Chapter 29
New
- Location
- Iowa, USA
Next step?
[X] Try to flee, you just want away from all this. (15 Votes)
[X] Try to flee, you just want away from all this. (15 Votes)
The idea of fleeing tugs at something ugly deep inside me, something that says I should be on top, I should be the Apex. But it is quiet compared to the pain and panic rolling through me that is yelling I need to get away. The red Alpha in front of me is still making noise at me as I slowly back up, trying to buy time for my Warp channels to realign.
The Alpha takes a step forward, and I decide that I can't actually wait. Splitting, I fling my Phantom at them and dart to the side, not bothering to see how effective it is. My spines' feedback has dulled, and my whole body feels overexerted beneath the crisscrossing lines of white-hot misery.
My floating balance is thrown off by the white-yellow sap that the Uprights flung at me, because sap is the only thing sticky like this I can think of, but it isn't bad enough that I can't hover across the short distances between buildings as I flee. I can see that my Phantom is doing its job and distracting the Alpha as I make it a few buildings away. I can't fight like this, restrained, tired, hungry, and in pain, so I turn to stealth once again.
After making it a few buildings away, pushing my low flight speed to its limits, I choose a random space between buildings to drop down. I don't have time to climb down nicely and so the fall hurts my knees as well as the bent, trapped tails that are being pulled up into an odd position. Dismissing the sensations isn't as easy as it would have been a bit ago, the fight has started to drag on longer than it should have, and it is getting harder to hold onto the rush of battle that lets me keep moving and ignoring all the animal parts of me that are urging me to do things that will get me killed.
I feel my crown start to reform which tells me my Phantom has disappeared and sure enough briefly casing my attention towards the Alpha I can see that they are moving this way. Moving way faster than and Upright should be able to, again using muscles that aren't there. I duck into an overturned green metal box, hiding myself in the discarded materials and rotting organic things, watching the Alpha move across the roof gap above me and not slow down.
I can't relax yet, though. Quickly pulling myself out of the improvised hiding space, I contemplate moving back to the big pond of water, but that is on the other side of the fight, so I dismiss that idea and press forward further into the unknown, needing to get further away before I can even hope to relax.
-{/\}-
I don't know how long I traveled for, at some point I zoned out and let my instincts take over. I had to pass across some of the wider spaced between buildings, the ones with black stone instead of the grayish stone, and I know I was spotted a few times. It was unavoidable, there are dozens of Uprights everywhere I look!
Eventually I managed to get away from the huge crowds of people, but the area I manged to get to isn't much better. All the buildings here are short and spread super far apart, they aren't made of the red stones either, instead they are made from a thin material I can't identify. On the bright side, though, this area has green! Grass, and trees only, but it's still green! Part of me wants to roll around in it, though I have to suppress it in order to stay hidden.
I end up in a small house that is in the corner of a patch of grass that itself is separated with a short wooden wall. The sun is almost gone, hidden behind rapidly darkening clouds that spell a deep storm coming, and I am pretty sure the slightly darker world help me stay hidden. Hidden enough that I no one should be able to spot me through the whole I squeezed through.
Looking around the dark space with the rapidly fading light, I see the walls have lines of metal in weird shapes all over them, as well as a flat metal thing in the center of the room with four small wheels on the sides. I look at everything for a few seconds but abandon the attempt because none of it makes sense.
Tucking myself into a corner, underneath a wooden platform, the sound of rain on metal starts to hit the small building's roof, blocking out the omnipresent Upright smell with the scent of non-salty water. I won't be able to sleep, with the battle behind me, all my pain and tiredness and hunger and everything else I pushed away is flooding into me. I can't sleep, but I can rest a bit at least, and curled up like this the stone-thing binding up two of my tails and my right claw is almost unnoticeable. Almost.
/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\/|\
This chapter was no less challenging to nail down. Hopefully works out how I am aiming for it to work out. Also, Wraith has once again evaded a majority of plots I had spooling up.
What do you do now? Your nest is gone, and you are in a new place, still somehow still in the Upright's nest.
[X] Try to make your way back to the water, though the Uprights know you were there now…
[X] Try to get the yellow-white rock-sap off your tails and claw.
[X] Just rest. Nothing should know you're here and you need it.
[X] Write-In:
(Note: Write-In's must be simple in direction or concept. Your votes are instincts, not complex thoughts.)
(Votes are done in the approval style, where you can vote for more than one option that you like.)