Dear Dad, As you can see by the enclosed little pillow heart, Aunt Jane's been teaching me to knit. I'm not very good yet, but I've been practicing. I hope you like it. 3 Things have been kind of quiet lately. I don't mind, though. I still hate it when we all have to hide in the bunker from the Imperial drones. Remember when John accidentally kicked that pile of buckets over and I screamed like Jaspers did when you stepped on his tail that one time? I was such a child then, wasn't I? Mom continues to do well since the big Synthahol Confiscation of '18 (thank you, Uncle Jake!). She's sober almost all the time now, and she doesn't cry at all anymore. Dave's just as predictably insufferable as ever. (I learned the word "insufferable" last month. I like using it. It has a certain satisfying ring to it, don't you think?) He hung all my stuffed animals from the ceiling fan yesterday. I got him back with Lil Cal, though. I got him Dave still makes sure to spar with Sawtooth every day. I must say, I think you'd be proud of how good he's gotten with your swords, and Uncle Jake's kept up on his lessons to all of us kids as well. He's been showing me how to use his knives, and I can hit a target from up to twenty feet away now. Jade's already a natural with the guns, and John takes way too much pleasure in beating up the training dummies with the warhammers, tonfas, and nunchucks, even though he's not allowed to use the nunchucks anymore after he gave himself a concussion. Aunt Jane says maybe when he's older (ha, as if). Speaking of the twins, they are doing fine, and so are Uncle Jake and Aunt Jane. Aunt Jane managed to make a cake for you today. I think you would have liked it. It was chocolate and had orange frosting. John tried to sneak a frog onto Jade's plate when she wasn't looking. Dave grabbed him before he could, though, and then they got into a wrestling match and Uncle Jake joined in just for the fun of it (or so he said) while Jade and I had to save the frog. Boys. As Mom would say, "le sigh." The frog is in an old fishbowl that Uncle Jake found for her on her dresser at the moment. She named him Slick. Call me crazy, but I think she plans to keep him. Jade and I have been working on that wizard fanfiction I told you about in my last letter. She's composing some music for it, and I've just gotten to chapter 9. Dave offered to do fanart, but I am suspicious of his motives. However, I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt, though I'm kind of expecting him to come back with something "ironically" inane. You taught him too well, Dad. What else…? Oh yes, Mr. Egbert just visited! He left a couple weeks ago, but he was here for about a month, discussing rebelliony stuff from Command with Aunt Jane. Between him, her, and John, it's a wonder any of us got any sleep at night between all the pranks they somehow managed to mastermind together. Must run in the family, I guess. Other than that, it was nice to have him around. John and Jade adore him, and he's better than anyone at cooking except for maybe Aunt Jane. I think we were all pretty sad when he had to leave for the next outpost. Okay, Mom's yelling that we've really got to go to the Miss you, Daddy. Love,
Rose
==
"Listen up, mammalian meatbags," the tall alien said in a quiet, emotionless monotone as the huge troll beside her finished rumbling something in a deceptively calm, pleasant voice, so richly deep and resonant that it almost sounded like a tiger's growl echoing off the stark metal walls of the large room. His vividly dark blue eyes roamed over the group of terrified captives, taking in every detail, missing nothing as the yellow troll translated his words. "Because I'm only going to say this once and no other troll on board speaks your pathetic, primitive excuse for a language. You are now the property of Interstellar Unlimited, and by extension, the Imperial Empire. If you are lucky, you will be sold to the highest bidder on our home world or outlying colonies, either for entertainment or labor. If you are unlucky, you will be culled. Whatever your eventual fate, there is nothing you can do to change it, so I suggest you get used to the idea as quickly as possible.
"Troublemakers are not tolerated here. Despite your profit potential, we are not above culling those who show overt displays of dissent, disobedience, or discord. You will learn your place quickly and will comply with our demands for you, or you will suffer the consequences. And believe me when I say those consequences will not be pleasant. For you, at least." The blue troll smirked as the translator finished relaying his message, revealing a mouthful of sharp, gleaming fangs, and something about the animalistic sneer said that he would very much enjoy being the one to carry out said "consequences."
