Content Warning: Graphic descriptions of mistreatment. Slavery conditions on Sakaar are upsetting, and it is an violent interpretation of the "pig pens" in Spirited Away when Chihiro sees her parents in the barn.

...

The Pen

I flinch awake with a gasp. It's in the middle of the night, and my stomach is growling loudly. Not eating all day yesterday finally catches up with me fully, and I eat the crackers and drink from the waterskin that MJ had slipped to me. It's not filling, and it's not good. My stomach continues to rumble even when I'm done.

Hopefully, though, it's enough to help me refuse breakfast tomorrow. But I can't hold out much longer than that. I have a few hours at most.

It feels like I blink for only a moment, and when I do, it's no longer midnight and there is a gray light peering in from the small, slated window. My spider-sense picks up on a thin, wraith-like figure, sneaking between the bunks. Before I can overreact, my senses seem to recall the same presence that MJ brings - an intelligent, saddened aura of a friendship long forgotten and her self-defensive fears. I feel that again, and I know it's MJ - or Sendriel - sneaking through the room, looking over each bunk till she finds me.

She reaches out into the darkness, tapping on my shoulder.

"Hey, Midgard, I can take you to see your Aunt," MJ whispers. "Be quiet and follow me."

She slides open the panel in the wall, beckons me after her. I tiptoe past the other bunks of sleeping gladiators and slide in behind her, and push the panel shut again.

She sneaks through the darkness and drops down into a thin opening in the wall, kind of like a dumbwaiter without the lift. It's a short fall, only about four feet. I can hear the sounds of people in the building stirring to life.

MJ ducks and crawls through a crawlspace, and I follow her. She pushes against a vent in the wall, which pops it out onto the muddy ground, touched by a silvery frost.

It's early morning, and the sun - or whatever it is that provides them light, whether it's artificial or not - is on a set rising schedule, and about to breach the edge of the city. Smoke and smells rise from the chimneys, and there is a distinct morning chill.

I can see my breath, and hers, rising in plumes.

"Why are you helping me?" I ask, now that we're outside. "I thought… I thought after yesterday… I might never see you again."

She looks at me over her shoulder. "I was in your shoes once," she says. "And there was no one there to help me."

"Do you remember your parents?" I ask.

She shrugs, pushing a finger to her lips, and points above us. Some of the windows in the side of the building are open. "Come on," she whispers.

We maneuver through the junk in piles. If we had met when we were younger, we may have played in junkyards or abandoned lots, and it would have felt like this. Skirting around huge behemoth pieces of junk and machinery haphazardly thrown together, mountains of trash beginning to steam as the morning light touches them.

"Is… this where the cannibals are?" I ask quietly.

She shakes her head. "This is just Sakaarian trash. The landfills outside the city are even worse."

There's a footbridge over a chasm, and the churning gray waters beneath are full of trash and sewage. The smell is awful. She grasps one hand on the railing of the footbridge, followed by her other hand, and she walks herself across the small bridge, hand over hand at the railing.

"You okay?" I ask. I don't touch the railing. I don't need to.

"Don't like heights," MJ says shortly.

"Oh, okay."

She stumbles a little in her concentration, jumping off the last step of the bridge and landing on the hard dirt ground on the other side. When I step off, I find myself reaching for her elbow to steady her, but I remember yesterday, and I don't touch her arm.

"You sure?" I say again.

MJ shakes her head. "Like I said."

On this side of the bridge, a large warehouse-like building, sort of like a barn but more like a science fiction bunker, sits nestled between heaving stacks of trash. She jerks her head towards it. "She's in here."

"Thank you," I say quickly, walking up to the door. My heart pounds. How will Aunt May look? Will she still remember me? Or will she be like MJ?

I reach my hand up to press the button for entrance, when MJ catches my wrist in her own. "Don't, yet," she begins. "I mean - just - you need to prepare yourself for what you're going to see in there."

I turn towards her, eyebrows furrowing. "So, tell me what I'm going to see."

"Prisoners," she says. "Hundreds of them. Okay? It's not… it's difficult to accept. What you will see in there. I need you to promise you're not going to go totally crazy and like, Hulk out."

I feel my eyes growing wide. "How… how do you even know about the Hulk? How do you remember him?"

"The Hulk was a champion in the games," she lets go of my wrist. "Till he disappeared. Everyone knows about him. He's legendary."

"So you don't remember Bruce Banner."

"I don't know who that is. And the Hulk hasn't been seen for years and years." She frowns. "Don't distract me. I need you to promise you're not going to go absolutely crazy when you see your Aunt and vow revenge and escape and you rush back to the Hold and try to kill everybody there and blah blah blah…"

"I promise I won't make a scene," I say, unsure. "How bad is she? Is she getting fed?"

