Lin's Challenge

by Mara Jaye

  The two motion with the tips of their guns and everyone in front of me moves out. I try my best to hide by staying in the middle. Because men and a few women who resemble redwood trees in height surround me, I can’t see anything. I scan the crowd and hope there are a few shrimpy people around here. Otherwise, I’ll be reliving my childhood by needing to climb every countertop just to accomplish basic tasks.

  I watch as the door behinds us seals, the air whistles through the uncovered holes, and the forward door opens. The landscape outside is beautiful. Tall, rocky spires lie outside a glittering dome. The two moons, one large with pink splashes of craters, one smaller gray-blue, take up the twilight sky. A setting sun or maybe even suns give the bright clouds a teal color. The same color hugs the horizon and segues into a midnight blue above us. A vast dome overhead goes so far I can’t see where it ends on the horizon.

  My heart skips a few beats as the realization sets in. Shit. I’m on another planet. Probably light years from home. I’d be in awe and taking millions of photos in nearly any other circumstance. I have no idea how they abducted me or what they want. Hell, I don’t even know who they are. I stare at everything in case I return home so I can make serious bank on the talk shows. Who cares if they think I’m crazy as long as they pay? I can quit my job and start my own business.

  They lead us out of the huge airlock, distracting me from my entrepreneurial dreams. I breathe in to get the smell of the place and try to ignore the body odor around me. A cool gust of wind slips through the people around me, and I shiver. My bare toes begin to ache. I cross my arms to try and keep some of my body heat near me. The crowd does help. I’m scared of what happens if we’re all separated into pods or whatever aliens do to us here.

  A couple more of the flat-faced guards appear and circle us. The extra guards ensure we’re herded into a much larger room under the dome. We’re all led to a part of the place where walls double the tallest man’s height converge until we’re forced into a single line. The body heat from those around me fade, and I’m freezing again. I clench my jaw to keep calm as we move forward, step by step. A tall guy with a beagle’s coloring in front of me steps into a horizontal and clear tube. I have to follow.

  The space is tall enough for anyone here to walk upright yet narrow enough to touch on either side with my elbows. I feel bad for the wider frog men. They had to have been scraping their way down the passage. The enclosed heat is welcome at first. After my chill bumps are gone, the shivering changes to sweating. Still on a mission to make money whenever I’m dumped back on Earth, I smell while staring out of the tube. The air has a damp and metallic quality, and yes, there are two suns.

  The beagle guy in front takes a step back, stomping on my bare toes. I stifle a scream and bite into my lip. He looks at me with a grunt before facing forward again. My eyes tear from the pain as I watch a clear vertical tube come down over the lioness in front of him. Her hair is blown or sucked up, and a metal arm comes down to smack her on the neck. As the cover lifts, the floor tilts forward, and she steps off. It’s Mr. Beagle’s turn. The same isolation, even without the lifted hair, and slap on the neck.

  Only with him, I can see some sort of metal disk clinging to his skin. The cover lifts and he steps forward. There’s no choice but to step forward, so I do. I look up to see if the place has a hint of lasers because I’m going to scream if it hurts.

  The tube comes down, and I thank whoever’s listening that I’m not claustrophobic. The vacuum feels rather good, and I relax as my hair is pulled up. If there’d been a shower before the drying, life would be better.

  A slap on the neck takes me by surprise. Stupid, I know, but the wormy feeling of my nearby skin crawling afterward bothers me more than the initial hit. Good thing the floor tilts or I’d probably still be standing there with my mouth open. I want to pull the metal off but the way it’s digging into me? Feels like my spine would come out, too.

  Not until the stinging subsides do I realize there’s a voice talking on this side of the vertical tube. The same one from the cargo ship and even better? I understand what she’s saying.

  “Single file. Left to dig, right to plant. No exceptions.”

  People ahead of us are mixing in with others who are covered in the planet’s dirt. As the guy behind me is getting his new device, I tap the grimy giant lizard in front of me on the back. “Hello, do you know where we’re going?”

  He turned his head and hissed, “Shut up, or you’ll get us killed.”

