Dance or Die: a Fanfiction

Chapter 17- Desert of Nil

A/N: I hardly do author's notes, but I just wanted to say thank you for over 1,000 reads on this story! I can't believe it's gotten that much attention since I started writing DOD. Love all of you, faithful readers and friends!

"Kut: Siron, Tephe, Rulefe; Miyr, Najat; and unregistered," a white-clad uniform said, holding a transparent tablet with glowing writing on it, glancing over the men in the cell from behind his visor. "Unregistered, what is your name?"

"Derek Mount," the blond said.

"Mount, Derek. Thank you," he noted and wrote down in orange, then continued, "You're from Earth, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Ah, I see," he said. For a moment, he stared straight at Derek, hand beginning to glow brightly, but let up on the light and walked away in a stately manner. Derek looked at him as he went away, wondering what rolled through his head in that moment.

"There's about thirty minutes left, if I'm correct," Nate said, sitting on the floor, "I volunteered here before, but only once, so I don't remember it well."

Sure enough, Nate was right. The five were escorted out and brought into a low-domed room, two people in white cloaks and V-shaped headdresses flanking a sitting figure in black, hood over his head, face visible. Soli, Jake, Josh, and Nate seemed a little frightened by the three, but held their ground. Derek kept his head, not knowing who they were.

"The Jalaath," the black figure said in a high, effeminate voice, gesturing at the two in white to his sides, "and I, Guredel Valy, welcome you back, Kuts and Miyr. And a happy first visit, Mount. Nil natives are friendly, I assure you, but seeing as all of you are here on official, criminal matters, we will have to be harsh."

Guredel stood and walked towards the five, stopping a few feet away from them.

"We doubt there will be a trial for your actions, since upon your first for disobedience to the furthering of our status as the advanced, superior society of the planet, you expressed deep distrust in all the figures above you. Not only that, but you went missing for a long period of time on Earth, and failed to inform us of anything for that time. And you even converted a human! A simpler being shouldn't have to nearly die because of your mistakes."

Derek took minor offense to the "simpler being" claim, but recognized he did almost die when that happened.

"For misconduct and government rebellion, plus more charges, we will have to extract the majority of your energy-- all five of you-- and send you out into the desert," Guredel concluded, walking back to his seat.

"You cannot do that to Derek!" Nate said, stepping forward, "If we almost killed him giving him the bioradiation, then you would nearly be exterminating a so-called 'simple being' if you did the extraction process on him!"

A burst of green energy flew at Nate, the strength of it flipping him onto his back. One of the Jalaath had their hand outstretched, and as they were retracting it, Jake realized something.

Only androids have green energy, he thought, like the Cascador one... Oh my word, the Jalaath are robots!

"Guys," he said, grabbing onto Soli's shoulder as Derek and Josh helped Nate up, "Did you--"

"Silence," Guredel said, eyes glowing red for a moment, "You will be led out now for extraction."

---

Watching the process alone was enough to make Derek fear for his life. Nate, a Nillite himself, said he would most likely die while they sapped the bioradiation from his body, so his nerves were on edge. Soli had to go first, his feet locking into the floor of the room with a glass panel, so the others could see. A nozzle and a large motor-fan-like contraption were built into the wall opposite the man. There was silence for a while as the nozzle extended to his face, and a light glowed on it as it moved over Soli. It retracted and stopped the light, a whirring coming after it. It seemed peaceful at first, red wisps trailing off Soli's face into the blades of the fan machine. A moment later, bigger and bigger pieces of energy were seemingly torn from his body, and that was when Derek started hearing muted shouts. Soli had an arm and a fist stretched towards the machine, shining brightly. The whirring noise increased, and the discomfort in his face increased, the glow behind his eyes diminishing. A large chunk of energy was ripped out of him, as if his arm was being amputated, and he screamed like that was the actuality. He seemed to give in to the force pulling the radiation out of him as the last several wisps exited from his face.

After being let out, Josh was taken in, and Soli joined the three to come in the near future. He looked directly at Derek with a tear-stained face and dead eyes, only making the man all the more horrified for the veritable torture to come.

---

They felt weak. They were very literally drained, sore, and tired. Derek hadn't died, and he counted that a miracle, but he had to be carried into the ship that would take them to their final destination because he was that lifeless. He drifted in and out of consciousness as the ship took off, the four others sitting in silence. He didn't know when they got there, but it was a long enough journey that he could at least stand without falling over by the time they were forced to get up. The vast sandy expanse was rather tranquil in the early morning light, but as Derek had learned with the extraction, it seemed that anything the Nil government did as punishment started out with nothing appearing to be wrong.

"All we can do is walk from here," Soli said, and the five trudged on. The dark sand was sticking to their feet, Derek found, and it was slowing him down. Deciding not to ask because this was an alien planet, he kept going. After a while, the wind started to blow. Tiny pellets of sand hit their faces. Looking off into the distance, an inescapable sandstorm was coming upon them. They simply continued, accepting their fate. The sand began to coat them as the storm came over, and the in-ear translators Derek had been given were ripped out by the sticky globs. It wasn't like he could hear anything in the howling wind, anyways.

He and another one of them fell over, weakened by the swirling storm. None of them could see, as they were covered in the unusually viscous sand. The ones who fell crawled even after the storm passed, but none of the five made it far before two more collapsed to the ground. The last one standing, dark, gritty ooze dripping from every part of him, wiped his mouth area with his hand as best as he could. Creating a gruesome-looking hole by opening his mouth, strings of goo spanning across it, he yelled an almost inaudible phrase to the sky with outstretched arms. In the bright day, he fell to his knees coughing the sand out and let his face plummet into the sand.

Days passed peacefully in regards to the lack of storms. They kept on moving, not towards the city this time, but further into the desert, whether walking or crawling. They knew they would suffocate or starve soon. The one kept repeating the phrase every day they traveled, hoping for some kind of change.

They didn't want to die out here.