The metallic floors were sleek, with small raised notches in it for traction. The walls and ceilings were smooth metal. White, bright light shone from the ceiling at all times of the day, with a dimmer setting at night. In the living quarter called Sector L4, two small restaurants were across from two small shops. Apartments crowded the rest of the living quarter that went up to five stories. The apartments may vary by size but the furnishing were the same. The restaurants held no seating inside and were only a walkup and order. Dozens of tables were outside the restaurant that were composed of metal, with seats of metal with cushions. A walkway that was the width of three people was between the shops and the outside seating area. The walkway was sixty paces from one end to the other, and both ends led to the left and right. It all looked clean, organized, and functional.
   Devon sat with his work colleagues at their usual table. They ate and sat silently, listening to the video screen that showed the Overseer on his morning announcements.
   "Morning reports: Sector 15 has once again won the previous week for production achievement. Outstanding job to all of those employed in Sector 15!" the Overseer reported.
   After the announcement of the winner, everyone returned to their meals and conversation. They had no interest in the rest of the Overseer's cheerleading.
   "Fucking Sector 15. Every time... those butch of lousy cheaters," a man named Smith said that sat next to Devon.
   "They always win because they have the easier jobs,” Devon replied.
   "We busted our ass to increase our production by 15% and it didn't even matter. We might as well just not even bother. Let's just not work today," another man named Chris that sat in Devon's crew said. A few people over heard this from other tables and gave Devon and his work colleagues mean and disapproving looks.
   Devon grabbed Chris's arm. "Would you shut up," Devon told him in a whispered voice, "never say that out loud in public. You know how much they depend upon us."
   "Yeah, but we did all that extra work so they would have the surplus," Chris replied in a heated and hushed tone. Devon understood his frustration. Everyone felt it. The entire working system was against them, all of them. Except Sector 15, who won the majority of the time.
   "He has got a point," Smith told him.
   "Yes, they have a surplus, but it will not last the entire six hours of our work today. We still have a minimum quota to meet. You know we are at the top and if we stop working, there are going to be ten other sectors yelling at us for having inadequate supplies," Devon told them in a stern voice.    Everyone knew what Devon said was true, but he still had to remind them. He went around the table, giving everyone a stern look of 'shut up' and 'we have to work, regardless.' They all looked away as Devon’s gaze found their eyes. It was an odd form of agreement.
No one was happy about the loss, and a silence fell upon the table. Smith spoke up and changed the subject. "So tonight, Devon, are you with us?"
   "Yeah, I will join you guys for cards tonight," Devon replied. Smith nodded in a delightful response, looking forward to Devon joining them. Devon rarely played and when he did, he joined Smith and the two of them were good team mates. When Devon did not play, Smith had to partner with someone else and lost all the time.
Devon looked over at the empty seat of where Fran always sat. "Has anyone seen Fran around? It has been a while since I seen her," Devon asked, concerned for his female friend.
   "Ehhh... who cares about Fran," Smith said and then went back to telling the story he began before the announcements started. Devon cared. He enjoyed Fran's unique wit and sense of humor. It was not a sexual or a romantic relationship, yet a simple friendship. Fran was older than him by twenty years, with Devon being only twenty himself.
   They continued their meal with an idle chat of new and old stories. Then suddenly one of the Overseer's machines came down from overhead. Long tentacle arms came out and efficiently plucked Smith out of his chair. It happened so quickly that it left everyone in shock. The machine’s movement was smooth, quick, and quiet.
   "Hey!!! What the... let me go!" Smith screamed in the middle of his bite, "I didn't do nothin'... I didn't do nothin'!!" Smith protested at the machine that held him at his mercy.
   "You have violated a sacred oath and now must pay the punishment," the machine informed everyone as it moved quickly away and carried Smith out of sight.
   Devon and everyone stopped what they were doing and stood up to witness one of their friends and crew mates taken right before their eyes. They all started protesting and shouting back at the direction the machine left and the Overseer, who still read his morning announcement.
