Slowly, keeping low to the ground, Amy crept through the ruins of the old city. She was a young woman, 19 years old with the lean, athletic body surviving after the end of civilization demanded. Her light brown hair was tied back in a ponytail. She was dressed in a white tank-top, now very worn, ripped and threadbare and a pair of khaki cargo shorts with hiking boots. A backpack was slung on her back.  

Amy continued her slow progress, ducking from one wrecked car to the next rubble pile to another burnt out shell of a building. Here and there, where the asphalt and concrete of the roads and sidewalks had cracked and crumbled, patches of grass and shrugs sprung up, thick and tall as any country field. The trees that had once been confined to sidewalk planets had begun to spread to, already some of the new saplings were as tall as any from the old days. Before long, as the buildings crumbled away, there might be a mighty forest here.

But Amy’s thoughts weren’t on the future, but the present. The young woman poked her head from her current hiding spot, glancing around. Though the city was still and quiet, there were always plenty of dangers for the unwary scavenger. Building might collapse, streets could give way when underground sewer pipes gave way, pockets of natural gas, some left from old pipes, others from organic material rotting underground, needed only a spark to go up in an explosion. But the greatest danger, one that stalked her every moment of every day, was the omnipresent threat of the Cybersaurs.

Who could have imagined, 64-million years ago, a civilization of dinosaurs had flourished in the teeming jungles of Pangaea? That with their advanced scientific knowledge and technology, they had found a way to escape the destruction of their world, by opening a portal into the distant future, when the planet, spurred on by global warming, had started to return to the hot, humid climate of their golden age?

With their advanced technology, the war had been swift and one sided. Within a few short years, humanity, once masters of this planet, had been conquered, nations laid low, cities destroyed and what survivors remained scattered to remote areas, scavenging what they could from the ruins and just trying to stay alive and beneath the notice of their new, scaly overlords. Men they hunted for cruel sport. Women… Amy shivered. No one knew why the Cybersaurs seemed to prefer capturing female humans instead of killing them, even going to great lengths to secure them unharmed, but she was deathly certain she never wanted to find out...which meant being cautious at all times, ever ready for their hunting parties and traps…

There, up at the end of the block, was the building she’d seen on her last scavenging expedition. The outside was charred with fire and overgrown with vegetation, but unlike most of the other buildings here, it was still relatively intact and didn’t show any of the usual signs it had been picked over by other scavengers already. Amy approached, but carefully. The Cybersaurs knew their human prey were drawn to their old cities, scavenging what little they could from the old world, and buildings such as this were the perfect bait for an unwary scavenger.

“Aha!” Amy thought, stopping at one wrecked door. Just inside, cunningly hidden in the shadow of the building, was one of their advanced snare traps. The round circlet, it’s segmented metal body dulled to a dark matte finish, would automatically tighten itself the moment it detected someone’s foot setting down within its circumference. Another cable ran from it to a staple, anchored tight against the brick wall of the building. Once snared, the unfortunate scavenger would be stuck, faced with the awful choice of having to saw their limb off, or wait for the cybersaurs to arrive, alerted by a signal that their trap had caught a new victim. A cruel, but cunning trap…

Cunning, but predictable. One thing that had allowed Amy and other scavengers like her to survive was that, for all their technology surpassed humanity, the cybersaurs themselves seemed to be unimaginative and slow to adapt. She’d seen this same trap, in this same position, dozens of times before and knew to look for it, and how to counter it. From her backpack, she took out a can of bright orange spray paint she’d traded from another scavvie who’d been clearing out an old hardware store. A few quick passes and the snare practically glowed in the dim light. She’d have no trouble avoiding it now, and any other scavengers who came after her, if the pickings in this place were more then she could bring back herself.

Stepping over it, Amy proceeded into the ruin, still carefully but much more relaxed. Another thing about the cybersaurs, they rarely put more then one trap in a spot, perhaps unable to believe any pitiful humans would be clever enough to avoid the first. Still, there was always a first time and Amy had no desire to wind up their captive just because she’d run into the first one to think of it…

But she soon put them out of her mind...for the moment at least, because the place proved to be rich pickings indeed. It had once been an electronics store of some sort and much of its merchandise was still intact. She ignored the display models, scattered on the floor, overgrown with moss and weeds, and went to the storeroom, where the boxed goods had fared somewhat better. Though many were soaked from leaks and rotted over with mold, there were still plenty in boxes that were relatively good. And even the ones that weren’t might have spare parts that could be scavenged. She grinned, filling her pack to bursting. She’d live like a queen back at the scavvie encampment the next few weeks, longer even, if she could keep this place a secret and make a few more trips before others found out about it and cleaned it out…

Amy was just thinking that when she heard the sound of footsteps in the street outside. She froze, looking up in alarm. Fortunately, it wasn’t the heavy tread of cybersaurs, or the pawing of feral dogs, but even another human could be a threat, not just to her lucrative haul of scavenged goods. The young woman was quite aware what some men might do if they found a pretty girl like her out alone in the wastes. The cybersaurs weren’t the only predators on the planet, after all…

It was then Amy realized that the fresh spray paint she’d left by the door, besides highlighting the Cybersaur trap, would also let anyone passing by know someone had been by recently, and inside her footprints were still fresh among the dirt and dusty of the ruined store. Sure enough, the footsteps stopped, when they’d reached the door…

“Hello? Anyone in there?” Amy relaxed, letting out a gasp of relief at the sound of another, undoubtedly, feminine voice. There was nothing to worry about. Briefly, she considered her windfall of loot, but in the end decided to do the polite thing and share with her fellow scavenger.

“In here!” Amy called. “There’s plenty of scavenge here, but be careful of the trap by the door.”

