MISCOMMUNICATION (10)

Where am I? was the first thought on Lucy's mind when she woke up. She couldn't feel any pain, yet she was shot. She remembered being shot by Snake. At first she thought she was dead or in the hospital, but as her vision focused, she discovered that was not the case.

She was in a room with strange texturing on the walls. Fog pooled the floor below, and everything was light in a dim blue light. She was resting on a slab off to the far side from where the door to the room was.

"Definitely not in Boston anymore." Lucy said, before addressing her wounds. To her surprise, they'd been bandaged, and when she took them off they'd almost completely healed. She wondered what happened after she passed out. Who came for her? How much time had gone by? Then she remembered Nightmare.

It must've taken her here. Where here was, or why it took her here, Lucy didn't know. For all she knew she was in his freezer waiting to become his next snack. Lucy knew what it could do. She remembered the skinned, half-eaten bodies from the Tiller Hotel and the subway station. Lucy remembered what that bastard did to her parents.

Lucy felt a small wave of anger come over her when she thought about that. She was going to make it pay for what it did to them. But first she needed to get out.

She moved off the bed and towards the door. It was triangular in shape with hieroglyphs that were similar to the the markings on the walls, and a small window that she could see out of. Lucy was almost surprised by how tall the door was. It was so tall she had to stand on her toes just to see out of the window, but even then it was difficult.

She could see another room outside with more strange markings and designs. The room was much larger than the one she was in, and was held up by six pillars that surrounded a strange orange light source on the ceiling in the center of the room. She could see more doors at the other end of the room, and hypothesized that there were more that she couldn't see.

As Lucy looked through the window, her knee accidently brushed up against one of the textures on the door. Lucy jumped back as the markings folded back to reveal a pannel inside the door. She put her hand on it and a series of symbols came up in the spaces. She couldn't understand any of them. Lucy curiously pressed one of them and it beeped at her. She jumped back and waited for a short moment to see what would happen. Nothing.

She came back to the pannel and pressed another button. It beeped at her. She pressed a third button. This time it lit up and chirped.

Oh, so it's like a combination key code, Lucy thought. She pressed another key. It also chirped. Then another. It beeped, reseting her progress as it did so.

"Dammit!" She cursed before starting over. She ended up having to redo the combination four seperate times. On her last try, she began to hear something that sounded like heavy footsteps approaching. She stood up to look through the window on the door. There was nothing there.

Suddenly the door opened, and she saw a camouflaged figure towering over her. Nightmare!

Lucy laid there on the floor petrified. The monster's figure then began to spark with electricity as it's camouflage deactivated. She couldn't make out very many details in the dim light, but there were a few things she could see. The creature was seven feet tall, perhaps taller. The creature had rough scaly skin, like that of a reptile. It was faint but, Lucy could also see strips on the creatures body. Its face was masked. It growled when it saw her.

"Well... Let's do this!" She told it as she put her hands up to fight it. Lucy knew this monster was stronger than her. She had no weapons, and there was no way she could take it on with her bare hands. Maybe she could outsmart it somehow. Either way she wasn't going to take this lying down.

"Well what are you waiting for? I'm right here! Come and get me!" She asked. The monster wasn't attacking. It was just standing there, staring at her. After a couple of seconds it came forward.

As it stepped into the room the light adjusted and she could see more of the creature. It's skin was a different color. Nightmare had black skin with red strips, but this one was green skin with bluish yellow hues. Lucy thought to herself when she noticed this. Either these things could change color, or this was a different creature. That's when the realization hit Lucy, There's more than one of them!

Lucy took a mental picture of its mask.

The mask had a smooth bronze polish to it, and there several small potrusions on the upper half. There were three parallel slits where the mouth part was. Perhaps it was a gas mask or something that helped it to breath. It was already clear it wasn't human, maybe it didn't breath air like regular humans could. The eyes of the mask came together to form a visor. There was a blue symbol on its forehead that looked like a backward Z.

As the creature came Lucy noticed it was holding something in its hands. It was a tray. The creature set what it down on the slab, and turned its attention to her.

Lucy crawled back, but it pulled her forward by her foot. The monster held her firmly by the throat. Lucy began fighting back, but her attempts to get the creature off or break its grip were futile.

The beast moved its claws toward the bandages, and carefully removed them. it growled when it saw them. Lucy noticed what he was trying to do and stopped fighting.

It continued looking over her injuries, and after seeing that they'd healed, it let her go.

Why didn't it kill me? Lucy asked herself curiously as the creature left. She couldn't understand. Perhaps it wanted her alive? It seemed like that was the case. Why else would he have treated her wounds, and brought her here? Lucy wasn't sure, but she didn't trust it.

