The Planet Keeper

Chapter 12

He pressed his finger against his lips. After he checked that the hallway was clear, he motioned for me to follow him with his hands. As quickly and quietly as I could, I followed after him, trying not to drop the heels I was carrying. We made it to the escape shuttle. My heart was pounding, beating fast and ready to leap out of my body. I was screaming on the inside, but I remained calm and collected on the outside.

He carefully opened the shuttle door and hurried me in, climbing in behind me and shutting the door. He took his seat as pilot and began to flip switches and press some buttons on the control panel. The engine of the small shuttle started up, but briefly after it did, a loud deep toned beeping began to sound throughout the room that held the shuttle and assumingly the rest of the ship.

****BEEP, BEEP, BEEP***

"We've got to go now!" he said frantically. "Put on your seatbelts now!" He put the shuttle into gear, sweat dripping down his face.

I quickly did as I was told, and my anxiety levels rising with every second. Suddenly the door of the docking bay slammed open and in rushed at least ten guards, all armed, all ready to fire, and all moving quickly towards the shuttle. I screamed.

"GO, GO, GO!" I screamed at Jake at the top of my lungs.

"I can't. It needs time to start properly," he said in a loud nervous tone, but didn't yell.

"What!?" I screamed. Panicked and fear stricken, I began to shake.

The door to the shuttle was ripped open and in rushed two guards. I turned my head to look at Jake, but he wasn't there. Confused I looked back to the guards and realised Jake was already up and fighting them off with his fists. He knocked one out and took his gun and then he began shooting at the other guards rushing to enter the shuttle. Gun shots rang through my ears, one after another. There was black ooze everywhere, dripping from the seats in the shuttle and the walls of the bay, pools of it forming around the lifeless bodies that lay on the floor. That's when I realised that this was their blood. They were not humans. They were... aliens?

Suddenly, I felt pain on the back of my neck, spreading to my shoulders and down my back. I reached up to touch it, or at least I thought I did, but my arm wasn't moving, why wasn't it moving? I couldn't move. WHY COULDN'T I MOVE!? I could still feel everything, but I couldn't move my body. I was lifted up by two guards and carried out of the shuttle. They had Jake too, but I couldn't tell if he was paralyzed as well or if he had been knocked out. I began to feel dizzy even though I wasn't even standing on my own or walking at all, and started to see at least three of the ceiling as they blurred together and apart rapidly. Suddenly everything went black.

When I woke up my head was pounding just like it was the last time I had woken up from a blackout. But instead of being on my cot in my cell, I was on my knees while both my wrists and ankles were chained to a wall, leaving my arms and head to dangle but giving my legs some freedom to move. I felt weak and vulnerable. I pulled as hard as I could on the chains that held my hands, but it only made my wrists bleed more than they already were. I began to feel hopeless and felt the urge to cry, but the sudden movement of something about five feet away stopped me, paralyzing me with fear for a few moments.

I kept my eyes on the area that I had seen movement for what felt like hours, and yet nothing else happened. No movement, no noises, nothing. Afraid that if I looked away something would happen, I slowly allowed my bowling ball of a head to dangle from my body, sighing in relief as my chin finally reached my chest.

*RATTLE... RATTLE...*

I was being lured back into a dream, trance-like state by the endorphins my brain was producing to help ease the pain that overtook my body, but the sudden rattling of chains pulled me back to reality. But it was only a slightly real version of reality because I was also pretty much high off of the endorphins. The rattling continued and my vision came into focus. There I could make out the silhouette of a man, on his knees, moving and pulling at the chains that bound him. He yelled out in frustration. His cry of frustration sounded very, very familiar, but I didn't know why. He yelled out in anger. There were no words, but there was indeed sound. It was loud, angry, and dangerous feeling.

"Keeper! Keeper! I know you're watching! I know you're here somewhere!" The man aggressively pulled at the chains again. "Come out and take me on like the woman you are!"

I realised who the man was across from me.. I don't know why I didn't realise sooner. It was Jake! But what was he yelling about? I decided to remain still and silent. I wanted more information. I needed to know why Jake was yelling this.