I
The city of light was nothing as Jasper as imagined.
That was his first thought.
The second (more of an action, really) was to retreat himself from a lethal looking machete which stopped just inches from his face.
He impacted against a wall, realizing that all of his exits were blocked, his senses 100% alerted from what he was watching.
"Who the fuck are you?!" the machete bearer said. It was actually a she, now that his eyes were focusing more. She wasn't shouting, but speaking quite low as if she was afraid of being heard. That didn't take anything out of his menacing presence.
"I am Ja-Jasper" he involuntarily stuttered, his black eyes still fixed on the blade.
"You're one of hers!" she exclaimed, pulling her arm behind her back preparing to attack him. The first time she had just aimed to scare, this second time she was probably going to get his head.
"I'm here for the city of light!- Jasper shouted, unable to move away from that blind spot- Please!".
The second after seemed millennia long, but she didn't move her weapon at the end.
"Then, maybe you're one of mine".
She was pretty. Raven Reyes kind of pretty, but more curvy and feminine. The girl was probably his age or slightly older, black long hair braided in one thick not, almond eyes which burned like pins.
"I'm Amanda" she said, sitting in front of him, without loosing any control on the machete "Did you take the damn pill?".
Jasper nodded. That was the last thing he remembered, and it had happened just instances away. He had swallowed and closed his eyes, then opened them to found himself in that ravage of a room. It was a wreck of a timber building, broken by jungles' trees mixed to electrical cables and rusty pipes.
"We need to leave then. She will be looking for you" Amanda said, and without any explanation she stand up, abandoning the room.
He followed, just because he didn't know where else to go. He thought he wanted to die, or that it had nothing else to loose. But now that he was there in the middle of that nightmare, he sure wanted to live. If not, just for having another drink.
And strangely, he felt more alive then that he had felt in all the previous weeks. Maybe it was the sense of danger, maybe it was the change of scenery. That was different. He followed behind for a while, before starting firing tones of questions.
"Who are you? Were you on the ark? Who's the she you are talking about? Is this the city of Light?".
After a while she seemed to have enough of his petulant trivia, and she actually replied.
"I am one of the original Earther. I am just another fool who took the pill as you did, hoping for a better world… the city of Light- she rolled her eyes while making a vulgar gesture with her finger- Bullshit. You knew there was something wrong about this right? You knew."
Jasper nodded yes, in fact, he did strongly suspected it was a fraud. That didn't stop him from stealing one of the pill behind Raven's nose and washed it down with a glass of vodka. Was that the alcohol which created that side effect?
"So did I. This- she said, gesturing all around the derelict village which they were hours walking on- it's what happens. This is your brain, our brain, saying no to her. You're saying no to the city of Light".
That was absurd. But he sort of make sense too.
"So where the fuck are we? And why are you with me, if this is my… sort of nightmare?".
"We are in a coma. Inducted by the pill. And about that… you can also believe in what I think, that we must have been connected through the chip that we ate, or that I am just a bad dream."
"Whatever this is… I think I'm screwed" he murmured.
"Welcome- Amanda said, enlarging her arms- What should I say then, I have been here for more than hundred years".
"Hundred years?- Jasper gasped - how can you possibly be alive?!"
"Alie its a machine. She controls everything and she can create everything. I'm in a sort of room which stops my biological time. Don't ask me the details because I don't know. She feeds me with tubes.- Amanda stopped as if lost in deep ancients was a veil of sadness when she spoke next - Sometimes I sort of regain consciousness...then she puts me back to sleep. The only way she can recover me it's in here. But I don't want to be saved".
The more she spoke, the more Jasper found connected to the girl's feelings. But he still asked: "Why did you take the pill?".
It's almost like he was asking that to himself too.
She scrolled her shoulder, while she kept preparing a rudimentary camp fire where they can spend the night. She already explained to him that concepts of day and night did not exists in there; sometimes she barely ate for months, but it seemed like rhythms had became more normal since his arrive. Maybe his brain was still too adjusted to reality and it was influencing what happened to that world too.
"It sounds stupid, but everyone else was taking it and seemed so happy. I thought... maybe it was the only way to see my family again. My parents and my little brother, they all died in the war. But I knew there was something rotten in this, and my brain did not accepted her presence. So I rejected her...and here I am".
"Were you lonely?" Jasper asked. They were very close, and all he could think was her pretty face broken by pain. He was broken, also.