She heard the quite foot pads carefully slipping past the snare and a second later, another woman came into view in the storeroom. She looked to be a few years old then Amy, tall and lean, with a narrow, sharp face framed by straight black hair cut shoulder length. She was dressed in a red top, cut short showing several inches of smooth, toned belly before a pair of long, camo pants, ending in combat boots. A blue neckerchief was tied around her neck. Like Amy, she had a pack on her back and a tool belt.    

“You weren’t kidding!” The other woman said, whistling as she looked around the storeroom. “This will all take some hauling...”

“Yeah...” Amy said, eyeing the other woman. She didn’t recall seeing her around the trading camp where Amy traded her scrap, but that wasn’t surprising. These days, people needed to keep on the move constantly, to avoid the frequent Cybersaur patrols. Trading camps popped up wherever different groups of scavvies met, trading whatever they had more then enough of for whatever the other side needed least. They disappeared just as fast, whenever word got out one of the Cybersaur's flying craft was heading that way, ready to drop another hunting party of the scalie monsters on their heads.

The other woman noticed Amy’s glance. She extended a hand in greeting. “I’m Rebecca.” She introduced herself. Amy returned it with her own, then turned back to the pile of DVDs she was sorting. Old Fran back at the village still had a player that worked and a small collection she’d show to others in exchange for food and occasional trinkets. She might be willing to pass some on to Amy if she brought her back some good one and the evenings at the village would be improved by the increased selection.

Rebecca, meanwhile, had started filling her own pack, taking a few choice items, but not stuffing her back full like Amy had feared. It seemed she was willing to respect Amy’s right to claim the bulk of the prize. Neither said much, both had grown used to the solitude of the ruined cities and found having a companion a novelty, but an awkward one.

When both had grabbed as much as they could practicably carry, they both shouldered their packs and headed for the door. “After you...” Rebecca said, waving Amy forward. “And mind the trap.” Amy nodded, carefully stepping over it and poking her out cautiously out the door, looking for any dangers that might be lurking outside.

She was so focused on spotting danger outside, she didn’t notice as her unexpected companion reached to one of the pouches on her belt a drew out a small, silver device. She raised up, pointing at the back of Amy’s neck, point blank range.

“Zaaap!”

A flash of pain lanced through Amy’s body. For an instant, it seemed every muscle went tense all at once, then just as suddenly went limp, sending her crumbling to the ground. She would have screamed, but her vocal cords were just as paralyzed as the rest of her. The only part of her that seemed to function were her eyes, which darted around frantically, though at the moment all she could see was dirt and concrete.

Vaguely, she became aware of something...someone, touching her. The sensation felt oddly muted, like she was wearing several thick layers of clothing, but someone was fumbling over her, slipping her arms out of the straps of the pack and pulling it away. They didn’t stop there, untying her boots and pulling them off. Her tank-top was pulled up, baring her chest, then her shorts were unbuckled and pulled down her legs, along with her panties, leaving the young woman completely nude. To her shock and amazement, as she flopped her head over, she saw the one stripping her was Rebecca!

“wwwaaa...rrrr...ooo...oooiiinnnggg?” Amy slurred, her mouth and tongue sluggish. Some movement and feeling was starting to come back into her body, though at the moment she could still only twitch a little as the other woman rolled her once more onto her belly. Amy felt Rebecca pull her hands around behind her back, then felt something being slipped around her wrists. She heard the clicking of metal and a second later felt the cold, hard steel rings of cuffs close tight around them. Her squirming took on a more frantic tone as she realized Rebecca had just handcuffed her.

“Whaa...what diiidd you doo too mee?” Amy said, still slurring her words. She struggled to get up, but she was still weak and Rebecca had little trouble keeping her pinned down. Another ring, larger and thicker, but still cold, hard metal, was slipped around Amy’s neck and closed shut. The young woman could feel the pressure around her throat, the evenness broken here and there by odd protrusions jutting uncomfortably into the sides of her neck.  

“Wha-what is this?” She demanded, her growing fear helping to shake off the last effects of the stunner, but by now it was too late.

“I’m sure you can guess easily enough.” Rebecca said, the earlier friendliness gone from her voice. “It’s a collar, a slave collar. Made by the cybersaurs.”

Amy’s eyes went wide with horror as she took this news in. “Noooo!” She screamed in terror. “Please no!” She thrashed about, until Rebecca put a knee on her back, pinning her back down to the ground.

“It’s too late. There’s no way to remove that collar, short of cutting that pretty head of your off, and that won’t do you much good. The tracking beacon in it has already let the cybersaurs know they’ve got another slave. No matter where you run know, they’ll be able to find you. Sooner or later, they’ll come to collect you.”

“You bitch!” Amy shouted angrily, struggling against her captor with all her strength. “You awful bitch!”

“I’d save your strength, slave.” Rebecca taunted her. “It won’t do you any good, and you’ll need it when you meet your new masters.”

Amy’s head dropped back to the ground. She sobbed, tears welling up. “How?” She demanded, anguished. “How could you betray your own kind to the cybersaurs?”

Rebecca slid back, removing the pressure from Amy now the captive girl wasn’t struggling. As Amy struggled to sit up, she saw her captor reach up and untie the bandanna around her neck. As it fell away, Amy saw a metal ring, covered in irregular seams, running around the other woman’s neck. She guessed the ring around her own looked exactly the same.

“You’re a slave too?” She exclaimed, in surprise.

“I was.” She told Amy. “Two years back, I was taken in one of their raids. But I convinced my master I would be of more use out here, capturing other pretty girls like you for him. So long as I keep providing him with other slaves, they allow me some degree of freedom.” She shrugged and got to her feet. Taking Amy by the arm, she hauled her captive up as well.