The troll's eyes swept the room once more, lingering a little longer on a few select members of the group of small mammalian creatures gathered before him. An adult male glaring at him with open hatred in his dirt-colored eyes from a distant corner. Another male, clutching at a wound on his arm that leaked copious amounts of that abominable bright red blood all over the floor but still managing to stand upright and glower at him. A young adolescent female who looked a few clicks away from charging the nearest troll with just her bare fists and teeth. A small wiggler standing protectively in front of an even smaller female wiggler and an adult female who knelt on the floor beside an unconscious male youngling, another held protectively in her arms. Something in the tiny female's unflinching violet gaze made the blueblood pause for a split second longer before he turned and left the room without another word. Yes. Yes, those four would do quite nicely.
==
The entire room breathed a collective sigh of relief as the large blue troll left, but the atmosphere became tense once again when it became clear that the seven other trolls weren't departing so quickly. The aliens began to move among the huddled humans, herding them through an adjacent doorway. Rose scrambled to lift an unconscious Dave off the floor, not knowing what would happen if he was left behind, but not wanting to find out. Even with Jade's help, the two nine-year-olds could barely lift the older boy's limp body.
A small shriek from Jane made Rose twist around to get a glimpse of her, and she saw the woman backpedaling away from a troll wearing an orange-accented uniform, John held tightly to her chest. The troll was undeterred by this and simply plucked her son from her arms, drawing a pained groan from the half-conscious boy as his broken arm was jostled unmercifully. Rose desperately wanted to rush forward and pull her friend away from the troll, but she couldn't do that without dropping Dave, so she stayed where she was.
John was tucked into the crook of the troll's arm the way the human would hold a puppy, and the alien moved on, pausing only to scoop up a woman drunkenly weaving toward the large doorframe, blood staining the floor underneath her. She squealed in protest and struggled feebly, but she might have been a stuffed animal for all the attention the troll paid to her.
Dave's weight suddenly disappeared from Rose's shoulders, nearly making her fall over from the imbalance before she managed to right herself. Jade was not so lucky, and tumbled to the floor. Jane was at her side in an instant, helping her up, but Rose was already wildly looking around for Dave, panic making her throat constrict. She found him draped like a doll over another troll's arm, this one wearing a uniform with dark red accents. In fact, Rose saw as she glanced around the room, the trolls were specifically going for the most badly injured of the group. As dread filled her stomach, Rose ran after the trolls, not wanting to lose sight of Dave for an instant. These creatures had already taken her parents from her (don't think about it, don't think about, don't think about it), and she would not let them take him, too.
The next room was slightly larger than the first, and a line of odd metal pods lined one wall atop a ledge far too high for her to reach. The trolls carrying injured humans were depositing their cargo in the pods, one human to each pod. Rose noticed the red troll laying Dave into one, and immediately ran to it, placing her hands on the wall and craning her neck back as far as it would go, desperately trying to catch a glimpse of him. What were they doing to him? What was going on?
The red troll nudged Rose away from the pods none too gently with her – at least, it seemed like a her – foot, growling something irritably at the child as she did so. She gestured to a blue troll – a different one from the one who had spoken to them – standing beside a pile of formless, baggy clothing at the other end of the room where some of the less injured humans had nervously gathered before moving on to the next pod and placing an unconscious woman with blood streaming down her face into it.
Leaving Dave's metal cocoon took every scrap of willpower Rose possessed, but she did it. She noticed Jade and Jane being shooed away from another pod further up the line, presumably John's, and hurried over to them, immediately feeling guilty for leaving them like that. Jade gave her a wan smile as she approached, but she was obviously on the verge of tears no matter how hard she tried to hide it. Rose slipped her hand into her best friend's and squeezed as Jade clung to it tightly in turn.
They and the rest of the stragglers joined the rest of the humans deemed fit to not receive any special treatment at the clothes pile. The blue troll gave a loud bark to draw everyone's attention to him, and then unceremoniously snatched up a random teenage girl who Rose did not recognize. The girl went limp in his hand, her face ashen with fear as he methodically removed her cracked sunglasses, scrunchie, beaded necklace, and wristwatch, tossing them carelessly onto the floor. When he started on her clothes, however, the girl seemed to rally and began to struggle, but he simply tightened his hand around her torso, constricting her air supply, and she stopped, gasping and trembling violently.
Rose averted her gaze, embarrassed for the poor girl, and instead watched each article of clothing fall one by one onto the small heap on the floor. When Rose ventured to look back at the troll and girl, she saw she was now dressed in a baggy, sleeveless, dark gray shift, barefoot and her brown curls in wild disarray. The troll then gestured pointedly to the pile of shifts, glaring at the rest of the group until they tentatively started to remove their own accessories and clothing themselves. Satisfied that the prisoners were complying with his wishes, he left the room, still carrying the girl, who had started to cry quietly.
