Lost in the Dark

Written for the Spooktober23 prompt "Helpless"

Astraesto    Events/Challenges    Spooktober 2023      Lost in the Dark

They were clear in their convictions. All of them. Hours and then days of pain forced no betrayal. The men of pain always seemed... surprised, after what they had done. Surprised of what, I hadn't the faintest clue, surely they knew torture doesn't do a thing, save get someone to tell you what you want to be told. The only thing that surprised me was that they existed at all, though, given the circumstances, I don't begrudge Black.
I'm sure Envis feels safer, knowing its attackers are safe and secure, locked in a box in a desolate wasteland, their every waking moment one of pain. Though God knows it doesn't make up for a million dead. One of the torturers is Navy, no doubt feels some level of guilt, doubt it justifies what he's doing in there, behind closed doors. I hear the screams, I try not to think about it. Thinking about it only hurts me.
The commander wants us to move them, all of them, about 20 in all. Only about double that in guards but we made do. I walk with the one I'm assigned to, slowly, desperate to avoid any eye contact, fearful even. Yet it was impossible to miss. A single wry look, into the eyes of a man that was no longer all there. His face - destroyed as it was, was nothing against that endless stare. My stomach is saved only by our arrival at our destination.
A single ship at a solitary spacepad, its silvery paint the only clue to its allegiance. Any emblem was long scrubbed away, its parts clearly built from a number of manufacturers. It hardly looked suitable for atmosphere, let alone interstellar travel, though its faster-than-light core, and outward engines, betrayed that capability. It was big though, far larger than any prisoner transport I had been on.
The prisoners entered one by one, each looked over by an ominous figure, tall and thin like the figure of death itself. His hands swiping over documents, and then the items of the prisoners. He appeared to be in search, of what I had not the faintest idea, and he never seemed to find it, even as he reached the end of the line, even as he reached me and my prisoner. I watched as minutes passed, his search was quiet and driven, eventually he turned to me, and gave but the slightest nod of his narrow head.
Most guards returned to their posts, those of us who remained? As the commander put it, we had the esteemed role of continuing our watch. I entered the ship, observing those of us who remained, observing the prisoners - grim and broken as they were.
What happened next was quick, the ship travelled into the void of space, far enough that the lights of stars no longer reached it. A single window in the cargo hold glimpsed into that endless abyss. The guards were restless, the thin man and those he brought with him were attentive but, at ease. They knew something we didn't.
It wasn't long before they moved, the thin man first. The prisoners were ordered into another part of the ship, another cargo hold it seemed like to me, though completely and utterly empty. The guards and I also moved to it, though another man, far larger than the thin man though sharing his dark demeanour stopped us. He said no words, but we listened, confused as we were.
The thin man returned, the prisoners absent. He mumbled into his communicator, and the ship moved, a grinding sound, and then nothing. Something felt different, I could feel the engines firing, the swift acceleration of the ship, but as I glimpsed out the single window of the cargo hold, I saw something.
A crate, a box, no bigger than the cargo hold in which I stood in now. It was soon out of sight, out of mind. There convictions, they took them to the grave. They are now nothing but a haunting memory.

Context

FNV Porter Hijacking & Attacks

Liam Black