Thank you all for such amazing support over the past year! Here’s another segment of The Downtrodden, set late in Alek’s time as a Diçian prisoner.
Word count: 1703
CW: death mention, blood, dead bodies (briefly seen), prisoners of war, guilt, left for dead, abandoned, whumpee isn’t a minor but is viewed as a child from the main POV
Titans: Omega tag list: @nightly-whump, @whumped-cream, @ghostcomit, @whipper-whumper, @yet-another-heathen (let me know if you’d like to be added!)
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“Get these doors open. We haven’t got all day!”
“Hold on, I’ve almost… Got it!”
The control board finally responded and the doors to the cell block creaked open. Major Tamarus and his troops entered as one of them worked to open the dozens of cells inside. It was eerily quiet in here, and Tamarus was sure a few prisoners would be calling out, maybe even walking if they had the strength. But it was too quiet.
“Spread out. Search for any survivors.”
He was met with a variety of ‘Yes sir’s as they scattered to search the cells. None of them were quite sure what to expect when their division of Pax Rebels raided the Diçian blacksite. It hadn’t even appeared on their radar until a couple of dœlae ago. The Diçians were informed of their plans a few days earlier, and evacuated before they arrived. But Tamarus suspected that they might have left some of their remaining prisoners for dead. Hopefully, a few would still be alive. But his hopes seemed to be dashed.
“Sergeant, make sure the medical team has some white ribbons available. I’m hoping we won’t have to use any, but…”
“I know, sir,” his Sergeant replied, “We might still find a couple of them.”
“Who knows how long they’ve been here? When they might have disappeared?”
As they searched, they found many of the cells empty. A few were occupied by the bodies of dead prisoners, signs of torture covering their skins. A few seemed to have died from abandonment, starvation. Others appeared to be shot. The smell turned Tamarus’ stomach in an unpleasant way.
“Oh, Em,” his Sergeant muttered quietly by his side. His head turned to see what she was looking at. His eyes found an open cell, dark except for the light shining in from outside. The body of a young soldier laid in the back, blood covering his clothes and skin, and coating the floor around him.
“Geez, these fucking savages,” Tamarus gasped, “He looks like a fucking kid, it’s—”
His words froze in his throat when he saw the prisoner shift. He watched carefully, finally noticing his chest rising and falling slowly. He was alive.
“Whoa, medic! We need a medic in here!” Tamarus shouted at the top of his lungs as he and his Sergeant rushed to the prisoner’s side. The smell of old blood was strong, but they pushed past it as they turned him over gently on his back.
“Careful, watch for any injuries,” Tamarus said as one of his medics ran in to join them. She held his wrist in one hand to check his pulse as she opened her medkit.
“His heartbeat is too low.” She ran a bioscanner over him and checked his eyes and breath. “We need to get hm on antibiotics and a respirator as soon as possible. He’ll need a blood transfusion too.”
Tamarus lifted the prisoner’s head gently and rested him against his knees. The prisoner groaned softly, his eyes twitching under the pain of being moved. He brushed some of his bloodstained blond hair out of his face.
“Hey, kiddo, can you hear me?” Tamarus tried to speak loud and clearly as the medic continued working. “My name is Major Unaira Tamarus, and we’re here to help get you out. Our medic here is checking you for any injuries. Can you tell me your name?”
The prisoner didn’t answer, but exhaled sharply as he tried to breathe. He was in bad shape, very bad shape. Dark circles hung under his eyes over pale, clammy skin that drew away warmth like a vacuum. Scars and bruises seemed to paint him underneath the blood stains. There was grime too, in his hair and over his tattered clothes from what must have been weeks of not being washed. He looked like a skeleton, so close to death that they really should have found him dead in here.
“We need to get him moving, right now,” the medic said as she began injecting boosters into the prisoner’s arm. “These should hold him for at least a few hours until we get to a triage facility, and I can give him an IV when we get to the ship.”
“What about his injuries? Blood loss?”
The medic frowned. “He doesn’t have any fresh wounds from what I can see. And none that would lead to this much bleeding.”
Tamarus looked up at her, a look of mild horror in his eyes. “What? Do you… you mean to say this isn’t his blood?”