“Now be quiet. We’ve a long walk ahead of us, through dangerous terrain. I’d advise you to keep quiet, there’s no hope of anyone rescuing you now, but there’s plenty of other dangers and I’d prefer not to have to gag you if I don’t need to...”

She reached into another of her pockets and drew something out. It was a leash, made of the same silver cable the snare was. It clipped easily to the front of Amy’s collar, though there hadn’t seemed to be anything for it to attach to. Taking the free end in her hand, Rebecca grabbed Amy’s pack, along with her discarded clothes. Then she turned, not bothering to check her captive was following. When she reached the end, Rebecca kept going, letting the leash snap taut. Amy was jerked forward, almost dragged off her feet. Sobbing, she trudged along after her captor…

***  

“Ah!” Rebecca said, as they rounded another corner in the ruined city. “Here we are, home sweet home.”

Behind her, her latest catch, Amy, trudged along, dejectedly. Despite Rebecca’s repeated warnings to keep quiet, the silly girl had continued prattling on the whole trip back, swinging back and forth between angry curses and useless threats of retribution on the one hand and equally useless pleas to be let go on the other.

Now, the crumpled pair of panties she’d been wearing filled her mouth, held in with a torn strip from her tank top, serving to muffle both satisfactorily. Her muffled sobs had continued, nonstop, after, but Rebecca was used to that from her captives, once the hopelessness of their situation set in and they contemplated their inevitable futures as slaves to the cybersaurs, a fate Rebecca had only just escaped, and one she vowed she would not fall into again.

Slipping around the alleyway, Rebecca found the rusted metal hatch that hid the entrance to her lair. She went to work, quickly unlocking it, and disabling some of the traps, far more cunning and sneaky then those of her Cybersaur masters, and opened it.

From inside the dark interior, a chorus of frightened moans rose up to greet Rebecca and her newest victim. They took on a note of anguish as they realized who it was and knew the hoped for rescue had once again failed to come and instead it was only their cruel captor returned with another victim to join them in their nightmare.

“Did you miss me?” Rebecca said, coming down the stairs, dragging the hapless Amy behind her. Her lair was hooked up to a generator that still gave power, and she flipped a switch, causing a single naked bulb overhead to come own, lighting up the dark, dingy space and it’s current inhabitants.

Rebecca was quite proud of her current catch. There were still two weeks before she had to deliver her next “tribute” to the cybersaurs and she’d already collected half a dozen fit young maidens. They were chained along one wall of the basement, connected by their leads to a metal rail running along the wall that had once held a rack of some sort before scavengers had stripped out most of the contents.

Closest by the door was Helen, a tall black amazon, her naked body heavily muscled. She’d managed to shrug off enough of the stun blast to run for it, making it nearly a dozen yards before it had recharged for a second shot to put her down long enough for Rebecca to get the cuffs and collar on her. She glared up at Rebecca with a hateful expression. Like Amy, she’d yet to learn to keep quiet like a good slave and was currently chewing on a bit gag Rebecca had fashioned from a short length of PVC pipe and two lengths of electric cable.

To her left was Katherine and her two teenage daughters, Sally and Beth. The three were close in looks, pale skin, blue eyes and curly brown hair. The cybersaurs would be pleased with them, Rebecca thought. She’d run into Beth near the outskirts of the city and had been about to grab her when the teen mentioned meeting her mother and sister not far away. Following her back to the family’s campsite had taken the rest of the day and brought Rebecca to the edge of the ruins, but when all of them had bedded down for the night she’d managed to stun them, one after another, in their sleep and get them stripped, collared and leashed for the journey back here.

Fifth was Nancy, a tomboyish redheaded girl of 18. Like Amy, she’d been scavenging in the city when Rebecca had spotted her. Unlike her newest captive though, Nancy had been suspicious from the beginning, though she’d thought Rebecca had nothing more sinister in mind then robbing her of her hard won scavenge and had pulled a gun on the huntress. Fortunately, Rebecca had been a bit quicker on the draw with her stunner, and Nancy perhaps a bit reluctant to shoot another woman in cold blood, so Nancy had wound up shackled down here, while Rebecca remained free to bring in fresh captives. Like Helen, Nancy had a gag in her mouth, a leather strap tied around her head. She chewed on it angrily, glaring up at her captor.

Last was Olivia, a short, pale, dark haired girl. Unlike the rest, Rebecca wasn’t the first captor Olivia had had the misfortune to be taken by. About a month ago, a trio of human raiders had snatched her away from the nomadic caravan she’d been apart of and kept her as their concubine. They’d intended for Rebecca to make concubine number 2, but she’d turned the tables with some of the other tools her masters had provided her. Olivia had been happy enough to see her tormentors blasted away...less so when Rebecca turned out to be no rescuer…

It was beside her that Amy was now chained. Her seventh victim of this bunch. “Sit quietly now, while I get all of you some food.” Amy sobbed, but food was a strong motivator for good behavior, something aped by all the other captives, with the exceptions of Helen and Nancy who continued to grumble curses through their gags. Both had missed more then a couple meals since their captures, though the punishments had yet to change their attitudes towards their captor or captivity much.

The others, meanwhile, knelt silently, heads bowed, and waited as Rebecca walked over to pallet of cardboard boxes, each with a faded logo of a happy canine on the side. From inside one on top, Rebecca took out a couple dented cans and started opening them. She took up a couple of old, bent dishes and scooped the gray-brown contents out onto them, setting them down on the floors. Worn down from their captivity, the other women simply bent over, the shackles forcing them to eat with their mouths alone. Amy watched, horrified, but hunger won out in the end. She turned her head, so Rebecca could untie her gag.

