The sound of crying barely registered in my ears as it bounced off the walls of the nearly empty room. Naps have always been a big deal for me, the way puppies and newborns are a big deal to everyone else.

My roommate, a paradoxical combination of party girl and early riser, never got the memo. For a couple of seconds, instinct took over and I almost reached toward the edge of my bed to pat my perpetually drunk roommate on the head.

My hand got halfway to the woman next to me before high, clipped gibberish snapped me back to reality.

I opened my eyes and looked toward the front of the room, a cold lump of dread settling where my stomach used to be. Familiar images flashed before my eyes. The cool, heavy quilt my grandmother made for me, draped across the bed in my apartment. My solid wood desk, which devours most of the walking space in my bedroom, but I just had to have. None of them were there. All of them were back home. Back on Earth.

My name is Ella Browne. I’m from Western Springs, Illinois.

Two weeks ago, I was a typical twenty-something college student living on Earth. Then I went to a party with my roommate and her friends and let my guard down. My mother always told me that a stupid decision could lead to a lifetime of trouble. She just forgot to mention how many ways that trouble could manifest.

Three blue women stood in the doorway, each of them tall, leggy, and dripping with supermodel levels of glamor. Their wide hips swayed with each step.

The scent of their perfume reached all the way to my spot in line six feet away. It hung in the air, heavy and sweet, but still not strong enough to cut through the thick cloud of sweat and funk. There were two dozen women crammed into the room.

As far as I could tell from the few snippets of conversation I’d heard, all of us had four things in common. All of us were from Earth. All of us were grabbed by men with blue skin while we were alone. None of us knew where we were. None of us signed up for this.

The tension in the room ramped as those of us at the back of the room realized it was that time again. We’ve been in this room for days, squatting on the floor in lines that snaked across the empty space.

It didn’t look anything like what I thought a prison would. Someone had taken the time to attempt interior design, if mauve walls and beige upholstery counted as a design scheme. But it looked like they’d lost interest halfway through.

There were three couches and six cushions arranged around the room, but none of us used them. We never moved from the line. Even if there were a window in the long rectangular room to see from, we wouldn’t know exactly how many days any of us had been there.

If there had been beds, even if we had to double up, it wouldn’t have been so bad. It wouldn’t have been better. It definitely wouldn’t have been good. But at that point, I would take what scraps of light I could get and smile. Even the ones I imagined.

"Collecting time," the woman to my right whispered. She had been in the room longer than I had, but neither of us had bothered to learn the other's name.

I looked away from the doorway but made the mistake of looking down at my shaking hands. It wasn't the first time my line neighbor had used the phrase, but each time she did, the words hit a little harder than before.

Early on, I learned that the women in the room marked the passage of time by four key events. Twice a day, the trio of blue skinned women brought us bowls of grey slop. No seconds, and they never gave any of us a big enough portion to feel full. Mealtimes had taken on a twisted flavor. But I was getting used to being hungry. I hadn't figured out a set of coping skills for collection days yet.

Collection rolled around every few days and brought its own special brand of terror with it. The blue women walked the lines aisle-by-aisle. When someone caught their eyes, they pulled her out of line. The collected women and the blue models left the room. When they returned, usually hours later, they were always short one human woman.

The few panicked whispers in the room died as the trio of alien women began their walk down the aisle. Some of the girls around me craned their necks to listen to the glamazons’ whispers. New arrivals to the room always tried to eavesdrop, but there was no point. The blue women only spoke their own language. Probably so we never knew for sure what they had planned for us.

I didn't need to look up to track the blue women's progress through the room. Whimpers of fear told me how far down the line they had gotten. Sighs of relief told me how many women they had already passed over. The further down the line they got, the more my belly burned. I hugged my knees and buried my face in the dark space between them.

My name is Ella Browne and I don’t belong here.

A sob rang through the room. The trio had stopped to pick someone from the line. I peeked over my arm just as they moved the blonde girl into position behind them. She arrived in the room the same time I did. The first time she was collected, she fainted. This time, she climbed to her feet without so much as a wobble, but she still sobbed as she moved behind the blues.

The girls who came back from the collection always told the same story. The first time I heard it, I didn't want to believe it. I'd heard stories of men in flying saucers who stole drunk county folk in the middle of the night, and like most people, I thought they were a bunch of crap. Until a hairy mouth-breather dragged me out of a stranger’s bed I was stupid enough to fall asleep in.

But the stories were wrong. The men weren't green and they sure as hell weren't little. I had never thought of myself as short, but every alien I had seen so far towered over me. They weren't doing experiments on us either. I doubt any man on Earth would be able to resist the gorgeous glamazons, even if an anal probe was on the menu.

