by Zara Zenia
"Don't do it. Please... I can't stand it."
He licked his lips and a devious smile spread across his face, a predator ready to eat its meager pray. All I could do was close my eyes and think about everything I loved, about the people I wished I could be with and about the world outside. There was such a beautiful world out there with plants, trees, and animals. There were families out there who loved each other, friends who laughed in each other's company. There were endless treasures and mysteries, a million things to be seen, touched and learned. There was so much out there but I would never see it. I would live out my days down there in the mine until I died like everyone else I loved.
My mother... I always thought about her in the darkest moments. She looked so radiant in her final act of defiance, pulling us all together as she told us:
"Now is the day we escape. We are no longer to be water miners. From this day forward we are to be human."
I was so small and confused. Looking up to my two big sisters, Lucy and Sadie, I saw they were crying and shaking, clinging onto my mother's skirt as they wailed.
"Why must we go?"
"It's too dangerous out there!"
"No one escapes unless they're in a coffin."
I didn't understand what was happening but I could feel the tension in the air. The whole time my mother told us the plan, my father was watching stone-faced with his lips pulled tight into a line and his hat hanging from his fingers in front of him. He didn't look as convinced as she did but she was a determined lady and insisted that we put her plan into action.
"When the moon shines and the stars are bright then we know it is our time. The masters switch shifts at the darkest hour. That is when we must run. There won't be long, just a few seconds but it should be enough time for us to reach that fence over there."
She pointed out past the cavern entrance to where a fence stood.
"Your father and I, we have been digging covertly, shifting the earth beneath the fence so that we will be able to burrow beneath it."
I remember saying:
"Can't we wait until The Contract is up?"
The Contract was what bonded us to the mine and to the masters. To the outside world it meant little more than a sheet of paper on which we scribbled our names, but in the mine, it was far more insidious. Only the most desperate people signed The Contract and usually did so when their lives were in peril and they had nowhere else to go. That is what my parents had done before we were all born. It was so much more than just a document. It was a symbol of eternal suffering. The Contract never ended, not unless you did.
"Girls," my mother said as she took turns kissing our emaciated faces. "You are to be brave little tinkers tonight. We will only have one chance."
"Marianne," my father interrupted. "Are you sure it will work? I have seen what the masters have done to those who have tried to escape. The bloodshed, Marianne... I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy let alone my own children."
He reached a hand out toward us.
"I will not live in this cavern another day," she said as she stood up and gripped his hand. "Our children deserve so much better."
He looked terrified and desperately uncertain but nodded nonetheless.
"Ok... It is your wish."
The day passed slowly as we waited for the masters to change shifts. My parents argued throughout the day.
"You will kill us all!" my dad had insisted.
"Stop being so wet and weak," she's replied. "You will take back your words when I have saved us all from a life of slavery."
At last, the time came when we were to make our move. The other miners were consumed by their work, trudging up and down the ramp with barrel after barrel. Even we little ones shifted the barrels of water with the three of us struggling to keep hold each one.
"Pssst... We must move. Stay close to one another," our mom cautioned.
My sisters and I had glanced at each other in a panic.
"Grip hold of each other's skirts," Mom had ordered. "And stay close behind me and your father."
From outside the cavern, we could hear a distant bell, the one that signaled the end of one shift and the beginning of another. Mom took one last look around the cavern before giving dad a thumb’s up.
"Children, are you ready?" she asked.
We all nodded meekly with our fingers tangled in one another's skirts.
"I love you all," she said with a single tear dripping down her cheek. "Now run!"
We dashed out of the cavern, the fence only a few yards ahead. It was getting closer and closer until I could make out the pattern of the metal framework. The pile of crumbled earth was in front of us, waiting to be dived into. Just a few more steps, then another one.
"Halt!"
The masters had noticed us. We all froze on the spot, the frigid wind blowing around us. My sisters on either side of me were trembling in fear, their eyes wide and terrified as they looked at the masters with their rifles pointed at our heads.
"They'll kill us," said Sadie.
"Shhh," Lucy responded.
"Quiet!" the master's voice boomed.
He marched over to Mom and pushed the barrel of the gun into her forehead.
"Explain yourself," he said.
I could see the rage in her face.
"I will explain nothing. If I only have a second left to live I will not do a thing that you ask of me."
"Very well," the master said. "You have left me no choice."
Without warning, he pulled the trigger. There was a flash of light, the piercing boom of gunfire. Instinctively, I covered my head with my arms and fell to the ground. I could smell the gunpowder in the air and, with my ears still ringing, I looked up. Mom's body lay in front of me, her face turned toward us and her eyes staring blankly. I don't remember feeling or thinking anything, but I can remember the scream that escaped my mouth, the gut-wrenching shriek that refused to stop. I kicked and cried, reached out to my mother only to be held back by my sobbing sisters. Meanwhile, the master was reveling in my misery, laughing as he watched me pummel my tiny fists into the mud.
"You!" he pointed to my father. "You should have known better than to try to escape."
