Page 56 of Ruby
In response, I spit blood at him, swearing breathlessly. He glares at me with those creepy black eyes before he retracts his feet and sloughs off with the hunter that came running in. With him gone, I’m surrounded by spectators, none of which move me. It allows me a moment to catch my breath, however painful. It feels like I’ve been run over by ten tractors, each taking its time.
The hunter’s argument has gone past quiet chattering and now they are whispering harshly to each other, clearly engrossed in their little conversation. There is nothing I can do but lay here on the ground and wait for my eventual fate of very obvious death, so I decide to listen in.
“The camp is being moved, seems to be less of us and more of the desiccated green testicles,” the second hunter, much wider than my captor, says.
My head begins to throb and I only hear a mention of spotting a Manticorid… or a spotted Manticorid. Then confusing talk about a venom spitter. Or a tail? And a tail? Whatever it is, it sounds scary if they are talking about it in panicked tones and I don’t want to be here when it gets here.
I make my rattled brain pay more attention; maybe they’re speaking of Szhe’ka or something that could help me or some predatory hunter that would kill my captors and massacre me too. Either way, it’ll be better to be informed; my mother did always say knowledge is power.
“Sounds like an excellent trophy,” my captor says and starts to turn around.
His counterpart holds onto him and they both turn to look at me. I see my captor tighten his hold on his gun and my heart tumbles to my stomach.
The gray blob motions toward me with a clawed flipper. “What about her?”
“She is ruined. I will finish her off,” my captor says and his colleague honks, slapping his back twice and asks him to save some for him.
They laugh together some more before parting ways but all I can think about is how absolutely fucked I am. There really isn’t much I could do to protect myself in this state and as he proved earlier, even if I were in peak physical shape, I would still lose this fight.
My body does not seem to get the memo that I am about to be raped and killed by a disgusting blob monster that probably has a gelatinous dick too, as moisture continues to collect between my legs just like it has since I’ve been here and a laugh tries to bubble back up my throat.
I am frozen, laying prone and watching as my soon-to-be murderer approaches me, unable to do anything.
I’m fucking aroused? I have well and truly lost my mind.
“Did you hear that? You are ruined.”
A blow to my jaw with what feels like his gun follows with a kick to my back and I yelp out in pain.
This is not going to be a quick death.
I spit out the tooth that has come loose along with some blood and scramble to find something to use to defend myself, finding a fist-sized stone, which I weakly try to throw at my tormentor.
It whizzes past his head and he honks before continuing to hit me. All I can do is continue to scream.
“Your metamorphosis was supposed to be mine.”
A kick to my left breast follows and I sob, holding my hands in front of my face. It doesn’t make much of a difference, as he has three thick and stubby legs that are working overtime to inflict harm on me.
“You were supposed to be mine, but you decided to be a whore.”
I’m sure I hear a crack in my ribs but there is pain radiating from every part of me so I can’t be too sure. I don’t even know why I’m still alive to feel all of this. God should be merciful enough to take me quickly, so I don’t have to feel all of this pain.
The sound of a gun cracks through the air and the hits stop. There is a thud behind me and I struggle to let out a painful exhale. This is it then; this is how I die; beaten up and shot by a raging mad hunter for supposedly ruining myself. Something I didn’t even know was a thing.
I had never been beaten like this before. I’ve been hit, sure, what actress hasn’t? Still. It wasn’t something I had ever imagined could happen on this level. I didn’t even live a full life and now I’m going to be dead at thirty-nine.
It’s quiet all of a sudden. The hits I’ve been bracing myself for never comes and I peek past my swollen eyes to see why there’s calm. There’s a silhouette in front of me of some sort of humanoid creature. The creature is speaking to me and I feel my brain try to understand what they’re saying.
“Are you alive?” The person asks and I open my eyes and am instantly met face to face with the lifeless eyes of my captor beside me.
I scramble from the ground too fast and the entire world begins to spin, but a hand with brown and off-white coloring stretches out in front of me, three slender fingers and slightly shorter thumb wide apart from each other.
I make the connection between that and the deep voice.
I allow him to pull me up and take a few steps away from the gray blob, just to assure myself that he really is dead.
“Thank you for saving me back there,” he says, but I can’t find the words to respond.