The woman to my left's voice hitched as the trio stopped in front of us. I tightened my grip around my knees, curling my shoulders as far as they would go. Over the years, I had learned to make myself small when trouble brewed. But no matter how tightly I curled into a ball, the glamazons’ whispers wouldn't go away. Strong, thin fingers wrapped around my arm and pulled me to my feet.

My heart pounded and a cold sweat broke out over my skin. It was my turn. Blue 2 pulled again and grunted something in her language. She stole a quick glance over her shoulder at Blue Prime. Blue 2 always looked at Blue Prime. Sometimes to make sure she wasn’t in trouble, sometimes to make sure something Blue Prime caught her doing something worthy of praise. At least, that’s how it appeared.

Blue 2 tugged and spat another stream of alien words in my direction. I still didn't understand, but it translated perfectly. Get up the hell up!

Blue Prime, the tallest of the three, moved behind her. The two women chattered back and forth, gesturing to me.

Deep down, I always knew my turn would roll around eventually. There was nothing I could do about it, so I tried not to think about it. Now that the moment had arrived, all I could do was make my body limp and hope gravity would save me.

Blue Prime wrapped her fingers around my other arm and tugged. My dead weight trick barely worked against one of them. It failed miserably against two. As I shot to my feet, momentum almost carried me back to the floor. The blues surrounded me, steadied me on my feet, and slid me into position behind the blonde girl.

My eyes met hers. She wasn't sobbing anymore, but streams of tears still flowed over her chubby cheeks. Up close, she looked to be about my age, but the dark circles under her eyes made it hard to tell.

For one second, I forgot to be scared for myself. I reached out and touched her arm, trying to give her some comfort. She flinched but didn't move away. I told myself to take the hint, but I couldn't move my hand. She was barely more than a kid. No kid should have to go through this alone.

None of us should have to go through this at all.

My brain fumbled for some words of reassurance, but by the time the glamazons started marching us down the aisle again, nothing had come to mind. So, I said the first thing that popped into my head, the first thing I’d said to anyone in days.

"What's going to happen to us?"

The blonde girl looked at me like it was the dumbest question she had heard in her life. She sniffled as she wiped the tears away with the back of her hand. The blues stopped again, pulling a curvy redhead out of the line.

"Is it true?"

Her eyes met mine again. I could almost see the wheels in her brain turn. Which would be better, a pretty lie or the butt-ugly truth? She looked away and her shoulders slumped as she made her final decision.

"Yes," she whispered as we crossed the threshold of the heavy wooden door in the room. "The auction is real."

That’s when it finally sank in. I was miles, probably lightyears, away from everyone and everything I knew. My roommate was a sweet enough girl, but she wouldn’t remember anything through the haze of alcohol and other substances she drowned her brain in while in party mode. Nobody was coming to save me. Nobody would know how my life in the room had been or how I’d died.

My chest clenched as Blue Prime pulled the door shut behind us, letting the heavy sound punctuate the blonde girl's words. She, more than any of the other glamazons, was always in a rush. With thin, nimble fingers, she punched a code into a keypad screen embedded in the wall. Numbness spread through my limbs as we walked down the hallway. No redemption. No reprieve.

Our march continued down the hall and around a corridor to a set of rooms. The same heavy wooden doors, the same keypad screen on the wall. Blue 3 took my arm and led me to my door. Her touch was the gentlest of the three but still like iron wrapped in a fleshy glove. More clipped alien words left her mouth, but her voice wasn’t as staccato as the other two.

I planted my bare foot in place and gripped the edges of the door. “Please. Please, I don’t want to do this.”

The blue woman put her hands over mine. I expected her to rip my fingers away from the frame, but instead, she brushed her fingers over mine and whispered in my ear, “Chitak, kalidin djaht.”

Over my shoulder, the other two girls were already in their rooms. There were no screams or gasps of pain. Whatever was happening wouldn’t hurt.

I let go of the door and let Blue 3 open it to reveal a bathroom. No, bathroom didn’t do it justice . Several dozen bottles of brightly colored liquids and creams sat on shelves along the walls. A cloud of steam hung over the room, but it smelled of flowers and citrus fruit instead of sweat. At the center of it all was a deep tub imbedded in the floor. Purple and green petals dotted the surface of the water.

“A bath? You want to give me . . . a bath?” Suddenly, I felt stupid for being so afraid, like a child who throws a tantrum over a shot only to discover the pain isn’t half as bad as they imagined it would be.

Blue 3 smiled and nodded her head toward the tub. Her eyes softened as if to say, “See? This won’t be so bad.”

For weeks, I’d sat in that room in my own filth, terrified to leave, when a warm bath in a luxury spa waited on the other side of the door. But as she unfastened my little black dress, now too soiled to be saved, I wouldn’t let myself forget the reality of the situation. This wasn’t a spa vacation. They were bathing me because I was about to be auctioned off to the highest bidder.

My name is Ella Browne, and I’m about to become an alien man’s slave.