There was a cutting sound of metal - the door behind me closed automatically. There's a squeak. It's definitely time for a new one. Well, this was where I'd be spending the next couple of weeks. With any luck, even less. I switched on the secondary lighting, illuminating the control panel with it's many buttons and the "showcase" where the victim spends all his time. It was strange to call a separate room a showcase, but that's what it was: behind the glass that shielded me from the subject was a room about eight by two metres. I would call it a cage: there was absolutely nothing to brighten up the subject's leisure time, just white walls and a waste room with a shower. Of course, I usually guarded more than one victim. The amount and manner of work directly depended on the number of successful specimens found on Earth. The sector under my responsibility was designed to hold five such victims. But lately, it's rare to have more than one. That's why I'm here instead of outside, guarding the doors. When you're guarding one victim, it's easier to work, you can live right here, and there's a bunk. The important thing is not to underestimate the importance of the job. You'd think a helpless female human would need a guard. What could possibly happen? In extreme case, you can find a fugitive somewhere on the ship, shaking with fear and do not know where to run. But this line of reasoning is flawed. There have been precedents, and more than once. I remember an incident when I was still head of security. One lazy guy decided that it was a bad idea to sit in a cell and guard one sample, it was better to check it from time to time, and spend the rest of the time in his quarters, drunk on Jupiterian liquor, or worse, Cayan dope. When he stepped away for that and returned to check on the specimen, he found it dead behind the glass on the floor, with brute Warten standing over the corpse. The horny one has no other than a mutation in his brain at creation, as he has absolutely no way of keeping his cock in check. So as soon as the opportunity presented itself, he broke into the empty cell and raped the subject. It ended badly for both the slacker and Warten. I locked the two of them up in a holding cell overlooking outer space in minus thirty temperatures. There were no more such precedents. Once again there was a metallic clanking sound. A single skroge came through the door, dragging a young naked girl by the glass. Without saying a word, I opened the doorway for him and he carelessly threw her in there like rubbish, and without a word, scurried away. I sat on the bed and watched her, I had nothing else to do here. She was short, unformed, barely breathing, and covered in wounds and bruises, probably left by the men who had brought her here. I wondered if she had already been experimented on. After sitting like that for half an hour, I almost fell asleep out of boredom. But suddenly I heard a faint knocking on the other side of the glass. The girl looked frightened, as if she didn't understand where she was being brought to and why.
- Hello? Where am I? Who are you?
Oh, wow. Can she talk? Usually people like her are just stunned, staring off into the distance. Or crying all the time. I didn't say anything to her.
- Who are you?! - she kept banging on the glass, only louder now.
- Your master.
No, seriously, what am I supposed to say to her? Hello, my name is Kserd? Make yourself at home? Here you will taste bullets, bullets, and... if you're lucky, warm semen. For the next week until you die, I get to watch you get stuffed with lead? I didn't say that out loud, of course. It would have been too cynical, even for me.
- Oh my God, it's happening! - she shouted, starting to bang on the glass.
- You're trying for nothing. You can't break through it.
The glass was made of a very strong material, only a skroge could break it, and that was if you tried hard enough.
- No... no, it can't be, oh my God! Not this, no!!! - her voice was getting louder and more annoying.
The girl hit the glass with her hands and then her knees, but of course that would do more damage to herself than to the glass. She became hysterical, and soon broke both her hands and knees in blood, but still she continued her endeavours. This made me furious, and I couldn't stand it any longer, and hit the glass with all my might.
- Shut your fucking mouth, - I hissed through my fangs, - Your screaming is making my ears hurt! - The last sentence was especially loud.
The girl instantly recoiled from the glass and trembled.
- You... you're all monsters, - she said, and slid to her knees desperately.
- I can't help it, - I said, and took a cigarette out of the drawer, lighting it at once.
- I've been told about you. That you kidnap women, and... - she sobbed, tears streaming down her cheeks, - and... kill them.
I laughed out loud.
- No one is more interested in your survival than we are. But somehow you keep dying. Will you stop it?!
- We're dying?! Oh, so this is all our fault! You son of a bitch!
- Not the best way to deal with a security guard.
That picture was something of a surprise to me, to be honest. Not only does she know how to talk, but she manages to be rude.
- Please... let me at least get dressed, - she put her palm on the glass, leaving bloody marks on it.
Indeed, she was completely naked. Usually they wear at least some sort of shirt.
- I was lying on the bed, staring at the wall, smoking.
