by J.P Jackson
Taylor heard a creaking sound and sensed a slow swaying back and forth, almost like he was on a boat. His head was clear but his nose was broken, both eyes black and his arms and legs like lumps of concrete. When he opened his eyes he saw that he wasn't in a boat, but in a metal cage. He gripped a bar behind his ear and sat up, patting his bare chest and jeans to check if everything was in order. Turning his head to search through the bars, Taylor's stomach lurched when he witnessed a churning vortex of green fog hundreds of feet below, and a single hook holding his cage aloft. Other cages were silhouetted around his own, near and far, some vacant, others filled with dispirited prisoners or piles of rotting meat and bone. There was a huddled body sharing his cage, a goose-pimpled, leather skinned creature that looked as beaten-down as those around him.
Taylor took a pulse reading at his neck, a steady rate but nothing out of the ordinary. He touched his broken nose and a nauseating sensation stirred when he ran his fingers over the break.
He yowled in pain as he jerked his nose back into place. “Fucking lion bastard.”
Done, Taylor lay against the bars and grimaced at his severed pinkie. Feeling an itch in his scalp, he reached to scratch it then gasped as if electrocuted. “What the...”
Slowly and carefully, he reached again to the back of his head, fingers shaking as he parted the hair and dabbed at a pulsating boil the size of a marble.
"You are a dead man,” said a numb voice near his foot. The goose-pimpled creature was awake, and it raised it's head to look at Taylor.
"Who are you?” Taylor asked, too tired to defend himself.
The creature paused to take a nervous breath. “You called me Yellow Jack. I am...was, Secretary General of the Jackanine Council.”
Yellow Jack hid his large eyes behind his hands. His once bright yellow feathers had been forcefully torn from his body. “We have both been branded enemies of the Pride.”
Taylor crept closer, the cage creaking with his shifting weight. “What did you do?”
"I have been judged to be soft on Earthlings, untrustworthy and undeserving of my position. After they threw you into interrogation, I purposely loosened your bonds. Compassion sealed my fate.”
Taylor nodded his thanks then searched through the bars, studying the many cages swinging over the fog.
"What is this place, Jack?”
"The lion's den,” he dimly replied. “You are in the heart of the Pride mothership, hovering some thirty thousand feet in Earth's stratosphere. You are going nowhere.”
“mothership.” He scowled, observing no entry or exit. “There's always a way.”
Yellow Jack looked at him with vacant eyes. “Escape this cell, Ham Taylor, and you are still dead in a matter of hours. The back of your skull, feel it again.”
Taylor ruffled through his hair, eyeballs bulging and gut twisting as he felt the boil grow. He tried to burst it out of his head, but the more he squeezed the hotter it boiled, hot enough to singe his hair and sear the ends of his fingers.
"Fuck!” he cried out, clanging his torch against the bars. “What the fuck is it?”
"A defence mechanism,” Jack said. “You are experiencing the secretion of a mesomite.”
The boil expanded, creating a baseball sized deformation at the back of Taylor's head. He pressed it again but the pain was too much. “What the fuck have they done to me?”
Panic took hold and Taylor grabbed Jack's arm. “Get it out!”
Jack appeared stone-faced to the hysterical Earthling an inch from his beak.
"The mesomite,” Jack explained, “is a parasite gathered from the seas of Nido. Once placed on the head, the mite injects a paralyzing venom into the host's nervous system. The mesomite then works to create an identical copy of the host's brain in the form of an egg. The process takes minutes and once complete, the egg is cut loose and the parasite is discarded. The fully produced copy can be read, its information interpreted by a skilled Jackanine.”
Taylor released Jack and fell back to the bars. “What happens to the host?”
Jack frowned and turned away.
"What happens to the host? Tell me.”
"The host,” Jack conceded, “is left to face the consequences of the venom circulating inside your brain. Your head will continue to expand, Ham Taylor, larger and larger before the pressure becomes too great. A particularly gruesome and, I might add, excruciating death.”
Taylor hugged his chest as if to console himself. "How long do I have?”
