Trapped in a Cage

Original Suggestion: Puppies in Space
Suggested by: Kevin Pitts (@kevinmpitts)


It was a beautiful Thursday morning. Bright blue skies, no wind, perfect temperature. Ideal conditions for one of the last shuttle missions in the history of NASA. This particular launch, however, remained fairly secret. The reason? The controversy.

With the fear of backlash brought upon by PETA, NASA kept this particular mission under wraps, as they would be sending animals into space to test the effects that the new space station, and all of it's tremendous scientific advancements, would have on animals. Dogs, to be more specific. Despite all of the other missions they had done involving animals, this mission remained vital to NASA's research, as the believed dogs would help humans with various tasks in space, just as they don on solid ground. But, the question remained: will the dogs be safe on their trip? And how will they react to their new environment once they reached their destination?

So the mission was set, the subjects chosen and ready to go. For obvious reasons, the dogs will be joined by two men to take care of them while they were in route. They would also be observing the dogs' behavior while on board the station.

The men strapped the dogs in, ready for their month long endeavor into the depths of the final frontier. They set themselves at the helm of the ship, readying themselves for lift off.

"You ready, Jonathan?"

"As ready as ever, Pete."

"Houston," said Pete. "All systems, check. The subjects are set, let's get this started already."

"Roger. Prepare for launch. Initiating launch sequence."

10...9...8...7...6...5...

Pete and Jonathan gave one last look to each other. Neither were happy about their mission. But as important as it was, they took it as seriously (in appearance, at least) as any other.

4...3...2...1. Liftoff!

The rocket burst upward in a glorious cloud of smoke and fire. Higher and higher they rose into the sky, trailing behind them a stream of fumes and rocket parts began to fall away. Traveling higher and higher, the smoke billowing behind them, they finally reached the outer atmosphere. The first part of the mission was a success.

"Houston, everything has gone according to plan," said Pete. "Going to check on the subjects to see how they handled lift-off."

"Roger. Report back when you have the results."

"Take control, Jonathan. I'll go take a look."

"Whatever," said Jonathan.

Pete disengaged his belts to head down to where the dogs were strapped in. As he opened the door, he expected to hear them barking and whining. Instead, he was greeted with a cold silence. He checked each dog noting how they all looked, their breathing, etc.The first two, German Shepherds, seemed fine. The Retriever also seemed healthy. He reached the fourth cage, the Chocolate Labradors, to find the dog hasn't moved since they had strapped her down. He reached in her cage to check her out. To his dismay, she was not breathing. The thrust from the launch, coupled with they dogs system of straps had caused her to panic, and at some point,  die. Pete made the necessary notes in his journal, telling what was wrong and how to avoid this end next time.

As he reached the fifth cage, Pete noticed something strange in this dogs eyes. The Rottweiler was staring at him, following his every move. Pete went to reach inside to make sure it was o.k., but the dog barred it's teeth and him and started to growl. Pete hastily backed away, wrote down some information in his journal, and retreated back to Jonathan in the cockpit.

"So, how'd we do so far, Pete?" asked Jonathan.

"The Shepherds and Retriever are fine. The Lab didn't make it. We'll have to put her down in the cold storage to keep her safe until we get back."

"Or we could just launch the bitch out to space," Jonathan said with a sneer.

"You know we can't do that," said Pete. "The vets will do their thing on how and why she passes when we get back."

"Right, whatever. How about the Rottweiler?"

"She seemed o.k.. Scared the hell out of me, though. Just started at me the whole time, and damn near took a bite out of me when I reached in to check on her."

"Probably just scared," said Jonathan. "Just let it be until we get a little farther and we need to feed them."

"Sounds good. I'll get on the horn and report back."

