Chapter 12 #2
“Did you now?” he echoed. His tone was patronizing, and an uneasy jitter sputtered to life inside of me. “You know, I’ve seen your face before somewhere, I think…”
I looked at him in confusion. What the hell could he be talking about?
“I’ve never been down here before,” I answered timidly.
“No, but we’ve been warned about you,” he countered.
“About me? How could you know me?” I asked suspiciously.
He reached into his pocket. I should have been concerned that he was about to take out a gun or something, but I was too shaken to reach for mine.
When he pulled his hand back up, there was what appeared to be a piece of paper.
It was homemade and a bit lumpy, but when he held it up in the light, I was able to discern a picture drawn on it.
It was my face. Above it were the words that branded me a traitor.
The man walked a bit closer, and I was able to read more of the makeshift poster.
It detailed that I’d betrayed my own people, that I’d chosen an alien over my own species, and that I was not to be trusted.
The more I read, the sicker I felt. When I finished, I flicked my gaze back up to the man holding it.
“That isn’t true. I want to help you,” I offered quickly.
“Do you though?” he asked sarcastically. “Is that the same thing you say to that alien when you spread your legs for him? When you beg him for his cock?”
His vitriol was polarizing.
“Did you think the same thing when you dragged him out of harm’s way? When you bandaged the wounds of the alien you were supposed to kill?”
I stilled completely. I hadn’t thought anyone could have seen me. I opened and closed my mouth in shock, looking from him to the others and finally realizing that none of them looked like they wanted to welcome me. If anything, they looked like they were ready to kill me.
“I only wanted to warn you that the aliens know where you are now,” I began. “They’re going to come for you, and they mean to take your city as theirs once and for all.”
“Did you lead them here?” the man murmured angrily.
Desperately, I shook my head. “No. I don’t know when they plan to attack, but it’s soon.
You need to get out of here,” I insisted and the leering grins on their faces only seemed to grow more perilous.
My uneasiness grew tenfold, and I took a step back, but someone cleared their throat behind me.
I paused, jerking my head back to see who was there, but it was already too late.
“I don’t think we’re going to do that, Raiza,” the man replied coldly. A hard shiver raced down my spine and I did my best to remain brave.
“I only wanted to give you time so that you could escape them. He’s coming and he’s bringing his army. He’s going to take the underground for himself,” I exclaimed, and the man’s eyes simply darkened.
“No. He’s not,” he replied.
“I’ve seen the plans! He’s mapped it out. He’s preparing to ambush you any day now,” I continued.
“Not if I can help it,” he said curtly. His gaze drifted up and down my body.
I visibly recoiled and he just continued, stopping at the cusp of my thighs with a wicked grin.
It made me feel dirty and I lifted my chin in defiance.
The men to either side of him hovered around him, impatiently waiting.
My fingers twitched and my eyes jerked around the dark tunnel, trying to focus on any ways out and finding none.
Like a rabbit shoved into a cage with wolves, I trembled, trying to remain brave despite the sickening feeling that was roiling in my belly.
“Talyn will kill you if you hurt me,” I whispered and the man’s grin widened viciously.
I slowly dropped my hand, regretting holstering my weapon.
Without wanting to alert them, I cautiously stretched my fingers and drew them backwards as the group of men drifted toward me.
A boot scuffed against the ground behind me, and I made a quick move to grab at my gun, but it was already too late.
Something hard hit the back of my head and I knew only blackness after that.
* * *
Oh, my god, my head.
I groaned, tentatively bringing my fingers to my scalp.
It felt wet. I could have sworn someone was hammering a nail right through my skull and I struggled for what felt like forever to even open my eyes.
The moldy stench that surrounded me was rank.
It made my head pulse that much harder, and I groaned as I pulled my hand away.
I dropped my hand to my throat.
My collar was still there.
I pressed my fingers against the band and held them there, and my chest unknotted enough for me to take a full breath. It was stupid. I was in the dark, underground, and my head felt like it was splitting, and the thing that settled me was the presence of an alien man’s mark around my neck.
The mark I hadn’t been able to remove since the day he’d placed it there.
