be sure and didn't want to disturb the archivist, so I left it as it was. Especially as it puts the poor girl as one of you."

There was definitely a playful tone now. Though Four still didn't know what was going on.

"Wait!" Ordered another human. A female this time. "Her name is Four, as in the number?"

"The elves she was put with couldn't be bothered to name her and just called her Four, from the last number in her designation."

"That's horrible." Said the human woman, again. "Why couldn't you have put her here with us. We'd have looked after her properly."

"That was sixty years ago, by our standards. Nearly seventy, by yours." You weren't around to take her, even if I was in a position to assign her."

Four was then turned around and grabbed in a hug by a woman she didn't recognise.

"Well, Princess, she's ours now and we will look after her."

"I thought you might. Though I wasn't expecting it to be you, Captain."

"Kat, please, your highness."

"Only if you call me Yslana or Lana. You know the rules. Use my rank and I will use yours."

"Yes, Lana." Sounding ever so much like a title.

Release from the hug but still held by the woman she was turned to face her. In front of her was an older human. Not as tall as Four though she did have similar colour hair. Her eyes, however, were bright blue against the white of a human eye.

"She's tall like one of you, has the ears and facial features. Oh, and those eyes are like bottomless pits."

Most of that sounded Ok, though the bottomless pits bit was a bit unnerving.

"But to us, her hair and eyes are human coloured, and she has body hair. And you know how bigoted we are. If she's not pure elf, she is a lesser being."

"And lesser beings are slaves." Finished the man called Joe.

Then looking at the woman who still had hold of Four.

"Do I take it, Ma'am, that you're adopting our new citizen?"

That got a laugh out of the crowd, thou Four didn't understand all of the question. Seeing the look of confusion on her face, Yslana spoke to her directly.

"You seem confused, Four. I suppose this is very confusing for you. Do you need anything explaining further"

"I..I don't understand everything people are saying, Mistress. "

"OK, such as what?"

Panic now as she was being asked to repeat words she had only ever heard once. Seeing the fear, Yslana changed tack a bit.

"How about, if someone says something you don't understand you ask them, and they will explain it to you. Better?"

"Yes, Mistress."

"Good. Now I noticed you looked like you didn't understand Joe here. Is that right?"

"Yes, Mistress." Nice simple questions, with nice simple answers. Four could handle that.

"OK. Joe say it again, and when he gets to a word you don't understand raise your hand and someone will explain."

Joe started again.

"Do I take it, Ma'am.."

Four tentatively put her hand up.

"A term of respect for a more senior - important - person." Explained the one holding her. The one called Captain.

"Like mistress?" She asked.

"Not quite, but close enough for now."

Joe carried on. "...You're adopting..."

He paused, waiting for her hand this time guessing it was coming.

"In this case: Effectively becoming the parent of a person."

"...Our new citizen."

"Citizen. A person who belongs to a planet. We are citizens of a planet called 'New Geneva', while Yslana is a citizen of this planet. "

"In this case, me? " At the nods. "So you were asking if Captain was going to be my mother?"

This got a laugh, which caused Four to believe she had it wrong.

"My name is Katherine, Four. Katherine Longwood. Kat for short. Captain is my rank in the army. Apart from that, yes. If you want me to be."

"I don't know. I don't know what having a mother means."

While most of the crowd had left the gathering around them, the ones that were left looked sad at that news.

"Try it for a while, Four." Recommended one of them. "If you don't like it you can end the arrangement."

As her hand went up. One of the others explained.

"You can make it stop."

"What do I have to do?"

"Nothing. I will help you and look after you. I will help you get to know these people and their ways. I will help you settle in when we get back to our own world. I will do the best I can to make your life a good as possible."

Stunned, Four couldn't speak. No one had ever offered to help her, let alone help make her life better. She started to cry, something she hadn't done in public since her days in the crèche. Katherine hugged her closely again and started rocking from side to side, trying to comfort the overwhelmed young woman.

"Can I ask you something, Yslana?" Asked Katherine.

"Of course, Kat."

"Did you grow up without a mother? Zahra said you two were born from a slave as well."

"We grew up in a communal nursery and then what you would call a boarding school. I only met my father after we finished school at twenty six and didn't meet my mother until after Val met Zahra. Val still hasn't met mother. I guess she never will now."

Four just about managed to pry an arm free to raise it.

When Val and Zahra won the freedom for these people, Zahra included our mother's people in the arrangement. Being less of them, they have already been returned to their home world.

"My sister was the closest thing I had to a mother growing up. And my life would have been a lot nastier without her. I do sometimes wonder how much better my people would be if we grew up in a manner similar to yours."