As Lucy sat up she noticed what the creature left behind. It was a mushy substance. Probably food? Lucy cautiously took a piece of it in her hand, and smelled it. Lucy gagged as she inhaled the awful smell before setting the filth back on the tray.

Lucy began exploring the rest of the creature's lair. Some of the doors would open for her automatically, while others wouldn't. She tried finding a pannel for them, but none revealed themselves. Perhaps her "savior" didn't want her to find her way out or something.

She was still allowed to move through some parts of the ship freely. One of the rooms she was allowed to go into looked like a training room of some sort. There was a circular platform in the center of the room. Several ruinic symbols were etched on the platform's stony surface, and she could see more gracing the walls of the room. There were also several shelves and racks on the walls.

There were several bladed objects on the walls. Weapons. Lucy recognized one of the monster's jagged wrist knives. She scowled when she saw them. Nightmare had used them to kill her parents.

Lucy continued looking at the wall rack she and saw more masks, each varied in design. As she continued, she also saw a bow, one of the monster's shoulder guns, several disc shaped objects, and a couple weird cylindrical objects with points at the ends. She went to touch one of them, but as she did so she heard a growl from the other side of the room. It was the creature.

He stomped towards her. Lucy prepared to fight, but it didn't attack. It focused on the wall and began tapping on some of the symbols. The weapon racks slid back as the walls came together, concealing them.

The creature looked down at her and gave an irate growl. Perhaps he was touchy with his gear? After that he left the room. Lucy wasn't sure what to think of it. She couldn't understand. She was seeing the inside of the monster's lair, yet after everything she'd seen it didn't answer any of her questions. In fact it just made her ask more questions. Why was this thing here? What was it doing? What did it want? And what did it want with her?

At the time though, Lucy didn't care. All she wanted was to get out.

She followed the monster into another room. This room was different from the rest of the structure. Some of the rooms textures and symbols were blinking with energy. The creature tapped on some of these symbols. Suddenly part of the wall opened up revealing a control pannel. There were two large screens above the pannel.

"Hey," Lucy said. the creature didn't respond. "Hey," Lucy said again. No response. "Excuse me," Again, no response. This was getting annoying.

"Hello, I'd like to go home," Lucy tried again. This time she tapped on its shoulder. It growled softly, almost like it was deliberately ignoring her.

Lucy groaned. She looked over at the wall and saw another cylindrical object. She grabbed it and slowly approached.

Just as she was about to hit the giant with the object, he grabbed the object. It hadn't even been looking when she did that, yet somehow it still sensed what she was doing. The humanoid tore it from her hands. The creature arched it's back and threw its arms wide as it let out a loud hiss.

Lucy took it as a sign of aggression and kicked at him. Just as her foot was about to connect with his face he grabbed it. The monster threw her to the wall in retaliation. After hitting the wall, it let out a shrill hiss. Just as Lucy was about to get up the monster stomped towards her and pinned her against the wall. She responded by kicking him in leg hard, causing him to lose his balance. She then brought the palm of her hand into the monster's masked face. Her first hurt when she did that, but the mask had come loose. The creature tried fixing it but before he could do so, Lucy spun around and sent her foot into his face.

The mask flew off his face.

"Want anymore?!" Lucy said with in a cocky tone.

The creature turned sharply revealing it's face. Lucy jumped back. Four crab-like mandibles clicked and flarred angrily creating a growling noise. Small hair-like frills on the monster's forehead raised in an aggressive display as it's yellow eyes locked onto her.

Lucy tripped over, she was too shocked by what she saw to pay attention. The monster picked up the item she'd tried to hit it with earlier, and stomped towards her. As Lucy was about to get up, the monster grabbed onto her shirt with one of its claws, before throwing her to the far end of the room. The force of the collision knocked the wind out of her.

As she recovered the monster pressed a button on the object, causing it to unfold. It was a spear, but it had two edges, and it was collapsible. The creature approached with the telescoping spear. Lucy got up, but the monster grabbed her, lifted her off the ground, and pressed her up against the wall. Lucy closed her eyes as the monster prepared to impale her with it's spear.

Lucy heard the spear hit the wall just inches away from her. She opened her eyes. It'd missed.

She looked back at the enraged monster. Its eyes locked onto her menacingly. Its mandibles opened wide as it shrieked in her face. Lucy closed her eyes as the creature's hot breath hit her face.

Lucy opened her eyes again, as the creature gently twisted her head side to side to get a look at her. Its mandibles made another clicking sound, before dropping her. Lucy coughed and gagged as the monster collapsed its spear and put it back where she'd got it.

The monster turned around to give her another hard glare before picking up its mask and positioning it back on its face. The creature grunted at her again before walking away.