"It's not a question of whether or not she's getting food," MJ shakes her head. "It's how they keep the prisoners. Just remember, she can't… feel anything."

"Feel?" I respond with a sort of high pitch creeping in. "Feel anything?" I slam my hand on the button. "Being vague is not helpful."

A flash of hurt crosses her face. "I risked a lot to get you out here, you know."

"And I'm... really, really grateful! But if you're trying to prepare me for seeing something, you might as well tell me..."

"Hell," she responds lightly. The doors begin to whine and crank, sliding aside like a door in Star Wars, only the garbage truck version. "I wish I had some sort of Midgardian basis of comparison for you. But I don't."

I feel a skitter down my spine and step over the threshold. MJ is close behind me.

It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust in the darkness. It is like a barn; rows and rows of walled stalls, dirt floored paths between aisles. There's a right or a left on either side of me, with further aisles on either side, and one right in front of me.

I can see the distinct shapes of people through the chicken-wired windows, pressed shoulder to shoulder like old historical photos of prisoners in concentration camps. The air smells warm and dank like body odor. It's eerily quiet. If there is this many people in one place, I would imagine there would at least be a hum of conversation.

"Where is she?" I whisper.

"Number six, straight ahead," MJ answers tightly. "I'll go first. Don't look too closely."

"I don't think I can help that," I respond.

Her thin figure walks with some familiarity and resolute strength down the center aisle, passing by the first, second, third stall. I follow and keep my eyes on her back, her shoulders, the curls of brown hair tied back with an old twine. Today she's wearing long, light-red dress over black cargo pants and military-looking boots. Nothing fancy like before.

Her arms are distinctly bruised and rough-looking today. I wonder if they were like that yesterday, or if something happened to her between the spa-room and this morning. The thought of the unknown fills me with anxiety, spiced with displaced rage on her behalf.

I keep glancing at the corner of my eye, but trying not to. Finally realizing what I'm seeing makes me stop in my tracks.

People pressed shoulder to shoulder in rows, hanging in some sort of black harness from long lines of pipery running through the open ceiling plumbing across the whole ceiling of this barn, interspersed and attached to the rafters. The black harnesses aren't really harnesses, not like something you'd use for parachutes or zip-lining.

I don't know what they are. They appear to be connected to them, as much as holding them a few inches off the ground, as if they are gutted pigs lined up in a butcher's shop for mass production. Dark cords wind from the mechanism into their forearms, like an IV, into their throats through their mouths like oxygen masks, and some sort of console or reader-board hangs on their chests with vitals in symbols and languages that I don't understand. A sort of IV cylinder hangs above each person with a bubbling liquid inside. All these wires and connections hang above them, connecting to the piping.

They're all sleeping, heads hanging limp, chins to their chests. The bodies look in various states of perhaps the way they arrives - some bloody, scratched, muddy and battered. Clothes torn, hanging, damaged or missing.

I let out a sort of strangled breath. "Oh… no, no, no…"

MJ has stopped. I've stopped too, only because I think I might be sick.

"Number six," she says softly. "Remember what I told you. She can't feel anything. She's just sleeping. They keep them in a stasis like this until they can sell them as slaves or put them to work here."

I shoulder past her into the open stall. There's no doors or locks. They wouldn't need them, after all. The people lining each stall, five rows of six, all hang in quiet comas. Some of them aren't even human. I spot the blue skin of a Kree, the green skin of something else that I don't know. A pointy-eared Centaurian, and golden Sovereign. The rest are human - or appear human.

My whole body is shaking as I move down one row, turn, and go back up the next row.

Aunt May hangs in the third.

A horrible sort of gurgle of grief bubbles up my throat and nearly makes me scream, but I swallow it down quickly. Her head is dropped, her long, dark hair hanging dirty and matted in front of her face. She's still wearing the same clothes she was wearing the day we were taken - blue jeans, a floral top, white tennis shoes. The sweater is missing.

Her clothes are hideously dirty and frayed, scratches and mudstains across every surface. The places where the wires enter her forearm are bruised yellow, her fingernails dark with dried blood. Probably not hers - she fought and fought hard, probably scratched up one of the abductors really good. Even if she couldn't remember who she was, surely she would have walked into a place like this and fought as hard as she could to get away.

I feel sorry for whatever horrifying fear she might have felt when she couldn't get away.

I move her hair away from her face, nearly gagging again with gut-wrenching horror. Her face is bruised too, huge and painful scabs of dried blood on her forehead and scalp.

