24 Shafted
a/n: Frye gets hurt. Phog's okay, though. Continued from Ch. 23.
Harm warning, but not graphic. Two OCs from last chapter.
All the good things belong to Monolith Soft. Inspired quite a bit by art by Rosyan.
Frye should have felt panic, but he didn't. In retrospect, the lack of panic should have been the sign to start panicking. Instead, he felt a light buzzing numbness. Not unpleasant and nothing like intoxication, more like the pause between breaths, and certainly not painful. Phog must have done a bang up job when he shot Frye full of whatever had been in the small medi kit he'd pulled from one of his pockets.
Frye had made it to Phog with no trouble, if you don't consider flying through the air 20 stories above the plains of Primordia using nothing but a length of high tensile rope as a trouble. Frye didn't, not when he reached the ledge at the cave entrance and had ducked his head in to find his brother several meters down and totally uninterested in being rescued. Phog had scaled down a rock tube hollowed out in the center of the supporting arch.
"Yo, numbnuts! Look up!" Frye had shouted into the vertical tunnel. Phog had unsurprisingly not looked up.
Frye hadn't even wasted a sigh. He'd fastened a second coil of rope doubly secure, then lowered himself into the shaft. It was wide enough to reach Phog without bumping him. He winced when he noticed that Phog wasn't roped up.
"Buddy, you're killing me. Let me link up with you."
Phog ignored Frye's fussing. He had his comm device hanging around his neck, recording probably, but also shining a dim light that made his face glow like an angel's. "I know how the arches formed."
"Sure, sure, hold still..." Frye reached out with an extra clip to attach to Phog's belt.
Phog shrank away from Frye. "I'm hooked," he said resentfully, and pointed to a single wire running from his belt to a gap in the wall. "It's a cinch to free climb anyway."
Frye reached out again. "Humor me. Then tell me about what you figured out.'
Phog laughed, a slight sound that whispered up and down the shaft. "You wouldn't understand it."
"So long as it doesn't put me to sleep," Frye said, and was glad to hear the snap of the carabiner on Phog's belt. He kept one hand on his brother's hip, and used the other to scrub the sweat out of his eyes.
The cave wall had crumbled at that moment.
It hadn't been a dramatic break. It was just enough that Phog's toe had slipped, and he'd yanked down on Frye. Frye had gripped him, but the jerk had sent him spinning sideways. Phog's silver lifeline hadn't been up to the task, just as Frye had suspected. The two of them were now spinning and dangling over an empty nothingness. Phog's comm device had flown down into the void, but neither had the time to watch its light disappear. Between bouncing off the wall and gripping Phog's belt so hard he thought his fist would crack, Frye hadn't even managed to grab his own rope to steady himself. But it would be okay. The rope was good, the knots were good, the carabiner was good, they'd be fine.
When Phog's belt gave way, Frye had empty air in his hands and only one plan, one that had been in his brain since the minute he swung away from Veena. He unclipped and fell, after his brother, hoping the idiot had scrambled against the walls enough to slow himself, maybe get a purchase. Hell, he might even be the one to grab Frye.
If Frye had bothered to breathe, he might have been able to tell you how many seconds it took to reach his brother. Phog was sliding along the wall, not exactly falling but not exactly stopping. Frye scrambled along and they plummeted together, slower than a free fall but not reducing their speed by much. Gravity works differently on Mira, every one had accepted that (although Dr. Karen was still arguing with the planet on the details), but landings could still be bad. Frye kept an eye on the pit below, even if it was a useless black. He kept an ear on it, and when the echoes went from eerie to flat, he grabbed Phog, pulled the kid to his chest, and turned his back on the impact.
His shield was a good one, biased towards physical resist with a side of gravity. It smacked into the uneven floor, protecting the two brothers from the worst of the blow. Frye felt it fail, though. Not the worst he'd been hit, but something cracked along his hip and the emergency notices flashed behind his retinas. He ignored the scrolling ones and zeros, holding tight to Phog. He did his best to roll through the impact, keeping it from hitting his brother. They slid only an arm length further, finally lying uncomfortably on rocky spikes.
"Stalagmites," said Phog. Frye could hear him scratching around while keeping one hand on Frye's chest.
"Gnnnnnrrhhh," replied Frye.
"I think I found my comm device."
"Gnnhh? Niceghhhhhhhh."
"It's broken."
"Aw. Gnnhhhfngg. You got nnngghhhh a medi ghnnnnngh kit?"
a/n: Cliffhanger, because I want to do other things tonight. It'll be fine!
Rosyan has done some brutal art of Frye, "Distress", over on deviant art and is worth a look and a follow. The light, the expression, the armor! Some of Rosyan's art is nsfw so have those shields up and ready if that's necessary.
Belligerence Limit on loop.
Next up: I'm telling you, he'll be fine!