Chapter 2
Haley
Two days have passed since Zaez told us that our destination is a slave auction.
An illegal slave auction because apparently there is an important distinction. It has not been an easy two days. My nerves feel like they’re pulled to the breaking point. I’d give anything to see Earth again, but realistically, I know that will most likely never happen.
An air of hopelessness has descended over the cargo bay that feels like it’s going to steal the breath from my lungs. The others have been quiet for the most part, and I think we’re all still trying to process this latest turn of events.
My next-door cell mate, Emily, sobbed off and on for hours after Zaez left. Now, based on the lack of sounds coming from her cell, I think she might be sleeping. I don’t know what to say to comfort her. Hell, I don’t even know what to say to myself.
It’s breakfast time again. Yesterday, our meals were switched up to something a little more substantial, although it was still just as unappetizing. Today, we’re having a big bowl of slimy gray noodles covered in a green sauce that tastes like warm yogurt. Yum.
Crystal suggested our abductors could be trying to fatten us up because we might be sold to aliens that consider humans a delicacy, but my mind shies away from that thought.
Fucking hell, please don’t let us be like the alien version of filet mignon.
I force myself to eat as much of the yogurt noodles as I can stand because I’m going to need as much of my strength as I can get for the upcoming ordeal. Maybe once the ship lands, there will be an opportunity to escape and go on the run.
Yeah, right, who are you trying to kid?
We’re headed to a space station that’s hosting an illegal auction. It’s not like there would be anyone that might help us there, but maybe, just maybe, I can use the distraction of the auction to escape and find somewhere to hide until it’s over. I’m trying my best to hold tight to any shred of hope I can manage. So far, it’s been difficult, but I’m aware it’s the only thing keeping me from dissolving into despair like Emily.
I glance through the bars of my cell and watch Zaez use a long-handled contraption that looks like the space version of a mop, but instead of using water to clean, it emits a stream of air and a blue light – sort of like the cleansers in our cells. The small alien moves the contraption back and forth in sweeping arcs, his short, thin legs taking tiny steps. Just as he nears the door of the cargo bay, it opens with a whoosh and two Zyfeliks enter.
It’s been several days since we’ve seen anyone other than Zaez, a fact I’ve been grateful for. Apparently, most Zyfeliks consider humans to be little more than vermin, and they’re wary of catching any diseases we might have. I hope their fears come true, and we give them some horrible disease that causes them to die a slow, excruciating death.
I don’t remember ever seeing these two aliens before. One is a little taller than the other by nearly a foot, but they both have the slender build that is apparently common among their species. They’re wearing white outfits that resemble wetsuits with built in boots, although the shorter one has the addition of a silver insignia on his chest. I assume he’s some high-ranking member of the crew.
The shorter Zyfelik shoves past Zaez, knocking him to his knees, and the frail alien releases a startled cry of pain.
Crystal strides across her cell to the door and shouts, “Hey! Pick on someone your own size, asshole!”
The taller Zyfelik immediately stalks across the room until he stands squarely in front of her with only the metal bars separating them. His unblinking stare is cold as he sweeps it over her. “Silence, female, or I will silence you!”
Quick as lightning, his long, spindly hand reaches out holding a metal stick that I don’t remember seeing when he entered. An electrical hum is the only warning we have before he pushes it through the bars and shocks Crystal with it.
Oh shit. She stumbles to the floor with a pained shout as the nauseating odor of burned flesh fills the air. An angry red mark mars the skin on her throat and tears well in her eyes. Her platinum blonde bob, usually so tidy, is tangled around her face.
Aria rushes to the wall she shares with Crystal’s cell and tries to comfort her, calling out to ask her if she’s okay. Across the room, I notice Zaez slip unnoticed through the door, his head bowed in submission and his eyes glued to the floor.
We’ve been lucky, so far – if you can call this luck. The other Zyfeliks have mainly left us alone, but it looks like our luck is about to change. Again.
As Crystal grunts and slowly picks herself up off the floor, the taller alien moves back to stand beside the shorter one who has been watching all of this play out with an almost bored expression on his face. I almost expect to see him start polishing his nails or something.
“Listen well, females! Captain Zirconiz will address you now. Heed his words!” The tall one bows his head in deference to the captain as the shorter gray alien takes a step forward.
