(“No offense Pryvani, but you can’t know what it’s like to lie on that plate and realize you’re about to be something’s meal.” Darren trembled as he recalled the feel of the cool porcelain against his bare skin, the screeching, chilling sound of steel on ceramic as utensils he couldn’t see dug into the flesh of animals thrice his size, the wafting smell of food that under different circumstances may have had him salivating, and the chilly cold air against his prone body.

His eyes glassed over and his voice trembled. He felt like a child, afraid, terrified to even recall what had transpired. “Every second of your life, every achievement – graduating, getting a girl for the first time, enlisting in the army, rising through the ranks, training and drilling and earning the respect of everyone around you boils down to nothing! Yer just a cold slab of meat on someone’s dinner plate. Just a brief bite for some kid who won’t even take a second to think about all she’s snuffing out!” Darren battled to regain his composure, as he trembled, he shrugged off a gentle finger that attempted to stroke his back. He shrugged it off with spite, in anger and sorrow.

“Just something to tide her over so she doesn’t have to be just a little bit hungry for an hour or so!” Darren looked away quickly, desperate to avoid Pryvani’s gaze.

“Darren I….”

“Yer hopes, yer dreams, everything you were and everything you ever could have been…don’t mean shit.” Darren felt the warm salty stream of tears fall down his face. He hated himself for it, for feeling this way, for letting it affect him.

“Darren….” Pryvani’s voice quaked as she sniffed back her emotions.

“Because that’s all you are from that point on…that’s all yer ever gonna be, someone else’s gat’dang shit.”

There was a moment of silence as the Titaness seemed to consider his words. Finally, when Pryvani spoke, her tone quavered, as she tried her best to envision everything he had just described.

“You’re right.” The young woman finally whispered, her voice laden with emotion. “You’re absolutely right. I will never know what it’s like to be that helpless. We Titans are the biggest sentient species, after all. I think sometimes we forget that, and we take advantage of others because of it. I’m so sorry Darren, I wish there was more that I could say….”

“It’s not yer fault…” Darren whispered softly.

“We don’t give humans enough credit. None of us do. Darren I… I don’t even know what to say…I’m sorry…you didn’t deserve that. Nobody does.”

“Yer not all bad.” Darren muttered, his breathing slow and steady as he worked to pull himself back under control.

“I don’t know how you can still say that after what you’ve been through. I know some pretty amazing humans with the same attitude you have, who have been through the layers of hell and back. How do you still manage to put even a shred of faith in us after all this?” Pryvani asked, genuinely searching for an answer.

Darren shrugged. “Can’t let a few bad apples spoil the crop I guess. I know some amazing Titans…yer all clumsy and a bit gabby don’t get me wrong!” Darren tried to lighten the mood, but his voice was ragged and wornl. “But yer not all terrible. Some of you are alright.”

Darren took a long breath and exhaled. Pryvani could see the pain he was going through, the struggle to maintain his dignity and be true to his experiences at the same time. He may be small but he was really no different than any Titan man she had ever known. Stubborn and determined to not let a shred of emotion or weakness show.

“Do you want to stop?” Pryvani asked gently.

“No.” Darren said with fire determination. “You wanted to hear this, and I’m gonna tell it.” Darren paused and gave his head a shake and cleared his throat. There was still so much to tell, and it didn’t get any easier.)

Recovery seemed to come a lot quicker than Darren had been expecting, but not nearly fast enough. He could move his eyes in their sockets and blink to clear the blurry dryness. If he really struggled he could maneuver his neck to look around, slowly, methodically, and painfully. He wasn’t numb, not at all, not anymore. Dear lord, he could feel everything.

His skin burned and crawled with an itchy tormenting persistence, like he was covered in red hives he couldn’t scratch. His jaw hurt from the glue-like jell, and his muscles cramped and tightened in agonizing pain. He wanted to scream, it hurt so much, but his mouth was fused shut, and his body responded much slower than his mind ordered it to. Things seemed hopeless, and then he looked up.

His first impression of her was not at all what he had expected. She wasn’t a brutish, pale-skinned druggie with sick oily hair and mangled features. She was a cute, rosy-cheeked young woman with sweet freckles and raven black hair. She had the most intense eyes, and a perfectly centered nose that sat full of freckles in the center of her face. Sharp features, soft skin and a pleasant, winning social smile. She chatted with the people around her, she laughed, and she ate. Dipping bread in a messy brown and red sauce in a bowl and shoving it daintily into her mouth. She never spoke with her mouth full, and maintained eye contact whenever she was spoken to.

