Christopher Nuttall - Their Darkest Hour

“You will talk,” he said. “We have all the time in the world to break your resistance. You will be broken apart and then you will tell us everything we want to know. Do you understand me? Resistance is futile.”

He slapped her again. Alex felt an unholy ringing in her head, which faded slowly. She hadn’t had anything like enough to eat over the past few days. Chances were they’d held her long enough for hunger to set in and weaken her resistance. Her lips felt bloody and broken after the two slaps. The strap around her chest seemed to be contracting, squeezing the breath out of her. It was all she could do to remain aware and alert.

A glint of light caught her eye and she froze as the interrogator advanced towards her with a knife. He was going to cut her throat… for a moment, she was gripped with absolute terror, just before realising that they would hardly let her go that easily. She felt a tug as he pulled at what remained of her shirt, slicing it away from her bare skin. Her bra followed, leaving her breasts exposed to their gaze. She cringed back as he pinched her nipple, before turning his attention to her trousers. When he had finished, she was naked and exposed — and helpless. No amount of struggling would break the tie they’d put around her chest.

“Do you understand me?” The interrogator whispered. “You will talk, one way or the other. Talk now and we won’t have to hurt you any longer…”

Alex tried to lose herself in thought. Where had the interrogator come from? She knew that some policemen were collaborating, but surely they would draw the line at such an interrogation… But the aliens had presumably taken the prisons as well. They’d have plenty of volunteers for an interrogation crew if they broke open the cells containing violent offenders. Some of the stories she’d read in the newspapers over the years had been horrific, like the brother who had casually tortured his own sister to death. He’d been jailed for a very long time — but had the aliens freed him and put him to work?

They didn’t seem to enjoy making people suffer themselves. The aliens stamped hard on resistance, and they were indiscriminate when it came to applying heavy weapons, but they didn’t have the sadistic urges that many human despots had indulged. But if they’d found humans who did enjoy making people suffer… the thought was sickening. If someone had suggested it to the aliens…

A hand grabbed her breast and squeezed, hard. Another reached down and clawed between her legs. Alex screamed for the first time, trying to bring her leg up to kick out at her tormentor. He slapped it down and then yanked at her breast. Alex felt her mind start to blur as he slapped her time and time again, the pain threatening to drag her down into the darkness. She’d lost track of time. How long had she been tortured… she heard a hiss and opened her eyes, in time to see a single jet of blue fire right in front of her eyes.

“You won’t be such a pretty face when I’m through with you,” her interrogator whispered. There was no doubt at all that he was enjoying himself. Alex cringed back as the heat came closer and closer to her face, only to be pulled away just before it started to burn her skin. “Do you know how many women I’ve beaten and broken here? How many are nothing more than my slaves, dependent upon me for everything?”

Alex tried to speak, but it was so hard to concentrate. She wanted to give in, and yet some stubborn part of her nature refused to surrender. The pain was growing; she was suddenly aware that he’d freed her from the chair, only to roll her over so she was bent over the chair, her buttocks lifted up for his inspection. Something sent a wave of pain over her rear and she screamed again, feeling a desperate desire to be sick that sent a tidal wave of vomit out of her mouth. Everything she’d eaten in the camp, as mushy and tasteless as it had been, seemed to be spilling out of her.

She felt his hands on her rear, spreading her thighs. And then she felt him pressing his hardness into her… the pain and humiliation overwhelmed her, sending her crashing down into darkness. Her last thought, shining out against the blackness, was that she’d told them nothing…

“Are you all right?”

Alex opened her eyes slowly, unsure of what had happened to her. She found herself in a small cell, staring up at a naked girl. The bruises on her skin told their own story. Every single piece of Alex’s body hurt in ways she would have thought unimaginable. It hurt to try to open her mouth and speak. The pain around her breasts was horrific.

“Remain still,” the girl urged. “He’s cut you, the bastard. I don’t know if you’ll recover…”

Somehow, despite the pain, Alex managed to pull herself up into a sitting position — and instantly regretted it. Her buttocks felt as if they were on fire. Carefully, she inspected herself and saw red marks and cuts covering her skin. Some of them looked to have broken the skin, only to be allowed to heal on their own, without interference. She glanced around the dirty cell and realised that there was a good chance that one or more of the scars would become infected. And then… she doubted that they’d give her any medical treatment. Maybe the infection would finish her off quickly.

“What…?” She managed to say. Her mouth still hurt, even when she touched it. They’d slapped her, she recalled. Maybe they’d knocked out a tooth or two. Or maybe… hadn’t she read a book, once, where the hero had had his teeth removed to make him talk? She didn’t seem to be missing any teeth, but her mouth hurt too much for her to be sure. “What happened to me?”

“They dumped you in here,” the girl said. “I don’t think you told him anything. He was proper raging when he left you here and told me to take care of you. I think he’s probably afraid that the Leathernecks will be angry with him for failing to get anything out of you.”

“Good,” Alex managed, finally. Maybe they’d send him to be interrogated instead. A taste of his own medicine would teach him a lesson. “Where… where did they get you?”

The girl hesitated, and then shrugged. “My brother was killed by the bastards and I was taken away,” she said. “When I woke up, I was here — at his mercy. You… you don’t know what they’ve done to me…”

“I think I can guess,” Alex said. The bastard had raped her, just as he’d raped Alex. Part of her wanted to crawl into a corner and die, but the rest of her wanted revenge. There would be a chance to kill the bastard and she intended to take it. It was the only thing left to her. “Do you have more water? Something to wash?”

“There’s a shower over there, but the water’s always cold,” the girl said. Alex pulled herself to her feet, despite the pain, and staggered towards the little chamber. “They do it on purpose, the bastards.”

“Probably,” Alex agreed. Her body was stained with blood — and his seed. She wanted to be clean again, even though she felt as if she would never be clean. “But we will get them, one day.”

Near Alien Detention Camp

United Kingdom, Day 40

“Jimmy!”

Jimmy Coates scowled as he heard his wife calling his name. What did the dumb bitch want now? It was bad enough that she picked a fight with him about each and every little thing, but she wouldn’t allow him to respond to her stupid arguments. So what if he drank too much and came rolling home drunk? She’d come rolling home drunk if she saw half the shit he had to see, as well as the looks people gave a collaborator when they thought one of the aliens wasn’t watching. And who cared if the fucking cooking club bitches had voted to throw Ginny out on her arse? Just because they didn’t want a collaborator’s wife…