“Hey, you cut too deep that time,” Malketh said calmly to the masked man in front of him, “And I think you nicked an artery. I’ll die of blood loss if you don’t get a doctor here soon to fix me up.”
“Who in the Shadow is this guy?” General Williams swore from behind the glass, his heavy black mustache twitching in frustration. He had thought that a little torture and pain would get this strange man to crack his composure at least a little. He had seemed normal enough emotionally as far as General Williams could tell when observing the recordings of the initial interrogation at the police station.
Here far deep underground at the government black site, their torture experts… no, enhanced interrogation. He had to remember not to use the word torture on the budgeting reports, the word always made people in the party too jumpy about what needed to be done…
Anyway, it had been days already and Malketh was completely calm. Even now the supposed expert looked in a panic at the cut he’d just made on Malketh’s body and signaled his assistant to get the doctor before visibly recovering his composure.
“That’s what we’re trying to find out, General,” the leader of this facility replied to his words.
“Then why isn’t it working? Is he immune to pain? Fear? That genetic condition, what do you call it that the soldiers have? How can he be so calm?”
“No, General. Brain scans show he’s feeling all the pain and fear responses that he’s supposed to. We’d have directly stimulated them more to activate them if he showed no response at all. That works even with people who can’t feel pain or fear since birth. Our efforts with direct stimulation on Malketh were… unsuccessful. As soon as the initial response is over, his fear and pain levels climb back down to baseline and he calms down again. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen. He truly is someone who is just ignoring it all through pure willpower…”
General Williams shot the man with a sharp look.
“You almost sound like you’re admiring the man. Why the knives and pulling of fingernails then if direct stimulation didn’t work? Wouldn’t the response be less from these crude methods?”
“Yes, usually…” The site leader said, “But it was thought that having a visual indicator of the pain and fear would lead to a higher fear or pain response. But… It has become clear over the last few hours that there seems to be no difference. I don’t believe we’ll be able to get any information unless we have some sort of other leverage over him, sir.”
“Nothing?” General Williams said, “We can’t find one bit of information about him beyond the obvious cover identity? Someone trained like this, and able to completely thrash three police officers while completely drunk? I don’t like it, not at all…”
A doctor came into the room and began healing Malketh who looked bored more than anything and idly tried to talk to the doctor as if he had met him on the street. The doctor didn’t answer Malketh as he followed his orders to stay silent.
The doctor kept working as General Williams rubbed his chin and thought.
“There’s only one thing left,” The site leader said tentatively, “If there’s no information on the outside… then we must put him in solitary confinement. A sensory deprivation chamber and a feeding tube. His only way out will be to say something we want to hear. I’m sure that after a few months or years he’ll crack and spill everything he knows.”
“Months? Years? You think it’ll take that long? I thought that most cracked in weeks?” General Williams asked in irritation.
“I think it’s likely to take longer, sir. He has a strong mind. I’m sure he’ll last a long time before he finally breaks.”
General Williams considered the proposal for a few seconds before nodding.
“Approved. We’ll do it until we find something better to get him to spill his guts.”
“Yes, Sir. We’ll get right on it.”
— — —
Sean’s new life sucked. He’d thought it would have been alright after he woke up and went to the festival. He even had won that axe throwing competition. Then he’d been arrested and tortured for a while.
He had been Immortal for a long time. Whatever they did to him wasn’t nearly a tenth as bad as some of the things that he’d already gone through. In this mortal body there was more pain, more fear of death. But not enough to overwhelm Sean’s experience and instincts as an Immortal telling him that all that pain would wash away as if it had never been if he just waited.
Not that it washed away anymore, but his instincts kept stubbornly insisting that it would no matter how long it lasted. On the timescale of Immortals, being in pain for a few weeks was a blink of an eye. Maybe if they’d continued it for years or longer then his mind would have started to break from its old habits. But they’d stopped after a few weeks after it appeared to not affect him at all.
Then they’d thrown him here into this tank of salt water. Sean’s whole body was like a giant wrinkled fruit after being submerged for so long. He was floating there in the dark chamber suspended in the buoyant water in an effort to remove all sensation in his body. A sensory deprivation tank. He was wearing a helmet that gave him air as he was suspended under the water, and a few straps to keep him from trying to float over and touch the dark walls of the tank that he knew must be there. And a thin white bodysuit that clung to him like a second skin as he floated there in the water.
A flexible tube lowered from the space suit like helmet every once in a while and stuck itself in his mouth to feed him some gruel or water. A series of uncomfortable tubes cleared out any waste that he made. At least it was convenient that way.
