ALIEN ABDUCTION (Captured by Aliens) (20 page)

This was
very different.

And it
disturbed and embarrassed him to see the condition these particular women were
in.  The air was cold inside the palace, since the guards always wore thick
black leather coats and boots and the king and his ministers went about in
layers of heavy silks; but these women wore only slight scraps of fabric which
barely covered them at all. 

Worst of
all, one of these women--the one with the dark skin, the one who looked so much
like his own wife, Adrienne--was Ebony, Adrienne’s sister, and therefore his
sister, too.  Ebony’s eyes were wet, but unlike the other three women she kept
her head up and had a cold and defiant expression on her face. 

“Dezec. 
Dezec!
”

There was
an urgent whisper behind him--and the voice was very familiar.  Still walking,
he turned his head just enough to see who was there.

It was
Adrienne.  She had the hood of her black cloak pulled up over her head and the
edges of the cloak wrapped around her hands so that they would not show.  “Adrienne. 
Why are you here?  And why do you hide yourself?”

“Dezec,
honey, my sister and I are the only black people on this planet.  We can’t
exactly hide who we are from anyone.  And that’s my sister right there in front
of you!”

“Yes.  I
know she is there.  But you should go back to our home immediately.”  He turned
and kept on walking, but did not try to stop Adrienne from continuing to hurry
along beside him. 

“She’ll
be a slave again if we don’t help them!” Adrienne said, breathless from the
exertion of half-running while very pregnant.  “And they’ll kill that man--she
loves him, I can see that she does--she said he rescued her, and I believe her--I
know her better than anyone.  Dezec, you have to do something!”

Just then
Ebony turned around.  “Adrienne!” she sobbed, and started to run towards her
sister.

“No!”
snapped Zeta.  He caught Adrienne by the arm and held up his hand, palm out, to
stop Ebony.  “Not here.  Come with me.  Guards--take the women by the arm and
bring them straight to the harem. 
Now!
”

The four
women found themselves hurried along the corridor towards the huge doors at the
very end.  Dezec walked steadily, watching them closely, and allowed his
pregnant wife to hold onto his arm so she would not stumble. 

Finally
they were all back inside the harem.  The doors slammed shut behind them and
the guards released their hold on the women.  Instantly Adrienne ran to her
sister and collapsed in her arms.  All Dezec could hear was the sounds of their
weeping and of how glad they were to be back together again.

He nodded
to the guards.  “Go and wait just in front of the doors.  Do not leave me in
here alone.  I am merely allowing my wife to visit her newly returned sister.”

As
ordered, the guards moved across the very large room and stood near the door.  Adrienne
lifted her head from Ebony’s shoulder and looked up at him, and then glanced
over at the guards.  “Do they have to stay?”

Dezec
looked closely at her.  “I am King Kore’s most trusted guard--that is why he
allowed me to marry you and keep you all to myself--but even I would not push
that trust so far as to stay in the harem alone.”

He looked
up.  “Ebony.  I am glad to see you again, though I am sorry you must return to
this place.  And I am sorry that…”  He stopped and lifted the long black cloak
from Adrienne’s shoulders and draped it around Ebony, who pulled it close around
her. 

“Thank
you,” she whispered, and then she looked over at Cassie, Famke, and Jane.  They
still stood shivering and nearly naked.  “Go into the wardrobe, or the sleeping
rooms, and get something to cover up with.  They’re not going to take the sheets
away and if you have to wear sheets, then wear them.  I will.”  The three women
nodded and then hurried away, leaving Dezec alone with Adrienne and Ebony and
the four distant guards standing by the doors.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Ebony
looked up at Dezec, and caught hold of her sister’s arm.  “What I said was
true,” Ebony told them, in a strong voice.  “Fallon and his men did sneak in
and take me and seven other women, but they were taking us to a new life--to
freedom.  They were
rescuing
us from slavery, not taking us to it.  Fallon
is building a new world and I want to be part of it.  I want you and Adrienne
and your baby to be part of it!  You cannot let him die!  There must be
something you can do!”

“Ebony,”
Dezec began, “if I were to interfere with this in any way, it would be certain
death not only for me but for Adrienne and our child--and for Adrienne’s sister
as well.”

“But,
Dezec!” cried Adrienne.  “If you, if we, do nothing, then our child is
condemned to live in this same terrible world!”

“It is
not so terrible.”

“Have you
thought of what will happen if our child is a
girl?
”

Dezec’s
eyes flicked from his wife to his sister.  Ebony put her hands on her hips,
allowing the black cloak to fall back and reveal once again the scant red silk
coverings she had been forced to wear.

