Twenty-One - Barbra Dawson

Wren Ashford has spent twenty-one years preparing for her future.

She knows what she wants. She knows where she belongs. And she trusts the Civic State to know her better than she knows herself.

On Allocation Day, every twenty-one-year-old is given the purpose they have been preparing for their entire lives.

While thousands of young adults receive the futures they have spent their lives preparing for, Wren receives something else. Her letter contains a word she has never seen used for a person before.

SURPLUS.

And a date she will be terminated.

Her family refuses to believe it. The Civic State insists there has been no mistake. But when Wren discovers that others have received the same letter, she begins to realise that her Allocation may not be an error at all.

Someone knows what is happening.

Someone who shouldn’t be able to contact her.

Someone who knows she is searching for answers.

As the days disappear, Wren is forced to choose between the life she has always trusted and a truth she may not be ready to face.

Because the Civic State has given her twenty-one years of safety, purpose and certainty.

Now it has given her twenty-one days to live.