Pete opened his eyes and winced at the intrusion of light. He waited a few seconds to allow the slow transition, sat up and attempted to check out his new surroundings. When he moved his head, he almost threw up. The pain was excruciating. It felt like the first (and last) time he suffered the dry horrors from too much liquor consumption in his much younger days.
“Ohh,” he groaned and lay down again. He tried to organize his thoughts, but the pain was too intense. He waited a little longer and raised himself up again. His head screamed in protest, but he forced himself to ignore it. He saw Tremaine and Mason a few feet from him. He crawled over and saw Tremaine was coming around. He left him and went to see Mason. Mason was unconscious and breathing shallow but steadily. His temperature was a little high, and his head and neck wounds had swollen. Pete took his jacket off and laid it over the unconscious man.
“What the–Jesus, my head,” Tremaine gasped, clutching at his aching skull. He took a breath and sat up, glanced at Mason and turned to Pete. “How is he?”
“Okay, I guess, all things considered,” Pete replied. “You alright? You look like hell.”
“Yeah, and you look like how I feel. Death warmed over.”
“Touché.” Pete grinned bleakly.
“Do you know where we are?”
“Nope, only remember those Trimadian soldiers pushing us into that craft thing of theirs and, well, here we are.”
“Are you sure they are Trimadian? That poncey mouthpiece said Sotoid or something.”
“I am sure, thanks to all the data Sataal has given me. Remember, they are divided up in fleets under varying Commanders, or masters. I am positive they are Trimadian.”
Tremaine rubbed his aching temples and decided his brain needed a holiday.
“Here goes,” moaned Pete, as he stood up and moved to a bench against a wall. Tremaine followed suit.
Looking around, it was obvious they were in a cell that had dim lighting emitting from the ceiling and from the floor and on the sides. In fact, each side, top, and bottom of their cell was the same. It felt very unnerving, and the accompanying vertigo effect did not sit well with the pain and nausea.
There were no obvious door openings, windows, or anything to distinguish how they were brought into the cell.
“Shit, I hope Kate is okay,” Pete said. “She was having another one of her visions last I recall, a pretty violent one.”
“Yeah, she touched Sataal’s hand and all hell broke loose,” Tremaine recollected. “And she burbled something about a device that had detected Sataal’s men. Do you think she was trying to warn them of the Trimadians near the BSP?”
“Possibly, only way is to find her and the others and get the hell out of here.”
The pain in Pete’s head seemed to subside a little.
He looked at Tremaine, still rubbing his head. “How’s the pain?”
“Barely bearable, it feels like someone has driven a pneumatic drill through it or used it as a punching bag.”
“Could be a mind probe or drug they gave us to render us unconscious?”
“Yeah, or a whack on the back of the head with those nasty war sticks of theirs. Well, doctor, do you have a theory for getting our asses out of here?”
“Yeah, we wait.”
A faint humming noise coming from Tremaine’s side filled the stillness. A door slid upward and Kate, standing, silhouetted against the invading light, was supported and dwarfed by two huge guards. They put her down on the bench beside Tremaine and left.
Pete leapt to his feet, ignoring his screaming nerves resonating in his head. “Are you all right, Kate?” He knelt down in front of her examining her face.
She looked fine and smiled at him. “I think I will live for now, thanks.” She rubbed her legs. “Just my muscles feel like I have completed a marathon.”
Pete held her hands. “It must have been the drugs to knock us out. Or in your case, to bring you back.”
She saw Mason still unconscious.
“Is he alright?”
“I hope so.”
“So what has been happening? Can you tell us anything, anything to help us get out of here?” Tremaine urged.
Kate held her hands up like a patient parent calming excitable children, “I will tell you everything I can remember. I woke up in a cell, alone, like this one we are in now, guards came and got me. I then realized that Sataal was right, the invasion has started and that these beings were Trimadian warriors. I was taken to another room, a large spacious room that housed the most amazing machinery and computers. It looked like some kind of an infirmary or laboratory. I had all sorts of gadgets attached around my body and head. I’m not sure what they were doing, but I thought they may experiment or torture me or something.
