Beneath The Darkness Between The Stars

[Veloras Itana 0]

Beneath The Darkness

Between The Stars

Pt. XII

"The Executioner's Waltz"

 

We searched the ship from top to bottom, every square centimeter of it but, Everett was gone. Internal sensors only showed three life signs. Mine, Jai's and Danella Sil's. Neither Jai nor I was exactly certain when he had gone missing. It was strange though, the panic we all shared the first several times this happened seemed to have lost its edge. We were getting used to it. One of the first signs of imminent defeat. Complacency.

 

Danella was, of course, still asleep. Leaving Jai and I to search alone. We knew we wouldn't find him but, we tried anyway. If for no other reason than to feel as if we were doing something. To feel as if we still had a modicum of control over our situation. That effort was as futile as the search itself.

 

After several hours combing the ship, I sat at navigational control in the cockpit fighting sleep myself now. I can remember dreading sleep even in the early days of our capture. In many respects I still do. I never quite recovered from that aspect of our captivity. That was when I developed my affinity for Terran coffee. I drank it by the gallon aboard the Antioch, clinging to my coffee cup the way a drowning man would cling to a reed in a flood.

 

"No sign of him I take it?" Jai came into the cockpit and rested his hand on the back of my chair.

 

"No. Did you really think there would be?" I replied, still staring out at the eerie crimson ribbon that streaked through the blackness beyond the forward view-screen.

 

"I guess not."

 

Jai sank into the chair next to me, putting a hand on my knee. I laced my fingers around his and we sat there for quite a while staring out at the darkness without saying anything. By that point there was little left to say.

 

"Fish in a barrel." Jai finally spoke and, I remember looking at him with a mixture of amusement and confusion.

 

"What?"

 

"My grandfather used to take us fishing when I was little. There were two popular "fishing holes" in our village. One was huge, almost ten kilometers around. The other one you could swim from one side to the other in under ten minutes. He never took us to the smaller one. He used to tell us if we could wade in a pluck the fish out with a net it wasn't fishing. "You might as well fish in a barrel." He used to say. I was just thinking how right he was. And, how much I feel like a fish in a barrel."

 

"Oh, 'glow bugs'." I replied with a smile. "I feel like a glow bug in a jar. Same basic story though. We're dead aren't we?" I looked over at him hoping to hear something reassuring.

 

"Yep. We probably are." He winked.

 

"At least you're honest." I don't know why but, that struck me so funny and I laughed so hard my sides hurt. After several minutes of staring at me like I'd lost my mind, I guess Jai got the joke too and burst into laughter as well.

 

The indicators on the con panel lit up suddenly for the first time since we'd been abducted. The ship shook violently and for a moment, outside in the blackness, there were stars. The comm, which had been left open since the moment we arrived here, crackled and sputtered with static. The ship lurched violently once, then a second time, sending both Jai and I to the floor. We clammered back to the seats, shouting into the comm at the top of our lungs. The panel popped twice with two loud cracks and, for an instant we heard voices, human voices. We shouted again that we were here, we were alive. Then it went dead. The stars disappeared and the ribbon-shot blackness returned. I heard the clicking again. Intense for a moment, gradually retreating behind the background noise of the instrument panel. There was a noise from behind us and, we turned around to see Danella Sil standing in the doorway. She was ashy and pale but her remaining eye was clear and sharp. I don't know where she'd been since all this started but, for right now, she was here with us.

 

"I heard them." She muttered through cracked dry lips that had been nearly cut in half by whatever damage was done to her face. "They can't hold us much longer." She giggled maniacally. "It's all falling apart on them. Too soon. They tried too soon." She wobbled slightly, leaning forward. "I can't go with you." She said staring directly at me. "You can't let this get out." She grabbed her head and screamed, doubling over. "hu ..hu.." Her body arched backward again as she tried to speak. Her spine cracked noisily as the vertebrae were bent out of shape then snapped back into place. She screamed. "Oh God! PLEASE! Make them stop!" She shrieked, jerking backward into the wall.

 

Her body whipped sharply upright with such force I could hear the bones in her neck crackle painfully. When her head leveled off again her mouth hung open and that sound returned, coming from somewhere inside her. That chittering insect-like click rose in volume till the sound was nearly deafening. She convulsed violently but, stayed on her feet, as if she were no longer in control of her own body. After what seemed like an eternity, she fell silent and slumped to the floor. Motionless but breathing shallowly.

 

It was a sickening sight but, both Jai and I watched it seemingly unaffected. We were more concerned with what had happened outside the ship. There had been stars out there for a moment, we'd seen them. Escape may still be possible. Survival was still foremost on our minds, even on this irrational level we knew there was next to nothing we could do for this woman while we remained trapped here. Getting out had to be the priority.

