“I didn’t know they’d take her! I swear to God I don’t know anything about it! I wasn’t there, I haven’t even spoken to any of those people since—” He blubbers like a youngling caught in a lie.
“Ah, but if you don’t know anything about it, then how could you know why I am here, hm?” I ask him, squeezing his neck harder until he gurgles and chokes.
“Kila,” Kiva warns.
“What do you want from me?” Vic whines, his face red and sweaty.
“Names. Addresses. Everything you know. Now,” I demand in the clearest terms possible. I hear the beep of Kiva’s mini tap-pad as he begins recording.
“I wasn’t there,” he says again.
“That is inconsequential.” I drop him to the floor. He rolls around, panting. I pull my ikani from my pocket. I show him the shining black handle and press gently on the release. The short blade emerges with a delicate hiss.
“You don’t get it. I’m worried for Ella, really, but they won’t kill her. They’ll kill me though,” he says desperately. “They’ll kill me if they find out it’s my fault a bunch of crazy aliens showed up at their place.”
“That is fine,” I say. “When I am done with you, you will be wish to be ashes. That is… unless you start talking…”
I move to pin him and he flops like a fish, squirming to get away. I dig a knee into his back and press my weight into him. I grab his arm and lock it into place while he starts screaming. Kiva shuffles anxiously behind me, but I haven’t even cut the coward yet and he shrieks like a hopper in a jungle trap.
“Before, I told you of the traditional Kar’Kali method of torture. One of the few barbaric practices we’ve kept from the Archaic period. I promised you a demonstration,” I say calmly, forcing his palm open. “It begins easy. With the smallest finger on your hand.”
I grasp the finger, just as I told him. Perhaps too zealously, because he lets out a high-pitched scream of pain, and I realize I might have broken his pointer finger in the process. No matter…
“It is best done with a Kar’Kali blade. Our metal cuts through bone,” I tell him, and begin to dig my ikani into the tip of his finger.
“Jesus… Jesus Christ— AAAaaannnHHHhh,” he cries out. “Fuck, fuck, you are crazy. Okay, okay, stop it and I’ll tell you what I know.”
I drop his arm. “Quickly.”
***
ELLA
Well, it’s definitely been hours and so far, my scheming hasn’t gotten me very far. In fact, accomplishing just about anything in my current state is exhausting.
First, I almost cracked my head open by getting to my feet and hopping to a light switch. It’s slowly gotten darker and darker. Then, I had to go to the bathroom, which was horrible. I dragged myself to the door, got up on my knees and pushed on the knob with my mouth. This door swung in, causing me to topple onto the tiles from my lack of balance. I had to climb up onto a foreign toilet and shimmy my ass out of my pants. Wiping myself was too tedious and ineffective for me to even think about again.
I searched the place for something sharp, but I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m trapped in a guest room that doesn’t get regular usage. Soap, shampoo, and towels just won’t cut it if I’m ever going to escape. Before today, I wouldn’t have thought that the kind of person with a guest room that has its own bathroom attached would be the same kind of person who gets random kidnapped women dropped off by criminals. Just goes to show that you never really know…
The only thing I’ve found that might be useful is a travel sized bottle of hair spray. By turning around and using my bound hands, I’m able to shove it down the back of my jeans. It’s not comfortable, but it’s better than nothing.
Resigned to my situation and mentally fatigued from brainstorming escape plans, I haul myself onto the top of the bed and lay there.
Just as I feel close to drifting off to sleep, I hear the front door slam open again. I hear voices, but I’m not able to make out what they’re saying at first.
Then, predictably, they start arguing again.
“No! No way!” my unenthusiastic babysitter yells. “Get her out of here. You are not doing your bullshit in my house!”
“The only reason you live here is because we let you,” the man says. Heavy footsteps approach my door and his voice drifts closer. “Put your headphones on for all I care. The compound’s being watched.”
“Don’t you touch me—” There is scraping and shuffling from a brief struggle from just beyond the door. The woman whimpers, and I assume he’s putting her in her place. I tense up, the fear blossoming in my stomach. In a minute, I’m certain this brute is going to be focusing his attention on me.
“You only make it harder on yourself,” he says as he opens the door. For the brief moment before the man shuts it behind him, I can clearly make out a female form on the floor of the hallway, hunched over and trembling.
Then I’m alone with him.
Chapter 23
KILA
“Infiltrating this fort would be suicide,” Mori states once he’s completed a scan of the area. “And I have no positive indication that Ella is inside based on these scans. In fact, there is no chip technology anywhere on this property.”
We are seven miles away from the town of Piney where the research facility is based. We’ve arrived at the address provided by Vic Williams. This area is less populated and predominantly wooded, but it wasn’t far to go in one of the human’s cars. Jen offered us one of the facility’s vans, implying that her assistance was not to be acknowledged publicly. The vehicle is primitive, but Vala seems to enjoy driving it.
“Are you telling me this was a waste?” I ask, immediately wondering whether the spineless human lied to us. If he did, I’ll make time once Ella is safe to punish him. I tap on my seat, impatient to find her. It’s been far too long now, and I can’t imagine how frightened she must be. I sit in the seat beside Vala, while the others are seated in the open area that makes up the larger back compartment of this van.
“I am telling you that this area is stocked with enough human guns to kill us all a hundred times over,” he says. “And there are some Alliance made weapons as well, just to be clear.”
“Not a waste,” Pakka says. “It’s clear based on that data that this is a base for the group that was behind the break-in and Ella’s kidnapping. It just so happens they are not keeping her here.”
“It makes sense,” Kiva agrees. “This is a known organization and it is associated with this address. Therefore, bringing her here while the authorities are searching would be inadvisable.”
“That’s true. In fact, there are two vehicles parked on the south side of this property with multiple heat signatures and weapons inside. That is likely the authorities, on watch for any suspicious activity,” Mori posits, gesturing at his scan. “Too bad they are bound by silly human laws requiring ‘legally procured evidence’.”
I turn to Kiva. “What can you tell us? You’ve been researching the information that Vic provided. Is there anything we can work off of?”
He turns pale once he’s under my gaze. “Kila… I… It will upset you.”
“I am upset already,” I say. “Brief me.”
“The names the man Vic provided are associated with an organization whose mission is to convince the public to join the Anti-Alien, Anti-Alliance, Pro-Sovereignty movement. They call themselves the Exile Squad. Mainly they focus on exposing the lies that they believe the Alliance government is spreading. They have a popular website called AlienLiesExposed.Com to which they upload many videos showing supposed ‘confessions’ made by aliens and any prominent Pro-Alien figures they can get their hands on.” He turns his tap-pad around to show us the main page of their website.