I'd had enough of this girl for the hour she'd been here. How nice it was when I was head of security...
- Please, please, I'm begging you! At least bring me a shirt! - she was smearing the glass, trying to cover herself.
- What for? Did you grow your tits for nothing? - I grinned, noticing the unnaturally large breasts for her almost childish body.
She began to whimper quietly for fifteen minutes, and it finally pissed me off. I feel like after this week I'm going to ask for a holiday.
- All right, fuck, all right. Stop crying. I'll get it.
I left the observation room and locked the door. Fucking hell. This is the worst day I've had in the last month, I had no idea the broad could even be here in adequacy and string words together. Where am I gonna get her a shirt? I'd have to go to the next sector, see if I could find something there. I went through the airlock to the warehouse - some clothes were in there, I think. I reached into the first box I could find and pulled out some simple cotton pyjamas. Hopefully it would shut her up for at least a few minutes. Back in the observation room, the first thing I picked up with my keen sense of smell was the smell of blood-the girl lying unconscious on the floor, in a pool of blood, her veins slashed. Damn it. How had she managed to do that? She had nowhere to hide anything she could cut herself with. Exactly. She broke the bathroom mirror. Why the hell did they even put it in there? You'd think they'd need it. But the worst part is that if management finds out about this, I'll be thrown in the SHU for being absent from work, and that's not my plan. Shit, I've got to do something. I pulled the first aid kit out of the nightstand: there were bandages, ammonia solution, peroxide, alcohol, and some pills. The bare minimum of what people need around here. We don't need it: the Skroges don't know what small wounds are, since our soft tissues regenerate almost instantly. Grabbing bandages, ammonia, and pyjamas, I went behind the glass, and started punching the girl in the face, grudgingly leaving cuts on her. I hope she won't take offence, but my hands are meant for slightly different things. She opened her eyes briefly, and started mumbling something incoherent. Thank God she's alive. I bandaged her arm tightly, thankfully the cuts weren't that deep. It seemed to have stopped bleeding. As long as she didn't put up much of a fight, I reluctantly pulled her trousers on first, then her shirt. She needs clothes now, because I'll be charged for the cuts. I gave her a sniff of the solution and she instantly came to her senses.
- Get away from me! - she immediately pulled out of my arms and backed up against the wall.
Like I was here to rape her.
- Whatever you say, - I left the girl behind the glass and returned to my bed.
- You won't even let me die in peace!
- You can always die, that's all you people do here. I don't want you to die of your own free will, I don't want to spend a week in the SHU. Well, you're not quite in one piece, but at least you're dressed. Now will you shut up?!
- You have no heart, - she said in a flat, angry voice.
- That's where you're wrong. I do have a heart, and it's much stronger than yours.
- It's an expression. No heart means no feelings. What's your name, anyway? Or should I just call you that, heartless?
- Kserd. Does that mean anything to you?
- I'm Lya.
- At least it's not Nancy. Now back off.
- Why can't you just talk to me? You won't let me die. You won't let me cry. At least you gave me my pyjamas, thank you.
- If I'd known you'd do something like that, I'd have stayed without them.
- You don't understand. You weren't kidnapped from your home, thrown into this... white cage, left without water or food, naked!
- You're probably right about that. But you know, you're lucky to have me.
- I'm lucky? At least those guys in the lab were polite.
- You mean the scientists? Have you learnt history, silly? There was one called Josef Mengele. He was also gentle and polite. You'll soon find out the price of their politeness.
- What do you mean?
- You weren't kidnapped to torture and kill you. If you're here, you must have some value to them. Apparently you have good genes for experiments or something.
- Experiments?
- You're so stupid. Yeah, experiments. Do you like the way I look?
- What does that have to do with it?! - she was more outraged than when she found herself here.
- It doesn't matter, though. If you're lucky, you'll be like me, only a woman. But that's unlikely.
- Like you, only a woman?
- Yeah. Will you give me a minute's peace?
- Please don't be so mean! I'm all alone here!
- Am I being mean? Do you want me to transfer you to Warten? He's certainly not mean. Have you ever seen one of those big dinosaurs that's about two-fifty? Their penis is proportional to their size. He's one of them, very nice to the likes of you. You'll get a quality fuck every twenty minutes, non-stop, for the duration of your time here. Till you're literally torn up inside. That's a cool prospect, isn't it?
- No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no! Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Just don't do that thing you just said. Kserd... right, am I right? - she was obviously very scared, judging by the instant change in tone of voice.