“Now remember, keep quiet or that goes right back on.” She told her new prisoner. Amy have a quiet whimper, but silently joined the others in their meal. Rebecca turned and went to another stack of boxes to find her own, considerably better, meal when there was a sudden noise from overhead. A harsh whine of engines seemed to rock the basement down to its foundations. Half a dozen heads suddenly popped up, looking to the roof of their prisoner fearfully. Like every human inhabitant of the planet now, they knew and feared that sound intensely. Even Rebecca couldn’t suppress a frightened shiver. It was one of the Cybersaur’s ships, coming in for a landing nearby. Her masters had arrived...

***  

The Cybersaur transport landed with a thud that shook the building. Down in Rebecca’s basement lair, her captives were going crazy, screaming in fright, sobbing brokenly and fighting against their chains as if there was any hope of escape. Their new masters were here to claim them and there was nothing they could do to stop it.

Rebecca ignored them, heading up to the hatch. She stepped out, blinking in the bright daylight and looked across the street where the aircraft had landed in a field of rubble that had once been an apartment building. It was about the size of a large cargo helicopter, but broader with thick wings on either side, holding the strange anti-gravity engines that lifted it off the ground. At the front was a bulbous cockpit, tinted dark and below, the prow of the craft was painted with a fierce, snarling, saurian mouth, letting anyone who saw it know it was no civilian craft. The rest was painted in mottled greens and browns and fierce red tiger strips.

Three thick legs held the craft up. As Rebecca watched, a ramp lowered at the back and with the heavy stamp of boots, the cybersaurs inside tramped out. As always, humanity’s conquerors presenented a fearsome sight. They were humanoid, but broad and heavily muscled, standing a full two heads taller then the average person, their scaly heads rounded up top, ending in long, fanged snouts in the front. Their scaly skins ranged in color from dull reddish-browns and tans to bright greens. Cruel yellow eyes, with red slits looked around the ruined city disdainfully.

True to their name, each of them bore some sort of cybernetic augmentations. None were precisely the same, some with gleaming metal visors or monocles, some with robotic limbs or tails, one even with his lower jaw replaced with chromed metal. A few had no visible augments, though below their silver jumpsuits, their bodies bulged unnaturally with hidden pieces. Those who didn’t have weapons built into their bodies in the form of arm or shoulder mounted cannons carried the cybersaur’s usual rayguns. As Rebecca understood it, the augmentations had been necessary, in order to survive the trip through the time portal from the distance past to the present.

As the cybersaurs marched out in two lines, Rebecca threw herself onto the ground, bowing down, almost prostrate before them. It was part of their arrangement, they allowed her some degree of freedom, yes, but only so long as she remembered she was still their slave and they her masters. So she groveled, waiting to be noticed as they came to a half before her.

At the head of the troop stood one Cybersaur, a full head taller then the rest of his men. His dark, reddish-brown scales were scarred, with extensive cybernetics covering half his face. He glared down at the human slave, his organic eye narrow his hate. Rebecca knew him as Redclaw, a rough approximation of his suarian name, the subtle hisses and growls beyond feeble human vocalization. He was the second in command below Rebecca’s master, Tyrant-X. He resented her, she knew, since his hunters hadn’t been bringing in as many slaves lately while she’d managed to keep meeting the quota of captives her masters set each month.    

“Ripper! Terror!” Redclaw hissed, ignoring Rebecca for the moment, pointing at two of his hunters. “Go and see what tribute this slave has managed to collect for us.” They nodded and headed for the entrance.

From her position, head bowed to the ground, Rebecca suppressed a grumble. She’d been hoping to keep one or two of the girls and offer the rest as tribute. It would put her closer towards the next month’s tribute and give her a plaything or two to make those long nights in her dungeon more pleasant. She could have made them fight for the privilege of being her plaything, submitting to her every whim for the meager promise of not being turned over to the cybersaurs...for another month at least.

No chance of that now… Rebecca wondered if that was all they’d come for, if Redclaw had hoped to find her empty handed and use that as an excuse to end this arrangement and drag her back in chains. A defiant part of her wanted to demand to know what he was doing here, weeks before her next scheduled tribute, but the rational part of her knew it wasn’t wise to do anything that might annoy the seven foot tall, cyborg dinosaur who already disliked her and had the power to make her life literal hell, so she kept quiet, waiting to be noticed.

After a few minutes, perhaps hoping Rebecca would forget her place enough to speak out of turn and justify a punishment, Redclaw waved a clawed hand, granting her permission to rise. She did so, trying not to do so too quickly, and keeping her head bowed in submission. “How may this slave serve you, magnificent master?” She said in a quiet voice.

“We have an...assignment for you, slave.” Redclaw hissed. “One for which you are...uniquely suited.” Despite the handicap of having half his face replaced with machine parts, Rebecca could see he was struggling with the fact she was better at something then he or one of his hunters would be. He held up a clawed hand. A small hologram flickered into life above it. Rebecca recognized it as a map, showing the region where the cybersaurs had established their city and where most of the human slaves they captured were sent.

As Rebecca watched, it zoomed in on one of those prison camps, marked with the claw-scratch runes the Cybersaur’s used for writing. “Recently we have had instances of slaves escaping from the training camps in the region. Steps have been taken to increase security and those responsible for guarding those camps have been...reprimanded, but it has not stopped the escapes.”

Rebecca’s eyes boggled. Since their invasion, she had never heard of anyone captured by the cybersaurs escaping them talon’d clutches. It seemed impossible. For a brief moment, the possibility of her own escape occurred to her, but she quickly suppressed those thoughts, lest her expression betray her. “Surely it is impossible, master!” She said, acting as best she could the obedient slave.

“It is...this is only a temporary escape. Each of these wretched slaves will be hunted down and punished severely for daring to defy their masters! And you will help!”

