Chapter ERROR (Capture) (2/2)
”Yes, sir,” Do'ormo'ot stated.
Another Terran looked down and Do'ormo'ot could feel the disgust rolling off of the jumped up lemur. It angered him but then he felt a trickle of fear and looked at the Terran with the shock baton.
”You are more than spies. Spies, well, spycraft is a long recognized and somewhat honorable profession. You are saboteurs and assassins and more,” the Terran said. He straightened up. ”I am Captain Carkinger, Terran Confederate Space Force Judge Advocate General's Office.”
”Yes, sir,” Do'ormo'ot said, hanging his head. He didn't want shocked again.
”Aboard your ship we found weapons of mass destruction in the CBRNAN categories, to include, but not limited to: attack nanites loaded with Terran biological protocols, three different types of bioweapons and a bioweapon adjustment laboratory, Grey Goo, and high energy long life radioactive isotope powders designed for rapid dispersal and maximum damage.”
Do'ormo'ot just stared down.
”Additionally your ship was camouflaged to appear as a non-State actor,” the Terran said.
Do'ormo'ot didn't even bother to try to deny it.
He didn't want shocked again.
”As such, you are not protected by the standard protections regarding enemy personnel during a time of war,” the Terran said. ”We were able to determine from your astrogation log that you were the ones who visited and set up the operation on Tabula-929.”
The Terrans around him shifted angrily.
Do'ormo'ot looked up at the Terran.
”What will happen to me?” he asked, for the first time in his life finding himself on the receiving end of a beating and not liking it.
There was silence for a moment.
”Tell him. He deserves to know,” one of the females said.
”The Black Citadel.”
The words didn't make much sense to Do'ormo'ot but the combination of disgusted pity and malevolent satisfaction that radiated from the Terrans was enough to let him know he was in trouble.
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The trip had been terrible. The cell he was in, the lights would flash sporadically, sound would blare in, discordant atonal arrhythmic tones. He had barely gotten any sleep and was struggling just to stand. Water, sometimes warm, sometimes cold, sometimes body temperature, would spray on his at random times. The gravity was high, making just standing up exhausting.
Finally, Do'ormo'ot wasn't sure how long, the cell filled with a warm breeze that dried him off and the door opened.
Fully armored warborgs stood there.
”Prisoner 4582143. You will follow us. Any attempt at passive or active resistance will be met with escalated force. As a terrorist activity engaged state sponsored individual your rights are waived and you have no protection under the law during transfer,” one grated out. ”Do you understand? Respond.”
”Yes, sir,” Do'ormo'ot said, shaking. He was hungry, tired, chilled but overheated, and his mouth tasted terrible from drinking the water that showered down on him.
The two warborgs attached the manacles to him and then a collar and leash to his neck. He expected to have a bag put over his head but instead he was simply led through the ship. The halls were empty, there was no writing on the walls, the lights were so bright they hurt Do'ormo'ot's eyes.
The airlock at the docking bay had two slender female Terrans in black uniforms with silver edging. Their faces were hid by masks that were blank warsteel.
”Prisoner transfer,” one of the warborgs said. The data had already been transferred between datalinks, but protocol demanded verbal exchange. ”Prisoner 4582143.”
One of the females stepped forward, holding her hand out. ”We accept the prisoner,” she said, her voice a gurgling liquid thing.
The warborg handed the leash over and the female turned around, pulling Do'ormo'ot behind her.
”Resistance will be met with up to lethal force,” the female gurgled. The other one followed behind him.
”You are being transferred to the Black Citadel. You will be isolated in a cell-blister so that you may observe where you are going,” the one behind said, her voice cracked and broken. ”It will be the last time you see this universe for possibly the rest of your life. I would advise staring at the stars and fixating them in your mind.”
Do'ormo'ot frowned slightly. Was the prison in jumpspace? Perhaps Hellspace? The would require an expenditure of energy and resources that far outweighed any benefit of putting a prison there.
They led him to a door, opened it, and unclipped the leash before motioning at the door.
”Enter the cell. Resistance will be met with up to lethal force,” the one behind rasped.
Do'ormo'ot trotted in. His training told him to wait, be watchful, and be ready for any possibility of escape of sabotage.
The cell was a crysteel bubble set into a ship. He leaned forward and looked to either side then up and down. The ship wasn't lit, but from what he could see of it, the black armor looked twisted, almost like it was sticky and slick and smooth all at the same time.
”You would be well advised to stare at the stars. It will be the last time you see them, prisoner,” the one with the raspy voice said.
The cell door shut.
Do'ormo'ot stared around him. There was a planet below. Unfamiliar, storm clouds in the atmosphere. A pair of moons within visible range. And a plethora of stars.
After a few minutes Do'ormo'ot began to wonder who the two females were. Why did their voices sound so strange, even for Terran voices.
Something began to change outside. As if water was slowly spreading out in front of him. He moved forward and stared at it. It looked thick, viscous, almost like slime. It spread out further and further until suddenly twisted multicolored flames burst into life at the leading edge.
Is that... is that Hellspace flame? Do'ormo'ot wondered for a moment.
The ship around him shuddered and groaned. He could feel the vibration of the floor as the ship began to somehow descend into the slime.
