Changeling Chronicles Ep. 18: Paige

Surrounded by space pirates. There are those who, after being informed of her life so far, would argue that next to disappearing from a ball pit somewhere in Suburbia and waking up on a starship and needing to deal with those circumstances, space pirates shouldn’t be a big deal.

First, she would tell those people if she wasn’t immobilized, I don’t remember much about the ball pit. Second, not being able to move AT ALL while space pirates decide what to do with you is plenty scary. She couldn’t even have a proper panic because she couldn’t move. The space cows were on the other side of the deck, and they seemed calm enough that Paige guessed they’d been here awhile.

One of her humanoid kidnappers steps close to her. They snap their fingers and her mouth can move.

“Here’s the deal,” the space pirate says. “We want the lost dragon. We saw you with a dragon. Where is it?”

“Gone.”

Space pirate narrows their eyes. Paige’s whole body is in agony. She wants to scream, but she can’t move her mouth again. She can, apparently, cry tears. She does. A lot.

Later, Space Pirate says, “Both you and the cows know where the dragon is. The first one to give us that information lives.”

Everybody leaves the deck. It’s just her and the cows. She doesn’t have the information she needs to survive.

Well, she thinks, I ended up here last time I died. I suppose I’ll just have to try again.

It never occurs to her to wonder what might happen if nobody has the answer the pirates want.