I’d escaped. I’d gotten out. I’d taken one of his ships and flown it myself and made it all the way here.
I was theoretically free of him. Free of the penthouse, the collar, the leash, the slow and absent way his fingers moved through my hair when he wasn’t paying attention to anything else.
I should have been thinking about the people I’d come to warn. I should have been planning.
Instead, I was pressing my fingers against a silver band in the dark and feeling my heartbeat slow.
I thought about how his voice had gone quieter when he’d said, ‘You will want for nothing.’ Said like the simplest thing in the world. Like he’d decided it would be true for me and that was that.
I thought about the leash, and how I’d learned to walk close enough that it never pulled.
I pressed my fingers harder against the collar and kept them there until I felt less like I was drowning.
Then I looked around and started figuring out how to get free.
It was dark, but a soft burning light in the distance cast a glimmering glow on the floor. My vision was hazy, and I had to blink several times to clear it. I swallowed what felt like a mouthful of cotton balls and licked my lips. They were dry and cracked. How long had I been out for down here?
There didn’t seem to be anyone nearby and when I finally moved my other hand, I found that it was bound by a hard metal cuff.
I pulled at it, but there wasn’t any give.
My wrist was tender. The metal chain was long enough where I could bring my hands together and I tried to rub the soreness away, but that only seemed to make it worse.
The cuff was so tight that I couldn’t even slide a finger beneath it.
I yanked at the chain, which only made a deep agony radiate up my arm.
I looked around, trying to gauge my location.
It didn’t look much different than the sewers I’d been in before.
There were dark puddles on the ground all around me.
The walls were made of metal, but there were several rusted patches that looked so thin that I could have pushed a finger through.
My eyes eventually adjusted to the dim light, and I was able to make out more pipes and a train track maybe six feet away from me.
I wasn’t sure how many levels of the old subway there were, but this appeared to be one of the older ones. The tracks were just as rusted as the walls and many of them had already disintegrated into soggy piles of dust.
My head pulsed harder, and I pushed myself up to a seated position just so I could hug my knees to my chest. I groaned, pressing my forehead against my knees. My entire body was sore, but there was one thing that seemed to bring me comfort even in all this mess.
I could still feel the marks from Talyn’s belt on my backside. It made it so that he didn’t feel so far away.
I stared up at the darkness above me. I couldn’t quite make out the ceiling.
When the vicious pulsing in my skull calmed a little bit, I lifted my head back up and tried to get a better handle on my surroundings.
I pushed myself up to my feet, testing how far my chain would allow me to move.
It wasn’t far. Behind me on a table was a cup of water and a piece of thick bread. My mouth watered.
I was famished.
I took a step, reaching for it and cried out when I realized that it was just out of my reach. There was nothing I could use to grab it. With a disappointed sigh, I turned away, noticing an empty bucket. I sneered in its direction.
I wasn’t an animal. I wouldn’t stoop to that level.
There were piles of debris on the floor all around me. Most of it appeared to be old garbage. Pieces of dirty plastic. An old soda can. The six-piece ring that held a pack of beer together. A broken tequila bottle.
None of it appeared useful until I noticed an old metal pen that was sandwiched inside a filthy plastic bag. I reached for it, just able to slip my fingertip under the torn handle. I stretched as far as I could and when I had a good hold, I carefully pulled it toward me.
A footstep scuffed on a piece of metal around the corner, and I stilled, leaving the bag where it was and jerking my hand back to my chest. I glanced down, noting that I couldn’t see the pen through the plastic anymore.
I sat back down and wrapped my arms around my legs, waiting as the loud clomp of a pair of boots rounded the corner.
I could see enough to recognize him. He was one of the men who had been standing to the right of the leader who had done all the talking.
“Well, look who’s finally awake,” he sneered, and his gravelly voice only exacerbated my concerns. By the hungry look in his eyes, he hadn’t come here to free me.
“Hey,” I answered weakly. My own voice sounded like I’d been chewing on a piece of tissue paper. I stopped, cleared my throat, and began again. “Will you please pass me the cup of water? I can’t reach it.”