Chapter 1: The Undercage
I wasn’t always so alone. When we set off, we were a group of twelve, not counting the ship itself. The… I hesitate to call them monsters, something out of the scary stories about brutish and vicious animals I used to share with my son, but the name fit. They were monsters, and they captured us, all of us.
Never in all my days would I have thought it possible to find monsters, little more than animals, of all things in space, at least not ones that could harm us. The histories spoke of creatures like that, living their short and brutish lives on Achila, killing each other and our ancestors for sport. The Standing Ones bred the Guardians to protect us from such things, to keep the lesser beasts that still roam the wilds at bay. The idea that similar monsters could travel the dark beyond the light of the sun made me question everything I knew. Given the situation we found ourselves in, I had little time to worry over such things.
When I woke up to find myself in this unnatural cage and not my chamber on the ship, the others shared what happened. The Tall Ones didn’t choose me for the mission to tend the ship while it floated through space or to protect the crew. In transit, I saved my energy, slumbering in my chamber until needed. The others didn’t have a chance to alert me before it became too late. The monsters captured us and stuck us here.
According to the crew, the monsters struck like lightning from their gleaming vessel. When one of our guardians claimed the monsters used a lance of light to cut into our ship, disabling its ability to move, I didn’t believe him. Guardians were not bred for their intelligence after all, but their size and strength. They fell into flights of fancy from time to time.
“Light gave us life,” I scoffed at him. “It couldn’t hurt us.”
Langlo, the lead ship tender confirmed the Guardian’s story, leaving me with yet another fundamental belief in question. I’d ponder that after I found a way for us to escape. Things were different then, when they didn’t know what we were. All twelve of us were still together in the unnatural cage, life-giving light bathing us from translucent enclosures on the ceiling.
The others called it the Undercage with good reason. Gray material, hard as granite but completely smooth and cold to the touch, it covered three of the walls and the floor. It was as though the monsters carved the room from a single block of the odd material. Vertical bars made of the same thing covered the other wall.
Bars covered the ceiling as well, but right above them sat a honeycomb of the same gray material: the floor of another chamber. This earned it the name Undercage from the crew. The monsters plodded up and down that chamber, their long black hooves clanking against the floor with each thudding step. It caused dust to fall into our cage, smelling of ozone and tar. Even their dust seemed unnatural.
We stilled whenever we heard the sounds from above and watched them go by while they barked and gurgled at each other. As shocking as I found the idea, I realized they were communicating. It seemed like such a ridiculous idea. Animals didn’t have that kind of intelligence, but these animals traveled space, too. I’d be foolish to underestimate them more than I already had. The others looked to me for a plan to escape and I didn’t intend to let them or my son back home down.
Several boxes were stacked beyond the bars. Unrecognizable symbols covered them, likely more proof of these monsters’ intelligence. Past them, another gray wall, this one with a door, stood tantalizingly out of reach, at least for most of us. After probing every other surface in the Undercage and finding no other possibilities, the door became our best option for escape.
The bars were not much of a barrier to me. The monsters must not have realized I could slip through them. Unfortunately, the Guardians were not bred with my limberness, nor the Tenders. They were both way too thick. I’d need to discover a way to get the Undercage’s door open for all of us to escape.
Before I had the chance to even think up my first plan, the door opened, and I got my first good look at one of the monsters. It walked on two legs like the Guardians, its long black hooves shining in the light with each of its plodding steps. Oddly, its hide didn’t match the hair covering its pale face and head. Instead of brown and oily curls covering its body, the hide shimmered in the same gray as the walls, glittering as it moved.
I turned away the moment I looked at its face. I’d never seen an animal like it, so pale, bulbous and ugly. It grunted, speaking some unknown words in its language as if we’d understand. A foul stink hit me, but it told me little, not even adding any nuance to its off-putting speech.
It approached the bars and held out a rod in one of its hairless paws. More words came from its mouth, the scent of death on his lips. The stick in his hand crackled, lighting erupting from the tip with a flash. The thing’s smile widened before it caused its stick to erupt in lighting again.
