CHAPTER 8
"Release him."
Dan Pascal felt the cuffs that held his wrists high above his head release their hold, and he crashed knees first onto the floor of the cell. He was barely able to drop his hands beneath him before his face likewise collided with the floor.
As he heaved himself up, thinking he had just enough strength to stand, a booted foot crashed into his abdomen.
After a seemingly interminable beating administered by a trio of Visitors over the course of the last few hours, this last kick was totally unnecessary.
"Why – " he coughed a few seconds later, once he had regained his breath.
"Because I can," said the tall, young Visitor.
Pascal looked up at his tormentor. Not for the first time did he think that this Visitor, with his stature, his blonde hair and blue eyes, might have looked like the prototypical matinee idol if not for that twisted, angry expression he wore on his face ever since Pascal first saw him on the Visitor shuttle on the way up to the Mother Ship.
His vision blurred as he struggled to breathe, his eyes looking not just at the Visitor matinee idol who had kicked him so hard in the stomach, but at the two other alien soldiers who were beating him up as well.
All three had been taking turns at administering the worst physical punishment Pascal had ever experienced in his life. Although he was a criminal, he stuck to white collar crimes.
Violence was something he avoided at all costs.
The reason was simple.
He was afraid of pain.
"Get up," the alien matinee idol said.
Pascal coughed again, this time spitting a few drops of blood onto the floor. He held a hand up to a point just above his left eyebrow, wiping away more blood that seeped out of an ugly gash there.
"Please," he said, his voice pathetic. "Please… no more."
"Get up," the Visitor matinee idol said again. "Now!"
The fury in the alien's voice made Pascal ignore the pain signals now flooding his brain protesting against any movement he tried to make. He used the wall of the cell closest to him to help prop himself up to his feet.
The door to the cell opened, and another Visitor stepped in. This one looked like a black man.
"I've just received word the Los Angeles Police Department has a SWAT unit ready to assist if needed," said the black Visitor to Pascal's principal torturer, his basso tones not masking his voice's distinctive Visitor trill. "I've also confirmed that other sources have corroborated this criminal scum's confession."
"Good," said the Visitor matinee idol. "Have Steven and Diana been notified?"
"Yes, and Steven has authorized deployment of two squads. They are waiting for you now at Security Headquarters. Steven also said that you ought to bring this prisoner with you when you launch your attack. A shuttle to take you to Security Headquarters is waiting for you in docking bay seven."
"Thank you. Please report back to Steven and Diana that we will be leaving to attack the target now, and that I will have Mr. Pascal with me."
"I shall."
"Thank you, Captain Jake."
Pascal wiped away more blood from the wound near his left eyebrow, then did the same to another wound on his right temple, as he listened to the two Visitor officers' conversation. He saw the black officer leave, then tensed up when he saw the alien matinee idol make a gesture. The two other Visitors whose faces were hidden behind black helmets and face shields approached him again.
"Please!" Pascal screamed as panic got the best of him. He pressed himself harder against the wall, wishing he could disappear into it and avoid getting beat up again. "Don't hurt me anymore, please!"
The helmeted Visitors clamped their powerful hands on his biceps and began dragging Pascal away from the wall and out of the cell.
"You're coming with us," said the young Visitor.
Pascal tried to resist, but the combination of the beating he'd suffered and the sheer strength advantage of the Visitor soldiers who held him now meant that he had no choice but to go where the aliens wanted to take him.
His entire body throbbed with pain as he was marched down the dark corridor outside his cell. He thought that this was not the view of the Mother Ship interior he remembers seeing on the footage the press contingent shot when the aliens first arrived all those months ago. The footage showed pristine, white, apparently antiseptic halls. The only part of the Mother Ship that kind of matched that aesthetic was the landing bay.
But then he remembered the moment he and his captors first emerged into these dark halls.
He was forty eight years old, but for some reason seeing this dark, hitherto unseen aspect of the Mother Ship amped up the sense of ominous terror that had been his constant companion ever since he was shocked awake in his home, arrested, and taken aboard the monstrous spacecraft.
Maybe it was some evolved form of that natural fear of the dark everyone has and eventually overcomes.
Pascal and his escorts had gone no more than forty meters down the corridor when he heard a low humming sound echo further down the hall. By now, he recognized this sound as a sign the door to a cell was opening.
"Halt," said the Visitor matinee idol, even though Pascal and the soldiers holding him up hard already stopped. Pascal looked up. Despite the darkness of the hallway, he could see three Visitors and a small blonde woman exit a room and turn towards them.
The woman hung like a life-sized rag doll in the grasp of two Visitors, the tops of her feet dragging along the floor. As they got closer, Pascal noticed that she was completely naked. Despite his own pain, he found himself feeling sorry for her, and he was thankful he was never subjected to the indignity of his clothing being stripped from him.
He didn't want to look at her – despite his criminal activities, Dan Pascal still thought of himself as a gentleman – but something compelled him to strain through his blurred vision and have a good look at the woman being dragged out of that other room. He couldn't shake the feeling that there was something familiar about her.
As she and her captors got even closer, he noticed that, unlike him, this woman had not been subjected to a beating. Even through the darkness he could tell she had no bruises or open wounds anywhere on her, even if she had an ugly burn scar on her right hip. For some reason, though, she lacked the strength to even hold her head up, and her honey-colored curls obscured her face.
Then, suddenly, she lifted her head a bit, and her hair parted enough so that he could see her face.
His eyes widened when he recognized her.
"You! Parrish!"
The soldiers holding him tightened their grip on his arms, and fresh new pain erupted in Pascal's brain. "Be quiet," the soldier on his right said.
Something inside him had snapped, and Pascal found new strength upon recognizing the woman prisoner. He strained against his captors as her own escorts approached his.
One thought dominated his mind.
"You sold me out!" he screamed. "You sold me out!"
When she and her escorts got close enough, he tried to kick her, but it was a weak attempt which didn't connect.
The Visitor matinee idol's fist found the right side of his face, and the soldiers holding him slammed him into the wall.
"You sold me out, you bitch!" he kept screaming at the woman, ignoring the Visitors trying to restrain him. "You sold me out!"
The Visitor matinee idol hit Pascal again, and this time it felt like his cheekbone had cracked with the blow. "We told you to shut up!" he said to Pascal.
Tears welled up from his eyes, not from any emotion, but purely as an involuntary physiological response from the Visitor hitting him. The tears obscured his vision even more, but Pascal kept his gaze locked on the woman.
He thought he heard her moan and groan, saying something incomprehensible as she and the Visitors dragging her passed by, but he didn't give a fuck anymore.
He knew – he just knew – Juliet Parrish had told the Visitors where they could find him.
It's her fault he got arrested in the middle of the night.
It's her fault the Visitors took him up here to the Mother Ship.
It's her fault they beat him to a pulp.
It's her fault he finally answered the question the Visitors kept asking him over and over and over as they beat him, and he answered it with the truth.
And that's just as well.
Because now, Pascal thought, the Karmic circle will close.
She sold him out, just as he sold her group out.
Karma is indeed a bitch.
"I hope they kill you!" Pascal yelled at Juliet Parrish, even as he watched her Visitor escorts toss her like a bag of grain into a holding cell.
"I hope they make you suffer!"