- No, you're not wrong... - I exhaled smoke.
- Please be merciful to me. I'll do anything you say, anything at all. I'll be your... your..." she started sobbing again, - a whore if you want.
- I've been asking you to shut your mouth for an hour, but you can't even do that. You're a lousy whore.
Surprisingly, after she said that, she finally shut up. Really? What a relief. But my peace didn't last long. Two lab techs entered the room, carrying a suitcase of some kind.
- Kserd, open the door for her.
Oh, here we go. Here we go. She was brought in here not even a day ago. I reluctantly got out of bed and pressed the button, letting them in. They walked in on the horrified girl, one of them stunned her and she fell to the floor, the other pulling some kind of syringe out of a suitcase and filling it with some kind of substance. Certainly not a drug.
- What is it? - the girl asked in a hoarse, terrified voice.
But, unlike me, there was no answer.
- Hold her still, - one of the orderlies injected her forearm.
As soon as he pulled the needle out, the girl screamed, no, wailed in pain. I don't know what the substance was, as I'm not good at science. But it's always injected before they start shooting the subject with lead bullets. They need to see if this stuff works properly and if she regenerates. They stashed the remaining medication in the suitcase, and silently left the room. The girl turned pale almost instantly, her veins were literally everywhere: on her forehead, on her neck, on her arms, everywhere my eye could see. She must have been very hot because she literally tore off her pyjamas. Within an hour she was squirming in pain on the floor, not knowing where to put herself. Twitching like a wounded animal. However, the cuts on her body healed. Soon after this semblance of regeneration, she stopped agonising, apparently the pain was gone. For a while, she just lay there, recovering from the experience. But then she got dressed again, and slowly walked to the waste room, not coming out for a long time. I should check on her... I wondered what else might be on her mind. I went in, and found the whole place splattered with blood, but the girl herself unharmed.
- They're... healing, - she said, sliding down the wall to the floor.
- Surprised?
- No matter what I do, no matter how I cut myself. they heal. Almost instantly.
- I wouldn't worry so much if I were you, - I said, calming down and walking back behind the glass to the security camera.
- I can still feel the pain.
- Remember what I said at the beginning? I can't help it," I laid back down on the bed and covered my eyes with my forearm.
- What else are they going to do to me?
- Well, probably nothing today. Tomorrow they'll be checking to see how your... regeneration.
- Testing? How?
- You want me to tell you the truth?
- Tell me everything.
- Well, they'll shoot you, test your regeneration like I said. You'll feel everything.
- And then what?
- I don't know. It depends on whether you survive or not. Listen, why are you being so chatty, huh?
- What's wrong with you or something?! - she shouted, - Chatty, yeah, chatty! What would you do if you were me? - she slammed her fist into the wall and then took my hand.
I laughed.
- If I were you? Well, I'd ask to go to a brothel. They treat you softer there.
- You're a bastard.
- You're funny. If you want to be my whore, you'd better call me "my master". Or have you changed your mind?
- I'm sorry. It slipped out. I forgot that you Skroges have no empathy.
- Why are you being so rude, huh? You're heartless, you're a bastard, you're a monster, now I can't empathise with you.
- Isn't that right?
Actually, no. Skroge's stormtroopers would rather ignore feelings than not feel them at all. I've grown accustomed to it over the years. But sometimes even I get a shadow of what she calls sympathy...
- Who knows, who knows. so what about the whore? You know, I've changed my mind. Why don't you just stay rude? I've never met a slut like that. At least not here.
- You don't look like you need it. Are you mocking me?
- Show some of that pathetic sympathy you brag about, baby. I'm locked in here with you for at least a week. How else am I supposed to have fun?
- If I could, I'd kill you and everyone on this ship!
- Why me? I saved you from dying. Lya, is that your name?
- I'm honoured you remembered my name.
- Why didn't you ask for a job in a brothel?
- How is that different from becoming a guinea pig for your cruel experiments? At least it'll be over relatively soon.
- You're not as stupid as I thought. Well, that's your loss.
- I could use some praise.
- Not gonna happen. You want some cayan dope?
I was willing to give her a pill just to get her back to her own thoughts.
- What?! No!
- You don't want some? Whatever you say, - I said and took two pills at once.
I want to distract myself for a while. Maybe I can ignore her drug-induced chatter. Although... I'm dreaming. But, um. it'll make me feel a little better. The drugs kicked in, and I sank into the high, ignoring the screams.