Their ship faced another assault, and this time, it was evident that the attackers were not pirates. Small talk was cast aside as the intruders stormed the ship, each armed with identical guns and uniforms. The entrance was aggressive, with the leader—a wolf-like alien—sporting an aggressive smirk, eyeing the surprised crew.
"If it isn't the thorn in the Emperor's side," he snarled. "You better come quietly or..." He gestured menacingly toward the robot in the room, firing multiple bullets with precision into the android. The once vibrant blue eyes of G-MERA now lay lifeless and as black as the abyss.
"G-MERA!" Rito cried out to the fallen robot, ready to run to her side but halted by the barrel of a gun pressed against his back.
Their fate sealed, prisoners of Emperor Drakil, Tobi couldn't help feeling guilty as he looked at his friends. He clenched his fists in frustration, tears threatening to escape. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!" he shouted in sorrow. "I'm sorry I couldn't just accept my life, sorry that I dragged you all out here for my own stupid, selfish want." He rubbed his eyes, intensifying the stinging pain.
"Tobi..." Rito uttered, a tinge of sadness in his eyes as he looked at his friend.
"It's not your fault," Rayla tried to comfort, placing a hand gently on his, but he yanked it away.
"Don't lie. I ruined everything. We'd all be fine if it wasn't for me," Tobi insisted.
Oros growled, "Does that mean you regret saving my life?!" He screamed at Tobi, punching him in the face. "You can't just sit there and blame yourself for everything that's happened and act like you haven't helped people. You are my brother's dream realized; you made me see what he stands for!"
"What?" Tobi asked, confusedly rubbing his cheek.
"I used to think my brother was selfish for leaving me, but you've made me see the importance of standing up and fighting for what's right. If anyone's selfish, it was me. Even if I die today, I don't regret helping those people, the less fortunate."
"I don't regret it either. If I didn't, I would never have become a peacekeeper in the first place," Rayla added.
"And I don't regret it either," Rito said, looking up at his best friend. "And I don't blame you. If it wasn't for you, I would've never achieved so many of my dreams I gave up on."
"Rito..."
After a lengthy ride, they were thrown into the dungeon, the captor not bothering to appear and taunt them.
"Ah, more people here to meet their demise in his game," a rugged man from another cell slurred. "Hopefully, you last longer than the last."
"Who are you?" Rito asked, being the closest to the man.
"Gerson. Not that it matters anymore." He took another swig of his booze. "I hope you like getting shit-faced because grog's the only thing to numb the pain."
"What's going to happen?" Rito inquired.
"Ain't you ever seen the Drakil games before?" Gerson took another sip, lamenting the empty bottle. "You fight to survive, making it to the top, fighting for freedom only to be killed by his pet." He threw the bottle at the largest cage adjacent to them, the glass breaking on the large beast's hide. The creature didn't react, staring into the wall.
"Fight who?" Oros asked.
"Each other. We're all traitors of his bastard-tergy, so he makes us fight for his own sick entertainment." Gerson leaned on the bars, his body shaking and his eyes half disoriented. "But we don't have to play by his rules." He gripped Rito through the bars. "You've got to kill me here and now. It's the only way this shit will end."
"I can't kill you!" Rito shouted in shock.
"Please," the man practically cried, pressing on Rito's chest through the bars. "I'm so sick of fighting; he won't let me die. If you don't kill me, I'll have to kill you."
"Why do you fight if it's what he wants?" Oros asked, confused.
"I literally can't. It's this chemical he puts into your blood; it makes you act... Savage." He mimicked injecting something into his arm. "And the gas. It's like choking." He grabbed his throat.
"Why hasn't he put you up against his... pet?" Rayla asked, staring at the beast still lying there unmoving.
"Because he knows I want to die."
"No one is dying because we are busting out of here," Rito declared.
"And how do you plan to do that?" Oros asked skeptically.
"Are you familiar with radio waves?" Rito asked.
"Yeah, they are messages that travel between antenn—" Tobi stopped talking, remembering the little purple bugs' antennae on his head. "You didn't?"
"Let's just say I got a message too, Mauve. It was a little tricky since we aren't the same species, but it seems she received it. Hopefully, the pirates will come to our rescue."
"I wouldn't count on them for anything," Rayla said, defeated, leaning against the bars. "I waited a decade for them, and they never came for me." She stared into the beast's cage; it still lay there, just staring into the wall, but she swore she saw its ear flicker.
"Have a little hope; it's all we have left," Tobi said, wanting to give Rayla a comforting touch, but she was a whole cell away.
"Well, I guess we should get some sleep like he is," Rito said, pointing to the passed-out drunk.
As they attempted to sleep, Rayla couldn't. She stared into the single spot of light in the dungeon, a pale beam of moonlight. It hit the concrete floor just beside the cell. The beast started to stir in the cell across, his lime green eyes fixing on her as he moved to a sitting position, looking down at the same moonbeam. He inched closer to the side of the cell, and she stared at him in curiosity.
With the pale light, she could now make out his features. He was large, his lime green eyes looking at her with equal curiosity, although they were hard to see with his messy overgrown hair partly covering them. His gaze traveled down to his neck, a large steel collar encased it, and around that collar, black burn marks littered his skin. His torso and arms were covered in old wounds—cuts, bites, slashes—and his wrists had the same type of cuff as his neck, equally covered in burn marks. He was malnourished to the point where his ribs poked through his skin. If she didn't just see him sit up and actively stare at her, she would have been convinced he was a corpse.
It was at this point she realized that this wasn't just some mindless beast. "You can talk and understand, can't you?" He nodded. She let out a shaky breath. "Oh god, this is sick. The Emperor's pet isn't just some poor abused animal; it's a person, a thinking, living person. How long have you been here?"
He looked out into the hole where the pale moonlight peeked out. "Never been anywhere else."
"What are you?" She asked.
"I don't know, a hybrid? A monster? A champion? I don't understand any of it," he rubbed his head.
"Do you have a name?"
This question threw him off, but slowly he nodded. "Turukh." He looked away from her. "Please don't tell me yours; others' names still haunt me."
Rayla nodded in understanding, feeling a mix of sympathy and horror for Turukh. "I won't tell you mine then. But Turukh, we're not here to harm you. We're prisoners too, and we're going to get out of here together. I promise."
"Prisoner? now that is a word rarely used for me" Turukh studied her for a moment before speaking, his voice hoarse from disuse. "Promises mean nothing in this place. It's all just a game to them."
"But we're going to change that," Rayla asserted. "We're not playing their game anymore. We're going to fight for our freedom, yours included."
Turukh's gaze lingered on Rayla for a moment longer, and a flicker of something—maybe hope, maybe disbelief—crossed his eyes before he turned away, as if shielding himself from the vulnerability of trust.
"Freedom?" the word felt foreign on his lips. He was made for this role, a hybrid cooked up in the lab, formed for the sole purpose of fighting for his master's will.
Rayla vowed to Turukh that they would break free together, and despite the skepticism in his eyes, she saw a flicker of something. Hope, perhaps. The crew's resolve strengthened as they decided not to play Drakil's game but to fight for their freedom.
As Turukh grappled with the foreign concept of freedom, the crew understood the challenges ahead. They were up against a sadistic Emperor, but Rayla's promise echoed in the cold dungeon—a promise of defiance, hope, and the shared pursuit of liberation.
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