Fourteen Years Ago
Scarlett
A pounding headache resonated from my head as I woke up. I had the strangest nightmare the night prior. I dreamt that I was abducted by aliens and turned into a freak of nature. Peace washed over me since I knew the nightmare was over. My eyes would open soon to reveal that it wasn’t much of a dream. The nightmare had come true as I noticed that my arm was covered in fur. “What?” I tried to rise out of bed quicker, but felt a pain somewhere I never thought I’d feel anything. I grabbed the body part and brought it into view, revealing a fluffy fox tail. I felt the grasp, informing me that it was attached to me. “This can’t be true!” I screamed as I rolled out of my bed and onto my feet. Everything about me was off, yet nothing felt unnatural to move.
I walked up to a mirror above a nearby sink and looked in it. My face was wrong. I had a muzzle with a small black nose at the tip along with whiskers. It felt surreal. Despite the scientific impossibility, this was my new reality. I moved my mouth to form words, surprised that my muscle memory seemed to shift along with my physical form. I took a deep breath before testing my vocal abilities. “I am Scarlet Rose Campbell. Somehow, I’ve been turned into a fox. I look like a living cartoon character, and that scares me. Though I must admit, I look rather cute.”
My voice was the same as it was before the change, with no noticeable accents or slip-ups caused by my mouth changing into a muzzle. To confirm that the change was real, I touched the tip of my new nose. It was far more sensitive than a human one. It was far more sensitive than my new chin, if I could call it that. I could feel the smooth fur that covered every inch of my body except for a bit of the inside of my ears. My new fox ears. I attempted to twitch them, surprised that they responded. With a little more practice, I would be able to manually control them.
Once I investigated my body, I noticed that I was wearing only a hospital gown. I ran to the bed I woke up in and wrapped the bedsheet around myself in a makeshift cloak. As I wrapped it, I took note of my hands. They were clawed with paws on them but functioned just as easily as human hands. It helped that the claws were semi-retractable and the paws were flat and soft. I took a look at my feet and was glad that they were a similar story. Similar layout to the human version with a few modifications to fit my new form. I was just glad that my heels were touching the floor unlike actual foxes.
As I stared at myself, I could hear footsteps approaching. My enhanced hearing could pick up on claws hitting the metal floors. I looked at where the source was originating to see a massive monstrous alien approach. It was ten feet tall with scaly skin and no hair. It was horrifying to look at. Not only was it massive, but it was uncanny, like a mix between a human being and a lizard. Not like an anthropomorphic lizard, but some impossible scientific fusion. I knew I wasn’t really in a position to criticize, considering I was now a talking fox.
“M734 is awake,” the scaly alien said with a robotic voice that made it impossible to determine gender. The alien pointed at me as it said it, which infuriated me. Just because I wasn’t human anymore didn’t mean I lost my name.
“My name’s Scarlett, not M734!” I shouted back as I looked through the small window in the door again. I could see several rows of cells like the white padded one I was in. In fact, the entire facility was pristine white, unnaturally so. I knew I wasn’t anywhere near home, but it was too alien for me to process.
“Incorrect,” the massive alien replied as it stared down at me. The alien pulled out a tablet and typed in it. “M734 insists on having a name. It is a stupid animal.”
“Animal! I only look like one because you made me this way!” I shouted back while flashing my new teeth. I was shocked when the cell door slid open. My ears pinned against my head as my new tail fled between my legs. It seemed that I got some instinctual reactions to this event. I saw the alien looming over me and decided to run under my bed. I managed to barely slip under it. It seemed that the transformation didn’t halt my growth. Given a few weeks, I probably would've been too tall to do it.
As I hid, I pinched myself, hoping to wake up back home. I wanted this to just be a big nightmare. Unfortunately, not all nightmares were dreams. A fact I was quickly reminded of when a massive hand grabbed me and pulled me out from under the bed. It didn’t take a genius to know it was the alien that grabbed me. The alien slammed me against the wall and shouted, “M734, learn obedience or be culled!”
“Um hm,” I mumbled back, having difficulties talking because that tends to happen when your face is slammed against a wall. The alien dropped me to the ground and turned to face the open door.
The alien walked to the entrance and said, “M734, follow me. Any deviation from the path will lead to flogging.” As the alien walked out the door, I was quick to follow. I already knew I was going to be bruised by his actions and I didn’t want to add broken bones to my injuries.
We walked past rows of cells. Several aliens were locked in them like I was. Some were mishmashes of several different species while others had limbs replaced with mechanical replicas. I didn’t know how many were intelligent, but I assumed all were. If they were mere animals, they would’ve been put in cages instead of cells.
After walking through a few nondescript hallways, we ended up in a conference room where an alien from the same species as those who operated me sat at the end. Unlike the one who took me here, this one had red scaly skin and looked a bit taller. The red alien pointed to me and said, “M734, take a seat. We have much to go over.” I heeded her advice and climbed onto one of the chairs. It was embarrassing to be too short to just sit on it, but I couldn’t do anything about it.
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Once I was on the chair, I watched as the red alien tapped the whiteboard behind her. Right before my eyes, I saw the board switch to a TV screen displaying what looked like the stock market report. Since I was only ten, I had no idea what it meant. There was also the fact that I was now a freak, which concerned me far more than anything else at the moment.
The red alien pointed to a downward facing red line and said in a feminine voice, “As you can see here, our sales revenue has been going down. According to our market analysis, we discovered that our products were bland and predictable. According to many customers, Tellos line products are too numerous, flooding the market with their low demand and high supply. They’re too weak to do many tasks.” I raised my hand since I was thoroughly confused. She looked at me and said, “M734, I know what you’re going to ask. What is a Tellos product? The answer is simple.” The screen changed to display some strange bird alien. That’s when the gears clicked in my head.
