Gentle Beast

by Margaret Afseth

  All Althea wanted to do was get out of there, but the way was blocked behind by the two who had forced them out of the cell, and the way ahead, though it lead away in three directions, each was equally fortified by giant Rottweilers. There was nowhere to go.

  At the convergence of the four-way passage sat another small-breed dog. As each human passed, he sniffed the air and declared in a confident voice his verdict.

  A skinny older woman came even with him.

  “Worker,” it decided, and the others pushed her toward the middle passage.

  A plump short man with white hair came next. “Meat!” And he was pushed to the entrance through which the child had been taken.

  Althea began to tremble visibly, as the meaning of the terms hit home.

  The young girl just ahead of the boy and the man, who had forced their way ahead of Althea, came even with the bloodhound.

  “Breeder.” Wailing, she was shooed to the left, to stand in a row of girls already winding away out of sight.

  The young boyfriend came abreast of the creature. “Stud!”

  Althea shivered.

  Are we like mere cattle to these things?

  The older man was next. “Worker!”

  It was Althea’s turn. The bloodhound sniffed, sniffed again. She held her breath. She was older; by this time, Althea knew the pattern. She was either worker or meat.

  “Breeder!”

  A sentry nearby growled. “That’s no breeder,” it challenged. “It’s too old.”

  “She smells fertile! Can you not whiff the hormone?”

  The other stepped forward, sniffed at Althea, and stepped back puzzled. “Looks too old, but does seem breeder.”

  Althea stood stunned.

  I've not had a period for ten years. What do they smell?

  “Move it!” the guard from back by the cell growled. He’d come up behind, his bark causing Althea’s heart to jump frantically in her chest. “Move along!”

  Because they were nearing the end of those who had come from the cages, all had gathered round these last to be processed.

  “It most likely does not understand,” defended one of the other guards.

  “Yes, it does!” declared the larger one. “It should! I have my throat translator on just like you. Move along, you stupid animal. That line!”

  It pointed to the left passage, and finally Althea came to her senses. Fleeing to join the younger women, she was just relieved and thankful that she had not been declared ‘meat’.

  ****

  This new line moved quickly forward, and around another bend, finally spilling everyone into a large room.

  Again a smaller dog manned this station. Obviously a female, she wore no shorts as had the males behind, and her gender was apparent.

  She sounded like a barking excited Shihtzu when she shouted at them. “Strip! Strip! Only two garments to keep; the rest go in the chute!”

  Althea only had two pieces. She was still wearing her pyjamas.

  But like the rest, she shed her clothing, clutching them in front of her to hide her embarrassment.

  “Put on the benches!” they were ordered next. “Leave! Leave! Into the next room, naked!”

  Oh, golly. What next?

  When all the women had descended into the lower chamber, the door slid shut with an ominous bang, sealing them in.

  For a moment, nothing happened.

  Then from every direction, boiling hot water came out of tiny jets, ceiling, walls and floor. There was no escaping them.

  And it was not enough to simply scald them; the liquid also contained some sort of disinfectant that made the eyes sting and weep, and caused uncontrolled fits of coughing, if it was breathed in.

  The screams and desperate dancing of naked bodies continued until the flow abruptly stopped again. It had only been ten minutes, but to each, it seemed an eternity.

  And then, the blowing air came to dry them, frigidly cold.

  The outer door finally slid open again. They did not need to be told to vacate the room. Shivering; with blistered skin and teeth chattering, they fled back to find their clothes.

  And in the ordeal Althea realized: sometime during her capture, she had not merely lost her valued freedom, but she was missing an essential for survival: her false teeth. Without them food would be more curse than benefit.

  ****

  From there they were placed in another holding cell, and yes, fed. The brown gruel was course, consisting of large, tough chunks of half-raw meat, and hard uncooked granules of some sort of grain. A milky substance held it together, and apparently they were expected to eat with their hands, or slurp it up with tongues. The moment Althea tasted it, she gagged, for it was exceedingly bitter, slimy, and rancid, as if it had been kept day after day until it should all be used. Even if she’d had her imitation teeth, she would not have been able to stomach the meal.

  CHAPTER 6

  “Oh, crap!” hissed an exceedingly pregnant middle-aged woman, as Althea and the young teen that had been taken with her were brought to the new cage. “Don’t put them in with me.”

  “Move back, bitch!” growled the Dog that held Althea by the arm.

  “Don’t put her in here! There are other cages. Can’t you wait until this one is empty? I’m the last one; I was next to go to comfort care. Now, I’ll have to wait ‘till these two are bred, before I’m taken. Double, double hell!”

  “What’s got this female in such a dither?” the second guard wondered. “You’d think we were threatening her.”

  “Beats me. Can’t understand their yowling when they’re not fitted with a translator,” his companion answered.

  “They should fit them with one as soon as they arrive instead of only when they reach comfort care.”

  “Back! Get back, or I’ll hit you! Do you hear?”

  “This one is called Lana,” offered the other. “Maybe if you use her name, she’ll be less aggressive? Try a little gentleness; they get miserable when they’re near term.”

  “Nice Lana. Move back now; we don’t want to hurt you.”

