Sharing My World - part 6

Valez wanted his brain to shut down badly. He wasn't sure why it hadn't. He desperately wanted to be unconscious like the others. He was thankful for one thing though, that Toby Linde never regained consciousness after the third cut.

The Sxanian Iox was excited cutting into the bound human to the point of insane glee. First, he rid Linde's body of his testicles, then his penis and the butcher continued to cut, upwards. Chunk by chunk Iox fileted the young man and passing the flesh that was freshly freed from the human to a waiting attendant standing behind him with a metal tray. The butcher was so engrossed that he would toss the hunks of meat back and it would miss the attendant and fall to the floor with a sickening splat.

Valez squeezed his eyes shut and wished that he could shut out the sounds as well. Iox began to hum as he worked and soon there was nothing left hanging on the binds but a bloody mess of bone, skin and remnants of stubborn flesh – remnants of what used to be Lieutenant Tobias Linde.

Valez screamed when the butcher hacked the carcass down from the binds. His eyes were swollen from the crying and his tears blurred his vision. Iox was panting and stood looking at the pile of bones on the floor. He walked over to Valez and picked up an errant piece on the floor. Iox held the piece up to Valez's face and even with his blurred vision he could see that it was a chunk of Linde's penis. The organ had been skinned and bits of the corona was torn off. Iox forced open Valez's mouth and pushed the bloody meat in, laughing as he did. Valez panicked and tried to spit it out. When he finally did, Iox had walked away from him.

“I've learned so much from just dissecting one,” he said holding up the laser cutter and walking back to Valez. “Now I shall be more careful with you.”

Valez screamed and struggled uselessly as the butcher touched his naked body. “From what I hear, your species do pretty much the same thing with your livestock,” said Iox feeling Valez's smooth torso. “So stop fighting, because it's not going to make one bit of difference.”

Iox aimed the cutter at Valez's abdomen. Valez cried shaking his head violently, he couldn't believe that he was going to be disemboweled like an animal. He wailed with all his might but then nothing happened.

He opened his eyes and saw that Iox wasn't moving and his expression had changed. The Sxanian then fell forward missing Valez by inches. When Valez looked up he saw six humans in uniform decloak. He thought he was dreaming until he smelt the burning flesh from the hole in Iox's back. Valez started to cry again but this time it was tears of relief. With their helmets on Valez couldn't tell who it was who was there to save him. But he didn't care. One man from the rescue team cut his binds and threw him over his shoulder. Valez was choking back his tears and then he started to chuckle. “Oh Lieutenant Commander Stone, I'd recognize that beautiful ass anywhere!”

Valez held on so tight that his knuckles went white. He could hear the rescue team shooting at the Sxanian guards and he could hear them bark orders to free the rest of the landing team. He tried to stay conscious but then fatigue won and he drifted to sleep.

…

Energy beams seared off part of the hull even as Starlight engaged in an evasive maneuver. The ship rocked violently under the barrage of firepower from three Sxanian attack cruisers.

“I guess they found our empty barge,” said Commander Greg Holts.

“I just hope our men got to the landing team in time,” Captain Hunt said without looking at his first officer.

“Fire particle cannons!” yelled Hunt over the din. This was their maiden voyage and the first time they have come under fire, Hunt felt he needed to bark orders just so that everyone focused on their duties and not give in to fear.

The ship veered starboard in time to fire three shots at their nearest attacker. The particle beams penetrated the first attacking ship and it burst into a million pieces. A second ship flew by and pounded the hull near engineering.

“They are trying to cripple us!” seethed the captain.

“Captain, the Sxanian ships can outmaneuver us,” said Holts. “We need to deploy our fighter crafts. Hunt knew Holts was right, they needed the faster and smaller crafts to split up their attackers. “Get ready to launch the Penumbra and the Solstice.”

“Sir, we're detecting another ship coming from the planet surface,” interrupted Lieutenant Sparr at tactical. “It's the Shadow sir!”

The scout craft Shadow picked up speed and fired at the attacking Sxanian ship disabling it immediately. The last ship broke away and headed back to Sxania.

“Hail the Shadow,” said the captain permitting himself a smile as the bridge crew cheered. Stone's face appeared on the screen and Holts raised his hand to silent the crew. Looking at Stone's expression all their smiles faded.

“Captain,” said Stone, his head lowered. “We have injured... and two fatalities.”

Hunt sighed and nodded. “Prepared to dock. We need to get the hell out of here before the Sxanians decide to send in more firepower.”

…

Captain Hunt walked into sickbay, his steps heavy. He saw Dr. DeSalle and his medics attending to the landing party. Hunt walked to Valez's bedside, took his hand and offered him a smile. “Welcome back Mr. Valez,” said Hunt squeezing his hand. Valez tried to smile but he nodded instead.

“They are all in stable condition captain,” said DeSalle who stood by the captain and gently touched Valez on the shoulder. Valez started to cry and the doctor took the captain aside.

“The others were unconscious when the Sxanians experimented on them, but they are going to be fine in a week or so,” said DeSalle in a hushed toned. “Valez was the only one who saw them torture and kill Linde and Cooper.”

“My god, what did they do to them?” Hunt said looking over the doctor's shoulders at Valez curling up and sobbing.

“From what little Valez told me, they castrated Cooper and he bled to death. Linde was slaughtered in front of him.”

“And Valez?”

“He has no major injuries, but his psychological trauma...”

“Will be more difficult to heal,” finished the captain as he turned to leave sickbay.