Captive of the Cardassians [still this universe]
They wrapped his head with something thick and soft, leaving him blind and deaf, and bound his hands in front of him with the same so that he could not feel. One of them held his arm; that was the sole indicator Julian had of his surroundings. He gritted his teeth. Sensory deprivation may have been standard treatment for Cardassian prisoners, but the Federation considered it torture.
He'd always fancied there was a sensation to being transported, a feeling to having one's atoms converted to energy and back again. It was only when the ground beneath his feet began to faintly vibrate that he realized he'd been beamed up to the Cardassian ship, and that the purported tangibility of transportation was only a figment of his imagination.
His captors shoved him roughly into a seat. He waited. Within his dark, silent world there was no hint as to the passage of time other than his own breaths. He concentrated on his respiration and the faint vibration from the ship's engines, trying to judge the oscillations of the warp core merely by the resonance of the unheard hum.
The first bump of atmospheric turbulence shocked a gasp out of him. The frequency of the vibrations shifted as the pilot presumably compensated for the stresses of reentry. The knot of anticipation in Julian's belly grew as the wavelength of the vibrations increased. It was with a curious mix of relief and dread that he noted the slight bump as the shuttle set down, then the vibrations abruptly ceased.
He flinched involuntarily as a hand grabbed his arm and jerked him to his feet. He was led out of the shuttle a short distance before stopping. There were no clues to his environment here; the ground was hard, but it could have as easily been street or an interior floor. He sniffed the air; there were no telltale odors, save a faint, neutral scent that he associated with Cardassians. That was no surprise; the hand of one of his captors was still on his arm.
From Julian's lack of perspective, every change was sudden, every event came with no warning. The hand on his arm was abruptly gone. He stood still, waiting for some hint of what was happening. His sense of time began to fade once more.
The next thing he felt was the last thing he expected. Someone touched his face--not a blow intended to hurt and humiliate him, but a shockingly gentle caress. He bit his tongue to keep from gasping aloud.
The light nearly blinded him as the wrappings were pulled from his head, and he found himself staring into a pair of unsettlingly familiar dark eyes.
"My dear doctor," said the handsome Cardassian with a smile, "welcome to Cardassia Prime."
He'd always fancied there was a sensation to being transported, a feeling to having one's atoms converted to energy and back again. It was only when the ground beneath his feet began to faintly vibrate that he realized he'd been beamed up to the Cardassian ship, and that the purported tangibility of transportation was only a figment of his imagination.
His captors shoved him roughly into a seat. He waited. Within his dark, silent world there was no hint as to the passage of time other than his own breaths. He concentrated on his respiration and the faint vibration from the ship's engines, trying to judge the oscillations of the warp core merely by the resonance of the unheard hum.
The first bump of atmospheric turbulence shocked a gasp out of him. The frequency of the vibrations shifted as the pilot presumably compensated for the stresses of reentry. The knot of anticipation in Julian's belly grew as the wavelength of the vibrations increased. It was with a curious mix of relief and dread that he noted the slight bump as the shuttle set down, then the vibrations abruptly ceased.
He flinched involuntarily as a hand grabbed his arm and jerked him to his feet. He was led out of the shuttle a short distance before stopping. There were no clues to his environment here; the ground was hard, but it could have as easily been street or an interior floor. He sniffed the air; there were no telltale odors, save a faint, neutral scent that he associated with Cardassians. That was no surprise; the hand of one of his captors was still on his arm.
From Julian's lack of perspective, every change was sudden, every event came with no warning. The hand on his arm was abruptly gone. He stood still, waiting for some hint of what was happening. His sense of time began to fade once more.
The next thing he felt was the last thing he expected. Someone touched his face--not a blow intended to hurt and humiliate him, but a shockingly gentle caress. He bit his tongue to keep from gasping aloud.
The light nearly blinded him as the wrappings were pulled from his head, and he found himself staring into a pair of unsettlingly familiar dark eyes.
"My dear doctor," said the handsome Cardassian with a smile, "welcome to Cardassia Prime."