I am from District 9; this district is put in slums far away from the city to keep us isolated. The only other life that we know is out there as of now is the guards that make sure we stay in the right slum, or, district, and the other sectors before and after us. District 9 is made up of seven so-called kids; why they call us District '9' hasn't really been thought of by any of us. 

     'Us' consists of, well, us: Woojin, Minho, Hyunjin, Chan, Changbin, Seungmin, and me. Felix.

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      "Felix... Felix~! FELIX GET YOUR UP!" I feel hands on my shoulders shaking me violently before I open my eyes and push them off me,

     "What, what what?! What do you need so bad, Changbin?" I sit up and push the thin blankets off of my body.

     "There's two leaving Six," He says with worry in his voice.

      "What do you mean, 'leaving Six?'" I put on the white button up and white pants, and plain enough, I have white shoes as well; I see Changbin already in uniform, along with the other five on the other side of our small, broken down slum.

       "They're taking people out of districts to kill them." The others' heads turn to the two of us slowly & confusingly.

      "Kill them? What's that supposed to mean, Changbin?" Hyunjin speaks up whilst walking towards us.

     "Exactly what it's supposed to sound like, Hyun," Changbin rolls his eyes excessively and looks back at me.

      "What do we do, Felix?" I stare at him with dull eyes and go through every option I can think of while eliminating ones that will surely not work. After wasting a little over 15 minutes, I have a solution that will surely work, although it is pretty dangerous. 

      "We go to the Strays."

      "T-the Strays?" Seungmin stutters.

      "You explained to me a problem, therefore as a good friend, I explained to you a solution." I cross my arms and push past them.

     "Okay, that was not explaining." Minho's eyes explode and move towards me.

     "Was too explaining. I just left some details out..."

     "Felix, this is serious. What if they pull one of us out?" Seungmin, the youngest, questions with a frown. The rest of District 9 do the same and look down.

      I walk over to Seungmin and put my arm around his shoulders, "We'll get through this. If they take one of you, they'll have to take me too. As long as I'm here and alive I won't let anything happen to you guys."

     "We should get going before we're late, again." Woojin utters quietly.

     "You all remember what happened last time. Let's go." Chan announces as well. They've been awfully quiet lately, I wonder what's up with them.

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     "If you don't already know, we have and will be continuing to extract individual units or small crowds from certain districts," a security guard I'm not familiar with speaks firmly to all ten districts that are lined up, us incontestably being ninth. "When I call your unit number, please step forward." 

      Seungmin grabs my hand tightly and I swear he almost breaks my hand off. I squeeze his hand slightly to reassure him everything will be fine; at least I hope. I hear Woojin at the end of the line repeating his number over and over again, Hyunjin's thin layer of sweat clearly evident in what sun that climbs out of the thick clouds, Changbin keeps his eyes closed, Chan's eyes are glistening with a sheer blanket of tears, and Minho is on the other side of me breathing heavily.

     The guard must be down to the last few numbers, he only said there would be ten. One from each group; what if I can't keep the promise I made? What if I let them down?

     "District Eight, '970901' please come forward." When I hear screams and cries from the district not too far over, Seungmin tightly shuts his eyes and grabs my hand with his other one as well. Screaming and crying usually means the component didn't obey and had to be dragged from their commune in order to seperate. I see what looks like the youngest member be pulled from the rest of their group, his arms and legs thrashing around around, one associate even tries to grab him back. That's never a good thing to do; an extra guard comes up from behind that district and grabs a syringe, putting into the deep-voiced male's arm and making him instantly pass out. 

     "This is a warning." The officer with the unconscious body in his arms states. 

     My pace of breathing quickens and my legs are shaky, I don't want them to leave. Better yet, I don't want to leave them.

     "District," he stops speaking when another person comes up to him and whispers something I can't hear into the other's ear. He nods his head and blabs again, "District Ten, '931101' please come forward."

     "W-wait...wait!" A member from District Ten speaks up, I believe his name is Jeup. His eyes are wide and his mouth is hanging open, his hands in front of his chest,

     "Y-you can't take Taeho, please. Take me instead, I know what happened to District Six and I can't let the rest of District Ten face this pitiful slum of yours without him."

     My eyebrows almost lift up to my hairline, no one has ever sacrificed themselves for another unit. Talking back to an officer? Pff, that's a usual around here; just ask Woojin.

     "Fine." The guard holding this Taeho's arm throws him to the ground, ruining his clean white pants and shirt. You can see the trail of tears run down his face as he gives Jeup one last hug before getting ripped away from his former leader.

      He runs back to his precinct after looking back at Jeup one last time, his sobs can be heard from where I'm standing. I notice how much the groups have gone down since I've got here; I mean, this is the first time we've ever been eliminated for good, other than the older districts.

     District One, Two, Three, Five, Seven, Ten, and now Eight have only lost one member; We haven't lost any and I'm growing concern. What if they're planning the worst for us?  District Four used to have 12 units, up until now, at the time they only have eight. District Six is down to one member when it had four, the only province to ever be women. 

     We're going down too fast; we have to get into the Strays quick. Before it's too late.

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     "Dammit. Why the hell are none of us getting phased out?!" Chan screams out of anger and confusion.

     "Would you like one of to be? Hm, Chan? Would you like that!?" Hyunjin yells back at the enraged boy.

     "No... no, I'm just- I don't understand anything..." Chan's knees give out and he downgrades to the filthy floor underneath him.

     Changbin and Minho are just as confused as him; as am I. Why aren't we getting taken out of our section?

      "That's it. We leave for the Strays tonight. There's a bus just outside of the second skid row, if we snake in grass when it's dark enough, we'll be able to get out without being apprised of."

     "What about our uniforms?"

     "It's a supply bus. It'll have food, blankets, water, clothes, all that fancy stuff we barely get." Seungmin sits up and nods,

     "District Nine sticks together. Are you all up for leaving tonight?" He and I look around the blighted area and see all nods and smiles.

     "Then it's official; we leave tonight."