Chapter 2 - The Gang in the Crater

Almost every time August fell asleep, he would have the same dream.

A vicious but silent war of steel fought on dusty colorless plains where no one could have their feet on the ground for long. The only sounds that could be heard during the chaos of jumping from debris to debris were the dying screams of men transmitted through a faulty radio. And though in the dream he was in a metal suit that protected him, he felt nothing but imprisonment on his flesh and soul.

But always at the end of the dream was a human touch. A hand warm with affection. The sensation of care and safety.

"Don't be afraid…" The feminine voice would speak to him. And in that instance, serenity and peace would envelop his mindscape, wiping away the terror of war.

"Don't be afraid."

…

"Don't be afraid!"

August awoke to an unfamiliar ceiling. In front of him was a girl and a younger boy arguing just outside of the room in front of the doorway.

"Come on. Don't be afraid!" the girl said as he pulled on the arm of the boy. "He's not gonna wake up!"

"I don't want to! He's scary!" the young one cried. "Alex said you're supposed to be the one watching him! Not me!"

"But I gotta take a piss!"

"Then ask somebody else!"

"But you're right here!"

"You're gonna wake him up if you keep shouting like tha—" The young boy stopped mid sentence as he noticed that August had been staring at them the whole time. There was pure fear in his eyes as he ran out of sight.

The girl noticed this, though instead of running like the other kid did, she calmly waved at August. "Hey. You're finally awake."

"Where am I?" August asked as he rubbed his finger on the bandaid across his cheek, covering the cut he got last night.

The room had smoothed out but unpainted concrete walls. The morning light simply poured in through the glassless barred window. August's bed had a slightly rusted steel frame and a rather tightly packed mattress. His pillow was not one that was filled with either feathers or cotton, but simply a number of clean rags and unused clothes packed tightly under a cloth. The ceiling fan above his head did not seem to be functional. There wasn't even much of a "ceiling" as there was just a plain steel roof over them. The clock over the doorway was also not working as it was frozen at 3:19.

Clearly, this wasn't any kind of clinic or hospital. Nor was it any sort of dorm in a factory as that would be even smaller and cruder. And surely, a regular home's bedroom would look better than this?

It wasn't a setting he was familiar with waking up to, but a comfortable one nonetheless.

"I would tell you," the girl in front of him replied. She sat down on a metal chair in the corner. "But the boss said he would like to be the one to explain it to you."

"The boss?"

"Yeah. Right now he's just dealing with something downstairs."

August's mind was still in the process of waking up but his senses were starting to come back to him. And he realized that he was vulnerable and still in an unfamiliar place with a stranger. Boss, she said? At the moment he seemed to be under the custody of some sort of group, and he wasn't quite sure he could trust them. The thought of not being aware or having control over his situation started to make his heart race.

And now that he's thought about it, the girl sitting in front of him with her arms crossed didn't seem to be just the usual harmless soft girl in the city. The sleeveless white shirt she was wearing revealed an X-marked scar on her upper right arm. And though she had a slender build, her arms had muscle to them. The calm but serious look in her eyes and the shoulder-length hair that seemed to be hastily cut with a knife. He was almost deceived by the cleanliness of her hair and face, but this girl was definitely raised in the streets. And not just begging for scraps, but fighting for them.

"Who are you?" August asked.

"Hm? Oh, I'm Ashley. And your name was, uh, August, right?"

"No. I mean," he said in a more serious tone. "Who are you people? What do you want with me?"

"Calm down."

"And how do you know my name?" He threw the blanket away from him as he stood up from the bed.

Ashley stood up in response and showed her palms to August. "Calm down. Nobody's going to hurt you."

"Somebody's getting hurt if I'm not getting any answers."

Step. Step. Step.

Footsteps from outside of the room diverted August's attention. Another person was coming in. Who was it going to be? The kid from earlier? Another girl? A large man? August was still too weak in his arms and legs to put up a real fight.

"Oh, you're awake now."

