The Slow Path Home

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Chapter One

He really wished they'd hurry up and kill him.

The man was lying face down on the deck of the spaceship with his hands bound behind him while they stood over him and argued. He paid no attention to them, their voices just a background drone to his own thoughts. They needed to get on with it, he thought impatiently to himself. He was very tired of waiting.

The leader of the gang was a slow-witted humanoid named Bay. Bay stood with one foot on the man's neck to keep him from trying to run while they debated over what they were going to do with him. He needn't have bothered.

"The client said he wanted him alive better 'n dead but that he'd take him either way. If he's willin' to pay that much for him, livin' or dead, then he shouldn't care none if a part or two of him went missin'. Long as he's still livin'." The majority of the gang nodded in agreement at Bay's line of reasoning.

They were Body Snatchers; one of the many gangs that roamed this part of the XYZ Galaxy in search of body parts and genetic material to be sold to the highest bidder. Of course, by all civilized laws such activities were illegal. But it was a big galaxy out there. That made it easy for them to ply their trade with little fear of being caught, especially when there were plenty of unscrupulous doctors and scientists willing to pay good money for what they needed.

"We take off a leg, maybe an arm or an ear, an' sell 'em to other interested parties. That's just that much more profit for us. An' we can claim that it was all done in the fight to capture him."

At that last statement, the whole gang burst out in jeering laughter. There had been no fight to capture the man. Flix had been walking though the market place on a scouting trip when he saw him, sitting on top of a low wall, watching the crowd pass by. A quick call to alert Bay and it wasn't long before they were all gathered outside one of the entrances to the market. Their quarry was still there, sitting on the wall with an unreadable expression on his face.

It was unusual for a client to demand one specific being; the usual request was for several members of a certain species. No matter. The sum that the client had promised to whatever gang brought the man to them first was large enough to push aside any questions they may have had.

The gang had bided their time until the crowd began to thin out at the end of the day. A few of the sellers began to shutter their stalls. They made their move cautiously, fanning out in a large circle around the edge of the market. Once they were in position, Bay signaled them to start moving, slowly circling in and tightening the noose.

Even when they had moved in close enough that Bay knew that the man had to have seen them coming for him, he sat motionless, staring off into some far distance. Finally, when they were within 20 feet of him, Bay raised his hand to the stop the gang.

The man on the wall glanced down and he and Bay looked at each other for several seconds. "We have business with ya," Bay barked out. "You're comin' with us."

The man made no move to get down from his perch. He kept his eyes locked with Bay's but there was no hint on the man's face that he had even heard Bay's command.

"Are ye deaf? Get yer arse down from there or we'll drag it down!"

The man looked at Bay for few seconds longer, and then glanced around at the others arrayed in a semi-circle front of him. He gave a dismissive sigh and looked back off in the distance once again, as if deciding something, then slid down off the wall. He stood there and shoved his hands into his pockets.

"Get 'em," Bay snarled. The gang surged forward and pulled him to the ground, kicking and hitting him as he went down. The whole time, the man never resisted or uttered a sound. With his hands securely cuffed behind his back, they dragged him down the dusty alleyways back to their ship.

Now that they were done arguing, Bay took his boot off of the man's neck and used it instead to flip him over onto his back. What Bay lacked in intellect, he made up for in cruelty. He enjoyed causing pain and fear in others. It was how he became the leader of this band of body snatchers and how he kept the job. He was accustomed to seeing fear in the eyes of his crew. He liked it. And he expected to see that fear in the eyes of the man when he rolled him over.

But he didn't.

He looked down into the eyes of the man and saw nothing.

Bay didn't understand it. They had beaten him, dragged him, talked about cutting him up like a side of meat right in front of him and yet he lay there now as if none of it had happened. The man's eyes were empty and his face was without expression. The man confused Bay, and Bay did not like to be confused. Confusion made him angry. Bay set about rectifying the situation.

He grabbed a handful of the man's shirt and yanked him to his feet. "What the hell are you? Deaf? Stupid?" Bay shouted as he shook the man like a rag doll. "D'ye think if you put on a brave front we'll let you go? It ain't happenin'. You're worth a pile of money to us, every little piece of you, and we're gonna get as much out of you as we can!" At the end of the tirade, Bay held the man up within inches of his face. "Say somethin'!" Bay roared. "Say somethin'!"

There was nothing there. Just empty, vacant eyes staring back at him.