Sean was sure the conditions would be horrible for literally any other mortal person. But Sean knew what to do with isolation more than anyone. So when he wasn’t swallowing the gruel at meals or drinking from the little sippy straw hovering by his mouth for water… He was meditating. And the time passed by in a blur once more. No one ever spoke to him. No unfamiliar sensation ever came over him. Everything stayed the same as Sean meditated.
He wasn’t sure how long it had been, but he had lost track of the number of meals at one point. He was sure he had never had to use his meditation techniques for this long of a stretch before. And he still had to sleep for half of the time, which helped pass the time quicker at least.
Sean was actually not the best at meditation. The others had always been better than him. Sean had always tried to keep himself busy as he and his friends went on adventures to explore the remote regions of the galaxy. Mostly he had buried himself in playing the Foundation of All game when the others were too busy with something to spend time with him. He grew obsessed with it.
It was Lira who’d forced him to learn to meditate properly as an Immortal to pass the time. It’d been right after her and Robert had staged their ‘intervention’ over his long stints of playing Foundation of All. Back before Lira had been captured, when they were setting up the transmitters throughout the galaxy for Emily to find, not knowing that she’d been captured by the Immortal Council.
After Sean admitted that he couldn’t keep his hands still and needed to do something to pass the time, Lira had taught him the meditation technique she had been taught after she’d first been discovered as an Immortal. Taught by the Immortal Council Enforcer that had transported her away from her homeworld and to the more Immortal friendly one that she would live on for thousands of years.
After that, Sean had still needed to keep his hands and mind busy if he could. But if there was nothing to do, he no longer grew twitchy or upset if he couldn’t. He could just meditate even if it took some effort and the time would pass quickly.
So, Sean wasn’t the best at meditation. He had never been good at it. For an Immortal. For a mortal, a few weeks or months of inactivity and lack of all sensation like here in the tank would be an excruciatingly maddening experience. But to Sean it was nothing. Just practice for him to refine his meditation techniques that he had never been able to before like Lira had wanted him to.
Because although the meditation had helped him, Sean still grew obsessed and over focused when he was stressed. Emily was the same way, he had seen it many times in the years that he’d known her both on Earth and out in the wider galaxy.
Maybe this experience was somewhat of a good thing after all, Sean mused, just some extra practice time. That’s all it had to be.
He sank back into his meditation and let time pass by him like a streaming river. They hadn’t killed him yet at least. There was that.
— — —
Sean’s eyes snapped open as his chamber rumbled. It had moved? What was this? It shook again until suddenly Sean heard loud pings and pops ringing through the isolation chamber and startling him. There were some more sounds, and a few more loud metal clanging noises blasting through Sean’s head like he was sitting inside of a massive bell. After so long in utter silence and contemplation, the sudden input and assault on his ears overwhelmed him and caused him to weakly thrash in place, completely stunned.
There was a brief period of silence before with a loud clang the top of the chamber opened up and let in a flood of light down onto Sean. He was instantly blinded and could only close his eyes and look down inside his oversized helmet. He felt himself being raised out of the water by the bindings that had held him in the center of the tank. A wash of new sensations washed over his skin as the water ran down his body once he was completely exposed to open air again.
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There were fingers scrabbling at his neck as somebody cut through his bindings and carefully placed him on his back on the ground. Sean weakly moaned, his voice atrophies after not speaking for so long even as he kept his eyes firmly shut. Even the light coming streaming in through his eyelids was almost too much for him even if he was slowly adjusting.
Sean could hear a blaring alarm and flashing red light filling the room as he opened his eyes just a crack as the massive helmet let out a pneumatic hiss and came off of him.
“Can you walk?” Sean heard a female voice say from above him, “Shit, of course he can’t walk… Alright, Sierra. You lift him.”
Sean saw a massive metal hand suddenly appear over him and reach down and grab him around the torso with its long fingers. The palm was a little smaller than a dinner plate while the fingers were long enough to wrap completely around Sean’s whole body as he was bodily lifted into the air. Sean idly noted the articulated metal joints of the hand and the more padded interior pressed against him through the small crack in his eyes that he could handle at the moment.
Experimentally, Sean tried to move. His leg twitched slightly, but didn’t do anything more than that as he dangled freely in the air, held aloft by the metal hand that could only be from a rather large exosuit. Sierra based on what the mystery woman from before had said. The three of them started moving with Sean dangling from the exosuit hand and facing forward while the woman with what looked like a heavy machine gun took the lead. She was wearing a sleek helmet that completely covered her head and pitch black body armor. Only her voice and the slight curves in her armor signaled her gender.