“You sell aliens? Isn’t that slavery?” I asked, acutely aware of why I was captured. If this was some form of karmic punishment for my ancestors’ crimes, I would disagree on the account of my family’s history. They may have been from Georgia, but they were never participants in slavery. They became rich in the 1920s.
“Correct. As a superior species, it is our inherent right to do as we please to the inferior. You are a fine specimen of an inferior species. More specifically, a former human,” she explained as she pointed at me. She switched back to the line chart. “As I was saying, Tellos slaves are too numerous without enough demand, meaning their profit margins have shrunk. That’s where you come in.”
The screen switched to display two figures. I gasped as I noticed that both were of me. One was myself back when I was human while the other was the current me. The red alien pointed at the picture of human me and explained, “So that’s where you come in. Humans are unique as a species. Your genetics are easy to modify. That’s how we changed you into your current form.”
“You turned me into a fox?” I asked as I scratched behind my ears. They felt itchy, which was odd to feel on the top of my head.
She laughed and pointed at the picture of my current form. “Silly mutant, we didn’t turn you into a fox. We didn’t even hybridize your DNA. Such a process is impossible while keeping you genetically stable. Instead, we gave you similar traits to one while keeping you genetically close to humans. We could’ve just given you fox ears and a tail, but what’s the fun in that? Humans are hideous! You should thank me for your new appearance.”
“Thank you? I look like a dog! People will think I should be a pet instead of a person,” I replied as I pointed to my face. The red alien merely laughed, an airy and screechy sound emitting from her throat.
“You look nothing like an actual fox. You have a humanlike skeletal structure barring the head and tail. You age at the rate of a human and share the same height. You will also grow some strange lumps on your chest, which seems to be exclusive to humanoid species,” she explained before switching the slides to show different bar graphs.
She pointed at the low chart. “According to our surveys, you were objectively ugly. Nine out of ten Qarri put your score as a one out of ten. When shown the picture of the new you, they scored you a five out of ten. That’s a difference of four points.”
“I know. I can do math,” I replied with a smirk. That was when I learned I should’ve kept my mouth shut. She picked up a stapler and threw it towards my head. I attempted to dodge, but the other alien held me in place.
The stapler connected with my head, shooting pain through it. It wasn’t a fracture, but it would definitely bruise. These aliens were strong, and I could see that she was holding back. They could kill me if they found me too annoying to deal with. Sarcasm and sass were on that list.
“As I was saying,” she resumed as if nothing happened, “you aren’t anywhere near the level we desired, but you’re an exotic good. You’re perfectly suited to be a domestic slave, with some side benefits for mammalians.” She smirked as she said the last part, making me uncomfortable. She explained, “For your information, we ran simulations on your development. What we discovered is that once you reach adulthood, you’re considered moderately attractive to a large swath of mammalians. Not exceptional in any category, but still considerable.”
“You’ll sell my body for money?” I asked as it started to dawn on me. I was only ten at the time, but I knew a bit about what they were talking about. I remembered hearing about a trafficking ring that was busted by the FBI on TV. My parents explained to me what happened, and it was horrifying. And now it was my reality.
“You have eight years to come to terms with it. If that doesn’t work out, we’ll just have to find another use for you,” she explained before standing to her full height. “Welcome to the Imperial Qarri State. I hope you do well.”
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November 7th, 2023
“And that was my first day as this creature,” I explained as I pointed to myself. “I remember it vividly even if most days between then and now are a blur.”
Quentin put his hand on my shoulder and looked into my eyes. It was times like these that I felt lucky to meet someone who truly cared for me. That he could love a freak like me made me feel more human. He interrupted my thoughts by saying, “If it hurts too much, you don’t have to tell me more. You’re safe now, so you don’t need to worry about getting recaptured.”
I looked at him and gave him a thumbs-up. “I know. But I feel like there’s more I could do.” I stood up and paced in my room. “Those Qarri monsters will continue enslaving and experimenting until they are stopped. I want their slavery operation to end! So if there’s a way to do lasting damage to them, I want to do that.”
Quentin looked at the ground for a while before replying, “I have an idea. We can attempt to intercept a Qarri operation. Knowing their technological abilities, they can probably kidnap several people on a single spaceship. What we need to do is defeat the Qarri soldiers there and free their captives. We can pretend to be space pirates or something in order to pass by unnoticed. It’s risky, but it should put your conscience to rest.”
I sighed as I knew it was all we could do. We had nowhere close to the psionic mastery needed to fight on even terms with those aliens. The only reason we won the fight back at the gateway was due to two enemies killing each other until their guns were empty. Even then, it was Gruma and Harry who won the battle. Quentin and I were chumps who hid in the cockpit. The two of us had literal superpowers, yet we couldn’t do anything.
Quentin walked to the door and looked back at me. “I’m doing to appease my own conscience as well. I shouldn’t have broken my morals to buy you. I should’ve liberated you by force, but I’m too much of a coward to take risks.”
“Quentin,” I said as I walked up to him. I grabbed his hand and continued, “don’t feel that way! It would’ve done us no good if you died. While our weakness is regrettable, we should do what we can to end their evil practice!” I continued to hold him for a while before asking, “Care to join me in the simulation? That way you can see me as I truly am.” Regardless of his answer, I walked to the simulation room. It was my daily escape, and I didn’t know what I would’ve done without it.