This enraged Bay even further. He slung the man back down at the feet of the others. "Take him down below," he ordered. "Get him ready. I'll be along there soon. And while you're at it, take some time to work him over. Make sure he looks like he's been in a good fight." A couple of them grabbed the man by the collar of his jacket and dragged him off. The rest of the gang slowly dispersed to other parts of the ship. A tall, thin, green being stayed behind and approached Bay.

"What do you want, Flix?"

"I do not think it is wise to damage the man unnecessarily." Flick told him. "We should deliver the property in one piece to the client as quickly as possible."

"Well, he ain't the property of the client yet, Flix," Bay snarled. "He's ours to do with as we want until the client hands us the money for him."

"I've met with these beings," Flix argued. "They are not the type to be trifled with. They put on a pleasant face but....that's not really them. They're hiding themselves."

"Everyone in this business has something to hide, Flix. That ain't nothin' new."

"Just give them the man as he is, Bay. Hand him over, get our money and be done with them."

Bay considered following his advice. That was the reason he kept Flix around. He was smart and his species had a knack for bargaining and seeing through subterfuge that came in handy in this business. Flix's insights had more than once turned a loosing deal into a profitable one. Maybe he ought to follow his advice on this one, Bay mused. But the image of the man and his fearless eyes appeared in his mind and sent any small bit of good sense in this matter fleeing.

Bay snorted. "You worry too much, Flix. Your whole planet is nothin' but a bunch of worrywarts. I'll deal with the client if they get pissed that we took a few cuts off of him for ourselves. Now, you let me tend to my work while you tend to yours."

Flix gave a weary nod of assent and turned to leave. "Flix," Bay called after him. "Have you contacted the client yet?"

"Yes. I sent them a message that we would deliver him tomorrow at first light, as you instructed."

"Good," Bay grunted. "We want to give ourselves time to get him stable and patched up enough to deliver." He went over to a locker on one wall of the ship and removed a dirty, stained cloth bag. "Time to get to work." Bay turned and stalked off down the corridor. Flix watched his leader go with a grave face. No good would come of this. Flix was certain.

---

They dragged the man down below and into a room where they pulled him to his feet. The man glanced around the room. It looked like some nightmarish cross between a mechanic's shop and a surgical suite. It was filthy and filled with decrepit-looking medical equipment, containers of preservative fluid and odd bits of machinery. In the center of the room were a hospital trolly and a table littered with surgical tools. He took it all in as he stood there, waiting for whatever was coming next.

"Let's have a go at him for awhile until the boss gets here, like he told us," said one of the men who had brought him down here. He walked up to the man quickly and gave him a hard punch across the jaw. The man staggered at the blow but managed to stay on his feet. The other men around him cheered. "Hit 'em again, Boggo! Crack 'em another good one!" This time Boggo landed the punch in his stomach. The man doubled over at that one, gasping for breath but quickly straightened back up.

"Ain't you a tough one!" Boggo sneered, then viciously threw a punch straight on into the man's face. This one was hard enough to send him falling backwards to the deck. Blood started flowing from his nose.

The man sat there for a few seconds, his eyes unfocused. He shook his head back and forth a few times, trying to clear it. The man looked around at his tormentors as they waited eagerly for the next round. He shut his eyes and hung his head, apparently yielding to let them do whatever they wanted. They began to jeer and catcall at him.

Suddenly, the man's head snapped up and he opened his eyes. They weren't quite as empty and lifeless as they had been. Now there was a tiny glimmer of life in them. He began to scramble to his feet again.

With a shout, Boggo and the rest descended on him. They yanked him up and knocked him down again and again, throwing punches and kicks constantly. One being with a particularly good set of claws took a few swipes at him across his chest before retreating with a roar of triumph. They kept at him for quite some time and through it all he remained silent, refusing to fight back.

There was an abrupt silence and the one holding the man up for the convenience of the others let him go. The man tried to stay upright but his legs wouldn't hold him; he fell face-first onto the deck and lay there.

Bay stood in the doorway. "Bloody hell!" he roared. "I told you to work him over good. Not turn him into a pudding!"

"You said t' make it look like he was in a good fight, Bay. That's what you told us. We was just followin' your orders!" whined Boggo.

"Shut it." Bay snapped as he shoved Boggo out of his way. "Get him up."

They pulled the man to his feet in front of Bay. The pale, thin face was bruised and bloodied but he was still alive. Bay looked into the man's eyes, sure that this time he would see the fear he was looking for but he didn't. There was no fear but now there was a faint spark of defiance, a look that dared Bay to do his worst.

"Has he said anything yet? Has he made a sound?" Bay asked

"Nuthin', boss, unless you count the crack of his nose against my fist."

