In Search of Home

Chapter 4

Viktor woke up to a loud clanging noise. He sat up as fast as he could, blinking in the weak sunlight. He sniffled, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. His head was pounding.

"What's going on?" he grumbled, annoyed that he woke up.

He peered out of half-open eyes, sleep trying to linger in his bones as long as he could. He was slowly remembering where he was. Alien planet. In a cage. In a dogfighting arena.

"Damn," he groaned quietly, shuffling towards Pedro's cell on his knees, looking through the bars to see what was going on.

"Kids can't cuss," Pedro said, looking very awake. He had something on his neck.

Viktor made a questioning noise in the back of his throat, suddenly very aware of the pressure on his neck. He reached up, feeling with fumbling fingers a very heavy, very metal something on his neck.

"Is this... Is this a fuckin' shock collar?" Viktor choked out. Prongs of metal dug into his skin, extruding from the band itself. When did they put this on? He whipped towards the floating water trough, eyeing it distrustfully. They must have drugged it. That's why he had felt so damn tired yesterday. He had thought it was, y'know, emotional exhaustion or whatever.

Pedro nodded, hitching a thumb over his shoulder. Viktor stood up on his knees, peering over the fit man's shoulder. Yep, everyone else had shock collars on as well. He glanced at the other beasts, noticing where he had not yesterday that they also sported one as well. Though, it seemed that only the really big ones had them.

Viktor frowned, sitting back on his knees. It was probably to keep the really dangerous animals in check. He guessed that since humans were an 'unknown animal,' they were probably classified as dangerous. 

"Pedro, what-" he started to ask, dropping his hands from his neck. Pedro cut him off with a hiss, eyes wide, and Viktor realized that the aliens that had captured them were in front of their cages.

With a small noise of surprise, Viktor looked up at them, mouth open slightly. This was the first time he had gotten an unimpeded view of them. The ringmaster was in front of his cage, looking at him shrewdly. The scar that Viktor had seen did travel across his face, starting just above his left eye and going across his nose diagonally. It traveled to just under his jaw on his right side. The ringmaster was much bigger than its companions, though a tad shorter.

There were two others beside the ringmaster, looking a bit bored, but peering at him with interest. Viktor saw them glancing at the others, so it wasn't just him that was interesting. It loosened the knot of anxiety he had in his chest, though not by much. They were both a bit slimmer than the ringmaster, but one of them had a tail. Viktor decided he'd call it Tail. The other one could be Notail.

Yeah, he probably wasn't going to win an award for creativity any time soon.

They all had this loose flowy clothing on them, cinched at the waist by a belt. Their clothing was colorful but didn't seem to clash at all with the color of their hides.

The ringmaster said something to Notail in their weird grunty language, gesturing to Viktor. The amusement he had about naming them slowly turned to nervousness, especially as they started to open the cage door. Viktor stood up, noticing that Pedro did as well, grabbing his arm through the bars. "Pedro?" the teen said nervously, shuffling backward so that his back pressed against the bars. He could faintly feel the body heat of the other man.

"Viktor!" Ezekiel called worriedly from his own cage. They were all watching with various degrees of success, some more secluded and far away from Viktor's cage than others. Tail yelled something at Ezekiel, probably something along the lines of 'shut up!'