It was the boy that August met that night. The boy who left him in the city. It was Alexander. August stood frozen as he couldn't believe he would see him again.

"Did you get any good sleep?" he continued, putting down a small box on a metal table in the room.

"Ashley, put down that steel bar. You'll provoke our guest," Alexander said, pointing to the weapon she was hiding behind her back.

"...I'm sorry."

After a moment of hesitation, she put her head down as she dropped the bar to the rough concrete floor.

In an instance, August dashed through the room, grabbed Alexander by the collar of his polo shirt, and pushed him to the wall. "Where the hell did you go last night?" he said in an angry whisper.

Ashley was about to step in but Alexander raised a hand at her.

"Ashely, put it down," he said.

"But—"

"Put it down."

For a second time, Ashley put down her weapon.

"Hey, I'm talking to you!" August shook Alexander. "You led me into the middle of the city and disappeared. You have any idea what I went through!? You made me walk through the damn city when I was dead tired!"

There was a fire in August's eyes. A raging flame in his voice. Alexander, on the other hand, maintained his composure as if his life wasn't being threatened.

"You're right. I apologize. It was foolish… No, idiotic of me to make you walk that far, when it had already been the end of a rough day for you. I overlooked the fact that you may have been fatigued as the rumors had always spoken of a boy who was inhumanly relentless and inexhaustible."

"Rumors?"

"Yes. You're quite famous even here on the crater side of Crescentia. The Phantom of the Alleyways, they would call you, because you would always disappear into the maze of Crescentia's alleys as you leave behind a pile of unconscious bodies, some dead even."

August loosened his grip as he thought about what Alexander had told him. The Phantom of the Alleyways? He had never imagined such a reputation. And where did he say they were? The crater side? All the way to the other side of the capsule city?

"So what does that have to do with me? Why did you make me walk that far?"

"Well, you see. I had started looking for you ever since the morning. I kept searching and searching, I ended up walking quite far from my mode of transportation."

"But why? Why were you looking for me?"

"I told you last night, didn't I? I wanted a little companionship," Alexander replied with a gentle smile on his face.

"Hmph." August released him from his grip. It didn't seem like anything Alexander said was far from any truth. Or at least at the moment, he had a very convincing smile.

Grumble.

A loud roar from August's stomach resounded through the whole room. It had still been four days since he had a proper meal.

"Oh, I'm terribly sorry again," Alexander said. "I had forgotten you were starving. Come. Follow me downstairs, there is quite a banquet being prepared. And there is more of that delicious bread you love downstairs."

Before Ashley followed Alexander out the door, she furrowed her eyebrows at August as she gave him a deep stare of distrust.

August took one last look at the room. A moment of hesitation before following the two strangers out of the room. He was quite surprised to see that outside of his room was a hallway filled with doors to several other rooms, possibly similar to his. It got him thinking just how many other people could be living in this building; how many other people were associated with Alexander. And even stranger to him, the walls of the hallway were also an unpainted lifeless surface. He didn't have much time to think about this however, as his stomach roared louder.

August stepped foot in a busy dining room that was also part kitchen. There were a total of nine kids, including August. In the room was a long dining table made of metal. Everyone in the room had their hands full performing some sort of task, like arranging the table or cooking food. Alexander was placing down plates on the metal table. Ashley was carrying a large bowl of hot soup to the center of the table. The only one who wasn't doing anything was the kid from earlier who argued with Ashley. Right now, he was sitting eagerly and comfortably at the farside of the table.

"Oh, please, take a seat over there," Alexander said to August as he pointed at an empty seat. It was at one farside of the table opposite to the kid sitting down. But between the two of them, August was the one who looked like a child the most as he excitedly watched the food get prepared.

A few minutes later, the table was finally set and everyone had settled down and took a seat. Quite a banquet was before August's eyes. It was unbelievable. This was the most amount of food August had ever seen in one place. A platter filled with chicken, a bowl of soup, a large plate piled with bread, two whole pitchers of water. There was more food in this room than he has had in the past month. And it was freshly cooked and ready, something that August hadn't experienced in the last few years.

