Part: 4/?
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From mud lined trap to metal cage; it wasn't much of an improvement in John's mind.
He had not had a good couple of days. After he had been hauled out of the forest trap he had been chained up and manhandled, though admittedly they had been super strong women, rather than men, who had thrown him into a cage on wheels alongside three other unhappy looking men. John had tried to explain who he was and that he had been part of the group that had tried to rescue people in the local village, but it had all fallen on deaf ears.
John's heart had dropped when the cart had been taken through the Gate - how would Atlantis be able to track him now? But, things only got worse from there as he and his fellow prisoners had been added to another larger group of other prisoners, all men and all chained up. John had tried to escape at that point, but that plan had ended pretty quickly at the end of several painful cattle prods. When he had come round he had been on board a ship and the bright blue light of hyperspace had glowed through the tiny port window he had been caged by beside.
He had been given water and a loaf of bread, but he had been kept caged away from the rest of the grubby and nervous looking men, no doubt due to his escape attempt. His vest, weapons, broken radio and even his belt had been taken off him. Fortunately his trousers fit well enough that he didn't miss the belt too much. His weapons however, he wished he still had with a passion.
The ship had finally dropped out of hyperspace perhaps a day later and he had lost some of his anger to awe as he stared out the small window at the massive complex space station at which the ship was docking. There had to be ten or more other ships already docked along the station and John focused his attention on studying as much as he could about the ships and technology around him.
He was clearly in Alliance territory as they were the only space faring group that John was aware of. But, from where he was crouched he could already see the diversity of the ships at the station. The Alliance, as far as Atlantis understood, was made up of a large collection of space faring worlds, who had all united together to battle the Wraith, very successfully to the point where there were no Wraith in their territory. The Wraith had been pushed out of a large area of the galaxy and they had not been happy about it and took that aggression out on all the rest of the worlds not under the Alliance cover. The only other contact Atlantis had with the Alliance was a rather nasty run in with some Genii rebels last year, but their government who were part of the Alliance, had denied all knowledge and all contact was cut off. So basically Atlantis knew next to nothing about the Alliance, so John decided he would learn as much as he could for Atlantis, but also to distract himself from the humiliation and nervousness he felt at his current situation.
He had been let out of his cage to join the rest of the men to be herded out of the ship and into a narrow corridor which presumably attached the ship to the station. He had clearly been labelled a 'trouble maker' as once he was in the corridor his chains had been adjusted so that his arms were behind his back – restrained at his wrists and above his elbows. The other prisoners also appeared to be cautious of him, keeping their distance as much as possible. He had tried to talk to them, but conversation was 'discouraged' by the guards and their cattle prods.
There were no windows in the narrow corridor they were all queued up in, so John contented himself with studying the other prisoners around him. They were dressed in various styles of clothing, some clearly from the same worlds, whilst others were not. There were even two who had what appeared to be purple skin and their eyes, when they lifted them enough for John to see, were also of a deep purple colour.
What was most apparent, and shocking for John, was how compliant all the prisoners were. They just all did as they were told and kept to themselves. Most kept their eyes down, like they were shamed or perhaps frightened. And that they clearly preferred not to be near John told him that they had a good understanding of what was going on and what would happen if they didn't do as they were told. John wished he did, or perhaps not.
The queue moved forward and John could now see that each man in turn had to stand up on a raised metal platform and a bright light passed over them twice before they were waved forward down to a room beyond. John's turn finally arrived and he stepped up onto the platform with curiosity. There were several guards and what looked like a bored scientist standing next to emitters on both sides of the platform. A bright yellow light swept down over him, as it had done to each of the men before, but unlike those previous occasions this time the light turned red before it shut off. John looked to his right to the scientist who had pulled forward a flat screen and was studying it with a frown. John craned his neck to see. He couldn't understand the language flashing up, but he understood the human outline and a large red circle around his right upper arm. They had detected his locater implant.
The scientist stepped up to John and held a small device to John's upper arm. John felt a brief burst of warmth against his arm and the scientist stepped away. The yellow light played over John again and this time there was no flash of red. They had disabled his locator. Crap. Another source of rescue crushed.
