"You cannot live on the food we have for you. That leaves me three choices. Let you continue to starve, slowly dying. Or put you out of your misery, and save the resources of feeding you for someone who has a chance to live." The orc gave me a long, calculating look before he continued, "Or I can find you someone who is willing to spend his personal resources to care for a defective human."

My name is Wilhemina Jensen. I am one of the few people who survived when aliens first made contact.

It wasn't the invasion that made society fall, we did that all on our own. People panicked. The food supply chains broke down. We started fighting each other for the last loaf of bread or bag of flour. That was before I ever saw one of the orc-shaped aliens.

One day at a time, concentrate on getting through today, worry about tomorrow if you got there. Be safe, be smart, be invisible. Take care of each other. And don't forget to feed the cat.

I managed to hide for more than a year before they found me. I ended up living in a tent city set up in a school yard that felt like a human zoo for months when one of the orcs pulled me out of the food line. He and his friends fed me the first real meal I'd had in ages before sending me back to my tent. I wasn't trying to attract attention, but the next thing I know, I'm getting special treatment. When I asked why, I didn't like the vague answer I got about Romeo, Tybalt, Mac and Iago deciding to keep me. I don't know what they're up to, and it's hard to trust monsters at the end of the world.

——

Misconstrued is a stand alone book in the Mistaken Universe