Chapter Text
Year 0. Earth: The capture
Seth staggered out of the bar, turned and caught his class mate. “Thomas, ‘burp.’ I don't think we'll pull that all-nighter.”
"Doesn't matter, we only need to study for half an hour at a time.” He leaned on Seth having trouble standing straight.
“What you mean?” Seth said and leaned back to stay on his feet. He directed them back towards campus. “Half an hour isn’t enough.” He tapped his lips confirming they were numb. He was drunk right enough.
“No! No no no. Half an hour; at a time.” Thomas staggered along. “It’s the learning curb. ‘Burp’ learning curve.”
Seth stared at the edge of the sidewalk. “Huh?!”
“I’ll show you later. Let's go through the park.”
Half way home the park lights went out, they could only see distant streetlights. "Crap."
They heard a man's voice in an unrecognizable language.
“What the F...” There was an Electric buzzing, pain and darkness.
Year 3. Malar: The Arena fighting floor.
Seth heard voices he didn’t recognize, English?! He opened his eyes and got up. For a second, hearing his first language made him forget where he was. He looked around the circular Arena, tall white granite walls and the packed gray sand. He’d survived long enough to accept it as his home. He worked, trained, slept and sometimes even ate there.
Getting to his feet his plate armor creaked. The weight of the plate armor didn’t really slow him down anymore, it was pretty much a second skin.
He saw young men of different races, in wet civilian rags, being herded into the arena, a few familiar curse words coming across the sand, Americans? They were being shoved out of the east gate, staggering, stumbling and blinded by the early morning sun. A new set of gladiator candidates fresh off the slave ship.
Seth vaguely remembered his first day in the ring. These guys probably thought the trip was rough. They were in for a nasty surprise.
He spotted the three new Trainers. His new overlords had set up a small folding table, in the shade of the arena's center pillar, and were drinking something from cups. Seth figured they drank Rakk, something similar to coffee. It looked like it was going to be a long day.
He took a deep breath and walked towards the grey skinned trainers. He'd met them for the first time yesterday. He tried to remember their names. The new head trainer had an almost Slavic name Ludvig, no; Lutvig. The new trainer looked tired, something about Yarn, Garn... Gern. And the new assistant, he looked young like he ate ice-cream, ice-truck, ice-car, Iskar. For slave drivers they’d seemed nice enough.
He walked slowly, making noise so he didn’t surprise them. The three trainers, dressed in dark leather armor, were discussing something about a war, no, singular; “The war”. Something about a military unit in trouble, he didn’t have any context to determine unit size.
He stopped, facing the newcomers, at a very respectful distance from the trainers. He almost wished they didn't notice him. But he should help the newcomers. Not as much for moral reasons as he once would have. The more he helped the newcomers the fewer would die needlessly. Or, He thought with a grimace, they’d die slower. For a second he considered letting his fellow humans die faster, to put them out of their misery. Too late; one of the trainers spotted him.
“Forty-four what are you doing there?” Assistant trainer Iskar asked.
Seth had his hands behind his back trying to look harmless. “Good morning Trainer, my apologies for disturbing, I’m merely observing.” He nodded at the newcomers. “I heard a few words from my homeworld.”
“Very well.” The trainer said and took a sip from his cup. He looked up and grinned at Seth. “Fell asleep in your armor again?” Inspecting their new workplace, they had spotted Forty-four in the Arena. Thinking somebody had forgotten to clear away a corpse, they had walked down to have a look and met Forty-four taking a nap.
Seth had learned to sleep in his armor; it wasn't totally unheard of. But Seth not only slept in his armor, but on the fighting floor of the arena. His most valuable items were hidden inside the armor. “Yes. Trainer, I’d just have to put it back on again.” And he thought: I don’t have to get used to the weight again. It fits perfectly and parts might get stolen, if I take it off in a communal area.
The other Trainers glanced at him.
Seth tried to be invisible by standing totally still, at a kind of slouch. Being noticed sometimes got you promoted; a fast way to get killed.
They seemed to ignore him. They drew their whips. Seth winced at the sound, a buzz and crackle of electricity. He’d been hit four times, he remembered every time and avoided it at all costs. He felt faint, a chill ran down his back, he could hear his heart in his ears and tasted the bitter flavor of adrenaline.
Head trainer Lutvig put his cup on the table, stretched and sighed. He yelled at the newly arrived humans. “Get in formation!” he pointed at the ground in front of him.
The humans, all young men, looked at him in confusion.
Seth thought he saw a few military buzz-cuts. With a small prayer he spoke, in as non-confrontational voice as he could manage. "Head Trainer, permission to instruct the newcomers.”