Bay's blood began to boil. He felt as if he were being mocked by this strange, silent being. Trying to belittle him right in front of his own men. He'd teach that skinny bastard a lesson.

"Put him on the table."

They unshackled his wrists from behind his back, then pulled his jacket off and tossed it aside. Two of them grabbed him under his arms to lift him up and push him roughly down on the gurney. They each took one of his arms and held it down while a third pinned down his legs. Bay strolled over, smiling broadly. He opened up the cloth bag he had brought with him and dumped the contents out onto a tray stand next to the trolly where the man lay. There was a loud, metallic clatter as the objects hit the tray.

"I think we'll be hearin' a peep or two out of him now. What do you think, my friend?" Bay grabbed the man's jaw and forced him to turn his head to look at what was on the tray. It was an array of wicked looking knives and laser cutting devices. Bay felt the man's jaw tighten under his hand.

"Now there, don't you be worryin'," Bay said cheerfully. "Didn't I tell you I was a doctor? A surgeon, in fact. Top of me class in medical school I was!" He patted the man's cheek. Bay motioned for one of his men to pull up the man's left trouser leg.

Another one of Bay's men came over with a syringe and an IV set up. "Ready for us to knock 'em out, Bay?"

Bay waved him away. "Nah, this brave fellow don't need none of that," he answered in an obscenely jolly voice. "You won't be feeling a thing of what I'm doin'. Will ya, brave fellow?" Without looking away from the man's eyes, he reached out to the tray of instruments and wrapped his hand around a scalpel. In one quick motion, he brought it over and jammed it down into the left calf muscle of the man. Other than a quick intake of breath, the man gave no sign of feeling it.

Bay gave the scalpel a vicious turn as he yanked it back out of the man's leg. "Just a little test jab there to see how you'll handle this. I think you'll do just fine." He put down the scalpel and picked up a much larger bladed knife. "Now it's time to get down to business." He took the knife ands sliced across the leg just below the knee cap. The man on the table gasped and shut his eyes tightly.

Feeling a little thrill of victory at provoking at least that much of a reaction, Bay bent over the man. "Is that a bit uncomfortable, brave fellow? Could you feel that?" Bay held up the syringe his man had brought over earlier. "Would you like a bit of this? Just to take the edge off. Make things a little easier on ya." He waved the tube back and forth in front of the man's face. "Whadya say, brave fellow?"

The man opened his eyes again and looked up at Bay. If Bay thought he was going to break his victim that easily, he was grossly disappointed. The man stared unblinkingly at Bay, refusing to give him the satisfaction of even a whimper.

Bay gave a harsh laugh. "You'll sing a different tune before long. Old Bay is gonna have you singin' like a bird." The knife began to slowly slice down the leg, a long deep cut that went from the knee nearly down to the ankle. The man's leg was rapidly becoming soaked in blood but he lay there unflinching, staring straight ahead.

Bay threw the knife across the room and slammed his hands down on the gurney. "What the hell is wrong with you?" he leaned over and whispered in the man's ear. "You've got to be feelin' this. I know ya do. All ya got to do is say one word. Just one word to your friend Bay here and I'll give ya something to knock ya out for the rest of this. Just one little word."

The man turned his head to look at Bay, then turned his head back and shut his eyes. He looked as if he was going to sleep.

Bay could stand it no longer. Something inside of his dull brain snapped. He stepped back from the gurney and held out his hand. "Gimmie the saw."

Boggo scrambled over to one of the tables and brought back the laser cutter that they usually used for these jobs and put into his hand. Bay threw it back into his face.

"I said gimmie the saw." His voice was low and menacing.

"Bay," Boggo stammered. "We, we, don't use the saw. Not on the live ones."

"Gimmie the damn saw!" Bay bellowed.

One of the others hurried over and handed Bay the saw.

"Bay, don't do this," Boggo protested. "Let us at least knock 'em out. He won't last if you do 'em this way."

The man holding down the legs chimed in. "Lookit how much blood he's lost already. He's gonna bleed out on us, Bay. We're gonna lose 'em."

"And so what if we do?" Bay snarled. "They'll pay us the same, dead or alive. So hold 'em down while I work or by the gods I'll use this saw on you instead!"

At this point, not only did Bay no longer care if the man lived or died, he no longer cared if the client paid them for the man or not. The man was undermining his authority. His men were questioning his orders, doubting his decisions and this he could not stand. Bay rounded on the men standing in the room and brandished the saw at them like a sword. "I'll use this on every one of ya if ya can't do as yer told and follow orders and I'll leave ya in worse shape than this fellow's gonna be!" He turned back to the gurney. "Hold 'em down."

