Something smells of algae.
I frown, wrinkling my nose, a weak noise choking out my throat. Why did that hurt? Better yet, what even smells like algae in a place like this? We’re in Zar, I remember that much. And this place is all metal and glass. Unless I’m back in that strange drainage tunnel—but no, I left that place. I left and came back and fought with the siblings and nearly got my ass handed to me by Kel and a bunch of cyborgs who—
I fell.
Of course, something hurts, I hit the platform below, which is gonna leave some bruises, even for me. But no. That’s wrong too. Something is much worse. I can barely breathe, let alone move. My ears are ringing a monotonous tone of something I can’t manage to reach up and turn off. When I try to open my eyes, they hurt like hell, moving my eyelids nearly impossible.
Where did I fall? Where’s Bat? Surely, it’s only been a minute or two, or else he would’ve come looking for me by now. Where are Zane and Lalia? The princesses?
Gone, probably, reminds a little voice in the back of my head. Get ahold of yourself, Aaron.
I open my eyes then squeeze them shut when my stomach churns, threatening to betray me. A bright stab of light is all I catch.
I focus on counting my breaths. A deep one in and out. Another. And another. My body will grow accustomed to whatever damage I have, eventually. I tell myself so, but the throbbing continues. In fact, it’s traveling, the various extent of whatever damage I’ve done to myself making itself known. I’m fairly certain I can feel every implant in my head, and not in a good way. My ribs hurt, my muscles burning as if I were a mere human trying to scale a cliffside. Everything feels to be dipping and bowing even with my eyes closed and my body still and nearly lifeless. My arm hurts in a deep, bone-aching way, and I don’t even want to think about how oddly frail my skin feels. I must have fallen far.
Aren’t there supposed to be shields? Maybe all the commotion and breaking metal damaged whatever generators were powering them. I don’t know where I am, but if I fell onto one of them, there’d be a more electric, distinctly force-field type of scent to the air. I wouldn’t be having a hard time trying to figure out why it smells like I’m in an abandoned sewer.
If I fell all the way down, down past the levels of the city below and closer to the center of it, quite frankly I’m a little impressed with myself for being alive. I suppose Captain did a great job in that respect.
Maybe I’m as impossible to kill as a ForceZero number, I think a little giddily, realizing even as my head spins that I shouldn’t find that amusing. Something is very, very wrong, Aaron. You need to wake up and get up.
Maybe I should prefer being dead. At least I can feel everything. That means everything’s still in working order, even if too broken to be used properly.
Get up before more numbers find you and realize you weren’t just an innocent bystander to the whole ordeal.
I wonder what happened to the number that crashed into me. Fell onto a working shield perhaps. Or onto the roofs of one of the levels of houses below, unluckily for the residents.
Or maybe he’s laying here alongside me. It isn’t as if I would know. I need to open my eyes.
Carefully as possible, I do so. My left one—the side I’m lying on—feels odd and puffy, too swollen to fully open. My right is a little better. Momentarily, everything is a blinking white blanket of painful light, but it’s my eyes, not my actual surroundings. As they acclimate a bit, I’m given the cold blues of a chilly area, and a dark, moss-covered metal and stone tunnel of sorts. Weird. My ears are still humming at me, and I close my eyes again, barely able to focus on more than one thing at a time. My arms feel unmovable, though they certainly hurt enough I know I can move them. If I could only turn the stupid things off—
Something pokes my shoulder.
I rather undignified, startled noise comes out of me, accompanied by too much pain at the rather harmless touch, and I glare at whatever’s violating my space. If it were Bat, he’d be all over me by now.
An old woman stares at me. At least, I’m pretty certain it’s an old woman. The heat signature is correct for a human. And when my human vision decides not to be unbearably fuzzy, I think I see a wrinkled face and long, silver hair with a little blue in it.
For a moment, I think I’m imagining her, then she pokes me again, and I nearly panic before telling myself she isn’t a cyborg, don’t freak out, you’re not dead yet.
“Hey,” she says, in a heavy accent nothing like Cath’s but unfamiliar nonetheless. “You dead?”
“No,” I say, and the word feels like I’m dragging knives out of my throat. “Where…am I?”
“Below,” she says and grins. I’m not entirely certain she’s sane. Well, that makes two of us.
“Below?”
“Below.”
Helpful. I close my eyes again, trying to think about moving. You can do it, Aaron. Get a grip and do it. I cough, and it kills my insides. And I thought the city air in the upper levels was bad.
“What are you?” the woman’s asking me. Well, most people aren’t so blunt.
“A person,” I say a little bitterly. I’m obviously hurt and all she’s doing is poking me with…something. I crack an eye and see a cane in her hands. She’s spinning it with her fingers while she crouches near me. Her clothing is odd, thick, and multicolored. There are beads in some of the stitching. It’s kinda pretty. Either that or I hit my head hard enough to actually give me a concussion. Given how far I must’ve fallen, it seems likely enough.
Gathering as much logic as my brain can scramble, I ask, “How do I get back to one of the surface sectors?”
She makes a noise a bit like a snort. I stare at her, irritated at how heavy my body feels but rather frightened to try to force it to move.
