Angel squeezes my hand. Greta didn’t say anything to her. Does that mean I’m it? I’m the only human here? I’m the only one from Earth? I’m the only one from my own world?
I wonder if that’s good. Maybe the men here won’t even like humans. Maybe they won’t bid on me and everyone will let me go. Maybe no one will hurt me. Maybe I’ll be fine.
Only, I know before Greta speaks her next words that it’s a futile thought. Of course they like humans. Everyone does. We don’t wander around much, so we haven’t bred with aliens from most of the planets. This means most humans are full-breed Earthlings. It’s rare to find a human hybrid, so when someone does catch a human, that’s the first thing they want to do.
They want to breed us.
I’ve heard of this before, but only rumors. My friend Heather’s sister left the planet to work on Orchid and when she came back for a holiday break, she told us stories about life outside of Mirroean. She told us stories of women being captured and taken. She told us stories of aliens trying to seduce her so she’d have their child. She told us all sorts of things we weren’t supposed to know.
I think a part of me always hoped her stories were lies, made up.
A part of me always hoped her tales were nothing but ghost stories designed to scare us into good behavior.
I never wanted to think her stories were real, that the rumors were true.
I never wanted to think the universe was that bad.
“The guys I work with are nothing like these fuckers,” Greta says. “I work in a place where there are rules. They are boundaries. Money talks and they have it. Here? These guys are fucking buying us, ladies. There aren’t going to be any guards to keep us safe. There aren’t going to be any cops to look after us. There isn’t going to be anything. It’s just us and them and the things they want to do.”
“What are they going to want to do?” Angel asks.
I wish she hadn’t.
So does Greta.
“Close your eyes, Angel,” Greta whispers. “The devil is coming for you.”
Angel starts to cry and I wish she would stop, but Greta doesn’t say anything and neither do I. This is it, then. This is the end of the line for us. This is the end of our lives as we know them.
Unless I can find a way to escape, a way to get away, a way to make things different, we’re all going to be played with and tortured and eventually killed. Is that really how I want to go out? No. It’s not. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die because some asshole needed to get his rocks off with a human.
I don’t want to die.
I need to come up with a plan. I need to come up with a way to escape. There has to be one, right? Most girls either accept their fate or they freak out. Most girls don’t try to escape. Most girls don’t try to fight because they’re smarter than me and they realize there’s no way out.
But I’m not smart.
I’m human.
So I might not be wise in the ways of the universe, but I’m scrappy. I’m sneaky. I’m brave even when it’s the stupidest thing I could be.
There has to be a way.
I let go of Angel’s hand and begin crawling around the room we’re in. I have a general idea where the door is and I feel my way over to it. It’s solid wood. I don’t bother knocking on it to see if there are any weaknesses. Obviously, there aren’t. Still, I run my hands over the edges to see if there are any places where the wood has cracked or broken off. Maybe I can break off a little piece to use.
I bet getting stabbed with a piece of wood, even a sliver, doesn’t feel very nice. It could give me something to fight back with.
Slowly, I feel a little bit of hope creeping up into me, but then I feel a hand wrap around my wrist.
“Don’t try to fight them,” Greta says. “Trust me. It’s not worth it.”
“What do you know?” I hiss at her. “You keep saying how bad these people are, but what do you actually know? Nothing. You don’t know anything. You’re just like the rest of us. We can all imagine the worst possible outcome, but at least I’m trying to fight back.”
Greta doesn’t say anything for a long time. For a minute, I wonder if she heard me. Then she takes my hand and presses it to her cheek. I try to choke back a gasp, but I can’t.
Her skin is ridged, thick with scars. Despite the fact that we’re in total darkness, I can feel them. I can feel exactly where Greta has been sliced and sewn back together. I can feel exactly where she’s been cut over and over again.
“I know more than you think, Fiona, and these aren’t men you want to mess with. You? You’re human. For fuck’s sake, you’re probably a damn virgin. You’re going to go to someone who bids high and who plans to take care of his prize. Me? I’m going to go to someone who doesn’t mind taking a monster as a slave and trust me, Fiona: my time isn’t going to be nearly as pleasant as yours.”