Page 1 of Ravaged By the Reaper

AMARA

The sky over Grolgath Prime is the color of curdled blood—an ominous red with streaks of venomous yellow that stab through the clouds like warning flares.

I step off the shuttle ramp with my chin lifted, posture perfect, every line of my body echoing the grace and poise drilled into me by the Companions Academy.

My heels click against the metal deck with a deliberate cadence—elegant, unafraid.

I’ve faced kings and warlords. I’ve danced beneath chandeliers hung from the bones of extinct creatures. Grolgath Prime should be no different.

But it is.

The air here is different—thicker, heavier. Like it’s watching me. Like it resents me.

The docking platform, a sprawling half-circle of polished obsidian, should be lined with ceremonial banners and diplomatic greeters, per Coalition tradition.

Instead, there’s a sparse group of armed guards—tall, expressionless Grolgaths with blunt facial ridges and skin like shale.

Their armor gleams, but not with pride. With menace. Cold, efficient menace.

One of them steps forward. “Amara Destrier?”

His voice is sharp enough to flay flesh.

I incline my head, keeping my smile demure. “Of course. I’m here under Companion contract—registered with the Ataxian military commission. I assume my escort is delayed?”

The guard doesn’t blink. “Come with us.”

No titles. No welcomes. Not even a nod to my status. The bile rises in my throat, bitter and electric.

“Am I to be escorted to the Consul’s chambers?” I ask, gently.

No reply. Just a tightening of grip on a plasma rifle.

They flank me on all sides. A procession of threat instead of ceremony. My heels click against the obsidian again, faster now. Louder. Each step echoes like a gavel. The corridor smells like oil and gunmetal, and somewhere faintly, ozone. A storm’s coming.

We enter a narrow chamber—no more than a cell with sleek walls and one steel chair bolted to the center of the floor. That’s when I realize this isn’t an administrative delay.

This is an ambush.

A man—no, a wraith of a man—stands in the far corner. Cloaked in layered gray and black, his hands folded behind his back, eyes sunken but alert. He radiates stillness. Authority wrapped in skin so pale it’s nearly translucent.

“Amara Destrier,” he murmurs, like he’s greeting an insect. “I am Malem Karag.”

That name is ice down my spine. I know of him. Everyone does. The Coalition’s Inquisitor of Protocol. A man whose politeness is as feared as his rank.

“I’m sure this is a misunderstanding,” I say smoothly, forcing warmth into my voice like it isn’t made of glass. “My credentials are in order, if someone would—”

“Your Compad has been confiscated,” he says gently. “Standard procedure. All foreign devices are considered potential espionage vectors until cleared. Surely the Academy prepared you for such precautions?”

“Yes, of course.” I bite down on my words before they get too sharp. “I’d simply prefer to speak to a liaison.”

Malem glides toward me, hands still clasped, voice syrupy soft. “You will find, Companion Destrier, that we are not overly fond of deception here. We do not shout. We do not beat our chests. We do not torture. We extract. Truthfully. Carefully. Deliberately.”

I swallow hard. “I’ve done nothing wrong. I’ve come here in service. Under contract.”

His smile is like a crack in marble. “We shall see.”

Two guards grab my arms. I try not to flinch, but they’re impossibly strong. A third steps forward with thick restraints.

“I must protest—”

“You may,” Malem says. “But you will be ignored.”

The restraints click shut around my wrists and ankles—cold, too tight. I’m guided—no, forced—onto the steel chair. My head spins. This isn’t protocol. This isn’t legal.

My belongings are dumped onto a secondary table—my gowns, my perfumes, my jeweled stylus, my personal effects. Everything is cataloged, stripped of its meaning. As if I’m nothing more than a dangerous curiosity.

As they rifle through my things, I stare at the floor, willing myself not to tremble. This is just a misfire. A delay. Someone will realize the error.

But when Malem turns back to me, eyes gleaming like a predator who’s smelled blood, I know better.

This isn’t a mistake.

This is the beginning.

They bring through two winding corridors, deeper and deeper into the station’s belly, each step clanking with finality.

