Chapter 4
Haley
A day has passed since the Zyfeliks’ changed their plans to make a detour to sell me on the planet called Gigla. So far, our only visitor has been Zaez, and I don’t know whether that’s good or bad.
He’s come in a few times to deliver our meals and to clean the room. Unfortunately, he’s only had time to chat for a few minutes as the crew has kept him busy with plenty of tasks to do, especially now that they’ve planned a detour. He did let it slip that he overheard some of the crewmembers talking when he was unstopping the hydration pipes that carry water into our cells.
Apparently, there was a short disagreement between the captain and sub-captain about changing the itinerary, but ultimately the leader of the ship relented. Now, an air of anticipation hangs over the crew who are eager to fill their coffers with the credits Giglisian jewels will bring them.
The girls and I have quietly discussed every option we can think of, and so far, we think our best bet is for me to try to escape when we land on Gigla. Once I’m taken off the ship, they’ll try to create a diversion of some sort and maybe that will distract our abductors and I’ll have a chance. If the jewels are as valuable as the aliens claim, then there is bound to be some type of law enforcement on the planet to make sure they’re not stolen. If I can find them, I can get help for the others and lead them back to the ship. And if I can’t find any space cops, well, we’ve decided I should try to hide out until it’s safe and then look for someone to help.
But to escape I’ll have to make it past the gray aliens. While the Zyfeliks are stronger than they appear, I still think I can take them on in a struggle. They seem to rely on their gadgets like the cattle prod and our fear to control us more than actual brute force. If I can get one of the cattle prods away from them, I’ll have a better chance.
We haven’t mentioned our plan to Zaez, for obvious reasons, but I wonder if he might suspect something. He’s slipped me a couple of extra rations of food and told me to hide them. If he does know, I just hope he won’t tell any of the other Zyfeliks. I don’t think he will, but you never know.
As we get closer to our destination, my anxiety increases. So many doubts and thoughts have been racing through my mind on repeat. It’s not only my future – my life – hanging in the balance, but my friends’ lives, too. Any little mistake could have disastrous consequences for all of us. I take a few deep breaths and try to still my racing heart, repeating my mantra over and over in my head.
I glance over at Emily in her cell. She’s retreated back into herself and has barely spoken a word since yesterday. Yesterday, I tried sitting next to the bars that separate us and talking to her, but she just turned her despondent eyes to me and murmured that she would rather be left alone. I’m trying to honor her request, but it is so hard to watch someone in distress and do nothing.
But if all goes to plan, we’ll get out of here soon. Soon, I’ll get a chance to show our abductors exactly what Earth women are made of and make them regret the day they decided to abduct us.
The hours pass in a monotonous blur, and before I know it, the lights begin to dim to indicate its nighttime. I crawl onto my narrow bed and eventually fall asleep, despite the thin, uncomfortable mattress.
I don’t know how long I’ve been asleep, but I wake up to shrieks of alarm.
“Is everyone okay?” Rose calls out.
“Yeah, what’s going on?” I ask as the other girls respond in confirmation.
“You didn’t feel that lurch? It felt like we made a really sharp turn or something.” Rose continues. “I think something is happening.”
I sit up and glance around. The lights in the cargo bay are on, now, but they’re only a dim glow and I can just barely make out the others. Rose is standing at her cell door with her hands tightly wrapped around the bars. The others are still on their beds, waiting expectantly to see what will happen.
The cargo bay is quiet and heavy with anxiety, making the hum of the engines sound even louder. The tense atmosphere is broken with gasps and squeals as the ship lists hard to one side. The movement nearly throws me to the floor, but at the last second, I manage to grab onto the metal frame of my bed. Chaos explodes all around me. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Emily is bleeding from a wound on her head and she’s slowly sliding across the floor of her cell.
The ship makes a quick turn in the opposite direction, and I hang on for dear life as the momentum tries to pull me from the relative safety of my bed. In the din of shouts that ring out, I just barely notice a loud bang in the distance. The whole spaceship trembles in response.
Oh shit, is someone shooting at us?
Another bang follows, louder this time, and the ship shudders violently. The lights flicker, then go out completely and we’re plunged into darkness. Seconds later, there’s a loud whirring noise and emergency lights blink on bathing the room in a red glow. The whoosh of the door sounds as it opens, and I look over to see Zaez stumble inside.
“Zaez! What’s happening?” I shout as he lurches across the room.
“The Alliance Force is pursuing the ship, and we are being fired upon. I do not think the captain will surrender. I have come to warn you, you must prepare for impact. Your cells are equipped with safety straps in case of a crash.” Zaez answers my question in a rush, his voice higher pitched than normal in his agitation. As soon as he’s finished talking, he disappears back through the door hurrying away.
“The bathrooms! Everyone, head to the bathroom in your cell. I saw the straps earlier, they’re next to the toilet.” Emily surprises us all by unsteadily rising from where she has been thrown to the floor and shouting out orders.
I slither off my bed and painstakingly edge my way over to the small bathroom in my cell, all while explosions echo in the distance and the floor rumbles beneath my feet.