“My gratitude, Sub-Captain Zariz.” The captain turns to us. “You will have medical scans today. It should have been completed as soon as we left your inferior planet, but it took my incompetent crew too long to upload the control data for humans.” At this utterance, the captain shoots what I can only interpret as an annoyed look to the sub-captain before he turns back to us.
“Any humans found to be of inferior stock will be jettisoned. You have already been inoculated against the most common diseases known to the Alliance, including the Plague. We cannot have the merchandise dying from disease before we get a chance to sell you. You will. . .” Before he can continue, the door opens with a whoosh and another gray alien quickly enters the room, coming to a halt before the captain and bowing his head.
“Well, Zarenz, what is it? Speak now!” Captain Zirconiz demands in his weird, high-pitched gurgling voice.
“Captain Zirconiz, your mate has sent an urgent communication. She requests your immediate response.”
The captain releases a frustrated sigh as he tilts his large head back. “Sub-Captain Zariz, never choose a mate from one of the upper families on Zyfel. They are more demanding than the Intergalactic Alliance Council.”
The sub-captain emits a grating, high-pitched whine that makes me want to slam my hands over my ears, and I suspect it’s their version of laughter. If I wan’t so scared, it would be fascinating to watch this extraterrestrial soap opera drama play out, but I have bigger things to worry about right now.
I watch as the captain strides across the room to the door with an order for his subordinates to take over for him. As much as I don’t like the captain, the sub-captain’s eyes watch us with a cold, avaricious gleam that makes me feel even more nervous. It’s like he’s mentally tallying the money we’ll bring him all while thinking of ways he can make our lives as miserable as possible.
The sub-captain paces in front of us. “Females, if you pass the medical scan, you will be sold to our discerning clients. You unworthy humans will be given the honor of enriching Zyfelik coffers – consider yourselves fortunate to sacrifice your inferior selves to our empire. You are welcome, females.” He comes to a halt and his thin mouth stretches in what I assume is a smirk before he turns to the other alien. “Zarenz, we will begin with Cell One. Remove the human female and escort her to the medic bay.”
“Uh. . . which one, Sub-Captain?”
“The large one with head fur the color of weeviil vomit.” The sub-captain eyes Rose with distaste.
I watch as the gray alien walks towards the cell containing Rose and Zoe. He reaches it and leans forward to a small metal box on the front. A red light flashes and scans his eye, and a moment later the door opens with a whir followed by a metal clang.
My stomach sinks with disappointment. I slept right through it – personally, I think they drugged me somehow – when the others were brought onboard, so this is the first time I’ve actually seen how the cell doors are opened. I’m disappointed to see it’s done with what’s essentially some weird biometric scanner that belongs in a spy movie. Any plans that had been in the back of my mind of breaking out of the cell that holds me are now useless.
Not that I had come up with a plan to break out, but at least before now, getting one of the doors open was still an option.
As the gray alien reaches through the opening to grab Rose, Zoe wraps her arms around her teacher and clings to her like a baby opossum.
“No! You can’t take her!” The girl shrieks, her voice surprisingly loud considering her small size.
Zarenz immediately comes to a halt, a stunned expression on his other-worldly face. He recovers quickly and gets one of the cattle prod things out of his pocket. I realize now it’s retractable and with the click of a button, it extends until it’s at least three feet long. I hear the tell-tale hum of electricity as he presses a different button and the end of the stick glows a menacing electric blue. Rose holds up her hand in a placating gesture to him while her other hand rubs soothing circles on Zoe’s back. She bends down and whispers in the little girl’s ear.
From my position, I can’t hear what she says, but whatever it was, it settles Zoe down as she nods and reluctantly releases Rose.
Fifteen minutes later, Rose is escorted back, her face chalk white. I want to ask what happened and if she’s okay, but I don’t get the chance because the aliens turn to Zoe next. I think they’re wary of dealing with the girl, so they use a small handheld scanner that resembles the forehead thermometer at my doctor’s office. The gray alien uses it to scan Zoe from head to toe. Seconds later, the device pings and announces in a tinny robotic voice, “Immature human female. Condition within normal range.”
Then, it’s everyone else’s turn.
Over the next hour, we’re taken, one by one, to a room next door that the aliens call the medic bay for our scans. For the most part, everything goes smoothly – I think we’re all a little too scared of the cattle prod to do anything other than comply with their orders. Even Crystal settled for just shooting the aliens a nasty glare as if she was imagining their deaths.
If only looks could kill, they’d be six feet under by now.