I count the turns. I note the cameras. I mark the pressure points in the guards’ armor, even as my heart tries to claw its way out of my chest. It’s automatic—Companion training hardwired into my bones.

The room they drag me to smells like rust and rot. Not the sharp tang of blood, but older—like abandoned machinery or buried secrets. The walls are matte black, seamless, and the floor has a slight incline that makes me uneasy, like I’m being funneled downward—into something meant to trap and hold.

The metal table is bolted to the floor. No cushioning. No restraints padded. They slam me onto it with all the grace of meat dropped onto a butcher’s slab.

“I demand to speak with an Advocate,” I say for the third time, my voice cracking but controlled. “Coalition law recognizes the right to defense. You know this.”

Malem doesn’t look up. He’s scrolling through something on a translucent data square, fingers tapping softly.

“I know our laws,” he says without inflection. “Do you know the penalties for espionage, Companion Destrier?”

“I’m not a spy,” I snap.

He finally looks at me, and his eyes glint with something between curiosity and pity. “But you are from the Alliance. And your presence here… under the guise of a service contract… in this exact sector… it’s all very curious.”

“My contract was filed through proper channels. My client was pre-approved. You’re violating both treaty and protocol—”

“Yes,” he says gently. “That’s how I know you’re lying.”

My breath stalls. I stare up at the ceiling—no lights, just a dull red glow emanating from somewhere unseen. My wrists are already raw against the restraints. The cold seeps in, clawing up my spine like a lover with frostbitten fingers.

“I am not—” I begin, but he cuts me off with a slight raise of his hand.

“There’s no point in the song and dance, my dear.” He turns to a small black case on the far table. I hear a series of soft, organic clicks as he opens it. “Pain makes liars tell the truth. But truth? Truth makes liars scream.”

He turns around with something cradled delicately in his hands.

I stop breathing.

It’s small. Maybe the size of a melon. Its skin is slick and opalescent, shifting through shades of purple and green.

Tendrils uncoil lazily in the air, twitching with awareness.

Its center pulses like a heart—or an engine.

There’s a glassy black eye in the center of its body.

No, not an eye. A lens. Biotech. It watches me.

“What the hell is that?”

“A truth-seeker,” Malem says, walking toward me with the thing balanced in his palm like a chalice. “It doesn't torture. It doesn’t even hurt. Not intentionally. It simply… accesses.”

I thrash against the straps. “You can’t do this! I haven’t been charged!”

“You’ve been accused.” He stops at the side of the table and leans down, his breath cold against my cheek. “That’s enough.”

“Please,” I say, voice trembling now. “Please. I haven’t done anything. I’m not Alliance intelligence. I’m not anyone. I’m just—”

“You’re just inconvenient,” he murmurs, and sets the creature on my face.

It moves fast.

The tendrils dive down—up my nostrils, into my ears, across my temples, latching onto my spinal nodes, spreading like liquid fire through my skull. I scream. I can’t help it. The pain is… wrong. Not sharp, not stabbing. It’s invasive. Like it’s peeling me open neuron by neuron, cell by cell.

Memories slam into me.

I’m six. My mother’s perfume smells like citrus and smoke. She’s crying, but not looking at me.

I’m fifteen, fencing with a Terran Duke’s son, laughing as I beat him again and again.

I’m nine, locked in the Companion transport pod, weeping so hard I throw up

I’m thirteen, and my genetics counselor tells me my DNA isn’t fully legal.

Everything floods me. Out of order. Out of control.

I sob. I gag. I scream again.

The creature tightens its grip.

I see someone, hacking through soldiers, face wild with rage, red eyes blazing like twin suns. He roars, and the sound shakes me even in memory. He’s coming. He’s coming for me. Is it real? Is it now? Did I dream him into being?

“No,” I whimper. “No, no, no—”

The table shudders. My body thrashes without meaning to. The restraints bite deep.

Malem watches without blinking. “Fascinating,” he whispers.

I fall into blackness. My mind feels stretched, warped, twisted like hot glass. The tendrils pulse. My own memories become strangers. My name doesn’t feel like mine anymore.

When the creature finally retracts, I’m a shaking wreck.

