Page 6 of No Strings Attached

“Hell if I know.”

The giant was still staring and grinning at Bahbi when he said, slowly, “Kompi.”

Alved shrugged, “I guess his name’s Kompi. First time I’ve heard him say anything.”

Bahbi dragged his feet a little following Alved to the second to last cage, housing a huge, fur-covered nightmare. Almost as tall as Acken, with long, shaggy white fur, and a slightly feline facial structure; its claws were extended and its teeth were bared.

“Garoxian. Like I said earlier, no language in the translators. Just make sure you stay out of reach of his cage. We’ve all seen what they can do to a body. And that brings us to this nasty little shorg in the last cage.”

Bahbi looked at the female, taking all of her in. She was naked and covered in Ulu blood, like the Ophidian had complained about. Shiny black hair on her head, curly black hair on her cunt, and piercing green eyes. Creamy beige/pink skin with a bluish cast and splotched with dried Ulu blood, except for her hands and forearms, which were covered with it. She was shorter than Bahbi, with a similar slim build and two small teats.

And she was obviously furiously angry. She stood with a wide stance and her arms crossed under her teats, glaring in their direction. Then she spat, “Human. From Earth. And fuck your mothers,” before turning her back to them. Bahbi found his eyes admiring the delicate curves of her tailless backside, then caught himself.

Alved signed heavily, “Right. Let’s do the feeding.” He walked over to the cage that Caussus was in and pointed. “Here is the water line.” Alved placed his hand in the cage and pointed to one of the bars that obviously had a hollow compartment towards the top for a water tube. Seeing Alved’s hand in the cage and Caussus standing placidly towards the back, he realized why Alved had chosenthiscage to place his hand in. It was one of the few that he would get it back from.

“Water runs down the bar into the hole in the ground.” Pointing to the drain hole the bar continued down into. “Hole in the back of each cage for shitting.”

Then he pointed over to a wheeled cart holding paper bags, “Food in those. Go grab the cart, and I’ll show you how to do it.”

“You said yesterday that I wouldn’t need to come in here during my shift unless there was trouble.” From behind him, the Estranian snickered.

“Day shift boys voted and decided to pass it off. Don’t get in a twist about it, there are a few other nasty jobs that are much worse that they’ve left for you.”

“Like what?” Bahbi felt sick.

“One thing at a time. Get the fucking cart!” Alved was clearly losing patience.

Bahbi wheeled it over to Alved, and he grabbed the first bag, then turned toward the Ophidian’s cage, “No arms to grab you, but you want to stay away from those fangs.” He tore the top off the bag to make a kind of bowl and placed it on the floor. Bahbi saw without much surprise that it contained the same kibble that was in his pouch.

“Take this stick here,” grabbing a five-foot-long stick from the top of the cart, “and push it into the cage. But the stick doesn’t go in the cage for the threatening ones with arms. We can’t be giving them a weapon.”

Bahbi nodded in understanding while Alved grabbed the next bag and placed it on the floor without tearing it open. He pushed it toward the cage with the Estranian and left it just barely within reach when the Estranian pushed his arms through the bars.

For the trawg, he repeated the same maneuver as with the Ophidian, tearing off the top to make a bag bowl and pushing it in. He simply handed a bag directly into Caussus’s hands, who received it with both hands and a bow, then pushed a bag as far back into the Mineralite’s cage as the stick would allow. Moving across the way to the giant snail, he took a bag and carefully poured out the contents on the floor within the cage. Alved skipped the reanimated cyborg but handed a bag into the hands of the smiling Kompi. Then he handled the Garoxian and the female the same way he did the Estranian. The Garoxian upended the bag into his mouth, eating all the kibble in one mouthful. The female looked at the bag sitting a few feet in front of her cage in disgust and made no move to take it.

“More pounded fish assholes?”

Bahbi snorted laughter through his nose and then nodded at her in confirmation, glancing over sheepishly at Alved when he realized what he had done. She looked into his eyes with a smirk,her green eyes sparkling, and they held each other’s gaze for a few seconds. Then both of their attention was torn away by the Garoxian as he howled and snarled, pounding at the door of his cage. When the female spoke again, Bahbi’s head snapped back to her.

“He’s still hungry.” She bent at the knees and reached out for her bag. Then she did the unthinkable, walking over to the side of the cage that separated her from the Garoxian and sticking her arm through the bars into his cage, holding out the bag of food.

The room—which had been full of the sounds of eating and low complaints about food quality and quantity—went silent as Alved and Bahbi shouted, “NO!” in unison.

She spoke to them without turning away from the monster who was silently regarding her and her outstretched arm, “Why not? Why would he want to hurt me?Ididn’t put him in this cage. And I’m not going to eat this shit anyway. I only gagged down the first round because it had been a month since I’d eaten anything at all. Even pounded assholes tasted decent at that point.”

The whole room, at least all the conscious and sentient beings in the room, watched in fascinated silence as the Garoxian approached the female’s offering. Rather than tear the bag out of her hand or rip her arm off for the fun of it, he slowly raised his fisted right hand to his chin, bowed low, and then gingerly took the bag out of her hand. Before she could retract her hand, he caught it in his massive, fur covered mitt.

Bahbi’s breath caught, and his body zinged in fear. But the Garoxian just held the female’s hand for a moment while looking into her eyes. Then he carefully dropped it and sat cross-legged on the floor, holding the bag with both hands. He didn’t move to open it and eat, just sat.

“You’re welcome,” she whispered, and the whole room continued to hold its breath for another handful of seconds.

Alved sort of shook off the moment, then turned back to Bahbi, “You’ll need to get her cleaned of that blood before Qlu’s inspection at the start of the next day cycle.”

As Alved turned back toward the heavy metal door that led to the corridor and control room, Bahbi sputtered, “Wh…pff..what…how the fuck am I supposed to do that?”

Alved just motioned to the utility section of the room that held mops, buckets, a hose, and a deep sink, then placed his hand on the scanner. The door clicked open, and he pulled it, looking back at Bahbi impatiently. Bahbi followed, the sound of the Estranian laughing heartily at his back.

Six: Mister Beastly?

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