Chapter Text

Prologue:

A ten-year-old Eden stood at the edge of the dock in a small fishing town on Alaska's coast, watching her father's fishing boat sail into the harbor, the tide pushing it up to land. As it pulls up the sails and it docks, Eden's father steps off. With a large smile, he places a hand on her head and ruffles her hair, but she doesn't care; she's just happy to see him.

A 10-year-old Courtney sits on a private jet, forty thousand feet over Paris, France, her dad yelling at his secretary on the phone, and her mother, too busy reading a book, not even giving her child a passing glance. Courtney just wishes someone would pay attention to her, even just for once.

Chapter 1:

Whales, Birds, and Space Pirates

Eden stands on the deck of her father's ship, now 19 years old. Her father finally lets her work with him. She stands there, watching a giant jump out of the water, and flips onto its back, taking in all the air it can before it goes back under.

“It's a beaut, ain't it?” Says her father, Joseph Cross.

“Huh? Oh, yeah!! I mean, it's really very pretty, it's very fascinating, how they jump so high.” She rants, but it turns into a murmur out of embarrassment quite fast.

“Oh, don't worry, hun, you don't have to be embarrassed, we all love to learn from the smartest person on this ship!” Boasts Joseph, quite proud of how smart his daughter is.

As he says that, it starts to rain, only a little bit. But based on how the clouds are a dark, ashy grey. It's probably about to storm. A giant thunderbolt shoots from the sky, and it's followed by a loud bang; the storm is approaching.

“Move! Move! Move!” he shouts at his crew. “Secure the boat, reduce speed, and maintain control! Close the hatches, and stow the gear away! We are not losing another boat to another wretched storm.”

The crew moves fast, loading crates of the haul for today into the hull of the boat. They close the hatches and start getting ready to go into the storm.

Right when the storm hits, splash a giant mechanical whale jumps from the ocean and falls on top of the ship, splitting in two.

The entire crew gets knocked out by the impact, and only one person on that boat survives.

Courtney sits in her father's jet, above Alaska, and she's going to Japan for her little brother's 10th birthday. While her brother is getting showered with affection, she's sitting in the corner and being forgotten again, still wishing to be noticed.

“Oh, happy birthday, Jack! We’re going to give you the biggest present in Japan. As soon as we get there, you’ll get a big surprise!!” Mrs Ellis Exclaims, she wasn't like this on Courtney's birthday.

On her 16th birthday, she was too busy watching a movie with her friends.

“Yeah, kiddo, you'll get something you've always wanted!”  Mr Ellis declared.

A giant black bird flies next to the plane. Only Courtney sees it, as she looks at the black bird, she notices a large, ash grey storm in the distance is brewing.

“Uhm, mom, dad?” she murmured, barely loud enough for them to hear.

“Ugh, Courtney. What is it now?” Mr Ellis Sneered. 

Courtney pointed at the window, nervous about getting yelled at.

Mr Ellis looks out the window, noticing the large storm, maybe 20-30 miles away miles away from them. If it were to hit them, they’d have a very low chance of surviving. But Mr Ellis doesn't realize that.

“Oh, Courtney, don't bother us unless it's for something important.”  He hissed.

She looks out the window, then she sees a giant; it jumps and crashes into a boat. She says nothing out of fear of getting yelled at. She continues to look out the window, seeing the large bird fly by the plane. Its feathers are a purplish black like the night sky, small white feathers can just barely be seen, eyes are red like a blood moon.

She looks off into the distance, seeing a large bird coming towards the plane, as it gets closer she realizes it's much bigger than she thought. It gets close and then it hits her, this isn't a bird at all, its wings don't flap, stiff and mechanical, where its eyes would be is a red windshield. She looks right at her parents, fear in her eyes.

“Mom! Dad! We need to get out of here!” She screams. Full well knowing their thousands of feet in the air, and full well knowing they’ll just brush her off.

“Oh shut up for once, all you do is-”

Crash

The bird collides with the plane. Everyone is knocked out by the impact. Only one person out of the four passengers and five crew members survived.

Eden wakes up next to Courtney, both of them have bandages on their arms and legs. She looks at Courtney, and she saw her the day before she got on that boat. At her grandma's restaurant. She served her the food in that VIP section, filled with smoke from her dad's fancy cigars; she was the only person in there who treated her with basic human decency.

Courtney wakes up, and she looks at Eden, who is staring at her. A small part of her recognizes her. But not enough to actually fully remember her.

“Where am I? Who are you?” Courtney questions, grogily.

Eden stares at her for a few seconds. She just looks at her, she just woke up, she's tired, she's confused, and most of all, she's scared, for her life and for her father’s.

“I-I’m Eden, and I don't know why we're here… But who are you?” She says and asks nervously.

“Oh, uhm.. I'm Courtney.”

Before Eden can respond, a big bug-like creature walks in with two other odd-looking creatures. The big guy has a cockroach-like face, a body like a centaur mixed with a tadigrade, but the human part looks like a praying mantis; his outfit is like if you had metal pieced together to make cybernetic armor, a long trench coat made of tattered old fabric, and a pirate hat with a drone eye attached to it.

“Hello there… humans.” He snarls at them. 

He looks between the two girls; he knows they're scared, and he's willing to use that to his advantage.

“I am Captain Spark. I've killed your families and taken you from Terra. I will be taking you to the planet of Consterth, where you will be forced to fight to the death with other species that the overseers have deemed as ‘lesser intelligence’. We will arrive in a few of your planets' months.” Captain Spark takes his time to speak, emphasizing the most devastating words.

