THE BIDDING WAR
971 Words
**CHAPTER 2: The Bidding War**
The lights flickered once. Then died.
What came next wasn’t silence. It was chaos—the kind that rises fast and doesn’t ask permission.
But ten seconds before it all erupted, I knew something was wrong.
A holo-screen in the auction chamber blinked twice. A ripple of red static, like a corrupted video file. One of the guards—tall, thick-necked, cruel-eyed—gripped his baton too tightly. He whispered into his comms, then went still.
The air shifted.
My instincts screamed, but there was no time.
---
Screams tore through the stadium like shrapnel. A drone exploded overhead. I ducked as shards of glass rained from above. The giant screen that once displayed our fertility scores now flickered red and white, glitching between static and emergency warnings:
> “Security breach. Level Five threat. Facility lockdown in proggress.”
The crowd turned feral. Men who had calmly bid on wives like cattle now trampled one another to reach the exits. Gunfire echoed in the distance—short bursts, followed by a mechanical growl that sounded almost animal.
The stadium had become a kill zone.
---
Kalu didn’t hesitate. He grabbed my wrist.
“Come on—we have five minutes before the underground exits seal.”
We sprinted through the corridors behind the auction floor—past fallen guards, broken display tables, and half-eaten finger foods soaked in blood. I nearly tripped over a girl—Fatima—her white dress now streaked with red.
Her eyes were open. Staring. A smear of mascara trailed down one cheek like a silent scream.
A memory slammed into me—Mama yelling for me to run, chains clinking, smoke choking the sunlight.
I blinked hard.
Not now.
---
Kalu led us to a service elevator, smashed the override panel with his elbow, and hotwired the controls with a stylus that glowed faintly blue.
“You hacked a government elevator with a pen,” I panted.
“Don’t be impressed yet.”
We dropped five levels. The shaft rumbled like a dying beast.
“I saw Fatima,” I whispered. “She’s dead.”
“I know,” he said. “So are half the guards.”
“Who did this?”
“Not us.”
His eyes flicked toward me.
“But someone sent a message.”
---
The underground hallway stank of rust and mold. Steam hissed from broken pipes. Graffiti glowed under UV strobes:
**“Dead girls don’t birth heirs.”**
**“The Algorithm Lies.”**
A dripping triangle enclosed in a broken circle pulsed faintly on the wall.
Kalu pressed it.
A door opened.
---
Inside: a chamber lit by paper lanterns. Old computers. Rugs on concrete. Dust. Peace.
A woman sat at the back, typing into an analog keyboard. Her skin was deep brown. A clean scar ran from her temple to her jaw. She didn’t look up.
“You brought her,” she said.
“I had no choice,” Kalu replied.
Now she looked up—and her stare pinned me like a blade.
“You look just like her.”
“Who?”
“Your mother.”
I froze.
“I saw her,” I whispered. “During the breach.”
“No,” the woman said. “You saw a lie. Or a ghost. Your mother died two years ago.”
“You’re lying.”
“I buried her myself.”
---
Her words didn’t sting. They burned.
“She had her walk. Her eyes. The way she tilted
“She’s gone, Zara.”
I stepped back. I wanted to scream. But I couldn’t. I didn’t know how anymore.
Kalu looked away.
That’s when I knew—he had doubts, too.
---
“Why am I here?” I asked.
Kalu exhaled.
“You were sold, yes. But someone intercepted the auction. They rerouted your purchase through a ghost account.”
“Who?”
He hesitated. “We don’t know. Yet.”
The woman slid a box toward me. Inside: a glowing blue shard.
“Your mother made this.”
I lifted it. Cold. Smooth. Alive.
“It contains every record tied to Project W.I.F.E.—the Ministry’s plan to reprogram wives before sale. Full emotional suppression. Neural rewriting.”
“They’re turning us into robots,” I said.
“Dolls,” the woman corrected. “But yes.”
---
“What’s the plan?”
“You.”
“What do you mean?”
“You get into the mainframe. You trigger the leak. You make the world see what they’re buying.”
“I’m one girl,” I said. “I’m not a soldier.”
“No,” the woman replied. “You’re a virus. One they didn’t quarantine fast enough.”
---
We moved that night.
Through tunnels. Past checkpoints. Beneath Nsukka’s bones.
Above us, the world cheered for a new sports team or a royal wedding.
No one knew seventeen girls were missing.
---
In Enugu, we changed safe houses three times.
Kalu grew quiet. He watched me when he thought I wasn’t looking.
Finally, he spoke: “The money for your sale—it didn’t come from me.”
I stopped.
“What?”
“I raised the paddle. But someone else paid.”
“Who?”
“Untraceable account. Military-grade encryption. Someone who knew how to override the entire auction protocol.”
“So what am I really worth?” I asked.
He didn’t answer.
That night, I couldn’t sleep.
I removed my sandals and checked the heel where I’d hidden the microglass shard.
But there was a second one.
Smaller.
Already unlocked.
The files inside were labeled:
**ZARA. BACKUP. PRIMARY.**
And that’s when I realized—I wasn’t the only version of me they’d sold.
**END OF CHAPTER 2*
- Writer