  “Like hell you don’t,” growled Lana, in a softer tone, sounding much like a dog herself, but she did move to let them in.

  “See, it’s all in the way you treat them.”

  The first barked a laugh, as he slid the gate closed.

  Lana turned with a snarl toward Althea.

  “They’re going to fight,” warned the second guard.

  “Aock! Leave them be; they’ll get used to each other. They do this all the time. We got better things to do than police them. Still got the others to deal with.”

  As their voices receded, the hostile Lana demanded: “Man! How old are you hag?”

  “I’m not a hag…”

  “They’ll never breed you; even an old stud would find you ugly. What is your age, anyway?”

  “I’m only sixty…”

  Lana laughed, with long drawn out and raucous mirth. When she finally caught her breath again, she stated the obvious. “They’ll never get nothing from you. And,” she added. “Now I’m stuck here until the two of you are carrying. Which will be never…forever.”

  “Damn! Damn!” she mumbled, as she moved away to a corner by herself. “Got to do something about that.”

  ****

  “I need to go pee!” declared the young teen, dancing in place. “Where do we go?”

  “Over in the corner.” Lana pointed.

  “In what?”

  “You pull back the metal floor, and go through the bars.”

  “There are people down there,” the girl objected, as she followed the instructions.

  “So what. They’re just meat.”

  As she did her business, the teen thanked Lana, then told her name. “I’m Beth.”

  “Don’t care who you are. We’re not friends.”

  Beth came back and sat with Althea near the barred cage door, as much for comfort as to get away from Lana.

  “What do they mean by ‘meat�
��?” hesitantly whispered Beth, after a time.

  Lana heard her, but answered in a roundabout way.

  “Guess what they do with the fetus?” She didn’t wait for an answer, simply carried on. “We’re just cattle to them. Like cows. This thing inside me will be eaten; it’s a delicacy to the Roog. They’ll cook it on a slow boil, simmer it in my own milk, then when they eat it, they’ll break off an arm, and slurp off the meat…”

  Althea’s mind rebelled; Beth gagged and leaned forward.

  “If you’re going to puke, do it in the corner,” Lana said coldly. “Don’t need your stink to make me upchuck too.”

  Beth made for the corner, where she became violently ill. Althea found it hard to keep her own churning stomach at bay, but then there was nothing in it at the moment.

  ****

  An hour later they came with food.

  “Yummm! I’m starving!” Lana proclaimed, joining them at the bars.

  “Move back, little humans. Back, back, or I can’t get it through to you.”

  They moved back a few steps, as bowls of the brown gruel was past through a space near the floor on the sliding door. Lana grabbed at hers, and headed away with it to her space in the corner.

  “Better give them fruit, too,” ordered a second small female dog. “The one is pregnant, in final stage. She should have been in comfort care by now.”

  A small basket of apples, oranges and bananas was passed through along with the gruel, and their attendants moved off out of sight to the cages beyond.

  “Leave me the apples,” Lana snarled. “You can have the bananas, they make me sick; the oranges too. I hate citrus!”

  Althea approached the large dish, took a banana and an orange. Beth took the gruel. Althea left her bowl by the bars.

  “If you’re not going to eat that,” Lana said casually. “I’ll have it.”

  “Be my guest,” Althea agreed.

  Peeling her orange first, Althea sucked at the juice. Even if she couldn’t chew it, the moisture and vitamin D would fortify her. She swallowed most of the wedges whole; hoping her system would digest that bulk, giving her fibre. Then she started on the banana.

  This was her first real food, and it tasted heavenly.

  As they were eating, Lana chose to discourse. “You know what kind of meat is in the stew? It’s the old ones; Roog don’t like tough meat. They grind them up and feed it to us; sometimes the kitchen workers are too lazy, so they just chop them into pieces and put it to boil. The bottom burns, but the top never gets cooked. You’re eating human…Beth.”

  Beth stopped with a fistful half to her mouth, the bowl went flying and the girl headed to the corner.

  “Oh, gee. Look what you’ve done now. I could have had that bowl too.”

  Althea gagged on her banana.

  “You going to bring up, too?” Lana challenged. “This place is going to reek!”

  Althea wasn’t about to give her that pleasure. She swallowed slowly, near choking on the slippery mash as it went down; she held her breath until the gag reflex stopped, breathed out a sigh, and took another bite.

  Lana giggled, and went for the second bowl on the floor by the bars.

  CHAPTER 7

  Bom wanted a special one for next time. He was almost finished with the one he had now. He strode the corridors with his prison supervisor at his side.

  As they past the tunnel that led to the breeding pens, he stopped. “Let’s try down this way?”

  “But sir, those are the holding pens for impregnation. Surely you don’t want to take one of the valuable stock for mere consumption? Think of all the young you will forfeit.”

  “Is it not my installation, my livestock to do with as I please? I set this up! Haven’t I kept my fellow canine well supplied with food?”

  The other made no comment, knowing his chief held the lives of all in his hands. He dare not disagree, or he would end up in the entertainment cycle awaiting torture.

  “We go this way!” Bom ordered forcefully, tolerating no argument.

