"So… Let me get this straight; you and Eight were serious about all those stories? Like, no exaggerations whatsoever?"
When Three had emerged from her long mission in the Metro, speaking of the most incredibly improbable sights and experiences, Four had taken some elements of her story with a grain of salt. After all, could an entire, unknown society buried under the ocean really exist? And that didn't even factor in the seemingly mad, such as, as Three had stated word for word, 'a place positively brimming with electromagnetic interference and vast spaces of nothingness, where dreams bleed into reality'.
Literally, word for word.
It sounded more like some twisted fairy tale, one her mom would tell her to keep her delinquent self in line. Much like the drywall she tried to eat as a child, the story didn't quite jive with her. It was simply too fantastic and inane to properly comprehend.
Not to imply that Four doubted Three's experiences; she was almost a big sister to her, and her trust in Three was absolute. But equally, Four's ability to suspend her disbelief could only stretch so far. Four certainly did take her word at face value, but only somewhat. She herself could barely conceptualize what Three had told her of, and were it not for the Captain's and Eight's testimonies, her trust in Three may not have sufficed.
Because, holy shell, Three had been describing things that sounded downright schizophrenic in nature. Perhaps that was why Four was currently reeling.
Seeing this all firsthand was something else entirely, even if it was just the outer layers.
For what felt like an hour, Four had followed Three down through the Inkopolis underground, a mish-mash of sewers and subways. They had entered from the Deca Plaza subway, and through a winding, abandoned tunnel network that Three navigated with no trouble. How she remembered the path so vividly, Four couldn't say.
Even with Three's quickly healing leg, they made good time.
Despite this, they kept going deeper and deeper, decrepit concrete stairways one of the only constants in this twisted journey. Floodlights illuminated the space, reminding her that at this depth, they were the only souls around. At one point, she swore her ears popped from how deep they had gone.
Already, just seeing these tunnels was blowing her mind. She knew about the old kettle tunnels down here leading to the Valley and Canyon, respectively, but never had she considered that some paths might branch deeper. And oh dear, how far deep these branches went.
Four had heard plenty of rumors from the more conspiratorial of her kind that the city had been built over the ruins of an ancient civilization, potentially human judging by the sheer volume of artifacts located in the area. She had dismissed these theories as exaggerations, or wild ghost stories to rile up the public, but perhaps there was a kernel of truth buried within? Because, truly, could all of this winding architecture be a part of Inkopolis? The City itself was old, dating back from just after the Great Turf War, but to the extent of having these catacombs?
Four shivered. If this truly was the case, then what other dark secrets could be lurking? And for that matter, who had set up the floodlights, and how were they getting power?
A mystery for later.
Eventually, the stairs finally relented, depositing them who knows how deep underground, right in front of several rusted turnstiles. Four vaulted over, while Three stayed on the other side.
A small subway station greeted them beyond the turnstiles. Like the deeper sections of this old underground, it was in poor shape. Trash was strewn about; wrappers for foods she didn't recognize, broken glass bottles, and discarded stickers. The few benches left in the station were rusted through, and to Four, nearly gave her tetanus from just looking at them. The only functional parts of the station were the haphazardly placed floodlights, bathing the area with their grim light.
"Welcome to the Inkopolis station of the Deep Sea Metro," Three intoned. She almost sounded like a stewardess, "As you can tell, this is quite the popular stop."
Albeit, an incredibly sarcastic stewardess.
Three lounged on the turnstile's bars, shuddering slightly, "You wouldn't believe how long it took me to find this station."
"I can imagine."
Four was halfway listening. She was still awestruck that this station actually existed, and that she was standing inside of it. She could nod her head and agree that such a place existed, but to stand within it grounded her in a space not quite between fiction and reality. This place had always existed, hidden from everyone; it was a mad thought.
"You never did tell me," Four said, pulling out the CQ-88, "Why shouldn't I 'go down any stairs'? You were rather insistent on that," Never mind all the stairs they took to even get down here…
She fiddled with the device in vain, sighing slightly, "You mind?"
Wordlessly, Three took the device, and with a small twitch of her hand, brought up its holographic display. With the bend of its little joystick and the press of a few buttons, a map of the Metro Line came up, before handing it back to Four, "There you go."
Just as she handed it back, however, a low rumbling overtook the station. Grit fell from the walls, steel groaned, and the lights flickered. It lasted for only a moment, but shook Four off balance, yet Three barely flinched.
Four looked to her, but just as she did so, an ancient intercom crackled to life.
"Attention passengers," it droned, tinny and stuttering, "Due to unexpected electromagnetic fluctuations, minor seismic activity and aftershocks may manifest within the next eight to twenty-four hours. Please plan your activities accordingly, and have a safe day!"
