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- I don't remember much after I knew it was going to happen. I guess I just shut down as my controls failed and the tractor beam drew us closer and closer.
- I've never gotten along great with my fighter, but to his credit, he kept...well, fighting...to the end. The last thing I remember is him yelling my name and something about sidearms.
- I woke up in the dark. I thought I'd just had a nightmare at first, but then I tried to roll over and something was in the way and it made a weird noise. I was in some kind of hollow. My movements made a rattling, crackling sound and it smelled like the time my 6th grade class toured the local paper mill. Looking up, I could see veins of orange light outlining rounded concave shapes. I touched one with a shaky hand and it crackled.
- No human built this.
- I became aware of yelling from far off, as well as clicking, crashing, and shrieking noises. It sounded like the fighters' base level for a moment. Then the yelling got more frantic and abruptly stopped.
- In its place, I heard a dragging noise, coming closer until one of the orange veins of light above me split. I was blinded by the sudden brightness. Then I saw several long, thin, shiny, many-jointed limbs holding a long, thinnish bundle wrapped in something like paper. I managed to get only partly out of the way before it was dropped half on me.
- I shoved and kicked at the bundle as the orange seam was sealed up again. It was heavy, and it took some work to get free of it.
- I couldn't go far, though. The other side of the chamber was less than two meters away, and the roof was too low for me to stand. Cupping my hands around my eyes as I pressed my face to the clouded but transparent surface of one of the hollows, I could see the blurry outlines of many more chambers like this one.
- The bundle groaned.
- I scrambled back over to it and tentatively placed a hand on it.
- It moved a little, as if something was trying to get out and not doing a very good job. Then it made another noise that sounded exactly like a muffled human voice.
- That was enough for me. I started tearing at it with both hands. The outer layers were sticky but not very strong, but I had to use my teeth to get a start on the inmost layer.
- I made a hole. Straight, oily black hair poked through.
- "T-Tech..ne...arghhh..."
- My spit seemed to dissolve the stuff, so I bit it again, and it wasn't hard to make a bigger hole. Within a few minutes, I had most of it off and balled up in an icky sticky mass that I glommed to the ceiling.
- And it was my fighter, of course. Still calling for his old navigator after all this time. It doesn't take a genius to figure out they loved each other, and I really feel sorry for him, but just then, I didn't have time for that.
- I shook him, gently, and then as hard as I could. Nothing.
- So I slapped him across the face.
- I'd never hit anyone before. I guess I didn't do it right, because he just groaned and turned his head away.
- I slapped him again, harder.
- "Uhhhh...ssstopppp...."
- Oh, come ON!
- "PRAXIS!"
- Whack!
- "WAKE!"
- Whack!
- "UP!!"
- Whack WHACK!
- "Oww... Tec--E-Ethos?! Wha..!"
- He blinked a few times and took in where we were.
- "Oh."
- I nodded. "Yeah."
- He slowly sat up and tried to cross his legs. One of his boots was still stuck to the floor with threads of sticky papery goop.
- "Eeuughhh!"
- "Yeah."
- "Gross. Usually, when I get captured, they just put me on a table and cut me up. Should be over by now."
- He scowled at me.
- "You're not usually in these ones either."
- What?
- He pulled a knife out of his boot and used it to cut a hole in the ceiling.
- "Well, come on. Let's go see how we die this time."
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