Slaves…
Year:3403 AD
Location:Orbit of Planet Azis IV, deep in Bathac controlled space
Robert's eyes opened. The dimly lit room was crowded with other people. His vision was extremely blurred and he detected a faint smell of rancid body odor.
He crouched in the corner, unsure of where he was and who the other 100 or so Humans were. He quickly scanned his surroundings, but was still confused. His head hurt. It felt like hundreds of voices were talking to him at the same time, but from inside his head. Robert wanted the voices to stop but they wouldn't. His vision remained blurred, his hearing was muffled, and he could not speak. It was surreal- he could think, but his other senses failed him.
Robert tried to remember what happened. A singular vision of a space station entered his mind, but was quickly shadowed by the voices. He did not know how to describe it to himself, but the voices actually clouded his mental vision. He panicked, his eyes darted around the room.
He wanted to scream.
Unable to express his outrage, Robert continued to examine his surroundings. Some of his senses were gradually becoming sharper, but not to the attuned level he was accustomed to. He did notice his arms felt heavy. Robert looked at his hands. They were shackled. He glanced from his wrists, to his arms and to his chest- they were all connected by some alien contraption. He had never seen a retention system such as the one he currently wore.
He looked up and noticed everyone else in the room was adorned in the same device. They also appeared to have a similar facial expression of confusion mixed with anger. A clear thought came to him, but only briefly.
He must be a slave, a Bathac slave.
Robert shuddered from the folklore of what happens to Humans that are enslaved by the Bathac. Even though he could not remember anything from his life prior to his eyes opening, he knew it would all be over shortly. He started crying.
He knew the Bathac captors would force him to perform grueling manual labor until his body would cease to respond. He would literally be worked to death over the next few decades, powerless to do anything. Before continuing his self explanation of the fate he was sure to suffer, his mind was clouded and the voices became louder.
Robert was having a difficult time of staying self-aware and ignoring the internal screaming. He wanted to remove the shackles, but his limbs would not respond. What would have normally been an autonomous, subconscious action was now an impossible task. He was growing increasingly angry at his lack of self-control. He wanted to burst out with a scream.
His head was swimming with foggy visions and voices. The voices were gaining control of his mind. He could not discern what they said, but he wanted them to stop. Just when he was about to remember something… anything, the voices would scream at him. The pain was unbearable. He knew he had to keep control of his mind.
Robert turned to interrupted thoughts of suicide. He yearned for something sharp to impale his temple on. His eyes looked frantically around the room, but he knew it was not simply a room. It was dirty, hot and had smooth walls. He convinced himself it was a holding area he was in. This ruled out the option of suicide, even though he would take the extreme measure of throwing himself out an airlock in the void of space before succumbing to enslavement. He now knew for sure this room was a transport pod of some type on a Bathac ship.
To his surprise, he saw someone move. Robert was only able to maintain eye contact with the silhouette. He was able to discern it was another Human by the outline of a retention device attached to it. The person started screaming. The screaming was almost as horrifying as the multitude of voices inside his head.
The unknown person took pushed their way through the crowd of people. By some unknown force, the other members in the pod were pushed against the walls. Robert felt himself being slowly pushed backwards until he was pressed against the corner. He felt a great pressure on his chest as if a 300 pound weight was resting on it, horizontally. He heard himself exhale while struggling to breathe. He noticed others were having a similar experience. The lone person was left standing in an open circle.
The pseudo-freed Human was now a spectacle for everyone to see. Robert could tell it was a young female, no older than 20. She continued to scream, "Stop! Get out of my head… Stop!!!"
Robert's vision instantly became clear. It was clearer than ever before. At the same time, the voices stopped. His hearing was also restored; he could hear the girl's screams as if she was speaking into a microphone. Even with her screaming, his head was quiet. The multitude of voices was silent. This short-lived reprieve came to an end. His head was filling with a sickeningly twisted singular voice.
"You all now belong to the Bathac. Resistance of our influence will only result in severe pain. Watch what happens to those that fight it" said the horrific voice.
A door-sized panel opened across the room from Robert. He wanted to turn his head and see who, or what, was coming through the panel but his vision was unwillingly locked on the girl. He heard the soft clank of boots walking across the floor. A tall figure with some type of metallic left arm came in to view. Robert had never seen a person, or thing, like this.