 

"See what you can do with this panel." Jai stammered, unable to take his eyes off Danella. "I'm going to take her back to bed."

 

"You heard that, didn't you?" I asked, pulling the console apart from underneath. "That sound." I smiled with relief as Jai nodded mechanically. Until then I had been the only one who had heard it. It was a small comfort to know that it wasn't all in my mind. The noise was real or, at least as real as anything else that was happening here.

 

Jai and Danella disappeared into the back while I tried to get the comm signal back on. The panel had shorted out but, it wasn't fried like the environmental systems had been. It was only a matter of bypassing the primary circuit to restore the signal and keep it transmitting. Or at least I think it was transmitting. Without knowing what the field we were suspended in was comprised of, I couldn't be sure if it was transmitting or not. But, any hope was better than none.

 

I was alone for quite a while. I remember that only because I noticed how long it had been since Jai had taken Danella back to the crew quarters. I was just contemplating going back to check on him when I heard someone behind me again. I turned and jumped in startled shock as I saw Everett fall into the wall. He was sweating profusely but shivering as if he had just been out in the snow. He coughed hoarsely, falling forward into the back of my chair, clutching at my shoulder. His eyes were filled with terror and his grasp was so tight I thought he may shatter my scapula.

 

Jumping to my feet, I wrapped both arms around Everett's waist and helped him against the wall. "C-c-c-cold." He shivered violently.

 

I had no clue what to do. "Jai!" I called into the back, trying to move Everett back toward the doorway. "Jai! Help!" Nothing but the whirring of the instrument panel in the cockpit and the underlying hum of the ship's main reactor.

 

It took most of my strength to half drag, half carry Everett toward the crew quarters. I remember stopping several times to allow him time to catch his breath from the constant fits of coughing he went through as he struggled to breathe. I called to Jai the entire way through the main cabin but never heard a response. I was dreading what I'd find when I finally reached the bunk area but, no amount of dread could prepare me for what I found.

 

You know how it is when you're in the midst of what my mother used to call a 'bad patch'? There will be periods of time where absolutely nothing happens but, even the absence of trouble breeds its own form of anxiety because you know, somewhere inside you, you know that WHAM, waiting just around the corner is another problem looking for somewhere to thrive. Well It seemed I lived there now because every time we turned a corner, things got worse.

 

Shoving Everett ahead of me through the bulkhead, I stepped into the crew quarters, shouting Jai's name. Everett slid down the wall, coming to rest on the floor, his head bobbing at an odd angle. He was still breathing but, only barely. I looked up to see Danella Sil holding Jai almost a foot off the ground by the throat. She pulled him tightly to her and spun in an odd dance, her head bobbing off to one side to avoid his. The clicking sound returned as they whirled about in their erratic waltz. Chittering like locusts, millions of them, as their heads bobbed back and forth. Her fingers had sunk beneath the skin in his throat. Blood oozed out of the wounds and down her knuckles as she pulled him tighter against her, pressing her face to his. I saw his cheeks puff out, as if she were trying to breathe life back into him. Then his throat puffed out around her fingers, pressing them deeper beneath his torn flesh. Her head fell backward suddenly and it became clear that her neck was broken. She released her grip on Jai and they both slumped to the floor.

 

The ship began to shake violently again as I watched some form of yellow liquid flow from Danella's now lifeless lips. Her eye was open, staring straight up at me in an accusatory manner that still sends chills up my spine. Jai's hand fell to his side, brushing the tip of my boot, the last contact I ever had with him. The ship shook again, tossing me to the floor beside Everett. There was a blinding flash so bright I had to look away. I lost consciousness, I think, but only briefly. When I opened my eyes, Jai and Danella were gone. Everett lay beside me on the floor, still alive but unconscious and running a very high fever. I never saw Jai or Danella again and, to this day have no clue if what I saw really happened or if it was just another twisted trick played on my mind by whatever sick demented creature had abducted us.

 

I slowly pulled myself to my feet and dragged Everett to a bunk. I covered him with a few blankets and gave him a shot of something (that I hoped) would alleviate his pain and lower his fever. He was rigidly stiff and so hot that waves of heat came off of him whenever he breathed. He seemed to relax a bit and his breathing got a bit more regular after the shot took effect. I remember the relief I felt as some of the tension left his face. As selfish as it sounds, I was thinking of myself now more than him. As I stood there, looking down on him, it came to me. If Everett Yung died, I would be alone. I started to cry then, wiping futilely at my tears. How could I be so selfish? But, the inescapable fact that I would be alone here if he died, never left my mind until the next day...when Everett Yung did die and I was left to face our captors all on my own.

 

 

...To Be Continued