The female's words came back to him and he looked up at the needle-bright stars, looking desperately for his home system's star with a feeling of sudden dread he could not explain.
The ship was sinking into the slime. There was no other explanation. There was no real up and down in space, but it felt to Do'ormo'ot's brain like the ship was sinking. The slime slowly covered the crysteel blister and Do'ormo'ot drew back from it, lowing in fear and shivering.
The slime got darker and darker, as if space wasn't dark enough. It was more than an absence of light, it was oppressive feeling, as if hope was being leeched out of him. He found himself hyperventilating, seemingly unable to get enough air as his mind insisted the spaceship he was a prisoner on was somehow sinking into water.
I'm going to die here, went through his mind suddenly.
The light was faint at first, but slowly grew. A purplish black luminescence that filled the slime until the slime began to thin out. It vanished and the ship was surrounded by faint, sourceless purplish light. The ship vibrated like it was moving but there were no points of reference.
Where are we? Where am I? Do'ormo'ot asked, staring out of the bubble. There was nothing to gain a reference point to. No Milky Way, no stars, no anything, just purplish-black light and the feeling of endless space that somehow felt claustrophobic and pressed in.
A tachyon the size of a marble hit the crysteel bubble with a flash and ricocheted off into the purple nothingness. The flash, the KRACK, the spiralling arc away, made Do'ormo'ot jump.
Time seemed to have no meaning to Do'ormo'ot. He did not get hungry, did not get thirsty, he just stared at the purplish space beyond. At times it seemed like he could see eternity, at other times it felt like the purplish-black was pressed against the crysteel.
Finally a thing came into view. A blur at first, it kept appearing and disappearing to Do'ormo'ot's vision. It grew slowly larger until Do'ormo'ot could make out details.
It looked like a stone fortress building on a chunk of planetary crust the had been ripped from a planet. The edges of the 'ground' only extended a short way from the edge of the walls, perhaps twice the width of the fortress. The underside was convex, striations in the black stone. Chunks of rock and debris slowly orbited the underside, forming a debris cloud.
The sight of the structure, the first thing Do'ormo'ot had seen in... eternity? Seconds? made his tendrils coil in terror and his crests inflate reflexively to protect his vital organs.
The fortress drew slowly closer and Do'ormo'ot turned away from it, unwilling to stare at the inky black, so dark it hurt his eyes, building on the chunk of black rock.
After what felt like no time at all but an eternity the door opened. Another Terran, male this time, in a black uniform with purplish-silver edging and a black warsteel mask, motioned.
”Prisoner 4582143,” the Terran said. His voice was hoarse, rough, as if he had been speaking for hours with a dry throat. ”You will follow. Resistance, passive or active, will met with up to lethal force.”
”Yes, sir,” Do'ormo'ot said.
As he was led down the black warsteel halls of the transport ship he felt resignation fill him. Even the crack of a small solar system, only the size of a pinhead, snapping through the armor and bouncing around the hallway for a moment before vanishing through the wall, couldn't break him out of the thick resignation.
”You are hereby being transferred custody from the Terran Confederacy to the Black Citadel, Prisoner 4582143,” the Terran rasped. ”For an undetermined amount of time you are being held for processing and interrogation before your prisoner status is determined. Once that occurs you will face whatever penalty is levied against you, up to and including state sanctioned execution and disposal of your physical remains.”
”Yes, sir,” Do'ormo'ot said. He felt like his blood was cold, sluggishly moving through his veins. Not since he had come off the standard Population Assurance Medication had he felt like this. His hearts squished rather than beat, his lungs felt like they were full of stale air and he felt like he'd just taken a breath of bad air or had been holding his breath too long no matter if he inhaled or exhaled. Sometimes his hoofs made too sharp a clacking sound, other times it was strangely muted.
The ship had landed on the surface of the rock, a boarding ramp leading down. The Terran merely motioned him to follow.
There was no atmospheric generators or retention membrane, just endless purple-light pressing closely against the bubble of thin dead air that was almost too thick to breathe.
A proton the size of a basketball arced around the chunk of rock, scraping something unseen, leaving behind sparks as it made a high pitched squealing noise before whipping away into the purplish light.
Do'ormo'ot stumbled several times following the Terran until they reached the gate of the building.
The gate was twisted black material, looking like screaming beings clutching each other to form bars and framework.
In the middle of the gate were five eyes, arranged in a five point pentagram. The eyes blinked, the pupils shifting to fix on Do'ormo'ot. Above the gate was a simple legend that Do'ormo'ot was surprised to see he could read.
ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE
The words made Do'ormo'ot's knees go weak.
A fanged mouth opened beneath the eyes. ”Prisoner 4582143. Prisoner exchange complete,” it said.
The Terran turned and walked away.
Do'ormo'ot's training told him to run, to escape, but a quick look around showed him a simple fact.
There was nowhere to go. The Terran and the ship that Do'ormo'ot had arrived on were gone, lost in the purple dimness pressing in on the Lanaktallan.
The gate opened silently, without even a whisper.
Do'ormo'ot didn't want to, part of his brain screamed not to, every bit of him was consumed by terror just looking at the flagstones of the courtyard beyond, much less that stark and severe looking fortress citadel beyond.
But his trembling legs still carried him through the gate.
The gate to the Black Citadel swung shut behind him.