Slavee

In the late twenty-fifth century, man did his best to destroy humanity on the planet Earth. The powerful used chemical, biological and light-arms with deadly efficiency. The combatants finally achieved a fragile truce. In this new world, governments had disintegrated or became so indebted to the new super-companies that sprang from the war; they became simple administrative branches and the super-companies became the real power. The pendulum of law enforcement swung from warehousing and rehabilitation towards restitution and revenge. A scientist working for one super-company developed a method to control convicted criminals. A small electronic device was implanted near the brain stem and wired into the brain. Attached around the prisoner's wrist was an unremovable bracelet-in reality a transmission device-slaved to a master bracelet. The purchaser of the prisoner's services received the master bracelet-the control device. Jalil was a scavenger who searched the miles of empty buildings left by the war for unique or unusual items. Other than the items she discovered, her world and the world of the super-companies did not intersect. Until the day they came looking for her, and becoming a slavee was her only option to keep on living.