The Belly of the Beast
When mankind grew too numerous, Earth consumed, each of the nation’s built themselves arks. A distant planet had been found, where they could begin their destruction anew. The journey would take generations, but the promise of a second Earth was too great.
And so, with the same greed Old Earth ended, a new era of humanity began.
The largest and most powerful of the nation’s built an ark of 26 levels, a ship so enormous it became a world within itself, nearly the size of a small moon. The wealthy purchased extravagant levels on the top, while the poor took levels further and further below, as divided as the nation they left behind.
They called it The Beast.
Chapter One
In less than ten minutes, all but one person standing inside the red circle will be dead.
We take bets on who.
“It’s ten to one on the new fighter,” I whispered to Xyla, checking over my shoulder to make sure the K-guards hadn’t moved. “Think he’s worth my last coin?” The dim light of the screens painted everyone a somber gray, but Xyla’s hair gleamed bone white. We sat hip to hip, squeezed onto one of the grimy benches that faced the screens.
“I’d pay our last coin to spend a night with him,” Xyla said, her grin matching mine.
“What about Wesson?”
Xyla winked. “I don’t have to pay to spend a night with him.”
My snorts of laughter earned us a few dirty looks before I managed to turn them into the more acceptable Belly cough. In the low lights of the filthy cafeteria, surrounded by X and Y engineers coated in soot and smoke, there was precious little to laugh at.
Xyla always told me I was beautiful, like the panther in her favorite novel The Jungle Book; deep eyes, inky black hair and lithe sulking power. To which I rolled my eyes. No one even noticed me when Xyla was near. White-blond hair, blazing blue eyes, taller and stronger than many of the men. If the handsome fighter had come down here, he would have been terrified or mesmerized by her—maybe both. Still, I was thankful that I was the one who blended into the shadows.
As a Z, my life depended on it.
Across a room of long tables filled with hundreds of X and Y engineers, Yerik, a bald engineer with a bulbous nose, was running a steaming business. These few minutes before the Letter Trial started, the betting ran the strongest. Yerik winked at me from across the room, and I nodded back, a twist of jealousy in my gut that I couldn’t host the bets myself.
Silent K-guards stood at the edges of the room, their black uniforms the darkest shadows in the otherwise metal room made to hold some 600 engineers—just one of the many cafeterias in the vast, smog-filled metal underworld of the Belly. I liked to think the K-guards didn’t know about the betting, that we’d pulled one over on them, but we were careful either way.
The buzz of the room silenced as each of the five screens on the furthest wall merged to show the newest trial combatant. He was tall, with golden-hued skin and wide, strong shoulders. Even so he looked barely older than me. His youth set him apart almost as much as his clean skin, full body, and lustrous hair—all of which marked him as from a higher letter than the Belly. Whatever he’d done, it was bad enough they’d sent him to the final Letter Trial. He could win, and move up. But even if you won the bottom Letter Trial, you still had to face four other Letter Trials before being given a new letter and a new life. I’d once asked Yaneli if anyone had ever made it to the Top from the Belly. She laughed.
“What do you think he did?” I whispered to Xyla, unable to take my eyes off the screen, until they panned to the next fighter, a middle aged man with a heavy gut and ugly sneer.
“With that body and face, probably caught the eye of the wrong wife.” Xyla shrugged. “He’s a bad bet, don’t waste your money on him.”
I rolled my last coin over the flesh fingers on my right hand, and then the metal fingers on my left, where the coin made a soft clink-clink-clink. Yaneli liked to call Xyla and me “the blind leading the blind.” But there was something about this new, young fighter, and the hate in his eyes. Like he’d lost everything he loved, and all that was left was to watch the world burn.
I knew that look.
“Twenty on the new one,” I declared, and slid the heavy brass coin down the table, the slight zing just audible over the low conversations. My pulse raced, a high rolling through me. Across the dented and dirty cafeteria tables Yerik winked and, when it reached him, slid my coin into a fattening pouch.
Wesson, Xyla’s current broad-shouldered paramour, caught my eye and gave me a wistful smile, as if hoping that I would scoot over and give him a spot next to Xyla. Fat chance. Something about Wesson’s sunny demeanor annoyed me. Nobody was that happy all the time—even if they were dating Xyla. Especially if they’re dating Xyla.
