Mission: Harbeasts of Mars

by V. A. Jeffrey

  “All done,” he said, sounding chipper and bright. One of the guards unlocked the chain cuffs from my wrists and threw the chains aside. Chains. How barbaric! I wanted to smash their faces in. They then took me down corridors until we came upon a cell block filled with even larger cage-like rooms, or as they were called by the employees here, cells.

  On both sides of me were tall columns of metal bars and I could see other humanoid-looking people or creatures, locked inside. I was put inside one of these cells. To my front were a thin row of strong metal bars. The attendant in the white coat looked up to the ceiling somewhere above us and said: “I'm through. I have samples from all of the new specimens.” A section of the bars lifted up and the guards followed him out. The bars then closed again firmly into the ground. I crept over to the front bars of my new room and reached out to touch them. I could feel the faint hum of energy there. I pulled my hand back and sat down, wondering what new devilries awaited me.

  7

  I sat on the hard floor, in shock at my current predicament. I'd gone from one nasty situation to another. I wondered what the manner of my death would be like.

  “So, why are you here?” Came a voice that startled me from the next cell over to my right.

  “I don't know,” I finally said. I heard mirthless laughter.

  “I guess I should rephrase the question then. How did you get here? Was it the old Shanghai trick at a dynashan or did he catch you out in the desert?”

  “Shanghai? People still do that kind of stuff?”

  “Most certainly,” said another voice in the cell room to my left. “Especially out here and in Syzygy.”

  “Well,” I said, stunned but glad for someone to talk to, “I was. . .rescued by him from someone else who really did Shanghai me from Terra Station.” I heard chuckling from several people.

  “Ah. Terra Station. Well known for devious dealings toward hapless wayfarers,” said the first voice.

  Right. I thought bitterly. It was always an amazing thing to me that what was 'well known' after the fact was really only known to a few, and this by design.

  “I might add that my would-be killer rescued me earlier from two harbeasts who were hunting me down,” I said.

  “Well, Lafayette's got you now,” said the first one. “And in case you're wondering, you’re no longer a human being with thoughts and feelings of your own. You are now officially, a specimen.” I was afraid of the answer to my next question, but I never got anywhere without finding out what kind of odds I was up against.

  “What's going to happen to me?” I asked.

  “What's going to happen to you will be the same things that happen to us. Experiments. And more experiments. And then eventually, death. That's what happens here,” he said as-matter-factually.

  “Yes,” chimed in the other, “Once you come here, you are a specimen, not a human being or an Eruatian. They harvest our genetic material for different. . . projects, I'd suppose you'd call them. Cells of various types, depending on what they plan to engineer. Skin, organ harvesting, blood, also bone marrow. That last one, in particular, is important and valuable. Unless you're sickly like me. Then you're fast-tracked to an early death.” I felt my stomach turn, but this was no time to panic or despair.

  “How long have you guys been here?”

  “Not long,” said the first one. “I've been here maybe a year and a half. My friend there on the other side of you, two years.”

  “How long are people kept around before. . .”

  “You mean before we're forced to 'give up the ghost', literally, as they say on Earth? About two and a half years. My friend there is reaching the end of his natural usefulness, aren't you, Giren?” He laughed grimly. The other sighed.

  “I only hope that I made some important contributions to science before I'm vivisected and harvested for everything I'm worth,” he said in mock reverence. I blanched and struggled to recover my composure after hearing that dreaded 'V' word! Please God, do something to help me, please! If I must die, don't let me go out like that! I sensed that even though they made light of our predicament, they had taken a fatalistic view. They were resigned to their fates. I wondered what experiences they had been put through to have the spirit beaten out of them so, and shuddered inwardly.

  “Watch out for the red door there, in the front to the left of the containment cells. Once specimens are taken through that door, they never come back,” warned the first one. I wondered what in the world I would do if that happened. It wasn't as if any of us had any choice here. But I supposed that was the only agency he had in here – to warn of impending doom. I looked ahead at the hall outside our containment cells. To the front, above us was a guard shack. To the left, as he said, was a wide, red door and to the right, a blue door.

  “What's behind the blue door?”

  “That leads to the labs, the gymnasium, showers and the cafeteria. All the places needed for mundane living and torture,” said the one named Giren.

  The two people I was talking to, now that I could settle my mind, were very human-like at first glance. On closer inspection, I saw that they, like another I'd met in Syzygy, Linaya, were half human and half alien people. But I could perceive that they had been twisted genetically. The one called Giren was a man with rotted, deformed looking wings of different colors. He had four arm appendages and four wing appendages instead of only two, but the second pair of arms were deformed as well, too small to be useful and he had what looked like scabbed-over sores all over his skin. The other was a bullfrog of a man with tentacles sprouting from his face. He was heavy set and looked like an obese human male, except for the tentacles and what I thought I saw under his thin coveralls were small gills. He also had a great, white beard. When he shifted position to get more comfortable I saw that his skin in localized parts under his body seemed to be luminescent. He wheezed lightly as if he had difficulties breathing.

