by Zara Starr
“Prepare for training,” Slinin said after a moment of silence. “We will not rest after battles. You are already healed and there is work to do.”
Slinin was right, Mal had been healed not long after he had been sliced by the Hucan. In fact, he had healed faster than the blood had a chance to dry.
But he had hoped he could get some time to rest. If Slinin wanted the grand prize, there would be no rest.
Mal thought about the female again. The human. The grand prize. She was what Slinin had his eye on. And why not? She was the best of the females Mal had seen up on that stage so far. A man like Slinin was, no doubt, accustomed to getting what he wanted.
It was merely a matter of taking the right steps. The first, obviously, had been to obtain a gladiator that Saithin Master though was worthy.
Mal knew he should feel flattered that Slinin had chosen him as the gladiator that would represent him and fight all his battles to win the grand prize.
But Mal couldn’t stop thinking about the female. About the female that had stood up there. She had not looked terrified like the other females, although she must have been.
She had merely stood there, watching, taking it all in as if she was sightseeing.
If Mal won all his battles, which he intended on doing, Mal knew that the woman would go to Slinin. He had no idea what the Saithin was like. He had only heard of his feats in the business world – and his riches. He didn’t know if the mantis was honorable. If he was kind.
He did not know if the human female would be hurt if she belonged to the Saithin that he now belonged to. Only time would tell. Mal would find out eventually. And then, so would the female.
Why did Mal care so much about another slave? He had never cared about the countless females paraded on the stage before.
He didn’t know. It shouldn’t have mattered.
It was just a pity that she would live her life as a slave. Something as beautiful as she was deserved to go free.
Chapter Four
Tanya
After the fight was over, a lot of the other women who had stood on the stage with Tanya had been taken down to the ring and offered to either the gladiators or what looked like noblemen in robes.
Tanya had been the last to be taken away. But she hadn’t been paraded around. She hadn’t been dragged down to the ring. Nothing happened to her at all and she wasn’t sure why. If she wasn’t going to be treated like the others, why had she been dressed like them? And why had she been forced to join them?
Instead of being taken to the ring, Tanya had been dragged back to the pod. This time, she had an ominous feeling, a sense of dread in her gut. She fought the guard that clamped its hand around her even more wildly than she had before. But the mantis-like monsters were stronger than they looked.
As soon as she was in the pod – this time, a guard with her – the pod started moving at high speed. This time, taking her across and down, in the opposite direction from which she had come.
Was she going to be taken to another room? What would they do to her?
A new sense of fear grabbed a hold of her. Tanya had always had good gut instincts – she always knew when something was going to go wrong. Whatever they were about to do to her now, it couldn’t be good.
The guard tried to say something to her in the language that she didn’t understand. And the clicking sounds that it made before and after speaking only terrified her more. What did they want from her?
She didn’t bother asking. She wasn’t going to get an answer anyway. She couldn’t speak the language.
When the pod came to a standstill, she was again dragged through metal doors that slid open, hissing as if air escapes from the room. She was escorted out and led to a room that looked like a hospital room.
Everything was white, from the tiles on the floor to the ceiling. And there were gurneys everywhere. Machines beeped along one wall, but everything looked like it had escaped from some futuristic setting. State of the art technology was used here. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to know that.
What was this place?
Another monster, one dressed in a lab coat, came to Tanya. She wasn’t fooled by his clothing. Maybe he was revered among the monsters, maybe he was seen as some kind of scholar or a doctor or something important. The guard seemed to speak to him with some kind of respect. But all Tanya saw when she looked at him was another monster that was keeping her away from her life back home. None of this made sense and Tanya wanted out.
The monster in the lab coat grabbed her and she fought him. But he was stronger. Of course, he was. Tanya should have known that he would be. But she wasn’t going to ever stop fighting.
Still, she was wrestled onto a gurney and strapped down so that she had no way of escaping.
It wasn’t just uncomfortable – since she had been strapped down on her stomach, face down – it was mortifying. She felt vulnerable. She had no way of defending herself. At least, she told herself, if she lay on her stomach her vital organs were relatively safe. For now.
She hated the train her thoughts were taking, but why else would she be strapped down other than for experiments? She wouldn’t put it beneath these monsters to do something like that. After all, they had already hurt her and forced her to parade in skimpy clothing. Now they had strapped her down.
Her head was turned to the side and she watched as the monster in the lab coat prepared something. At first, she couldn’t see what it was because his strange insect-like body was in the way. But when he moved, she noticed that there was something on the table, mounted on something that allowed access from all angles.
It looked a hell of a lot like a computer chip. What were they going to do with that?
The lab-coat-monster picked up the chip with tweezers and came toward her, slowly. As if he didn’t want to scare her.
Maybe Tanya wouldn’t have reacted so badly if he didn’t have a scalpel in the other hand.