He pulled the trigger again dad fell backward against the fence, his body limp as it caught on the spikes of the barbed wire. In just a few seconds we had become orphans clinging to one another, screaming and crying as the masters approached. Then they were on us, pulling us apart from each other with their strong, adult hands gripped around our infantile wrists.
"Mommy!" I screamed as I was dragged away from the corpses of my parents.
The masters chuckled as they dragged me back into the cavern.
"Lucy! Sadie!"
But they were being taken in opposite directions, their screams ricocheting off the cavern walls as they disappeared from view.
That was twenty years ago, but time moved so slowly in the mine that a day felt like a lifetime. I’d never seen my sisters again but I still felt they were always with me. Sometimes, I imagined they were beside me when I was struggling to hold the barrels. I thought of them as my helpers, angels that loved me when no one else did.
Yet, as I opened my eyes and saw the master with the whip over his head, his black, beady eyes dancing with glee, I felt so alone.
"Please," I wept. "Not the lashes. It burns so much!"
"Silence!"
His voice barked and as I looked at the stream of spit that was hanging from his lower lip, he resembled a rabid animal, a wild, bloodthirsty beast.
I heard the sound of the whip before I felt it; a whooshing noise as it cut through the air. Then it slashed my skin like a leather knife.
"Slacker!" he shouted as he hit me again. "Waster! That water was valuable, more valuable than you could ever be!"
He continued to strike me until the blood was running down my back and soaking into the ancient rags that were my clothes.
"Eighteen, nineteen, twenty!"
He was finished and w
as exhausted from his punishment of me. He took a step back, removed a handkerchief from his jacket pocket, and proceeded to wipe the blood and skin from the whip before placing it back in the loop on his belt. I stood shaking as the pain ripped through me. Scanning the cavern, I looked for a sign that someone, somewhere cared but no one looked up, they didn't dare. Where’s Marco? Surely he’s down here!
"You may return to work," said the master.
"H-how am I suppo-"
"Silence!"
All I could do was walk away and climb the ramp to the mill. There was more water to be mined and compressed for shipment. It was all that was expected of me and I daren't dream of doing anything else. As I returned to work, the master eyed me warily as I moved, I thought of my family and daydreamed that my mom and dad weren't shot. I imagined them on the other side of the fence free and happy. They were healthy now and rich too. Sadie and Lucy were with them, smiling and waving in their pink, floral pinafores.
"It won't be long," Mom said. "We'll come and get you soon. Just hang on a little longer."
Chapter 3
Gar’zul
3 years later
The crowd wanted blood. They were shouting for us, howling and jeering as they waited for the fighting to begin. Underground, in the pit beneath the arena, I looked down at my bruised and broken hands. There wasn't an inch of blue skin without a scar. Yet, every mark and injury told a story that went into the making of the man I was to become. I was now a gladiator, a creature to be feared. There were other fighters down there with me, securing weapons to their bodies as they psyched themselves up to walk out before the crowd.
Beside me, a tall, wiry red fellow was shadow boxing, grunting as his fists pumped the air. I watched for a moment, looking at the fierceness in his eyes.
"First fight?" I asked.
He continued to fight an invisible assailant, his feet as light as a dancer's as he moved. I thought he hadn't heard me, but then he said:
"Gar'zul, right?"
"Yeah... How do you know that?"
"I heard of you before I left home," he said, throwing two punches with sweat dripping from his knuckles.
"Really?"
"Yeah... Out there they say you're one of the best."
I wished there was a way I could have felt pride at my reputation, but all I felt was numbness like a lingering darkness had overcome my body and left me a husk.
"Where is your home?" I asked.
"Planet Dreynat, over at the Zobin Nebula."
"Oh."
"Been there?"
I shook my head.
"Yeah... nobody's been there. It's a frozen craphole."
He stopped and stood still. Turning toward me for the first time, I now saw the other side of his face that had previously been shrouded in the shadows. A scar ran the length of his cheek, ragged and angular.
"Did you get that fighting in the arena?" I pointed at it.
"Yeah, a killer human female did it. She was fierce, a real wild one. They don't make girls like that on Dreynat."
"Nasty Natasha?" I asked. "I've seen her fight before. She threw an ax through a Gorlog's head, cut the top clean off."
"Brutal!" he laughed. "That could have been me, except she did this with only her fingernails!"
"No!"
He nodded.
“Dug them straight into my face and tore a piece off me.”
"Humans... How did they become such a sadistic civilization?"
"Who knows? Anyway, aren't you on next?"
"Yeah... I'm fighting Black Buron from the planet Devol."
"Ah, you'll be fine," he patted me on the back. "You could kill him with your big toe."
We both laughed as I grabbed my sword.
"I'm serious. You're one of the best. I bet it won't be long until you replace the current champion, Furi."
"Maybe," I said as I tried to play it cool.
Above ground, the sound of the crowd became louder, their voices rumbling through the arena.
"I have to go now," I said.
"Good luck out there."
I placed my foot on the first step and took a deep breath. It was time to do what I did every day. I was going to fight for my life.
