Disclaimer: I guess this is where I'm supposed to tell you that the characters in this story are not really mine. I'll say it, but I don't really believe it. Paramount owns them and I'm hoping they have enough money not to need to sue me for this…otherwise, I guess I'm screwed.

Chapter Rating: T+ for descriptions of torture, violence. THE STORY DOES HAVE A PLOT, THOUGH! It's not just gratuitous violence. Well…all right. Not ALL the violence is gratuitous.

Chapter One

He tried to breathe through it, tried to withstand the brutal thrusting of viciously spinning metal twisting into the soft tissue of his shoulder…

"Ahhhhhh!" His throat, already so raw from screaming, scratched and tore at his voice as it forced its way out.

He no longer recognized the sound of his own voice, magnified as it was over the myriad of Jehnz-yin megaphones so that all passing by the facility would hear his cries. His cries…and his weakness.

Gods, he had to tell them what they wanted to know, just tell them what they wanted to know and it would all stop, it would stop and he could rest...

No! Breathe, damn it! Just breathe. You can't tell them anything! Nothing! What's at stake here is so much more important than one man…this doesn't matter. Nothing! Not a word!

There was also the fact that he really couldn't tell them what they ultimately wanted to know: only one person could.

She will come. That knowledge was the only thing that had kept him strong thus far. It fortified him, filled him with courage. She'd never leave him to suffer, to die at the hands of depraved beasts like the Jehnz-yi. She'd never allow him to endure alone.

She will come. It terrified him, even more than the hideous array of instruments they waved in front of him, their sharp, carnivorous teeth glinting beneath the spotlight which blinded him. If she came, they'd do even worse things to–

Thought ceased once more as the shrill whine of the torture device halted for an infinitesimally brief time, and the obscene splatter of his warm blood no longer sprayed the dank stone walls in front of him. But he knew all too well that the blessed pause served as a harbinger of even worse things to follow.

The whine began again, muted by the drag of ravaged skin and chipped bone, and the bit imbedded in his muscle tissue reversed. It whirred dauntlessly, spinning backward out of his screaming, fiercely tethered form…pulling pieces of him with it.

His tormentors howled with amusement, speaking somehow over his screams with practiced ease. Gods help him, the sounds they made...

Their words, too, carried out into the dirty streets of the opulent Jehnz-yin city…a favored entertainment for an unimaginably cruel society...

"Ahhhhhh!" Another scream, mindless and tortured, broke free. He sobbed, sagging between two unrelenting posts of icy steel, aware for a moment only of unyielding agony. And laughter.

They spoke, these soulless monsters. Moderately sized humanoids, they displayed eyes, limbs, bodies like so many others he'd encountered over a lifetime of interstellar travel. They had lungs which breathed an atmosphere enough like his own that he could survive on their world without the aid of technology. Their legs bore stocky torsos he imagined housed vital organs very like his own...

And they spoke.

That they had a language at all, could be advanced enough to have developed civilized conversation, grammar…seemed perverse. Such a beautiful thing, language...

But theirs was coarse. Crude. It overflowed with words, phrases for pain and insults meant to degrade and humiliate.

At first, their questions had threatened to drive him even more insane than the horrendous wounds they received so much enjoyment from inflicting upon him. Questions he foolishly thought to die before answering truthfully…or so he had resolved he would. Oh, but that was well before they began using their devices.

Once that happened, he had begun praying for a quick death. Because he knew instantly, with the first chunk of flesh they sliced from his thigh that he could not endure this for long. He was going to break and betray the one person he'd rather die than let down... And still, they pelted him with questions. Repeated them, rephrased them, molding inquiries like sharp blades and hacking away at whatever inner peace he'd managed to cling to...

Where was Janeway? Was he Janeway? Was he captain of the Alpha Quadrant vessel? The vessel even now providing safe haven to the centuries-long enemy of the mighty Jehnz-yin Empire?

And, as he'd known full well by that point what they intended for the captain of Voyager, he'd been brave. He'd done the only thing he could think of to stall, to give her time to come up with a plan and rescue them. And to spare Harry from similar mistreatment.

He'd drawn himself up to full height, stared the lead interrogator directly in his ovular, fathomless black eyes and barked, "Yes. I'm Janeway. I'm the one you want." And he'd hoped against hope that nearly five years of observing the woman had enabled him to do at least a passable job of imitating her fearless and innately proud bearing.

They laughed in his face.

Somehow, they didn't think so. For the deception, he'd received the first of many bone-jarring blows to his sensitive face.

No, they sneered. They didn't think so. The captain was human, like the other one they'd recovered – the dark-haired one. Their source had reported as much. Their source was never wrong. The leader of the offensive humans was most definitely not Talaxian filth. And the other one was too young. It wasn't him, either.

