The Gender End by Bella Forrest (the giving tree read aloud TXT) 📕

womb.” He turned, looking to one side, clearly mouthing the words “Switch cameras” to someone off screen.

A second later, the image of a dirt road from overhead appeared on the screen, a formation of black-clad figures marching along the road, the green of the night vision making them appear sinister, menacing, downright evil.

“Viggo, those are the—”

“I know,” I said softly to Violet, and she leaned toward me in her chair, her hand reaching for mine. I held it tight, the sense that something terrible was about to happen looming over me, the accompanying queasy feeling coming from a gut knowledge that I had no way of stopping this.

I realized why I thought that a moment later. “That night vision—this video is from at least a few hours ago,” I said to the group.

Violet nodded next to me, instantly comprehending what I meant. “Thomas, can you kill the transmission? I think we’ve seen enough.”

The small man blinked, and then his fingers went flying, as Maxen’s voice droned on over the video. “As you can see, she’s sent some of the very same freaks she tried to turn us into only a few days ago. I was notified of her plans by several informants—the True Sons of Patrus—led by this man, Peter White.” I narrowed my eyes, and I heard Violet gasp as the camera changed, and we both recognized Peter. He was a leader in the Porteque gang, and we’d encountered him more than once. Probably the leader, now that most of them were dead and gone.

Peter smiled—a charming smile that showed dimples—but the guileless expression was tainted in my mind by the knowledge of what kind of man he really was. There was only the briefest picture of him, and then the view came back to the boys marching, the camera moving in a slow circle around them as Peter’s voice presided over the footage.

“Thank you, King Maxen. As you can see, these creatures are well within our borders, an hour or two outside of town, heading for you even now. We’ve been watching them since last night, and their pace is relentless. They don’t seem to need to stop to eat or drink or even to sleep. Luckily, our king has provided us with the weapon we need to stop them.”

Violet’s face was rapidly turning from worried to downright sick. “The boys have been in the country for the whole night?” she murmured. “Why didn’t we know? We could have—We could have changed this—”

“We don’t have enough people or equipment to monitor the whole country, Violet,” Ms. Dale said, her voice full of regret. “We’d been concentrating on the city… and on you being gone…”

“We missed the country entirely,” Mags breathed, finishing the thought. All of us stared at the video, transfixed, and the feeling that something horrible was happening grew in my gut like the anticipation of being punched.

The view changed. It was still aerial, but two heavy machine gun muzzles jutted out into the top of the screen, angled toward the enhanced boys in black. Before I could say or do anything—even cry out in horror—the muzzles began to spin, and then the muffled noise of gunfire erupted through the speakers as bullets began to tear through the ranks. Some of them started running, fast, but the guns followed them until they were all mowed down. Tracking them was clearly a simple task thanks to the night-vision camera.

I looked away for a moment, my stomach churning as a wave of fury seized me, forcing me to ball my free hand into a fist. Those boys were innocent—victims, even—and he had butchered them. Maxen’s voice started up again, carrying with it a deep and resolute promise with sincerity that made me want to put my fist through something.

“My people, I will keep you safe from these creatures. I will keep you safe from Queen Elena. Even now, my team and I are planning an incursion into Matrus. The mission will be dangerous and full of peril, but if I am successful, I will bring down Queen Elena and the tyrannical government of Matrus, securing our people’s future. Patrus is in a difficult place now, but soon we—”

The sound stopped midsentence, and then the screen clicked off. Thomas looked up, his cheeks flushed with embarrassment, and I had no doubt that even though he didn’t show much else, the video had affected him too.

“That took longer than it should have,” he whispered, wiping sweat off his forehead. “Of course, I didn’t expect to be hacking into my own program using a remote terminal on a really awful connection… That was certainly difficult, and…”

“You don’t have to defend yourself, Thomas,” Owen said softly, interrupting the small man’s rapidly devolving babble. “You did the best you could.” I looked over to see Owen staring at the screen, a dark fury overshadowing everything else on his face.

“How effective is that going to be?” I asked. “I mean, not everyone has handhelds, so surely…”

“We gave them handhelds, Viggo,” Ms. Dale said after a moment, her mouth thinning. “We tried to hand out one to each group or family. Thomas was working on that mass broadcasting program, and it was supposed to be a way to notify everyone of an emergency.”

“I changed my mind,” Mags announced grimly. “We have to hunt him down. He’s going to be a threat to what we’re trying to accomplish.”

“I agree with Mags,” Drew said. “In fact, I don’t even understand why he was allowed to roam free in the first place.”

“We couldn’t have held him prisoner,” Ms. Dale said. “He’s a terrible person, but he isn’t a criminal. The only reason we took him was to keep him safe from Elena, because his death would help solidify her control, however she decided to play it.”

“He just murdered a dozen or so of the boys,” Violet grated out. “He is a criminal, and he deserves to die for what he just did.”

“Unfortunately, the rest of the country might not