Caged with the Alien Gladiators by Corin Cain
Jacky
“They’re going to hurt us because of you!” A thin woman in the same white suit as me points her finger accusingly at me.
“Sit down. We did what we had to,” says Kay, coming to my defense. We’re all thirty of us huddled at the back of the cell, away from the puddle of grimy water…
And as far away from the horrid crunching sounds that went on for what felt like an eternity as the Bullfrog feasted. We were all thinking the same thing…
What if the Toad is just an appetizer?
“If we’re sold to the salt mines, it’s your fault,” she says, venom in her voice, but I don’t blame her. She’s scared and looking for someone to vent at. If that’s me, then that’s me.
“You really think they were going to let us go free?” Kay stands, her head nearly touching the ceiling of the cells. “We made a choice. Now sit down. I won’t ask again,” she says, and the other woman walks as far as she can, slumping down and glaring soundlessly at us.
I slap myself to keep awake. Gods, but I’m tired. You’re supposed to come out of cheap statis slowly. It’s not like the fancy statis the rich can afford. I’d lined up a job interview at a posh hotel on planet Litika, doing the holo-vid interview before I took off. Will they even wonder where I am, or will they move on to the next applicant without ever questioning my disappearance?
Don’t think about what should have been.
“Where were you en route to?” I ask Kay.
She pauses for a moment, then shrugs. “I was going to head a security contract in Wild Space, border of Rogue. Was catching a transport from planet Litika. Mining company hired me to lead a contract they had with a new firm. Details were sketchy, but they paid well.” She extends her hand with a wry smile. “Kay Atlas, Atlas security. My cousin’s firm. She’ll be sending out ships to look for me, but once you get sold at an auction…you just disappear.”
No wonder she seems so capable.
It’s her job.
I take her hand. She’s got a firm shake. “Jacky no last name, dishwasher, janitor, server, and I was supposed to be moving up to front desk staff on Litika. I’ve worked bad jobs my whole life to get from deep in Wild Space to human territory. This was my last hop.”
“Your luck’s about to turn. I pride myself on being a good judge of people. When we get out of this, you’ve got a job lined up. Pension and health benefits.” She perks up as the engine rumbles. “We’re breaching atmosphere. Landing soon. Stick by me. This is what’s going to happen. We’re going to be taken to an auction, prettied up, and sold. We need to make an escape before we get on the block. You understand? When I give the signal, there won’t be a second to hesitate.”
“I don’t hesitate,” I reply, looking into her deep brown eyes.
“That’s right. You don’t. And we’re going to get free together.”
The hold fills with screams as we touch down hard. The doors open, and the Bullfrog stands in the doorway. Everyone pushes as far away from him as possible. “Come. I’m still hungry. Try to run, that happens,” he says, pointing to the right. I see the bone white of what used to be a Toad.
Kay stands, and we file out after two other women. I can’t help but look at the pile of bones.
The Bullfrog ate every ounce of fat and meat from it. Women sob behind me, and I hope I can get them free.
We go through the next set of doors, then the cargo bays yawn in front of us, open to the world. It’s even more humid. We step out, and I test the gravity. Slightly light, but almost standard.
We follow the Bullfrog onto a pathway. He has his back to us, not fearing us. What could we do? He’s massive, so big he barely fit in the hallways of the ship. He doesn’t need a weapon. Those teeth sawed through Toad hide in seconds. I don’t want to imagine what they’d do to me.
We’re on a landing pad. Another ship takes off thirty feet to the left, blasting off and flying over the tall walls that surround us. Ahead of us is a courtyard and huge, sprawling jungle gardens in front of the towering palace.
It’s built of a light green stone, and I know it must belong to a Toad Lord, if not one of the ten Fingers to their King. The stone is hewn in blocks half the size of a transport ship, massive squares that look like they could take an artillery hit.
Toads are working in the gardens. I watch a long tongue dart out of one of their mouths and grab a bird, which squawks before being crunched down. I wince. There are even a few humans walking about, and they don’t look like slaves. Who could work with such evil?
“This isn’t an auction. We’ve been bought direct,” hisses Kay.
The Bullfrog stops in his tracks, turning and licking his lips. “Quiet.” The single word is enough to make me grind my teeth closed, hoping he didn’t place the voice as Kay’s. I can feel the glares from the captives behind me.
We walk along a raised cobblestone path. There’s muddy swamp on either side, and I think I see something roiling under the surface, some sort of snake-like creature that makes me walk quicker.
I breathe deep, trying to adjust myself to the thick, humid oxygen. The sun can’t pierce through the haze of clouds and pollution above. That’s normal for a Toad planet. You hear about them—how a hot sun burns the skin of Toads, who like everything damp. I wish I’d only heard about Toad planets and never experienced it in real life.
Not one of the thirty of us thinks of running. There’s nowhere to go. Even if we got away from the Bullfrog, whose huge, muscled legs look like he could eat up twenty feet in a single bound, we’d only run into the towering walls that surround us.
The Bullfrog takes us into a small door at the base of the palace. I look up, imagining jumping from the parapets. Maybe that’s the only way I’m getting out of this.
No. That’s a useless thought. Make a plan. Follow the plan. Get to the destination.
That’s how I laid out my life—and right when I thought the grind was finally over, that I was finally going to be safe, I got snatched up.
We step inside, and the air is cooler down here, less muggy. We take a big set of stairs up. I share a glance with Kay. In the tight, winding staircase, the Bullfrog loses sight of us—but there’s nowhere to go. She shakes her head.
We get into a long hallway. There are big cells, wide, with tall thin bars. Each cell has ten feet of height at least. They’re built for Bullfrogs…or Aurelians.
“These look too big for us,” I whisper, my voice as soft as I can. I hold back a grunt of pain as I feel the sharp elbow jab into me from the woman behind me. I don’t even look back. I won’t retaliate.