   The crowd complained: "He didn't do anything!" "He was just sitting there and eating!!" "Fucking Overseer! Bring back our friend!!" Everyone got involved: his work mates from his work sector that knew him and those that did not know him well but perhaps seen him once or twice. People from both restaurants came out who worked there and served him food daily and complained as well. The people who worked in the stores also came out and were screaming. Everyone was angry, and some threw a few things in the absent direction of the machine and the Overseer. Even small children were angry and threw a fit with the rest of them.
   "Those damn things just ruined my day!" one quipped after everyone had settled down.
   "Ruined our night as well. We can't play cards with only seven people. It has to be eight!" Chris yelled.
   "Fucking Overseer!" another one yelled out.
   Devon was angry, but did not participate in the shouting. His anger was deeper. He noticed how everyone had gotten involved. Everyone. Every child, elder, worker, friend, and stranger was spitting mad.    He wondered if this was what happened to Fran, just snatched up and taken away. No answers or reason for their sudden capture. Everyone knew it could easily happen to all of them, and there was zero accountability. They would return isolated from the rest of them and never the same.
   He had enough. He stood up on the table and spoke to the crowd. "I am tired of this shit! We want our freedom. Freedom from the Overseer and freedom from these damn walls... these damn quotas... this damn food..." Devon went on and on. Everyone heard him and cheered him on. They all started chanting: "Freedom... freedom... freedom..."
   Devon continued his speech and afterwards led his colleagues to their work site. The 'start work' light came on, and the supplies came in on conveyor belts for them to work with. However, they had other plans. They made weapons. Devon destroyed the video screen the Overseer would come on, then led his men out. He spread the message to other work sectors. Most joined him, while others called him absurd.
  The Overseer lived in a house that was behind a high wall. It required two people to climb up it. Some started climbing it, while others tried to get through the front gate. The mob started using a ram that was recently constructed to break through the gate. The machines snatched the people that attempted to climb the wall. They came in and grabbed them once they were on top of the wall. They carried the people away while their screams of anger and fear echoed off the metal walls.
  Devon was working with the ram and was shoulder to shoulder with Chris. The crowd was angry and chanted “freedom” pumping their weapons into the air. Devon had never seen so many people, and the crowd was thick. After several hits with the ram, Devon looked back to find Chris was no longer there. A machine had grabbed him. The machines descended upon the people to pick them up and take them away. People fought back against them, but their weapons were ineffective. A few people grabbed a hold of one person a machine held in its tentacles. The machine did not stop pulling and more people grabbed a hold of the person. The machine ripped the person in half. Since they did not program it to stop. Anger broke out that a person had died. The anger against the Overseer slowly switched to anger against one another.
   "Listen, everyone... Sector 15 is going to tell us all what to do!"
   "Why is Sector 117 always the slowest! We are always waiting for you guys to finish and have to wait there hours after everyone else has left!" worker from Sector 95 complained. Arguments started and got more heated. What started as a revolt against the Overseer became complete chaos. Fighting against one another started with innocents getting in the way and people retaliating from those deaths, trying to calm people. During all of this, a machine grabbed Devon.    It took him to the Overseer and dropped him in front of the man he had seen all his life on the screen. The Overseer looked older and less omniscient in person. It also surprised him to see the Overseer in a wheelchair.
   "Look at what you did! People are dying out there. This is all your fault!" the Overseer said somehow in a large voice for such a frail-looking man.
   "You did this to us! We want our freedom!" Devon told the Overseer.
   "Freedom!? You have your freedom!" Overseer said.
   "We are trapped in these walls and in these damn quotas," Devon protested.
   "Now you are in my quarters. You see where I am at. Does this look so different from where you are!?" the Overseer told him. Devon looked around and saw that it had more rooms, but that was all. He had the same bed, same furniture. The other rooms looked to have been work rooms with equipment he did not recognize.
   "Stupid ... stupid man... you understand nothing!" the Overseer yelled at Devon.
   "Where is Smith! Where is Fran!!!" Devon yelled at the man not quieting from his fight.
   "You want to know where your people are? This way," Overseer went to a room with multiple screens, not looking to see if Devon followed. It showed all the people fighting and dying outside the wall.