She had a sweet and charming contralto voice that made her seem both well-read and educated. She was polite, she was beautiful and she was even kind-looking. Which made it all the more sickening that he was in fact laying on her dinner plate among a garnish of sauces, herbs and spices. This was the face of the monster that would end his life: a sweet young girl.

She seemed reasonable, the sort of person he could bargain with, the sort of person who could see things rationally and logically. She didn’t look like a murderer, she didn’t strike him as a killer at all. Darren knew killers; he had spent the better part of his life learning all about them. He had even killed himself, he knew what it took, he knew what it did to a person. Keeran Leffen didn’t seem the type – that made what happened next all the more difficult to watch.

“So how are you supposed to do it? I’ve never done this before.” Keeran asked a faceless presence beyond Darren’s vision as she reached down slowly towards her plate.

Her nails were polished and decorated, her hands were clean and tidy, she had soft, clean, almost dainty-looking hands. She didn’t look like she spent her life on a farm like Lezah, with dirt between her nails and dirty cracked hands, she didn’t look like she’d spent her life on a military base like the quick-witted Eyrn, she didn’t look calculating and clever like Aisell, she was just a girl, and she was reaching down toward him as if he were a scrap of jerky on her plate.

Her fingers brushed over him as she felt for which of her three humans she would eat first. The slender delicate platinum haired female, the tan skinned short haired athletic looking male, or the pale skinned red headed stout male.

Darren felt her fingers brush against him, his heart tore through his chest up into his throat, he trembled as he felt her soft silky skin against his own. Her hands even smelt like fruit and flowers, mingling together to form an image in his head that just didn’t seem right! It just didn’t make any sense.

“Swallow them whole, it’s the best way to do it. Cleaner that way, they get real messy otherwise.” The other voice spoke up, Darren figured it was a woman, but his head was throbbing and his thoughts were elsewhere.

“They’re kind of big for that. Isn’t there a danger of choking?” Keeran asked as she slid her fingers from Darren to Tapp, feeling the tiny humans’ still, petite forms with her thumb and forefinger.

“They are paralyzed, so they will slide down nice and smooth. But dip them in the black oily sauce and they get nice and slippery, slide right down.” The strange voice said with pleasure. “It’s a feeling you will never forget.”

Keeran’s idle hand brushed past Tapp to the pale skinned man and wrapped around his waist with her thumb and first finger.

“The black sauce?” She asked nervously.

“You’re not really going to do it? Are you?” A male voice spoke, he was much closer than the first voice.

“Of course Hedyn, it would be rude to refuse what we are offered.” Keeran spoke sounding unsure of herself. She eyed the tiny human between her fingers for a moment and grimaced.

“Why is he looking at me…I thought they were dead?” Keeran asked around the low rumble of dinner guests conversing.

There was silence, Darren’s skin crawled as the clicking and chittering from before began. After a pause the familiar female translator spoke up.

“They tell us, they paralyzed in the venom of gatherer drones, a potent venom that is absorbed through the skin. It slowly paralyzed its victim leaving them immobile and numb, but warm and living.” The translator spoke with formality.

“Oh, I don’t think I want my meal looking at me.” Keeran shook her head in disgust.

The dreadful insectoid tongue spoke its chilling words once more, a long and complex string of sounds. There was a chilling nature to it that made Darren fear the being without the need to see what it looked like.

“They said, you Titans eat filth. Artificial fowl filth that has no natural source. If your meal can look at you, it is food, and you should eat it because it is food. If it had a face, if it came from dirt clay or water. It IS something, it is not fabricated, it will make you strong, and reproduce, and bring success to your hive!” The translator spoke with all the passion her master commanded.

Keeran tensed up as the Overseer approached her from where ever it had been positioned in the room. Darren only heard it coming, a strange clacking and tip-tip-tip sound. Every instinct in him begged him not to look, but morbid curiosity demanded he do what common sense begged he not.

The hellish creature looked exactly like what it was called. It had a large triangular face with two big green eyes at the sides, tiny dark dots in the center of its eyes that didn’t seem to move as it looked around. Two enormous scythe like arms with sword like blades at the end hunched over like its tiny earthen counterpart. It had green skin, thick and armored, and a long tube-like body with a fat rear section that seemed to be the most vulnerable part of its body. It had folded wings and six thin twig like legs in addition to its two large arms. It moved carefully and calculatingly, with an easy grace and agility.