"Aunt May," I whisper quietly. "It's going to be okay. I'll get you out. I promise." My voice breaks entirely. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry."

I move her hair behind her ears, and carefully lift her chin gently into the air. The mask on the lower half of her face makes a slight creaking sound, and the bubbles in the hanging cylinder seem to guzzle a little faster.

Her eyes are black with purple bruises and smeared makeup, the mascara dried in black tears running down each cheek. Whatever coma they put these people in, they certainly didn't do it soon enough. She's suffered. All of these people have. You can see it on each face.

They might be in some sort of induced paralysis, but it's not sleep. Sleep is restful. Each one looks as if they were frozen in a moment of absolute terror and then just dropped where they stood.

I examine the various cords hooked up to her body. Whatever they are, they're keeping her alive and complacent here among the hundreds. But they don't look clean, either. This looks like the most medically unsanitary environment ever dreamed up by a psychopath, storing humans for their various slave trades and gladiator games.

At least the gladiators stay in a prison cell full of bunks. Nothing like this.

"Is she going to be okay?" I manage to say, my voice hoarse. "Please tell me - whatever this is - it isn't killing her."

MJ appears quietly at my side. "She's okay. She doesn't know what's happening. When she wakes up, she'll have no memories of this. Only the moment you were both taken. Even that will fade away if she stays and eats and drinks here. It works on long term memories mostly. She'll remember her daily life as a slave - like I do - if she stays here."

"It's inconsistent..." I say. "So maybe it will be like Rocket! And Bereet! They seem to do just fine."

"It's because they're not human," MJ answers. "It affects humans more than anyone. And it's usually for slaves and other palace staff. They usually don't feed that shit to the gladiators… or favorites. You probably won't have to have much of it if you keep fighting. But if you're particularly problematic," she gives me a stern look. "If you give them a lot of trouble, they slip it in. So. Stay out of trouble."

There's a short silence.

"Do you have any water?" I ask.

"I wouldn't drink the water they give me," she says, and I detect a hint of sadness. "It's definitely tainted."

"It's not for me."

She quickly shrugs out of a light pack hanging on one shoulder, and removes a small canteen from the top flap. I hook my hands on the edges of my shirt and pull it up and off over my head, and accept the canteen from her.

"Thanks," I say, pouring water onto my shirt.

MJ stares just a half-second too long at my abdomen before turning around and walking back to the door. "I'll give you a moment."

I use my T-shirt like a rag to clean the dirt and makeup off Aunt May's face. There isn't anything I can do for her clothes, not while she's hanging in here like a piece of meat.

I try to clean off some of the blood and grime off her arms, too, but the wires going under her skin make it difficult. I'm worried I'll hurt her.

I put my damp T-shirt back on and screw the canteen shut.

"I love you, Aunt May," I whisper to her grotesque, scarecrow-like figure. "I promise I will get you out. I have to leave you here just a little longer while I figure out how we can escape. I promise you. It won't be long."

Her head droops limply, body swaying from where it hangs. I touch her face carefully, and I put both hands on her shoulders. I can't really hug her with this harness, nor would it matter if she isn't mentally present to hug me back.

"I'll come back," I assure her. "I'll…"

I pause, feeling more wires just beneath my fingertips on her shoulders. Confused, I walk around her, bumping into the hanging human man behind me. The pipes above us creak, the bodies sway.

There's even more wires coming out of her back. All along her spine. Every place where the wires are, plunging through her shirt and to the skin below, old blood and dirt all across her back and staining her jeans. The wires wind together and go up to the pipes, like an overly zealous cord junkie trying to connect audio, internet, TV and gaming systems all up to one power-strip.

"Shit," I whisper out loud. "Oh shit shit shit…"

Whatever plan I have for getting May out, it needs to include kidnapping one of the professional traffickers here at the barn and forcing them to undo this. There is no way I can go through and just… pull all these things out without severely hurting or even killing her.

They're plugged into her spine…

"Aunt May," I whisper, convulsively swallowing and moving to the front again. "If you can hear me. Don't be afraid. Please. I love you. I will get you out. I swear. I will."

The gagging I had managed to keep at bay earlier come in full force now. I rush out of the stall, drop the canteen to put my palms against my knees, and retch towards the barn floor. Nothing comes up - of course. I hadn't had anything to eat yet this morning, the untainted crackers from long ago.

I spit on the ground a few times, trying to control my breathing. It isn't really working.

"We should go," MJ says tightly, appearing again at my side. "It's getting late. They'll sound the wake-up call soon, and you'll need to be back in your bunk as if you'd never left."

I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. "Are you sure?" I ask blearily. "Are you sure she isn't in any pain?"