“Me?” Rebecca asked. “How may I serve, master?”

“You will be transported to one of the camps which have had recent escapes, among the other new slaves. You will spy on the other slaves, until you find out how these escapes are happening and you will report back to us.” Redclaw told her. As he said this, the hatch to her lair opened and the two hunters he had sent down appeared again.

Trailing behind them was a coffle of the seven girls Rebecca had captured. Their collars had been linked with cables a few feet long. The girls’ shackles had been swapped out for standard cybersaur restraints. Silver bands, like the collars around their throats, circled wrists and ankles, joined by short cables ankle to ankle, wrist to wrist, with a longer one joining the two together. Briefly, Rebecca hoped that they’d remembered to use the keys this time. She’d spent forever scavenging old police stations to replace her stock of restraints after the last batch of tributes.

Thicker bands, of the same material, but flattened out somewhat, covered the lower halves of each girls’ face, covering their mouths and muffling their frightened whimpers. Some hung their heads down, sobbing, others stared straight ahead in disbelief. A couple managed to turn their heads and glare at Rebecca hatefully as they were dragged past, towards the waiting Cybersaur craft.

“um...ingenious master...if it please you...” Rebecca said hurriedly before he could pull out another set of restraints for her. “I don’t think that will work!”

Redclaw looked down at her, a cruel grin crossing his face. “Do you dare to defy the orders of your master, slave?”

“No, please oh great and terrible hunter...” Rebecca stammered, thinking quickly. “It is indeed an ingenious and wily scheme! Only, these slaves and many others would recognize me as a willing agent of your might power! They would never trust me enough to reveal their means of escape!”

To her relief, Redclaw seemed to think things over for a minute. “It is possible you may have a point slave...” He said, his own voice betraying disbelief at his admitting that. “There can be no hint you are anything other then another human slave, so that they will trust you.” He grinned. “And I believe I know how to do so...”

***  

Two days later, Rebecca found herself hiking through an endless wasteland of sickly brown grass and scrub. She had no idea where she was, beyond somewhere in what had once been the Midwestern United States. The Cybersaur’s craft had flown her up here, after dropping her luckless captives off at one of the saur’s training camps, one without an escape problem, to begin their new, miserable lives as slaves of the cybersaurs.

“Our spy drones have identified this region as having a large presence of wild humans.” Redclaw had told her. “You will locate one of the groups, join them and when the time is right signal my hunting party to come and collect them, as well as you. You will then be delivered to the training camp with no one suspecting you are anything but another newly captured slave.”

Rebecca felt awkward, as she walked along. For the first time in over two years, for the first time since her capture and enslavement, the constant pressure of the cybersaur’s collar was gone from around her neck. It would be impossible for her to explain to any free humans she met why she had a slave collar on, as she’d eventually persuaded Redclaw. He’d, reluctantly, agreed, taking some silver device from his belt and touched it to her collar. With a loud beep, it split open where the device touched it and fell from her neck.

Of course, they weren’t about to let her run off without some insurance to keep their unwilling agent in line. Just as soon as he’d picked up the collar, Redclaw took another device out which had injected a small tracking chip, similar to the ones inside the collars, into her. “I just wish they could have picked a different spot for it...” Rebecca grumbled, rubbing a hand over her ass.  

About noon-ish, Rebecca paused beneath a stand of trees that were only half dead and had a quick lunch break with some old food cans from her backpack. She’d brought those from her base. The Cybersaurs, on the other hand, had given her the 9mm pistol in there as well, to replace the stunner and ray pistol. It would be a little hard to explain to the other humans where she’d come by them…

“Assuming I find any of them at all...” Rebecca thought. Though the Cybersaurs had said this region had a substantial population, she hadn’t seen anyone since landing. Which wasn’t too surprising, when she thought about it. Since the brief but futile struggle at the start of the Cybersaur’s invasion through time, the one constant fact of life for humanity was it was hopeless trying to fight the invaders and their superior technology. Those who dead only wound up dead, in the case of the men, or slaves in the case of the women who often envied the men.

The only hope to survive a reasonable length of time and in relative freedom was to stay beneath their notice, which meant keeping constantly on the move to avoid the Cybersaurs, rather predictable, patrol routes and stay unseen.

“Doesn’t make my job any easier...” She thought. Just then, an arrow whistled out from the tall grass and thudded into the ground, quivering at her feet.

“That was a warning!” A female voice shouted from the brush from about the area the arrow had come. “The next will be through your heart! Stand up and let me see you!”

Rebecca had already jumped partway to her feet, a hand going to the pistol in her back, but she decided against risking it. “Okay!” She called back, keeping her hands up. “I’m not looking for trouble...” She said, which was true enough, she was looking for a group of human survivors. But trouble would come looking for her, sure enough.

There was a rustle in the brush, coming closer and then the tall grass parted, revealing another young woman. She looked to be about 18 years old, tall and lean with long arms and legs. Her sandy-blonde hair was tied in a long braid with a leather strap around her forehead. Around her waist was a short skirt, woven from braided grass, with leather sandals on her feet. A strip of cloth from what had probably once been a t-shirt was tied across her chest, covering her small, but perky breasts.

She held a short bow in one hand, an arrow nocked, through it was not drawn and she kept it pointed down, ready should Rebecca turn out to be hostile, but not actively threatening. Belted at her waist was a long quiver woven from the same grass-cloth holding more arrows.

“I’ve never see you before...” The primitive girl said. “Who are your people?”

“I...I don’t have any.” Rebecca said.

“Why?” The girl asked, suspiciously. “Were you banished for some reason?”

“No...the...the cybersaurs, they attacked and wiped everyone out.” Rebecca lied, striking on the most plausible excuse she could think of  for being alone. “I was away scavenging at the time, so they didn’t get me.”

