OtherWorldly

4. Warm Blood

4. Warm Blood

Langdon was awoken by the feeling of something sharp and solid jabbing him in the ribs.

"Wha...what in the..."

He cracked open his eye, and came face to face with some sort of otherworldly, macabre looking alien.

He stared at it for a moment, doing his best to keep control of his adrenaline and to keep from screaming in terror. The thing was no more than three feet tall, had a pair of thin, slit-like eyes, and had thick leather-like, hairless blue skin that was tightly stretched across a gigantic round skull.

Langdon opened his eyes slightly and discreetly looked around. He was in some sort of tiny room, surrounded on all sides by dirty, cracked concrete walls and was lying on top of a metal table. The being was holding some sort of metal rod, and it prodded him with it, poking him in his leg and his thigh. But then the creature pressed a button on the side of his device, and Langdon felt some sort of wave - an electricity-like current - come from the device and course through his body.

Langdon screamed with pain as the charge flew through his body, scaring the creature and making it tumble over onto its back. Langdon rolled off of the table and fell to the floor, and watched as the creature ran through the prison cells and out of the room.

"H...hey!" Langdon shouted, but he received no reply, other than the sound out the creatures footsteps padding away against the floor. He climbed to his feet and ran to the cell bars and gazed out in the hall, but he could see nothing but darkness. In fact, the only light that he could see was coming from small fluorescent fish, trapped in a bowl that was attached to the ceiling. 

"Hey! Get back here! Alex, are you out there? Can you hear me? Alex!" He shouted.

But there was no response. Langdon pressed his head against the bars in resignation. What had he gotten them into? He should have listened to his wife and stayed with the ship but instead he had been brash and over aggressive and had risked his entire family. He had no idea where Alex could be, he didn't have a clue how long he had been unconscious, and he had no way of knowing what would happen next. He would just have to hope for the best, because he didn't have very many options otherwise.

"Robert Langdon."

Langdon jumped with surprise and fell backwards, smacking his head against the examination table as he fell to the ground. Someone, make that something, had walked up to the front of his jail cell, so silently that he hadn't even heard them approach.

Langdon analyzed his new visitor. It was another creature. It looked exactly like the first creature that had been jabbing him while he slept, except he was much taller. The thing was impossibly tall in fact, it stretched at least nine feet high, had long, muscular arms covered by a long leather cloak like that of a monk, and had the same slit-like eyes and stretched out mouth.

"Are you the one called Robert Langdon?" The creature repeated, its voice incredibly deep and throaty.

Langdon stared at the creature, not knowing what to say or how to respond.

"Human. Can you hear me? Do you comprehend?"

"Where...where's my son..?" Langdon eventually managed to force himself to say.

"Are you the one named Robert Langdon?"

"Bring me my son you detestable freak of nature!" Langdon shouted, losing his temper and self-control all at once.

The creature nodded his head, slowly and smoothly.

"You are Robert Langdon. Voice profile is a perfect match to sample."