The next several days passed in much the same manner. Despite their chains, a guard was set at night, but Mitchell got the feeling after that first evening that it was much more to do with what might be out in the wastes they traveled rather than whatever the prisoners might get up to. They were left in darkness as the sun finally set but there was some sort of fire across the way where their captors had set up their tent. Mitchell didn’t know what they might be burning since there wasn’t a tree as far as the eye could see. Some brittle scrub grass or tumbleweed-type things dotted the landscape periodically but it wasn’t enough to keep a fire going. Probably something magical, Mitchell concluded.
The food they were given was sparse but serviceable. It was some sort of strangely spiced meat that tasted a little like curry and some root vegetables. Thought a bit gamey, it wasn’t bad, and he thought it best not to know what it was. He was hungry and it had calories and didn’t send him running to a shallow hole in the sand, so it would do. They were given a few ladles of water with their meals, a few more before they set out in the very early pre-dawn, and usually one or two in the early morning or afternoon before stopping. It was inadequate but enough that they wouldn’t die.
The creature that pulled the wagon stayed in the sand the entire evening and didn’t rouse itself until one of the group sat in the driver’s seat and twitched the reins. The great beast emerged then, shedding sand in waves. It shook itself very much like a wet dog and, in a truly terrifying display, yawned. Its mouth opened almost as wide as Mitchell was tall and he saw a double row of serrated teeth, each one about the size of his thumb that all angled back towards its cavernous throat. It squealed, an almost cute sound if you hadn’t seen it just yawn, and then shuddered slightly from head to tail before settling in and waiting for the command to go.
One thing that blew his mind was the sky. For one, it had two moons. They were only visible together in the sky for a short period during the night. Usually one was close to setting while the other was rising. Their colors were subtly different as well. The first moon had a pale blue-gray reflection while the second was a little more yellow. But, in the cloudless skies under which they traveled, the effect was that the night was never fully dark. Mitchell was almost struck dumb by the beauty of the landscape in the light of the twin orbs. The dunes reflected the celestial glow and it looked like rolling waves of glittering gems as far as he could see.
Allora saw him staring in awe that first night and had given him what he thought were the names. She’d pointed to the blue-gray moon and said “Ithstasy.” Then she pointed to the other horizon where the second one would rise later that night and said “Vish.”
Mitchell repeated the words, testing the foreign language out and Allora smiled at him and nodded.
The night had been quiet and blessedly cool after the scorching heat of the sun and he’d moved out from under the lean-to and laid where he could watch Ithstasy pass across the sky. It was so beautiful he almost wanted to cry at the sight of it.
Later that night Mitchell was awoken by a soft voice. He turned his head and saw that Allora was on her knees and bowing. Her voice was hushed but the night was quiet and it carried. She was bent forward with her head pressed to the sand and her forearms flat against the ground. As Mitchell listened it sounded like she was repeating something over and over again. He glanced up at the sky and saw that the second moon had just crested the horizon and Allora was facing it head-on.
He wanted to ask her what she was doing but also didn’t want to interrupt. Plus, she wouldn't have understood the question anyway, nor he her. The moment felt sacred, which was very strange to him because he’d never been religious back home. Sacred was almost a meaningless term to him. As he watched Allora praying to Vish, however, it was the only word that he could bring to mind that fit.
He may have been imagining it but he felt a presence settle over them. And there was also the fact that they couldn’t communicate. Mitchell had never felt so alone in his life but he felt like something was with him then. He couldn’t describe it but, as she prayed, he could swear it was there. He shuddered and laid back down. Watching her had started to feel like he was intruding on something that was meant to be private. His sleep was a little easier after that, though.
*****
Mitchell’s days were filled with heat and silence. Allora and the cambion barely spoke to one another although, from what little Mitchell could discern, the demon-like creature was trying to apologize. For what, Mitchell still had no idea. His captors had some sort of magic to talk to him but except for that first time, their leader didn’t have anything to say. The other guards or soldiers, whatever they were, didn’t bother trying to talk to him, either. The occasional grunt or non-verbal cues to go here, stop, get out, get in, and go faster were all he got from them.
There were five of them and Mitchell wondered if the ones they’d met on Earth had been part of their squad. If so, they didn’t seem too upset that three of their number were never coming back. There was the leader, whose name might have been Ivaran, but he couldn’t be sure. The other ones seemed to call him that but it might also be a title. Then there was Waterboy, Axe Man, and two others whom Mitchell had dubbed Dumb Fuck One and Dumb Fuck Two. His nicknames were petty but it wasn’t like he had much else to do as the hours in the cage went by.
He wondered what the cops would have made of the big green one with the tusks that was missing an arm back in Phoenix. Surely, he was dead. He’d been badly burned and then lost an arm to the gate or whatever it was that brought him here. How would that be explained? The guy was clearly not human. But then again, for all he knew, stuff like this happened all the time and it was routinely covered up by men in black going around with their memory erasers and clandestine organizations moving through the shadows. It put alien sightings and other strange phenomena into a whole new light. Maybe they weren’t full of shit after all.
