Arc 1 - Chapter 19: A Break; Full of Despair

(Prominis 21, 58 / 4:03AM)

“Sweet Jesus…” Whispered David.

In a room, in the middle of the abandoned military complex, were the rest of the adults. Screens plastered on the stone walls, it showcased many areas along the downtown district, including the harsh holdout the candidates went through.

Seeing they had closed the gate, their silence boomed through the hardened walls. David, Jenny, Gwen, Benn, and Boris; all saw the calamity through a black and white screen.

‘Poor Fred…’ thought Gwen.

‘Damn…’ thought Benn.

‘Just … why?’ questioned Jerry.

“Wait, where’s Ryan…?” Softly whispered Jenny.

Boris had slumped himself on a chair, his eyes focused on his trembling hands. His knuckles pale, drenched in sweat, he thought he saw a reddish liquid paint on them, as if his mind was toying with him.

‘This is how it feels… to have blood on my hands …’ thought Boris.

All five adults glared at Boris, their faces twitching and fuming. Gwen took a step further, as she walked toward him with a clenched fist, her knuckles close to being snapped in half by her strength.

David and Benn held her back, their fingers gripping against her leather jacket with surging strength. Even though he held her anger back, David did as well, his eyelids twitching and reddened.

“I didn’t expect you out of all of them…”

“I’m the one that has blood on my hands.”

“We all have blood on our hands. Don’t you see?”

David glanced down at his own hands, seeing blisters and calluses shackling his knuckles. His tone already low, his throat grim yet gentle, his cheeks wrinkled as his eyelids twitched.

“You sold your soul, for a cheap promise while drunk … and the fruits of our labor, is what brought us to this.”

He remembered those countless exercises he forced upon those kids, remembering the sweat they excreted from their bodies. As he did this, he looked toward a nearby sword rank, his thoughts replacing his memories with one woman.

“I lost my daughters during the attack, and I sure as shit won’t let that brat die … I can’t…”

He thud his steps, while exiting out of the room through the door. Following him, the rest of the adults walked out, leaving just Boris and Gwen. He didn’t care if Gwen strangled him, but while he sulked, he let a ripple of electricity spazz across his mind.

“I know you want to strangle me… but … remember the note … the poem from days prior?”

“What about that damn poem…”

Gwen slowly trailed her steps toward him, until she towered over him with her shadow. Boris sweeped off a droplet of sweat near his left eye, once he began tilting his head up to her.

“If Luke knows the true meaning, then he’ll save everybody. You have faith in him, don’t you?”

________________________________________________________________________

(Prominis 21, 58 / 4:36AM)

The candidates all slumped on the floors or walls, stuck in a safe room brittled in darkness.

Enclosed in a storage room, their breaths painted the air a deadly humid, making the checkpoint turn into a mini sauna. Body odor plunging and the air, it was clear their bodies were utterly, and completely spent. No one talked, not even a whisper. Their heads either arched down or up, some of them still replayed that cruel memory bestowed on them. A memory of Gemma’s shrill cry for help.

Fred had curled himself like a ball, staring at a wall with wide eyes. Stan, Gary, Diego, nor Luke could bring him back to reality, glancing at him with rigid and shivering bodies. Their bodies were too weak, it was as if everyone was on the brink of despair.

—This is all my fault…

All because of a cruel domino effect.

Luke was away from everyone, sitting on a wooden crate with his right hand covering his right eye. With his side bang tickling his hand, he stared deeply into the stone floor, leaving Hope to glance at him. Pushing herself up, she walked over to Luke, the corners of her eyes withholding salted tears.

While Luke had his dry.

“It’s not your fault…”

He lifted his head, seeing her blue eyes shine through the dark. Looking, stalling, letting himself be swept up within her ocean pupils, he rubbed his hands, and looked down at them.

“None of this could’ve happened if I hadn’t tripped…”

“Tripped?

“One thing led to another … which makes me …”

“Luke!”

She raised her voice. Bending down so her face was close to his, she couldn’t see herself within his eyes, with the room still blanketing itself with darkness.

“You’re not a killer! You didn’t kill them! Those zompires got to them!”

“But what about—”

“He was killed by a zompire too!”

“W-What…? Just what are you saying…?”

Luke pushed himself off the crate, letting himself tower over her as his body felt heavy. His eyes filled with guilt, all of it plunged into his lower eyelids, leaving them to bag a dark purple. Everyone in the room was staring at the both of them. Even Luna, who hated the very idea of Luke giving attention to Hope, kept to herself.

“Because … because … because—”

“Wait a damn minute …”

Someone from the other side of the room stood up, making his way melancholically toward them. His head wobbling back and forth, his right hand carried a simple pistol. Having silver hair, and being a couple of inches taller than Luke, Luke quivered his throat.