She shakes her head. "I guess I can't be absolutely sure. But… I wasn't."

"Were you kept in here too?" I ask.

She nods and looks away. "Long time ago."

"How did you get out?"

"What do you think?" she gives me a look. "The Grandmaster liked my look. Wanted me in his palace-staff. So he had his minions unhook me, clean me up, and delivered me to him. I've been serving drinks ever since."

"And you don't remember anything before that?"

"Like I told you before," she says tiredly, "I might has well have been born the day I got out of this hellhole."

"You don't remember New York, or…"

"I don't know what that means."

"MJ…"

"Stop calling me that," she shivers, bending down suddenly and wrenching the canteen off the ground, stuffing it into her pack once more. "I'm Sendriel here. If you accidentally slip and tell someone that you knew me from Midgard, they're be hell to pay for you, and probably death for me. How do you not get that yet? So keep your mouth shut."

She grabs my elbow and jerks me down the aisle. I force myself to put one foot in front of the other, instead of lingering at the door and resolving to watch over Aunt May till they discover I'm missing.

MJ and I step out the door. The morning light has broken through the gray clouds, and the frosts have begun to melt, trickling down the trash heaps and muddy puddles running into small streams. The footbridge sways in a sharp wind.

I think of the cords coming out of Aunt May's spine.

I sink to my knees, right into the muck, tears of frustration and sickness streaming down my face.

"Come on, I thought heights didn't bother you," MJ says brusquely.

"It's not the heights," I say quietly. "Just give me a moment."

I brace one elbow up on the nearest junk that looks like an old washing machine tipped sideways and hoist myself back up. I take deep, central breaths and blow out through my mouth.

"What are you doing?" she asks confusedly.

"It's… I'm just breathing," I say shortly. "Trying to keep myself from having a panic attack."

"Does it help?"

"Some… times," I stutter, scrubbing at my eyes with my palm.

"Show me."

I hesitate. "Well. Okay." I straighten and reach over, palm outward. "Can I take your hand?"

Based on our conversation yesterday, she seems genuinely surprised that I ask, and then relieved. "Okay," she says, putting her hand in mine.

I take her hand gently and put it on my chest. She can feel my heart racing beneath my shirt, how overheated my skin is. "Deep breaths with me," I say. "In and out. In and out. Like this."

I press her hand beneath my own, and she follows my breathing. Her lips part to exhale, shut again to inhale through her nose.

I fold my other hand over ours. Both keep hers at my chest, rising and falling, the rhythm growing slightly more rapid as I try to quell my own panic, and then suddenly realizing the additional jolt of adrenaline rushing through me at her touch.

She tugs on her hand, and I let it go quickly, feeling embarrassed. She lets both hands hang at her sides. "I have to go," she says. "Can you find your own way back? Through the panel, and replace the vent. Don't get seen."

"Yeah. I can do it."

Without another word, she turns and rushes away from me.

I feel instantly cold without her standing so close to me. I think about Aunt May hanging in that pen with hundreds of others, suspended in that dirty agony.

I bend my chin to my chest and let out a short sob, indulging in that fear and grief for a moment.

...

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Review Replies

warlocktoungue - that's SUCH A GOOD QUESTION! I tried to work an answer into the narrative as well to lessen confusion, but I will explain more here as well. This is where a bit of a translation between film and story is difficult. In the Spirited Away movie, Haku and Chihiro lose their memories because they are both from Japan... the real world. Haku gives Chihiro a berry to eat that helps her remember her own name and her parents, because she starts to lose all her memories just like he did. The movie never explains why he doesn't just eat a berry, too! Maybe it was too late for him, and he tried, and it didn't work? Or maybe because he's a river god and not a human? Like any fairy tale, "true love" helps him remember his true identity. I'm not going to do that in my story, it just wouldn't work in an MCU setting. Characters like Lin in Spirited Away look human (like Bereet) but they aren't human, and they are "natives" of this alternative universe. So in translating the plots here, I imagine that people from Midgard specifically are very badly affected and are purposefully given more tainted food and drink to keep them compliant. Rocket doesn't have the same body chemistry and neither is Bereet because neither of them are human. Hopefully this answers your question! I love your attention to detail!

EleanorGardner - thank you so much for your reviews, I am so glad you are enjoying! Peter is totally a cinnamon roll! I love it.

LoonyLovegood1981 - Yep, you're not too far off from that! I think Peter's going to have to have a few escape attempts before he finally gets away! Even though I'm enjoying writing this story I wish I could fast forward to my happy ending. It will be quite refreshing to have a major happy ending story without any major character deaths lol. Thanks for reading :)