Then he started wondering why they had magic here but not back on Earth. Allora had used magic but she wasn’t from there. Maybe it was just something people from Earth couldn’t use. But Dumb Fuck One was human - or looked it, anyway. He didn’t have pointy ears like the leader did.
Dumb Fuck Two looked like a smaller version of the guy with the tusks that had attacked them. His skin was a little grayer than green and his tusks were not quite as large but they were clearly the same species.
For days his thoughts went around in circles but he always ended up back to thinking about home. He missed his friends, he missed his parents. He even missed his sister and her stupid juice cleanses and messages to him to try Reiki healing. He thought of how unfair it was that he was going to die in this alien hellhole and his friends and family would never have closure. At least if he’d gone off to fight in a war he would have died doing something brave. Maybe even noble. But not here. Dragged before someone named Milandris, he was going to die like a whipped dog, executed for… what? Mitchell had no idea. It really pissed him off, though. If he was going to die, he wanted to at least die fighting. That kind of thinking was probably what led him to get a beating on their seventh night of captivity.
The sun had set and the camp was winding down. Dumb Fuck One and Pony Tail Spock were already in their bedrolls and Waterboy was bringing over their nightly serving of boot juice. Mitchell had started calling it that because it tasted like they kept the water in funky old boots before they served it. Waterboy carried the boot juice in a small cask with an open top into which he could dip the ladle which held about two cups, give or take.
As they approached the lean-to Dumb Fuck Two made an apparently universal gesture of a bad smell, pinching his nose and pointing at the three of them. He cracked some joke that made Waterboy laugh. Waterboy, instead of offering a ladle full of water to Allora to drink, dumped it over her head instead. It ran down her scalp and turned red with the dried blood that had caked into her hair and soaked into the torn and filthy white blouse she was still wearing. Unfortunately, this had the effect of a macabre wet t-shirt contest, and Allora wasn’t wearing a bra. Her nipples were on prominent display through the now pink shirt, a fact that their captors noticed.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
The laughter cut off and both of them took on a more predatory stance that was all too clear. Waterboy stepped closer to Allora and grabbed her roughly by the chin and said something. It sounded lewd even to Mitchell’s ears. On the other side of Mitchell, the cambion shifted his weight. Allora glared up at him from her position on the ground and her expression was like iron. Her purple eyes almost seemed to glow with the heat of her hatred.
Waterboy said something again, squeezing her cheeks and shaking her head back and forth with enough force to rock her whole body from side to side. Instead of saying anything in response, however, Allora spat in his face. Mitchell had a brief moment to be impressed that she could not only work up enough saliva but that she could nail him in the cheek below his left eye from her position on the ground.
Waterboy reacted almost immediately, backhanding her hard and knocking her to the sand. Mitchell had no memory of getting to his feet, but before he knew it, he was charging Waterboy and hit him low in the stomach, catching him on the shoulder and lifting him clear off the ground. The three of them had been close to the stone and he had just enough slack to follow Waterboy to the sand.
“You son of a bitch!” Mitchell screamed as he landed atop a surprised and gasping Waterboy. Mitchell had knocked the breath out of him. His moment of triumph was short-lived. Dumb Fuck Two was on him before he’d even fully sat up. A large beefy hand grabbed him by the back of the hair and yanked him backward pulling him bodily off of the wheezing guard. Mitchell hit the sand, his neck already aching from being pulled back so hard and before he could rise, a kick landed in his stomach. The breath left his body in an explosion of rushing air that was quickly followed by him vomiting up the bit of food he’d had.
As he lay gasping, Waterboy got back to his feet. He was rubbing his ribs where Mitchell’s shoulder had clipped him and he stood over him. He looked at Allora, who was just beginning to pick herself up, and then back at Mitchell. He smiled, but it wasn’t a smile of joy. It was a vicious, cruel thing. He kicked Mitchell again and what little bit of breath he’d managed to pull into his lungs left in a rush. He curled into the fetal position trying to protect his ribs as Dumb Fuck Two grabbed him by the back of the head once again and pulled him up to his knees.
Through bleary eyes, he was able to see Waterboy’s fist as it swung down and connected with his jaw. Mitchell landed in a heap, barely conscious. He struggled to stay awake, some part of him being determined to die on his feet but his legs didn’t want to cooperate. Dumb Fuck Two picked him up again and, through the pain and disorientation, Mitchell heard Allora’s voice screaming something. One eye wouldn’t open and the other was blurry but Mitchell could see past the big men to where the other tent was set up and saw two hazy figures running toward them. Mitchell never saw who it was as the second punch from Waterboy sent him at last into blissful unconsciousness, the crack of his jawbone being the last thing he heard.
*****
“Mitchell?”
A voice intruded into the darkness. But towards the darkness was pain and Mitchell tried to pull back from it. He wanted to stay in the void. Nothing hurt in the void.
“Mitchell, rocen savern. Petranas rocen!”