Except for the beads of sweat on his forehead that he couldn't control, the man still looked as if he were asleep. Bay positioned the saw in the first cut he had made below the knee and pressed it down through skin and muscle until he felt the teeth bite into the bone. He then slowly drew the blade back across the leg toward him. Bay looked down at the man and laughed as he shoved the blade forward again. Making a great show of it, Bay let go of the saw and spit into his hands, like someone getting ready to saw firewood. He repositioned his hands and was about to start again when Flix suddenly burst into the room.

"Bloody hell, Flix! You better have a damn good reason!" Bay snarled.

"The client is here. They want their property right now," Flix told him.

"Well, they can't have him right now. You tell 'em we'll bring him to 'em in the mornin' like we agreed." Bay turned back to continue his work.

"I've told them that. They insist. They want to speak with you."

Bay looked down at the man on the table. His head lolled off to one side and he was breathing rapidly. "How many of them, Flix?"

"Three," Flix hesitated before adding. "I think that they suspect that all may not be well with their property."

Bay sighed in aggravation, like a child told to stop a fun activity in order to do something else. He had been enjoying this. Bay released the handle of the saw but left it embedded in the leg. "Awright, then. Let's tend to the client. All of you come along. A little intimidation will convince our client to wait 'til we're ready."

"What about him?" Boggo gestured down to the table. "Who's gonna stay with him?"

The man was clearly unconscious. Bay shrugged. "He's out of it. He won't be goin' anywhere, even if he does come to." Bay headed to the door and the rest followed. Boggo hesitated momentarily, looking at the man on the table then turned to join the others.

---

The man was unconscious, but a small corner of his brain registered the fact that he was now alone, and slowly edged him back to consciousness. He lay there unmoving with his eyes closed, listening for any sound that might indicate he was not really alone. Hearing nothing, he slowly opened his eyes and looked around. There was no one. The man gave a deep sigh that turned into a groan of pain. He raised his head up enough to look down at his leg. The sight of the saw sitting there in his leg nearly made him pass out again. He dropped his head back down and tried to ignore the pain while he thought.

The man truly did not care if he lived or died at this point. He wanted to be dead. The sadness and guilt he had been carrying around for so long had finally become too much to bear. It sat inside his chest like a cold, hard lump, growing bigger and more painful with each passing day. The bigger it got, the less he cared about himself or about anyone or anything. He had kept on traveling but only as kind of aimless habit; not out of any sense of fun or adventure. If he left his ship, it was only to buy a little something to eat or drink and to watch the inhabitants of whatever planet go by as he sat in thought.

His spent most of his time thinking and his thoughts were always the same. If only he been smarter, if only he had been faster, if only he could have said those words, if only he had listened as a boy, if only.....if only..... They replayed in an endless cycle that fed that lump, making it grow bigger and bigger until if felt like it was in every fiber of his body. That was when he decided that he could no longer go on.

He wasn't brave enough to go ahead and take the matter into his own hands. He decided to take a page out of an old friend's book and when the opportunity presented itself, he would simply choose not to go on. Danger and death had dogged his footsteps all his life so he assumed it wouldn't be long before they caught up with him once again and his misery would end.

But, of course, nothing in the universe ever happened the way he wanted it to happen, especially if it was something he wanted for himself.

He went from galaxy to galaxy, system to system looking for his opportunity, but it never came. He put himself in harm's way time after time, but each time, death stayed just out of his reach. It was maddening. It finally drove him to the point where he had decided just that day to take his own life. He had been sitting on the wall when he finally decided and had been pondering the best way to do it when Bay and his men found him. At the time the irony of it had made him smile.

Well, he wasn't smiling now. This was not what he wanted. He had enough self-respect left in him that he didn't want to die as the plaything of that monster, Bay. And he did not want to end up the property of this client, either dead or alive. That was why he had been trying to taunt Bay, manipulate him into killing him outright but it hadn't worked. He needed to get out of here and back to his ship. He still wanted to die, but he was going to do it on his own terms.

---

On the main deck, Bay and his men entered the hold where the client waited. There were three of them, as Flix had said. The one in the middle had a bland, pleasant smile fixed on his face while the other two stood patiently at his side. Bay was annoyed that Flix had called him in to handle these people. They were nothing. Bay could have squashed them with his thumb if he wanted.

The man in the middle stepped forward, still smiling. "We've come for our property. We understand that you have him."