And Malem just smiles.

“We’ll go again in the morning.”

The thing is, pain stops meaning anything after a while. It just becomes a color—bright, hot, endless red. Like the sky over Grolgath Prime. Like the inside of my skull.

I wake to the sour sting of antiseptic and the clink of metal tools being arranged with surgical precision. My skin is slick with cold sweat. My throat tastes like copper and acid.

I don’t remember when I passed out. I do remember the creature unlatching from my face—wet, sucking, its tendrils retreating with obscene slowness. The sensation still lingers like phantom hands on my nerves.

I swallow bile and blink back tears. I will not let this be the last place I see.

Malem is back, seated across from me at a workbench, meticulously cleaning the extractor with a cloth that looks suspiciously like synthetic skin. His movements are precise, obsessive. His fingers tremble, but not from nerves—excitement.

“You’re still alive,” he says without looking up. “Impressive.”

“Screw you,” I rasp. My voice is wrecked. Raw.

He finally looks at me. “That language is beneath your training.”

I breathe in through my nose, deep and slow. Find center. Find stillness. Find the Companion mask and wear it like armor.

“Apologies,” I say, sugar-coating the acid in my tone. “I forget myself.”

He chuckles softly. “Don’t we all, eventually?”

My pulse is a drumbeat in my ears, but underneath it, there’s a rhythm—thought. Calculation. Memory doesn’t just flicker; it floods—but not in order. The extractor is flawed. It plucks moments from my mind like thorns from a bush. No pattern. No logic.

Maybe I can use that.

I let my head loll to one side. Let my muscles slacken. I moan softly, just enough to sound pathetic, not theatrical.

Malem watches. His expression is maddeningly neutral.

“What is it like?” he asks after a moment.

I lift my head with effort. “Like drowning in fire. Like being inside every mistake I’ve ever made all at once.”

He hums thoughtfully. “Poetic.”

I blink hard, forcing my eyes to water. “Please... I’ll talk. Just… please don’t put it back on me.”

He rises slowly, his boots silent on the matte floor. He comes to my side and leans down, searching my face. I do my best to look broken. Defeated. Like I’ve accepted my fate.

It takes everything I have not to flinch when his hand brushes my cheek. His touch is clinical, almost reverent, like I’m some rare artifact he’s cataloging before destruction.

“See?” he says, almost fond. “You humans can be taught.”

I let my lip tremble.

“Help me,” I whisper. “Help me and I’ll tell you what you want to know.”

He tilts his head. “That’s not how this works. But… we can adjust our methods.”

He steps away, back toward the workbench, turning his back to me.

I shift—just a fraction. My right wrist is raw where the strap bites in. If I can just…

There’s a tray of instruments a meter away. Nothing dramatic. But one of the blades looks sharp. Delicate.

I take a slow breath. Let the air fill my lungs. Think.

“You’re wrong about me,” I murmur, projecting just loud enough to carry. “I’m not a spy. I’m not anything special. Just… someone no one will miss.”

A lie.

But a lie he’ll believe.

He turns halfway. “Loneliness is useful, in espionage. Makes it easier to sever ties.”

“No ties,” I say, more firmly. “My parents sold me. My clients lease me. The Academy owns me.”

He nods. “Then perhaps it’s time someone… freed you from all that.”

There’s something in his voice—an edge. Not kindness. Control. Ownership.

That’s fine. I can work with that.

“You could,” I say, blinking up at him like he’s my only hope. “Please.”

He walks back, slow and measured. Kneels beside me, face close. His breath is mint and metal. His eyes—gray as old snow—watch me like a scientist watching a test subject poised to fail.

“I will free you,” he whispers. “But not yet.”

His fingers drift to the side of the table where the extractor rests in its recharging cradle. The tendrils twitch, as if sensing its next feeding.

He turns, moves to enter data into a nearby panel.

I use that moment to test the right restraint.

A tiny give.

Barely anything. But enough.

I almost cry from the hope that flickers in my gut.

Instead, I grit my teeth and let one tear roll down my cheek, calculated and clean.

This isn’t over.

You don’t get to break me, Malem.