   "Tell the computer their names and numbers," Overseer told Devon. Devon gave the information of Fran to the computer. The computer showed Fran was in her apartment.
   "I had not seen her in days. Why wasn't she at work! She did not return my calls even," Devon said to no one.
   "Report on this… Fran," the Overseer said.
   "Fran has refused to return to work until the case is done," the computer said.
   "What is her case?" the Overseer asked.
   "She has placed allegations of rape against a Greg Smith," the computer said. "Greg Smith was apprehended this morning." The computer responded by showing Devon’s colleague Smith being taken that morning.
   "Smith raped her?" Devon said, shocked at hearing Smith had raped someone.
   "I remember this one, this Greg Smith, had somehow scrambled the video surveillance, and it took some time to unscramble it. That was why she had been gone a few days," Overseer said. Devon could not get over the news of Smith raping Fran, and this deflated his entire argument. The Overseer pressed Devon for the response of the mob outside. "Are you satisfied?” the Overseer yelled at him, “Look at it... Look at it!! Computer, how many people have died today outside?"
   "Six hundred and twenty-nine are dead and another three hundred and seventy-two are estimated to die if not treated for their wounds soon," the computer said simply.
   "There you have it! Close to a thousand will perish all because of you. You are a stupid man," the Overseer told him.
   "You did this to us! You have us in here forced to do your work for you! This is all on you!" Devon yelled at him.     
"I did this? Yes, ‘I did this!’” the Overseer responded sarcastically, “Before people were bored. They had no drive, pride, purpose, or competition. I put the people to work. The quotas are for you. For all the people's demand of products. The quotas increase because humans were mating and having children, so there was more supply that was needed. You go to the store and see that there are twenty or thirty things on the shelves to buy. More than you would want, more than you would need. That is how people are. If there was only one item, people panic and go crazy. We have to have a large surplus for people to be calm and comforted. That there will always be supply. Believe me, there used to be crazy hording habits. I got that fixed, though. It took a few years, but I got it fixed."
   Devon didn't understand what he was talking about. He stood by his ground of demands. "Let us out of here! Give us our freedom!" Devon said.
"Freedom!? You have your freedom. Do you want to transfer to another work zone? You can put in a request and I can do it for you."
"Out of these metal walls. What is outside of here? What is beyond?"
   "We are not allowed outside," the Overseer said.
Devon, confident that he had the Overseer, now pushed the question, "Why not? Why not give us our freedom?"
   “We had our freedom, and we failed. We are all that is left of humanity. Those out there killing each other. That is it. A good amount did not show up to this, but most of us are out there killing each other now,” the Overseer stated.
   "We are allowed to exist, but only here. Why? Because of that!" the Overseer pointed to the screen. "Our self destructive behavior. We destroyed our world. We started on and moved to other worlds to only destroy those as well. We have destroyed so much through our greed and our distrust of one another. Now we are all that is left.
   “An alien race captured us and killed off the few remaining. It took them a while to purify our genes to what we used to be. We created such toxic environments that it degraded us to something so inferior that we were no longer 'civilized'. We are here, where ever here is, and the aliens they give us everything we need to live: food, shelter and each other. They thought it would be enough. But I was like you when I was younger. I stood up and fought against our 'oppressors'. They put me in charge to help things. To make things better for us. The ability to work and be proud. A competition amongst ourselves. Exercise! I intentionally lay out work sectors so people can get in a certain amount of steps every day. We keep fucking it up, though. Just look at it. Look at our awful mistake of 'us'.”
   Devon did not know what to do or say. Then an alien walked into the room. Devon became shocked at seeing this non-human. It looked at Devon indifferently.
   "The human population has fallen by 63%.” It then turned toward Devon and asked, “Will this human be the next Overseer?"

  Outside the human complex is nothing but cold space. A space station that has become a zoo for the alien caretakers of the human race. There is also a museum of human history and art in the same space complex. Scientists and citizens arrive to see the remnants of the humans. The carnage of that day forced them to close the zoo to the alien citizens. Their tickets were refunded, and it made the news on their network. Their amount of self destruction is something the aliens will never understand.