Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
The two human women were hauled away through a tunnel under the bleachers to the fading sounds of a cheering crowd. Four additional members of their prisoner group were selected as well. Two men and two women, rounding out the total of six new additions for the unpartnered competitors.
Not a single one of them seemed at all happy with the selections they'd been saddled with, but none were more irate than Dorrin, the imposing man glaring hard as Ziana was led away with the others.
The two humans were pulled from the rest of the group and directed to a different part of the facility. After all they'd been through, being separated from the group was more than a little disconcerting, especially given the not-so-veiled threats from a certain chancellor on whose bad side Ziana had just firmly affixed herself.
She scoped out the corridor the tunnel eventually connected to. It was a T-intersection, one direction leading upward to what appeared to be a courtyard and series of surface level chambers, though their doors were closed. The other direction headed downward. Down, in her history, tended to mean bad things. Crappy basement apartments, dirty clubs, and, of course, the horror film meme of hidden torture chambers. The first two she could handle. The third even, if she had to. What was waiting for them, however, would be something completely different, and not in a good way.
"Where are you taking us?"
The guard leading the way walked on without a word.
"Hey, buddy, I'm talking to you."
"I'm not to speak with you. Not until you have seen the Skrizzit."
Ziana and Maria shared a look.
"So, you're taking us to see one of those Skrizzit guys?" Maria asked.
The guard merely grunted but didn't answer. It was good enough for her.
"I'll take that as a yes, then." She turned to Ziana. "Looks like we're going to get more ink."
"Oh, joy," Ziana replied with a sarcastic smirk. "Just what I wanted."
They continued on for some distance, finally arriving at a large circular intersection that felt fairly deep beneath the surface. The structure was quite robust, the alien tech making it all perfectly safe and sound, but the feeling of being underground was something the animal part of the brain somehow picked up on regardless, as if it could sense the weight of the world above just waiting to come crashing down on top of them.
But if humans could build solid structures underground, aliens with much more advanced technology could certainly do a far better job of it.
The guard walked them around the perimeter of the intersection, following the curved wall. The whole place was illuminated not by light fixtures but rather a gentle glow coming from the material of the ceiling and walls themselves, lending a surprisingly comfortable visual feel to the whole thing.
"In there," they were directed, an ornate door sliding open silently.
Ziana stepped forward first. "Well, here we go."
Inside the room, the women were rather underwhelmed. It was neither super advanced and high-tech, nor was it some kind of alien dungeon cell. It was just a room. A room with what appeared to be a sort of massage table, the hole for the face making its use pretty apparent. There was also a small table with several dark and a few lighter pigments in little jars resting atop its surface. And then there was the Skrizzit.
He was a tall, bald man with skin of the darkest ebony. Fine lines of gold danced across his body, the details of his many runes intricate and utterly beautiful the way they both contrasted with his skin tone while also flowing almost organically with his musculature. He had four arms rather than two, the muscles long and wiry, and was wearing an embroidered vest of a metallic black material that had a series of small pouches affixed to the front.
His shockingly blue eyes were almond-shaped, but the corners were vertically aligned rather than horizontally. It was a rather unusual and quite striking look, and one that made Ziana wonder why she'd never seen that sort of morphology anywhere on Earth. Did it exist? She couldn't think of a reason it wouldn't, but she couldn't think of a single instance she'd ever encountered.
"Strip and lay there face-down," the man said, gesturing to the table with one of his arms while the other three moved in a flurry of activity, taking implements from the pouches on his vest and assembling them into what had to be a small, wireless form of the clunkier tattoo set they had seen Heydar using when he gave them their translation runes aboard the Raxxian ship.
"You want to go first?" Ziana asked.
Maria chuckled. "After your little display with the chancellor guy? Oh, please, after you."
Ziana shrugged and undressed. "He'll get to both of us soon enough."
The Skrizzit set to work immediately, his hands working independently yet also in unison, his mind operating them like a master drummer, somehow keeping track of multiple different tasks at the same time regardless of rhythm or movement. It was impressive, to say the least, and Ziana's runes were being applied far faster than she'd have thought possible.
The man was clearly an expert. If he was employed by the chancellor, it only made sense that he would be. But there was something in his air. His attitude. As if he was ill at ease. Uncomfortable about something. Was it the act of marking what, for him, was a completely novel species? It would only be natural. After all, she'd heard a few times that the runes sometimes reacted quite differently across the species, depending on the type, power, and placement of them.
