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For a moment Ka was almost too confused to be afraid. She fought the onset desire to cry as soon as her eyes stung and her throat became tight, but still she let the horror sink in: the freezer door was shut behind her. He had shut her in there, in that loud freezing mechanical room that she hated.
In a second's time since the door had closed, the compressor kicked on to restore temperature. The fans' speed rose to a roar, sending blistering wind howling through every crevice and canyon in the frozen stockroom. She sank to a crouch, hiding her face in her arms, becoming small and making her own darkness so not to see the terrible reality that awaited if the lights suddenly went out. In all the chaos and movement of the frigid cacauphony, she shrieked at the floor, holding her ears and clenching her eyes shut as hard as she could. The cold began to sting. Every day that she had worked at the store, Ka had heard this from outside of the freezer whenever she left it. She knew it was only eight or ten seconds. She remembered what it sounded like from the happy, warm backroom; the rumble of the wind and motors, the creaking ice and metal, the eerie whistling of the air pressure changing. All safe and distant, muffled through the heavy insulated door. She used to think of how horrible it would be to be trapped in there for the full fury it. That was now; it made the short time an aeon as she tortured herself with the pity and irony of it. The blowers died down with a slow groan, leaving nothing but the idling fans and clicking and cracking of everything frozen. Ka was holding her breath as she opened her eyes to the floor-- that she could still plainly see in the incandescent light from overhead. With a single sob, she released her face from the safety of her forearms. Her mouth was making short, nervous clouds of white as she picked her head up and looked around. Now that the horror was over, she desperately wished that something was truly wrong only for the satisfaction that she hadn't just had a mental breakdown over something routine or protocol to an inspection. Unfortunately, that seemed an unlikely reality. Nothing felt normal. In fact, there was the distinct presence of something dreadful afoot. No psychic herself, Ka began to worry why the feeling was so clear and profound. She tried to stand nervously. It wasn't so much that she felt paralyzed, as her mind refused to let her control the twitching eager muscles in her legs. She had an involuntary urgency to stay exactly how she was, where she was. The communicational link between her brain and body simply refused to engage the two, as if her judgment to move was reckless or destructive; it felt much like the experience of standing on a high ledge or roadside, and entertaining the notion to jump. An action that was entirely possible in healthy extremities would not happen, she realized, as she told herself over and over to do it and remained on the floor. She wondered if maybe it was fear paralysis, for she knew she could stand, should stand, and it was endangering her to do nothing to protect herself. It became clear that this motor intervention, however familiar from experience as her own, was in this case an outside influence. The deja-vu of lost memory accounted for the symptoms that began to manifest themselves in her. Her ears rang slightly and her heart fluttered as if tired-- or compressed. Her mouth tasted numb and metallic, like experiencing an electrical shock, she compared it; though it wasn't quite prickly. Oddly, there was no real pain, only the feeling of restlessness, rendered by the twitching lack of cooperation in her over-energized limbs. She heard footsteps again, confirming the final concern: the marshal was still there. Or more accurately... there never was a marshal. The realization of his familiarity sank into place, weighty and final like the capping slab on a stone crypt. Worse, it was the second time she had fallen for it. She swallowed hard with dread. His face and voice, the strange thoughts, they'd been inplaceably significant but not quite familiar until now. This crushing feeling around her heart and severed motor skills weren't new, either. Frantic memories reeled through her brain in snowy, staticky rewind and fast-forward as each detail pertaining to that uneasy night in her apartment led to the recollection of another. The block of lost time after she had assumedly blacked out was coming together. It all explained the burning unrest she had felt in the days following what, in all actuality, would have been just a routine "bringing home a bar guy" night. "Eugh..." Comically, she repulsed a little at that idea itself, wondering what was wrong with her. But she could deal with her own deteriorated self standards if she survived the day. She had to focus while there was still precious, hopeful quiet, she had only wasted several seconds processing the situation since the door closed, and she wasn't sure if any may have been her last. She wouldn't have it. Slowly, with every ounce of her will along with her new understanding, she overcame just enough of the communication halt between her brain and body-- or it laxed a little, and while still crouched, she shuffled one foot slowly, quietly out to the side, pulling her body after it. There was small movement behind her that stopped suddenly. She stopped in concert with it, to listen, hearing silence. Then once more, she inched away from the corner of the stack she hid behind toward the safety of its