Its mandibles didn’t move as it spoke, rather the sound came from its throat through its thick exoskeleton. It was truly grotesque, 100 feet long and at least 60 feet tall on all fours, maybe 90 if it stood on its hind legs. It was literally a giant praying mantis.

Darren was afraid, truly afraid like he had never been before. No longer did he hold on to a faint hope of rescue, or a slim chance of a heroic escape. The cold emotionless eyes of the overseer robbed him of everything but his terror.

“They wish me to ask you if their offering to you is offensive.” The translator spoke pointedly.

Keeran gave her head a slow shake, unable to take her eyes off the overseer.

“No…no…it’s ok. I like it, thank you.” Keeran mumbled nervously.

The overseer responded and the translator spoke pleasantly. “They are pleased then.” As the woman spoke the overseer moved on out of sight.

“Can I ask…I only see one…why do you keep referring to it as they?” Keeran asked the servant with a little more confidence.

“Simple, there is no word for ‘I’ in their tongue, there is no singular, only many. No one, only lots.”

“I….I see.” Keeran looked down to the tiny human between her fingers. She had owned humans before, she hadsat through lectures from a human professor at school. She was holding a class two sentient being in her hands. It felt wrong, but in order to experience their culture, their way of life…she would have to get dirty, and try things that didn’t fit with her own morality.

“They really do go down smoothly dear,” a familiar male voice spoke up – Lert, the man who had offered the truffles.

“Don’t do it Kee…it’s wrong.” Hedyn whispered, frowning.

Darren watched Keeran look from one face to another, then down to the teeny human in her grip. “Well, bottoms up I guess?”

Darren could only watch as the still, prone man disappeared into Keeran’s mouth. She slurped him in like a string of spaghetti and closed her eyes as she went to swallow.

Her throat bulged just a little as the fully conscious man slipped down her throat to the waiting pit below. A few seconds later Keeran opened her eyes and gasped.

“That felt so strange.” Keeran admitted as she rubbed her throat. “Not very easy to swallow whole are they?”

“You get better at it with time,” a woman said.

Darren went limp on the dinner plate, he had just watched another human being slip down the throat of a titan. Even though he couldn’t see the rest, he knew that all around the room the same thing was happening to other people. People with potential that would never be realized. Trusting, confused, innocent lives that could only watch as the malevolent gigantic beings they trusted with every facet of their lives, beings they had been raised to trust and love and obey murdered them one by one.

Darren’s eyes stung as tears fell from his cheek. He could her better from his current vantage, she had been there the whole time, and could likely see everything he could. Koranatappestrina Anghell Rozlan Debborruh, she was right next to him, watching everything he was.

Darren felt a swell of anger rise up in his chest. If he could at least save her – even if it cost him his life. At least he could still be useful, at least he could still be something more than a meal! She didn’t deserve this fate. As spoiled, mean and stuck up as she was, she didn’t deserve this.

Darren mustered up all the strength he had in him and turned his head to look to Keeran. She was conversing with the man next to her, whispering and eating, having some sort of disagreement. She drank a bit and ate some more, but she wasn’t watching him.

He looked back to Tapp. Her still eyes were frozen in a stiff look of horror. She was very much allert just like he was. Poi had been truthful, they had not soaked long enough, the venom had not taken hold. Tapp could hear, feel, respond and think. She was seeing all of this too, she knew what was coming, just like he did. Her eyes said it all.

Darren’s eyes slowly moved down the length of his body to his leg, he was completely naked save for one small missed detail. A small black elastic strap stood out to his keen eyes around his lower leg. In her haste, Poi had missed the sheath which held the 7 inch army blade he always carried with him.

It was useless against the Titans, that he accepted as fact. But for Tapp? If he could not save her, could he spare her? Deliver her peacefully to a merciful death rather than doom her to a slow burning digestion oven the course of several days in the stomach of a giant? He had to, it was the only bit of mercy he could give her.

But for that to even happen, he would first have to move his arm and reach his leg.

Moving was painful, but so was not moving. Everything hurt, but moving most of all. Not only had he the paralysis to fight, but the begging of his own conscience trying to convince him there was a better way. But it was a mercy, one he wished he had the strength to offer himself. If he ever met her in whatever afterlife awaited them, he was sure she would thank him for it.