Three nodded at the message, "Looks like something's been stirring up a whole lot of activity in the Lower Metro; it's always the noospheric energy creating those fluctuations. I'll bet my beak that it's one of the humans."
And there Three went again, speaking of things that made little sense.
"And why would you think that?" Four asked, hand on her hip. Never mind whatever 'noospheric energy' was, she just needed to know what fueled Three's crazed logic.
Three shrugged, "I know… some things about how the Metro operates, but that's on a need-to-know basis. And… you may need to know, actually."
Three fell quiet, deep in thought. A kind of struggle was visible on her, teal eyes flickering in brightness. Four waited attentively, curiosity burning her insides, yet counteracted by their eerie surroundings.
When she finally spoke, Four was rather creeped out. She swore that eyes were drilling into the back of her head.
"Well…" Three started, rubbing a temple in annoyance, "Cod, there's no easy way to talk about this. I know Eight was telling you stories about the downright impossible architecture of the place, the stations especially. And let me tell you, she wasn't exaggerating."
She sighed, before continuing.
"When I was… y'know, possessed," for a brief moment, her eyes glowed noticeably brighter, "I… was aware of my actions, I was in control, but my mental state was… distorted, in a sense. It was like a dream, where all my morals were tipped upside down."
Four nodded, taking a step back from her. She could feel a pit in her stomach opening.
"Even after he lost his grip on me, he still left his mark. Echoes, I call them. Names, information, they're…familiar to me. Looking back, the Strangers' language was something I should have recognized…"
Three shook her head, sucking in another breath.
"That's getting off topic. My point is, there was something I remember, something burned into my brain by that damned AI, something about the 'Tartarus initiative' and containing… something, something that is never meant to be unshackled. Whatever it is, it's tied to the Metro's being, I know that much. And, something tells me I don't want to know anything more about it."
"That's…"
Four… didn't have any idea of what Three was telling her. It was veritable word salad to her, yet Three's iron conviction backing up her statements nearly froze her blood. And the whole… possession thing too.
As Four's words died in her throat, a dull light peeked out from the subway tunnel, quickly growing in luminosity. Metal screeched upon metal as the subway train pulled into the station, its clean appearance, albeit heavily graffitied, contrasting heavily with the otherwise derelict station. As the doors opened, warm light spilled out. The cars appeared abandoned, no occupants in sight.
"And with that, it's all on you now," Three said, putting a hand on Four's shoulder, "Stay safe, and good luck."
In the dripping depths of the so-called 'Metro,' two humans and one cephalopod walked in relative quiet, the relative silence of the group broken by the occasional ramblings of one Emily Hawthorne.
Despite having long since given up trying to engage her newfound 'companions' in conversation, she still caught herself speaking to them all the same. Perhaps she was just going mad; considering the past few days, she was more surprised her sanity had made it this long. Still, it had been far too long since she had gotten the illusion of speaking with someone. (The Aberrant she kidnapped didn't count, that particular power dynamic was way too off-kilter. Her imprisonment and interrogation skills were rusty)
Still, the pickings shouldn't have been this bad!
One of her companions was just as human as her, albeit seemingly brain fried by this nightmarish funhouse of a broken, subterranean facility. The other was an Aberrant girl, who practically clung to the guy (and was still clinging to him now, clearly wary of her, not that she blamed the poor girl. That shared dream hallucination… thing had been intense)
Regardless, neither of them could speak English after having left that drug trip of a powwow, which made her new duty as the Metro's 'tour guide' that much harder.
Her grip tightened on the small, glowing stone within her fist. Her one ace in the hole, hard-fought to obtain. If God did truly exist in these dark depths, He certainly possessed a twisted sense of humor. Or punishment, depending on the angle by which she'd studied her life.
It certainly would explain the Flood, and whatever theological insanity that it implied. Seeing the spy-sat imagery of the Earth completely blanketed by the oceans had already throttled her objectivity enough, and now, this 'Metro' was what broke it. She would never sleep right again.
Of course, such a train of thought implied the world centered around her, which… down here, actually, might be true.
She now held a physical representation of the Metro's irreality, proof that the 'shared dream' had been more than just an off-chance hallucination. If the Compass wasn't enough of an anchor, the human scientist from Polaris and his Aberrant friend 'Sally' were the concrete proof that shattered whatever feeble rationalizations she could have created.
It was one thing to read about the Old Experiments, but another altogether to live in their twisted recreation. And now, they were on borrowed time in these depths. Whatever facade the Metro may have possessed had crumpled, baring its true nature to their little misfit party.
Where once she may have held the barest inkling of being watched, she now felt intangible eyes boring holes through her neck, her face, her body. The dead surrounded them, watching, observing, and both 'Sally' and the Polaris scientist could clearly feel it as well.