  Again they paced along cages filled with humans, but this time only females looked back at them.

  The studs were kept apart, in another area of the compound, well fed so they would always be virile, their stamina kept at peak, until they were needed.

  Perhaps I should choose a male? But no, too much lost if I pick one of those. One stud can produce thousands.

  Surely, there is some delectable morsel among these breeders that can give me a challenge, before I gut and feast on her live struggling carcass.

  His mouth began to salivate at the very thought.

  “I like to play with my food,” Bom stated. “It’s the cat blood mix in me.”

  “Breeders aren’t very quick,” the other dared to offer.

  “Yes. Some. But they taste better, and fight back. I like that.”

  He stopped at the bars of a cell; something had caught his eye as they were passing.

  Did I see a flash of red?

  This cell held a pregnant one. “Don’t want one that’s carrying,” Bom said aloud.

  His eyes roved over the other two cuddled together against the gate bars; the one was a mere adolescent, just into puberty. But the other…he could tell from her condition, she was a fighter!

  ****

  Althea wanted to slide away and hide, under the scrutiny of the formidable beasts peering in at them. The larger one especially was an unusual anomaly.

  As he knelt down to her level, he pressed a fingered paw to a small oval medallion on the band around his neck.

  Is that the throat translator they talked about? They are each wearing one.

  The male’s face came into close proximity to the bars; his eyes level with hers, his breath rancid, smelling like bad meat. His head was that of a bulldog, droopy ears folded back against the black head, brown-tan muzzle, the thin dark lips pulled back to reveal viciously long canine teeth on either side; an attempt at a smile that had resulted in a fierce grimace instead.

  Althea shuddered.

  Next a hairy paw-like hand inched through the bars, catching one of her legs quickly. Althea tried to draw away with no success. Her foot was held firmly with incredible strength.

  “Red toes,” the creature stated in a soft whisper.

  In shock, Althea’s eyes tracked to her feet. She had forgotten; for the fun of it she had polished her toenails a brilliant red. Her coloured toes had always been hidden from the eyes of others, her one indulgence, but now because her feet were bare, they were exposed for all to see.

  “I like red toes. Pretty red toes.”

  He released her foot, and quietly stood to his full height.

  At least eight feet of muscled formidable giant, he had long shaggy black fur, and a matted bushy tail like a cat. He waved that appendage with a nervous twitch as if ready to pounce, stood there thinking.

  Is this a canine or feline? He appears to be of both species. Is that even possible? If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I would have never believed it.

  The reeking giant turned to his comrade. “I will have Red Toes! Keep her here until I come back. Do not breed her; I don’t want the inside beast slowing her down, it’ll make her too emotional and weak. This one is mine! Do you hear?”

  Then he strode away purposefully. The other stood a second, then turned and went the opposite direction.

  Silence reigned for a moment; then Lana spoke.

  “You know who that was?” She chuckled. “You got the attention of the owner of this grand hotel. They call him Bom. He’s a crossbreed, between a dog and a cat, and oh… will he have fun with you!”

  Althea shivered.

  “But that still leaves you in here with me. Now I’ll never get in comfort care,” Lana added bitterly.

  ****

  Loki was tending to a dog guard who had challenged another for his prize. The two had fought, inflicting deep slashes and gouging bites upon each other. Which one had won out the physician didn’t know, but he woul
d treat them both equally.

  They just better not pick up the fight in this med bay!

  Bom pushed open the double doors to the bay, striding in with a gait that told everyone, he was pleased about something. All heads turned his way expecting reprimand, then turned away relieved at his amendable manner.

  “Your attention, please!” Bom bellowed. “I am making a new ruling.” When all eyes had turned his way again, he dropped a most unexpected bombshell. “I have noted the inmates serving in this facility work harder than most, with little perks. Today, I feel benevolent. For your good behaviour, you may each pick a human pet for your pleasure. It may be chosen from the kitchen workers, and will live with you in your compartment. You will feed it from your rations, and may train it to help you. But…when you are discharged, it remains behind, and is to be returned from whence you took it.”

  Bom turned to Loki specifically. “That means you too, Noor.”

  Loki scowled.

  Humans aren’t pets! They are intelligent creatures!

  “I mean it Noor! I’ll be watching to see if you obey. I’ll give you time to make your choice. I realize you are kept quite busy.”

  Then he turned once more to the group in general. “And make sure you tat them, so we can tell which belong to you, or they might just get eaten by mistake.”

  Chuckling hilariously at his own joke, Bom advanced with purposeful gait to the exit opposite that by which he had entered. The doors swung shut soundlessly behind him, whooshing at the air as if giving a fond wave in farewell.

  CHAPTER 8

  Beth was awakened by Lana’s panting. When she muffled a scream in grunting discomfort, the young girl wondered why the woman hadn’t moved to the corner latrine area to take her dump.

  The young teen could just make out the older lady, Althea, still near the bars, as she lay dead to her surroundings, curled in on herself for warmth. Beth had gone to the bathroom in the night, but had been too sleepy to crawl back to the comfort of the elder, had fallen asleep closer to Lana.