“You don’t,” she says.
“I don’t?”
“You don’t.”
This is not going to be a helpful conversation. How do I interact with this lady for answers? My brain isn’t obeying my wishes. “You’re never been to the surface of Zar?”
“Nope,” she says cheerfully and pokes at a torn section of my arm with the end of her cane. If everything didn’t hurt so bad, I’d probably be annoyed.
I try not to let that fill me with despair. What she’s saying can’t be accurate, but I don’t know how I’m going to find my way out of here. What if Bat can’t ever find me? If the siblings are even looking, maybe they won’t be able to either. I can’t imagine Yvonne figuring this place out—worse, I’m not certain I’d want her to. I try to imagine her and her baby sister in these levels without me as protection and want to puke my guts up. My stomach churns as if reminded by the thought, and I swallow painfully until it eases.
My left arm hurts worse than my right, so I focus on getting my right to move, putting my hand on the flat, cold surface I’m lying on. It’s damp and unforgiving, and I realize for the first time how cold I am. Shivering hurts, and I try to loosen my jaw so I don’t clamp it and hurt my head. Carefully as possible, I push myself onto my back—I’m lucky I didn’t break my spine—a pitiful noise ripping out of my chest. I’d be embarrassed if I could focus enough to care. My eyes water, and I force myself not to cry. There’s no point in it, and it’ll only hurt worse.
“You break anything?” the old woman is asking me, casual. I wonder what kind of people this place grows—off their rocker and unbothered by everything, if this lady is any indication.
“Probably,” I say, nervous to feel around for broken bones. I don’t think I’ve ever quite hurt this much, even as my body is trying to tone it down, so I’m certain I must’ve broken something.
Better not be one of my legs. If I have a hope and prayer of finding my way out of here, I need to be able to at least limp along. Putting my hand to my belt, I find both my guns gone. Right, I dropped one in the first platform fall, the second probably when that female number decided to attack me for shooting her partner.
Which reminds me—
“Are there any cyborgs down here?” I ask, voice far away.
“Metal people,” the old woman hums, but I don’t know if that means yes or she’s just talking.
“Yeah, metal people. Are there any down here?”
“Yep.”
I open my eyes to try to look at her. “Where?”
She points at me. “There.”
I’m going to die down here.
“Anywhere else?”
She shrugs.
Closing my eyes, I take another set of long, deep breaths. I need to get out of here. I know Bat wouldn’t leave the city without me, even if the humans did. If I can get up, I can manage to get out of here. I need to get it together and move.
Breathing slowly, I put my arm under me and push myself up.
Something smells of algae.
I frown, wrinkling my nose, a weak noise choking out my throat. Why did that hurt? Better yet, what even smells like algae in a place like this? We’re in Zar, I remember that much. And this place is all metal and glass. Unless I’m back in that strange drainage tunnel—but no, I left that place. I left and came back and fought with the siblings and nearly got my ass handed to me by Kel and a bunch of cyborgs who—
I fell.
Of course, something hurts, I hit the platform below, which is gonna leave some bruises, even for me. But no. That’s wrong too. Something is much worse. I can barely breathe, let alone move. My ears are ringing a monotonous tone of something I can’t manage to reach up and turn off. When I try to open my eyes, they hurt like hell, moving my eyelids nearly impossible.
Where did I fall? Where’s Bat? Surely, it’s only been a minute or two, or else he would’ve come looking for me by now. Where are Zane and Lalia? The princesses?
Gone, probably, reminds a little voice in the back of my head. Get ahold of yourself, Aaron.
I open my eyes then squeeze them shut when my stomach churns, threatening to betray me. A bright stab of light is all I catch.
I focus on counting my breaths. A deep one in and out. Another. And another. My body will grow accustomed to whatever damage I have, eventually. I tell myself so, but the throbbing continues. In fact, it’s traveling, the various extent of whatever damage I’ve done to myself making itself known. I’m fairly certain I can feel every implant in my head, and not in a good way. My ribs hurt, my muscles burning as if I were a mere human trying to scale a cliffside. Everything feels to be dipping and bowing even with my eyes closed and my body still and nearly lifeless. My arm hurts in a deep, bone-aching way, and I don’t even want to think about how oddly frail my skin feels. I must have fallen far.
Aren’t there supposed to be shields? Maybe all the commotion and breaking metal damaged whatever generators were powering them. I don’t know where I am, but if I fell onto one of them, there’d be a more electric, distinctly force-field type of scent to the air. I wouldn’t be having a hard time trying to figure out why it smells like I’m in an abandoned sewer.
If I fell all the way down, down past the levels of the city below and closer to the center of it, quite frankly I’m a little impressed with myself for being alive. I suppose Captain did a great job in that respect.
Maybe I’m as impossible to kill as a ForceZero number, I think a little giddily, realizing even as my head spins that I shouldn’t find that amusing. Something is very, very wrong, Aaron. You need to wake up and get up.
Maybe I should prefer being dead. At least I can feel everything. That means everything’s still in working order, even if too broken to be used properly.
Get up before more numbers find you and realize you weren’t just an innocent bystander to the whole ordeal.