Jack shrugged. “Minutes, hours, days. The size of the growth will fluctuate, larger and smaller. Each subject varies but the results are the same.”
Taylor smeared the blood from his nose and sardonically chuckled.
"Typical. Just fucking typical. In the last few weeks I should have died slashing my wrists, or jumping from the Brooklyn bridge. I should have been crushed under a skyscraper or vaporized by my own time machine. But no, I'm done in by a fucking alien jellyfish. Shit, I could use a smoke.”
Jack's expression had fallen, slack and indifferent. “You do have one chance, but it would be impossible at this point.”
Taylor perked up from his hopeless slump as Jack filled him in.
"The only thing that will reduce the swelling and save your life is the blubber of the mite responsible for your predicament. The blubber acts as a sort of anti-venom, and must be ingested for it to act on your condition.”
"So where is it?”
"Presumably left to rot in interrogation. You will need help to locate that room, and you will need to consume the dead creature's blubber before it desiccates. Time is not on your side, Ham Taylor.”
"It never is.”
Taylor scanned the circumference of the cage, plotting a way out. “How high up are we? Does gravity vary on-board? How is oxygen produced?”
Yellow Jack set his long hands over his knees, enjoying the workings of Taylor's brain. “Would you care to know the odds of you somehow escaping this cage, maneuvering passed the legion of Pride, and entering the interrogation room unimpeded before the perished mite's blubber decomposes and your head explodes?”
"Forget it,” Taylor scoffed, sitting back to mull things over. “I'll do it myself.
Several hours had passed with long bouts of silence. As Taylor wrestled with his predicament, a blood curdling scream echoed in the fog. The sound was human, male, and coming from a cage nearby.
Taylor watched as an enormous black spider attacked the cage, it's hairy mouth snapping at the wailing prisoner inside.
Taylor went pale as he scurried to Jack's side. “How can we help him?”
"We can't even help ourselves. This is what happens when you build a beautiful ship for filthy lions, it becomes a cesspool of crawling pests.”
The man screamed and Taylor winced. “What do we do?”
"Be thankful the spider is not taking an interest in us. That is all.”
The spider plunged between the bars and it's fangs punctured the prisoner's chest. The prisoner let out a garbled half scream, then went limp. Taylor watched as the spider bent and pressed it's bulk through the bars. Once wholly inside the cage, the spider wrapped its victim in silk.
"You helped designed this place?” Taylor asked, never taking his eyes off the spider.
"The ship was conceived of and constructed by my people. I was one of five designers who oversaw the build. I was once very proud of it.”
"Why do you allow yourselves to be ruled by a lion? If you're so smart.”
"The Jackanine are perhaps the most intelligent species in our Galaxy, but genetically unsuited for violence. Violence is abhorrent to my species, however we can be coerced and controlled through the use of drugs, particularly the seed of the sunflower found on your planet. Once under the influence, the Pride use the Jackanine to construct their ships, weapons, and administrate the takeover of planets like yours.”
Jack glanced at his wrinkled hands. “The seed is a difficult addiction to break,” h
e said, bitterly. “The Pride used this weakness to turn the majority of the Jackanine into raving addicts. They will do anything under the drug, and anything for Apophis.”
"No stranger to drugs myself,” Taylor said, rubbing his parched lips as the spider hauled it's bound victim out into the darkness. “Is that why you came to Earth? For a bunch of bloody seeds?”
"The abundance of seed is a bonus only. Apophis comes to Earth for two reasons, to trample the threat of man, and to resurrect his love Aquinas.”
Taylor made to interrupt but Jack finished his point. “Earthlings are intelligent and brutal, fragile and selfish, a fascinating mixture of both Pride and Jackanine. You have the potential to one day conquer our galaxy and shape the future of the universe. This is how Apophis sees the situation, and you Ham Taylor, a living breathing time traveller, prove man's potential and ultimately seals your fate.”
Over the swaying creak of the cage, Taylor recalled walking down a candelit cave and shelves containing seeds, a silver amulet and the carving of a golden bird. Apophis had somehow left his mark on modern man.
