Chapter 6: Introduction to Slavery

Adam woke up to the deep-voiced yells of his drill sergeants. These aliens had such a deep voice and yet they projected it so well you would hear them from a room away. Damn, Adam wished he could've skipped the drill sergeants. Every day it was the same thing; they'd yell at him then give him ten minutes to get his sleeping quarters in order, only to throw it all up into a mess even worse than his messiest friend from back home.

"How many days has it been now, recruit? You're trying to make me call you sir and yet you can't even make a simple bed right!" The creature used her spindly legs to wrap up the blanket Adam was reaching for and threw it onto another alien's bed, causing a glare from the alien in turn as she picked it up and threw it at Adam's face.

All he could do was let out a sigh and reply to his superior, "I'll do better next time sergeant."

He heard that the drill sergeant's schtick was to beat down the individuality of recruits and instill in them a sense of camaraderie as they worked together in order to survive against the harsh treatment of their instructors. However, as Adam didn't have that, he was alone to deal with the berating instead.

Each morning he saw the Vanid leaving early as they were let off, and was extremely glad for his relatively introverted nature as he could deal with loneliness better than other creatures. That didn't help with his anger though. Adam really had no way to vent his frustration at the amount of unfair treatment he had been receiving from his peers and the Vanid.

"Glrrk," was all that came out of the mouth of one creature as it completed its hourly discharge all over Adam's bed. They said it was random and uncontrollable, but that thing was always in front of his bed to spray it with gunk each morning.

"Could you face any other direction for once?" Adam snapped at the thing. The slug-like alien, covered in a secretion and suckers or tentacles, Adam didn't know how else to describe them, didn't even reply to him, slithering off as he wrapped up his blanket and pillow cover again. He would be late to breakfast.

Walking through the halls, he saw the entire breadth of species on this ship. As janitors cleaned the surfaces, engineers moved from location to location to keep all of the ship's parts working perfectly, to ensure that one failure wouldn't snowball into an issue that could lead to lives lost. There were far too many species on this ship to keep track of and as he passed some chittering soldiers he found the desired location.

Inside was nothing special, just a place to wash the fabrics every species used in their day to day life. He joined some of the messier species in setting up their bedding for cleaning as he had done ever since he started his training.

"So did that tear heal?" He asked the alien beside him, another slug-like species. Instead of multiple tentacle-like secretors, the creature just secreted a thick goo from his pores. He had a special place to sleep so he had no bedwear to clean, but that didn't stop him from needing to clean his uniform every morning.

"It did nicely, and I had no reduction in my gel production," the creature gurgled in glee. It was a surprise for Adam to find a friend so quickly, and one as good as the engineer.

"That's great, those artificial producers can get pricey. Did you sort out that manpower problem as well?"

"Not yet. With the funds we have, the only way we can get enough workers if some of you guys donate some slaves. Why can't they just increase our funding, I was trapped under the pipe for an hour!" He was obviously very touchy about his time stuck, his skin torn right beside an unconscious and snoring Hron.

"Well, if I catch you I'll try and help."

This caused everyone to laugh. Adam always seemed to try more than he could accomplish, though he also knew when to back down.

"Just survive the CEO change, then talk about helping us," another one joked as Adam collected his now cleaned bedding and walked back to the barracks to set his bed as fast as he could. Looking at the time, he wouldn't be able to have a large or complicated breakfast yet again. At least he would be able to be full by the time classes started.

"And of course there would be no benches free," Adam complained openly as he arrived at the officers' canteen. The Vanid had ensured he couldn't sit at any of the populated tables, and the recruits had spread out so far today that he had no place to sit.

He had experienced this situation so often it no longer elicited a reaction as he walked over to get his food, taking whatever leftovers were there for him. Today it was some sort of green slop, and whatever the slop was, it didn't taste anywhere near as bad as he had expected. It seemeds they had managed to leave him an atleast bland meal today.

"Did you hear? Aaron managed to survive the assault of a Vanid!" One of the alien groups near Adam began to gossip. He was leaning on a wall so he was relatively close to two of the benches. Just listening to their gossip, he knew the advanced translator was well worth the cost.

"To think there would be a creature that could face a Vanid and hold their ground. Seems some of the heavy races can match the Vanid in strength."

"He'd be torn to shreds if the Vanid was given a chance though."

"Who cares? He'll be a good general but we need to focus on our own position with them. Which Vanid have you joined?"

And let the factionism begin. Adam let out a sigh as he continued to eat his food. All of these young would-be officers were doing nothing but playing politics with their future CEOs; they had no drive to improve, just a wish to suck up to whatever person would be the best so they could take an easy path up. Adam's irritation at the fact that the only recruit who seemed to be actually trying hard was treated the worst, was just... He couldn't stay there any longer. Eating as much food as he could, he put his tray away and left for his first assignment to distract himself from his situation.

What he didn't expect though, was for his first assignment to be in the slave pens. Walking up to the... Even his translator couldn't tell him what sort of expression Alluris was giving him. She was one of the primary instructors for his recruitment as the right hand of the CEO.

"Here early, Recruit Blake? The food not to your liking?" Alluris asked professionally as she waited for the slave to finish their final health check before being given to his master.

"Nah, actually got tasteless food this time Ma'am," Adam said politely and properly, giving her a salute as is required when addressing an officer, "I had just had enough of the conversation near me, so I headed out to be early for my first assignment. What am I doing here?"

Alluris gave a sign of annoyance at hearing the boy. She had personally joined the fleet because it was fair in its treatment of different species and wouldn't discriminate against recruits based upon their gender or species, so to see someone she was told would be her superior one day treated badly just rubbed her the wrong way. Ever since the Vanid had entered the fleet things had been going downhill.

"I'm here to supervise the bestowal of your security slave, Recruit Blake," she replied curtly, waving towards the medical zone of the pens.

"We are ensuring your guard's armor is well-fitting and will not cause any health problems before we discharge him to your care."

Adam grew serious at this. He hadn't enjoyed the concept of slavery himself with how close he was personally to being a slave. However, with all of the dangers he had to deal with daily it would be good to make sure some "accident" wouldn't happen to him in a dark corner somewhere.

"Thank you for giving me this opportunity. I will make sure I pay back the debt quickly Ma'am." Adam didn't know how to reply to her, but he knew owing debts here would be a massive problem until he had some plan moving forwards.

"Don't thank me, only the worthy get to stay on this ship, and unless the rules change drastically, those who deserve things will gain them,"

Alluris kept her conversation aloof. She wanted to encourage the boy to keep going but as Gramu had said, they needed to be subtle about this, and Alluris was a horrible actor. She was just glad that the fleet could fake translations so that they could lie. How did humans do this?

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