A scream sends chills down my body. It echoes, a horrible premonition of what will happen to us if we don’t obey. The Bullfrog took us here to terrify us more.
That’s what I think at first…
Until I realize they aren’t screams of pain.
We keep walking and the Bullfrog stops in front of a cell, chuckling. It’s empty, but the wooden door to a private room is ever so slightly open, and there’s a woman’s voice calling out from it.
“Oh yes, yes, take me!” she yells out, in the throes of ecstasy. My cheeks go red.
Aurelians. Clearly.
The Bullfrog laughs, deep and booming. “Reedok says. If they win tonight. One of you is next prize. Get pretty looking,” he grunts, beckoning us to keep following him.
The bedroom door opens.
A sweaty, nude Aurelian comes out. I check instantly for the tattoo that would mark him as a Fanatic. I wish that it gave me any calmness to see his muscled chest is bare, the pure marble skin unblemished. Tattooed or not, he’s intimidating, making me feel even smaller.
He looks almost human, if humans were well over seven feet tall, with pure marble skin that looks hewn from rock. There’s not a bit of fat on his body, all hard lines and muscles I didn’t know existed until this moment. He looks like a demi-god come down from the heavens to judge us.
Gods, but he’s perfection. A strong, masculine face, with icy grey eyes that lock in on me. The screams continue from inside, but he must have just sated himself, his cock swinging, huge and soft between his legs. He breathes in, his nostrils flaring, confusion in his eyes as his cock twitches.
He’s getting ready for another round. His massive member rears up, filling, and the row of women gasp. It’s intimidating. He’s so strong that if the bars didn’t hold him, he could pin you down and ruin you with that weapon between his legs. Then just like that, he turns, walking back towards the bedroom to take the helpless slave again.
Aurelians are insatiable—and these three were willing to claim a woman given to them by a Toad Lord. They were unable to resist fucking a slave who had no choice but to come to them. She might be enjoying it, but that doesn’t change anything.
Fanatic or not, they have no honor.
I can’t help but take a glance at his muscled buttocks as he disappears back into the room. Every inch of him is perfection, and he’s huge, at least seven feet tall of rippling muscle.
What would it feel like, to be in a room with the three of them as they lose themselves to the Mating Rage?
What would it feel like to have all three of them staring at me, their slate-grey eyes hot with hunger, telling me they were going to take me?
I saw how big he was. I don’t think I could survive losing my virginity to him. If it’s true that Aurelians go mad with the scent of a virgin, then I need to escape before tonight…
Because otherwise, they might pick me.
The moans of ecstasy keep replaying in my mind as we go up another set of stairs. It’s getting more humid the higher we climb. This hallway has rows of doors. The Bullfrog scans his smartwatch against the first. “You two. In!’ he barks at the two women at the front. They go in, and the doors hiss shut after them.
He scans his watch, automatically opening the next sliding doors, and he glances at Kay and me, not wasting words. His curved, sharp teeth gleam, and I see a hint of green flesh between them that makes my stomach roil. He swallows the last piece of the Toad and burps, a wave of meaty gas pouring from his gut.
We go in without complaint, eager to be as far away from him as possible. Even though I’m trapped, when the door shuts closed behind me, I feel a hint of relief.
It’s a dorm-style room with two beds and mattresses that are so thin I know I’ll feel the metal bedframes underneath them. They’re just big enough for a human, but there’s no way an Aurelian would fit. They must have a big bed in their place…
But no matter how big it is, you’d feel tiny sandwiched between the three alien warriors of a triad.
The window is small and barred. Kay wastes no time. She rushes to it, looking out. “We’re high enough to see over the walls. I recognize that monument. We’re on Quazar 42, in one of Lord Reedok’s estates.” She turns to me, her face grim. “We’re going to have to steal a ship that can Orb-Shift. It’s our only way out.”
“Gods,” I whisper, and all thoughts of the Aurelians disappear from my mind.
Orb-Shifting used to be the way to travel. You could go vast distances in an instant. Only Aurelians are insane enough to do it anymore.
You’d need a death wish to risk it. Nearly half the people who try it never come back. When the Aurelian Fanatics separated from the Aurelian Empire, the footage was broadcasted over the universe. I saw a huge warship split in half as only part of it managed to Orb-Shift. I don’t know who was more unlucky, the ones left behind who burnt up in the atmosphere of Colossus…
Or the ones who disappeared, gone forever in some place I don’t understand and never want to experience.
“Hey!” Kay snaps her fingers, getting my attention. I drifted off in terrified thought, my brain still so slow. “It’s either that or be stuck here. You want to be a prize like that woman shrieking? Or do you want to get out?”
“I want to get out. But if there’s any other way…”
“I’ll look for one. But that ship that took off next to us when we landed? Orb-Shift capable. That means others will come and go. We only need to make it the hundred yards to the landing bay and get a ship. Then we can get out of here.”
She makes it sound so easy. I didn’t see too many guards, but there could be snipers on the rooftops, just waiting for someone to run.
I realize I’m sitting on the bed. I can’t even remember slumping down. I’m so tired. Kay is rummaging around the room. There’s a dresser drawer, a small table, and a door leading to a bathroom, but that’s it. She opens a drawer, pulling out clothes. Good—at least we’re going to have fresh things to change into. That sounds good to me, after a nice long shower where I can try to forget what’s happening to me.
“Fuck. No. No way you’re getting me into this,” Kay says, holding up a dress so sheer you could see yourself through it. It almost looks like an Aurelian pleasure dress, but there’s no way a Toad would waste his credits on that. I’d looked at the prices once. If I worked for three years as a front desk agent and saved every penny, I still couldn’t afford one.
It’s the last words I hear before I nod off.