“You look like a scavie...” The girl said. “Well, if you’re looking for a new tribe, you could do worse then ours.” She extended a hand. “I’m Katie.”

“Rebecca.” She replied, taking it. Katie gave a nod, satisfied and turned, waving for Rebecca to follow.

“Stick to the tall grass...” She told Rebecca, ducking back into the brush. “The next lizard patrol isn’t for a few days, but there’s others out here in the plains. I saw you coming a mile away, sticking out like a sore thumb.”

“Good advice...” Rebecca replied, silently thinking that, unfortunately for this poor girl and the rest of her “tribe” it wasn’t going to be good enough.

Katie led Rebecca on a long, circuitous route across the plains, to avoid giving any pursuers a direct line to their encampment, sticking to the tall brush and concealing trees whenever possible, darting across open ground in those places where they couldn’t, but at last they came to a sort of clearing where Katie’s tribe had set up their encampment.

There were about a dozen tents, some scavenged tents of nylon, others made of hides and that same grass-homespun. Coming in, Rebecca saw a couple dozen people bustling about, cooking at small, low fires, weaving grass cloth and baskets or tinkering with bits of scrap. A few members wore scavenged clothes like Rebecca’s but most had the same sort of “neo-primitive” garb Katie did. Away from the ruined cities, these nomads couldn’t scavenge as much as other human groups, so were more reliant on what they could fashion themselves. She saw a few guns, but more were wielding bows, some scavenged from old sporting shops, but plenty that were obviously hand made.

The odd thing, Rebecca noticed, was that just about everyone in the tribe seemed to be female, with only a couple of men. The women and girls were grouped in what looked like a number of family groups, some biological, others adoptive. The post-apocalyptic wasteland was not an easy place to live. Most of the tribespeople seemed to be in their teens, with a few adults. Only one or two, near as Rebecca could tell, were over 40.

“Where are all the men?” She asked, assuming they must have been out hunting or scavenging. Instead, Katie grew somber for a moment.

“Killed in the fighting.” She replied.

“Fighting who?” Rebecca asked, a bit incredulous. If they’d picked a fight with the cybersaurs, it seemed impossible so many of them were left alive and free.

Just then, there was a roar of distant engines, big, powerful V8s, a sound Rebecca hadn’t heard more then a handful of times since the invasion. A surge of alarm went through the camp as it drew nearer. Those with weapons hurried to the edge of the clearing, the rest began to hurriedly break camp, throwing what they could into packs and bundles as quickly as they could, but it was obviously not going to be fast enough.

With a loud revving of engines, a battered, rusted buggy ramped over the hill on fat tires. It tore past the camp, trailing smoke from it’s rattling, dirty engine. Rebecca saw a pair of figures, clad in a mix of leathers and scrap metal fashioned into what might have been armor, or might just have been decorative spikes. While one drove the buggy, the other stood up, resting his arms on the metal tube frame. The submachine gun in his hands chattered and one of the men in the tribe fell back, his chest riddled with bullets.

No sooner had the buggy sped away, easily outpacing the arrows the tribeswomen sent after it to turn around out of range and come back for another pass, then half a dozen more buggies, bikes and trucks appeared over the hill, piled with warriors, their howling cries mixing with the roar of their engines.

Around Rebecca, the rest of the tribe abandoned everything and turned to flee in terror before the rushing raiders, though there was no chance of them evading their pursuers on food. Rebecca looked around, bewildered.

“This is going to complicate things...” She thought to herself...    

***  

Engines roaring loudly, the raiders tore towards the camp, each piled high with men in leather and scrap metal armor, waving weapons and shouting in bloodlust as they bore down on the small tribal village. Most of the tribe turned to flee, seeming to have no better plan then to run for a stand of sickly trees, not far from the cluster of tents, in the hopes the raiders would not be able to follow them in their vehicles. Only a few of them showed much inclination to try and fight.

A dirt bike zoomed past, the rider holding out a machine pistol which jerked this way and that, spitting short flashes of light and smoke as he fired. Another of the tribe’s few remaining men gave an anguished cry, clutching at his chest where at least one of the bullets had found it’s unsteady mark.  Beside him, another man gave a cry as well, raising his battered, old hunting rifle. He fired at an oncoming truck. A few bullets sparked off the crude sheet-metal armor bolted to the front. Then his rifle jammed. Before he could run or flee, the truck’s occupants had fired back, dropping him as well.

Most of the raiders, though, held their fire. Whether it was to conserve scarce ammunition or simply preferring to try and preserve as many of the women to take as captives, Rebecca didn’t know. Ahead of her, she saw Katie standing with two other young women, their bows out, firing arrows as fast as they could, but they had little effect against the armored raiding vehicles as they sped past, heading towards the larger mass of fleeing tribals. One truck slowed down, letting its occupants jump out, wielding an assortment of clubs, old police riot shields and barriers fashioned from signs and other scrap metal, to deal with the bow-women.

A burly raider wearing a skull-mask said, looming over the teen, a heavy cudgel fashioned from a length of rebar with a rounded metal weight welded on the end raised high. She held up her bow in a feeble attempt to ward off the blow. It snapped as the cudgel came down and she was sent sprawling to the ground, stunned. “Mediocre…” A hoarse voice came from behind the mask. Beside him, another of the bow-women went down under the nightsticks of two more raiders.

The third girl, eyes wide with fright, dropped her bow and turned to flee. She made it only a few strides. A keen eyes raider sent a set of bolas flying expertly towards her. She cried in despair as her feet were suddenly entangled in the cable straps, sending her tumbling down. Before she could free herself, the raiders were on her, grabbing at her hands as she struggled frantically, ropes out to bind her, just as Katie and the other unlucky girl were likewise having their hands lashed with cord by the raiders.