There was a panicked urgency to the voice and memories began to coalesce in his mind. The memory of Allora being manhandled by Waterboy, then the beating.
Mitchell hadn’t been in a physical altercation since his freshman year of high school. It was stupid at the time. He couldn’t even remember what it had been about now. At the time, however, it had been very important and his teenage hormones had demanded satisfaction. It had been a clumsy affair between him and the other guy, with more punches going wild than landing, but his opponent had managed a couple of solid hits on Mitchell’s face. He remembered that it had hurt but not as much as he had feared it would. Once he realized that getting hit wasn’t that big of a deal, he was able to stop spending all his energy trying to avoid getting hit, had actually gone on the offensive, and won.
This was not like that at all. When Waterboy had hit him it had felt like someone had struck the side of his head with a brick. It had hurt a hell of a lot more than the weak-ass punches the kid in high school had thrown.
“Mitchell, rocen!”
A hand shook his shoulder and he finally relented. His head was clear enough now that he recognized the voice as Allora’s. Her again. The source of all his pain and suffering in the whole world.
“What?” he snapped. His voice was thick and his jaw wasn’t moving right. Then he had a moment of surprise that he could move it at all. He was almost sure Waterboy had broken it with that last punch.
He opened his eyes and looked up to see Allora kneeling over him, her face creased with worry. Her violet eyes really did have a soft inner glow in the darkness. God damn, she was beautiful. In the glow of Vish, he could see fresh tear tracks through the grime on her cheeks. Her lip was also busted and swollen where Waterboy had backhanded her.
The camp usually broke four or five hours before dawn to get as much travel as they could before the noon-day sun became too unbearable. He could hear the sounds of them getting ready to depart and knew what that meant. Any minute now they’d come over to the block they were all chained to and lead them one by one into their cages for the day. Mitchell’s muscles twitched at the mere thought of more hours spent curled up in one but the aches and pains in his head and stomach were clear evidence of what disobedience would bring. At that moment he hated everyone. He hated all of them and their whole fucking planet.
“Astahii get confen,” she said now that she could see he was awake.
Allora titled her head and indicated the guards. Their larger tent was almost packed up and Dumb Fuck Two had gone to rouse the big beast that was only partially buried in the sand. The ground was a little rockier and it had had trouble fully submerging itself. But Mitchell was used to the routine by now. He had maybe ten minutes or so before they would be given their water, unchained, and led to the wagons to be locked up. Her meaning was clear enough. Wake up before they have to wake you up.
Mitchell sat up and probed at his jaw experimentally. It was swollen along his left cheek where Waterboy had used his face for sparring practice, and it was tender. But, as he opened and closed his mouth, it wasn’t broken. His teeth weren’t lining up correctly and there was a bit of a slide as the jaw covered that extra millimeter or so but he could move it. His left eye was also puffy but not swollen shut. He was sure the damage would be worse. Waterboy had not held back.
Allora reached up then to examine the wound and, on instinct, he flinched back from her. Her hand stopped and a hurt expression passed over her face before disappearing quickly.
“What are you doing?” he asked her. His voice was cold and he didn’t care. He was bruised, battered, hungry, thirsty, filthy, exhausted, and being carted off to be executed for reasons that would probably never find out. She was the reason for all of it.
Her hand came slowly back to her side and she looked at him for a long moment. She opened her mouth to say something, then closed it. Without another sound, she stood and walked over a few feet before sitting back down to wait for them to be taken to their cages. She didn’t look at him again. That was fine with him.
Mitchell moved his neck about, testing the tightness of the tendons, and massaged them as much as he could with manacled hands. In his movements, he caught sight of the cambion. He was sitting as silently as ever but he was watching Mitchell very closely. His expressions were still unreadable to Mitchell but he got a sense that he disapproved of his sharp tone with Allora.
“Yeah, well, fuck you too,” Mitchell mumbled.
As usual, the big creature said nothing. His golden eyes merely observed.
On schedule, Waterboy arrived with the ladle. They took turns with the basic stuff like this but Waterboy had been on duty yesterday and from what Mitchell had seen so far, they didn’t usually repeat the same chores each day.
He ladled the water out to Allora, not on her head this time, and then he stepped past Mitchell to the cambion. When he got to Mitchell, he didn’t immediately hand him the ladle. He looked at him for a long moment, and there was an angry glint in his eye. Mitchell saw him look at the damage his fist had done and grunted. In satisfaction or disappointment, Mitchell couldn’t be sure. He scooped out a ladle full of water but didn’t offer it to Mitchell. He looked him right in the eye and, with a smirk, poured it out into the sand. It absorbed into the dry ground immediately.
“Zarafar!” Allora swore.
Waterboy didn’t rise to the bait. He looked at Mitchell another few seconds, perhaps waiting to see what he’d do, then glanced at Allora a few feet away. He blew her a kiss and sauntered back to the wagon, chuckling.
“Fuck.”
It was all Mitchell had the energy to say.