  I didn’t want to agree, but he’s right. Talking might be a crime here. Even with the rebuke, I can’t help but grin. This is the first speech I’ve understood in what feels like weeks. I look up from my navel-gazing and see the right and left doors. A bar of lights over one blinks until someone steps through. Then, the opposite side blinks until the next person. Back and forth as we edge closer to the division. I count back until I discover they’ll send me to dig. Which, I can’t do. I don’t have a shovel, and I’m far better at planting, anyway. So plants might die around our apartment thanks to me, sure, but I planted those suckers like a boss. I was born to plant.

  Cranky is up and goes right, lucky bastard. I try to sneak in behind him until a metal door slides down, hard. The bottom scrapes my nose and chest, scratching my face. I stumble back, glad I wore my bra to bed for the protection now, and take the hint. Digging could be fun. At least, a lot more fun than being cut in half.

  My nose stings, and when I rub it, my hand comes away bloody. Shit. I don’t have anything antiseptic and doubt anyone would help if I asked. I lift my shirt’s neckline to cover half my face before pressing my nose against the light blue fabric. My best pajamas are ruined, and there’s no way to order more.

  Shoes.

  Shit. I’ll need something with a sole if their shovels are anything like Earth’s. My toes still ache from big guy stomping on them. I suppose I could give him a name like I did Mr. Toad or Mr. Cat, but really, I can’t decide what the hell he looks like. Mr. Lizard and the gang looked like Earth animals. Toe-cruncher was an ordinary human with a yellowish orange tint. He was dirty enough to have been from what I assume are fields. I refuse to be jealous, even if he’s been sent to the outside twice in a row.

  And besides, silent bitching about his luck doesn’t get me anything to protect my feet. Any sort of shovel will shred my soles. I bite my lip, hoping they give us gear even though I figure they won’t. They haven’t since this crazy dream began. Why would they now?

  After wiping my brow from the now nervous sweat, I listen to see if the announcement has changed. The volume is lower. When I peer around the new guy in front of me, there’s a huge gaping hole in the ground. The zigzag of the path into the cave reminds me of Carlsbad Caverns from when I was a kid. Mom was on a sobriety kick and took us there with her boyfriend du jour.

  Even though I miss Mom as much as she misses me, I long for my former ignorance of what would happen after the trip. Hell, I should be longing for my former planet, shoes, and whatever coffee I can get. All of us meander down, further into what I’m pretty sure is a mine. The announcement from up ahead is getting louder as I approach.

  “Bust rock. Gently place blue glowing stones on conveyor. Place all cadavers onto conveyor.”

  “Cadavers? Holy hell,” I mutter before putting a hand over my mouth. No one is paying attention, so I let my hand fall. There is a bin of pickax looking tools rolling up beside a bruiser of a woman several people ahead. She reaches in, and sure enough, it looks like half a pickax. I sigh in relief. My soles are saved.

  Before I can blink, she buries the spike into the nearest man. His scream fades to nothing as she pulls the tool free and runs for the entrance. She shoves past me and runs up the switchback path before a familiar whistle blows. “Oh shit.” I crouch down just as a buzzing sound grows louder. Flashes of light shine through my closed eyes as the shooting begins. I cover my ears and crouch down when the alien woman and her victims scream.

  The buzzing resumes
and fades. Feeling the air still, I open my eyes and straighten. Whatever did the killing took out a lot more people than I’d expected. Bodies cover several feet in front of and behind the crazed woman. Another whistle and the announcement resumes. “Bust rock. Gently place blue glowing stones on conveyor. Place all cadavers onto conveyor.”

  I’m not sure how people are going to comply since the conveyor and other tools are in front of me. And that’s okay. I’ll just be grabbing my pickax, busting rock, and being nice to any blue glowing stones there to greet me.

  The ax is heavier than I thought it would be. The hulks around me made picking up one look easy. I gently put the slightly curved metal end over my shoulder. Easy does it because an aggressive move might trigger the death squad. I follow the man ahead of me.