She started thrashing violently against the straps that held her down. Whatever they were going to do with that chip, it was going to involve pain. She just knew it.
The monster shook its head – how was it possible for such an ugly creature to shake its head? It said something in the same language that Tanya didn’t understand and put the scalpel down for a moment. With one hand, it fastened her straps until she was unable to move, her face pushed awkwardly into the mattress on which she lay.
He picked up the scalpel again and brought it closer to the back of her neck. Tanya screamed.
It was only a moment, and then the scalpel reappeared in her vision with blood on the blade. Strangely, she hadn’t felt any pain. The tweezers appeared too. And they were empty. The chip had been inserted into the back of her neck. Or somewhere around there, if the light tugging had been anything to go by.
“Look, I don’t know who you guys are and what you want from me,” Tanya tried again. Her face was still pressed into the mattress and her words came out muffled. She was panicking and she didn’t know what else to do. “I have a lot of money back home. I will pay you anything you want. Anything. Can you imagine how rich I will make you?”
None of them had spoken language she understood so Tanya figured that her pleas were probably falling onto deaf ears. She was terrified. They had just planted a chip in her body. A chip! As if she was an animal.
Tanya opened her mouth to speak again, when suddenly, it dawned on her. Everything she had said had been in a language that was different from what she knew. The words she had meant to say hadn’t come out of her mouth – instead, it had sounded a lot like what she had heard the other creatures speaking.
“What the hell is happening?” Tanya asked. Panic was coming back, and strong. She had to get a grip on herself, but it was getting harder and harder.
“Please calm down,” the monster said.
Tanya was surprised to realize that she could understand the strange language that it spoke. For some reason, she was speaking his language and listening to it.
“We have just implanted you with a bio-enhancer. It’s a basic computer chip that is loaded with a language synchronizing program. It also contains a health monitor and a location tracker. With this, we will be able to keep track of where you are and how you are doing. And you will be able to communicate.”
Slowly, he started undoing the straps that had held her down. When she could turn over onto her back, she sat up and rubbed her neck.
“No, don’t touch that,” he said. “It will be sensitive for the next couple of days. If you touch it, it will take longer to heal.”
“I didn’t give any kind of permission for you to do that,” Tanya said accusatorily. As if that was going to make any difference. She hadn’t exactly permitted any of the things that had happened to her in the past couple of hours. How long had she been here?
Tanya just realized that she didn’t know how much time had passed while she had been unconscious, or what time of day it was. So far everything had been indoors and there had been no windows to show her the outside world
God, for all she knew they could be underground.
Her chest felt tight and she pressed her hand against her sternum. She tried to focus on breathing but she was starting to freak out. Her breath came faster and faster, in ragged gasps.
“Take deep breaths,” the monster said. Despite his fearsome look and the fact that Tanya had been taken against her will, the voice was calm and it helped. She did as she was ordered.
Slowly, she got a handle on things and started breathing normally again. Her heartbeat slowed. She looked at the creature. The black, beady eyes showed no emotion. Tanya doubted the creature had any.
“What’s going to happen to me?” she asked.
“Ready!” the monster shouted and the mantis guard that had manhandled her before came back. “Take her to the pool.”
The monster in the lab coat was ignoring Tanya’s question. He ignored everything she said and asked after that too. The guard grabbed Tanya’s arm again but she yanked it away and glared at him.
“I can walk by myself!” she snapped. And this time, the guard understood her. The words were in his language. He looked at her with a face that was void of expression but let go of her arm.
She stormed past the guard toward the open door, assuming that was where she was meant to go. The guard followed.
Again, they walked through corridors that seemed empty, lifeless. There were no decorations and it seemed primitive compared to the technology and luxuries that the rest of the rooms she had been in had contained.
All the rooms except the one she had woken up in, of course.
When the guard escorted her through another door, Tanya stopped dead in her tracks. She hadn’t known what to expect, but whatever she had imagined, it hadn’t been this.
The room was large, with double volume ceilings and mosaic tiles depicting spectacular views against the walls. Most of the floor was taken up by a swimming pool. The water was clear and inviting, and the steam that engulfed in the room suggested that it was warm.
Tanya breathed in. The air smelled floral, a fragrance that no doubt came from the water. Despite the fact that Tanya was a prisoner, this seemed very luxurious and calming.
A couple of different creatures were in the room, some sitting on the edge of the pool, their feet dangling in the water. Others were swimming back and forth with lazy strokes. Tanya recognized a couple of them from when she was on the stage, and she realized that again, they were all females. As she glanced around, she noticed that one of the other females was also human.
Tanya waited until the guard disappeared before she hurried to the other human, who sat quietly in a corner. Her skin was pale and her red hair was striking. She had a small form but she didn’t come across as someone weak.
She watched everyone in the water, her eyes slowly sliding around as if she was in a daze. She was far too calm – as if she was in shock.
When Tanya approached her, her green eyes slid up to Tanya’s face and a flicker of recognition came across her features.