They converged on him, four of them at once, and began to beat him idly, almost seeming bored as they drove hard, pointed feet into his hunched-up torso. He covered his bruised face with his arms and took the blows as stoically as possible. And, all in all, he'd been feeling rather pleased with himself – scared out of his mind at the unprovoked hostility – but still, rather pleased. His grunts were automatic and, save for a few smothered curses, he'd held up under pressure.

They knew there were three "Voyagers" on the shuttle. They had two. One was Talaxian filth and the other a mere youngling. "The boy", they called him. So, they reasoned, it must be the third. And, from the way these two captives had so touchingly struggled to protect each other on the streets, they knew how to catch the third...

Didn't they, Mr. Neelix?

He was never sure when he'd told them his real name – perhaps in a paroxysm of suffering he'd blurted it out. Probably. What else had he shouted in his terror? Oh Gods, what had he told them? He couldn't have revealed the shuttle's location?

Now, they were puzzled. Their scans had clearly detected three life signs aboard the alien shuttlecraft before it had disappeared from sensors: two males and one female. They had two males…and no Janeway. Their source reported that Captain Janeway was positively one of the occupants of the craft – a clever if misguided attempt to distract the Jehnz-yin fleet from its pursuit of Voyager itself.

"An attempt which worked! You don't have Voyager, do you, you xenophobic beasts," he'd taunted, spitting out fragments of bloodied teeth and grinning with defiance. Unable to help himself, it seemed.

Tom Paris himself could not have effected a more thoroughly insubordinate display.

The lead interrogator had smiled then ordered him stretched out between the two thick metal posts. Ordered his insidious little devices be brought into the dank chamber. Ordered the surveillance equipment turned on and the recording broadcast throughout the northern hemisphere. And he'd smiled still as the Talaxian's clothing had been sliced, ripped and ultimately torn from his mottled body until he hung helpless and nude. Exposed.

His tormentor continued, once more laying out the damning facts for their victim. Their source had reported that the captain was aboard the shuttlecraft. They had the two males…and no Janeway. So…Janeway was a woman? A woman commanded the humans? They'd take his silence for agreement, he was assured. Still, perhaps they'd take an index finger also, just to be certain?

Yes. Oh, and he was to feel quite free to continue screaming as those outside not near enough to a viewscreen would certainly appreciate his vocal talents.

So, Janeway was a woman? Even better. She'd be easier to break than the Talaxian would and – oh – they were looking forward to it! Wasn't he? She would undoubtedly prove so much more entertaining, too. All they had to do was continue their little show, and she would come.

They did hope she looked more like the boy than the Talaxian. Was she very old? That would prove most disappointing. Did he think she would scream so satisfyingly for them as well?

So, here he remained – nearly an hour? more? – later. He'd no real idea. Time had lost all meaning for him anyway. There was only the pain, only furious, blood-red, merciless, white-hot pain. Agony after agony. He'd barely managed to cling to reality…and the biting heat of the laser scalpel was turned slowly toward his good eye...

There was a commotion at the entrance to the room, pausing the brutal mockery of an interrogation within. He hung limply. Broken, gasping for oxygen but barely getting enough. He was hyperventilating again, probably. Pounding, someone was pounding at the entrance to the prison facility. The echoes reverberated in his head, making him retch with the sickening vibrations.

Bright light streamed in from outside, blinding him as effectively as the laser that had been paused by the interruption. So he couldn't see the cloaked figure huddled at the entrance or the expectant crowd of Jehnz-yi gathered behind it. But he heard the voice, and his heart gave a double beat of elation. That wonderfully inspiring, terrifying voice…sometimes like a particularly biting shot of whiskey and then at other times grating, like sandpaper. Today like warm velvet. Like heaven.

She'd come.

He sobbed quietly, brokenly as she pushed her way past startled Jehnz-yin guards and reached his side. A soft, cool hand brushed fleetingly across his uninjured soldier, and he gladly endured the feel of her eyes – though he couldn't meet them – taking horrified inventory of his injuries. Forgetting even to be mortified at his forced nudity, he heard the angry hiss of her in-taking air before he felt her turn abruptly away from him to face his tormentors. She stood firmly between him and hell, shielding him with her body.

She'd come.

Released him from this, his personal hell. She'd delivered him, as he'd known she would.

"Forgive the interruption, gentlemen," the last word dripped contempt, "but this interrogation is finished."

Soft, menacing laughter filled the chamber. "Indeed?" The lead interrogator drawled, his underlings forming a slowly advancing half circle before him. The amusement in Garan Xi's voice seemed lost on the small woman. "And you are?" Though he must have known the answer already, he posed the question anyway. Probably for the video recording's sake, Neelix thought bitterly.

She gave a toss of her cloaked head, shaking the hood away from her face and revealing the short auburn hair beneath. "I'm Captain Kathryn Janeway. I believe you've been looking for me, General."