  The mineshaft is damp, like the ones are at home. Cave openings to our left and less often to the right have been chiseled out. The lights strung along a pipe above shine down but not very far into the dark caves. Gates with bars cover every other doorway. Sometimes, I can see people inside, but it’s dim and no one’s moving. I wonder if they’re dead but know they can’t be. Bodies get tossed on the conveyor like the instructions say.

  A trench runs under the gates, and it isn’t deep. Maybe four inches and a trickle of water runs down the length. A conveyor moves to our right much like a normal baggage claim belt does at the airport.

  I hope the announcement changes soon. Something like, “Bathrooms are to your left. Beds are up ahead. Break time is in five minutes. Steak and lobster for dinner.” I never said I was sane.

  The motion forward pauses long enough for me to get a longer look into one of the openings to our left. It’s still dim in there, but when my eyes adjust, there’s just a hollowed out room. No furniture or lighting.

  There are no real landmarks other than support beams every so often. The mine is growing narrower the further down we go. I’ve scraped my knee on the conveyor belt’s housing a couple of times due to the closeness. The hollowed out rooms have grown fewer, too. I have no idea how far I’ve walked until I run into the male in front of me.

  “Sorry,” I blurt out to the hulk.

  He turns to me. “We work here.”

  “Okay.” I turn to tell the guy behind me who’s now to my right. “We work here.”

  Like a giant game of telephone, he tells the next person. I look back at the man to my left, and he’s already hacking at the rock over the conveyor. The pieces fall onto the belt as we work. At least our efforts drown out the instructional voice.

  I chip away for ages and make a slight dent into the wall. The instructions stopped earlier. I’m not sure when. The blisters on my hands kept distracting me. All of this is bullshit. This isn’t what science fiction shows promised at all. I want my hunky starship captain, a food replicator, and warp drive back home.

  While I’m daydreaming about some sexy recon team saving me, a blue flash to my left catches my eye. Several of us, including me, stop to stare. A warm azure gem is embedded in the rock. The stone sends out flashes of light. It’s beautiful, and I can’t help but say, “It must be one of those blue stones the announcer meant.”

  The amphibian between the new find and me smirks, “You’re smart, huh?” before turning back to the loveliness.

  Okay, so I’m slow on the uptake. Whatever. “We’re supposed to be gentle with them, aren’t we,” I manage to squeak out. No one pays attention to me as the one who found the pea-sized stone gives it a hard hit to bust the loveliness free.

  A blinding blue light flashes as an explosion shoves me into the worker on my right.

  Chapter Three

  Turkh

  I’m ready.

  The Alliance installed new biologically based nanotechnical systems and reprogrammed me with the latest and greatest system updates. G’nar and I have been given detailed briefs on this planet and the guilty parties using slave labor. We stop short of helping the innocent bystanders find new lives away from their original homeworlds. The Alliance Enforcers first heard about the Vahdmoshi using sixth world abductees a couple of months ago. As far as free workers go, sixth world is the best. They’re pre-interstellar travel so no one will fight for them. They’re humanoid so Alliance tech will work on them. The best part? They’re cheap and replaceable. Sixth world people haven’t learned population control. Coupled with their lack of travel, guys like the Vahdmoshi pop in, scoop up a hundred or so at a time, and use them up.

  I try not to smile at how hard these guys will go down. It’ll be interesting to see what they use for crowd control besides the heat-focused light weapons. I can see them everywhere. They’re not difficult to spot if you know what to look for and have infrared sight capabilities.

  Still trying to not grin at the future conviction as I record the surrounding humanoids through my optics. There’s a line of people in front and a longer stretch of them behind me. We’re in a standard confinement funnel for animals. Kinda pisses me off to think of how animals are treated, but mission comes first. I can be furious later while we’re rounding up the criminals.

  An isolation tube lowers several people ahead of me. A vacuum pulls the hair up from above so the automatic implant machine can do its work on the longer haired men and women. I shudder every time a machine smacks its occupant on the back of the neck with a crude translator. Something I need to modify once it’s implanted since I already have state of the art from the Intergalactic Agency.