“I do my
duty,” Dezec said quietly, looking away.  “I have no love for Kore.  I know his
cruel selfishness better than anyone else.  There was a time when I thought
things would change, but the power has gone to his head and destroyed what
honor he may have once possessed.”

Ebony
snorted and drew the cloak around her again.  “With all due respect, my
brother, you do not have the first clue about how cruel and how selfish Kore
really is.”

Dezec
looked up again and gave her a slight bow.  “I will agree with you there, Ebony. 
But it is true that my opinion about Kore has changed since my marriage to your
sister.  It has brought me greater knowledge of what the lives of the harem
women are really like and how they are truly affected.”  He sighed.  “I have
never had a better lesson on women’s lives than what I have seen here today.”

Dezec
turned away and paced a little, looking down at the floor.  The two women
remained silent.  Finally he looked up at them again.

“For so long,
the only women I ever saw were those here in this harem.  As both of you well
know, the women here are painted and polished and wrapped and adorned until
they look like artificial ornaments, because that is how Kore likes them.

“But for
these many months, I have seen the natural beauty of my dear wife.  She needs
no paint or polish to attract me to her.  I am far happier seeing her warm and
comfortable in her fine gowns and soft boots, knowing that her modesty is set
aside only for me.

“And now...today...I
see Ebony and these other three women, and I am ashamed at the contempt that
Kore shows them by forcing them to parade naked before thousands of men.  Their
bare faces are beautiful as they are, yet I can see the despair in their eyes
at the thought of having to go back to this harem.

“You no
longer look like shiny toys.  You look like people.  Your faces resemble the
images I have seen of my mother and my sisters.”

He smiled
just a little.  “I will see what might be done to help you and to help the man
who is now held prisoner for trying to rescue you.”  Ebony and Adrienne closed
their eyes and hugged each other again, this time weeping from joy and hope. 

Dezec
bowed again, and then turned and started towards the doors.  “My wife, stay
here and visit your sister.  I will be back for you in good time.”

***

Zeta
slept little that night, even when he lay on his side with his wife cuddled
close in front of him.  She was restless, too, and even gentle lovemaking did
not help. 

He did
not enjoy firing squad duty in any case--and tomorrow he was to preside over
the execution of his wife’s sister’s beloved.  So far, he did not know what he
was going to do about it, and he spent a long time staring into the darkness of
the room and thinking.

Eventually,
as Adrienne finally slept, Zeta got up and dressed himself in his full uniform
and long black leather coat.  He slipped out of the apartment and walked
through the palace until he reached the armory. 

He had
decided that, as was usually done, the firing squad would consist of himself
and two of his men.  As captain of the guard, Zeta was responsible for making
all arrangements for the weapons to be used and the men to pull the triggers.  His
men would ask no questions of him, but he would have to act fast. 

Zeta
walked inside the armory and shut the door behind him.  He locked it and then
took down three silver rifles from the long racks.

***

Even
before the first traces of light in the sky, the huge crowd began to gather at
the city square just as they had the day before.  This time, the square was
well lighted and roped off, and there was a single large stone pillar with two
chains hanging from it standing near the center.  Two floating plasma
radiocameras drifted overhead.

Zeta and
two of his guards waited there across from the pillar.  Beside them, on the
stone floor of the square, was a small metal rack on which rested three silver
rifles.  A long length of black silk trailed from Zeta’s belt. 

Very
soon, King Kore and his usual band of ministers arrived at the balcony.  As
soon as they were comfortably seated, the king waved his hand and Zeta nodded
to another group of guards.  From beneath the balcony where the king and his
party sat, the guards marched Fallon into the square and stood him in front of
the stone pillar.  Then they forced him to kneel and wrapped the chains around
his chest and arms.

Fallon
was still covered with mud and dirt and dried blood, just as he had been when
he first walked into the square the day before.  He looked up, blinking in the
glare of the bright lights, and then stared directly into the floating
radiocamera that was nearest him.

The crowd
shouted and jeered as soon as they saw Fallon. 
“Criminal!  Criminal!  Criminal!”
they chanted again.

Kore
stood up to pronounce the sentence, and the radiocamera moved into position
just above him to broadcast his image and words to everyone in the city.  “As I
told you yesterday,” he began, “this is the evil one who gave the order to
release that virus that killed the woman on our world.  Now he will pay for
that unspeakable crime, right here in front of my firing squad.  Captain Zeta.”

Zeta
stepped forward, drew himself up, and gave the king a sharp salute. 

“Carry
out the sentence.”