Lutvig stared at Gladiator Forty-four. Rarely would a gladiator below Warrior rank speak to a trainer. But Forty-four was senior for a Linesman, he knew better than to waste a trainer's time. And the phrasing had been extremely polite and very well spoken. “Go ahead Forty-four.” He said with a slight smile. At least, this could be interesting.
“Thank you, Sir.” Seth looked at the young men, contracted his diaphragm and bellowed. “Fall in!!!” A military command, used to get a group of soldiers into a formation. His ears rang, too late he realized; he should have taken his helmet off. The horizontal and vertical T-slit in his faceplate was lousy for projecting his voice. Luckily a few of the young men understood the command and jogged towards Seth and the trainers.
Seth knife-handed where they should form up. He also held a hand up, to make them stop a little further away. Malar social distances were a little further than Terran.
The Trainers were impressed as the new gladiator candidates fell into formation. The front row used an arm on the shoulder of the man next to them, to make even spacing. Obviously some of them had been trained similar to Linesmen. About half wasn’t trained, but picked up on the notion and got in formation, with a little guidance from the others.
From this distance the newcomers could see their captors weren’t quite human. Malar were humans but their skin was grey, they were tall, long limbed and their eyes looked black. The trainers had black hair which was most common.
The candidates had been whipped on the ship. Seth didn't approve of the practice. But it sure cut down on questions. And nobody was in doubt about who was in charge. “Good morning.” He said slowly but clearly. He hadn’t used English in years, but it came back slowly. “Welcome to planet Malar. Capital City of Jutan. This is the Arena. You’re here to become Gladiators.” He gestured around. “This is your new home.” He paused to compose his thoughts. What was the first thing he’d learned? Oh yeah; “The Malar word for your instructor is: “Trainer.”” He’d used the Maler word. “Repeat it back.”
They repeated it back.
“I can’t hear you!”
They repeated even louder.
“I am not your trainer. That would be the Malar gentlemen behind me. I am a Gladiator like you. He pointed at his shoulder pauldron, "My number is Forty-four," The number was in an elevated script on the armor plate. "It's pronounced; “Forty-four”, repeat it back.”
“I can’t hear you!”
He spotted a young man on the far left not following along. “I am not your master. I am here out of the goodness of my heart, to keep you from getting whipped or killed.” He pointed at the slacker. “You! How do you say: Trainer?”
The young man realized; he didn’t know and followed along with the lesson from then on.
“The Malar command to Fall into formation is; Fall in!” He followed up with: Left, right, forward and stop. making them repeat it back.
Seth swallowed hoping they would at least remember a little. “OK, let's try it: Turn left. Turn Right... He ordered them around a series of random directional commands. Then commanded them back into their original position. He sighed with relief, with a few mistakes, they understood and followed orders.
A kid at the back slumped to the ground.
Seth sighed. He had a flashback and remembered the screams and whips from his own first day. He looked at the trainers. They had actually gotten out folding chairs, watching the show. If he didn’t discipline the boy; they’d whip him.
Seth walked to the young man. Standing over him, he wanted to yell, maybe kick or punch him. With the heavy armor; it would be hard to hurt him without injuring. Maybe there was an easier way. “Can you stand, boy?” Damn it, was he crying?
“I want to go home.”
Seth more than anything wanted to knock the boy out; he was putting them both at risk of being disciplined. “So would I...” He said without thinking. He needed to caution the group about their new situation; before they got him or themselves killed. He glanced at the Trainers. Luckily Lutvig was pouring a cup, giving him time to make mistakes. “Permission to educate the candidates?”
Lutvig almost spilled his drink hearing Forty-four's word choice. Most gladiators spoke a pigeon Malar, But forty-four used multiple syllable words, the sentence was complex; almost poetic, it had an idiom and was grammatically perfect. The Linesman had, in less than half an hour, taught a new group to follow basic commands. A process that normally took several days. And he was asking permission?! “Go ahead Forty-four.”
Seth realized he was tired, mental fatigue? He needed to talk to them and they were probably just as tired as him. “Uh... Alright, everybody make a half circle. Sit down and take a breather.” What was that about a learning curve? half an hour at a time or something.
The Trainers looked on in surprise as the group formed a wide half circle seated around Forty-four. They could all see and hear him. Even the defiant one on the ground crawled into the new formation.
“I wasn’t sure if I could brief you like this. But you're doing great, when I arrived about five of my group were dead by now.” He looked around making a little eye contact. He didn’t want to get too attached to these men. Most if not all would be dead within a year or two. “Those whips the Trainers are wearing can be lethal. And if you attack them they will kill you.” He made eye contact with the crying boy. “They have a hard time distinguishing between us. So if you get punished, they might mistake you for somebody else and punish them. Screw around and you endanger not only yourself, but everybody in your group.” He kept eye contact until the boy nodded, hopefully having pulled himself together.