Beside me, Xyla lifted her tin cup full of her daily water ration. Or, at least, her official water ration—the rest of the water we needed we stole straight from the pipes. “When we win, we fill these suckers up with wine,” she declared.
“Wine? I’m thinking whisky.” We clinked the cups together and drank deeply, slamming them back to the table at the same moment. This time no one bothered to chastise us. Tense, whispered conversations grew across the room as the time drew closer. Besides the huge screens before that would show the fight, the only other light came from the information monitors screwed in place on the walls, shining with whatever message the Top wanted us to read today. Xyla and I once tried to steal one, but it had some kind of internal alarm. A shame really, because even though they usually only carried annoying messages—Your Admiral loves you! Be the Best Letter You Can be!—sometimes they showed a picture of a moving ocean, or a forest, like the screens were a window to Old Earth itself. And I would have given all the money in the galaxy for a true glimpse of any Earth, old or new.
Xyla and I had a good spot today, right up front, so the nearest guard couldn’t get to us without walking around one of the long dining hall tables first. Also nice because the table was so crowded Wesson couldn’t join us. No X’s, Y’s, women or children were fighting today, so the mood was lighter, voices a low murmur instead of a charged silence. Watching higher levels fight, it was easier to tell yourself that whatever they’d done, they deserved it. There was no one in the Beast lower than the X and Y’s.
Except for me, of course.
Finally, the announcers’ voices crackled to life, filling the room with noise. “We’ve got some interesting fighters here today. This is our final preliminary round—so next week it’ll be all the winners from our last ten Tuv Fights, fighting to move up to the Puckers!” The other announcer laughed and cut in, “You hear that out there folks? Stay outta trouble this next week, or you could be fighting the cream of the crop!” They laughed again, continuing in their pointless, belittling banter; but beneath it, I could hear the longing in their voices, to be assigned to a real Letter Trial. Not the metal pit with sticks and swords that made up the Tuv Letter Trial.
The camera panned across the announcers, a pair of T’s with dramatic makeup that gave them bruised eyes and bloody smiles, then sank past the cheering crowd, down sheer metal walls, and finally to the Tuv pit to where each man stood inside a painted red circle.
A K-guard had once told me it was painted in blood, but I was fairly sure that wasn’t true. Blood ran over those floors every week, but the circle stayed. Blood was temporary. The Letter Trials were eternal.
The announcers began to list out the offenses of the men in the Tuv Letter Trial with their new unlettered names that didn’t correspond to a level. Stripping the men of their lettered names and giving them another one, a name that meant nothing, just before they competed was supposedly a worse insult than the Trials.
Xyla and I both leaned forward as the announcer boomed out the names: “Wrecker, crime: stealing food and disobeying a K-guard’s orders. Tornado, crime: Assaulting a K-guard. Boar, crime: Failing to Meet Work Performance. Dagger, crime….” They panned to the new, handsome fighter, whom they’d chosen to name Dagger, and below the table, Xyla took my hand and squeezed. This would determine what I would eat or drink for the next month, and I selfishly hoped it was something truly awful. Something that would make the others afraid of him and earn us a much needed win.
“. . . Unlisted.”
A few gasps and then excited whispers broke out over the room.
“I’ve never heard of them not listing a crime,” Xyla whispered.
My mind spun. What was so horrible a crime they wouldn’t even list it now? The Tuv Letter Trial was the very bottom trial, reserved as the final judgment, a slap in the face for those denied the honor to fight in their own sections’ Letter Trial.
“Must be something they don’t want us to get ideas about…” But I had no idea what. I could dream up a whole lot of horrible—nothing so bad that they wouldn’t name it.
Xyla’s brow furrowed and I knew she was thinking about the coin I’d slid down the table. I stared at Dagger, wondering if I was about to regret betting the only coin to my name on him.
The clock on the screen started counting down from sixty and my pulse quickened.
Too late now.
Most people only cared for the fight, but the sixty seconds before told almost as much about a person. I studied Dagger. He could have been a few years older than my sixteen, maybe closer to Xyla’s age, but it was hard to say. His skin was healthy, golden, like the crust of fresh bread they served in the Tuv marketplace, his body like a coiled spring, his hair cropped short, almost military. A disgraced guard, maybe? Unlike the other men who trembled, his eyes traversed the pit, and then raised to look at the taunting crowd, betraying nothing.
