Don't You Like It?

By Daxton Comba

My first thought after I woke up was that I was swimming. I opened my eyes to a panorama of stars dotting the impenetrable darkness. I think it was the low oxygen alarm that woke me. I switched the atmosphere control system to recycling mode, and the beeping finally subsided, leaving an uncomfortable ringing in my ears as the sensory deprivation of space closed in on me. I kicked my feet, trying to shake off the overwhelming vertigo, and took stock of my situation.

Stranded in deep space, intact but low on oxygen with only one pair of CO2 filters. I had just about twelve hours of life-giving air left. So basically, I was totally fucked. I wasn’t even sure what kind of EVA suit I was wearing. Based on the pneumatic-buckle wrist joints, braided gas exchange tube, and absolutely shit visor visibility, I decided it was probably an Oscillator-9. My absolute least favourite, though still it saved my life. I’d expect to freeze to death briskly in deep space, but I’m sweating like a wet pig because of the excellent heat insulation.

After many minutes of scanning the distance for any sign of human activity, I was quickly losing all hope. I realized even if the shift manager did note my absence, the cargo had a strict deadline, and they had neither time nor resources to backtrack for a single crewman. Just when I’d settled into an ultimate despair, I saw a small object of mass catching the dim light from the red dwarf at the centre of this barren solar system.

I assumed it was just a far-off asteroid, but then I realized it was getting bigger, bit by bit. At first, I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me, but eventually, I couldn’t deny the object was getting closer. Then I noticed the flashing lights and instantly knew I was fucked. It was definitely not an asteroid, but a large spacecraft, not of human construction. Irregularly shaped observation decks, fore and aft thrusters, backlit windows, and synchronized flashing lights on each side—the universal sign of “Hey! I’m flyin’ over here.”

It was difficult to gauge the size versus distance with so little visual reference. As it got closer, I kept thinking it was about to be right on top of me, only to realize I had yet again misjudged its true scale. Watching for too long had me going cross-eyed. The slow approach gave me way too much time to think. I wondered what kind of alien species had constructed this vessel, and what type of temperament they had.

Humanity’s other encounters with extraterrestrial species had often been short and gruesome; I was hoping to meet a yet undiscovered species, and that they’d be kind and gentle. I begged God for them to please breathe oxygen and to please not be too interested in science.

The alien ship idly collected me on its way through, as a blue whale eats an unfortunate krill in its pathway. The porous burgundy exterior filled my entire view by the time the ship finally came near, and great hangar doors at least a half mile wide cracked open, revealing pitch darkness inside as the entrance approached me. While passing through the maw, I had the impression of being consumed by a titanic beast with vast horizontal jaws. When the hangar doors closed behind me, I was swallowed into total darkness.

Panic at the Disco by Mickyrose

2024; digital photo

I felt the tug of gravity beginning to take hold, and then suddenly, solid ground came up hard against my knees and hands. I would have thought the sudden return to gravity would’ve provided the relief my inner ears so desperately craved, but it only worsened. All I could see under the dim helmet light was the patch of floor beneath me, and it didn’t look metallic or concrete…  more reminiscent of bone. I assumed some sort of calcium-based construction material. Smooth but porous, it scratched the aromatic-nylon of my gloves like cotton on sandpaper.

Then, bright white lights flashed on, and the reality of my situation finally set in. I was, in fact, in the presence of a scientific species. Eight of them stood tall above me, holding clipboards and unrecognizable tools, each wearing their species’ version of a lab coat. Their heads had no recognizable features, but a complex series of folded overlapping tissue. Their pale pink skin was more opaque than human skin and wet—gooey even, and the fabrics they wore looked unabsorbent.

The room was octagonal, about 10 meters across at the widest, domed with a glass hemisphere, and furnished with foreign medical implements. No matter what species or place in the galaxy, there’s no mistaking the visual language of a surgical table with an observation deck. It was an operating theatre. After stripping me down, ripping my Oscillator-9 apart without difficulty, each took extraordinary interest in my hair after finding it was fused to my body.

My protests were hardly recognized as they grabbed me by the wrists, neck, torso, and ankles to strap me down to the operating table. Taking turns ripping chunks of hair out to examine closely, they eventually decided to shave me from head to toe. They stole every strand of hair from every part of my body. I was shivering cold as they raised the operating table to a 45-degree angle.

One of the aliens approached me carrying a clipboard and pen, and spoke to me in my own language, albeit in an alien accent.

“Do you have knowledge of your physiology?” The low-toned voice ruffled through the folds of its pseudo-face as it spoke.

I was so stunned that I just answered honestly. “Uh, yeah.”

“How complete is your understanding?”

I didn’t quite know how to quantify that. “Medium?” I said.

The alien turned away to speak with another. “It may have relevant knowledge; it should remain conscious.”