Seth decided to take his helmet off to be heard. He heard a gasp from one of the candidates. He didn’t know what he looked like, not having access to a mirror and he probably stank having lived in the armor for three days. He glanced at his distorted reflection in his helmet. “As I said: your gladiators: Untrained candidates, think of pawns. You will be pitched against other groups of beginners. By the process of elimination, the best of you will become ‘Linesman’ or Rooks like me. Rooks get armor and shields to form a ‘shield line.’ A line is usually under the command of a ‘Warrior gladiator’ or Knight. In some cases a young Malar ‘nobleman’. That would be a bishop in our chess analogy, who will command a line. The Gladiator arena is sometimes used by the nobles to train their upper class in tactics and bloody their warriors.”
Seth paused trying to figure out what was most important. One of the newcomers raised his hand. “Do you have a question?”
“Yes sir. When do we eat?”
Seth smiled. "Don't worry about it. Remember you’re property, so they have every intention of keeping you alive and fit. You’ll be fed after training.” He looked at the long haired young man. “Why is your hand still up?”
“Do we have any rights?”
Seth blinked. “I don’t think so.” He rested his head against his shoulder pauldron, using it to scratch the back of his head. He thought; he’d heard something in his early days, but before he fully understood the language.
The Trainers were fascinated by the interaction. They could see and understand most of the briefing. Lutvig saw Forty-four was drawing a blank. “What did he ask Forty-four?”
Seth took a second to switch languages. “He asked if they... we have any legal protection.”
All the trainers were stunned by the question. And again Forty-four’s sophisticated and idiosyncratic way of speaking was throwing them. Slowly they laughed.
Seth couldn’t help but chuckle along. He was struggling having to think of the problem in two languages.
“Not really.” Lutvig said.
Seth nodded. “Property value. Our deaths would be destruction of property?”
“Exactly.” The Trainers looked at each other, they couldn’t believe what they were hearing, a gladiator using a legal term?
Seth had an odd thought. “Are there any animal protection laws?”
“Yes. But they don’t apply to gladiators.” Lutvig said, but got a very unfamiliar thought; maybe some of them should.
Seth translated to the group. “Think of yourselves as property. If you’re worthless they’ll get rid of you, either in the arena as entertainment. Or just put you down.” He took breaks to translate some of the words like “Property, worthless, arena and entertainment.”
Trainer Iskar was staring. Forty-four had made a gesture; drawing a thumb across his neck, when saying: “Put you down.” Despite the gesture not being universal. He realized; he’d understood the entire brief. By the look of the candidates, they got it too.
Seth continued. “The higher the value you obtain, the more benefits you get. Linesmen get plate-armor, a small allowance, access to the shops on the promenade and a locker for your valuables. Warriors get a cell to live in, or if your rank is in the top ten; an apartment.” He had to stop; he didn't want to get their hopes up. “However, none of the benefits are guaranteed. Sometimes the budget is a little tight; you won't get your allowance, most shops won't service linesmen or any gladiators. Sometimes the cells and apartments are used for storage.” He looked around making sure they heard and understood. “Your lives have very much become unfair. Get used to it. You get what you get and be thankful.” He translated some of the bigger words, so the trainers could keep up, he didn’t want them to think he was fermenting an uprising or a riot. He had a slight hope the newcomers would learn faster.
Head trainer Lutvig leaned over to Trainer Gern. “How many of the residential cells and apartments are used for storage?”
Gern blinked. He’d just remembered quite a few were occupied. “I don’t know. The half of West on the first level corridor is stuffed with junk.”
Iskar joined in. “So is the corridor on the second and third level.”
“What? half the cells.”
Iskar was staring at Forty-four. “That’s why he sleeps in his armor.”
Lutvig got it. “He’s probably our most senior Linesman.”
They nodded.
“And he doesn't have a cell?”
Seth was giving the candidates as much time as he could, to absorb the information. Give them too much or too fast and they would forget. Glancing at the Trainers, he saw, they looked pissed. He better get on with it. Warnings; “You need to be aggressive to survive and gain rank. However, what do you do to a dog that bites everything?” He was paraphrasing something Thomas had said once. He caught a few looks from some of the ones familiar with slave management.
“They get put down.” A very young man said.
“Yes.” He gestured to a slightly older man of African descent. “Do you want to tell them?”
The man had paled, “They get cut.”
“Yes.” Seth said with an evil grin. “Castration!” he said in Malar, making a snipping motion with fingers and translated to English.
The Trainers couldn’t help laughing at the candidate's reaction. Wide eyed stares, pale faces, moans and curse words. Some even put their hands over their balls.