  You got a plan to get out of the implant?

  G’nar’s thoughts break into my own, and I give him a silent reply over our personal communications network. Not really. He’s my Agency partner and knows as well as I do we’re to blend in, not start a fight the first day planetside. Still, I need to ask him, Can we tell the bionans to shove out the device if we can’t avoid it?

  Hell if I know. They’re new to me, too.

  I suppress the urge to nod a response since he’s a couple hundred bodies behind me in the line. Neither one of us have been undercover for a long time. Forgetting conversational body language might take a minute or two. Understood. I notice how the translators glow. Unlike the Mrawrn, neither one of us has hair covering our necks. We’ll have to keep them in place but deactivate or subvert for our own use.

  Agreed.

  My current system functions display superimposes over the scene in front of me at my request. The adrenaline spike shown isn’t a surprise, so I ignore the warnings. Instead, I send a command to the chip in my brain to auto examine and report on foreign objects under my skin. And before I forget, to also dampen automatic voluntary responses. Not forever but long enough to get laughing, frowning, or rolling my eyes at what appears to be an imaginary friend whenever G’nar and I talk via the inner communications device.

  I take in what sort of humanoids are also in line. There are twenty-three ahead of me by now, and we’re all single file waiting for the translator. Every once in a while someone rebels and a guard smacks him in the head. Interesting how that part isn’t automated I note before going back to observing. Most waiting in line are male like G’nar and me. A few burly females stand among us. They’re Mrawrn with long hair and tails. One of the amphibians from Gleet bumped into a Mrawrn, and her claws extended. Good thing he noticed and backed away before she took a swipe at him.

  The guards are Vahdmoshi, of course. I’ve never met a decent one. They talk too loud, take what they want, and are the epitome of brawn over brains. But, since the ones here are the only bipeds armed, I just go along with the orders.

  Ugly fucker, isn’t he?

  The bionans have done their job, so I don’t snort out a laugh. So are you, I retort, yet I still love you. I hear his laugh in my mind even though I’m sure he has his dampeners on as much as I do. The Vahdmoshi have flattened faces with stubby noses. I’m sure the Blendarians with their snouts find them odd.

  Can you tell what’s happening up ahead? After the translators?

  I stand up on tiptoe to see over the slightly ta
ller humanoids. A doorway. I listen, focusing in and beyond the gasps or screams of the newly augmented people ahead of me. I hear clanging and see shadows.

  Shit.

  I know. I try to reassure both of us. He’s noticed the hidden and extensive weapons system as much as I have. No yelling or gunfire, though.

  All right. Be ready for anything.

  I don’t smile or nod even though the impulses are there. Instead, I transmit, I might be a little preoccupied in a moment. There are twelve in front of me, and the process is fast.

  Got it. We can talk when we’re both done.

  If I survive the translator, that is. It’ll hurt advanced races like me.

  Bitch.

  Nothing can keep my laugh from being a smile and slight chuckle. G’nar was recruited from a Gharnian colony demoted to third world status. I can’t help but give him shit sometimes. Being second world provides a guy with advantages.

  The line shortens between me and the automatic implant tube.

  Five.

  Four.

  Three.

  Two.

  One.

  And fuck! I put a hand to the back of my stinging neck. The machine’s strength is calibrated way off. If the bionans didn’t fix busted blood vessels, I’d have a knot or bruise underneath the electronics. As it is, the translator is moving ever so slightly under my hand.

  How’d it go?

  Can’t lie, hurts. They need to tone it way down, or they’ll lose their weaker livestock.

  Before I can say it, G’nar does. That may be their point. Hurts like what?

  The room I’m in now is larger and filled with more people than those we arrived with. Some humanoids are dirtier than others. Like a baby’s kiss. There’s nothing you can do to prepare.

  I’m going to kick your ass.

  You can try. The translator they gave me is loose, thanks to the bionans disallowing new hardware without permission. I pull my hand from my neck with the chip in my palm. I’ve rejected the implant. Approaching the doorway and there’s a divider. Splitting us up as we walk through. No choice.