"Stay here, girls," Jane murmured to Rose and Jade. She edged her way through the pack, picked out three shifts, and returned. "Change as fast as you can, okay?" she said as she handed them out. Rose nodded and reluctantly shucked her dirty shirt and skirt off and slipped the shift over her head before removing her shoes and undergarments.
Jade whimpered quietly, stroking the rims of her glasses once before removing them and setting them atop her own pile among her colorful reminders, and Jane was twisting her wedding ring round and round on her finger, biting her lip so hard that Rose thought that her teeth be in danger of breaking the skin. With a small sigh, she finally took it off, stuck it in the pocket of her jeans along with her glasses, and set her own small bundle on the ground. Without a word, she wrapped a comforting arm around each girl and led them away with the others who had also finished changing. The trolls, who had been standing around waiting for this, apparently, started to move among the loose group of bewildered, shell-shocked humans. Rose noticed that the red female troll had begun to advance on the three of them, followed by another red troll, this one with a more masculine build.
Rose clung to Jane's shift in a brief panic as Girl Red's hands closed around her torso, not wanting to let her or Jade out of her sight even for a moment, but the troll easily broke her hold and lifted her into the air, tucking her under an arm. She scooped Jade up as well, growling something to Boy Red before walking briskly from the room, accompanied by a couple other trolls with their own humans.
Rows of cages lined the back and far side walls, each one large enough for an average sized human adult to fully stretch out on the floor in every conceivable direction and stand up comfortably, but not much bigger. Rose barely had time to see that a few already held one or two humans before she and Jade were lifted up and shoved unceremoniously into a cage on the far end of the top row. The girls fell to the hard, cold metal floor in a heap, and lay there dazed as the door clanged shut and locked behind them.
"Ugh, my head," Rose moaned, rubbing a sore spot on the offending region and brushing some hair out of her face. She missed her headband already. "Are you okay, Jade?"
"I… think so," came the younger girl's tremulous voice as she pushed herself up on her hands and knees. Rose did the same, looking around cautiously. There were about five cages to a row, with the back wall, ceilings, and floors of solid metal and the remaining three sides comprised of rows of metal bars about six inches apart. Both walls held about thirty cages in total, each being steadily filled by the trolls as the humans finished changing. The children were paired up two to a cage like Jade and Rose had been, the teens and adults separately.
"Mama!" Jade suddenly cried, scrambling over to the bars on the right side of the cage and reaching for Jane, who occupied the next kennel over. Rose followed close behind. Jane wasted no time in gathering both girls into her arms and holding them as close as she could through the bars. Rose closed her eyes as she buried her face in her "aunt's" shoulder, breathing in her familiar scent, and briefly allowed herself to believe that this was all just a bad dream.
"Are you two hurt at all?" Jane's voice brought Rose crashing back to reality. The woman leaned back and held the girls at arm's length, inspecting them worriedly, though her eyesight was nowhere near as sharp without her glasses.
"Just a few bruises and scrapes," Rose assured her, Jade echoing the sentiment as they settled into more comfortable positions on the floors of their respective cages. "I'll be fine."
"Thank God for small mercies," Jane murmured, looking immensely relieved. "Oh!" she exclaimed suddenly, a look of growing horror on her face. "Rose, do you know if…" she chewed on her bottom lip again, reaching out and gripping Rose's hand tightly. "If Roxy… Is she…?"
"I…" Rose faltered, the memories of the past few hours that terror and shock had temporarily driven from her mind starting to trickle back in little by little…
- the alarms blaring in her ears, the floor vibrating with the distant rumble of shell blasts, the distant sounds of people screaming, Dave's hand on her arm, pulling her along as they scurry across the heaving floor. "You kids get to the bunker!" Mom bellows over the screaming and explosions. She starts to run down an adjacent corridor, her long, pink scarf billowing behind her. "I need to cut the lines to the Network before those bastards get their hands on my babies, and when I find out who led the drones right to the complex, I am going to "But Mom-!" Rose yells after her, skidding to a halt on the cracked linoleum and straining against Dave's grip. What is she "Dave, get her Suddenly, the ceiling explodes as Dave tugs her into a run again. The world turns upside-down, and dust and rocks fill the air. Dave's tackled her to the ground and curled on top of her, and is that her blood trickling down her face and neck? No, it's Dave's. He's not moving. She shakes him, calls his name, but he doesn't respond,
"I… I don't know," Rose whispered miserably, tears welling up in her eyes. "She was going to go cut the Network lines on the computers, but then the ceiling fell in and we couldn't get to her and Dave was knocked out and I don't know-!" Then Jane was wrapping her in a second tight embrace, whispering soft "shhh"s into her hair, while Jade clung to her waist, rubbing her back through the scratchy shift in her own attempt to console her friend.