Jasper thought about Maya, his reason to take the pill. And without waiting for an answer he started talking about that, talking to Amanda about how he felt. How it was hard to keep her dead body in his arms. How his best friend betrayed him, but also made the only possible choice and he knew and he still couldn't forgive him.
Before he finished talking, Jasper was crying, bitter tears running through his angular face. It was painful, but it also helped.
They spent hours talking and by the end of it, they were both crying, hugging each other between the ruins of that cold, lonely world.
"Jasper, we need to go" she woke him up.
It has been weeks since they first met, and it's all been about running away from Alie, hiding into dark corridors, or hiking devastated cities. But something was been different lately, as Jasper was more conscious of where his body actually was, for a start. If he focused very hard, he almost had the sensation of people holding his hands or whispering to him from the other side.
"You know what this means, right?" Amanda said, when he told her. Jasper was not sure.
"They're finding a cure for the pill. They'll take it out for you, your doctor friend" she said.
There was a smile in her face, and Jasper knew she was happy for him but that things also changed since he came into her universe.
First, she was not alone anymore. For years there was nothing, and now there were laughs, and jokes and even good food to share with someone else.
But it wasn't only that. They grew closer to each other. A lot. More than what they both wanted to admit.
And Jasper had changed. It was more the joyful boy he used to be, just more mature and conscious. He had become a better version of himself.
In silence, they started their day of walking and hiking. In a way, if it wasn't for a crazy A.I. trying to scoop them out, it would have been a sort of healthy life style. It wasn't any more dangerous than living in the real Earth, surrounded by bloodthirsty grounders.
It was late in the afternoon when they stopped, the sun already fading behind a gigantic mountain. They walked inside a partially erected building, grabbing vines to help themselves in. As soon as they stepped in, Amanda exploded in a nervous strange laugh.
"What is it?" Jasper asking with half a smile. He passed his hand through is very short hair, thinking he wouldn't have mind to grow them back.
She pointed at a corner of the room, where trash and objects had been moved against the wall, a shadow of an human print on the dusty floor. That was the very first room where they had met.
"Maybe we should say goodbye- she whispered, and her voice broke as she stopped smiling- I don't want you to go Jas".
He looked at her with terrible intensity; he had found himself back thanks to her and he would have stopped the time now and then if he could.
Without any warning and restriction, the girl walked straight to him, lifting herself on the tip of her feet to embrace that ridiculously tall guy.
As she laced her fingers behind his neck, an electrical shock run through both their bodies, such intense was the touch between them.
That was different. More intense and adult like than anything Jasper had experienced in his young love life. Their tongues caressed in a warm voracious kiss, as he grabbed her body closer to his. He leaned down to easier the kiss, his big hands running under her clothes, as she did the same, almost ripping his shirt off.
He pulled her head on the side, and started sucking and biting her neck, excited by her reaction. He wanted her so badly. He had made love to Maia, in a sort of sweet old fashioned way, but man, he and Amanda were eating each other alive.
She had pushed him against the wall, and Jasper took control by swapping their sides, using his superior strength. He lowered her shirt down, revealing her generous breasts, covering them immediately with his hands.
"I can't wait" she whispered, as their tongues and breaths merged together once more.
They almost slowed down, as he helped her to lay down on the dirty floor, using their own clothes as shelter as they got rid of the last ones. She was beautiful, her darker skin nicely contrasting his pale one. Curvy and feminine, as he was skinny and straight.
"Can I?" he asked, smiling, getting down on her body in between her legs.
She nodded, and he worked his way in with his long fingers, unveiling her wetness. Jasper looked straight into her eyes, as he pushed his member inside her, feeling all of hers wrapping around his erection.
It was hot. And wonderful. The sensations were amplified by the time they had waited before doing it; their desire almost mad as Jasper trusted himself harder and harder. He moved so she could touch herself at the same time, excited by that sight of her; it didn't take her long before coming strong, immediately provoking his orgasm. He bite her neck one more time, as he spilled his semen inside her; then they kissed.
He thought he had fall asleep after. He couldn't remember.
He opened his eyes smiling, and the first thing he saw was Monty's face, relieved and hesitant at the same time. He smiled too, and his best friend hugged him as he could, even if Jasper was clearly laying down.
"I am back" he said, and he didn't mean just about the pill. Somehow, Monty understood.
He felt a pang of sadness of having lost her, but he knew it was only temporarily. No matter where she was, no matter how long he would have taken him, he had now found a purpose back for his life.
He will have find Amanda.
Jasper smiled to himself, as he left the hospital bed for good.