Page 6 of Anna's Bounty
“The rest of the cages are empty,” the blue female says, her voice rich and throaty, her words oddly accented as she and the gray male walk away.
They didn’t notice me.
I’m not sure if I’m happy about that or not. I’m not thrilled to learn I’m trapped between two wanted felons. What did they do to receive warrants? Maybe I don’t want to know.
A cacophony of voices echoes from somewhere deep inside the ship.
I wish I knew what was happening. Are we being saved? Keeping the warranted aliens caged definitely puts a tick in thegood-guybox. Or has someone worse than the mantis-aliens taken over the ship?
Another roar, this one twice as loud as the last, shakes the walls around me, and I cover my ears, squeezing my eyes shut.
Please, please, please. Let them be good guys.
The shouting grows louder, and soon the group is crowding back into the cargo bay. They gather around my cage, and when they finally spread out, I’m surprised to see the three mantis-aliens locked in one of the empty cages across from me. Their pristine metallic robes are filthy and torn in places, and they look pretty beat up themselves.
Good! Serves them right.
A shrill whistle cuts through the sounds of celebration. “Your attention!” A loud voice carries over the crowd, and everyone stops talking at once.
I have to crane my neck to see who’s speaking, and I’m surprised it’s the monkey, who is perched on the lizard alien’s shoulder. Who the hell are these guys? How did I end up in a comic book movie?
“We thank you for your help in capturing the Xar’ads,” the monkey says to the gathered crowd’s jubilant cry. “To show our appreciation, we promise to escort you to the nearest station where you can procure travel back to your home planets. On the Xar’ad’s coin, of course.” He says this with a wink and a devilish grin full of sharp teeth.
A final roar goes up, followed by stomping and war cries. When the monkey climbs down from his perch, the room slowly clears out, leaving me sandwiched between the two felons and now the mantis-aliens across from me.
Part of me wants to rush the bars and sneer at them. To shout,“Serves you right, motherfuckers!”But I don’t. I just sit, huddled in the back of my cage, glaring daggers at them.
In fact, I’m so fixated on glaring at them, I don’t realize I’m being watched as well. Not until a deep voice shouts, “Igid!” It causes me to jump and my eyes to fly to where the gray alien is standing to the side of my cage with his heavily muscled arms folded across his muscular chest. His thick brows are dropped low over his narrow eyes, and he’s staring right at me.
“What is it, Rovos?” the blue female he called Igid huffs, appearing at his side.
“You missed one,” he tells her, motioning to me with his chin.
“What are you talking about?” Igid’s face scrunches up, and she pulls her device from her pocket. Pushing buttons, she scans it over my cage, and I watch as it lights up red. “Two warrants, just as before.”
Without taking his eyes off me, the gray alien—Rovos—shakes his head. “Not those. The one in the middle.”
Igid scans my cage again and makes an irritated noise. “There’s nothing in the middle.”
He finally takes his eyes from me to look down at the blue female. “Use your eyes. She’s huddled in the back.”
Igid looks up from her device and squints into the dimness of my cage. “Oh.” Her enormous eyes pop open in surprise. She frowns at her device and then back at me. Sliding the device back into a pocket, she takes a step closer to my cage. “I see her now. But why doesn’t the scanner pick her up?”
Rovos shrugs, keeping his inhuman eyes focused on me. He’s well over six feet, with a face that is more or less humanoid. His bright eyes angle up at the corners, giving him a feline look. His nose is flatter than a human’s, and his mouth is wide with full lips pressed into a thin line.
Despite the strangeness of him, I don’t find him unattractive—I meanfrightening!… I don’t find him frightening.
“Come here.” Igid gestures at me through the bars, and I notice she only has four long fingers on each hand, delicately boned and tipped with sharp claws.
My eyes dart nervously to either side of my cage, where my neighbors are quietly watching, and I shake my head, preferring not to flash my naked bits at the alien strangers.
“Suit yourself, then,” Igid says with a nonchalant shrug before turning back to Rovos. “I’m going to help Treto and Sone get everyone settled. I’ll meet you back on theShade.”
Rovos grunts, still not taking his eyes from me as Igid strides away. The weight of his gaze has me just about to shout at him tostop staring, but then he steps forward so that he’s standing in front of the bars.
“Come here, female,” he says to me in a deep voice filled with rumbly undertones.
Just to make sure it’s really me he’s talking to, I glance at either side of my cage.
