Total pages in book: 53
Estimated words: 47529 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 238(@200wpm)___ 190(@250wpm)___ 158(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 47529 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 238(@200wpm)___ 190(@250wpm)___ 158(@300wpm)
All of a sudden I was in a big room with more aliens than I’d ever imagined. My new owner didn’t have a leash or a collar on me. He seemed to think I’d just stay with him, like some kind of sentient Roomba.
Two days ago….
I wander away from my alien owner, looking for a way out of this party and off this planet. My plan has not changed since I was captured. I intend to get back home. I’m not a fucking commodity. I’m a person, and I own myself.
The crowd of formally dressed aliens parts for a brief moment, and my heart skips a beat when I see another human. There is a young woman around my age with flowing blonde hair that looks like it has been brushed a thousand times, slightly wispy around her head and shoulders. She is wearing a golden gown, a smaller version of the one her alien mistress is wearing. A collar encircles her throat, and a light golden leash connects her to the wrist of her alien owner.
She looks up at her owner as I approach, and the alien woman unclips her leash. There does not seem to be any animosity between them. I have to assume the other human is playing for time, pretending to play along with the alien agenda before making good her escape.
“Hello,” she says in a soft whisper voice that is barely audible. “My name is Melinda. What’s yours?”
She extends her hand to me, almost as if to go for a handshake, but flopping her wrist more like I’m supposed to kiss her freakin’ hand. I ignore the motion and step closer to her.
“How the fuck do we get out of here, Melinda?”
She gives me a strange look, as if my question is uncouth and very strange. She takes a step back, putting distance between us, and glancing back at her alien mistress as if for comfort.
“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”
Her accent makes me think she’s from the other side of the Atlantic, but that’s no excuse to be unaware of the horrors being visited upon us as a whole. We’re captives, people being traded for the entertainment of aliens.
“I mean, how do we get out of here?”
She gives a little shrug, as if the matter holds no interest to her.
I watch, stunned, as the female alien walks by, pets Melinda on the head, and drops a treat from between pale, scaled fingers. Melinda catches what looks like a boiled sweet and performs an actual fucking curtsey.
Melinda now speaks to me softly around her little sweet treat, changing the subject to one she is capable of engaging with.
“My owners are very high up in the government,” she says, smirking at me as if their achievement is hers.
“Okay,” I say blankly.
“What does your owner do?”
I knew that question was coming somehow.
“I have no fucking idea. And I couldn’t begin to care.”
She looks me up and down, judging my attire, which is outlandish and ridiculous, but not as fancy as hers.
“By the looks of it, probably a simple merchant. His wife probably works. And I imagine their children go to a common school.”
I have no idea what she is talking about, and I have even less interest in finding out.
“Did Kahn sell you?”
She asks another question in that same smug tone that implies she is better than I am. Any hope of getting any useful information out of her is starting to dwindle, but I have to assume she’ll eventually accidentally tell me something I can leverage.
“I don’t know who Kahn is.”
“Kahn sold me. He’s one of the brothers who owns the Human Pet Store. The Voros family. They’re very influential and incredibly powerful.” She speaks the words of that human trading hub with a certain emphasis that implies capital letters and a simpering excitement. “They keep that little shop for appearances, but their family owns half the city, you know. The Wrathelders own the other half. My mistress is a Wrathelder. Jessamine Wrathelder, she’s cousin to Phenix, who…”
I cut her off as she embarks on a long tirade of names I neither recognize nor care about. “I was sold by some asshole.”
She makes an expression that strongly indicates she does not like my disrespectful tone. Then she keeps talking about the thing she intended on talking about in the first place. “That might have been Arkan. He’s good too, but I think Kahn is the best trainer. He’s just so elegant. Never rough. Arkan always struck me as far too aggressive.”
Of course she thinks her human slave trader is better than the other human slave trader. This woman is under the illusion that she is better than any other human on this, or any other planet. She has fully identified with the role of pet and seems very happy in it.