Total pages in book: 45
Estimated words: 42969 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 215(@200wpm)___ 172(@250wpm)___ 143(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 42969 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 215(@200wpm)___ 172(@250wpm)___ 143(@300wpm)
“We might not have a few days—and they might never find us. You heard Barbarous—they have shields to hide the compound from the sky. We need to get out of here and get back to the shuttle so we can escape!”
Kross seemed about to say something else but at that moment, the door opened again and three treetures stepped in. One of them, Sylvie saw, was holding Kross’s blaster. She wished fiercely that she hadn’t been stripped of her own pack when she’d been taken—there was a blaster at the bottom of it that would really have come in handy.
“The girl leaves now,” the treeture with the blaster said, waving it at Sylvie.
“No!” Kross rolled over, shielding Sylvie with his big body and glared at the tree men. “No—leave her here.”
“Dr. Barbarous says no. The girl goes,” the treeture with the blaster insisted.
Suddenly, the screen on the far wall lit up again.
“Must we argue about every little thing?” Barbarous demanded. “Really, this is most exhausting!”
“Leave Sylvia here with me,” Kross demanded.
“Alas, I cannot. My next round of experiments will necessitate the two of you spending some time apart,” The mad scientist shook his head, as though he was truly regretful about their separation. “Please let her go with the guards—I promise no harm will come to her. She’s far too valuable to me to damage. So you can either let her go with the guards now…” His voice grew more menacing. “Or I can start killing off the other females in the complex.”
“No—don’t do that!” Sylvie exclaimed.
She didn’t want to go. She stiffened in Kross’s arms, hanging on hard for a moment. But she knew well enough that she didn’t want to have the guilt of the other women’s deaths on her head.
At last, she reluctantly let go.
Kross was every bit as reluctant. Even after she released him, he clung to her and buried his face in her hair.
“Don’t do anything stupid, Princess,” he breathed in her ear. “Just stay safe.”
Then, at last, he let go of her.
Straightening her torn shift as well as she could to try and hide her breasts, Sylvie climbed off the bed and went to stand by the hazy red pain wall. She could hear it humming faintly and the energy it was putting out made the tiny hairs on her arms stand up.
One of the treetures pressed the button and the pain wall in front of her disappeared abruptly. Sylvie stepped quickly forward and the pain wall came back again, humming right behind her.
“Come—back to the women’s tree.” It was Mandow—the “moss-man” as she thought of him. He took her by the arm and pulled her towards the door.
At the last minute, Sylvie turned her head. She saw Kross standing just behind the pain wall, a frustrated and worried look on his face. His big hands were curled into fists at his sides as he watched her. She could almost feel his longing to be with her so he could watch over her and protect her.
It made her feel warm inside and she promised herself that somehow she was going to get out and then the two of them were going to escape.
She just didn’t know how yet.
17
SYLVIE
But there was no opportunity for escape for the next several days. Dr. Barbarous must have sensed how desperate Sylvie felt because the guard around the women’s prison was doubled. Every time she dared to look outside, there were three or four treetures standing there with their arms crossed, looking like bouncers in front of an exclusive nightclub.
Then, just at lights-out on the fifth night since they had been captured, it started to rain.
“Ah, listen to that—rain!” Hersha exclaimed, cocking her head at the pattering sound from outside.
“Rain!” Clemina echoed. “Thank the Nature Goddess!”
All the women in the room cheered but Sylvie was bewildered.
“Rain?” she asked, frowning. “Why does rain make everyone so excited?”
“Because it means the treetures will be busy soaking in the water—it keeps them from wanting to take us,” Lorna explained. “It kind of immobilizes them— as long as it’s raining they just stand there, looking up at the sky.” She shivered. “I really hope it keeps raining all night!”
Her sentiment was echoed by the other girls, especially Shredda whose turn it was to “entertain” one of the tree-men that evening.
Sylvie hoped it kept raining too—she was beginning to think that this was the perfect night to escape. The pattering sound of the rain falling on the huge tree’s leaves continued through suppertime when they were served their protein mush, not by a treeture but by the collection droid, which handled the metal bowls using its long silver arm. By lights out when everything went dark, it was still raining.
Sylvie wanted to leave at once, but she didn’t want anyone to know she was sneaking out. She made herself wait until the small, dark room was filled with the soft sounds of regular breathing before she sat up and slipped out of her cot.