As time went on, Jonathan and Pete both took turns checking in on the dogs, Jonathan a little more reluctantly than Pete, not really caring for the animals as much as Pete did. He generally wasn't much of a dog person, not after having been bitten by his own dog as a child, then having to witness it being put down. Pete, on the other hand, was always fond of any animal. He aspired to be a veterinarian as a child, but found his fascination with outer space to be something better to follow through with.

Neither man found any problems as they checked in and took care of the dogs. They both noted, however, that the Rottweiler always acted the same whenever the entered the room. Never blinking, not eating much, and never letting Pete nor Jonathan linger too long around it's cage. Neither man was able to tell exactly what was wrong with it, and none were willing to find out so not to get a chunk taken out of them by the beast.

It wasn't much longer than that things really started to seem strange. Jonathan and Pete started having communication problems back with NASA, all the dogs started acting like the Rottweiler, and once in a while Pete would notice something was missing from his quarters, but never knowing what it was since it seemed like something different every time he had those feelings.

Jonathan wasn't much help in Pete's suspicions. He only thought about getting to the station and getting these experiments over with. One afternoon, though, Jonathan came running back to the cockpit, both hands covered in blood.

"Dude, another dog is dead. And the Rottweiler was out of his cage somehow. Took everything I could to get it away from that Shepherd. Have you had this problem before?"

"Not at all," said Pete. "I have more bad news though. Something has cut the power again for our communication back home. You think that Rottweiler had something to do with it?"

"It's very possible," said Jonathan. "I saw a lot of exposed wiring in their section of the ship. Too much damage to know what is out though."

"We need to go in there and find out," Pete said, a note of hesitation in his voice. "There's no fixing it if you don't go."

"Fine, but I'm taking something with me just in case."

Pete and Jonathan started making their way to where the dogs were kept. Once they reached the door, though, they could hear one of the dogs whining more than usual. As they reached to open the door, they heard a crunch, a short whine, and then silence.

They both wretched the door open. There was nothing inside. The dogs were all missing, there was more exposed wiring and the vent leading out of the room was ripped off of the wall. As they looked around, they noticed a few drops of blood around the Shepherds cage, leading away towards the vent.

"How could they get up there?" asked Jonathan. "That's gotta be a good five or six feet off the ground."

"I don't know," said Pete." Wait... listen."

As they got closer to the vent, they could hear a faint clicking, like a dogs claw on a hard floor.

"Is that... where does this vent head towards?" asked Pete.

"It sounds like it was heading toward the sleeping quarters," said Jonathan.

"C'mon. Let's check it out."

They left the dogs room, when suddenly the lights in the ship went out. From behind them, they heard a low, mean, growl.

Pete and Jonathan had no idea what to do. They stood there, frozen. It wasn't until Pete heard the thud of Jonathan hitting the floor did he gather his senses, and started running. He ran down the hall, and threw himself into a room off to the left. He hated having left Jonathan behind, but there was nothing he could do. He found himself in the sleeping quarters. Not sure where to go from here, he barricaded himself inside, and began pacing the room, feeling like a trapped animal.

He stopped. He could hear the growling from the hall, becoming louder, and louder, until it was right outside the room. This was it, no where to go. Suddenly, Pete felt something around his ankles, he searched around to find the Rottweiler, pining for his attention, as if something scared it to hiding in this room. How it got in here, Pete had no idea. All he could think of was if the Rottweiler was in here... what was outside the room?

He continued to search the room, until he found another gruesome sight. The second Shepherd, or what was left of it, was found underneath one of the bunks. Now Pete was really freaked out. What else was on the ship? Nothing got in that he could think of. The room started to grow colder. The Rottweiler staying at Pete's side the whole time...



A year later, a fisherman was sailing off the coast of Cocoa Beach, Florida, when he spotted something in the night sky, heading towards the water. With a splash, the ship hit the water, sending a giant wave toward the coast, and nearly capsizing the the boat. He immediately radioed the Coast Guard, telling him what he just witnessed. Hours later, they searched the lost ship from that failed mission. It was completely void of any signs of the crew, or the animals.