"Roxy's a tough girl," Jane said, running a scraped, dirty hand through Rose's hair comfortingly. "I wouldn't count her out just yet. If anyone could have survived that, she would."
"Even if she did," Rose choked out, the tears finally spilling over, "what's she going to do now? With me and Dave gone, she might just drink herself to death the first opportunity she gets-"
"Don't you talk like that!" Jane interrupted sternly, arms tightening around the girl. "Do not give up on your mother so easily, Rose. Roxy is stronger than you give her credit for, believe you me. As long as there's one person she cares around for her to fight for, she'll do it. And I have it on good authority that she cares about Jake a lot. She let him take her stash of synthahol, didn't she?"
"Yeah, I guess she did," Rose replied, a small smirk lifting one corner of her mouth.
"And that, Rosie my girl, is why you don't have to worry about your mom. If she's alive, Jake is going to make her stay that way when he gets back with his patrol, and vice versa. We all agreed a long time ago that we'd look out for each other and our families if anything happened to them, and those kinds of promises aren't ones you make lightly." She pressed a light kiss to the top of Rose's head, and Rose gave a watery sigh and snuggled as close as she could to Jane's reassuring warmth while she still could. She kept quiet, trying to come to terms with the events of the day while using Jade and Jane's presences as an emotional anchor.
After a few minutes, Jade asked tremulously, "Wh-what about… what the yellow troll said? About us being sold to other trolls? Will we stay together?" Rose's stomach twisted again, and she let go of Jane with one hand to wrap her arm around Jade's shoulders. She didn't want to think about this. To never see her parents again was bad enough; the thought that she'd never see anyone she cared about ever again was nigh unbearable.
Jane drew a shuddering breath. "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it, okay, pumpkin? We've got each other for now. That's enough."
"Do you think the boys'll be okay?" Jade continued, sounding slightly comforted, but still worried. "And all those other people they took?"
"I think so," Jane answered after a moment of serious deliberation. "They wouldn't go through all that trouble to capture us alive just to kill us right afterwards."
"So… what, they're like in suspended animation or something?" Jade asked, shifting around so her head was in Rose's lap and she was looking up at them, her face scrunched up the way it always did when she was thinking hard. "Like Ripley in 'Aliens'?"
"I still have no idea why your father thought it was a good idea to show you and John that movie when you were only seven," Jane huffed, brushing her daughter's bangs out of her eyes. "But to answer your question, yeah, maybe. We'll have to wait and see."
"Okay," Jade replied softly, reaching up and taking her mother's hand. "Is… is it horribly selfish of me to be glad you guys are here with me right now?" Her red-rimmed, bright green eyes gazed up into theirs imploringly.
"No," Rose said immediately, interlacing her fingers with Jade's. "If I had to be sold into domestic servitude, I wouldn't want to be alone in a throng of strangers, either."
Jade gave a breathless little giggle and they all snuggled in just a little bit closer through the bars separating them. And somehow, just for that brief moment, even though she had just been enslaved by a hostile alien race and would most likely never see her mom or her planet again… Rose wasn't afraid.
-0-0-0-
enthrall Welp, stick a fork in me, 'cuz I'm done. I tried, I fought against it, I really did, but I could not get this little plotbunny out of my head ever since I saw Paperseverywhere's Also, you have no idea how much the narrative begged to be written in present tense. It kept switching constantly. All the fanfic I've read lately, man. It's going to my head. . Credit for select head-canons and concepts used in this AU include: Homestuck © Andrew Hussie
1. to hold in or reduce to slavery
2. to hold spellbound
- Reverse Petstuck concept in general belongs to Paperseverywhere
- "Battlefield Terra" by Asuka Kureru for a couple ideas concerning trollian biology and language structure
- "Domestic Liberation" by Lnzy1 and "Property Of" by hydraling110, Transformers fics that also explore the "humans as pets" concept