Chapter 19 #2
They drag me along until we get to a haphazard pile of gear. Bags are pressed up against trees, and littered among them are folded up cages.
The cages are empty so I’m probably the first they’ve caught. The fact that they’re looking for others lets me know that there are definitely others hiding here. Szhe’ka and I were just unfortunate enough to get caught.
“Where is the bird?” one of them asks, getting my attention.
“Dead,” the one that caught me gurgles back. “I killed him.”
My heart jumps to my throat as the group lets out a honking sound that I suddenly realize is laughter.
Is Szhe’ka truly dead? Did he watch me try to save him despite knowing this just to mock me? Is my despair that enjoyable?
Despite the deep frustrations in my heart, I cannot speak of my pain.
With one hunter, I can curse at him. Being surrounded by several, all with their own motivations, is inviting a painful death.
One of the hunters hands some kind of shackle to the one holding on to me and he places it around my neck, finally letting go of my hair.
It clicks on and I feel my body go rigid at the added layer of stark reality.
I’m so fucked.
We begin the long walk back to the camp of the hunters, following a straight path that seems to have been carved out by them. We reach the camp by early evening and to my complete horror, there’s even more of them.
There’s a wide patch of forest in a sort of circle with a large ship with extensive craters and scratch marks on it, most likely the one I had been held prisoner in earlier, at the center of it.
Seems like their technology does fail after all.
There were smaller, circular clusters of tent-like structures dotted here and there in the clearing.
Three large hunters wait by the ship as if guarding it but I make out more movement in its dark recesses.
Escape now would be difficult, even for a rescue party.
There’s no chance I can find something poisonous enough to feed them during mealtime.
They’re not human so I don’t know what would work on them.
When they get that ship working and we leave here, my chance to leave will disappear.
Maybe my will to live will too, if I’m lucky.
One of them is larger than the rest, and is moving erratically. It’s making an odd, burbling chitter, which turns to a sickening squeal when it sees me.
It surges forward, ignoring the hissing and yells of the others as it moves forward with surprising speed. Clawed hands reach out to hold it back and it lets out a scream that makes my heart skip a beat.
Then it opens its mouth wide, and a long jet of liquid sprays at me, catching my side before I can dodge, the chain attached to my collar making me clumsy.
Then I’m screaming too, the liquid burning where it contacts my skin. It’s a small age as I scream and writhe on the ground until the burning stops and I come to my senses enough to hear them arguing.
“...she is already been exposed anyway. We should just have our fun and then bury the body.”
I know they are talking about me, but all I can do is lay on the ground panting.
Living really hurts right now. My legs feel like giant logs, my head and scalp feel like they’re being attacked by tiny stinging bees and my stomach and intestines feel like they have been taken out of me and put back after being tossed around in a washing machine.
Suddenly, there is immense pressure on my neck and the alien who captured me drags me along until I am able to scramble to get my feet under me, staggering behind him as he hisses at the other aliens to stay away.
I am too weak to argue with the hunters when they jeer lustfully at me and make remarks about my body, following them to the back of the camp that is close to a stream. The forest is sparser here and a lot more light filters through the leaves and dances off the slow flowing stream.
They whisper amongst themselves in a disgusting, amorphous huddle before I am left alone with the same hunter that led me back; his face has a greedy look on it as he pushes me toward the stream and speaks.
“Clean yourself quickly so you can be kept properly. Can’t risk you escaping again.”
Clearly, I can banish any expectation of privacy.
After willing the black suit to recede to the thin band around my waist, I wash myself under his watchful eyes, making sure to meet his gaze as he tells me the new rules of my existence.
I can’t tell if I’m making him as uncomfortable as he makes me but I sure as hell try.
After I’m done cleaning myself, he drags me to a small enclosure and unceremoniously throws me in, shaking and wet.
There is a small black carpet on the ground with a slightly raised end on one side.
I settle myself in a corner with my legs pressed against my chest and my arms cradling my shaking body.
My cell has a small round window in front of it so I can see glimpses of the world outside and it is dark outside before I’m given some crackers and a bowl of water. I cry again at the animal-like treatment, and then I remember that is all I am to these creatures.
An animal useful for nothing else but cheap entertainment and sex. Nothing much new here than on Earth, I suppose. If by some miracle I get the chance to go back, I will commit myself to veganism and charity work. If I manage to survive this. No one deserves to live like this.
As night falls, the camp quiets to a low murmur of conversations and the occasional hunter pressing his hungry face against my window as I try to force myself to sleep. Though I am exhausted, sleep is far from me. The pain in my head and legs are nearly gone now but there is a new problem.
I do my best to keep it quiet, but the itching burn in my arms and hair keeps me scratching and huffing in discomfort until I fall into a restless sleep.