Sean tried to move again, and his leg twitched a bit more this time. His captors had pumped him full with drugs that had let him keep his muscle mass. Theoretically he should be as healthy as he had been going in… He just needed his brain to connect to his body and realize that fact.
Sean jolted as there was a sudden burst of loud blasts from in front of him. He had been too focused on moving his body to pay attention to his surroundings as they rushed through the hallways of the sterile hallways of this facility.
The gunfire was odd. Not the crackle and buzz of plasma fire, but a more concussive boom. Sean eyed the perforated and bleeding bodies of the two soldiers that had just rounded the corner of the hallway with their weapons drawn only to be gunned down by the woman in the lead.
Sean eyed the faint trail of smoke trailing from the tip of her weapon as the three of them kept moving until they reached the closed doors of an elevator. Ah, physical projectile weapons, Sean noted. That was what the woman had fired before. Usually you didn’t see people using ones that small. Plasma weapons were deadlier and could charge with electricity rather than worrying about manufacturing ammunition or reloading if you fired all of your projectiles at once… Usually they were only used for heavy weapons if at all.
“Sierra. Elevator. They’ve probably locked it down by now,” the woman said shortly. Sean turned his head and saw the other hand of the bulky exosuit reach out to the panel to the side. With a crunch, the hand and its long fingers gripped the wall around the panel and ripped it partially out of the wall.
The long fingers moved and moved into the gap and mess of wires behind where the panel had sat. The tips of the fingers split open and revealed a variety of electrical tools that sparked and went to work under the skillful direction of the operator. Sean half opened his eyes, his overstimulation mostly having died down now that he’d had a few minutes to adjust.
This work and method of doing the electricals… How fascinating. Sean had never seen anything like it before.
“Sierra, how long is it going to be?” The woman said irritably as she tapped her foot in front of the closed elevator doors.
“Longer. Less than five minutes. More than two,” A deep voice suddenly said as it echoed out of the bulky exosuit that loomed at over eight feet tall where it carried Sean.
The woman grunted and shifted backwards to guard their backs out of sight from behind the exosuit.
There was suddenly shouting and more gunfire from behind them a few seconds later. Based on the swearing and screaming down the hallway, the woman at their backs hadn’t managed to land a lethal shot on the soldiers this time. Based on how the soldiers groans echoed, they must have been able to dodge back around the corner after getting hit non-fatally.
Sierra’s had retracted out of the elevator panel half hanging out of the wall and the ends of the fingers of the hand were covered again as the tools were transformed into the blunt end of fingers again.
“Done,” Sierra’s deep voice said, “Elevator’s coming.”
“Great,” the woman said, “Make sure to protect the asset. They might go for an ambush at the top, they’ll know you just bypassed their elevator control.”
“Will do,” Sierra answered and the metal doors dinged and opened to reveal the elevator itself inside. Sierra while still carrying Sean quickly hurried inside and the woman quickly followed while walking backwards as well. She kept her gun trained where the soldiers had retreated around the corner. As best as Sean could tell they had retreated to somewhere else to retreat the injured one’s wounds after a short argument. But it seems the woman was still suspicious and didn’t want to take any chances.
The elevator doors closed and with a lurch the elevator started moving upwards, the little floor indicators increasing as they moved.
Sierra shifted his grip on Sean so that he was cradled to the large exosuit’s chest and mostly protected by the metal shield of the exosuit’s hand as he was pressed against the cold metal chest of the device.
Just as the woman had predicted, as soon as the doors opened at the top, they were assaulted by a barrage of gunfire. Luckily they were pressed onto opposite walls of the elevator. So most of the initial barrage of gunfire flew right by them and buried itself in the back wall of the elevator.
The large exosuit was a bit bulky to completely get out of the way, but what few bullets managed to land only left small scratches and bounced off rather than dealing any real damage.
The woman in her body armor and helmet brought her heavy machine gun to bear and stepped out from where she had pressed herself into the elevator wall. She let loose and fired blindly outside even as she charged out the open elevator doors. Bullets pinged and sparked off of her armor as Sierra charged after her with Sean still held protectively to the exosuit’s chest with one hand.
Sean didn’t see much of the fighting, but he saw flashes of Sierra using the exosuit to smash through several locked doors or to bodily toss people aside when they got in his way while the woman in body armor kept firing her weapon and killing the soldiers who stood in their way in droves.
And then… they were outside. The blaring alarm and flashing red lights continued but outside of the base it was all muted as Sean got a glimpse of a starry night sky above.