The souls that wandered these halls, both of Kamabo's previous employees and the dead of the Aberrants, had given up their charade. For better or worse, they had the undivided attention of the Metro, and it had no compulsions of hiding that particular fact. They no longer cared of whether their whispers were heard, or what flickering forms were at the edges of her vision. They wanted her to know that they were watching.
But, that alone wasn't concerning her.
It was the noises that she heard just at the edges of her hearing that had her tense. They were more… emotions than actual sound, and she couldn't tell if her ears were hearing them, or her mind was picking them up. She felt like a ball of tinfoil in a microwave, for lack of a better description.
The writing they had scratched on the walls of the dreary maintenance tunnel certainly didn't help either. Some of it in English, the other in whatever script the human and aberrant could presumably read. It was an intense combination of cheering for their progress and decrying their existence.
Keep going, you got this!
It will rend you apart at the molecular level
You think your guns make you safe
That one had to be her favorite. Fuck you too, Metro Freaks. For now, she was content with ignoring the ramblings.
Something fizzled at the edge of her consciousness, a minute wavering in her vision that wasn't caused by her APP mask's lenses.
She held out her hand, signaling for the two behind her to stop. Her eyes narrowed as she peered ahead…
As quickly as the feeling came, it faded away. The air restabilized in front of her, whatever noospheric insanity the Metro had planted three having moved on. A quick check by way of a thrown empty plasma cartridge confirmed her suspicion, and they were back on the move.
The air felt heavier, the artifact in her hand imperceptibly glowing brighter and brighter as they walked. They were getting close, she could feel it.
She knew that anomalous artifacts born from noospheric 'errors' had sent her species's technological prowess centuries ahead of schedule, but to hold one was an entirely different experience. There was something in her very being, like a string tugging on her soul, pulling her up and away from this place.
Of course, such a string was subject to a tug of war, and she could feel that resistance growing.
As they waded their way through the maintenance tunnels and their veritable minefield of anomalies, she could hear the Polaris scientist muttering reassurances to 'Sally,' most likely empty platitudes of 'A jump, skip, and a hop, and we'll be out of this!' or more despicably, 'it'll be alright, just follow her!'
Leave it to a Polaris employee to spin up extravagant false hopes, even if they were loosely based in reality.
It was how they acquired their budget, after all; take the technologies that Borealis brought into the world, water them down to the lowest common denominator, and then returning these neutered products while preaching about the wonders each of their modifications wrought. False hopes of how each new modification would do 'this, that and the other thing' and 'increase consistency and cut production costs' and 'it won't explode now half the time' and yada yada yada, it was all just corporate bullshit to her.
She knew of the arrangements, of the economic realities of Polaris's mission statement, but did they need to be so blatant about their work? Wars may be won with quantity, but quality and sheer, unparalleled firepower was still needed.
Even that suit of Environmental Reconnaissance Armor he was wearing showed visible signs of modification, a halted transmogrification of a cheaper, long-term environmentally sealed evolution of Borealis' APP armor. The signature geometric decals and markings of Polaris' shell company FLK didn't exactly do much to conceal all the similarities in visual design, after all.
And yet, that damn suit got the scientist this far. She did have to respect that moxy, but really, how much had they changed from the design patterns the company had been sent? She knew a carbon-nanotube hydrophobic weave when she saw one, and those weren't cheap! It was Borealis tech that had kept him alive, but only barely.
Bah! That didn't mean it would do shit against any real weapons, considering those particular suits only had minimal reactive armor plating and kinetic dampening in the undersuit.
She shook her head. Considering their situation, any kind of armor was better than nothing. A familiar itching was already growing at the back of her skull, one that hailed they would be having company soon.
One way or another, the Metro wasn't going to give them up without a fight.
Emily's eyes took in the empty halls all around them, dark corroded metal and concrete lit by red low-vis lighting. Each ceiling mounted strip of LEDs would subtly illuminate her and her companions, silhouetting them against the oppressive darkness of the halls beyond.
She was loath to imagine what horrors lurked ahead - much like an unobserved quantum particle, something could be hiding anywhere in the spaces between lights, hidden to them until it was too late.
Every corner turned was a potential ambush, every rusty ventilation grate they passed an attack vector. Sealed doors to other parts of the Metro were left completely alone, and much of the writing on the walls was ignored; the golden line emitted by the Compass, the one she could see in her mind's eye, was the only trustworthy source of direction down here, and even then Emily had her doubts.
This may have been the original Metro line, even before the Blob had begun reshaping reality as a collective consciousness, but it wasn't immune from the changes. She hated having to throw her trust, and by extension her life, to the mercy of an artifact given to her by the remnants of the Collective, yet what other choice did she have?