Or was it something else? A thought flashed through her mind.
"Hey, can I ask you a question?"
"You may ask ," he replied in a shockingly deep baritone for his lean frame.
"I was just wondering, are you doing this as a job, or are you working as a sort of slave to the chancellor? He kind of mentioned if I lost I'd be working for him. Is that what happened to you?"
The man grunted and shrugged but didn't say a word. Whatever the situation was, he would not be giving her a verbal reply.
Makes sense , she mused. Guy's probably terrified of pissing off the chancellor and losing his job, regardless of how he wound up with it.
"Sorry, it was rude of me to ask. Forget I ever mentioned it."
"Forgotten," he replied. "Now, please, turn over. I have completed the runes on your back and must now apply them on your front."
"Am I getting that one in the middle of the chest everyone seems to have?"
"Yes. But the Infala will be the final rune. Just relax. It will make the process smoother. Normally you have days of preparation before receiving the runes. Doing it like this will be a bit harder on your body."
"Grrrreat," she grumbled, relaxing as best she could. "Well, let's get on with it then."
The process went on for a while longer, then it was Maria's turn. As no one came to fetch Ziana, she took the opportunity to speak casually with the Skrizzit as he worked, hoping to draw out at least a little information from him if his work kept him distracted enough to actually forget himself and answer. The questions would have to be general and casual in nature, but she felt that if she managed to get him talking, he might loosen up and actually tell them something of use.
Eventually, though it took a while, he did start to engage a bit once he realized the questions were innocuous enough. Most fascinating were his comments on the games themselves and why the two humans were being marked rather than sentenced to death.
"You are of an unknown race. And one from outside the Dotharian realms and possessing no runes. It is quite the novelty."
"Glad we can be of amusement."
"You jest, but that is to your advantage. You should remember that being something new and different will draw viewers and gain you a following. It is something you would do well to nurture. The more popular you are, the better you will be treated. Everyone loves an underdog, after all."
"Underdog? Who's to say we can't win?"
At that, the Skrizzit actually stopped working, likely because his sudden and genuine laughter might have caused one of his four hands to falter in their work, and no one wanted jittery designs on their skin for the rest of their life.
"Oh, you poor, na?ve woman. There is no way you can win."
"Hey! We may be new here, but we might?—"
"You just said it yourself. You are new here. And being new means you will not have time to learn the games. Win? Not a chance. Just focus on being an interesting novelty and winning favor with the crowd and you will be okay. That is what they want. The champions compete . You are here to amuse ."
Ziana had a few snarky comments spring to mind but kept them to herself. He'd finally dropped his guard.
"I suppose you're right. You do know far better than I do about these games."
"I'm glad you realize that."
"Clearly, you know a lot more than either of us do. As you said, we're not from around these parts and it's all new to us. But hey, what happens if we lose? Something about becoming a slave?"
"Not a slave, no. But as a fill-in for a regular competitor, you face a different set of rules. If you lose, and lose you will, you will become an indentured servant for whichever of the elites sponsored you to the games."
"So, there's no choice in the matter?"
"None. You will become a servant for them, working until the end of your term of indenture. Of course, any wages will be used to offset the cost of your food and board. And, in your case, the expense of applying your runes."
"Are they expensive?"
"I was directed to use a fairly pricey set of pigments, yes."
She didn't like the sound of that. The chancellor was setting her up not only for failure, but for a pretty hefty debt if she lost.
"Well, how long might that sort of thing take to pay off?"
The Skrizzit's smile remained but there was hesitation in his eyes. But the ice had been broken, and now that words were shared, they kept flowing.
"I was a competitor once," he said, shaking his head slightly. "In much the same situation you now find yourself in."
"Really? You were a fill-in competitor?"
"Yes. I lost, of course, and now I work for the chancellor, paying off my debt."
"Wow. I had no idea. How long has it been, if you don't mind my asking?"
He sighed, contemplative a moment, then his smile brightened. "I am treated well, and I live a comfortable life."
"Sure, but how long?"
He locked eyes with her, now, for once, truly seeing her. His smile faltered. "Twenty years."
Ziana felt her stomach somersault into a knot. Did he just say twenty ? Oh, shit.