“You think Luke is innocent? Why do you put so much faith in him, Hope?”

Fred stopped in front of the two of them, looking down at Luke’s soulless eyes and Hope’s watery eyes. The gun that he carried, creaking and shivering, allowed the metal to jump and jitter the more he put his strength on the grip.

“His actions caused Gemma to die, making her save my life while I couldn’t save hers. Ever since four years ago, I’ve felt like someone’s pulling the strings … hey Luke …?”

—He placed the barrel onto his left temple.—

“Am I lucky enough for this world?”

Their sulking ceased, once they jumped out of place. Running toward him, they faces shot up, their cheeks and foreheads growing white as—

“Stay Back!”

Fred put himself in a corner, his finger on the trigger as he watched nobody dare to make a move. The 10 candidates, excluding Cameron, raised and extended their hands toward the panic filled Fred, whose right hand shook violently.

“Fred, calm down!” Yelled Stan.

“Come on now … don’t be rash.” Whispered Gary.

“Don’t do it Fred.” Said Diego.

“Please no …” Said Luke, trailing his words. Luke placed himself in front of everybody, his hands shaking and trembling as water encapsulated his lower eyelids. “Don’t do this … I always cared—”

“Care?! You Care?! Tell that to Gemma! Tell that to Ryan!”

Their breaths got stuck within their throats, the silence loudening the stone walls and floor. Luke looked down, his palms sweaty and clammy as some eyes from around him pinned on him.

“I knew something happened to him, but I wanted to believe he was with the others. And when we were all charging towards the gate, sure enough, he was nowhere to be seen. Did we leave him behind? Did he chicken out and run? Tell them, Luke!”

“Fred…”

“Tell them now!”

All of their eyes were targeted at him like a pair of ghost eyes. His body, feeling rigid as cardboard, caused him to glance one by one at the candidates who stared at him. Closing his eyes shut, he shattered his words, dragging them out of their will.

“He helped me get back up after I tripped … and just as we were about to leave … Ryan … got blown up … at the same tile too …”

A collection of gasps stormed through their mouths, their eyes shell-shocked at the news Luke bargained from his lips.

—Please don’t forgive me…

Luke felt everyone’s eyes deepen into his soul, his heart burdened with regret and guilt. His legs wanted to move, his back wanted to hunch, yet he remained standing.

—Please … don’t—

“I don’t think I’m cursed…”

Everyone then turned their attention to Fred, as he still pointed the gun at his right temple. They remain silent, their lips sealed without any word or breath drawing out.

“You know what I think … I think you’re just too lucky Luke …”

He slowly pulled the barrel away from his temple, moving his hand with caution as he bent down to the ground. Placing the gun to the floor, he straightened his back, and kicked the gun toward Luke’s feet. Once the magazine clicked onto the tips of his boots, the barrel of it pointed toward Fred, causing Luke to push up his eyes.

“You have a choice to make Luke … either you shoot me …”

Fred stuck his pointer finger at Luke, his hand quaking intensely as he stared a rigid dagger at his best friend.

“Or you shoot yourself…”

Their lungs glassed their breaths, as Luke looked down at the handgun beside his foot, touching his boots. He didn’t move. His fingers didn’t flinch or twitch, leaving only his heart screaming at him to not lay a finger on the metal.

—Why me…?

“Don’t touch that gun.” Stan put a hand on Luke’s shoulder, with tears starting to roll down his face.

Upon instinct, Luna and Miles ran towards Fred, tackling him to the ground with force. Both of them gripping and pinning him hard, their teeth clenched, but not by frustration, but by pure nervousness.

“This conversation is over… Everyone!”

Stan took the stage, leading everyone to trace their eyes on the freckled elf. Using his right sleeve to swipe away specks of tears, he grilled his throat, and put his right arm high.

“This whole program! This everything … is done! We’ve been training for what, to be a zompire’s dinner?!”

Everyone’s bodies began to slowly loosen, except for Luke, Fred, Miles, and Luna. Nodding at his words, Stan looked at all the candidates around him, even at Fred who tried to pry himself out.

“I say we go backward! We go backward so fast that we may have a shot of escaping!”

Selling out a dream, Stan managed to woo the candidates over, his speech trying to turn the tide of despair. Looking at Luke, he softly whispered to him, his tone relaxed and reassuring.

“Come on Luke … let’s go home…”

Leaving Luke to stand in front of Luna, Miles and Fred, Stan and everyone else headed toward the door they entered through. Luke looked at the gun at his feet. Hope being nearby, she was nervous as Luke kept on looking at the gun intensely, his eyes not losing focus.

“Luke … hey Luke …?”