I was glad it trusted me to stay awake but started second guessing myself when they wheeled a large container into the room and cautiously removed the lid. One of them reached in with tongs and withdrew a literal nightmare. Hanging from the tongs was a foot-long, writhing creature with hundreds of knobby legs, producing copious amounts of goop. Like a hagfish crossed with a millipede, I found it fascinating. I didn’t notice another alien had snuck up on me until I felt a metal clamp forced in between my teeth.

Before I knew it, my jaw was locked at maximum spread, and the lead alien had brought the writhing creature to my face. I gagged as it hit the back of my throat with force, and choked on the flailing thing as it fought its way further inside me. I tried with all my strength to bite down, straining against the spreader. I felt hot tears streaming down my face as I fought against the many restraints holding me still. The creature’s tail whipped side to side, hitting me in the neck before curling back around and hitting the opposite cheek, the tail getting shorter as it inched its way toward my stomach. Then the creature was gone, disappeared down my throat—travelling around inside of me.

I barely noticed as they removed the jaw spreader, only feeling the thing writhing inside of me, squirming past my stomach sphincter and forcing its way into my small intestine. I wondered, in some small part of my brain, if it would lay thousands of parasitic eggs that would eventually hatch inside me until I was bursting at the seams with larvae, little baby parasites eating me from the inside. But the larger part of me was more concerned about where the creature was going. Which neighbourhoods of my body would it explore? And more importantly, would it appreciate the exquisite views?

The aliens left me alone for a few minutes, maybe a half hour, but eventually began to crowd around me again. If I hadn’t already reached maximum nausea, I did then. I was going to puke, but then I realized it was just the gastric explorer on its way back up. I dry heaved once, twice, and then I was puking a strangely delicious slime, the sludgy monster amongst it. One of the aliens caught it with a net, retrieving the creature and letting the slime fall through the grated floor beneath the operating table. The alien smacked the creature on the head, then jammed a spike into it. The spike was cable-bound, with the other end plugged into what I could only assume was an alien computer. Other aliens crowded around the viewing screen, and from what I could tell were quite impressed. Their heads bobbled side to side jubilantly as the lead of them pointed to the little marks on the display. Suddenly I was overwhelmed with pride. Why shouldn’t they be impressed? The human gastronomic system is one of the most efficient in the galaxy. If they didn’t already know, they would soon learn.

The alien that spoke earlier approached me again, this time with a scalpel, and I knew it was finally about to happen—and I was so ready for it. Another alien stepped over and fixed an intravenous tube straight into my carotid artery. Alien drugs fast-tracked to the brain. It was like nothing I’ve ever tried before. I was so incredibly numb, yet surprisingly lucid and present in the moment. Then came more tubes, a second one to my carotid artery and one to my jugular vein. The tubes sucked and pushed blood through a mechanical system at a regulated pace before returning it to my neck.

I felt the faint tickle of an incision through the haze, from shoulder to shoulder and top of sternum to mid pelvis. I hardly felt the first layer come off; it tickled, and even though I was already nude, when the alien scientists peeled the skin back it made me feel double naked. They rolled the flaps over and pinned them down at the edges. I didn’t feel the second layer at all. They delicately peeled back the interwoven muscles of my torso layer after layer, like unlacing a corset, until my gaping chest cavity was exposed for all to see. I felt so extremely underdressed, so many of them staring down inside me, it was making me blush. I hoped they liked what they saw.

Secondary surgeon aliens stood by with clipboards; some took notes and some sketched images. I think one was trying to draw a map of the human physiology. I heard an electric saw and felt vibrations rattling through my chest. More layers were coming off; it felt so incredibly immodest. The lead surgeon was so quiet and focused, it made me feel as I did at the dentist, and then I remembered how much I missed going to the dentist. How long it'd been since he’d grabbed me by the face. It was times like this that made me resent ever leaving the warm, comfortable, and sturdy curves of the earth.

They removed my sternum and front rib sections and passed them off to secondaries without any examination at all. I was slightly offended they didn’t take the time to look at my bones. It’s not the most interesting part, I recognized that, but it wasn’t just garbage either. I was fully embarrassed then, it made me feel like squirming but the restraints were too effective, and I couldn’t move.

Then they really dug into my meat and potatoes. After removing my left lung, the secondaries neatly placed it on a tray. They began examination as the lead surgeon alien asked me what the organ was called and the function it performed. I said I needed it to breathe nitrogen and oxygen.

“This much surface area for gas exchange? And you have two of them?” it said.

“Hell yeah, I do… Or did.” I didn’t really understand its body language, but I understood the apparent shock as envy, and suddenly I was a little less embarrassed, though I still wanted some privacy.

“Does there have to be so many people in here?” I asked.

The lead surgeon stopped momentarily and responded, “What?”

“This room is so crowded. Can we do this just you and me?”