“Who are you!? And why would you kill our families!?” Shouts Eden, pissed that her father died to some oversized bug.

Captain Spark stares at her, a look of sadistic happiness in his eyes.

“Because. I. Could.” He hisses, not a hiss of hatred, but of pleasure for seeing her in this state. “Stand up, it's time for you to work on deck while we wait to get to our destination.”

He commands his two lackeys to grab them and push them out of the brig. Once their out, he hands them an old-fashioned mop and bucket.

“You have tools from your planet, so get to god damn work!!” He shouts at them and walks into his quarters.

Eden and Courtney both look at each other. Courtney smiles at her while she is straight-faced and just starts mopping.

“So… how about we learn more about each other?” Courtney says with a smile.

Eden keeps mopping. She thinks for a bit.

“I’m Eden, I had a cat named Pickles, and I worked at my grandmothers sea seafood restaurant. Before getting taken, I was on my father's fishing boat, but then a… uhm… a giant mechanical whale crashed into it, killing my father and his crew.” Eden lamented.

“Oh, uhm… I’m Courtney, and I'm the daughter of Jefferson Ellis and Celine Ellis. And before I was abducted, I was on my father's private jet, and a giant mechanical bird hit the plane, killing my whole family.” Courtney Recalled.

Eden stared at her, kind of mad that she was stuck with some rich girl. But then she remembers that she treated her and her grandmother with kindness.

“Oh, Ellis, your parents came to my grandmother's restaurant… to buy it,” Eden murmurs sadly. She doesn't even know if her grandma is alive or not.

Courtney just barely hears her. She looks at the ground, not knowing what to say, then goes back to mopping.

Chapter Text

Chapter 2:

The Floating Oceans

Five Earth hours later, the ship finally makes it to a planet. Eden looks down. The planet itself is entirely made up of land, but there are giant bubbles of water and islands floating all around the planet.

“Whoa… are they, floating?” Eden asks Captain Spark.

“Stop asking questions and keep cleaning, human,” Spark shouts at Eden.

Eden looks at the deck, clean and shiny. Over the 5 hours, she and Courtney swept, mopped, polished, and dried. She looks back at Spark, thinking about how to tell him there's nothing else to do.

“Uhm… sir, there's nothing else to clean. We swept, moped, polished, and dried the entire deck.” Eden pauses What are we supposed to do now?”

“You… you, you can just shut your mouth, you stupid human!!” Growls Spark, in a large scratchy tone.

Eden steps back, her eyes wide in shock and fear. She looks at this beastly thing in front of her. His twiggy, bug-like, and disgusting appendages twitch with anger. His four bulging eyes stare at her, looking like they're about to shoot out of his head and fly at her. His breath burns her nostrils with a stench like rotten flesh and a moldy cup of orange juice. Eden looks at him with a sickly face.

“Wh-whats that look for!?”  Spark spits towards her.

Eden feels something racing up her esophagus, and a putrid taste infects her mouth before it hits. All she tastes is something disgusting, worse than Spark’s breath? God no, that's impossible. Eden tries to stop it, but her mouth opens anyway, and all that comes out is chunks of food, stomach acid, and a scent nearly as bad as Spark himself.

“Lord Glink!! What the Thagorn is this!?” Spark fumes. 

He wipes the barf off of him, failing to get it off before it can seep into his clothes. Spark glares at her, a glare that burns as hot as the twin suns above them.

“You… you… You pest!!” He screams as he reaches for his gun, aiming it directly at Eden. “Vermile, pests like you don’t deserve to see this uni-"

A loud bang rings out, a green green goop sprays out of a newly formed hole in Spark's head. Spark falls the the ground, dead. Killed by a gunshot.

Chapter Text

Chapter 3:

The Masked Killer

Eden looks at the body in front of her, mortified by the green blood-like liquid seeping out of Sparks' head. The smell travels through the air and up to his nose, a smell of burning flesh. A small bit of smoke rises from the hole in Sparks' head.

“Shamoli… Spark, we told you not to hurt the merchandise.” Grummbles, a masked figure. Their voice is deep and gruff, like a southern farmer. He has a figure with a large frame. Broad shoulders, 7 feet tall at least, and a frame like a rectangle. “You two,” he points at Eden and Courtney, “Come with me.” He says as he starts to walk off.

Eden and Courtney stand there, terrified of the Masked man who killed Spark.

“I meant right now… idiot earthlings.”

Eden and Courtney snap out of their terrified trance and follow behind him, off the ship into the field, filled with pink cotton candy-like plants. They walk from the fields into a town. Not like how you might imagine an alien civilization's town to be, it looks like a village from the Middle Ages, but much larger, taking up the amount of space as New York City.

“So you two are the Earthlings picked for the Colloseum?” He questions, saying Earthlings like a slur. “Tch, Spark picked the two worst Earthlings for this. Not even warriors.” The man scoffs, although he seems amused.

“What do you want to use us for!? Why did you bring us here!? Who even are you!?” Courtney Vociferated.

“I’m #156; all your other questions will be answered later by your overseer, once we reach our destination.”

He turns ino an alley way, dead end. 

“Uhm sir? This is a dead end.” Faltered Eden.

“No it’s not” Scorned #156 as he hits one of the stones mounted to the wall, making it split down the middle an open into a dimly lit corridor, it feels way more technologically advanced than the rest of the city.

“Go down the hall to the very last door, door 56. Then knock, do not open it, you have to knock on it.” He pushes them into the corridor, then the wall closes back up.

“Courtney… what are we supposed to do now?”  Questions Eden.

“We walk, we walk down the hall to door 56… and get back to Earth” Courtney answered, she said it like a promise.