She placed her hand onto his shoulder, tugging him gently to lose his focus intentionally.

“Are you going to follow Stan?”

He reached for the gun, picking it up with an iron grip along the metal. Having his pointer finger on the side, he only took a couple of steps forward, so he faced Luna and Miles who held Fred down. All three of them focused on the gun…

—Luke pointed the gun at Fred.—

““LUKE!!””

“WAIT!! WAIT!! WAIT!!”

“Don’t!”

And then turned the barrel so it pointed at a brick wall, a wall where Fred had cornered himself prior.

—In a forest of dead bricks.

Moving his finger toward the trigger, his fingertip caressed the silver lining of the black paint.

—Take the tunnel to see a cool trick.

And he pulled the trigger, rippling the wall with small bullets.

Bombarding everyone’s ears with pulsating gunshots, everyone turned to look at Luke, seeing the jumping light from the barrel. Finishing every last bit of ammo within the mag, smoke plumed from the barrel.

Luke threw the gun toward Fred, who was still trapped underneath.

“What are you doing?!” Yelled Stan.

Stan grabbed a hold of Luke’s collar, his fingers on the verge of ripping out pieces of the leather.

“Look over there!”

“Why? Just what the hell are you thinking of this time?”

Someone pushed down the old brick wall…

With little to no ease, the person—or rather the horse-human, saw a bright light coming from the other side of the wall.

“Cameron?” Said Stan.

Their eyes were directed to the light, leaving Stan to let go of Luke’s collar. Miles and Luna, who soon released Fred from their body weight, hovered over him like a pair of eagles.

Cameron remained silent, glancing at every candidate, his red eyes healing from the breakdown he had a couple of hours ago.

Once they all walked through the tunnel, the scenery changed from stone to metal. And from dark to light, the walls and floors are sparkling clean, devoid of any rust or dust. The more they walked, the closer they got to a white wooden door…

Stan noticed that the door wasn’t budging, as he tried to push or pry the handle hard.

‘Guess we’ll have to break down the door…’ thought Stan.

“Miles and Luna, I’m going to need your strength.”

The three of them rolled up their sleeves, showing off their muscular triceps. Taking several steps back, readied their stances, they pushed the tips of their toes off the ground to charge.

“““AAARRRGGHH!!”””

Not only did it open, but the entirety of the doorframe fell, since both of them managed to somehow pry its screws loose. Dust clouded their nostrils and eyes, forcing them to cough and gag as they pinched their noses.

Swaying away the dust with their hands, it started to clear off.

“Is this … an armory?” Questioned Luke.

“No … this is a miracle…” Said Stan.

All around the room were weapons. Assault rifles, RPGs, Sniper rifles, shotguns, hand grenades, ammunition, smoke grenades, flashbangs, handguns, etc. Everyone glanced around the room, letting their eyes sparkle and twinkled with the sudden flames beneath their hearts.

“Everyone stock up! Choose whatever weapon that may suit you best!”

Everyone started to pick their preferred weapons, ones that suited their fighting style best.

Luna took out two twin blades swords from one of the sword racks, the silver lining gleaming under the artificial light from above. Similar to Luna, Miles preferred close combat, as he carried dual wielding sawed off shotguns from the shotgun rack.

In the rifle rack, both Sean and Stan looked through thoroughly, as Stan stuck to the basic AK. Meanwhile, Sean had a classy side to him, leaving him to choose the Thompson gun with a circular magazine near the trigger. Same as Sean, Cameron took out another Thompson from the rack, his hands smoothing out the metal.

Then there was the RPG and Sniper rifle rack. Without thinking, Jack carried a long barreled rifle with both his hands, cuddling it like a baby. All the while Loraine got her small hands chock full with a large RPG.

Yep, the youngest candidate was wielding the largest gun.

Finally pinning the camera to the handgun rack, both Diego and Gary took out two simple guns. Gary being more of a pistol person, Diego took fond of the spinning magazine of the revolver he adopted. And similar to Gary, Hope picked out a pistol, a pistol that looked engraved and used for war and combat.

The very last two were Fred and Luke. Fred kept his hands in his pockets, not wanting to touch any gun that he saw.

“I don’t think I should touch any gun…”

“Fred…”

“What if … What if I—”

“Fred!”

Raising his voice, he grabbed Fred’s collar, making him look directly into his eyes. His grip on him firm, Luke pulled him in, his face inches away from his.

“You made a promise with Gemma, right? What type of vow did you propose to her?”

Fred wanted to slump down, wobbling his legs as his knees wished for the marbled floor below. Feeling pins and needles flickering the soles of his feet, he quivered his throat.

