The Corporation owns everyone and everything on your homeworld, including the planet. Some Citizens work for the Corporation while some work for businesses owned by the Corporation. No other alternative exists. Surely a time existed before the Corporation took ownership of the planet, but there is no one left alive who remembers and therefore no one who would find any point in pulling up the bill of sale from the record.
Growing up here, you can't think of another way life should work. And besides, you're happy. You did reasonably well in school and you're a relatively well-paid administrative clerk for a small trading firm. The apartment you rent from the Corporation is spacious, yet modestly decorated. Your work keeps you away from your inner sanctuary most of the time you aren't sleeping, and you aren't happy to boast you sleep less than the average Citizen.
But, at least you have work. You tell yourself this as you pack your lunch and again as you check your appearance in the mirror hanging in your entrance way. All in order, you step into the hall of your employee housing unit and head for the lift at its end.
The street outside your apartment complex is completely empty. A chill from the abnormality of the scene runs down your spine and you check the display glowing on your wrist. It's the time you would typically leave your house, and there's no flashing indicator warning of an incoming storm. You check the sky and it's the usual cement grey; not the charred and angry mix of grey and purple that heralded severe weather. With no reason for the quiet you think: where are all the people?
There is a single black rover heavily shielded with no discernable windows parked at the end of your walk. As it finally stands out to you, you stop walking and take a step back. Sure, the weather is normal and it's the middle of the day, but if there was ever an ominous vehicle to avoid, you're sure it'd be that one.
You take another step back as a man dressed fully in black leather opens a hatch and steps out onto the sidewalk. He's sporting the ridiculously cartoonish logo of the Corporation on his muscular chest. You turn and fucking run when he starts walking toward you, not because you think it's a good idea to try and outrun a man who looks like he could win a medium category intergalactic neo-wrestling match, but because the sight of him coupled with the deserted city block and his armoured car terrifies you.
True to your prediction, you can't outrun him. He has an arm across your neck, a fist balled in your hair, and he is swinging his other arm to catch yours before you make it through the second of your housing complex's 'security doors'. You scream with fear and frustration as he pins your arm behind your back, pushes you to the ground, and handcuffs your wrists together. Metal bites into your skin. Tears streak down your face and you tremble as he hauls you to your feet. You want to scream again, but you know no one is coming to help you. You wouldn't come to help you because anyone can tell this is Corporation business
"What's happening?" You ask as your teeth chatter.
His voice is light and he smiles, taking your question as a sign you're done struggling. Are you done struggling? Your muscles and where your jaw scraped the ground ache in protest. Yeah. Yeah, you're done struggling. "You're being reassigned."
"I don't understand."
"You were an administration clerk?" You nod and he continues: "Now you're not that." As if that answers your question or fixes your confusion.
"What am I, then?"
"You'll see."
While this entire ridiculous exchange is happening, he's directing you forward, down the path to his rover. You tense. Even if logically you know it's a bad idea to struggle, your body does not want to get in the vehicle. Once you're taken to a secondary location, that's it. You've seen the movies. He seems not to notice and within seconds he pushes you into the darkness of the vehicle.
Blinking to hopefully adjust your eyes faster to the dim mood lighting, you notice the interior of the rover is a light colored velvet. The vehicle rumbles quietly when it lifts into a hover, but the subsequent movement is so smooth you don't feel it. You're alone, but you yell hoping the guy is within earshot in another compartment. Silence is the only response you receive. You wriggle your wrists against the cuffs while trying to clamp down on your fear, and you're truly successful in neither attempt.
Thinking back on the way in which you led your life and the way your community of employees was structured, you don't think you've done something wrong, and you can't think of anyone else who was abducted from their home by the Corporation, or can you..? You try to follow the flitting thought of a face, but it lingers at the edge of your memory the way words sometimes would on the tip of your tongue.
Beyond your moving, armored cell, the city-colony you lived in your entire life is a motion-blur. In minutes you've travelled fifty kilometers from your home. You know this because you also know exactly where you are when the man drags you from the vehicle: Corporation Headquarters. You're close enough it's a strain to angle your head back to see the top of the building.
"I'm being reassigned to work here." You say. Everything finally makes sense. Except, the cuffs. Actually, you retract that. None of this makes sense.
"Exactly!" The man who captured you is beaming, but he's not really looking at you. Your stomach twists. Perhaps his definition of the word 'reassigned' is different from yours.
Still, you have little choice but to follow him as he leads you into Headquarters through a less than imposing side door. Once inside, a second person joins from a side hall and follows close behind you as if you'd try to make a break for it while your hands are bound. As you walk, the sound of three sets of footsteps out of sync irritates you and it's what you're focusing on when you run into the back of the man.
He turns and smirks at you, before opening a nondescript door to an unlit room with no apparent windows. "Now in you go. Have fun." He says this, but before you can think about whether you want to listen, he's shoved you in and shut the door behind you. You make a note to file a Human Resources complaint once you've been on-boarded as you stumble to the floor in complete darkness.
Moments tick by and you start counting your breaths. One breath. Two. Three. When you've reached ten, you bite your lip and take one more steadying breath. Then, "Hello?" You call out, not really expecting to be dignified with an answer at this point.
Just as you're ready to start counting again, a smooth yet clearly artificial rendition of your voice echoes: "Hello?"
You shout in surprise and light floods the room. You're alone under the bright lights. Beneath you the dark floor is textured and grooved. The rest of the room is so nondescript, you're not even sure where the door you came through is.
"What's happening?"
In your voice, the room responds: "Hello? What's happening?"
You should probably feel afraid, but instead you're angry. Whatever this nonsense is, it's gone on for long enough. You try to stand, but listen, you never thought skipping those core workouts would actually come back to bite you, yet here you are without the use of your arms to assist you. After you fail to rise a few times, the lights above flicker and the floor beneath you moves. You plunge into darkness yet again.
Although your landing is padded, the jostling you've endured thus far has your head pounding. Faceless machines come to life around you and you shrink back against the grey cushion. It tilts, sending you forward onto what you can only describe as a person-sized conveyor belt. You almost immediately pass through a cube of pink-tinged air. Your clothes melt away into the cube and, you realize belatedly, so too have your cuffs.
Springing to your feet as you are passed from pink back to uncoloured air, you lurch toward the edge of the belt only to glimpse nothing but machines below. You partially stumble, partially throw yourself to your knees in fear. Your cuffs were removed because there is nowhere for you to run to, and the thought of falling into the abyss stretching out beneath the belt paralyses you.