Page 16 of Shattered Silence

Toying with her.

Several of the soldiers laughed.

Layla had just spent the last few weeks, months, whatever, drifting through empty space in a defective escape-pod, knowing the dead bodies of her fellow passengers were in the destroyed ship alongside her.

She’d come to terms with her mortality, spent hours upon hours listening to the deathly silence, and had almost gone mad wondering if she was doomed to slowly eat through eight years worth of disgusting Nutricubes until she was left with nothing.

No food, no communication, no hope.

Until the mysterious Enki caught her singing.

Layla straightened and stared at the Sergeant, refusing to play into their little game. Yes, she was scared, and maybe she was acting stupid, but she was a little bit unstable right now, and she just couldn’t get it into her head that she was supposed to be inferior to these callous silver assholes.

It was maddening, not knowing what they wanted with her, although Layla could hazard a guess.

“Who shoved the stick up your ass?” she asked softly in Eskulin, another of the languages she spoke. “I really hope my boy turns out to be someone who can do you folk a lot of damage, because that would be insanely satisfying.”

“Tch.” The Sergeant shook his head in a disapproving manner and uttered a soft command.

And suddenly Layla’s world was doused in a haze of agony.

Pain shot around her neck, digging vicious claws into the column of her spine. Pain ran down her back, turning her legs to jelly. Pain tore across her scalp, her face, her eyes, turning her vision white.

She’d thought the pain in her ribs and ankle was bad, but this…

This was the worst thing she’d ever experienced in her life.

A punishment for her mild disobedience.

Please stop.

She just wanted it to stop, but she would never, ever beg.

“Voruk.” This time, the Sergeant’s command was deceptively gentle; almost a caress. It was as if he were taunting her, donning a mask of restraint while the most excruciating pain rocketed through her body.

Now it just felt like she was taking a bath in fire and being flayed alive at the same time. What kind of sadistic, depraved, degenerate mind had come up with this awful, awful device?

A Kordolian mind, obviously.

Enki, I hope you’re real and not just a figment of my imagination, and I really, really hope you don’t get off on this kind of shit.

Somehow, Layla was still on her feet, but she’d reached the very limits of her endurance.

She couldn’t take this anymore.

Make it stop. Makeitstopmakeitstop!

She swayed. Closed her eyes. Tried to remember what she was supposed to do.

Voruk.

Kneel.

She dropped to her knees, gasping.

In a flash, the pain disappeared, leaving her nerve endings raw and tingling, the memory of impossible agony freshly imprinted on her mind.

Already, a scar was forming.

---