"I'm from the future,” Taylor thought out loud, “therefore mankind has a future.”
Jack disagreed. “Time is a fickle force, as you well understand. Time travel is the most dangerous tool in existence, and there are grave consequences for trifling with it.”
Taylor felt like he was standing on a frozen lake, feeling the cracks of time growing under his carefully balanced weight.
"How do you destroy a planet?” he then asked. “And what has Earth got to do with resurrecting...?”
"Aquinas,” said Jack, whose voice had gone soft with exhaustion. “The secret lies within the pyramid.”
The fog muffled more screams. A vague shadow floated towards them.
"What is that?” Taylor said, squinting at a large object swooping between the cages.
When it broke through the fog, Yellow Jack's eyes bulged in his hairless head. The organism was the size of an automobile, orb like with a shell covered in spiky antennae, and a single blinking eye in the centre.
"Not this!” Jack cried, cowering. “I do not deserve such disgrace!”
The thing began circling the proximity of their cage. "Jack!” Taylor yelled. “What is it?”
Yellow Jack pulled his head from his hands and Taylor was shocked to see his tears. “Prepare yourself, Ham Taylor!”
"For what?”
They shared a final glance.
"The fight of your -”
The orb scanned them with light, then the cage snapped free from its hook.
Taylor's stomach fluttered to his throat as his back was pressed to the cage ceiling. He screamed through clenched teeth while Jack, pressing beside him, closed his eyes as air rushed through the bars.
Moments later, the cage fell through the fog and into a black shaft. The rock like hole closed in and when the cage contacted the circumference of the shaft, their descent slowed dramatically. Taylor and Jack hit the floor of the cage while the bars emitted a shower of sparks. Eventually, the cage screeched to a halt and the bottom fell out, dropping Jack and Taylor into a shallow puddle.
Parts of the cage lay broken and bent over Taylor and Jack. The only route was a faint light at the end of a gloomy tunnel. Taylor shrugged off the wreckage of the cage and squinted at the exit, still struggling to believe he was on a ship floating in the sky. “I'm not dead, am I?”
"That comes next,” Jack said, rubbing the shivers from his featherless arms. “They will be waiting for us.”
“Who?” Taylor asked as he assisted Jack to his feet
The condemned Jackanine took the lead without offering any explanation. Taylor followed, too intrigued to be scared, too ignorant for his own good.
They walked through muddy puddles, catching their shoulders on moss covered stone. Light increased at the end of the tunnel along with the unmistakable sound of a crowd, a myriad of voices screaming in unison, the thunderous applause of a mob.
At the end of the tunnel, their route was blocked by a set of thick metal bars. Side by side, Taylor and Jack pressed their faces between the bars and gazed at a large amphitheatre.
"Whoa!" Taylor exclaimed, awestruck.
Eighty thousand Jackanine sat in tiered seating, rising to encircle a spacious arena covered in sand. The atmosphere was hot and sticky, with smoking vents around the periphery, spaced between dozens of similarly barred tunnels.
Egyptian slaves served boisterous Jackanine in the stands. The birds ate from mounds of seed and assaulted the slaves whenever they felt the need. One man was thrown down an aisle for no apparent reason, and another had his arm ripped off like an insect for accidentally spilling the precious drug.
"My people are not like this...We are not!”
"We're all like this,” Taylor said, wrapping his hands around the bars.
In the arena, two groups of men and women waited on their hands and knees. At the head of each group was an elephant, adorned in dazzling golden jewelry and red saddle cloths.
An orange Jackanine wavered between each elephant while three lions grasped the elephant's leash. A black Jackanine, wearing a large elephant mask, ran around the arena, waving and working the crowd into a frenzy as slaves at the head of each group were forced onto their stomachs. A tense moment later, the orange Jackanine's prompted each elephant to raise their feet over the slaves' heads. When the time was right, when the applause reached a crescendo, the elephants, on command, stomped down.
The crowd cheered. The lions dragged the now headless bodies to a garbage chute then returned to drag the next slaves forward. The applause grew, and the elephants lifted their feet.