“…No, I don’t think it is.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Tamarus saw his Sergeant fight the urge to gag at the thought. Days of being locked in here, covered in someone else’s blood, not knowing if the door would ever open again. He could imagine what that would do to someone’s mind. Or maybe he just didn’t want to.
“C’mon, let’s get him out of here so he can start treatment,” said Tamarus. “We can ID him on the ship en route.”
The medic nodded and retrieved a collapsible stretcher from her bag. It expanded as she and the Sergeant stretched it open. The three of them carefully lifted the prisoner up and onto the stretcher. He moaned quietly, his voice garbled in the back of his throat. Tamarus followed as his medic and Sergeant carried him out of the cell and down to where their ship was stationed.
Outside of the cell, his troops continued their search. Tiny flashes of white ribbons appeared around him, clenched tightly in anxious fists. That same sinking feeling from before returned in his stomach. He wasn’t confident that they would find many more living prisoners. With the state that kid was in, it’d be a miracle. So many dead around them.
There’s some good in this, he tried to convince himself. At the very least, we get to bring them home.
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Two prisoners. That was all they found in the end. Two living, and nearly three dozen fallen, left behind to rot in their cells. Tamarus accompanied one of his ships back to the border after instructing most of the troops to secure the Diçian blacksite. He’d rejoin them soon, but he had to see all of the captives to their next journey.
After he and his Sergeant found the younger prisoner, a few other found another prisoner a level above, alive and surprisingly awake. He was older, perhaps in his 360’s, and was found huddled in the corner with a chain locked around his neck. It was frightening to see how willingly he went along with everything, accepting every suggestion or request as a command like he’d be killed if he resisted. There was a haunting deadness in his eyes as they freed his neck of the chain. They gave him antibiotics and sedatives to help him sleep on the flight back to the border.
Tamarus checked on their continuing route once more before returning to the ship’s temporary medical bay. Two of his team’s medical officers were there, including the one who helped care for the younger prisoner when they first found him. The two prisoners were now carefully strapped in cots to keep them from tossing in the ship’s motions. They slept soundly, or rather as soundly as they could after being rescued from such horrors.
“How are they doing?” He asked the medic who attended to the younger prisoner. She looked up from working on adjusting his IV.
“Not real improvement yet, I can’t determine anything until we get him on some proper equipment,” she said, cleaning as much of the blood staining his skin as she could. The more she cleared away, the younger he looked. Tamarus actually began to wonder if this soldier was actually of legal age to be in the military.
“Have you been able to ID them?”
“Yes, we have.” The medic pulled away and reached for a data pad, switching it on and pulling up the files they found. “Okay, here we have Private Alekoran Ryg Thnam, assigned to the 416th company of the Pax Rebel army two years ago, operating in a squadron commanded by Captain Davorus Imadaal. The whole group was taken prisoner in Kanalaya last year, according to our records. Looks like he began serving under Imadaal right after completing his basic training.”
“Wait, immediately after? How old is this kid?”
“Uh,” the medic’s brow furrowed as she searched his records. “He turned 174 about a month and a half ago.”
A child. Old enough to fight, but he was practically a baby. It was never shocking anymore when he heard of young people suffering and dying in this war. But it was never easy, especially seeing it firsthand. He exhaled sharply. “What about the other one?”
“Ah, yes. Sergeant Tzimer Corvalatus, age 354, assigned to the same company as Private Thnam 93 years ago and was taken prisoner at the same time. He’s doing better physically, but I’m worried about the psychological damage he went through while there.”
“No doubt they’ll both struggle during their recovery.”
“If they both survive.”
Tamarus nodded grimly. She meant Private Thnam when she said that. Even under the surgical mask strapped over his face, his breathing was shallow and rattled in his chest. Something was deeply wrong with him, and he’d be lucking to survive the trip to the triage facility alone. That was the ugly truth all of them would have to face over the next few days.
He wanted to stay and watch over them. In some ways, he felt responsible for their state of health, responsible that they didn’t get here sooner to save more prisoners. He felt like he owed as much to make sure they got the best care possible. But as much as he wanted to, they needed him up in control to navigate safely home.
“Inform me immediately of any changes, good or bad.” The medic nodded in response and Tamarus turned to leave. He couldn’t help but stop outside the door just once to look back. They were so helpless, so weak. He prayed to Em Zavo that they would survive the trip home.