All of us in the Undercage leaped back from that. For me, it confirmed what the others had explained. The monsters had turned light into a weapon. Its teeth showed when it smiled even wider. Not as sharp as I expected, the sight still sent fear through me. From the scents coming off the others, I was not the only one of us who found the display so frightening.
The door to the cage opened when the monster pressed its pudgy finger on a small box hanging from its hide around its middle. One of my crew’s scent changed from fear to rage. Before I could command him to stop, Nol, one of our guardians, barreled toward the monster. I should have expected as much, but not what followed.
The monster stepped a few feet past the door and waited. Nol readied one of his thick stalks to skewer it. Before he could, the monster poked its stick out. The moment it touched Nol’s side, the hulking Guardian fell to the floor, the stink of his pain flooding the room and keeping our other guardians at bay, stilled by their fear.
The monster laughed and the door closed on its own. It dragged the still Nol from the room. We never saw him again. When the monster returned the next day, he smelled like pain and anger, Nol’s pain and anger.
That added urgency to our escape plans. Nol might have been dead already but if not, we needed to find a way to save him and get home. When the monster left us alone again, I approached the bars and reached out to touch one as lightly as possible. The Poker’s stick captured the power of lighting, the bars might have been able to do the same.
Lighting did not strike me so I bent myself until I fit between them and slipped through. The others watched, their anticipation filling the air and feeding my confidence. The Standing Ones didn’t send me on this expedition to execute a prison break but I’d been bred for my mind, for my ability to find solutions. I hoped the others couldn’t smell my fear.
Unfortunately, that first attempt ended in failure. I found no way to open the door to the cell or the door out of the room. With the others guiding me, I searched the area outside the cell, but I couldn’t even open any of the boxes. In the end, I waited behind one of those boxes for the monster, the Poker, as the crew referred to him, to return.
The remaining Guardians tried to instruct me on how to attack it, but they didn’t understand that I lacked their power and abilities. I was not bred for violence, my stalks were not weapons. The others gave better advice, but when the monster returned, it was not enough.
I leaped from my hiding place, landing on its back. Ignoring the sme
lls and the wave of disgust that hit me upon contact with its oily skin, I tightened a stalk around its neck. Lighting buzzed and I felt pain unlike anything I’d ever experienced.
By the time I recovered my consciousness, the monster had taken another of the Guardians. The animal stink of the beasts filled the room. Several of them worked on the other side of the cage, adding horizontal bars. I wasted my only chance at surprising them. When they finished and left, the lights in the cell and room shut off, robbing us of its life-giving rays. They must have performed an autopsy on Nol, learned about how we lived.
Since then, the Poker returned, each time taking another one of my crew, smelling like fear and pain from the last and smiling the smile of a predator, a killer. We tried to escape again, to trick the Poker into entering the cell, to take his Lightning Stick, but nothing succeeded. The monsters only turned the light on for a short period at a time, keeping us weak and unable to fight back.
I didn’t know how long it had been since they took Oln, the last of the Ship Tenders but it felt much longer than with the others. Were they waiting for something before they took me to be tortured like the rest of my crew? Why?
These thoughts and my failure to protect the others plagued me while I sat against the far wall, still as a stone to conserve as much energy as possible. I needed to escape, to get home to my son, to warn my people of the horrors that lay outside the light of our sun. I might have failed my crew, but I would not fail my son or my people. Warning them would be the best way I could honor the dead, the ones I let die. Once the Poker returned, I’d put my last plan into action.
The monster didn’t leave me waiting for long. Like the sun’s rays each morning, it returned regularly to rattle the cage and mock me in its barbarous language. Since it took my last crew member, I'd stayed far back in the cell, not even moving when it came in to taunt me. This time, I rushed forward, darting to the side of the door.
Exactly as I expected, the Poker brandished its Lightning Stick, rapping it against the bars. It followed my movements until its arm slammed into one of the boxes close to the Undercage. I scrambled back, acting cowed by his weapon. I’d accomplished my goal and had no need to further the confrontation, not yet.
Well after he left, I moved again. Once I reached the bars next to the container the Poker slammed into, I slipped a thin stalk through them until I reached the strap sitting on top. I’d noticed it before but once they added the extra bars to the cell, I couldn’t reach it. Now, thanks to the monster, I could.
