Read The Last Girl for Free Online

impassive wall and casts off the memory. It had been a battle, she knows that now, but what for and with whom, she can only guess.
    She moves to the narrow closet set beside the bathroom and draws the doors open. In it hangs a dress made from the same rough material as her current clothes, the color an identical gray. She takes it down, hating the feel of the fabric more than the uniform she wears. She takes the dress into the bathroom and changes into it, only looking at herself to make sure the neckline is straight and the shoulders are even.
    It’s an ugly thing, lumpy and rough. It isn’t made to be beautiful. It’s made to remind the wearer of her place and of what will come.
    She turns off the light, liking the darkness better, and stands there in the silence, bathing in it like a healing balm.

    Zoey and Simon travel up the stairway to the fourth level, stopping to wait for the rest of the women outside the assembly. The hallway is quiet except for the footsteps that gradually come nearer from several directions. There are workers in their bright yellow coveralls, cooks wearing green aprons, several guards who are either off duty or unneeded for the moment, adorned in the customary black vests and cargo pants. Their prods hang from their belts, the long burnished composite tubes reflecting the light with a promise of violence, two electrodes protruding from their ends like silver fangs.
    Zoey eyes the weapons and wonders what it would be like to be beaten with one of them, to be shocked. She’s seen it only a handful of times. Once, when a worker seemingly lost his mind and had stripped a guard of his prod, screaming incoherent threats and obscenities. Four other guards had surrounded him, diving in at once, their prods blazing white electricity. The worker hadn’t even been able to scream, he simply stiffened, his mouth opening, and she had seen pale fire jumping from tooth to tooth within.
    They wait outside the assembly, the women all in their identical gray dresses, their Clerics beside them, the Clerics’ sons standing in another group. The boys are all close in age, some tall, some short, some with cocky grins and looks to boot, all wearing pale blue shirts over dark pants. Zoey finds Lee in their midst and he winks, barely keeping his smile in check. She frowns and looks away.
    The sound of booted feet come from the far end of the corridor, and her heart nearly stops.
    Reaper and six Redeyes march toward them. Their uniforms are black with matching boots polished to dark mirrors. In their hands they carry short, powerful-looking machine guns. They walk in time to a pace set by their leader. Reaper is a head taller than almost all the other soldiers. He is broad across the shoulders with a growth of dark hair cut close to his skull. A long scar slices through his hairline, streaking down in an ugly, rippling mass to the mask he wears on his lower face. The black fabric covers his nose, mouth, and jaw. Two straps run from it around the back of his skull to hold it in place.
    The gathering of people in the hall splits like water as the men near. The Clerics stand at attention while the women press themselves to the wall. Zoey is no exception. She tells herself she won’t look as they move by, knowing what she will see, but in the end she can’t help herself. She glances up as Reaper passes.
    He is looking directly at her.
    His eyes are nearly colorless in the artificial light. The slightest shade of gray tinges them with a frigid clarity of complete inhumanity. There is no emotion in them. They have been burned cold.
    Zoey shudders and looks away until they pass, the sound of their boots fading to nothing. It is only minutes before the sound of helicopter rotors rise somewhere above them. Even through the thick layers of concrete the motor’s voices are clear.
    “Must’ve got a tip on a baby girl,” Meeka whispers.
    “They’ve never brought one back since Lily,” Zoey says.
    “Doesn’t mean