To her great surprise, Rebecca found herself standing her ground as well, the pistol out in her hand. It wasn’t to try and protect the innocent women and girls of the tribe from the raiders, after all, her plan all along had been to bring a hunting party of an entirely different sort down on them, dooming them to a life of captivity and bondage. It wasn’t even to try and save herself, logically she knew the safest thing to do would have been to surrender, meekly like many of the other women and girls had, once it became apparent there would be no escape for them.

If she was being honest, it simply galled Rebecca to think of letting savages like these take her without putting up some sort of fight. She had been enslaved by the cybersaurs, true, but they had proved their might, conquering the planet, defeating the mightiest human nations and armies with ease. She might not like submitting to them, but she could respect their superiority. She’d be damned if she’d do the same to mere human raiders, parasites scurrying in the shadows of the cybersaurs.

A raider came at her, holding a battered stop sign out in front of him. While it might have been enough to stop an arrow, the 9mm bullet Rebecca fired punched right through the thin steel and he dropped, clutching at the wound. Another approached, his riot shield more useful in protecting him. Instead of wasting a bullet on it, she fired at his exposed feet, sending him scurrying back.

Rebecca backpedaled as two more raiders, fresh from trussing up Katie and the other tribals, headed for her. “Let’s see…that’s three bullets down…” Rebecca thought, trying to mentally calculate how many shots she had left. She had a spare magazine in her back, but she knew if it came to it, or if the gun jammed, an all too common occurrence with scavenged weapons and ammunition, the raiders would be on her before she could reload or clear a jam.

“Maybe surrendering wasn’t such a bad option…” She thought, trying desperately to think of a way out of this situation. The raiders held back, shields up, ready to dodge if she fired, but content for the moment to sit back and wait…

The road of an engine told Rebecca what they were waiting for. One of the vehicles had doubled back after dropping off its load of raiders and was now heading straight for her. She dodged out of the way, keeping her eyes on the raiders, expecting them to charge while she avoiding the buggy’s attempt to ram her…

Too late, she realized that wasn’t their plan at all. As the buggy drove past, too wide to hit her even if she hadn’t moved, a raider in the back tossed a lariat made of that same woven grass rope. Despite Rebecca’s attempted dodge, it hit her head on. In an instant, it snapped taut and she was jerked off her feet by the speeding vehicle.

For a few awful seconds, Rebecca was dragged along by the speeding buggy, bouncing and rolling on the end of the taut rope. Fortunately, this stretch of land was covered by a thick scrub of tall, brown grass, so she wasn’t as badly hurt as she might have been had she been dragged over a road or rocks. Still, by the time the buggy slid to a stop, a dozen yards on, she was feeling quite battered and bruised.

One of the raiders hoped out and ran back to where she lay. She was too dazed to put up a fight as he bent over her. It took only seconds for the raider to untie the lasso from around her waist and only seconds more to use the rope to bind her hands together tightly, in front of her. Under other circumstances, Rebecca might have been impressed at the skill of a fellow slaver, but as it was her being enslaved, she was less pleased.

She managed to get a few choice insults in to him before he took something from his belt and lowered it to her head. She found out, when it was jammed between her teeth, it was a bit-gag, consisting of a metal pin, wrapped in leather and fitted with leather straps which, when tied around the back of her head, kept the muzzle in place.

“You’ll need to learn your place, slave...” The raider spoke sternly to her, as she glared up at him, grunting angrily around the gag in her mouth. “…and be quiet.” He turned and jogged back to the buggy. As soon as he was seated, the buggy started forward again. That was all the time they gave Rebecca to struggle back to her feet. It was lucky she did, as the rope, now tied to her hands, went taut, she was forced to jog along after the buggy or be dragged behind it again. The pace they set was slow enough for her to keep up, but she still had to exert herself to keep the rope from snapping taut again.

Rebecca’s captors turned around in a slow arc, falling into place with another buggy and a truck which had also returned. Katie and the other bow-women stumbled along behind them, ropes running from their bound hands to the back of the raiders vehicles, forcing them to run along behind to be dragged. Like Rebecca, the other captive girls had been fitted with gags. The four of them put up a chorus of anxious grunts and moans as they were led off by their captors.

Up ahead, the small group caught up with the rest of the raiders and their own prisoners. If any of the women or girls had escaped, it didn’t seem like it. Over two score captives huddled in a group, under the guard of half a dozen raiders armed with clubs and old cattle prods while their captors went through the group, binding them.

Some of the women had been fitted with yokes fashioned from planks of wood, old plumbing pipes, leather straps and other manner of scraps, some were fitted with steel handcuffs and leg irons, some had their hands tied with cord. Others weren’t even tied, except with rope tethers at their necks, joining two or three together, to make it difficult for them to try and run. About a third of the women wore gags: bit gags like the one in her mouth, leather straps or bands of cloth.  

Rebecca guessed the different degrees of bondage were based on how much resistance the women had put up to their captors. Those who had struggled or resisted had been bound, with increasing stricture the most they had fought. Those merely tethered at the neck had surrendered without a fight. Any who had talked back or cursed had been silenced with gags. From the looks of it, only a few had put up more than token resistance. Most had meekly surrendered to slavery.

Rebecca wondered if, now that they had caught up, she and the others would be untied and joined with the rest of the coffle. It seemed, though, that the raiders had a different plan in mind for the four captives that had dared to fight back against their enslavement. As soon as the cars came to a stop, the raiders hopped out, untying the ropes from the back. Tugging sharply on the leads, they dragged Rebecca and the other three over, standing them in line in front of the rest of the captive tribe.