interior, trying anything to break the reception of the strange radiation she'd come to understand as this particular ascellus' primary method of subjugation. She tried to move again, but her strength congealed to a sludge and soon she seized as if frozen; he must have heard her move-- or maybe he simply knew? Though motionless her whole body still fought, which felt very different from the first sense of simply not being able to convince herself to move. She wasn't being allowed to. The exertion became unbearable as her muscles ran out of oxygen and began to operate desperately, pouring acid into her bloodstream with each straining heartbeat. If she let go of the struggle, however, she felt as if she'd collapse in on herself, crushed by the force of it on her. Her mouth moved slowly and silently, her voice barely a squeak as she released what little air remained in her lungs for fear they would burst. Under the pressure she simply couldn't inflate them once more. Instinctive panic washed over her, making her heart pound, demanding another breath by its prostrate master. The disaster that she could only imagine would await her wasn't of any consequence, as long as this ended. For anything and everything in the world, just let go of her. With all of her focus and the last bit of her she could still control, a frenzied plea exploded inside her brain. Stop! The death grip on her life relented suddenly and entirely, as if taken aback. She collapsed onto her knees and elbows, releasing a white plume of thankful breath as she sucked in another for her burning muscles, trying still to stay quiet in the relative silence without the blower fans. Fortunately it was no longer a priority. "You should come out from there," a calm voice called from behind. "You were just putting up such a good fight, I didn't think I could be hurting you so soon. That was my mistake." Ka covered her mouth, stifling her breathing though it hurt to do so and her shaking limbs protested, coveting previous air. She instinctively looked out to the side, though sight wouldn't save her from a confrontation, she'd learned. She was too afraid to try to move again, for fear he would just stop her. Also, for the first time since the fans shut off, and without other duress, she was incredibly aware of the cold. Every hair on her body stung like a tiny needle and her ears and lungs ached from freezing moisture inside. She wouldn't answer. She couldn't move. What could she do but play dead there, hidden behind a wall of bag ice and frozen dinners? It was a useless bluff. Her eyes stung again as she tried to swallow down the impulse to cry once more, with less success. "You see that's not what I'm here to do, quite the opposite actually..." he continued, followed by aimless footsteps. He was also talking slowly, lazy and a little condescending. "But if you make it difficult," he paused. "you could end up getting hurt anyway." There was no way. No reason excused by any logic she could conjure up to believe the words-- not after what she could remember. Not after the last few weeks and what had just happened. She lamented as the welling tears in her eyes began to spill over. She looked downward, rathering them to fall and harden on the floor than on her face. This freezer cruised at a steady twenty degrees below zero. So frightened. So depressed. She had been hiding from the reality of what existed beyond Earth like she was dodging collector calls; denied it, along with her own identity, thinking a few thoughts and regards toward her past here and there would repay the debt of her shrugged responsibilities. The idea that everything she thought she had outrun had finally come back to end her was overwhelmingly sad and surreal. It filled her with guilt, and her willingness to resign to it so suddenly without any options made it sadder still. She matted her eyes against her short sleeve, looking back at the ground. The feedback ringing in Terry's mind of her current humor was making him ill with its staggering pathos. Ill as well as aggravated; he should have just let her drop under his strain and carried her out. It's not like she'd freeze solid in the ten seconds it'd take him to find her unconscious body, even in the cluttered room as she hid. "Major Ka..." he continued flatly. "I won't," she called back, stifling a sniffle. Acclimated to the sadness, she became angry. "You say you're not gonna hurt me, prove it. I'm not coming to you, s... so just leave." It was a pretty feeble argument. A loud clicking noise erupted from the ceiling, and the blowers powered back on at normal speed to circulate the settling temperature-layers of air. She was already where it was coldest, only now it was windy. She held herself and sobbed, gritting her teeth as her body began to fight the cold in much the same way it had fought the smothering energy before. "Oh God," she hissed, beginning to shake even more, her muscles in danger of cramping from the strain; that would make them useless. "This won't work for you, Ka," came a significantly more spirited warning than the first. "I can stay in here all night if I have to. But it wouldn't even come to that, would it." The grim implications were already in place in Ka's mind, before they'd been mentioned. After all, they couldn't be ignored in that frozen hell. But Terry continued. "I'd say, the shape you're in, you've got about fifteen minutes before you lose consciousness, if I helped... that's longer, I think, than it would take anyone to realize a problem over here. And at that point, you'd lose any