Page 3

CHAPTER 3

S he woke to light. Bright, artificial, too white to be natural.

And glass. Or something like it. Clear walls on all sides. She was enclosed. Exposed.

Sylvia bolted upright with a gasp.

The container she was in was rectangular, sleek, and seamless. Transparent but glowing faintly around the edges, its material pulsing with faint circuitry. There were no seams, no doors. Just containment. She could move, yes, but not far. A few steps in any direction met invisible resistance. Her breath fogged the surface in front of her as she reached out…

And recoiled.

She was on display.

Like a product.

Her pulse pounded in her ears. Her mouth went dry.

No. No. No.

She spun, taking in the market around her. Other beings—aliens, creatures of all shapes and sizes—milled about a cavernous space beneath a domed ceiling that stretched far above. Strange symbols flickered across suspended panels. Drones hovered overhead. The air buzzed with voices—clicks, growls, melodic tones—none of it human.

None of it comprehensible.

This couldn’t be real.

But it was.

Her fingers trembled as they touched her own skin, her face. No dream. No hallucination.

She was here—wherever here was.

The outfit they’d forced her into clung to her like a curse: two pieces of slick, iridescent fabric that barely covered her. Her stomach was bare. Her legs, her arms. She crossed her arms over her chest instinctively, heart thudding with a sharp, primal rage.

How dare they?

How dare they dress her like this and parade her like a prize animal?

She pressed her forehead to the glass. “This isn’t happening,” she whispered.

But it was.

One by one, the beings approached.

The first was spindly and grey-skinned, with a bulbous head and long, three-fingered hands. Its voice was like a wind chime tangled in a storm. It stared at her, blinkless, fingers twitching as it spoke to a nearby drone. Glyphs floated around them, changing rapidly. Then it reached out, gesturing toward her.

To her horror, a section of the container slid open with a hiss.

“No!” she jerked back, but it was already reaching in.

Its hand touched her arm—clammy, cool, and dry. It stroked her skin with a deliberate slowness, as though examining a fruit in a market stall.

She swatted it away. “Don’t touch me!”

But the thing only blinked once, cocked its head, and withdrew.

Then came another.

Red-skinned, hulking, armored. It tapped the controls with a clawed hand. The panel hissed open again, and it reached in. Its fingers brushed her cheek before running down her shoulder. She flinched and shoved its hand away, disgust curling in her stomach.

They weren’t seeing her. Not as a person. Not as Sylvia Russo, twenty-seven, from Cronulla, who worked two jobs and had just broken off an engagement she’d tried to convince herself was right.

No. To them, she was meat. Exotic. Rare. Valuable.

Her skin crawled with disgust.

Her soul recoiled in horror.

This was really happening. This absolute fucking nightmare.

More came. Dozens, maybe more. She lost count.

Some asked to touch her, others simply stared. One appeared to take pictures with some strange alien device. She wanted to scream, to lash out, to claw at the walls. But the collar pulsed at her throat whenever she raised her voice, and she quickly learned not to push it.

And the worst part—worse than the touch, worse than the humiliation—was the helplessness.

There was no escape. No Earth to run back to. No help.

No one.

She blinked against the sting in her eyes. Her throat tightened. The tears were coming.

But she refused.

No. Not here. Not in front of them.

She clenched her jaw, bit down hard, and glar ed through the glass at the next one who came near.

They wouldn’t see her cry. They wouldn’t see her break.

Her fear was ice beneath her rage, and both held her upright.

Let them stare. Let them prod.

Let them wonder what they were really buying.

Because she wasn’t just some trembling thing from a backwards planet.

She was Sylvia. She was human.

And she would survive. She had to.