“Don’t worry, A Neuter Gladiator doesn't last long in the arena, they won't bother unless they dislike you, or you’re costing them money. So I’d really advise you against attacking the trainers. A common misconception is; that your job is to kill or die for the guests' entertainment.” He looked around making sure they were listening. “You are entertainers!”
The Trainers looked up as he translated the last word. That didn’t sound right.
“You do not kill your opponent, unless it’s to keep yourself alive!” Seth caught himself yelling at them. He had seen way too many friends and teammates die needlessly, not having figured that out. “Your opponents are also valuable property. Except if they are Malar; then they are people, which you are not.” He held a hand to his ear. “What are you?!”
“Property.” The crying boy said. His tears had dried up.
“I can’t hear you!”
“We’re property!”
Seth took a deep breath to calm down again. “You will not believe how much trouble you're in if you manage to kill a Malar nobleman. For one, it’s almost impossible. They are heavily genetically modified.”
The Trainers got up out of their chairs shocked as he translated. How did Forty-four know about genetics? How could he even translate using so few words and how could the candidates understand? They were savages.
One of the candidates had raised a hand. Long hair again.
“Yes?”
“Is there any way to get a checkmate?”
“What?”
“In your chess analogy you only went up to bishops. Is there a king or a queen, a way to win?”
Seth was taken aback by the question and to his dismay the trainers had gotten up and were standing right behind him.
“What did he ask?” Lutvig asked.
To Seth’s relief they didn’t seem angry or agitated. “Oh. I was using a game analogy to describe the ranks." Malar Chess was similar to Terran. "He was asking if there was a way to win the game. By taking out the opponent's Monarch.” He didn’t say king since the Malar supreme ruler was female.
Lutvig had to think. It wasn’t a bad analogy. “If you get the Empress's favor or impress her; she can grant you retirement and citizenship. A Noble family can grant you citizenship, and buy your freedom...” Lutvig hesitated. "You can also buy your own freedom, and earn citizenship through military service." The last option was a long shot. But no more ridiculous than the others:
Seth was stunned for a second. “We can?!”
“Yes. But it's very difficult.”
Seth chuckled, “We can agree on that.” Their allowance was the equivalent of pocket change. He was fairly sure, the street beggars outside the Arena earned more in a day than he got in allowance in a week. He translated for the recruits.
“Any queens.” Long hair asked.
Seth didn’t get it, did he mean the empress? He was sweating with concentration, speaking in English and immediately translating. “Oh. A top tear chess piece. I guess that would be a Malar martial arts master. The arena is also used to demonstrate martial prowess, advertise for weapons training , dueling and settling legal disputes, such as trial by combat.”
“Confirmation trials.” Iskar reminded him.
Seth was unnerved, he wasn’t used to being addressed directly by the trainers. “Oh yes, Coming of age ceremonial combat. To demonstrate bravery and martial ability.”
“And to eliminate defectives.” Iskar added
Seth translated, but gave Iskar a look. He hadn’t understood why they would need a culling, if they had mastered genetic modding?
“No more questions right now. I know you're all tired. If our overlords will permit; I need you to rest and reflect on what I’ve just taught you. That way you’ll be able to absorb the next lesson in...” He looked at Lutvig: “Four minutes?” A Malar second was about the same as a Terran second. But a minute was a hundred seconds.
Lutvig nodded. Forty-four had just done more than four days of work and not lost a single candidate.
Long Hair had his hand up.
Seth got annoyed and growled at him. “Put your fucking hand; and your head down. Or I will knock you the fuck out and shove that hand up your ass.” He caught the trainer's eyes. Damn it, now he had to translate that.
Lutvig listened in amusement to the translation. He was wondering with Forty-four as a third trainer, he could leave and catch up on his administrative work. “Forty-four can you continue as a trainer?”
Seth couldn’t believe his ears. “Yes sir.” He didn’t need the extra work, but he couldn’t refuse and it would be less boring.
Lutvig caught nods from his subordinates; they were OK with the idea. “Do you need a whip?”
“No sir, Trainer Gern and Iskar have all the punishment we need... I could use water as a reward. They’re about ready to kill for a drink.”
Lutvig nodded. “I’ll activate a fountain.” He nodded at his two assistants. “I’ll be in my office. I’m getting the feeling we’ve missed something.” He turned and left. Walking he mused about the terran idiom for sleeping: “Put your head down.” and the threat of shoving an offending limb up someone's ass. He’d have to remember that one. And he’d have to see why the Gladiators didn’t always get their allowance, why the shops on the promenade would refused service and what the “fuck” was in the Gladiator cells? “Fuck.” Handy word. He wondered what it meant. As in: Why the fuck was a senior linesman better spoken than his top tear warriors and why did he look emaciated.