Every time he wanted to stop, when it became too hard to fathom what he was planning on doing, all he had to do was remember that stone frozen look of absolute terror in her eyes, and remember what she was seeing, and hearing.

It felt as if he was learning to move all over again. Slowly, excruciatingly slowly, he reached for his leg, trying to twist it just right in order to shorten the distance between his two limbs. It was exhausting, and without the ability to open his mouth to take in extra air he felt dizzy and light headed from the exertion. He had only reached his knee, and already his strength was gone, sapped by the venom surging through his veins. He still had to reach his ankle, take the knife, and then make his way to Tapp. It seemed hopeless, but anger drove him to keep going.

Darren’s fingers felt the leathery sheath, he scratched and fumbled to open it, being careful to make sure he wasn’t being watched. The guests at the dinner feast seemed oblivious to what was going on. There was a bounty spread before them of all the different offerings brought to the overseer, and of course the overseer itself watching the happy little sheep gorge themselves on their own offered gifts.

Darren’s hand slipped off the sheath and he cursed to himself; he felt weak helpless and useless. Determined, though, he pushed on until he unbuttoned the holster and took the knife in his hand, palming the handle and hiding the long blade behind his hand.

Pulling his arm back up was a little easier than reaching down, but shuffling over to Tapp was like pulling a three hundred pound weight through the mud in the rain.

He had to do it as slowly and carefully as he could, lest he be seen and doom them both.

He would cut her quickly, likely across the neck so she wouldn’t suffer, then if he had the strength he would do the same for himself. It wouldn’t save their lives, but it would rob their murderers of their victory in some minute way.

Darren was half wayto his goal, when a shadow overcame them both, he looked up to see Keeran reaching down towards them. He had taken too long, his time was up! So close, only to fail at the last moment.

Darren screamed internally as Keeran’s fingers hovered over them, she wasn’t even looking, she didn’t even give them that small dignity! Her fingers lingered over the two of them until settling on Tapp. Gingerly she took hold of the small woman by her waist and lifted her up off the plate, only to find the second human clinging to the legs of the first.

“I thought they were supposed to be paralyzed?” Keeran asked somewhat off put as she looked around to the guests sitting next to her.

“Reflex mostly, nothing to worry about.” A voice spoke up.

“Oh.” Keeran took hold of Darren by the legs and parted them easily. “Wait your turn little guy,” Keeran said whimsically, and set Darren back onto the plate.

Darren looked up in time to see the back side of Tapp vanish between the ivory teeth of Keeran. Her lips closed with a suckling sound as she pulled her fingers out of her mouth.

‘No, please sweet Jesus not like this!’ Darren screamed inwardly as he watched the placid expression of Keeran focus as she forced Tapp down her throat with a sickening loud gulp. There was a bulge in her throat, a cough followed by a quick drink and a satisfied ‘ahhhh’ and then she was gone.

Koranatappestrina, was gone.

***

Degu screamed in frustration at the third strange pair of shoes he came across, just further cementing his failure to locate his mistress. At this point he almost felt like he was shooting in the dark, he didn’t know if going left or right north or south would bring him closer or further from salvation. All the while at the far back recesses of his mind he could only guess what was happening to Darren and Tapp.

They were not all best friends, they annoyed each other, Tapp was insufferable, rude and stuck up and Darren was often mean and sarcastic. But they were the only other humans he had lived with since he was a kid. They were the closest thing to family of his own kind he had, and even though they were full of faults, he was concerned for them.

Helpless was the only way to describe it. He felt helpless. Titans were supposed to be kind, friendly, helpful. Titans were protectors and providers and caregivers, not enemies. Shadow people, shaar and kipps, those were monsters, Titans were friends. Weren’t they?

“We have to get to the hospital, your arm is dislocated and you’re cut all over. Dirty wounds get infected you know! Gorram pup what’s wrong with you! What in the hells were you even thinking? Why did you do that? Look at yourself! You almost lost that eye you know!” Degu heard the unmistakable voice of Lezah, she was close!

“Will you stop screaming? I have a headache.” Aisell groaned in reply, much softer.

“I can’t believe what I saw! You were like a ninja! First you took his tail and we’re all wwooooosh, and then he was ggggggrrrrrowl and cut your face! But you rope-a-doped him! Just like Ali and Frasier! You were just awesome Aisell! Wow!” Eyrn’s familiar and chipper voice rang in next like a hyper jack rabbit.