control you had over this situation." The stinging pain of the cold was beginning to make it hard for her to concentrate on his words themselves. He sounded almost encouraging, in the twisted, almost antagonizing way one negotiates with another for their wellbeing however against their wishes. As if she were hostage and madman at once, he talked down to her like a suicide jumper. False benevolence, it had to be total bullshit; she had heard him threaten her again with the paralysis. As she thought of it, she realized with her warming anger and passion that it was nearly gone. She could move. "That's all you ever want, isn't it, to at least have some control, have your feet on the ground?" He began to move toward where she was, slowly. "Then walk out of here. You can't be more afraid of doing that than being carried out, without knowing, without seeing, just oblivious. Like before." She crawled to her feet. And then, she began to climb. The roaring fans hid the crinkle of the ice bags as he continued. "I know you don't trust me enough, now, to rather that experience again." The words brought a little pain, but her fingers stung more as she clenched the rock wall of frozen water, punching her fingernails through the thick plastic to better grip the hard, unforgiving surface. She responded, deciding that if continued talking was probably a device to distract her since none of it could be true, she could use it the same way. "You went on your way that night, you left on your own. At least I was all right after that!... far as I know..." Nearing the top, she kept herself low and close to the ice, not entirely aware of where he was or how easily he could see her. The stack of boxes provided some cover to the left, and it wasn't too far down to the floor-- not far enough for her not to consider jumping, making a break for the door. Who was she kidding, there was no guarantee the door would open back up. And she'd kill herself in the landing, in the state of frozen stupor she was in. The sensory reception on her entire body surface was scrambled by the cold-- she was numb, but hurt all over. Her stiff, wet hands were tender, flushed red and and yellow over the ice, purple fingernails. Smooth as the frozen surface was, it felt like climbing on razorblades. She finally reached the top, becoming stiff and weak in the blowing air, but fortunately it was making her voice hard to locate. "Before, I was all right... This time though, aren't I more unlucky... " She carefully rearranged her legs, preparing for a blind jump onto whatever was on the other side of the ice stack, hopefully something half as high. "But you people... I'm sure I... I..." She lost her concentration as she thought about the fall, feared it. "We're not the ones you need to be afraid of." At first it sounded like it had come from right next to her ear. Then she wasn't sure she had actually heard anything at all; whatever the case, in the tenth of a second in which all the reaction took place she had already startled terribly, and her leg muscles fired her wild and unprepared from her safe vantage. Pangs of weightless fear struck the bottoms of her feet as she forfeited her balance and contact with any ground, a feeling like almost falling down stairs or jumping too high off a playground swing. The baser, automatic fears of human freefall were replaced by more tangible ones, as she saw the ascellus waiting between her and the ground. She could have sworn he was making his way around toward where she'd been, but there he was, on this side. She screamed in anticipation of a horrible landing that would possibly include the floor afterall. As she collided with her assailant, however, she kicked and flailed desperately to try to continue falling, in spite of the fears she'd often entertained of breaking her head open on the slippery concrete in a similar accident. She realized quickly after the shock and pain from the impact that the opposite was more frightening. Even awkwardly sprawled over the ascellus' shoulder and halfway down his back, the floor and its freedom were still far away and wouldn't come any closer. Try as she might to dislodge herself, the sharp pressure of the grip around her midsection held too well, and it was just one arm. "Told you you could get hurt," Terry said quiet and cavalier as he knelt down, not bothering to yell over the Major's hysterics. He fended off her thrashing legs with his free hand, eventually subduing them against him while she bucked like a captive dolphin. That in order, he pulled her into a more manageable angle, to reach into his top pocket for what he planned to sedate her with. She kicked and clawed and pounded at him, but all he felt was the same condescending sense of pity one feels holding a frightened animal. Apart from aggravation, none of her attack fazed him. He should've done more talking before closing the door, he thought with an eye roll as he shakily fished a syringe out of his shirt around her flailing. He may have talked her into it, but on a "walking out on her own" to "crushing her to sleep with his energy" kind of scale, knocking her out with Ativan seemed the neither risky nor barbaric option-- the medium. She was spitting and swearing him up and down quite unlikeably, but he had planned ahead to keep that comparably gentle compromise available to her. The arm holding the sedative held her feet and calves down while the other pinned her torso to his shoulder, and with the cap from the needle in his mouth he eyed the back of her knees, where large arterial vessels would