No slave cried or attempted to run. One man however decided to take his own way out. He stood, cursed then ripped the cloth from his waist. Naked, the slave stuffed and crammed the material down his throat, managing to swallow half before his bloodshot eyes rolled back into his head. There was little reaction from the crowd or the other slaves as he was promptly discarded down the chute.
General Apophis sat on a golden throne in a raised box overlooking the arena, where he could both see and be seen. Stacked in-front of him was a mound of human tongues, which he tossed into his mouth three at a time. Seated around the general were his most trusted soldiers and Jackanine diplomats, all sharing in the evening's entertainment.
Just beyond the bars from where Taylor and Jack stood, two slaves were locked in mortal combat. One held a broadsword while the other batted it away with his full body shield. The men fought for their lives, all for the amusement of the audience.
Throughout the contest, the unskilled fighters were overwhelmed by debris thrown by the Jackanine. The man grasping the shield took a stone to the eye, and dropping his defences, he was quickly cut down. The victor, panting and bloodied, threw down his sword and raised his arms to receive a rapturous applause from his alien audience.
The roar reverberated a second time when Apophis extended his arm and held out his muscular thumb. Taylor, and eighty thousand Jackanine awaited the general's decision. The thumb went upward, and the crowd went wild.
"He saved him?” Taylor exclaimed, astonished.
"His prize will be a speedy death,” Jack said. “No-one survives the circus.”
As Jack spoke, five lions bounded into the arena and lunged at the hapless slave. One lion immediately tore out the man's throat while the others clawed and chewed their way to his internal organs.
“I won't fight you,” Taylor said, over the mayhem. “If that's what they want.”
"A contest between Earthling and Jackanine would be no contest at all. Apophis will have something bigger planned for us. A spectacle.”
All action in the arena was captured by the spike covered orb and its living eyeball. It swooped in low for sensational close ups and presented its feed on raised holographic screens for those in the cheap seats.
When all the slaves had been sacrificed, the elephants were lead out
of the arena, leaving a trail of bloody footprints in the sand.
Taylor peered at the garbage chute, around which buzzed a swarm of black flies.
“Can we get out down there?”
A lion approached the chute and placed a heavy looking grate over top of it.
Yellow Jack grimly shook his head. “The grate has a mass approximately ten times your own. Can you lift a that much, Ham Taylor?”
Taylor looked back at him. “Can you?”
Jack responded as if reading from an instruction manual. “I do not have the strength required to lift the grate. I can, at most lift 89% percent of it's mass. 89% percent is not 100% percent.”
Taylor's eyes went large as he mentally calculated the weight, including variables like dry mud caked over the grate. “So it probably weighs somewhere in the region of 2000 pounds, and if you could manage 89% percent of that, it would leave approximately 220 pounds for me. I could probably manage that.”
"Ham Taylor there is no probably. You can or you can't. Which is it?”
Taylor grinned and slapped Jack's arm. “You Jackanine ever smile?”
"Ham Taylor, I smile when I am happy. My painful death being imminent, I see nothing about which to smile, and your bizarre notions are remote at best.”
"Glass half empty then. Suit yourself.”
Eyes back on the action, the pair observed a young man scurry out of an opposite tunnel and into the arena. He stood alone, malnourished, and scared out of his wits. He was armed with a spear that shook in his hands. Jack and Taylor suddenly flinched as the bars shielding them from the arena sank into the sand.
"It is time,” Jack said, preparing to enter. Taylor tugged back his elbow.
"Are you nuts?”
Taylor then winced at a sharp pain located at the back of his head. He reached back to gently dab at the hot and bloated boil.
Jack placed his hand on Taylor's shoulder. "We have no choice Ham Taylor. Voluntary or involuntarily, we will face the terror that awaits us.”
Stepping out, the crowd booed and jeered the instant they noticed the disgraced Jackanine. Taylor shook off the migraine and pressed in beside Jack, grimacing at a torrent of waste thrown from the stands. He shielded his head with the torch, then bent to collect the abandoned broadsword near his foot.