"Wow" were the only words to escape from August's lips. His eyes sparkled. His mouth wide open. But how much longer was it going to be until he can finally have a bite?

"Here," Alexander said as he put a plate in front of August. On it was a large chicken leg and two pieces of bread. "You can dig in. No need to be—"

August couldn't handle it any longer. He took the large chicken leg with both of his hands and munched on it like a rabid animal.

"...reserved." Alexander hadn't even finished his sentence.

"Jeez. It's like the kid hasn't eaten in days."

"Well, that is because he has not eaten in days," Alexander replied. "But this can also be attributed to your fine cooking, Bobby. Good work as always."

Bobby chuckled. "Hey, I just do what I'm good at."

"So is this the guy you've been looking for?" a boy who had a scar across his left cheek commented. "He looks like a dog. You didn't tell us you were looking for a pet."

"Reydan, you are talking about a boy who single-handedly took down a patrol-bot with a trash can lid last night. It would be wise to pay careful attention to your next words."

Everyone's heads turned. Gasps and murmurs were heard all around.

"What did you say?" Ashley was bewildered. "He… He took down a patrol-bot?"

"That's impossible!" exclaimed Reydan. "Did you even see it with your own eyes?"

"No."

"Then it's another rumor—"

"Jimmy saw it," Alexander continued, pointing his thumb at the far-end of the table.

Everyone's eyes turned to the little boy. He had been so busy trying to tear apart the chicken on his plate with a fork and spoon, he had not noticed all the attention he was suddenly given.

"Jimmy, is it true?" Reydan stood and called out to the boy. "Did you really see this dog beat one of those damn rat-killing towers?"

"Huh?" He had finally noticed that everyone's eyes were glued to him. "Y- Yeah… He was, like, jumping all around and stuff dodging the electric tentacles. And then he took a trash can cover and ran on the wall and then he killed it."

The group sat in silence for a moment, except Alexander and August who continued to eat.

"That's not possible…" Reydan scratched his head.

"Jimmy doesn't lie," Ashley said.

"And even if he were to lie," Alexander stated. "There is no mistaking that August was found next to a destroyed patrol-bot. Who else could have destroyed it? Surely, not the citizens of Crescentia."

At that moment, everyone had come to the agreement that August indeed was the boy from the rumors. The boy who would leave a trail of unconscious bodies. The boy who would disappear into the darkness after raiding a stall.

When August finally finished his meal, he stood up and asked Alexander just where exactly they were. Alexander merely said nothing as he and Ashley led him outside the door. As he was led outside, August could only gasp as he realized just where he was.

He was in the crater side of Crescentia.

He has only ever heard of Crescentia's crater side. It was a lot bigger than he ever imagined. And he could see that it really was a crammed town as the rumors had said. Rows upon rows of colorless concrete buildings all around this ginormous hole on the moon. There wasn't even the slightest sense of uniformity as the buildings seemed to be competing against each other to be taller, wider, bigger. Some stuck out like sore thumbs, others joined the sea of insignificant buildings.

Unlike the perfect city designs, the buildings in Crater Town had all kinds of quirky accessories attached to them. Clotheslines, steel barred windows, spray paint vandalism, vague and poorly put together pieces of technology, and the occasional children or artificial animals running through the concrete mazes.

What stood out the most though was the sophisticated tall metal structure in the middle that almost dwarfed everything else. August pointed at it and asked but Alexander himself didn't know much about it either, only that it was guarded by highly armed dangerous robots that stood all around it like statues. They only guard the structure though, they would not lift a finger if a citizen was literally in front of them being murdered.

This was the neglected pit of poverty that the proud Crescentia had been hiding. An infrastructural mess that was hiding something in the center.

"Don't look so intimidated," Alexander said, as he gazed upon the town. "You'll find that it is easier to live here than over there."