deliver the stick most quickly without having to get at a more conventional site That would require him to change her around or bring down one of her arms-- and risk wrenching it off as she fought to get it away. Though the strongest part of her legs was out of use, the Major's arms and head were in fact still free. She reeled and hammered and pushed against Terry's solid frame but it only hurt and tired her. His shoulder pressed hard into her sternum, near enough to the bottom to make her thrashing more uncomfortable each second. The believability of escaping him physically had officially waned off, something she'd always sworn would never happen in a dark alleyway with any ordinary human being-- and it wouldn't have. She was just dealing with a kind of strength she had never met and didn't understand. She grew more infuriated and upset as she thought of her workmates. How could no one hear her? Were they just sitting around back at the restaurant, not believing anything to be amiss? That was apparently the point of such a simple plan as the one her enemies had concocted to grab her, where they had failed before. Rather than using crime, it had made more sense to use the law. Her mind became desperate, even without knowing how close she was to losing control of the situation as she had no knowledge of the syringe. Just then, her eyes fell upon the gun holstered on his belt. It was out of reach below on his hip, but it became a shining option. She stretched as hard as she could downward, but he just responded with more pressure the other way than she wanted to go. "Hold still you..." he shook his head with a resigned smile. "If you make me screw this up you're not going to be happy with the alternatives." As he fought her, waiting for a still moment between thrashes to accurately inject, he didn't expect her to use his strength to her advantage. She suddenly went almost completely limp. In the split second she became slack, his countering pull on her yanked her up away from the ground and past his shoulder, far enough that without a foothold behind her she might've tumbled into his lap. When she was able to reach, she twisted around as far as she could to bite him with all of her might, her jaw a fresh resource not nearly as tired as her arms and legs. She latched onto the tendonous flesh between his ear and shoulder and held like a rottweiler complete with a triumphant, furious snarl. It wasn't as lucky as she'd hoped, but wasn't as disastrous a move as she'd feared. He was definitely startled; his hands opened with a spasm and the one bearing the syringe let it skitter to the floor with a tiny toss. His jaw clenched, and the change in tension in his neck muscle dislodged her canine clamp with tooth-breaking force. He didn't yell out, and he didn't let go, but his grip crucially laxed just long enough for her to push with her one lucky toe on the ground, lunging forward with everything she had in her. Practically flinging herself headlong back over his shoulder, two eager hands and both sets of very determined fingers laced around the handle of the heavy gun, yanking it out with the anticipated, assisted force of him pulling her backward. He'd felt the tug on his belt. "Put that down--!" he admonished sharply. The tone was urgent, frightened in a different way than someone who could've been killed by the weapon. He knew the first thing she'd do, and all of a sudden there was real danger where before she just hadn't fully understood the situation. Expectedly, his mind momentarily flashed back to where he'd almost unloaded it. Too late now, and no one unexpected had shown up afterall. She fell sideways as he had yanked her down, and he whirled around to pin her on her back and pry the gun away before she began a frantic firing spree inside the charged freezer. But a thunderous crack had already ripped through the still air. As the shot fired, Ka felt warm blood hit her face and the weight of the ascellus over her change suddenly as if startled. Her eyes were closed defensively, and she shrieked as the recoil threw her hand backward, narrowly missing her own face. Behind the eight-pound firearm was already enough weight to hurt as her hand slammed to the ground, but the addition of the explosive force of the discharge and the unforgiving concrete broke two of her fingers. She wailed angrily, convulsing the bruised muscle left over with desperate strength as Terry grabbed the gun's muzzle to wrench it away as he began to sway backward. In the split-second fray before it left her aching fingers, Ka squeezed off another shot. There had been another sound she couldn't hear over the ringing in her ears, but Terry did even in his briefly compromised state. The first round had hit him exactly where she'd bit him, separating much of the flesh and tendon in the immediate area. But the second, he heard with one good ear, had hit something else not too far away. Something metal. Not having been the one shot through the neck, Ka wriggled away as soon as she realized the opportunity and absence of the shadow over her. She swung on a shelf as she turned the corner not to slide on the floor. She threw herself into the strike mechanism on the door, kicked at it too, as it only clanked uselessly without properly engaging. She jumped up and clawed for the axe, either to use on the door or against her attacker. It came down hard, handle first. She whirled around instinctively, expectant of an instant chase. The freezer was ominously still as she surveyed it for a moment, holding the axe in a ready position, the