Chapter twenty nine
The man that still held her tight against his chest tightened his grip
even more so as he rose his eyes up from his huddled position in the cargo-hold
to look into the face of the gigantic Sindareen that stood in the
oval doorway. In reality, Jeb guessed that the man was maybe six feet
five or six but against their smallness and the fact that he clearly
had to stoop to manoeuvre around the ship's insides, he seemed gigantic.
Jeb felt the trembling woman in his arms stiffen when she'd lifted her
own eyes and realized that he'd been addressing her. Her unconsciously
whimpered, "No, please!" tore from her throat on a sob before she
buried her face against his chest, pulling her limbs closer to her body
in a valiant effort to somehow make herself disappear.
But her effort was in vain when she heard the thud of his boot as he
stepped into the hold, reached down and dragged her to her feet by her
hair, it emitting a screech of protest and pain at the brutal handling as her
hands instinctively reached up to prise his fingers loose. It was a
futile effort as his hands were like hard, ice-cold vices.
Jeb made to stand; to help her, stop them, to say something - anything to
halt whatever they had planned for his charge, but when that same boot
landed upon his ankle, snapping it in one swift purposeful stomp the
sickening noise echoing in the shocked silence, he could do nothing more
than slither back to the floor crying out in agony as he felt the bone
snap, his face draining of colour as he swallowed down his churning
stomach as the pain surged throughout his body.
Deanna screamed as she witnessed the barbaric treatment of a friend who
had become someone to hold on to, someone whose mental strength had
saved her own sanity in this desolate and cruel time. "No! No! Leave him
alone!" she cried. "I'll come quietly!" Spinning in his arms to face
the enemy, her eyes beseeched his and pleaded for mercy.
The Sindareen let out a roar of laughter that made her blood run cold.
But she didn't have time to reflect on her precarious position as he
spun her around and begun to drag her out of the hold. And then suddenly
he stopped and addressed one of the guards that stood watch by the door.
He pointed to Jeb and snapped, "Get rid of him."
Unable to stop herself, Deanna let out another ear-piercing scream,
"NO!" she sobbed making one more try at freeing herself from his grip,
her pathetic attempt only producing another heinous bout of laughter
from her captor.
She watched in horror as the guard stepped inside and reached down to
drag her quivering and terrified friend off the floor, but the boom of
anger from the man holding her made her jump out of her skin, "Not him,
fool, the piece of scum behind!"
All eyes turned to the poor soul that lay half covered and bent over in a
foetal position behind Jeb. The young man was dead. Deanna shivered with
horror as she realized that she had sat within inches of a corpse. So
wrapped up in her own grief that she hadn't noticed the dying man take his
last, painful breath and her heart broke as she pictured him dying alone
without a hand to hold his as he passed away.
They all watched with morbid fascination as the guard reached down,
dragged the man up onto his shoulder as though he weighed nothing at
all and passed them by, taking him out of the hold.
But horror turned to disgust when he dropped the man to the floor,
reach down to release the latch on a hatch and pull it open, letting
a whoosh of freezing air pour into the ship, making Deanna gasp with shock at
its frigidness, and then he simply and without ceremony or feeling
dropped the man through it, and then just as calmly, close the hatch
and bolt it down once more.
For a long moment Deanna could only stare at the metallic hatch and
imagine the poor soul free-falling through the skies, but she
deliberately closed her mind and her eyes to the vision that would
ultimately follow his arrival to solid ground. But as hard as she tried,
Deanna couldn't stop herself, her face paling with the waking nightmare.
With morbid curiosity the grinning Sindareen watched her face with
Interest until at last, satisfied that his action had received as much
revulsion from her as it could have he laughed and moved on towards the
ships control room, still dragging her along by her hair.
Pushing her free of his hold as they reached the centre of the control
room Deanna momentarily stumbled with the suddenness of her release.
Glancing around the room, taking in the three men who's backs faced her
as they busily manned their own panels, she questioningly turned to face the
big man, her eyes wide with fear.
Grinning sadistically he studied her for a brief moment and then
pointed to the control panel behind her. Puzzled, Deanna turned and
glanced at the unfamiliar set-up and then back at him, confusion etching
her wary, tired, tear-stained face.
He laughed loudly for a moment and then just as suddenly severed the
Action, and then with his overly deep voice, punctuated with venom, he
snarled, "Beg for your life, Betazoid bitch."
Tbc...