“Listen up, you miserable sluts!” A tall, broad raider dressed in tattered black fatigues and military vest that had been ornamented with the standard raider spikes and ornaments and painted with skulls and other insignia in blood-red paint, paced between the crowd of captives and the four who had been set apart. Rebecca guessed he was the leader of this band of raiders.

“As of this moment, you are the property of Blake’s Company and after whoever we sell you to! Your only purpose in life now is to serve and toil for your masters! Work hard and obey and you will continue to live! Disobey or try and escape and you will suffer worse than you can imagine!” He continued his address to the captives. He turned and pointed to Rebecca and the others who had been singled out. “These four thought they could fight back against their masters! They were wrong, and now you will see what happens to slaves who do not obey…what will happen to you if you do not obey!”  

A low murmur of distress passed through the crowd as their fate was pronounced. It increased as a raiding truck was pulled up beside the chosen four. The bed of the truck had been built up into a sort of firing platform for the warriors it carried. A long railing circled the platform, extending a few inches away from the base and hanging some ten feet off the ground. Rebecca and the others squirmed and fought as they were dragged over to the back of the truck, but it was a hopeless struggle. The ends of the long ropes binding their hands were thrown over the bar and several burly raiders tugged on each, hauling up each struggling girl until she was stretched out completely, their toes dangling scant inches off the ground. The ends were then tied off securely, leaving them to hang. Rebecca grimaced, biting hard on her bit as the rough rope dug painfully into her wrists.

As the four hung, facing the back of the truck, a pair of raiders approached, knives in their hands. The four grunted in fear, echoed by their unwilling audience, but to their relief, the raiders merely went to work cutting away the four captives clothes. In a few minutes, all four were stripped completely naked. No sooner had the raiders finished then two more came forward, whips and flogs in their hands. There was a crack of leather and beside Rebecca Katie gave a sharp cry of pain, only partly muffled by the leather muzzle over her mouth. Then a second later, Rebecca felt the whip on her back, cutting a livid streak of hot pain just below her shoulder.

“Let this be a lesson to all of you!” The raider leader shouted, as the four were mercilessly whipped again and again. “Obey or you will be the next one up there!” Rebecca and the other captives could only scream and thrash about at the ends of their ropes, dancing under the constant pain of the slavers’ whips.

As punishments went, this one wasn’t too bad. Certainly not compared to some of the punishments the cruel cybersaurs had inflicted on Rebecca when they had captured her originally, breaking her to their service. The raiders were more interested in putting on a show for the other slaves watching, cowing them through fear, then inflicting the most pain and, fortunately for Rebecca and the three tribals, they seemed reluctant to risk marring four choice pieces of merchandise with any permanent damage.

That said it was still torture. Tears flowed down Rebecca face; she clenched her teeth tight around the bit in her mouth, fighting back the urge to scream. Beside her, Katie sobbed brokenly, yelping loudly with each slap of the whip across her naked back. When the slavers decided they had made their point, the four were let down, all of them, even Rebecca, collapsing to the ground in a heap.

Their captors did not let them lie there long, recovering their strength. A burly raider snatched up Rebecca, half leading, half dragging her forward. Distracted by the pain of her whipping, Rebecca hadn’t noticed the raiders had brought up two more vehicles. The 18-wheeler trucks had, like the rest, been outfitted for the slavers’ purposes. In their case, the trailers had been fashioned into long, mobile cages, for carrying the unfortunate spoils back to their lair.

The trucks had trailed behind, letting the faster raiders go ahead to run down and capture their victims. Now that they had, the trucks had caught up to load the new slaves. Ramps at the back were lowered and the bound women were being herded up and inside. But what drew Rebecca’s attention immediately was the front of the trucks and the horrific ornamentations there.

Projecting front the front of each truck’s engine block, like some obscene prow ornaments, were three thick metal poles, one pointing straight ahead, the others slightly off to the left and right. It was obvious they were meant for securing prisoners to, trophies to show off their success. As Rebecca got closer, she saw each pole had a second, smaller pole sticking out, perpendicular to it, about halfway up. Projecting up from this were a pair of thick rubber prongs, the front slightly longer than the other. She had no illusions where they would soon be going.

Rebecca squirmed and fought as the raider dragging her along lifted her up to another who had climbed onto the engine. He took the captive woman and pulled her around, so she straddled the horizontal pole, with its two penetrators. The first, meanwhile, grabbed her ankles, keeping her legs spread and lining her up. She groaned loudly through her gag as they slid in, plunging deep inside of her. As soon as she reached the bottom, the two went to work, binding her ankles together and fastening them to a metal ring at the bottom of the pole. Her hands were raised up and tied off to another ring at the top. More ropes lashed her to the vertical pole, ensuring she would stay in place during the long, very bumpy ride, back to the slavers base.

Katie was lifted up to grace the pole beside Rebecca’s, while the other two bow-women were dragged to the second truck. The teen squealed loudly as she slid down onto the thick penetrators. In no time, she was lashed to it as tightly as Rebecca had been. The two glanced over at each other, faces red with shame at their predicament.

Behind them, the last of the sobbing tribeswomen were herded into the back of the truck’s long cage. The back ramp was hoisted up with ropes and chained in place, trapping them inside. At an order from their leader, the rest of the raiders hurried to finish looting the encampment and mount their vehicles. “Back to base!” Their leader ordered in a loud voice. “Tomorrow is market day!” the raiders cheered, drowning out the anguished sobs of the new slaves.

Behind Rebecca, the engine of her truck roared into life. She and Katie both groaned loudly as it lurched forward, sending the plugs plunging deep into both of them again. It started to bounce forward along the rough ground, promising them a long, very uncomfortable journey.

“I’ve still got the tracking chip…” Rebecca thought, between thrusts. “I can alert the Cybersaurs…” the only question was when to use it…