floor and the distance out of sight through the collecting fog layers and the pitiful light. Without turning around, she backed against the door, breathlessly feeling for the strike. Finding it, she repeatedly smashed the butt of the axe against the push-knob behind her, figuring it the more effective option before chopping her way out, contrary to the intention of such a provision. She cried for help, but only once before a discouraging sight appeared before her. From the foggy shadows a few yards away, Terry got to his feet. He was hurting and a little angry, but not dying by a far cry. He hadn't been shot in ages, and hadn't been in peak condition since he'd escaped from those fifteen years of poison below Eden. He grit his teeth, in rage and discomfort equally, as he held at the spurting gunshot wound below his ear. It itched and burned as it righted itself in a second or two, but it was not a lasting victory. He had just broken across the open space to have at her, when the curious sound from her earlier shot manifested itself in the worst possible way. He stopped dead and about faced, both of them watching aghast in the moment of mutual panic as the farthest blower unit sparked violently and swayed on only one of its two mounts from the ceiling. The second had been completely blown apart by the errant round Ka fired earlier. The remaining mount popped one screw, then another as it failed under the torsion, and with only the wiring and coolant lines holding it anymore the entire fan toppled forward under its own weight, snapping the ancient copper pipes from the wall. Seeking equilibrium, the liquid ammonia inside vaporized out into the open in a screaming jet of toxic yellow steam. to be continued. NOTES FROM THE AUTHOR/EDITOR so show of hands, do i get rid of the diffy titles and stick to numbers? keep in mind i go for "lightheartedly heavy-handed." ...ironic. but if i'm not doing it right i wanna know. graphic/existential content fully considered it's still a mostly upbeat story. this one's a little lengthy but there's just nowhere to cut it. thanks for reading. PART ONE [link] PART TWO [link] PART THREE [link] PART FOUR  |
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Comments
Okay first things first: Fantastic illustration. The pose is top notch, the expression is great, just incredible work.
Writing: Hot damn woman you can work your words.From the first line the hair on the back of my neck stood up. Next time you unleash a writing piece like this I want a songlist to play so I can get the full experience of this epic film in my brain.
Favorite moment of this piece? The block of lost time after she had assumedly blacked out was coming together. It all explained the burning unrest she had felt in the days following what, in all actuality, would have been just a routine "bringing home a bar guy" night.
"Eugh..." Comically, she repulsed a little at that idea itself, wondering what was wrong with her. But she could deal with her own deteriorated self standards if she survived the day.
In the middle of this creepy freezing death sentence our heroine grosses herself out and decides to have a self heart to heart to discuss upping her dating standards. Fucking Genius.
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Some people say perfect is a place where the mass graves are well-hidden.
and yeah, i know. i do that to myself sometimes.
hope to hear from ya soon.
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ALL THE COOL KIDS ARE READING IT
Don't expect the best, you won't be disappointed when you take a bite and watch the worm crawl back inside.
Also, why doesn't this picture have more comments?
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If violent video games affected children then everyone who played Pacman would just walk around in the dark, eating pills & listening to repetitive music (~ Marcus Brigstock)
so, in not-snotty manner, thank you, for liking any part of this.
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ALL THE COOL KIDS ARE READING IT
Don't expect the best, you won't be disappointed when you take a bite and watch the worm crawl back inside.
And God I Love This Series.
I'm only halfway through the chapter (I need to learn how to read faster) but I got impatient and wanted to comment early. I love it so far. If you ever publish this as a novel please PLEASE let me know, 'cause you know I'll buy it.
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I Proudly Ship SokaroxKlaud. If You Do Too, Join Us.
-I Snipe For The RED Team-
i'm glad you dig on the art; i was proud of it but always get a kinda deflated reaction as days go by when i see it. tricky perception, y'know?
and if i ever publish this as a novel, someone will have to tell ME first-- because it could only mean i have an evil (and more ambitious) twin doing awesome shit behind my back.
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ALL THE COOL KIDS ARE READING IT
Don't expect the best, you won't be disappointed when you take a bite and watch the worm crawl back inside.
I'd comment on the art art but its a small red X for me.
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Help me...I broke apart my insides.
i got the whole event planned but like i said i just need to fine tune the details for maximum AWESOME return.
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ALL THE COOL KIDS ARE READING IT
Don't expect the best, you won't be disappointed when you take a bite and watch the worm crawl back inside.
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