“No.”

The rejection stung, but on some level, I understood it had to say no. Then they removed my heart, quickly rushing to attach clamps to the loose arteries. The lead surgeon held my heart for a moment, turned it over, and handed it off to a secondary.

“Very impressive. What is that called?” It asked, turning back to me.

It was my moment to shine. “That’s uh… my heart,” I said.

The lead surgeon jotted that down, then asked, “What purpose does it serve?”

“Uh, circulation? It pumps the blood.” Another great answer. I was so happy with myself.

“Blood is what you call this red coagulating fluid?”

“Yeah.”

“What purpose does it serve?”

“It carries oxygen,” I said, proud of my own basic knowledge of human anatomy.

The team of aliens continue removing organs, carefully jotting notes and asking me questions. The longer it went the less awkward I felt, and with each organ catalogued my delight grew more palpable. I asked myself why I’d even felt so anxious, there was no reason to be ashamed. I think it was just nerves, after all, it was my first time.

“What’s this one do?” asked the lead surgeon.

Though my voice was weak, carried on the breath of a single lung, I answered firmly. “Liver. It cleans the blood… and kills toxins. I think.”

“And this one?”

Truthfully, I wasn’t sure about that one. Small, tear shaped, and grey. Even if I wasn’t sure, I still knew more than they did. “Gallbladder, I think. Makes bile, or maybe just stores it.”

“What is bile?” It asked, facial folds pulling tight for a moment.

“Digestive fluid. Very alkaline.”

“How about this one?”

“Pancreas, I think… I don’t really know what it’s for.”

“And this?” It asked.

“Kidneys… uh, something to do with waste removal,” I answered.

They wanted so badly to learn all about me, their intensity made my cheeks hot, and I could tell I was blushing. It went on like this for quite a while, and by the time we finished I could see so many pieces of myself laid out neatly on trollies, organized on trays. A secondary surgeon inspected each one, noting weight, shape, and size. Hypothesizing how each function fit together. The sight reminded me of mechanics in an auto-shop doing an engine block teardown. The secondaries wheeled my organs out of the room, and I watched them go longingly. I felt so remarkably empty—an interesting sensation. I tried to peer into the gaping hole that had been my torso and saw that I’d been fully gutted, nothing but an empty cavity. Clamps tying off the exposed parts of my organs. Staring at the front of my spinal column, I felt a phantom clenching in my stomach as my brain tried desperately to vomit. My insides wanted to contract and heave, but they weren’t presently even attached. My mouth was so dry.

The lead surgeon stepped back out in front of me, this time with a sheepish demeanour; facial folds loose and looking toward the ground.

“Uh, so… I want to thank you for being so helpful.”

I was so shocked to hear words of appreciation that all I said was, “You bet.”

“Can I ask what you call your species?”

“Uh… Human. Or, homo sapiens.”

The secondaries continued wheeling my organs out. “Where are you taking those?” I asked.

“The imaging room. Don’t worry; they’ll bring them back soon.”

I didn’t really understand but acknowledged the answer anyway. “Oh… Okay.”

The alien continued, “Umm, okay, I’ve got a proposition for you…” and I realized this was my moment. The moment I’d been waiting for, perhaps the moment I’d been born for. I knew then I’d been embarrassed for no reason earlier; I had to prove how beautiful it was inside me.

I tried to play it cool. “Mhm?” I said.

“Listen, you’ve been an absolute champ about all of this, and um, I don’t know… You just seem like a really smart guy. I almost feel bad, but you know, it’s my job.”

I tried to seem stoic. “It’s cool. Don’t worry about it.”

“This has all been really great, but it’s all just…. surface level. You know? We want to go deeper into your biology, and you’re so knowledgeable of your physiology, would you consider staying on to help me with further experiments? I’d appreciate it very much.”

I wasn’t quite sure what I was expecting. I thought the alien would come to praise the beauty and flawlessness of my human physiology. I wanted to hear from the alien’s own folds about how perfectly all the systems of my body networked together, how efficient the design of my digestive system is, and how little energy it needs to power such a variety of systems and chemical reactions. The prime example of a flawless super-organism. But instead, the alien was more interested in pushing me even further rather than giving me praise.

Before I properly thought of what to say, I blurted out, “Can I have my organs back?”

“Oh yeah, definitely. We’ll get your organs all back mostly where they go. I was paying close attention during the removal process. But it’s a wild and intense puzzle in there so, no promises.”

I was taken quite aback by this. Clearly, the aliens did not yet understand the value of the specimen they’d obtained. I bit my tongue, frustrated with how little appreciation I’d been shown. Surely if we went deeper into my physiology, I could show them how effortlessly gorgeous my design was.

“Yeah absolutely. That sounds great,” I said.

“Perfect! I’ll have a lab coat made to fit your weird, gross body.”