This place is so much bigger than I thought. So much of it is sequestered from us, or at least me.

So if Chosens can get pregnant– of course, so long as their contracts allow– where do they go to give birth?

A lab? An infirmary? I'm assuming it's like in the movies, where they're surrounded by kind hands?

Hallway after hallway, almost like a puzzle of locked doors, I find no answer.

Or, one unlocked door. The card scanner turns green, and I scurry to behind a corner, heart about to pound out of my eyeballs, as a few nurses or doctors walk out, chatting and giggling amongst each other.

The door remains unlocked as they leave. I glance at both corners, hesitating.

Well, what's the worst that could happen if they catch me? Throw me out with the Jackals outside? Wait- Elena told me there's not actually that many, and most try to avoid humans. But then again, she stands outside next to all the turrets and sentry bots, so of course the Jackals will stay away.

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Or, are they really smart enough? If i'm there, what would the turrets and Fence guard systems do?

Why did they even try to throw out that one guy to begin with? What did he do?

Another set of footsteps approach.

Shit. Already too late. Might as well...

I lunge from one corner to the next, somehow avoiding the technician's line of sight. She's looking at a clipboard, through a hazmat. Guess the headpiece and visor blocked her peripherals.

Now I'm all in, no way to go back, I tell myself as my hands tremble. But what stood ahead of me was far more terrifying– dozens of glass stasis chambers with naked women lying in them, with various sensors, wires, and tubes attached all over their skins; their heads each in some kind of box at the top of each cylinder, numbered like airplane seats. Some are pregnant, some not.

Unable to peel my eyes away, I look at the one closest to me. Is she breathing? I can't even tell.

In the room across, there's more chambers, but vertical. I precariously walk over, before I jump in terror, only to realize it's the automatic sliding door.

The vertical chambers house what appear to be embryos, at varying phases of development. One, what seems to be a late-stage fetus, calmly floats with its hands at its chest.

Are they boys or girls?

Can't tell, there are mechanical umbilical cords blocking that area.

The developed fetus wiggles its limbs, and I almost trip on my feet walking backwards.

I must be hallucinating. We are all indeed orphans.