  I looked around at the brutalist metal, plexi-glass and stone building that was now my new home. I wanted to weep, but my own stubbornness and seething outrage prevented me from doing so. I'd gotten out of bad fixes before, I was going to find a way to get out of this one. I just had to figure out how.

  And it looked hopeless.

  . . .

  My days, so far about three, were filled with what seemed to be a prison regiment. Only the blue door opened each time, for which I was very relieved. There were plenty of other human and alien specimens on the cell block. I could hear their voices echoing farther down the hall, but I couldn't talk to or see them. Everyone dreaded the day when the red door would open and anyone of us would be taken.

  We were given two meals a day and while the food was decent and there was enough of it, it wasn't a feast, nor was it very interesting. We were given time to move about in a semi-open air gymnasium for one hour a day, or at least this was true for those not encumbered by injuries received from the experiments. I got a chance to look at everything and I tried to make note of where all the guards were stationed, where all exits and windows were, how high, etc.

  I become acquainted with my new prison mates who were helpful and friendly to me, probably out of pity for my naivete. The half Miku was named Kiernan and the other was Giren.

  I was walking along with Kiernan, who had to walk with a staff given to him by a guard whenever it was time for our exercise for the day. I noticed that one particular guard would hand him his loaned staff and I was surprised he was allowed to have it. This particular security guard's was named Thomas and he wasn't mean like the others. Kiernan would thank Thomas each time it was time to go for our walks in the gymnasium. It was taken from him when our little one-hour jaunts ended and we were sent back to our cells. Lots of space, clean, soaring walls and columns and vast windows, some of which were open, described the gymnasium we were in. I studied the walls, the columns, the windows, wondering how I could eventually make an imminent escape. Burly guards stood at one hundred feet intervals around the gymnasium bearing laser rifles. Secur
ity mechs patrolled the property just outside the building perimeter. Outside I saw special labor mechs going about their tasks, helping the much larger ones with unloading cargo, cleaning cells, animal cages or helping guards to subdue some of the more savage animals.

  “So, when are they going to take me into the lab for experiments?” I asked Kiernan. He sighed.

  “Do not strive after death, my friend. It will come, in time. Sooner than you think. It could be when they have some work they need to be done or some new project they've launched. Bone marrow tissue engineering is the largest research project being carried out here. A lot of underhanded money involved in it,” he said, lowering his voice.

  “I can only imagine,” I said. He turned and gave me a sly look. “Don't speak too loudly. The security goons don't like for us to talk together for too long. It encourages rebellion, they say.”

  “Seems like they've got everything covered around here,” I said dryly. “Speaking of marrow, have you ever seen a person in the throes of marrow. . .uh, withdrawal?” I asked. He gave me a sidelong look.

  “You mean drashai?” I sensed a new vocabulary lesson coming on.

  “What's that?”

  “A, how do you say it? A syndrome that some Erautians develop. Yes, it comes from a long, steady habit of consuming the bone marrow of higher order beings. Doesn't happen from consuming animal bone marrow. Those who suffer from drashai deserve their evil fate.”

  “The human bone marrow trade is growing in Syzygy.”

  “Is it? I suppose I should have known. Honestly, the bone marrow of humans has properties it is claimed by some that help induce or enhance certain powerful abilities. It is all related to pure-blood supremacy and other ancient ideas some Erautians are obsessed with dredging up.”

  “Are you. . Erautian, Kiernan?” I wasn't sure, to be honest. He scratched his beard.

  “No, but my father was. Would you believe me if I told you that genetically, I was born Suwudi?” My face must have betrayed my shock. He smiled and nodded.

  “Yes, yes. The powers that be at Triskelion decided that it would be amusing to try and turn me into a Miku. They failed. They made an odd zukzuzu instead.”

  “And what is-”

  “Monster,” he quickly answered.

  This bone marrow issue got me thinking about certain cultures in ancient human history. In fact, quite a few human societies had developed the concept of consuming or eating the organs or other body parts of powerful animals or even enemy warriors, sometimes thought to be spirits that had great powers or magical properties, and these powers would be imbued upon those that consumed the flesh. It seemed a similar concept at its most basic premise.

  However, though human bone marrow contained fascinating natural elements and properties, enhancing magical woo-woo powers I was sure wasn't one of them. Furat probably would have disagreed.

  “So do they perform regular health check-ups?”

  “If you seem healthy and strong, yes. Sickly like me? They eventually take you through the red door. One can only guess what happens after that. My theory is that they harvest you for all they can get and throw your remains out to the carnivores they keep here.”

  “You've seen this happen?”

  “Not directly, but I've heard evidence of those who were once walking, talking specimens with sharp, quick minds and failing bodies one day were then made useful as meals for the animal specimens in here the next day.” He gave me a droll look. “Guards talk, you know, and regrettably, they aren't particularly sensitive to our situations. Except maybe our dear Thomas, one of the few decent ones around here.” Perhaps I could learn a thing or two on how this place was laid out since the guards were so talkative.