My heart beat with the countdown. Ten. Nine. Eight…
“Remember,” the announcer sang out, as the last few seconds clicked off the clock, “Live in the Beast.”
Dagger opened his mouth. A shiver ran down my spine as my lips moved with his, as every person in the room repeated the same words as those in the pit.
“Die in the Beast.”
The fight began.
The men rushed to the weapons piled in the center. I lost sight of Dagger in the confusion of every screen showing different shots of men shoving and fighting to pull weapons from the pile.
Dagger dove out of the center already bleeding from his shoulder and holding only a thin sword. Xyla swore under her breath. Without thinking, I removed my third and fourth fingers from my left hand, rolling them under and over each other as I watched. Why the hell didn’t he get something with a longer reach? If I’m wrong…
Dagger lunged away from the fighting, but then staggered, and held one hand clenched to his side, blood dripping off his fingers. A group of three broke off from the weapons pile, each carrying a spear, and made their way towards Dagger.
Dagger stared down the men as they came to kill him, the sword held at his side, nearly limp.
Time seemed to slow. The first screen showed a pair of brothers fighting a huge, bald man, the other screen a one-on-one grudge match.
But the third screen showed three men, spreading out to coordinate their attack against Dagger. Still the sword stayed at his side, still his eyes remained unreadable. I wanted to jump up and scream at him to do something. Xyla’s hand hit the table and she hissed, “Move!” but no one, including myself, turned to look at her. Instead, the shouting of the other engineers in the room, the announcers voices, all faded.
He’s waiting for them. The realization hit me a split second before Dagger surged out of the screen. I stood up as the room gave a collective gasp. The camera zoomed back out. One of the men clutched his throat, a river of red bursting free.
At that moment, Yerik dropped the coins.
For a moment I thought the noise came from the screens, but they never played noise; the crowd was so loud only the announcers’ voices were projected. Which made the sudden crash and tinkling of coins all the more dramatic. Xyla and I both turned to watch as copper and bronze coins rolled in every direction, spinning and flashing. Yerik stared at them, his face frozen in horror.
The K-guard Kaptain, distinguished by the golden band on his black uniform’s arm, pushed off the wall, the sharp tap of his boots a countdown in the sudden silence. He couldn’t yet see past the tables and people watching.
Yerik didn’t move, face pale, eyes wide.
The Kaptain’s footsteps grew as I met Yerik’s eyes. His mouth was a perfect O, his hands outstretched like he thought the coins would magically return— which was when I realized he was going to sit there, unmoving, until the Kaptain rounded the corner and put together exactly what had happened. Yerik was already known for his slippery dealings in the Belly, and he’d been caught orchestrating illegal betting before. With a single snap of the Kaptain’s fingers, he’d go from watching the Tuv Letter Trial to fighting in it.
But he’s never caught me gambling before. He’d never caught me at anything— I was a shadow, a wisp of smoke, a Z.
And now, apparently, an idiot.
The footsteps came closer and I tossed the fingers of my hand into the pile, jumped off the bench, and undid as much of my mechanical arm as I could.
The K-guard turned the corner. He stopped, eyes widening.
I imagined what he saw. A teenage girl in dirty overalls, slim but strong. Black, curly hair barely contained, and brown eyes open with what I hoped was believable surprise. Surrounded by the pieces of a mechanical arm and coins.
His eyes darted from one piece of the puzzle to the next. Come on, put the pieces together. I laid them out so nicely. His hand inched toward his burrowing whip.
“I’m sorry!” I blurted out. “I was surprised, and my arm fell off. All the coins inside fell out.”
There was a silent moment as we stared at each other. I could already picture Xyla’s incredulous response: really, Z, that was the best lie you could come up with? But it was too late now, so I kept my face blank, my eyes wide and innocent even as a line of sweat ran down my back. The room flickered light and dark, the Trials still playing silently on the screen, but for once no one watched them. Instead, the weight of every eye held me anchored to the floor.
