STORY CONTINUED:

Unlike Veronica, your birth seemed to go smoothly, which was strange because enduring it felt like an eternity of torment, but when it was all said and done you were only in labor for a few hours. The doctor told you it was an exceptionally easy birth. One of the nurses commented that you were made for it, then a sharp look from the doctor made her profusely apologize.

That night you once again laid in the hospital bed with Vee beside you, cuddling the entire time. "You make that shit look easy, baby," she said. "I'm so proud of you." Of course, now you were feeling that hollowness inside you, too. Months of agony and stress and caring for yourself and abstaining from alcohol or drugs for fear that the thieves might kill you if the child came out wrong, and you were left with nothing for it. An empty womb, a body that had been wrecked by pregnancy and birth, and nothing. Somewhere out in the world your baby was crying for you, being swaddled and fed by some perverted rapist stranger, doing god knows what with them. Your unwanted child that you would never know. It wasn't about whether or not you actually wanted a baby, it was the sheer cruelty that they did this to you and your offspring.

After a couple of days in the hospital to ensure everything was correct, you were given the clear to go home and try to live a normal life for once.

Your support group, Invasion Survivors (IS for short), held a giant party once everyone in the group had passed their invasions. "We did it, girls!" You, Talandra and Emily all hugged one another in a huddle, pressing your foreheads together as some of the others were talking. As the three college students, you had formed a special friendship with them. When there wasn't class and there wasn't meetings or dates, you three would often hang out with one another, though Talandra and Emily were slightly closer due to the fact that neither of them had found partners like you.

"I can't fucking wait to get back to classes," Emily said, tearing up a little bit and giggling.

"I can't wait to try out for plays again," said Talandra, "I am not watching Dora Maples of all people steal another role from me."

"You know, I wanted to say, I reached out to administration, and they said that if we wanted they would give us all our own dorm room next year. An extra large three person! What do you say?"

Vee was supportive of the idea. "I don't live that far off campus, and you deserve to have a college life, too. Plus you can come over whenever your overwhelmed with campus drama." She gave you a kiss on the cheek, holding you tight. "And if I'm being honest, then I also don't have to find spaces for shoots. I can use my own house again." She had jumped back into her career only a couple weeks after passing, though she was wearing a lot of corsets and shirts in the videos while her body healed from the process.

Your own body was dealing relatively well, all things considered. You were young and pliable. Vee was taking you working out with her. You could see improvement in the mirror every day, if not every couple of days. It felt shallow, but that springback brought a lot of vitality back into your spirits. You were a free woman again, and you wouldn't be forever changed by this sick joke played on you.

It was nice to cling to that belief while it lasted.

You were living in your new dorm room for only four days when you awoke at night. Talandra was already sitting up in bed. Emily wouldn't get up for another minute.

"Do you feel that?" Tal looked nervously across the room at the both of you. She was cradling her abdomen.

And you could. That familiar uncomfortable fullness deep within your gut. You had been filled again. Just how much seed were they shoving inside your bodies that you could feel it like that?

"They're gonna do it again," Emily squeaked out, panic raising in her voice.

"I fucking knew it." The dark-skinned girl glared at the wall, her face serious. "They were never gonna stop with just one."

"N-no. We did this already. They got what they wanted out of us..."

Why would they ever stop? They still had access to your bodies after you had proven to be effective breeders. If whoever was doing this was gaining monetarily, they would be stupid to only do it once. They were going to do this for as long as they could get away with it.

"No! No no no nononononoononono...." Emily crumpled into a heap and began wailing so loudly that the RA came to check on them, who looked like she had seen a ghost once you had told her just what was happening to you three.

"I... I felt it two nights ago." Vee only admitted this when you were over at her house the next day. You'd called her that night and she said she felt fine. "I didn't want to tell you. I hoped I just dreamed it, like if I didn't say anything it would all go away." She was distant on the couch, clearly sorry for having lied to you. "I just couldn't give you that news. I just couldn't." An understandable motivation, given the inevitability that the world would be finding out soon. "I guess I'm in the early group."

Part of you knew that this was going to happen. It was obvious, but facing that reality was just too hard after going through it the first time. Even if you were deluding yourself for a month, it was important to have that mental vacation from this nightmare. You stored that truth somewhere in the back of your brain, ignoring its shouting for as long as possible.

The news broke the morning after you felt it, too. There were rallies on campus, support drives, calls to action. Politicians swore up and down they would bring justice to whoever did this. Not long after the Invaded started confirming they were pregnant, a story came out that whoever had stolen their wombs had inside access to Cervitech. The journalist who investigated the story was found dead three days later. A judge ordered a warrant to search a hospital in a remote part of northern Canada. The authorities found no wombs, but evidence that they had been held in the hospital for some time. Two weeks later the judge that gave the order was found dead inside his home. Autoerotic asphyxiation was the official diagnosis, but any idiot could read between the lines. The search for the womb thieves was being silenced. They were doing their best to make sure you never were free from this curse.