Scrapyard Ship 7: Call to Battle by Mark Wayne McGinnis Page B

being.
    Three separate visits now—each one progressively more invasive—more painful. Aside from the guardian’s proclivity to cause pain, Ricket found the creature fascinating. Easily as large as a rhino-warrior, he was an interesting amalgamation of serpent and reptile. And then there was the smell. A strong, fishlike odor. Fish and something else … chloride?
    Thus far, their keepers were unaware of either Ricket’s, or Gaddy’s, internal nano-devices. Their inset devices had been their one saving grace. As the torture sessions began, both Gaddy and Ricket had come to the other’s aid; not physically, but emotionally. This, the two had worked out, allowed them to go into something akin to autopilot mode. The ability to turn inward and deal with the misery—misery that inevitably turned into extreme agony.
    Now, listening through Gaddy’s open NanoCom channel, Ricket concentrated on what the guardian was asking her.
    “And how did you return to Halimar? How did you skirt the thousands of warships that surrounded the Craing worlds?”
    Calmly, Ricket told her exactly what to say: A small shuttle. We weren’t noticed.
    Ricket listened to Gaddy’s raspy voice repeat his words. “A small shuttle. We weren’t noticed.”
    Ricket let out a breath. Any mention of HAB 12 and their ability to move between The Lilly ’s Zoo and the Craing world of Halimar could have dire consequences in the future.
    The guardian’s frustration instigated a quick reaction and the progressive turning of a small dial. Frustrated with his lack of any real progress, the guardian resorted to a new variety of devices—each designed to produce the highest levels of pain, with minimum actual physiological damage. It made sense. The guardian wanted to extend his torment session timeframes as long as possible—a totally incapacitated prisoner, or worse, a dead one, would be of no use.
    Ricket also experienced this particularly terrible device just hours earlier. He heard Gaddy scream out in pain as this same device, now attached to her toes, came alive. Red hot heat, indistinguishable from the sensation of an open flame, first blisters the soles of the feet, then the flesh begins to char, and exposed nerves start sending excruciating, white hot jolts of pain up the leg, and the body goes rigid—to the point leg bones are on the verge of shattering.
    Ricket’s eyes filled with tears as he heard Gaddy’s heightened shrieks of pain. And then, finally, there was quiet.
    Ricket heard the wet, lispy, voice of her tormenter say, “I want you to imagine something for me, Gaddy. I want you to imagine having a long life. Many more years. Imagine those years spent right here. Spent right here with me. Did you know my species has a remarkable lifespan? My father survived close to two thousand years. I am a mere three hundred years old, so I will be here long after you take your last breath. If you don’t start cooperating, we will be spending decades together … right here in this little cell. Understand, you will not be rescued … there is no hope of that. No one has ever escaped the confines of Dreathlor prison barge .”
    Ricket continued to speak into Gaddy’s NanoCom, Gaddy, we will be rescued. Nothing will stop Captain Reynolds from getting us out of here. We just need to hold on a little longer. Can you do that … can you hold on?
    Ricket listened to the silence and wondered if he was making any impact at all on her, or if she was on the verge of giving the guardian everything he wanted. Then he saw her distorted shape rise up—her head looking up at the towering form standing before her. When she spoke again, her voice was weak and barely audible. “Has anyone ever told you … you smell like shit?”
     
    * * *
     
    Superintendent Gettling stood thirty feet above them on the catwalk and watched the Mollmol conduct his trade. In all the years he’d known Trancus, to his knowledge, he had never let a subject get under his slimy, black