I wonder what happened to the number that crashed into me. Fell onto a working shield perhaps. Or onto the roofs of one of the levels of houses below, unluckily for the residents.
Or maybe he’s laying here alongside me. It isn’t as if I would know. I need to open my eyes.
Carefully as possible, I do so. My left one—the side I’m lying on—feels odd and puffy, too swollen to fully open. My right is a little better. Momentarily, everything is a blinking white blanket of painful light, but it’s my eyes, not my actual surroundings. As they acclimate a bit, I’m given the cold blues of a chilly area, and a dark, moss-covered metal and stone tunnel of sorts. Weird. My ears are still humming at me, and I close my eyes again, barely able to focus on more than one thing at a time. My arms feel unmovable, though they certainly hurt enough I know I can move them. If I could only turn the stupid things off—
Something pokes my shoulder.
I rather undignified, startled noise comes out of me, accompanied by too much pain at the rather harmless touch, and I glare at whatever’s violating my space. If it were Bat, he’d be all over me by now.
An old woman stares at me. At least, I’m pretty certain it’s an old woman. The heat signature is correct for a human. And when my human vision decides not to be unbearably fuzzy, I think I see a wrinkled face and long, silver hair with a little blue in it.
For a moment, I think I’m imagining her, then she pokes me again, and I nearly panic before telling myself she isn’t a cyborg, don’t freak out, you’re not dead yet.
“Hey,” she says, in a heavy accent nothing like Cath’s but unfamiliar nonetheless. “You dead?”
“No,” I say, and the word feels like I’m dragging knives out of my throat. “Where…am I?”
“Below,” she says and grins. I’m not entirely certain she’s sane. Well, that makes two of us.
“Below?”
“Below.”
Helpful. I close my eyes again, trying to think about moving. You can do it, Aaron. Get a grip and do it. I cough, and it kills my insides. And I thought the city air in the upper levels was bad.
“What are you?” the woman’s asking me. Well, most people aren’t so blunt.
“A person,” I say a little bitterly. I’m obviously hurt and all she’s doing is poking me with…something. I crack an eye and see a cane in her hands. She’s spinning it with her fingers while she crouches near me. Her clothing is odd, thick, and multicolored. There are beads in some of the stitching. It’s kinda pretty. Either that or I hit my head hard enough to actually give me a concussion. Given how far I must’ve fallen, it seems likely enough.
Gathering as much logic as my brain can scramble, I ask, “How do I get back to one of the surface sectors?”
She makes a noise a bit like a snort. I stare at her, irritated at how heavy my body feels but rather frightened to try to force it to move.
“You don’t,” she says.
“I don’t?”
“You don’t.”
This is not going to be a helpful conversation. How do I interact with this lady for answers? My brain isn’t obeying my wishes. “You’re never been to the surface of Zar?”
“Nope,” she says cheerfully and pokes at a torn section of my arm with the end of her cane. If everything didn’t hurt so bad, I’d probably be annoyed.
I try not to let that fill me with despair. What she’s saying can’t be accurate, but I don’t know how I’m going to find my way out of here. What if Bat can’t ever find me? If the siblings are even looking, maybe they won’t be able to either. I can’t imagine Yvonne figuring this place out—worse, I’m not certain I’d want her to. I try to imagine her and her baby sister in these levels without me as protection and want to puke my guts up. My stomach churns as if reminded by the thought, and I swallow painfully until it eases.
My left arm hurts worse than my right, so I focus on getting my right to move, putting my hand on the flat, cold surface I’m lying on. It’s damp and unforgiving, and I realize for the first time how cold I am. Shivering hurts, and I try to loosen my jaw so I don’t clamp it and hurt my head. Carefully as possible, I push myself onto my back—I’m lucky I didn’t break my spine—a pitiful noise ripping out of my chest. I’d be embarrassed if I could focus enough to care. My eyes water, and I force myself not to cry. There’s no point in it, and it’ll only hurt worse.
“You break anything?” the old woman is asking me, casual. I wonder what kind of people this place grows—off their rocker and unbothered by everything, if this lady is any indication.
“Probably,” I say, nervous to feel around for broken bones. I don’t think I’ve ever quite hurt this much, even as my body is trying to tone it down, so I’m certain I must’ve broken something.
Better not be one of my legs. If I have a hope and prayer of finding my way out of here, I need to be able to at least limp along. Putting my hand to my belt, I find both my guns gone. Right, I dropped one in the first platform fall, the second probably when that female number decided to attack me for shooting her partner.
Which reminds me—
“Are there any cyborgs down here?” I ask, voice far away.
“Metal people,” the old woman hums, but I don’t know if that means yes or she’s just talking.
“Yeah, metal people. Are there any down here?”
“Yep.”
I open my eyes to try to look at her. “Where?”
She points at me. “There.”
I’m going to die down here.
“Anywhere else?”
She shrugs.
Closing my eyes, I take another set of long, deep breaths. I need to get out of here. I know Bat wouldn’t leave the city without me, even if the humans did. If I can get up, I can manage to get out of here. I need to get it together and move.
Breathing slowly, I put my arm under me and push myself up.