After my first escape attempt ended in failure, I tried to snake a stalk around the Poker through the bars. It panicked for a moment when I wrapped around its leg but then it slammed the Lightning Stick into it and I curled up into myself, losing my grip on it. I hoped the strap might allow me to do the same without getting shocked.
I found out during its next visit. Before it arrived, I arranged the strap through the bars to snare him. The monsters always turned the lights on when they entered and the strap’s bright red color stood out on the gray floor. In order to keep the Poker from seeing the strap, I needed him to look somewhere else. I had a plan for that, too.
The lights flickered on and the door opened. The Poker’s plodding steps sounded before he called out, the noise grating to me as all his vocalizations were. His steps hurried to the bars when he noticed me hanging from the ceiling. Were any of my crew still here, they’d smell the exhilaration I sent out when his feet crossed over the strap.
I dropped to the floor and yanked the ends with all the power I could muster. The Poker’s feet slammed against the bars and in its panic, it dropped its Lightning Stick to grab them to stop its fall. If only I thought of this plan when my crew was still with me.
Shaking the thought from my head, I hurried to the bars before he realized his mistake. One of my stalks grabbed the Lightning Stick, holding it out of his reach. At the same time, I sent more through the bars and wrapped around the Monster’s arms and legs, holding it in place.
The Poker screamed in its guttural language. I should have silenced it, wrapping over its mouth but I hesitated. The thought of touching it that way, touching its mouth that always smelled of death revolted me. Instead, I followed the instructions the Guardians gave me, wrapping around its neck and tightening.
This silenced the Poker, its already bulging eyes widening in fear. I smelled it, rank and biting. The monster deserved so much more for what it did to my crew but I wasn’t a monster. I didn’t kill. When the Poker’s eyes closed and it fell slack in my hold, I released its neck. It still drew breath.
One of my stalks found the box that controlled the door. With a click, it swung open. I dared not move. Instead, I opened my senses as far as I could. Nothing sounded out of the ordinary, no shouts or pounding hooves. Panic filled the air, both the Poker's and mine, but nothing distant. Its screams did not alert the other monsters.
I lowered the Poker to the floor, slow enough not to waken it. Every moment of contact with its waxy skin disgusted me and I almost dropped it. To be safe, I should have moved it into the cage, locking the door behind it. The thought of touching it again horrified me.
Panic and shame bubbled through me whenever my gaze neared its face. It smiled like a predator while it dragged each member of my crew away. I failed them and that monster’s smile already invaded my resting thoughts. I couldn’t even look at it. After I picked up the Lightning Stick, I left the animal there.
My crew might have died, but if I returned home, they might not have died in vain. I could warn the Standing Ones. They could make us ready, keep the rest of our people from suffering the fate of my crew. And I’d get home to my boy.
Selfish, I know. Unusual for my people, but a side effect of my specific breeding. Guardians had their strength, the Ship Tenders their ability to keep our ship healthy, the ship was the ship, and me, me they tasked with thinking differently. I found solutions to the problems the others couldn’t deal with, were not bred to deal with.
The Standing Ones cursed me with a little selfishness compared to the rest of our people. Right now, I thanked the deepest root for that selfishness. I wanted to escape so my crew’s deaths were not meaningless, but I wanted to get home to my boy more. In the end, I just wanted to survive.
With the Lightning Stick ready, I crept to the door and used the Monster’s device to open in. I didn’t have time to wait until morning. I had to act now or suffer the same fate as the others.
Chapter 2: The Steel Chamber
I stilled completely when the door opened, not even letting my fear or adrenaline lead to shaking tremors, despite how much I wanted to give in. My senses focused, widening to hear any sound or smell any scent that might signal more monsters nearby. All I heard was the low rumble and constant hums in the background. They’d been present ever since I’d woken up in the Undercage.
The panicked and pained scents I’d been wallowing in before, lessened with the door open. In the background, I still smelled death and rot, as ever-present as the hum. It kept me on edge or at least more on edge. Either the monsters couldn’t smell it or it didn’t bother them as much as it did me. They might have even liked it. They were only animals, after all.