When it was Maddie’s turn, the sub-captain warned the other one, “Be careful of that female. The color of her hair is not within normal parameters for humans. She may be diseased.”
Maddie rolled her eyes at the alien who waved her out of the cell with the cattle prod thing extended towards her as he stared suspiciously at her dyed purple hair. They both made sure to keep a healthy distance from her the entire time like she was contagious.
The only hiccup was with Emily. As soon as it was her turn for a scan and her cell door opened, she immediately fainted. The gray aliens had to call another crew member to help carry her unconscious body to the medic bay.
When it’s my turn to be scanned, I go willingly. Well, maybe not willingly so much as without causing a fuss. My parents didn’t raise a fool, and I know to choose my moments to rebel wisely. I plan to wait and bide my time and keep my eyes and ears open for the right moment. I don’t know what I’m looking for exactly, but hopefully, I’ll recognize the perfect time.
There are three aliens escorting humans to the medic bay, now – the Sub-Captain Zariz, Zarenz, and another gray male. They lead me through the doorway to a room that is slightly smaller than the cargo bay and brightly lit with white metal walls and floors. Metal storage cabinets are lined up along one side and I assume they must contain medical supplies since they called this room the medic bay.
In the center of the room is a device that reminds me of a really big tanning bed. It’s massive and takes up a large amount of space. There’s a screen about the same size as a laptop that juts out from the side of it. Weird symbols, almost like Cyrillic letters but not quite, run across the screen like a tickertape – I wish I could read it, but I don’t have the faintest clue what any of the symbols mean. I guess the translator in my head doesn’t work on written languages.
Before I can utter a word in protest, they shove me towards the machine. The tube-like contraption opens and one of the aliens roughly pushes me inside it. I swallow down a curse and grit my teeth as the top of the contraption lowers and I’m enclosed in near total darkness. A robotic voice breaks the silence, but the words are so muffled that I can’t make them out. Moments later, a small dot of light appears.
An unbidden memory flashes through my mind of the summer my best friend – yes, the one who slept with my boyfriend – talked me into trying out a tanning bed. My usually pale skin was lobster red for days. Of course, she talked me into trying it again and again, insisting I just needed a base tan to prevent burning. That was the summer I learned that my skin does not tan at all, and I resigned myself to learning to love my pasty complexion. But now, I’d rather take another chance on getting burned in that tanning bed than this.
The light grows bigger and brighter to an almost blinding degree, and I squint to keep from closing my eyes. Then again, maybe I should close my eyes. Maybe the light could damage them. But if I close them, then I won’t be able to see what’s going on, and that somehow seems worse.
My thoughts race as the light begins to move up and down my body in a sweeping circular motion, leaving a trail of buzzing warmth behind. The sweeping motion speeds up faster and faster until the light moves at a dizzying pace. I try to follow it with my eyes, but eventually give up when it becomes too difficult to track. After what seems like an eternity, it stops and the tube goes completely dark.
I’ve never had a problem with claustrophobia, but the darkness is oppressive. My heartrate speeds up and I try to suck in as much air as I can, but it feels impossible. As my eyes adjust, I can just barely make out the walls of the contraption I’m enclosed in, but unfortunately, that seems to make my claustrophobia worse. It feels like the walls are moving in on me until I feel as if I’m going to suffocate. I suck in air, but it doesn’t seem to help.
In the back of my mind, I know I’m having an anxiety attack and that the dwindling supply of oxygen is just a fabrication of my stressed brain. But in the darkness of the narrow tube, it’s hard to concentrate on that.
A heavy weight sits on my chest, pressing me down, and my lungs heave in and out like bellows trying to draw in enough air. My head swims and I try to swallow, but it feels like there’s an obstruction there and I can’t.
I haven’t had an anxiety attack in years, but I remember the coping methods I used to turn to so frequently. I concentrate on my breathing and repeat the same phrase over and over in my head.
You’re okay. This is only a moment in time and it will pass. You’re okay.
It takes longer than I’d like, but I can feel myself slowly begin to calm and my breathing and pulse start to slow. Then, a puff of mist bursts from a nozzle in front of me that I hadn’t noticed before and I jump.
Ugh. I cough in irritation as bitterness floods my mouth, almost like biting into a lemon – if a lemon was mixed with antiseptic. The mist must be some sort of cleansing solution or medicine – did I mention the Zyfeliks consider us unclean vermin?
And then, it’s over.