Maybe he really bought my bluff. Or, maybe, in that moment he could feel the sullen, simmering hatred of the room pressing in around him. Maybe for one silent moment, the people of The Belly stood strong.
I was playing a game as dangerous as the Letter Trials. He could arrest me easily, but accidents happened to guards in the Belly sometimes. A broken pipe. An errant machine. The Belly was a big place, and even the K-guards understood if you kicked a dog too many times, eventually it bites. What would arresting a skinny 16-year-old girl really win him?
“Pick ‘em up.” His voice was gravel over my skin. Xyla moved to help me. He yanked out his burrowing whip, the end unraveling and glowing bright as an ember. She froze.
“By herself.”
My face burned red. The pieces of my mechanical arm lay across the floor, but I didn’t dare reconstruct and show him how flimsy my lie was. So I struggled to collect the coins with one hand, piling them back into the mesh bag they’d rolled from, eyes down.
It’s just an act. You eat crow every day. This is nothing.
Even so, I burned at the humiliation of crawling at his feet. The last coin had rolled between his legs, and I reached for it, finally looking up. From below, I could see the stubble beneath his chin he’d missed, and the holster for the gun the guards rarely used in favor of the burrowing whips. I made my eyes like the fighter’s: a deep, endless pool with hatred buried beneath miles of darkness.
“Anything else?” The words were out before I could stop them.
He smiled. “Give ‘em here.”
Those three words finally snapped Yerik back to life. Behind the guard he jerked upright, his mouth set into a line of hate as I passed over the coins.
Before I could slink away, the Kaptain reached forward, gripping my chin painfully, and bringing my face closer to his. My flesh crawled where he touched me, but I didn’t jerk away. This close I could smell breath like old meat— something we didn’t eat in the Belly, but I sometimes found in the Chute covered in maggots. I met his eyes and swallowed my rising bile— and the anger that came with it.
“You’re a pretty little thing.” His eyes flicked to my arm, where the flesh ended just below my shoulder and the circuitry began. His smile turned ugly. “Or at least, you were.” He shoved me away, and with only one arm I fell hard.
“If I see any more coins, I shoot first and ask questions second,” he roared to the hundreds of watching faces. “Back to watching.”
The low noise of whispers began again as I slid back into my seat. I didn’t miss the looks of anger shot at the guards or the looks in my direction: mixes of appreciation, exasperation and relief. Xyla squeezed my hand, her eyes worried as I gave her a tight smile I knew she saw through.
Just as I turned back to the screens, the announcer’s voice boomed over the room, “And that’s it! Dagger takes it! What a Trial! Unbelievable!”
With every camera trained on him, projected larger than life, Dagger stood, blood splattered on his chest. His shirt was torn from shoulder to hip, an ugly cut bleeding down muscles that spoke years of discipline. He didn’t move to cover himself. Instead he glared up at the crowd’s gaping mouths, now cheering and screaming for him, portrayed to us in deafening silence.
He’d won.
Somehow, impossibly, he’d won. And yet, Xyla was right. He was a bad bet after all.
“You okay?” Xyla whispered, watching me in the way she did when she was worried.
“Course. That Kaptain’s an ass.” But I didn’t say it too loud.
She stood suddenly, even though we usually watched the final recap. “Let’s go. I’ve got a circuit to fix in the Incinerator district. Yaneli said she could use your help.” I knew what she was doing—shielding me from the curious eyes, or even getting me away from the Kaptain before I said or did something stupid—but I didn’t protest like I normally would have. Together we made down the long tables, the room still dark as the others watched. I looked back a final time at Dagger, standing in the pit, almost a statue but for the blood running down his side.
He had fought. They all had. And even if all of them were dead but him, there was honor in that.
Xyla thought I gambled because I liked the risk, and I did, but there was one more reason I bet on the Letter Trials.
I was jealous of them.
Dagger stood in a pile of the dead, as I did every week, but after next week’s Trial, he would either join the dead or leave the Belly forever.
All my life I’d been too much of a coward to do either.
(Click here to continue reading “THE BELLY OF THE BEAST“, FREE and exclusively available on Wattpad. Also don’t forget to subscribe to my monthly newsletter here, for my Top Ten Writing Tips and “The Inevitable End“, a prologue short story to The Last She series.
Best, H.J. Nelson)