“You’re human,” she said.
Tanya nodded, sitting down next to her.
“I’m Tanya,” she said.
“Amelia,” the other woman said. “You are new?”
Tanya nodded again. “And I feel completely out of my depth. What is going on here? Who are these… monsters? And what do they want with us?”
Amelia glanced at Tanya. “I haven’t been here for very long. Some of the girls here have been around much longer. It’s been a couple of days for me. And so far, they haven’t hurt me. In fact, I have been treated well – pampered. Almost like being at the most extravagant spa you can imagine.”
Tanya frowned. “That makes no sense.”
Amelia looked around again. “Actually,” she said without looking at Tanya “It does. They are keeping us in good condition. As prizes. For the gladiator contest.”
Tanya shook her head. That couldn’t be right. How was it possible in this day and age that she had been captured to be a slave, a prize in a contest? But when she thought about everything that had been done to her so far, being paraded on stage, the chip in her neck, it made sense. Even though Tanya desperately didn’t want it to.
“They want you to behave,” Amelia said. “They want you to enjoy yourself, pretty yourself up. It is what they want for the people who are going to end up owning you.”
It was horrifying. Tanya tried to keep the look of horror off her face, but she couldn’t. Amelia nodded solemnly.
“It’s awful to think about, I know,” she said. “But I guess we just have to accept our fate. That’s what I’m trying to do.”
Tanya couldn’t accept that. How could she just get used to the idea that she was going to be a slave? This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. She lived in a free country, for crying out loud.
But she was very far from home, wasn’t she?
“Is there any way to contact Earth?” Tanya asked Amelia. “Surely, we can’t be completely cut off from civilization?”
Amelia let out a laugh without expression. “Civilization? Honey, this place is more advanced than any place you have ever been to. Trust me, this isn’t some forgotten wasteland.”
“I mean that I want to contact home,” Tanya said. She was exasperated with Amelia’s nonchalance, the way she seemed to just accept their fate.
“No,” Amelia finally said. “There isn’t.”
A female with blue skin and long arms and legs, probably almost twice as long as Tanya’s, swam closer.
“I couldn’t help but overhear,” she said.
Right, the chip, Tanya remembered.
“There is a communications room in the gladiator dome.”
She swam a little closer and leaned her arms onto the side, making herself a part of the conversation. Tanya perked up at the news.
“Really?”
“Yeah, they broadcast the fight across the entire galaxy so their technology is pretty strong.”
Tanya thought about it. Maybe that would be her chance, maybe she could send some kind of message.
“I wouldn’t try to access it though,” the females said. She ran her hand through wet, thick, black hair that was pasted to her head. “I tried to escape a while ago. I wanted to do the same thing. It didn’t go down very well.”
“What happened?” Tanya asked. She glanced at Amelia, but Amelia was just staring at the female in a daze.
“Well, I figured fighting my way out was a bad idea, since they already use gladiators. What if they throw me into the fight?”
Tanya hadn’t thought about that. She was impressed with how logical this female thought.
“My strategy was to try to seduce one of the guards,” she continued. “I got him to give me a tour of the facility in hopes that I would know how to find the communications systems and figure out how to use it.”
“That’s a really good idea,” Tanya said.
“Not good enough,” the female said
, shaking her head. “He figured out what I was trying to do before I could put my plan into motion. I was returned to the prize quarters and the security protocols on my bio-enhancer were pushed up. Way up. Before, it was only programmed to notify security if I left the gladiator dome. Now, I can’t move without them knowing about it.”
Tanya shook her head. What had happened to this female sounded awful. But instead of feeling crushed by the story, her hopes for escape – it inspired her. She wasn’t the only one who wanted to get out. And she wouldn’t be the only one who had tried.
Maybe she could still figure it out.
Chapter Five
Mal
Mal was in the ring again. His new Master had gotten him a fight almost immediately after the last one. Before, days had often passed without any new opponents. Clearly, Slinin was serious about pushing Mal up in the ranks.
The Masters could choose which fights to enroll their gladiators in. The more fights the gladiators won, the bigger the prizes they could collect. But the fights also drained them. The more fights they fought, the bigger the chances that they would lose because they were exhausted. It was a gamble, a guessing game, in some ways. Or a very strategic one if you were invested enough.
Mal’s new Saithin Master was very invested.
Mal’s opponent was another Karzem, standing at the same height as he was. He had the same build too. They were roughly the same strength. Everything about them was almost the same. Except this Karzem didn’t have black hair as Mal did. Instead, his hair had been shaved and metal spikes had been implanted in his head, creating a spiked metallic crown.
The Karzem gladiators were often adorned with such implants because they felt no pain. Not unless it was serious. The metal decorations made them look fiercer and more intimidating. And if the opponents were terrified of them, the battle was already won.
Mal had his own implants for so long, it had become a part of who he was.