"Have you ever wielded a bladed weapon?” Jack asked him.
"Do scissors count?”
Taylor gestured the young slave with the spear to join them and when he did, the trio watched Apophis stand from his throne and throw up his arms. Silence fell over the amphitheatre as the general addressed his legion. Yellow Jack translated the collection of snarls and hisses for Taylor's benefit.
"My people, my Pride. On the eve of our greatest ever triumph we have one last display of justice. Behold the undesirables,” he announced, pointing an accusing claw at Taylor and his companions.
"The first is a man slave, a murderer who drove a knife into a Jackanine's back. His back!”
The riled up crowd threw stones and stomped their feet. “Treacherous blood flows through the heart of every Earthling! Tonight you will see what cowardly blood looks like! The second Earthling,” Apophis added, eyeballing Taylor, “is a magician using the power of lies to threaten our empire. He is a devil, and his magic will be banished back to the darkness!”
Apophis devoured another tongue, allowing time for his audience to vent.
"The third,” he swallowed and resumed, “is the worst of all. He is a Jackanine, one of your very own! A sympathizer who used his trusted position to betray our Pride!”
The frothing crowd screamed, their collective fury causing the sand of the arena to shake. “A murderer!” Apophis concluded. “A devil! A traitor! Let their end usher us to a new beginning!”
"Blah, blah, blah,” Taylor uttered, as the general received a standing ovation.
The amphitheatre reached fever pitch as a section at the edge of the arena descended, forming a ramp to a subterranean level. In the eye of the storm, Taylor glanced down at his sword and pondered the bizarre nature of his situation.
"Pay attention!” Jack snapped, bringing Taylor back to the here and now, and to the ancient carnivore climbing the ramp. A hulking, sabre-toothed cat raged at the end of thick metal chains attached to a collar around it's neck.
Taylor looked at the slave to his right, watching the piss stream down his leg. Taylor sympathized, he'd piss his own pants if he wasn't so dehydrated.
The cat's ribs could be seen through its hide. It had been starved, and streams of saliva ran down it's yellow teeth.
"Ham Taylor,” said Jack, directing Taylor's eyes to the general's box, where Apophis cracked an egg on his knee and scooped out the gelatinous matter from within.
"Is that what I think it is?” Taylor asked, his head swimming as Apophis threw the viscous ooze into his mouth. “He's eating my brain”
"The neural pattern will have been interpreted already,” Jack added. “Apophis will know everything about you. He will know when and where you were born, everything about your family and friends. He will know that you are a time traveller. Your presence is the greatest threat Apophis has ever faced. This spectacle is all for you, Ham Taylor.”
"Fan-dabby-fuckin'-dozy.”
Apophis licked the slime from his paws then aimed his thumb downward. On that order, the chains restraining the cat detached and it raced towards it's moving feast. The terrified slave ran for the boundary, scrambling for a way out. Jack meanwhile scooped up the full body shield and nestled himself against Taylor.
"Brace yourself!”
The full brunt of the springing cat collided into the shield, knocking them over like bowling pins.
Shaking the stars from his head, Taylor's stomach turned inside out as he felt the cat's fetid breath and tickling whiskers against his neck. The sword was out of reach, and face to face with the cat, he threw his arms up, stuffing his torch into it's mouth. The cat gnawed as Taylor forced against its snapping jaws. Drool spilled over his face and Taylor let out an excruciating cry as the predator's claws dug into his shoulder. Suddenly, the cat jerked backwards as Yellow Jack drove the broadsword through it's side. Taylor rolled as the yelping animal retreated, the sword’s hilt jutting from its ribcage.
Apophis slammed a fist into his throne as the crowd argued amongst themselves, trying to make sense of the surreal scene of Jackanine and Earthling working together.
"Are you well?” Jack asked, helping Taylor up.
"I'll need a fucking tetanus!”
