The Menagerie

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. I’m not a scientist so I don’t know if that’s true, but I damn sure tried.

I’m not sure how long I’ve been stuck in this cube. The marks I made to keep track are erased every night once I’m asleep. I don’t think it’s automated, I’ve tried forcing myself to stay awake long enough to find out… but when I inevitably lose the war against deprivation, the marks are gone no matter how quickly I come to.

Barely large enough for my lanky frame, I sit with my back against one wall of the cube. My legs are bent in front of me with my feet pushing against the cube wall to the front while my head brushes the ceiling.

The light was non-existent, and I’d been given no food or water since I’d been taken… Oh, I hadn’t explained that? Silly me.

I’d just done my best Bill Russel impersonation at the park with my friends. With three of us about to ship out to basic training, it was most likely the last game for some of us. My friends had left, but I had wanted to put up a couple more jump shots. That’s about the time Mr. Grabbypants showed up,

I don’t know what he looked like and having not seen “him” if it even was a Mr… all I know is my shot went up, then I did. I’d like to think I made that last basket, but I never saw it land.

I woke up sometime later in this cubicle. In the complete absence of light, as I screamed until my voice was no more.

Now here I was talking to you. A figment of my imagination, because talking to myself was less horrific than thinking about my predicament. Which I was just telling you about… so I was thinking about it.

It was enough to drive someone crazy. Lucky for me I was in space, no looney bins up here… was there?

Almost as bad as being unable to see was the stillness of the air. It had no movement at all. That I had air to breathe was some small consolation, though it was the only consideration to my needs for sustained life.

A buzzing feeling, like standing too close to high voltage, had slowly been building until I was suddenly aware of it. In the absence of everything else the new sensation was jarring.

“Hello”, I shouted,” Is there anybody out there? Can anybody hear me? Is there anyone listening?”

I could feel the air begin vibrating again, “What is this?” I began shouting, ‘What is going on”?

The continued silence wasn’t shocking, but the sudden zap was.

“That was sure something”, I muttered as I rubbed my aching arms. At least it wasn’t high voltage.

The cube suddenly grew warm as the buzzing grew alarmingly loud and the walls of the cube began glowing with a red light.

It didn’t take long for it to dawn on me the impending charge would be less than pleasant.

“Oh, shhhhh”, was all I was able to elicit as the sudden current turned me into a spastic meat mannequin.

I awoke several hours later with the wall at my feet was giving off a faint yellow glow. I looked at my hands in the light, turning them over and over… just being able to see my hands again helped somehow.

That’s when the wall turned into a screen with a square at the top with some kind of writing. I couldn’t read it, but it was obviously characters of some sort.

After a few minutes I could feel the buzzing again. “No…. no, you ca”. A large shock and nap time again and I could see the characters on the screen looked different, but I still couldn’t make them out. Several rounds of shock therapy and sleepy time later I could suddenly read the screen, only I wished I still couldn’t.

Dear new acquisition

You were taken shortly before you were to die. No one will come for you, no one will even know you are gone. That life is over. From now on you will live and prosper depending on how well you can survive. Soon you will be delivered to The Arena for your orientation battle. If your survive, Teagan Va’al Noor may decide to add you to his collection. If he does, I get paid, so please do well.

Welcome to The Menagerie.