Lucy decided to spend the rest of the day in the room she woke up in, and let the monster vent in peace.

/

Lucy woke up a couple hours later feeling like shit. The creature hit harder than she thought. Thankfully it didn't kill her, especially after she antagonized it yesterday. She felt that an apology was in order.

"Hello," Lucy called out softly. She was calm. She still didn't know the creatures true motives, but if it wanted her dead it wouldn't have gone through the trouble of saving her.

"Hello," She called out again as she began searching the place for the monster. Lucy found him inside the control room. She approached him carefully, announcing her presence as she entered.

"Hey I-" Before she could get out a full sentence she noticed the front of the room where the two screens had been. They were slid back to reveal Earth and the black void of space surrounding them.

Lucy's jaw dropped when she saw it. They weren't in a lair or a structure. This was a ship. An alien ship. When Lucy saw this everything began to make sense. There was no way this creature could have come from Earth. It was an alien from outer space. When she thought about it, she wasn't all that surprised, but it still amazed her nonetheless.

The alien let out a hiss as soon as it saw her. Lucy put her hands in the air as the alien approached.

"Hey, hey, hey. I came to-," Lucy spoke. The seven foot tall humaniod towered over her. It growled menacingly as it looked at her. It didn't trust her. She couldn't blame it.

"I came to apologize," Lucy told the alien, keeping her hands up.

The creature stared at her for a moment, growling, before walking back to the control room. She went in with it.

"Listen... Can we talk?" She asked. The alien didn't respond.

"May I please just talk with you?" Lucy said. It continued to ignore her. This was getting irritating.

"Listen I just want to apologize for-." Lucy said as she touched his shoulder. The alien turned sharply and stared her in the eyes. It growled angrily as the eyes on its mask flashed. After a short moment of staring it left the room.

"Well, that went well," Lucy said sarcastically. "Nice job."

A moment later the creature came back with the tray of muck. It handed it to her. Lucy felt her stomach turn, but she ate it without complaint. She may have insulted it if she didn't.

Once she was finished eating she approached the creature.

"Hey," Lucy said as she tapped it on the shoulder. The creature turned and looked at her. It put a hand on her shoulder before shaking it. Lucy couldn't understand the gesture, but it didn't hurt her, so that was something.

"Hello." Lucy said as she waved at it. The creature cocked its head to the side as it growled softly.

"I'm Lucy," She introduced herself. "What is your name?" She asked. It didn't respond. Lucy was sure that it wasn't ignoring her, just that it didn't understand.

"I'm Lucy," She repeated as she pointed to herself. The creature raised one of it's claws and poked her with its index finger.

"Lucy," She told it. "What is you name?" Lucy asked as she pointed at it. The creature growled. It still couldn't understand.

"I'm Lucy," She pointed at herself before pointing at the creature "What is your name?"

The alien pointed a itself curiously. Lucy nodded affirmatively. The alien responded with a series of hand gestures. Lucy knew sign language, but she'd never seen those signs before.

"Shit," She said. "Can you talk?" She said, making the hand signal as she said it. "Can you talk?" She repeated. It cocked its head to the side again, confused. "Yes or no, can you talk?" She signed as she spoke. The creature didn't respond. It was clear it didn't know how. And she was sure that it couldn't speak.

"Fuck it, I'll just call you Mute." She named it.

The creature made another hand gesture.

I don't understand, Lucy signed. The alien made another hand signal.

I don't understand, Lucy signed again. The alien growled in irritation before making another gesture.

"I don't understand, I'm sorry." She told it. The monster growled in irritation before walking away. It was clear to him that she couldn't understand, and he didn't have any patience for this.

"Feeling's mutual," Lucy said softly.

For the next three days things were like this. Lucy tried her best to communicate with Mute, but they couldn't understand one another. They were able to pick up a few things, but it wasn't enough for effective communication. The two would only spend a few minutes together before they lost their patience for it.

On the fourth day Mute approached Lucy.

"What is it, Mute?" She asked impatiently. The last time they tried to talk, he ended up hissing in her face.

Mute motioned for her to follow him. She did as he requested, and she followed him into the control room. The seven foot tall alien tapped on the control pannel, which brought up a holographic image. It was the image of another alien, but Lucy recognized this one.

"Nightmare!" Lucy scowled when she saw it.

Mure growled. He pointed at the black monster on the screen before makiing a clawing gesture at it. This guy had come to kill Nightmare. And he wanted her to help. That's why he saved her.

The alien then pulled up an image of Snake. It pointed at her and then at the drug dealer. Lucy could understand where Mute was going with this. If she helped him kill Nightmare, he'd help her kill Snake.

Lucy didn't even have to think about it. She nodded in understanding.

They were going hunting.