The cat, angered by it's wound, returned to the fray, this time going after easier prey. The petrified slave lost his spear as he jogged aimlessly around the arena. The cat pounced, sinking it's dagger like teeth into his head. The audience rejoiced as blood erupted from the man's ears and mouth. The cat separated the man's head from his shoulders, then carried it off to a corner to enjoy. The jagged orb came in low to capture the money shot and Yellow Jack took advantage. He bolted for the discarded spear, and with a powerful throw, he flung the spear at the orb's gelatinous eyeball. He struck his target dead centre. Light sparked over the orb and ink spurt from its burst pupil. The live feed died and the orb crashed down onto the cat, it's spiky antennae piercing the howling beast.
"Holy shit!” Taylor cried, in astonishment.
Jack grabbed Taylor's wrist and took off for the grate. Taylor slid towards it like a baseball player stealing home base. Covered in sweat and with adrenaline pumping, Taylor stood side by side with Jack as they grasped the heavy grate.
"On three!” Taylor bellowed, bending his knees and fumbling for a better grip. “One, two!...”
On three, the grate screeched upwards. Taylor's determined face turned red as the veins branched down his neck and arms. “I'm lifting more than 11% percent here, Jack. Put your...back into it!”
Jack's face appeared more focused as he raised the majority of the weight.
High on his throne, Apophis roared, ordering soldiers i
nto the arena. Taylor's back and shoulders burned as he and Jack raised the grate past his shins, then up to his knees. When the grate reached Taylor's thighs, a nearby growl caused him to lose concentration. He released the grate and Yellow Jack, unable to bear the weight alone, let it clang back over the chute. Taylor stumbled, catching his breath and rubbing the pain from his palms.
Jack's eyes bulged as the wounded cat crawled out from beneath the broken remains of the orb. The animal was dotted with bloody lacerations and wounds, which appeared to enrage it further. The monster howled and Apophis smiled, ordering his soldiers to stand down.
Jack sighed. “We will need more time.”
Taylor nodded back as he considered a ludicrous idea, the only one he had. He ran to the shield and tossed it at Jack.
"Keep the cat busy, Jack! Distract it, beat it, keep it off me! Right?”
Yellow Jack nodded, grasped hold of the shield and set off towards the cat. Taylor meanwhile stepped over the mutilated and headless slave, hearing the shuddering thud of shield meeting claw. Engrossed, Apophis bent over the edge of his raised box as the arena held its collective breath.
"I can't do this much longer!” Jack cried, beating his shield into the cat's snout.
Taylor yanked the laces from his boots, sucked them between his lips then parted the serrated flesh over the dead slave's abdomen. Exposing the interior stomach, Taylor's bloody hands shook as he reached into the body and pulled the stomach sack free from the esophagus.
With the sack balancing in one hand, he knotted his laces around the stomach's upper esophagus and lower duodenum, forming a balloon of hydrochloric acid.
"Fucked if I know,” he mumbled, finishing his knot.
Taylor looked up at Jack and the cat, tucked the package under his arm then sprinted for the cat's rear. Yellow Jack cracked his shield one last time across the cat's snout as Taylor arrived to break the bag between its ears, splattering the cat in a corrosive, gastric soup. The cat writhed on the sand, yowling as the eyes were burned out of its head.
Stunned silence swept throughout the amphitheatre, and Jack and Taylor used the moment to return to the grate.
"Together!” Jack screamed, and grabbing hold, the pair lifted the grate using the last of their strength.
"Come on!” Taylor scowled, as a team of lions entered the area. The grate reached their knees, then their thighs, the gap wide enough for Taylor to squeeze through.
"Get in!” Jack groaned desperately.
"You can't hold this alone!”
The lion's closed in. Jack closed his eyes and begged. “Please, Ham Taylor! Stop Apophis! Save...your planet!”
With the lions not far away, Taylor released the grate and leapt through the gap. The moment he was in the chute, Jack dropped the grate causing an ear shattering clang.
Taylor glanced up as he fell down the greasy passageway. Gaining speed, and with the grate shrinking into the distance, he witnessed for the first and final time, the smiling face of Yellow Jack.
— CHAPTER FOURTEEN —