Fleeting Glimpse by David Gowey

Author:David Gowey
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: anthology, short stories, mormon, space opera, science fiction, colonization, terraforming, colony world

Against the Deluge

“Be careful in there,” Janse said as her brows furrowed slightly. “He almost killed two of the marines just getting him onboard.”

Lor Prennick was skeptical. The screen above him showed a slight, pale man secured so tightly, it was doubtful the prisoner could even inhale all the way.

“Not much he can do now,” he replied, and nodded back up at the image. Janse only sighed and keyed the door to open. Lor stepped through and took a seat opposite the bound man. Though Janse had given him a tablet with pertinent information on the subject, he didn’t really need to bring anything else inside with him. It wasn’t about what you read in these situations, but what you felt. Across the room, the prisoner leered at him with an otherwise blank face. The bald skin of his head bore the wrinkles of age—likely over a hundred years old—but no emotion marked those thin lips or gray eyes.

“My name’s Lor.” He didn’t produce a hand that his partner couldn’t shake, but instead just set the tablet next to his chair and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “I don’t know yours.”

“I haven’t given it,” the man said. His voice sounded like a release of steam, with deeper undertones. It unnerved Lor, as if it was artificial. Even after years as an exsen interpreter, he could still count on humans to surprise him in some new way.

“I’d appreciate it if we could get on a first-name basis. This will go a lot easier if we can see eye-to-eye on some things first.”

“The interrogation, you mean?” Still devoid of emotion, but not of insight. No one knew just how deep the Lennix Institute’s programming went, but Lor suspected that this was only the beginning. He would start off honest, then. One of the first lessons of empathetic interpretation was to never underestimate the value of even artificial rapport.

“You could call it that,” he said, and rested against the back of the chair. “That’s certainly what it’ll be if you don’t help me. The guys out there won’t be as nice.”

“It won’t work,” the Ark Keeper said. “You know this just as well as I.” Lor had had bluffs called before, and this one was no different. The truth was that the marines probably would rather just shoot the prisoner now for all the trouble he’d apparently caused them, if not for the information he carried. And as much as he hated to admit it, the man was right. With the typical forms of interrogation, there was no way that Lor had ever heard of to break Institute programming. Others had tried, and they’d all failed.

But Lor had an advantage that none of those others had possessed, and he knew of no one who’d ever been able to resist it before. Time to drop the act, or at least change its appearance.

“What I do know is that your Institute trains you to resist torture, and I don’t doubt their abilities or yours.

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