Zeta
lowered his hand, spun around on his heel, and marched to the small rack
holding the three silver rifles.  He lifted up two of the rifles and gave one
to each of the two guards.  “Aim for the head,” he said to them quietly, and
then walked out to the pillar and the chained prisoner.

Standing
just behind the pillar, Zeta pulled out the length of black silk from his own
belt and proceeded to tie it around Fallon’s eyes.  “No,” Fallon said, trying
to turn his head away, but Zeta only pulled it tighter. 
“Trust me,”
he
whispered, tying on the blindfold. 
“Hold very, very still.  When you hear
the shots--play dead.  Trust me.  Ebony and Adrienne.”

The
prisoner raised his head and turned towards Zeta at the mention of those two
names, but Zeta was already marching back to the other side of the square.  He
picked up the third and last silver rifle and then stood between his other two
men.

King Kore
raised one hand.  “Ready!”

Zeta and
his men raised their rifles.

“Aim!”

“The
head,” Zeta whispered again.  He closed one eye and peered through the
crosshairs of his rifle sight.

“Fire!”

The
flaring white light and screaming whistle of three rifles shattered the peace
of the quiet dawn.  The crowd erupted into cheers as the prisoner jerked once
and then dropped his head and moved no more. 

Zeta
placed his rifle back in the rack and walked out to the prisoner, noting the
searing burn mark on one side of the man’s head.  A small spiral of smoke
curled up from the burned skin and the scorched chin-length hair.  Zeta placed
his fingers on the prisoner’s neck to check for a pulse, and then looked up at
King Kore and shook his head.  The crowd cheered even louder and began chanting
again. 
“Dead!  Dead!  Dead!  Dead!”

Zeta
looked up and nodded to the group of guards who had brought out the prisoner.  They
marched over and unchained the man, catching him as he fell over onto the stone
floor.  “Take him away to the holding room,” Zeta ordered.  “Quickly.  Before
the crowd riots.  Quickly.”

The
guards picked up the body and carried it straight out of the square,
disappearing under the balcony and leaving through the same door where they had
entered.  Zeta followed them closely.  He could hear the cheering of the crowd
and the bragging of King Kore echoing through the square, and the entire city,
as the radiocamera broadcast it everywhere at once.

At last
Zeta and his men and the dead prisoner were under the balcony.  The doors to
the city square slammed shut behind them.  They made a turn in the dimly lit,
low-ceilinged stone corridor and carried the body back inside the holding room. 

There was
a long wooden coffin waiting there for the remains of the prisoner.  “Put him
inside,” Zeta ordered, and the guards lifted up the body and let it half-fall,
half-drop into the coffin.  “Now go,” Zeta said.  “Quickly.  I will have the
disposal squad take care of the remains.  You have all done well.  Go now and
close the door behind you.  Wait until you hear my signal before you return.”

The
guards asked no questions, as Zeta knew they would not; and they all turned
around and left the room, shutting the door as ordered.  He stepped to the door
and listened to them marching away down the long stone corridor.  Soon their
heavy footsteps faded away.

Zeta
locked the door and walked back to the prisoner.  He looked down into the
wooden coffin and shook him by the shoulder.  “Fallon,” he said.  “I know you
can hear me.  I am Captain Zeta.  I am the husband of Adrienne, whose sister is
Ebony, one of the women you took from the harem.”

Slowly,
Fallon opened one eye and looked up at Zeta.  “You are the reason I am alive?”

“I am.”

Cautiously,
Fallon sat up and looked around the room.  “Then I thank you.” He turned his
head, wincing, and then touched the burn mark on the side of his head.  “You’re
a good shot.”

“I had to
make it look real.  The other two rifles were set to flash and sound only.  We
sometimes use them that way to break up fighting so that we don’t have to kill
anyone.”

“Yes.  I
know.  Again, I thank you.  But why would you risk so much…”

There
were footsteps outside the door.  Someone pounded on it hard, several times,
and then tried to open it--but it was well locked from the inside.  “Open the
door!” the voice demanded.  “King Kore wishes to see the dead prisoner for
himself!”

***

Fallon
grabbed the sides of his coffin and started to get up, but Zeta shoved him back
down.  “Quiet!” he hissed.  “Play dead.  I will handle this.  Follow my lead. 
Dead!”

From
where he lay in the rough wooden coffin, Fallon heard Zeta unlock the door of
the holding room.  “The prisoner is dead, King Kore,” said Zeta.  “I have
determined it myself.  There is no need for our king to stay in this dark and
dishonorable place.”

“Yes,
there is.  I will see his face.  I will know for myself that he is dead.”

“Guards. 
Wait outside.  I will protect our king while he is here.”