  “Are there snagars here at the lab?” I asked. He gave me a questioning look.

  “What do you know of snagars?”

  “I've heard about them. I've heard they were the progenitor animals, or one of them, used to engineer these harbeasts. I was also scheduled to be ripped apart by someone's pet snagars for crossing him.” I said. He looked very surprised.

  “I haven't seen a snagar around here since. . .well . . .I don't know, really. It's been many years. There used to be some genetically engineered snagars out in the Martian wild. I think most were captured, hunted or just died out. A sick population, perhaps.”

  “Only just crash landed here and hunted to extinction already,” I said.

  “I wouldn't give them a pity party. They are vicious creatures. And not just when they're hungry. Snagars take delight in cruelty for its own sake.”

  “These animals can think?”

  “Not necessarily like you or me, but they are very intelligent.”

  “What else goes on here?”

  “Well,” he said as if getting ready to reveal some top secret information. His quick eyes darted around the gymnasium at the guards, “there are things we hear about. Of course, they don't talk about what goes on much outside of the labs but once I overheard two researchers talking about something called The Game, and that they needed healthy players. I'll never forget it and I've only told Giren and now you. I was under anesthesia at the time but not fully and I could feel them operating on me while carrying on a conversation. They said something about Dr. Lafayette wanting more interesting specimens for,” he signed dramatically, “The Game, or whatever it is.”

  “And what is The Game?”

  “I'm not sure. Whatever it is, I imagine it's deadly.” A game. I wondered if that's what lay behind the red door. As if reading my mind Kiernan went on.

  “All sorts of things lie behind the red door, my friend. Not just The Game. Dr. Lafayette's friends are the type who are players of games.”

  “I don't understand.”

  “That's the end game from where no one returns, the red door. There are. . .little games they play also. You'll see soon enough. But the red door? That is the way to the grave.”

  “No talking! Hey!” Shouted one of the guards, who looked more like a cave-dwelling brute. He strode toward us.

  “I was just asking about meal times,” I said, trying to sound meek. He struck me full in the face with his fist and then struck me again several times with his baton when I fell to the ground.

  “Shut up! When I say no talking, I mean it, specimen!” You are a slug, sir. I thought. You creep upon the ground! I wonder how much they're paying you. I wondered if they engineered him to look this ugly on purpose too. He slapped at a comlink mounted on his arm and sent for back up and I was roughly handled by them and sent back to my cell.

  “You! Don't come here and start trouble!” The first guard warned me. The others laughed.

  “He won't be here long enough for that,” said one of them.

  “What does that mean?” I demanded. He struck me down again, grinning. I felt my old aches and injuries cry out through my frazzled nerve endings. One of them kicked me.

  “Watch your mouth, specimen!” They forced me back into my cell.

  “Hey!” Shouted another guard, approaching. It was Thomas. He was with a young man who was not dressed like a guard at all. “You guys had better hope you didn't break any bones or cause any serious injury to this man!” He warned, breaking into a run towards my cell.

  “What's it to you, Thomas?” Said Neanderthal Man in irritation.

  “Lafayette.” That seemed to have cooled the goons down.

  “Thomas is correct. We've just come from Lafayette's office. Watch how you handle this particular specimen, gentlemen. Dr. Lafayette would be very displeased if he was badly injured,” said a soft, cultured voice. The voice belonged to the slim young man with Thomas. He was dressed in a light green and gold calfskin suede leisure suit and a gold earring in his ear. His hair was artfully arranged in neat waves of light brown curls and he smelled of light incense and he had blue eyes.

  “Sorry, sir. We were just letting him know the rules around here. Seems like he wanted to make trouble.”

  “No, no trouble,” I said defian
tly, spitting out a mouthful of blood.

  “You've been trained to handle disorderly specimens in a specific way. Especially valued ones. You are expected to act in accordance with your training,” he said curtly, and then he turned to me, appraising me haughtily.

  “You may go,” he said to them without so much as a glance, his voice filled with disdain. The four dumb louts locked my cell door, one of them throwing the young man a dark look, before turning and leaving. Thomas turned and went to the guard shack.

  “Who are you?” I asked.

  “You're a bold one. You ask too many questions for your own good, Robert.”

  “You know my name?”

  “Some of us have heard about how you helped defeat the remnants of the Realm on Europa. I would like to see you remain alive, so be careful what you say and do around here,” he said, turning to leave. He turned back around again, “if only to see how strong your constitution is.” He smirked and then he left. I was mystified. Who was he, in all of this? Was he just toying with me?

  I made a mental note of this incident and what it could tell me, and also of the new information I'd learned from Kiernan and how all of this might fit into a bigger picture of this place. This man didn't seem to care much for the goons around here and they didn't seem fond of him either. I sat down, all alone in my cell, turning over this new incident in my mind over and over, until the other specimens were herded back in for the day.