Free Captive Surrender by Linda Mooney

Carefully, she kept them covered and in the dark. Otherwise the telltale sparkle at her forehead would be a dead giveaway to the Kronners. That, and her reaction to the unimaginable pain that would follow soon after.
    The Voice laughed. “When are you going to learn it’s futile to deny me? To be brutally honest, I’m getting tired of this. I’m not going to banter back and forth anymore with you. If that’s your final word—”
    “This is coming to a halt. All of it. Right now,” she told him with as much finality as she could muster.
    “Mincred!”
    A Kronner at the end of the line came to sudden attention. “Yes, Vol Brod!”
    Maurra’s breath caught in her throat. At the same time, a deep heat flushed her face. “Vol Brod?” She made eye contract with the lens of the closest vid camera and refused to turn away. “Tramer Vol Brod? Why aren’t you still rotting in the K’ro Kriall penal colony? Listen to me, Vol Brod. We’re not doing your sick bidding any longer. And now that I know you’re the evil fuck behind all this, I am officially putting a bounty on your head.”
    “Go ahead and try, JoJo. You’re still my prisoner, and your next lover won’t need me to order him to fuck you. Mincred, kill the Ellinod! Now! ”
    The Kronner paused, his face pale at the unexpected order. This part of the show apparently had not been planned or rehearsed. The alien set his neuron ray to black.
    “I said now, you worthless piece of kruart shit!”
    Nervously, the leader advanced toward the cell and pointed his gun directly at the Ellinod’s head. He’d moved closer to make certain he’d hit the huge beast and not her. Maurra took a step sideways to put herself directly in front of Safan. It was a futile gesture since he towered behind her, but she didn’t do it as much to protect him as she did to give herself unrestricted access to the others in the hold.
    “Good try, Maurra,” Vol Brod chuckled, using her real name for the first time. “Say goodbye to your lover.”
    Behind her she could tell the Ellinod was steeling himself. Two one-hundredths of a second. That’s all I need. Less than two one-hundredths of a second.
    She would not know the Kronners had dropped the invisible wall until Mincred fired. That meant she had to second-guess the alien. In two one-hundredths of a second, she could fire her powers. Maurra prayed she was accurate, that she’d survive and that both she and Safan would be able to escape. Otherwise…
    She saw the barely perceptible movement of the Kronner’s hand on the weapon. With a snarl, she opened herself up, letting her considerable psionic powers blaze through every cell in her body as she directed them forward in one final explosion of energy.
    The agony tore through her brain seized every organ in her body and stopped her heart.
    Time and the present ceased to be.

Chapter Fifteen
     
    Consciousness.
    She couldn’t move. Her hands wouldn’t obey. Neither would her legs. Or her eyes. She was breathing, but beyond that nothing else existed. Everything was black. Still. Quiet. Or maybe her ears had stopped working too.
    Blank. Silence except for the sound of her lungs taking in air. Working automatically. She could hear.
    She was breathing. Or rather, something was breathing for her. It was hard to tell.
    The pain was gone, but the damage remained. She couldn’t think. It was impossible to think, so she chose not to.
    It was easier to slide back into the comforting blackness.
     
     
    Voices. More than one. She couldn’t identify them. It hurt too much to try.
    “I don’t have that kind of facility or the training, Orgoran. I wish I did. Gods in the heavens, I wish I did.”
    “She’s dying. Her brain is shutting down sections at a time. Isn’t there something you can do?”
    That last voice was familiar. It sounded like soft gravel.
    “I can put her in a stasis tube. It will at least help keep her body alive until you can find help.”
    “I’ll be forever