The Performance

Chapter 2: My Jailors

My entire body ached. My head was pounding and my fingers cramped. My tongue felt heavy and foreign in my mouth while my teeth clanked together from the cold seeping into my body. The school's heater must have broken again, I thought.

I tried to move my hand lower to pull my thin, raggedy blanket over my head to preserve my warmth, but my hands were too heavy. My foggy brain couldn't keep up with reality and I closed my eyes to sleep away the aches and pains.

An icy splash of water doused my head. I sat up sputtering and coughing water out of my lungs. I pushed my wet hair out of my face in confusion.

I screamed and scrambled back into the wall when I was my attacker. Cold metal pressed into my back, causing shivers to run down my spine. I stared wide-eyed at the being in front of me, refusing to blink.

"What the fuck?" I whispered in shock.

The thing was a pale green color, the color someone's skin might turn on an airplane before they grab a barf bag. His four, large, beady eyes blinked at me in unison. He made a weird clicking sound in the back of his throat that no human could imitate.

He had a thin mouth and a long tongue that came to a sharp point and kept flicking out like a lizard. He had two holes in the center of his face, for breathing and two holes in the side of his head for hearing. His forehead was long and smooth. His head was completely bald which gave him an inhuman look.

An alien.

I froze when my brain finally caught up to me. My jaw hung open in disbelief.

The alien didn't seem concerned with my skittish behavior and pushed a thin black tube into the bars separating us. His bony fingers carefully held it and his scrawny, freakishly long arm extended between the bars and towards my face.

I screamed, jerking away from him, bumping the confinements of my cell. He clicked at me and his eyes blinked rapidly. His other arm shot out and his chilly fingers wrapped around my neck. I shuttered, disgusted this creature was touching me.

He pushed the small cylinder into the center of my forehead and a buzzing sound filled the silence. I heard a faint click and felt a pinch of a needle. I jerked away from the small device and the alien released me.

He looked down at the sneaky device with wide eyes and walked away without a second glance in my direction.

I gently prodded my forehead and my finger came back with a small drop of blood, but nothing major. Why did he take my blood?

A loud screech of a metal door sounded throughout the area and the room dimmed. Now that I was alone and no longer disoriented from the drug they had administered to me in the woods, I looked around my enclosure.

From what I could see, it was like a small jail cell. The floor, the wall behind me and to my right was a thick sheet of metal. On my left, there were thick steel bars, with tiny slivers of space between each, identical to the bars in front of me. But, still I didn't feel safe after knowing my captives can reach through them easily.

The small enclosure was just longer than the length of my body and I could touch my elbows to each end of my cage. There was no bed, blankets or toilet. The height of the cage was taller than my own, but I quickly sat back down, not wanting to attract unwanted attention.

Looking outside my cell I realized there were identical enclosures surrounding me. Each area was separated by vertical bars, keeping others from interacting. I couldn't see too far in front of me because the lights were dimmed and when the alien was here, I hadn't paid enough attention to anything but him.

I lurched forward, rattling the bars, testing their strength. There was no way of getting out. I was screwed.

The shock was slowly wearing off and now that I was alone, I felt more confident. "Hey, where am I? Let me out!"

I yanked on the bars with all my might, with no luck. "Hello!?" I yelled down the empty hallway.

Either they didn't understand me, they were ignoring me, or both. I was just abducted my aliens. Aliens? A historical laugh bubbled in my throat, but I pushed it down. I had to stay focused and sharp.

I slunk back into the corner until my back was pressed into the cold, biting metal. I wrapped my arms around my torso, trying to warm myself and kept watch. My salty tears quietly ran down my face as I tried not to completely lose it.

As my eyelids were drooping from exhaustion, I heard a loud screech of something heavy being moved. I instantly tried to shove myself further into the corner I backed myself into.

In the opposite end of the room, a small sliver of light ran across the floor. It slowly grew longer and wider until the entire room full of cages was illuminated by an outside light.

I finally got a good look around the room and realized just how enormous it was. There were probably fifty or more cages, all around the size of mine. I also realized I wasn't as alone in here as I thought.

Directly diagonal from my own prison, there was an occupied one. Somebody I had completely missed while I was lying in the dark, thinking I was alone in here.

From the bulk of their form, I assumed they were male. They were curled into their side with only their back facing me, similar to my own cowardly position.

I glanced around, shocked to find that there were more people in here than I thought, most of them were too far away from me to make out any distinct features.

My attention was captured by the entrance of the room, where the light was filtering in from when a strangled, humanoid sound echoed from there. I shifted as close as I allowed myself to the edge of the bars surrounding me.

The tall, lanky alien creature came into my view first and then the woman. The woman was being cradled gently in the alien's embrace. She had an olive complexion with tan skin and dark hair.

The alien disregarded the rest of the captives in the cage and strolled over to the cage one over from mine.

I froze, afraid of unwanted attention. But, he or she -I couldn't tell- was fully captivated by the woman. They gently set her down on the cold floor of the cage and brushed a lick of her dark hair out of her face.

I watched as they placed their long fingers to the base of her throat, checking for a pulse. After a few moments, they nodded to themselves, content with whatever they had felt.

They pulled out a thin black device, identical to the one they used on me. I shifted so I could get a better view and figure out what they did to me. The creature pinched the small device between their eerily long fingers and hovers it next to the center of the vulnerable girl's forehead.

Then, a thin needle shot out and poked her. I squinted, trying to get a better look as the alien turned the device and pressed the other side to the droplet of blood welling to the surface.

They turned towards me and clicked their tongue before leaving. My gaze flicked to the male across from me and found him watching me too.

"Do you know what's happening?" I softly whispered to him, over exaggerating the words with my mouth.

He shook his head, but awkwardly shuffled closer to the bars, he opened his mouth to speak, but the sharp, grating sound drifted through the room before the darkness surrounded us again. But this time I knew I wasn't alone.

"I was one of the first", his voice was quiet as a whisper and thickly accented which made it difficult to understand him, "from what I can tell they're collecting people from all over Earth."

"Why?" I questioned.

"I don't know. But what concerns me is the fact that most of these cages are empty and they've already covered most of the planet."

That last thought sent us both into silence and I shifted closer to the female near me and listened to her steady breathing. The poor girl is in for an unwanted surprise when she wakes up.