“They spoke a strange tongue, their local lingo I guess, and I gestured that I didn’t understand. Next second, I could understand them, like we are talking in English now. Yet, they kept talking to each other in their native tongue, so I wouldn’t know what they were up to, I guess.
“I think I faded in and out of consciousness. When I came to, I found I could not move my arms or legs. They asked me if my head was hurting. I said yes. Next second, the pain had gone. I don’t know what they did, beats the aspirin though!
“I managed to glance at a computer screen nearby and recognized some symbols and signs. Some were similar to what you showed me on the home base computer and in your books, Pete.”
“Did they question you, or say what their plans were, or what had happened to Sataal?” Tremaine queried.
“Let me finish,” Kate said, and took a breath. “I saw Sataal and two of his men lying on some makeshift beds a short distance from me, behind a glass wall. They were treating them all pretty roughly, especially Sataal. A tall dude who had some expensive looking threads seemed to be doing the interrogating, and every so often he would touch Sataal’s forehead with a small stick like device that seemed to cause him agonizing pain. The screams…it was not very nice. I guess, as he was in their ranks, he would not be treated very well. He was a traitor in their eyes.” Kate shuddered at the memory, recalling the pure malevolence permeating the atmosphere.
“Anyhow, the guards dragged them away. Sataal looked to be in a really bad way. This fancy dressed dude approached me and I thought, shit, it’s my turn. He was surprisingly quite courteous to me, way different from what I had just observed. He spoke excellent English and introduced himself as Lord Talokta, commander of the Sotoid fleet. I remember Pete telling me there were different groups under different rulers in the Trimadian race. Well, he gave me the spiel, boasting that his group is the vanguard of all the Great Trimadian Fleets and we are now his prisoners, that I would be treated well if I cooperated. He assured me that resistance is futile. When he said that, under any other circumstances, I would have burst out laughing as it sounded so corny, like in those terrible old sci-fi shows back in the fifties. Anyhow, he stated I am aboard his command domain ship and there is a contingency of fifty fighter ships orbiting Ahmadeus right now ready to attack. Their mission was to enslave all humanoid life on this planet for repopulation and recruitment, and obtain certain crystals found on this particular planet. Fascinating stuff, and he did all the talking, and I gave him sweet fuck all. That itself made me feel uneasy.
“I’m not sure what to think guys, as I did consider maybe he was feeding me misinformation. Maybe to cause outright fear, or warm me up for the kill or to make me trust him. I honestly don’t know. But here I am.” She paused studying their faces. “He knows about the OBF project and wants me to go back to Earth with the terms of our planet’s unconditional surrender.”
“What the fuck—” Tremaine’s eyes blazed.
Pete just dropped his head in his hands.
“Don’t tell me…surrender or die.”
She nodded.
“Wish this was a movie, shit!” Tremaine choked.
Tremaine and Pete looked at Kate, absorbing her words, her story. Was she tellin
g the truth? Had she had her mind altered or probed? Why did this Talokta character give her all this information and not ask her anything? But for now, their priority was to get out. The only person who could help was Sataal, who could be at death’s door. He knew or at least was familiar with Trimadian ships and their technology to help them escape to the surface.
“Kate,” Pete implored. “Do you remember that warning you mentioned before you slipped into the coma?”
She frowned at the recall. “Yes, a little. I had my usual jumbled up vision, and voices were talking, chanting something, it was loud, and I saw a flash—a close up view of a device used against the free Cantals. I feel it is a type of sensor or scanner that can read a body’s physiological state.”
Both men looked confused.
“You know, to see if there is a Cathexistome implanted or not.”
The full meaning of this fell on the men.
“If they have found a way to covertly expose the Cantal spy network, all is lost. The Cantal rebellion will fail, and we will never know where and when the enemy will strike,” Pete declared.
“Well, there’s very little we can do now. We don’t even know where Sataal and his men are, and they could have been executed for all we know,” Tremaine stated.
A wave of dejectedness fell on them. Pete looked at their faces. “Cheer up, I know another fact.” They looked at him. “Well, they have to feed us at some stage, I mean, even prisoners have to eat.”
Tremaine shot him a dirty look.
“Well, it’s hard to think on an empty stomach.”
“Forever the optimist,” Tremaine muttered.
With that, all three sat back engrossed in their own thoughts.