The little room is barely wide enough for me to fit inside with a metal bowl that sticks out from one wall that serves as a space-age toilet. There is no door, so technically it’s probably more of an alcove than an actual room or even a closet.
I spy the black straps just where Emily said they would be, and I quickly sink to the floor with my back against one wall and secure the straps over my shoulders and around my waist. Bracing my legs against the other wall, I can’t believe that my survival depends on what basically looks like a couple of bungee cords.
Safety presentations on every flight I’ve ever been on run through my head and I quickly assume the brace position I’ve seen demonstrated so many times. I’ve never been a religious person, but I send up a silent prayer to whatever deities might be listening. Please let us survive this, and if we do, please, please let the Alliance Force be the good guys.
As tense minutes tick by, the explosions grow closer together and even louder with the ship violently shaking after nearly each one. It is clear the spaceship we’re in has sustained multiple direct hits, and I wonder how much longer it can continue to fly.
The red emergency lights add a sinister pall to everything as they flicker in time to the blasts. The ship lurches almost constantly, and I feel like I’m on a rollercoaster on steroids as the ship takes, what I suspect, are evasive maneuvers to try to escape whoever is pursuing us.
The straps securing me in place look like they’re stretched to the breaking point as the ship makes a sharply banked turn, but surprisingly they continue to hold me in place. The hum of the engine increases in intensity as it feels like the vessel speeds up even more.
Slowly the sounds of explosions fade away, although the ship continues to toss and turn like an out-of-control train. The whoosh of the cargo bay door sliding open leads me to lean forward as far as I can and peer around the edge of the wall.
It’s the sub-captain.
I watch as he carefully makes his way inside the room towards a panel of blinking buttons on the wall adjacent to the door. He presses a red button and a hidden panel opens. A small chair folds out from the panel and I swear it looks like a jump seat on an airplane. I watch in curiosity as he straps himself into the chair with a harness that stretches around his body.
A small device is attached to his wrist, and he raises it to his tiny slit of a mouth. “Sub-Captain Zariz reporting from cargo bay one. I am secured in the emergency seat. Begin the procedure for detachment.”
An alarm begins to blare, ear-splitting in its intensity, and the red lights continuously flash off and on in warning. With dawning horror, I realize things are about to get a whole lot worse. The cargo bay we’ve been held in is about to detach from the rest of the ship.
I duck my head back inside the bathroom and assume the same position as before. Only this time, I grab onto the small toilet bowl and grip it as tightly as I can.
A series of beeping noises and loud mechanical bumps echoes through the cargo bay, and that’s when I notice that the hum of the engines has grown quieter before it completely fades away. A sharp jolt rattles everything around me and I’m jerked forward, narrowly avoiding slamming my head against the bowl. I notice the hum of the engines has grown quieter before it completely fades away. Seconds tick by, and the quiet hum of what sounds like a much smaller engine emerges, and I can feel the slight vibrations it produces through the floor.
Minutes or hours go by – I honestly don’t know at this point – before there’s another sharp jolt, and a computerized voice rings out, cutting through the tension. The voice speaks in a different language than the shrill one that the Zyfeliks use, but the tiny chip in my head seamlessly converts the words into English.
“Habitable planet detected. No sentient lifeforms logged in the Intergalactic database. Entrance sequence initiated to planet XB13.”
Oh, shit. Ohshitohshitohshit.
A countdown sounds out. “Ten. . . Nine. . . Eight. . .”
I screw my eyes tightly closed and draw in a deep, steadying breath as the vessel begins to list to one side, readying itself to descend. In the background, the countdown continues.
“Hold on everyone!” One of the girls’ calls out, and I’m momentarily relieved to hear someone else’s voice. That relief is short lived.
“Three. . . Two. . . One. . .” The computerized voice finishes its countdown, and the vessel begins to tilt even further in one direction, and I know we’re beginning to descend through the atmosphere to an unknown planet.
As we descend, a loud roaring sound drowns out everything else and the whole vessel shakes so violently that I worry it’s going to break apart. I swallow the scream bubbling up in my throat, and instead let loose with a mumbled string of obscenities.
It feels like we fall forever. At one point, it sounds like there’s a small explosion and my teeth rattle from the vibrations it causes. The room lists violently to one side and it feels like we are being tossed around in a stormy sea before it lurches again, and it seems like we’re falling faster. Fucking hell, I think we’re crashing.
I fight hard to keep my body from being moved around with the force of the descent. My fingers curl against the cold metal, clawing to find purchase against the slippery material as momentum tries to tear me out of the straps. There is a hard bump as it feels like we hit the ground and bounce into the air like a rubber ball, and a moment later the loud shrieking sounds of metal being sheared away.
We bounce again and I hear the ear-splitting screech of the walls being torn away. Tears blaze a path down my face and I screw my eyes closed as tight as I can. And then, just as suddenly as the freefall began, it ends with us skidding to a rough stop that jars my entire body and roughly throws me against the metal bowl of the toilet. I bump my forehead against it with a resounding crack, and blood drips into my eyes, blurring my vision.
And then everything is silent.