The individual was tall and sickly looking. It wore a thin suit of blackened armor with a matching cloak. Robert scanned this being's frame through his peripheral vision. He was drawn to the metallic sleeve. His eyeballs surged with pain from straining to stare directly at the sleeve he was marveling over. He was infatuated with it, much like an insect to a light. Robert now felt himself only wanting to please this cloaked wonder. Robert decided he would refer to the wonder as, "Master". His last few self-aware thoughts began fading away.
The twisted voice returned, "This brings me great joy, observe."
The young female's retention devices unlocked and dropped to the floor. She grabbed her hair and began pulling on it. Her screams of agony increased. She pulled so hard she ripped a handful of hair free from her scalp. Her head started bleeding slightly from the fresh wound. Robert was thinking she could run, but that would only make the Master unhappy.
The young female screamed louder than before. Robert could see a torment in her eyes he had never experienced. Her body started trembling slightly. Her eyes were wide open and her mouth agape. The screams turned into shrieks. Her empty hand clawed at her face, leaving raked marks from her nails. Her body was now shaking violently. Robert did not want her to stop, for it surely pleased the Master.
Suddenly the tremors, and shrieking, stopped. The girl's face gave an expression of utter torture. The cloaked figure swiftly raised its metallic arm upward. She was lifted, telekinetically, off the ground. She rotated slowly while being suspended several feet above the floor. The Master was laughing with demented enjoyment.
After being lifted, the girl's legs were spread shoulder width apart. Her arms were straightened and extended parallel with the floor out from her sides. Her hands opened letting the clump of hair fall. It rested atop the disheveled pile of her previously secured retention devices. The Master clenched his left hand into a fist and then quickly unclenched it. All of the girl's clothes were ripped from her body in an instant.
She continued to slowly rotate as the shreds of clothing drifted to the floor. Her eyes gave an eerie look of depravity in a trance-like state. The girl was unaffected by the fact she floated nude in front of nearly 100 people. She was rotated almost 180 degrees before coming to a stop. The vibrations and her shrieks resumed at an alarming rate. Her teeth chattered and sweat poured from her naked flesh. She looked as if she was having a seizure. The vibrations were so intense, her entire body convulsed violently.
A fist-sized hole between her breasts ruptured and exploded.
A thick mist of blood spattered the Human spectators in front of her. Shattered pieces of sternum, diaphragm muscle and globules of innards connected with their faces. Oblivious to what happened; the entranced Humans stared at the floating girl as the exploded pieces slowly slid off. The pieces of gore hit the floor with a sickly, "Thwop!"
The inside of her chest cavity was fully exposed for all to view. Her heart, now visible, was beating rapidly from the induced trauma. She amazingly was not dead. Her screams continued with unrelieved agony. A severed artery inside her chest wound spurted blood in rhythm with her accelerated pulse. The blood spurts arced upwards briefly before striking the floor. The Master lowered its arm. With a flick of its wrist, the girl's gaping thoracic cavity vibrated.
The girl's beating heart floated out of her chest, still attached to arteries and pulmonary veins.
The shock induced from seeing one's own heart, and the process of having it telekinetically removed, should have killed the girl. Unfortunately for her, she was still alive. She stopped screaming and stared horrifically at her beating heart floating in front of her. The arteries and pulmonary veins were stretched to their limit. The heart, and attached circulatory system, was now being splashed with blood from the previously severed artery. The blood-soaked, dripping, cardiac organ was truly a horrific sight.
The Master's laughing increased to a hysterical cackle. The metallic arm swept downwards in a diagonal motion. The girl's flesh started bubbling. She now screamed with an intensity that was nearly inaudible. Her entire epidermal layer sizzled and popped in a similar fashion of being sprayed with a caustic acid… except there was no acid.
The hysterical cackle continued. Robert watched with a sickened interest. With his subconscious fully subdued he stared in anticipation of the female's epidermis being ripped away much like her clothes were. He prayed the Master would receive fulfillment from this, much like he found himself wanting. Robert's gratification was expressed by the maniacal grin they formed.
As quickly as her clothes were shredded, the girl's skin was peeled from her body. The clump of epidermis hovered off to the side of the girl. The Master manipulated the mass so it appeared inflated, like a suit of skin. The, "skin suit" mimicked a representation of the girl as it floated like a shadow next to her. It even gave the horrified facial expression from the sheer brutality the girl experienced from being skinned alive. The flesh drifted from the girl's side to face her in a mirror image.
