Lieutenant Talyn Rac Part Seven: Break Throughs
by Sorlk Lewis
The group of commandos sweeped the halls. After Captain Rac found out of the escape, he was having the base gone over with a fine-toothed comb. He had given the order that Officer Aeryn Sun was to be found with in five arns. That was a short amount of time considering the size of the underground base. “Report Lt. Rac.”, ordered the Captain. Talyn stepped forward, “Still no sign of her sir. We have completed a sweep over one fourth of the base so far.” The Captain emitted a Sebacean curse, “Well, find her soon Lt..” “Yes Sir.”
Talyn walked into the room that the Aurora chair was being kept in. He saw John strapped into it, waiting for the probing to begin. He had never seen the chair in action; he was only briefed on its affects. “Lieutenant, I am glad that you are able to join us. We are just about to begin.”, said Scorpius in his usual calm demeanor. John’s breathing was labored and his eyes were red rimed, “Yeah, Scorpy was just about to show an old dog how to do new tricks.” He tried to laugh at his own joke, but his voice failed him. “Would you care to do the honors Talyn?”, asked Scorpius as he pointed towards the switch. Talyn reluctantly walked over to the control console. He hesitated for a microt before pushing the switch and flipping the rest of the controls on. John tried to scream, but nothing came out of his raw throat. Talyn felt ill, even more so than when he butchered that whole village. An alarm on the chair sounded. “What is that?”, questioned Talyn as a tech turned off the machine. Scorpius smiled sadistically, “That means we have found what we are looking for.”
Aeryn held her breath as another Peace Keeper passed her hiding spot. The whole base was on full alert to find her and she knew it. Aeryn finally took a deep breath. She crawled back into an access tunnel. Aeryn had made a mental map of where they would check and when according to Peace Keeper protocol. With these estimates she had been able to successfully evade capture. Because security wasn’t able to check all of the maintenance tunnels and repair shafts, they had turned up the heat in the confined space. Aeryn was becoming fatigued from the onset of heat delirium. Every couple of microns she would duck out in to a hall to cool down. This was risky, but staying in for to long was even more so. She made her way to Johns cell. Once she reached her destination, she couldn’t hear anything. She peaked through the crack in the wall that she had found earlier. John was collapsed in the far corner muttering to himself. Aeryn was now very concerned. “John. John its Aeryn.”, she whispered as loudly as she dare. He looked up, “Aeryn what are you doing here, it’s not safe.” He had forgotten their previous conversations. “I’m here to get you out, don’t you remember John?” He shook his head no. “All I remember is being in that frelling chair. Scorpius has found what he wants with me.” Aeryn knew what this meant. In a short time, John was going to be executed. “Why haven’t you been killed yet then?” He swallowed hard, “The tech said that it would take time to extract everything I know on wormholes. She said about seven arns and I would be useless. Or at least that is the gist of it.” Aeryn sat back down in her cramped area. She had to get John out and she couldn’t wait much longer. “Just hold on for half an arn. Then we can escape.” “Yeah Aeryn. I can do that. What have you planned?” “I can’t tell you right now. You will just have to trust me.” John smiled, “You know I trust you.”
Talyn was in his quarters. He felt ill from what he had done to Crichton. He had never felt that way before, he had never seen someone so kind in so much pain. He didn’t even know what kind meant, but he knew that John was exactly that. He stood up from his half crouch half sitting position. Talyn straightened his uniform and left. He was going to see Crichton.
To Be Continued…