Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 91631 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91631 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Now I'm going to have to make a mess again, just so she'll come back. I need to breathe her scent in again. I need to see that indignant glare on her sharp little face with the black brows.
She has no idea who I am, does she?
3
MINA
I greet the other female servants in the morning, moving to take my bowl and fill it with gruel.
"Mina." One of the women comes up to me and takes the bowl out of my hand before I can take a bite. "There's another alert for your cellblock. Can you handle it?"
I clench my jaw, nodding. There's only one occupant in the place I call cellblock C at the moment. I can’t read the alien alphabet, so I letter them all in my head. A and B are both filled with the general roster gladiators, but I tend to never go to those blocks. As a human, I have to stay out of trouble, and I learned the hard way that the sight of a human female tends to trigger the “reward” scenario in a lot of the gladiators' minds. I'm not allowed to go in there or else they think I'm on the menu in all ways. Cellblock C is mine to look after, because it's usually empty, or there's the occasional visitors to tend to.
Or at least, it was empty until he moved in.
I don't know who or what he is, just that he's messy. He tore everything apart yesterday and I got pulled from dinner. There's a limited window for food for the slaves, so I knew I was going to miss out on my meal, and it pissed me off. Mealtime—for all its shittiness—is the only thing I have to look forward to.
And now I'm being called out again. I snatch the bowl back before the other slave can eat it. I bring it to my mouth and tip it back, downing everything in one quick gulp. It tastes a bit like eating paste, but it's food, and I'll take it. Once that's done, I hand it back to her and leave the mess hall, grab my little cart and head back toward cellblock C. I pass by two guards doing their rounds as I go, but they ignore me. I might as well be a piece of furniture for all the attention they pay to me. There are other slaves here, of course. Lord Sir figured out that bots get too expensive, and with the humid atmosphere here on V’tarr II’s moon, they need a lot of maintenance. Far easier to just buy up a bunch of unwanted slaves and make them do all the grunt work.
The other females are from a frog-like race called “ooli” and they're nice enough. The gladiators tend to leave them alone, I suspect because the ooli aren't all that attractive to most eyes and have a particular smell to them. I guess they're cheap labor, though, because I'm the only human. I have to wear a collar that states I'm property of Lord Sir, and I think if I didn't have it, things would go badly for me.
Ironic, considering Lord Sir doesn't want me, either.
The moment I push my little cart into cellblock C, I can hear noise. There's the sound of rage, of things breaking, and I inwardly wince. The new gladiator must be awake again. I know that's my destination, but even so, I swing my cart toward Lord Sir’s offices. I keep them spick and span, adding little flowers here and there and making sure that he's happy with my work. Brown-nosing, in other words.
I slide in through the side door marked for the slaves, using one of my cuffs for the keyed entrance. The moment the door opens, it feels like a mistake. Lord Sir is seated at his desk, and across from him is the other male he's been working with. I figure the other guy must be some kind of scientist, but what, I don't know. All I know is that he's got eyes as cold as a reptile and he watches me as if I'm a chess piece waiting to be moved across the board.
They both look at me briefly and then return to their conversation. It's because I'm nothing, a no one, and I quietly push my cart in and begin to clean. V’tarr’s moon is a jungle planet, and it's covered in bugs. There's always a few dead ones to sweep up, plus cobwebs and cocoons. So many damn cocoons. Lord Sir likes to display a bunch of delicate-looking crystal sculptures on his shelves. I know they must be expensive, because every time someone visits him, they all pause and talk about the crystal for what feels like forever.
Lord Sir likes to be the biggest dick in the room, I'm guessing.