A black shadow blotted out the stars even as the woman turned around and fought to keep the soldiers behind them from coming out after them with some suppressive gunfire from her weapon.
There was a loud roaring sound as a sleek black angular craft suddenly landed in front of them. It was squarish but slightly elongated like how the cars had looked like back on Earth. Well, it was the right size to carry at least a dozen people, so larger than most cars Sean had seen on Earth actually. Instead of wheels, each far corner of the vehicle was occupied by a large plasma thruster keeping it aloft slightly off of the ground.
One of the side doors slid open and without saying another word, Sierra jumped inside with Sean still carried in his hand. Sierra turned and jumped inside as well and slammed the open sliding door closed again behind herself.
“Clear!” the woman shouted and the next moment the whole ship rumbled and then suddenly jolted as they went rocketing into the sky at maximum acceleration.
They lurched to the side a few times and Sean heard the rumblings that could only be missiles that had exploded a little too close to them for comfort. But then the sounds stopped and they stopped their acceleration. There was only the faint rumble of the engines that vibrated the floor as they moved. Sean felt some real feeling returning to himself and he was able to somewhat control the flopping of his leg as he focused on convincing his brain that it should let him move properly again now.
Seeing that he could control himself somewhat, Sierra twisted and placed him on a nearby bench built into the side of the interior cabin of the military style flying vehicle.
Sean stared down at his legs and worked on controlling them again, his eyes now fully adjusted to the light. After a few moments of work, he teetered to his feet and stood there for a moment before sitting back down.
“So,” Sean said as he realized that both Sierra and the woman wearing the helmet and body armor were staring at him intently, “Who do I have to thank for saving me?”
“The GFC.”
Sean stared at her in confusion for a moment.
“The Gaian Freedom Coalition?”
Sean kept staring at her blankly.
“Seriously? You’ve never even so much as heard about us before?” She said in seeming disbelief.
Sean shrugged.
“Thanks I guess,” he said while ignoring her slight frustration with him, “I guess I’ll know first hand soon if you’re taking me to your group.”
“Yes…” she said, “We will. You seem to be doing well. I’ve heard the… horror stories of the kind of things the government does in those places. Not many people who go in end up coming out.”
“I’ll be fine,” Sean assured her, “But yes it was all rather horrible. I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Hm,” the woman grunted before with a hiss she took off her helmet and placed it on the bench besides her. Her bright blue eyes contrasted with her darker bronzed skin tone and blonde hair. Sean blinked. That was a combination of genetics you didn’t see too often.
“I’m Violet,” she said, “Nice to meet you… Malketh?”
Sean considered his name for a moment before nodding back, “Malketh Gaiason. Nice to meet you Violet. Sierra?”
“Yes, Sierra is my real name,” the deep voice of the man said as the exosuit opened and revealed the barrel chested man inside with some of the palest skin that Sean had ever seen and red eyes.
“A good strong name to contrast with my perfectly weak skin, no?” the man said as he took a step away from his exoskeleton and lifted his muscled pale arm to demonstrate.
“Ah, Albino,” Sierra said as he saw that Sean didn’t understand, “No melanin in the skin. One little beam of light from the sun and sizzle sizzle my skin goes as it burns. Could have it fixed for a big price… But it is me. I’d rather have an exosuit to protect me from the sun than give up what makes me unique!”
“Er, congratulations,” Sean said, not quite understanding why the man wouldn’t get the treatment. If he liked looking so pale then Sean was sure that there was a way to do that without making himself so vulnerable to the sun and radiation.
“Makes me the best exosuit pilot, because I love being in the suit so much,” Sierra said conspiratorially to Sean in a stage whisper.
“Yeah, Sierra’s like that. Real chatterbox when we’re not on missions, almost dead silent once we’re going,” Violet said fondly.
Sierra shrugged, “Got to even out my speaking, no? Can’t chatter on mission, must do it here after. I go on so many missions that the words even out hopefully.”
Violet and Sierra kept bantering with each other and seemed to let off some steam after their stressful mission as Sean sat there observing them. He had chosen to keep the name Malketh for now. He had no idea if there was a reason why the Shadow had chosen that name for him or if it might be helpful later on. So until he knew better either way he’d stick with it and be Malketh for this life.
Hopefully Malketh wasn’t being dragged elsewhere to be tortured by yet another group. That was a distinct possibility still, despite how relaxed these soldiers were acting with him now.
But Sean hoped that that wasn’t the case. Violet and Sierra both seemed like interesting people as he kept listening to their lighthearted banter back and forth.