The top of the tube slides open and one of the gray aliens pulls me free from it. My eyes blink rapidly at the glaring brightness of the room, and I realize the sub-captain is there carefully examining a bunch of symbols and numbers on the device’s screen. He doesn’t look pleased.
“This female is defective. She is unbreedable. Ah, what a shame we will lose the credits she would have brought. Prepare the merchandise to be jettisoned.”
Oh shit.
“Wait, you can’t!” I shriek. “And I’m not defective!” The other two gray aliens are now on either side of me holding my arms in a rough grasp. I try to shove away their hands, but they’re a lot stronger than they look.
“We can and we will, female. Our clients are only interested in purchasing females of superior stock. Take her to the jettison hatch.” The sub-captain orders, gesturing towards a door on the other side of the room.
One of the gray aliens holds out his cattle prod thing, aiming it towards me in an effort to herd me out of the medic bay and to my death. Horrific images flash through my mind in a landslide of terror and I feel like my heart will pound itself through my ribs. How long does it take to die in space? I hope it’s quick.
Well, I’m not going without a fight. If they’re going to push me out to my death, then I’ll grab on at the last second and drag one of these fuckers with me. Take them by surprise, they won’t know what hit them. They’ll regret the day they messed with this human.
And maybe, just maybe, this is what should happen.
The girls and I have whispered about it when Jayden and Zoe have been asleep. That if things start to look really dire and unbearable, it might be better to just end things. I want to howl in despair and cry because I’m not ready to die. There are so many other things that I wanted to do. Like, finally travel abroad or learn a new language or get a pet.
But I force my shoulders back in resolve. If I’m going to die, then I’ll damn well do it with my head held high and I’ll do my damnest to take out one of the Zyfeliks with me.
I shriek and jump as the impatient gray alien pokes me in the side with the cattle prod to get me to move. Damn, that hurt. The smell of burned flesh reaches my nose and makes my eyes water. My side burns and tingling arrows of pain shoot down into my leg making me stumble.
“Sub-Captain, may I suggest an alternative? What of the Giglisians, sir?” It’s the other gray alien, the one without the cattle prod.
“What of them? They are as ugly as a newly hatched bewickii. And they have their own females, who are also as ugly as a newly hatched bewickii.” The sub-captain laughs and an unpleasant shudder goes down my spine. We’ve stopped now, halfway across the medic bay while the aliens talk. I don’t care if they decide to chitchat all day long if it will give me a few more minutes before being killed.
“Yes, but there is a shortage of females throughout the Alliance, including on Gigla. The Giglisians still have some of their own females, enough to continue their race, but they prefer outsiders for their brothels. Specifically, they prefer unbreedable females for their brothels as it is forbidden for the Giglisians to breed with outsiders. My brother is a navigator on another ship, and the last time I was home, he told me his crew sold an unbreedable female to a tavern on Gigla. She was not human, but an Ilzia.”
“Ilzia? They are uglier than the Giglisians.” I can see the gleam of interest on the sub-captain’s face. I watch with bated breath as the conversation continues around me and the aliens decide my fate.
“Gigla is in the Rexa star system, correct? That is four cycles out of our way.” The other gray alien interrupts.
“If we set the hyperdrive to maximum level, we can make it in two full cycles. It would be worth the extra time it will take us to travel there.” Then, the alien says the magic words. “My brother said the Giglisians were quite pleased with the female they purchased, and they paid with gems from their mines.”
“From Gigla?” I can practically see dollar signs glinting in the sub-captain’s eyes like a cartoon character as he salivates over the thought of acquiring jewels. “They are the rarest gemstones in the Alliance.”
“Even the Kakiav do not have access to Gigla gemstones. Imagine how many scores of credits they would trade for even one. We have taken such a risk to acquire the humans. It would be a shame to not take advantage of our endeavors and earn as much profit as possible. For the glory of our empire, of course.” The gray alien with the cattle prod is practically jumping up and down in his excitement at the fabled gems. I eye the electrified stick warily as it comes close to making contact with my skin again. “What should we do with the human, Sub-Captain?”
The sub-captain points a spindly finger at me and issues his command. “Return the human to her cell. I will convince Captain Zirconiz of the need for a short detour to the Rexa system.”
“And if he isn’t convinced?”
“He will be. I’ll make sure of it.” His cold eyes sweep over the other two aliens.
A shiver runs down my spine at the menace in his voice. Great, not only do I have to look forward to being sold to a brothel, but there may be a mutiny on the way.