I killed him in under a minute. Black Buron's body collapsed in the dust as the crowd roared, his blood soaking into the ground. For a long while, after he died, and the crowd was cheering for the next gladiator, I looked down at his body. His eyes were still open and the thick mane of purple hair that had sprouted from his black scalp was blowing in the wind. It was the only part of his body that could move. I had killed a man, a fighter just like me. As I walked away, I wondered if he was a deserter too, a man with a history he wanted to run away from. I wondered if he also had a broken heart.
"You're a psychopath, Gar'zul," one of the arena managers, Davoth said as he slapped me on the back.
Leading me back underground, I expected to walk into the preparation area where all the other fighters waited, but as I was about to turn left, he tugged at my arm.
"You're coming this way," he said. "I've got something for you."
He pushed open the door and I was immediately hit by the smell of marrowdust smoke, the red tendrils snaking up to the ceiling from the pipes held to people's mouths.
"You smoke marrow, don't you?"
"Yes... although..."
I was shocked, marrowdust, also known as just marrow, was an illegal drug that had been condemned throughout the galaxy. I never prided myself on using the substance. At times, I had felt deeply ashamed as I dropped the dust into my pipe with trembling fingers, desperate to feel the hit of anesthesia that it would bring me. It was the only thing that could numb the pain and make the memories float away long enough for me to sleep. Without it, I would be plagued with the thought that I wasn't there to save my family.
"Take a seat," Davoth said as he gestured into the corner of the room.
I sank into the chair as he passed me a pipe. Lighting the end, he smiled.
"There ya go, buddy. This is strong stuff, was smuggled here all the way from Jupiter."
I breathed in the smoke, felt the sting in my lungs and tasted the acrid tang of the drug.
"It's the best, isn't it?" he asked with raised eyebrows.
"It's fucking potent," I coughed.
As I leaned back and watched the smoke drift up to the ceiling, I felt the dust work its magic. At last, the image of the Black Buron began to fade, as did everything around me. There was nothing but the chair I was sitting in and the skin that surrounded my soul. Then that too began to dissolve and I was just a mind, floating freely in the ether with nothing expected of me and nowhere to go. I just existed in the nothingness, a black mass swallowing me up until I didn't feel real anymore.
When I opened my eyes, Davoth was still sat beside me, looking out the small, porthole window with a faraway look in his eyes. He noticed me wake up and gave me a nod of acknowledgment.
"I told you it was strong."
"It's crazy stuff."
I ran my hands down my face and shook myself wide awake. Looking around the room, I saw that most people had disappeared and those that remained were mostly unconscious. From somewhere in the shadows, music was playing, a soft melancholy tune that seduced me with its misery.
"You like marrow a lot?" he asked.
"Yup," I said.
"And your wife doesn't mind you smoking it? Mine'll flip when she finds out but I don't care."
"I don't have a wife," I replied with a heavy heart.
No matter how many days had passed since I lost my family, nothing hurt more than having to accept that I was no longer a father and a husband. My identity had been wiped clean. Now I was nothing more than a lonely soul, a single atom that occasionally violently bumped off others as I drifted from fight to fight.
"You don't have a wife!" he exclaimed. "You can't be serious? Do you not want one? Do you just have loads of girlfriends instead?"
He winked.
&nbs
p; "Actually, I had a wife, a beautiful woman but... she passed away."
"Shit, man. I mean, I'm so sorry. I'm really sorry."
He leaned over and squeezed my shoulder.
"I didn't mean to bring all that up. I was just making conversation."
"It's ok," I said as I moved his hand off me. "You weren't to know."
A few seconds of silence passed as he sucked on the end of his pipe.
"You ever think you'll marry again?"
I thought for a moment, imagined a life with someone else but it just felt wrong, as though I was somehow betraying my first family.
"I keep telling myself that I should just remarry, settle down and have a normal life but I just can't do it. I mean, what kinda life would I give my family? I'm a gladiator, a loner, and a murderer. That's no role model for a child."
"You could retire?" he suggested.
"Maybe..."
He was right. I could have retired and lived off my winnings, raised a family far away from this life. But... this job, it was the only thing that kept me going. When I was in the arena it was as though every second of my past had been obliterated and there wasn’t a single thing to think about but the man in front of me and how I was going to defeat him. When I won, it was as though I had transcended my very being. I felt powerful and extraordinary like a god. When I won I felt alive. Yet, when whatever sense of normality in my life returned, I was cursed by the black pit in my stomach that reminded me I had no family.
"Ok," Davoth said, leaning forward and resting on his knees. "Just imagine you were going to remarry. Who would you pick to be your number one girl?"
The question took me aback and I had no idea what to say.
"I-I-I've never thought about it."
"Really?"
"Never."
"Ok. I'm a happily married man but, well, forgive me for looking around. There's no harm in window shopping. You know, if I was going to remarry I'd pick one of those Zolork women."
"What? They are so small! I saw one of them fight in the arena once when I first began here. She was the size of a child."
He laughed.
"Good point. Well, what about the Glarph girls?"
