Page 104 of Scorching the Alien Empire
Drazard.
Truly tragic. Like discovering my condo is riddled with mold.
“Ah, would you look at that? Doors!” Drexios interrupts my troubling thoughts, gesturing ahead to where I see only darkness. “Doors, doors, doors. So many places to be, but I’m just little old me.”
He hums the words to himself, skipping ahead.
Dracoth quickens his pace, the others following suit. Drexios has already disappeared into the first room, the glyph-engraved doors sliding open with a smooth swoosh at his approach.
We step inside. Our breath catches.
The room is a maze of large metal tables, their surfaces pitted and scarred—stained with what canonlybe blood. Thick, segmented restraints dangle from overhead, bolted at one end, the other ending in sturdy clasps.
Trolleys of horrific tools are scattered about, their edges dulled with age but still capable of making my skin crawl. Forceps. Scalpels. Bone saws. Syringes. Some are caked in dried, flaking residue.
Machines loom in the corners, their tarnished surfaces blanketed in dust. Mechanical limbs hang motionless in the dark—waiting. Expecting. As if they’re still anticipating the next victim to arrive at any moment.
My breath quickens as the weight of this room crashes down on me. Even I can smell it now—the metallic tang of old, stale blood. Unmistakable. It clings to the walls, the floors, soaked into the very metal. Ghostly streaks of dark brown dragged into desperate smears. Handprints.
Some are small. Too small. The thought of what they might signify sends a shiver down my spine.
“Oh.” Drexios exhales, straightening. Hands settling at his sides. “Not going to lie—I’m disappointed.”
I barely hear him. My mind is lost in the horror of this place, in the grotesque relics of suffering lining the shelves.
“I was hoping for something... fresher,” he continues, tone sickly light. “If you—”
“Will you shut the fuck up?!”
The words tear from my throat, a shriek of raw fury. My hands tremble at my sides, my glare hot enough to burn.
“What?” He snaps, tossing up a casual shrug. “You’re pink inside and out. Haven’t you seen a torture chamber before—”
“This place,” Dracoth inhales, his voice low and heavy. I rise with his breath, lifted in his arm, as if we both carry the weight of his next words.
“I saw it.”
He isn’t looking at us anymore. His gaze is locked on the walls, the restraints, and the tables marred by suffering. “Thousands like it. Where our females were defiled. Killed.”
My burning fury turns to ice. I knew the Klendathians had lost their females—taken during a civil war led by Dracoth’s predecessor, his clan, and these very space-knights centuries ago. It seemed distant, abstract, like reading a sad post on social media—awful, but removed from my own reality.
But this... This is different. This is real. This is blood that dried beneath clawing hands. Screams that died in unfeeling, metal restraints. A slow, cold horror slithers up my spine. Thisisn’t just history. This isn’t just ancient. These were countless women’s last moments.
My gaze shifts, and I finally take in the shelves lining the walls, filled with rows of jars and containers, their glass long clouded, contents rotted away—or worse. Not all are empty. Some hold... things. Fragments of bone. Clumps of hair. Shriveling, decayed masses barely preserved in sickly, inky fluid.
“By the Gods...” Razgor breathes, horror dawning in his eyes. He rushes toward one of the hulking machines, scanning it with his wrist console.
The space-knights push inward, filling the room, their voices lowering to curses and prayers. Hard faces twist in disgust. Despair.
Everywhere I look is more evidence of pain. The deep, frantic grooves etched into the tables where hands would have lain. Single hairs caught in tiny snags—different colors. Different lengths. My stomach clenches. I squeeze my eyes shut, forcing the rising nausea back down.
“YOU!” Dracoth’s voice erupts, a volcanic explosion that shakes me to my core.
I gasp as his form grows taut as steel, his presence suddenly towering. He looms over Drexios and the other soldiers—rage carved into every line of his body.
“EVERY ONE OF YOU IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS DESECRATION!” His arm sweeps wide, like the flames of a dying god engulfing all in their path. “THIS IS THE FATE OF OUR FEMALES. LOOK AT WHAT YOU HAVE WROUGHT. WHAT YOU CONDEMNED THEM TO SUFFER!”
His crimson-silver glare sweeps the room. Some space-knights bow their heads in shame. Others shift uncomfortably, glancing backward, their faces twisted with concern.