"We do," Bay replied. "We'll bring him over to you in the mornin', like we told you we would. We got no time to deal with this now."

"No need to deliver him," the client said. "My friends and I can handle him, I'm sure. Just bring him up to us and we'll be on our way." Out of his coat, he pulled a credit voucher and held it up to Bay. "Your payment, of course, if that is your concern."

"I said we'd bring him to ya in the morning," Bay retorted. "You can keep your money until then. That's the deal. Now git yourselves home to wait until morning."

The client still kept his insipid smile plastered across his face but there was a subtle change in his demeanor as he spoke that caused Bay to begin to doubt his plan. "We'll leave, my friend. Of course, we will. But we'll leave with the man in our possession."

Bay opened his mouth to call his men forward but it was too late. The one in the middle raised a hand and snapped his fingers. " 'Sic 'em, boys."

With a demonic scream, the three of them changed into their true, bat-like forms and tore into the gang of body snatchers. Bay was the first one to die, followed by Boggo. The rest that had followed Bay to the hold ran panicking to the door where the bottle neck there gave the Krillitines a chance to dispatch several more of them. At the sound of the screams, men came running from other parts of the ship only to be caught up in the carnage. The Krillitines were coming down the corridor, picking off men left and right as they fled. They didn't bother stopping to feed on any of the bodies they left in their wake. There would be time enough for that later, once they had secured their prize.

---

Down below, the man heard the screech as the Krillitines transformed and instantly recognized the sound. He was going to have to move. Now. He could never let them have him, dead or alive.

He forced himself to sit up, pushing the pain to the back of his mind. First things first, he told himself as he looked down at his left leg. The man reached up and pulled the tie from around his neck. He then looped it around his left leg, just above the knee and tied it as tightly as he dared. Grabbing the bag that Bay had left lying on the instrument tray, he rolled it up, put it between his teeth and bit down hard. He leaned forward to grab the saw with both hands and gave it a good, strong yank. It took a second hard yank before it came loose. He let the saw clatter to the floor and nearly followed it there himself from the pain of it all. He sat there hunched over for a few seconds, trying to regain his composure. Finally he sat up and took the bag out of his mouth. Even with the improvised tourniquet, there was a rapidly spreading pool of red forming by his leg. As strong as he was, he knew he'd never make it to his ship if he kept losing blood at that rate. He took the bag he had used before and managed to get the rope used for the drawstring out. The man then took the cloth and placed it over the gaping wound that the saw had left. He used his tie to secure it and to keep as much pressure on it as he could. It would have to do.

Now, there were two things he needed if he was going to make it back to his ship. One was in his trouser pocket. The gang hadn't bothered to search him so it should still be in there. He patted the pocket and smiled with relief when he felt the familiar lump under the cloth. The other item he needed was in a pocket of his jacket. His jacket lay across the room from him against the wall where they had flung it. As fast as his battered body would allow him, he shifted and lowered his right leg to the ground. Bracing himself with his arms as best he could, he slowly slid his left leg over to the edge of the table and began to lower it down by the right leg.

The moment his left foot touched the ground, the whole leg melted underneath him like butter and he fell crashing to the ground. He lay there fighting off the grey fog of pain that threatened to take over his consciousness. The sounds of the fighting were growing closer and he had no time to spare. If he couldn't stand up, he'd have to crawl, so he began to drag himself inch by painful inch over to his jacket.

It sounded like the Krillitines had succeeded in wiping out nearly all of the body snatchers and were now only picking off the stragglers that were unfortunate enough to cross their path as they made their way through the ship. The man knew their attention would now be focused on finding him.

By the time the man reached his jacket, the screaming had stopped and the only noise came from the Krillitines as they searched for him. He pulled his jacket to him and sat up. The first pocket he put his hand into came up empty and he began to panic. Perhaps it had fallen out somewhere between the market and here? Maybe one of the gang had emptied his pockets while Bay had him on the table? From the sound of it, the Krillitines were only a few doors away now. He forced his panic to recede and tried the next pocket.

---

The Krillitanes had just finished searching a short corridor that led off of the main one they had fought their way down. Just as they turned their attention to the bit of corridor that remained, they heard a high-pitched whirring sound. With a screech, they flew down to the door where they heard it coming from only to find it sealed shut. Screaming in fury, they began to throw themselves against the door. Their claws and teeth dug into the metal and tore hunks out of it. They had nearly torn their way through the door when a mechanical wheezing and grinding sound filled the air. A few seconds later, they opened a hole in the door big enough for them to crawl through. They surged through as the sound faded, ready to take their prize.

The room was empty.

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