A blue light played out now, bathing him slowly as it had for the other men. A faint buzzing sensation played over John's skin. The light shut off and a guard nudged him forward. Guessing he had just been decontaminated, he stepped carefully down from the platform, aware of how much more difficult it was to walk down steep steps when your arms were pinned behind your back.
He stood patiently as the rest of the men were processed and then finally the far door of the room opened and the guards divided them all up into three groups. John's was last out and he was held back till the end so that guards could no doubt keep an extra eye on him. His group were then marched out into a bustling area of activity.
The station had the vibe of an airport; everyone moving quickly through it from one place to another. Everything was clean and well kept, but it was spartan and dull. As the corridor they were walked down opened up John found himself in what was clearly a market hall. But, it was a tidy, quiet kind of place, full of people who were more interested in completing their business than talking with anyone. John got a good eye full of several tables of weaponry that ranged from swords and guns, to large technological looking devices. Rodney would have loved it here. John was pushed on and they reached their destination a few moments later. The far end of the market hall had more open space and along one wall was one large stall, in front of which stood various waist high cages…full of people.
John's group were herded towards two empty cages. As John waited for his turn to be pushed inside, he casually checked out the area around him. If he got away he might be able to lose himself in the market crowd. Of course he had no idea where he was or how to get off a space station, but he could work that out later.
A cattle prod slammed into his side and he cried out as the electricity danced along all his nerve endings. He fell down to his knees and without his arms to support him he barely managed to stop himself from falling forward onto his face. The prod was pulled back and he panted to get his breath back as the pain receded. The floor was a shiny marble like material he noticed as he worked to ignore the numb tingling sensation throughout his middle. Two feet appeared beside him and he looked up at a smirking older woman, who held a cattle prod in her hand.
"I see we have a trouble maker here," she said with what John considered relish rather than annoyance.
John worked to regain his breath before he answered. "My father would agree with you."
She frowned at him and nodded to the guards behind John, who unstrapped his arms from behind him and his hands were abruptly free. Unfortunately he was in no state to do anything about his new freedom, but almost immediately his hands were pulled round to his front and chained up again. He was then unceremoniously shoved into the cage and the door was slammed shut behind him. The cage was too low to make anything but sitting comfortable. The others in the cage had settled down already leaving John with the very front of the cage in which to sit. There were flat pieces of thin metal spread over the floor of the cage to make sitting on the bars slightly more comfortable. With an angry grumble John sat down with a loud grunt and glared up at the stall owner through the bars of his new prison. She smiled down at him and turned away to a large electronic board on which she began to enter information. John watched the unknown language pass over the screen for all in the market to see. He might not be able to read the details, but he understood what he was seeing and his worst prediction was finally confirmed; he was a slave for sale.
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John sat sullen and grumpy in his cage for the rest of the day. More people had begun to arrive in the station and the market area had filled up with a massive crowd, many of which came over the to the slave stall.
Now John knew what cattle felt like in a market. At least no one was leading him around by his nose and hitting him with a stick. Well, not yet anyway. Though judging by the eclectic group of women looking over the cages he couldn't be too sure that his future wouldn't include something along those lines.
He watched the greedy eyes studying him. At first he had tried telling people who he was, but had given up on that as it had worked again him, only resulting in the seller raising his 'price' in response. He had been infinitely insulted by that and had begun to take out his frustrations on the stall keeper. She had responded to his outbursts with the cattle prod, which had one fortunate side affect of dissuading several women from 'buying' him. But, the tingling numbing sensation from the prods was getting too uncomfortable for him to keep up that routine, so he had lapsed into angry silence.
His future did not look good at this point. If he was sold who knew where he would end up and judging by the way some of the sold slaves were treated when they were handed over by the stall owner, John wasn't too keen on that way out. If he put up enough protests he had hoped to put people off buying him, but his price was high enough for him to understand that the stall owner intended to get a good price for him. It wouldn't be too long until one woman with a sparkle in her eye paid for him. John tried to control the shudder he felt at that thought. So, he did his best to appear difficult and unmanageable by glaring at the onlookers and to keep himself amused he took every opportunity to make snide comments at the stall owner.
That was until he saw 'her' across the room.
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TBC