Exposed muscle tissue, bone and veins were the only thing covering the girl's internal organs. Blood dripped from her entire body, soaking the clump of hair and retention device below. She wanted to scream, but her throat was too hoarse. She wanted to cry, but her eyes were already dripping blood. She wanted a release from this torture, but nothing could save her. The cramped room was silent except for the cackle of the Master's laughter, the girl's winced attempts at screaming and blood drops hitting the floor.
The Master's laughing ceased. It began moving its metal encased sleeve much like a conductor directing an orchestra. The Master was controlling the peeled flesh effortlessly. This orchestra of psychotic death took an unimaginable turn for the worse. The hollow mirror image of the girl stretched its hand outwards. It tilted its head side to side in an inquisitive, playful manner.
The empty hand grasped the quivering heart. Some of the oozing blood absorbed into the flesh while the excess dripped off. The heart was pushed up to the girl's face. Unwillingly, her mouth opened. The Master began feeding the girl her own heart, held by her own skin. Her mouth was manipulated to chew slowly and savor every bite. She was forced to swallow each chunk.
The hand that fed her applied slow, but steady pressure to ensure she continued eating. Each bite of the muscular organ ended with a brisk snap. Blood gushed over the girl's exposed lips and dribbled down her chin. Her face was messy and covered with tiny pieces of uneaten organ. She was forced to lick her lips intermittently before consuming the rest of her heart.
The Master stopped the self-cannibalism just short of the entire heart being devoured. The innate abilities of this cloaked figure were madly amazing. To continue this freakish display of power, blood was telekinetically pumped through the gnawed organ to keep the girl alive. She appeared ready to vomit, but the Master would not allow it.
Robert sat in excited awe, waiting for the next gruesome demonstration. He was not disappointed. The hollowed flesh released the remnants of the heart. It remained floating just outside the hole in the girl's chest. A fleshy hand was placed on each of the girl's shoulders. The skin suit gave a smile when a wave of nauseating pain washed over the girl's face. The epidermal specter gripped the upper biceps of both arms and started pulling outwards.
Muscles and tendons were stretched to their limits. Veins and arteries popped, spraying additional blood on the spectators. The crescendo of this twisted activity was marked by the gut-wrenching sound of the girl's arms being ripped from their sockets. A telekinetic barrier covered the armless sockets to prevent the girl from bleeding out. The shock, however, was too much.
The girl passed out.
The suit of flesh held a detached arm in each hand. Stringy connective tissue dangled from the appendages. The Master screamed, "Wake up!" It commanded the suit to slap the girl with her own arms. She was repeatedly slapped across the face by her hands, sending small splats of blood flying. The girl came to after a few more brutal slaps. She mouthed a scream, but was still too hoarse to produce sound. Satisfied its prey was awake for the grand finale, the Master stopped the suit.
The Master filled each spectators head with a final message, "You will soon be under the full control of the Bathac. If any of you ever have a conscious thought again, simply remember this." In a flash, the Master's metallic arm pointed at the suspended girl. The flesh suit reversed its grip on the appendages. It brought the arms backward in preparation of a powerful strike.
The girl's eyes focused on the dripping, exposed Humorous bones that protruded from the top of the detached limbs. Her mouth opened in wild desperation to scream, but her life was over before even a wince could be produced. Her fleshy executioner slammed the tips of the protruded bones into her eyes. The force was so great, the bones penetrated through her brain. They were only stopped by the connection with the rear skull plate of the girl's cranial cavity. Squished gray matter discharged from the girl's eye sockets and ran down her face. The pressure from the impalement had sent the girl's eyeballs outward. They dangled loosely from her face, colliding randomly with her cheeks.
The girl's body shook for the last time. Still suspended telekinetically by the Master, her body was frozen in the middle of the room. The sight of a freshly skinned Human body was ghastly by itself. The combination of a fleshless body and its own limbs impaled through the eye sockets brought it to a different level. Only a warped, twisted, sick individual could appreciate these grisly remains.
The Master gave a small grin, turned and exited. The flesh suit collapsed to the ground, soaking in the accumulated pool of blood.
Robert gazed at the deceased girl. He was enthralled by the gory remains levitating in front of him. The pressure from his chest was lifted and he was able to move. Robert did not want to move though. No one in the room wanted to move. The room was still other than the occasional drip of blood from the girl's deformed carcass.
The last thought in Robert's head was, the Master is happy.
