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I unzip the tent and step back into the gloomy chamber.

Then, it hits me.

The light in this dark basement isn’t only emerging from the pale, flickering lamp. It’s also coming through a set of small windows lining the far end of the room – thin and small, in a line right up near the ceiling. Through them, faint moonlight glows.

Those windows are too high for me to reach on foot – but I can feel the night breeze coming through them, which means they must lead outside.

If I can find a chair or a crate – anything to climb and balance on – I could squeeze out.

But only if I can distract the Aurelians long enough – and I have a feeling that will be no easy feat.

I look around the chamber again – some industrial basement beneath a factory or warehouse.

Otho has finished setting up the water purifier. Brushing his huge hands on his pants, he leaves – stomping up the metal stairs, presumably to collect more of the supply crates they’d stacked outside.

Now, it’s just me and Brennan.

One Aurelian or a hundred, it probably doesn’t matter. I’d have about as much chance of overpowering Brennan and escaping as I would fighting against an army.

Unless…

Unless, maybe – just maybe – I could get hold of his Orb-Blade, from where it dangles at his belt.

If I could grabthat, I could use it against him…

…if I could even figure out how to activate it.

But more – only if I had the guts to kill him with it.

I look at the magnificent, towering warrior – as sleek and sculpted as a marble statue. I couldn’t kill him, no more than I could any great work of nature. Not that I’d ever killed anything before – not in my sheltered upbringing in my father’s estate.

My shoulders slump. I turn and walk back towards the sleeping bags, my head hung low. I feel utterly dejected. My situation seems increasingly hopeless.

This is far from the safehouses of the crime families and corporations of Marn – where kidnapped victims are kept in relative luxury while they await the ‘business’ to be settled.

Yet, paradoxically, I somehow feel safer in this abandoned factory – surrounded by those three Aurelian warriors – than I did in my own home, surrounded by those hulking Sentinels.

We’re in an abandoned, industrial slum sector of the city. There could be squatters, junkies, cutthroats or criminals lurking in the factory above us – or even just wild animals, like Marn’s infamous beasthogs. Those tusked scavengers keep a distance from the city’s borders – but they’ll encroach into the abandoned sectors eventually.

It doesn’t matter. Not even a herd of beasthog, or a drug den full of junkies, could present a threat to a triad of Aurelian warriors. They’d have a death wish to even try – so, if therearereprobates or ravenous animals upstairs, they’re probably keeping a wide distance from us.

I might be the prisoner of these three towering aliens, but I know I’ll be protected by them. They’d fight to protect me – because I’m their property, rightfully kidnapped.

The only thing I have to be scared of in the captivity of these Aurelians is them – the hungry look they get in their eyes whenever they look at me…

…and yet, I believe Brennan when he promised he wouldn’t let anything happen to me – and I’ve seen how hard they resist the urge to satisfy their lust for me.

Maybe it’s Stockholm Syndrome – an Old-Earth disorder, in which captives developed feelings of trust and even affection for their captors – but as I crawl into the sleeping bag, I feel a strange sense of reassurance to be here now, with them.

These three Aurelians might not be the best kidnappers on Marn…

…but I’ll bet they’re the three most dangerous men on this planet.

I snuggle into the sleeping bag. It seems to be Aurelian Military issue, like the tent/toilet. As a result, the sleeping bag is designed for Aurelian-sized occupants – seven-feet-tall, five-hundred pounds, and as huge and muscular as a bull.

The sleeping bag swallows me up whole.

I’m not sure what it’s made of, but for military hardware, it’s surprisingly comfortable. The sleeping bag seems designed for long-term use – perhaps during months-long campaigns far from the luxurious feather beds that the Aurelian home world of Colossus has probably made most of their kind used to.