“She … wanted to spend the rest of her life with me … I wanted to make it happen … but she …”

Tears strolled down from the corners of his eyes. As marks formed along his cheeks, Luke let go of Fred’s collar, making him move his hands to Fred’s shoulders.

“Why did she … Why did she have to …”

“Fred…”

Luke wrapped his arms around him, giving him the same hug when they first reunited. Fred’s arms were too surprised by this sudden action, as he had them motionless along his sides.

“She wanted you to stay alive … can’t you understand that?”

Luke’s voice started to crack, as his arms started to tighten Fred’s back. Unwilling to look each other within their eyes, Luke had a couple of tears starting to drip on Fred’s shoulder.

“Have you ever gone through that before?”

“I have.”

“And … you still carry onward?”

“I don’t have a choice Fred, neither of us have.”

“… Do you still miss your mom?”

His hug loosened, making him remember the last conversation he had with her. Her speech to carry on, trying his hardest to live for her sake, throughout everything he went through … he was still breathing.

And he’ll do so.

—“Yeah … all the time …”—

________________________________________________________________________

(Prominis 21, 58 / 4:59PM)

“Come to think of it … what I said was pretty dumb …”

“How so?” Said Diego.

The boys huddled in a group, Stan looked at his friends and toward Miles, Jack, and Sean. Unclogging his throat, Stan folded his arms as he leaned on the stone wall.

“If we did leave the city, then how would we make it out of Ticia alive?”

“Yeah, thankfully we didn’t do that…” Said Jack.

“But hey! We just gotta do nothing for an hour, I mean … it’s better this way—” Said Sean, before he was interrupted by …

“Who says we’re staying here?” By Luke.

Luke carried dual-wielding uzis, with a belt that contained many ammo and magazines as well as a holster. He was looked upon with awe, with many of the candidates gleaming their eyes at Luke’s profound coolness. Even though Luke walked timidly.

“Don’t tell me you want to try your luck out there…”

“Stan, think about this … We’re fully loaded with our preferred weapons and you want to tuck tail and run?”

“I … damn.”

Stan looked away from Luke, letting his eyes sink deep into the stone floor. Seeing Stan push down his face, Luke turned his attention to Sean, who placed his rifle along his right shoulder.

“Dual-wielding uzis?”

“Better than some run-down submachine gun.”

“Hey! This gun is a classic!”

“Shut up Sean.” Said Luna.

“Come on guys, break it up.”

Fred carried a long wired yo-yo, with razor blades attached to the metallic string. Having both of his hands occupy each yo-yo, the wire drenched deep into the holding cell.

“I can’t believe I’m using Gemma’s razor blade wires for this…”

“She would’ve loved it.”

Hope wielded her combat pistol with her right hand, while occupying her back with a large backpack. Chock full of medical supplies, she pushed up a small smile.

“Hope’s right. Are you sure you’re ready Fred?”

“Suffering builds character I guess.”

All eleven candidates were behind Luke. Turning around to face them, he gave them a salute.

Balling his right fist, he thumped the left side of his chest two times, before gliding his hand straight across. Stopping at the right side of his chest, he kept it balled; as he successfully performed The Dark Angel salute.

Everyone did in return.

Luke put his right uzi onto his holster, as he moved his hand into his jacket pocket. Taking out a piece of white crystal, he held it up high, leaving everyone to tilt their heads and furrow their brows. Except for Fred, Stan, Gary, and Diego.

“Is that fulminated mercury?” Questioned Fred.

“Yeah… Everyone, stand behind me to form a line!”

All of them stood behind Luke, forming a single file line. Luke, being the forefront of the group, kept his eyes glued to the metal door. A door which leads to the third stage.

“So … what’s the plan?” Questioned Stan.

“There is no plan.”

Luke began rubbing the tip of the crystal, and slid his right foot so his body weight pressured into his toes. Ready to throw, he felt his eyes block off any distractions, limiting the ability to use his peripheral vision.

“Wait, hold on! The blast would throw a bunch of metal shrapnel at us!” Said Fred.

Everyone began to startle, murmuring and gossiping loud enough for Luke to break focus. Turning back, he pushed up a smug smirk.

“Don’t worry, that’s why I have everyone behind me. Like you said, Fred.”

He threw the crystal straight toward the door, seeing the fulminated mercury soar in slow motion. Everyone stopped their gossip, once the crystal slammed onto the metallic door.

——I’m too lucky…—

The door broke free.

In less than a millisecond, a mighty shockwave rippled through their bodies, numbing their muscles and blood. The metal shrapnel, which flew in all directions, barely grazed the strands of their clothes or hair. Leaving them to admire the bountiful sight, they felt their stomachs, chest, legs; everything within their body; squeeze.

With the dust clearing off, they all thrust themselves into …

“Charge!”

The last stage.