Degu searched in desperation, following their voices until he spotted them a few tables away.

“No really though, we have to get you to a hospital!” Lezah interrupted Eyrn.

“Lez calm down, can’t I enjoy a victory drink first?” Aisell grumbled.

“Your arm is all mangled and you want a drink?!” Lezah shouted in frustration.

“She does kinda deserve one.” Aehzay said quietly.

“Zhay!?” Lezah protested.

“And did you see how you twisted him around and kicked him all pow pow pow! It was awesome!” Eyrn went on, she hadn’t taken so much as a breath. “I wish Darren had of seen that!” Eyrn paused and looked around to the others in her company. “Speaking of Darren…where is he and the others?” Eyrn asked casually.

“Sleeping.” Bedra remarked as she ran a pocket dermal regenerator over Aisell’s face. She had acquired it from the club’s medical emergency kit.

“Sleeping where?” Eyrn peeked around curiously.

“In my purse. They were tired so I let them sleep.” Bedra responded distracted.

“W…where is your purse?” Eyrn asked with growing concern.

“At the table. It was loud, I didn’t want to bring them, it might wake them up.” Bedra grumbled and took hold of Aisell’s face. “Stop moving! It’s hard to work when you’re looking around everywhere!”

“You left the purse at the table, unguarded?” Eyrn said, sounding confused now, and a little worried.

“Yea, but they’re just sleeping.” Bedra commented hastily as she struggled with a stubborn Aisell.

Eyrn narrowed her brow and took off towards the table, wasting not so much as another word on conversation, she, did however look quite worried now.

“Shoot, think she’s mad?” Bedra asked as she ran the device a third time over the slow mending face wound.

“You were supposed to be watching them Bedra…of course she’s mad.” Aehzay returned with two drinks in hand and set them both beside Aisell.

“You did what?” Aisell spoke up nearly jumping.

“Sit down!” Bedra forced Aisell to sit.

“I told you to look after them! You said you were going to watch them. You can’t just leave them unprotected at a table in a crowded nightclub!” Aisell tried to stand again.

“They were sleeping! Besides I’ve been here a dozen times, this place is human friendly. I’m sure there all just fast asleep fine as….”

“There not there!” Eyrn shouted as she ran back to the four women in a panic.

Aisell shot up from the table and looked to Eyrn who threw Bedra’s purse down before them all

“What!?” Aisell’s eyes went wide.

“How can that be! I left them right there! We were only gone for a little while! Where could they have gone?” Bedra dropped the dermal generator and grabbed her purse, tearing through it viciously.

“Well they’re not there!” Eyrn shouted, her voice panicked.

“No, no, no this isn’t right I swear they were right here!” Bedra equally as panicked continued in vein to look in her purse.

Aisell pushed Bedra aside and reached into Bedra’s purse pulling out Bedra’s data pad then shoved it into Lezah’s hands.

“What are you giving me this for?!” Lezah asked with a concerned frown.

“We can find them with this, they’re all chipped are they not?” Aisell spoke calmly but with fierce determination. She looked calmest of the bunch, her eyes alert and her face sullen.

“Oh…that’s right they are!” Lezah looked down to the pad and began to thumb through the various applications. “You have the ‘Find Me’ program right?” Lezah asked.

“I do!” Bedra took the pad quickly and thumbed through a few screens. “Here!”

“What about Darren! He isn’t on there…how will we find him? I don’t have that app!” Eyrn asked, frowning.

“I’m sure he is with them. They wouldn’t separate…it;s not like they would just wander off in opposite directions, they’re not stupid. They know how dangerous that would be…don’t they?” Aehzay asked.

“You don’t know Darren! ” Eyrn and Bedra said in unison.

“Or Degu…” Lezah sighed.

“…or Tapp….” Bedra winced.

“Got em!” Lezah spoke with hope, then flashed a puzzled look.

“What? What!” Bedra asked leaning over Lezah’s shoulder.

“There both here…but not together.”

“What!” The remaining women spoke together.

“Where are they?” Aisell spoke calmly.

“Tapp is a few dozen units from here…and according to this Degu is….” Lezah looked down. “Right there…”

The group looked down at once to the sight of a flailing, screaming, desperate Degu waving his arms at their feet. Desperate to be heard in the deafeningly loud nightclub.