Admittedly, she was scared. Though, in all honesty, she wasn't all that scared for her safety - she was the woman with the gun and not much more to lose, after all, she could handle herself just fine - she was more scared for the other two behind her.
One was a scientist, who if she croaked would become the last active human left alive on planet Earth. With her out of the picture, and barring no other survivors showing up, humanity at best would be put on a fifty year timer. Even if he wasn't lying about a portion of Polaris's population surviving, she wouldn't trust them to perform basic calculations concerning the tensile strength of a platinum-iridium micro cable, much less try to repopulate the human race. Besides, most of Polaris's staff roll were old geezers, who knew how many of them were (relatively) young enough like he was?
Speaking of young…
Her other companion? An actual aberrant child, who just wanted to help her dad with his human research and somehow ended up down here because of it. Emily could tell the poor kid was just barely keeping it together as is, and if they were going to get through what comes next, she needed everybody's heads in the game.
(Including her own.)
Turning around and waving to get their attention, she popped the question, muffled through her APP mask.
"You two good?" she said, hoping that by also including the universal point-then-OK-hand gesture it'd trigger some neuron in the scientist's head that hadn't been scrambled yet, unlike the rest of his egg yolk head. She would kill for some scrambled eggs right about now.
While his eyes didn't convey a full understanding, the hand gestures seemed to do the trick. He gave her a shaky thumbs-up much to Sally's visible confusion, which was seemingly alleviated through a brief warbly explanation. How he forced his voice to modulate his pitch like that, she had no idea.
The girl also proceeded to give a thumbs up, forcing a little smile to further sell the 'I'm totally not seconds from a total mental breakdown' vibe she was trying to give off. The man from Polaris didn't look to be far off, going by the furrowed, pale complexion. She did appreciate seeing his face, even if it was a dirty myriad of uneven colors and pressure markings.
Just how long had he been wearing that mask beforehand? ERA suits were built with long-term operation in mind, but even they had their comfort limits.
(She pretended to ignore his eyes, and how they glowed - especially how they glowed the same exact shade of teal as the Blob did.)
She turned back, shivering slightly.
If they make it out alright, she resolved, she was going to take a day off. Drag the Polaris guy with her to a nice beach, do some much-needed sunbathing, and try to figure out exactly what the hell fried his brain. She needed her R&R desperately; this shit was running her ragged.
"Yeah…" she said to herself, frustration stressing her voice, "Of course. Run into another survivor, and it turns out that he's gone all native on me. Just my luck…"
She sighed deeply, hand running over her mask. She didn't know who she was speaking to anymore. Herself? The other two? The shadows?
"Y'know, part of my schooling was probability," she continued, ranting, "and I swear this chain of events should be impossible. No, scratch that, actually, I'm sure you were around, nudging events this way and that down here. Am I right?"
Yeah… she was speaking to the shadow people now. Maybe her brother was right about sentience being an evolutionary maladaptation. But really, this was just… mad.
Warily, she drew her pistol, noticing how Sally did the same with her cheap little plastic toy gun. Anything to help, Emily supposed. The scientist from Polaris didn't have a gun, thankfully. He may have been human, but whatever the Metro did to him didn't sit right with her. Until she knew what exactly was up with him, she had to assume he was compromised.
They were so close, they couldn't take any chances.
And, judging by the oncoming headache, they were close to losing their margin of error.
….
Which was sooner than she had thought.
Something had to give.
There was a stirring pull within her gut, one that was almost unbearable. It danced across her skin like a colony of ants. She wasn't sure if it was the Compass, or the anticipation and stress threatening to overwhelm her. Most likely the latter, judging by her two companions. Whatever semblance of control either had was all but gone; Sally had been reduced to a hyperventilating, teary mess, barely being held together by the Polaris scientist's feeble comforting.
They felt it too, no doubt.
Whatever intrinsic qualities the Blob may have held, subtlety wasn't one of them. She swore it was toying with them at this point, not even bothering to straight out incapacitate them. She wasn't a fool; that thing could give off near-lethal psionic emissions, yet it held back for whatever inane reasons.
Of course, that had been her working hypothesis roughly… she couldn't remember, five minutes ago? Unfortunately, that hypothesis had been shattered, its little, glassy bits thrown into a blender, pulverized to dust, then inhaled by her, to where her trachea and lungs were shredded in to bloody ribbons. Which, coincidentally, was how she felt at the current moment. Ever since she had retired from her previous career to work as a full-blown engineer, her cardio had gone to shit.
Not the Blob cared.
And this time, it had no compulsions of holding back. It shimmered strangely, its gelid glow fluctuating wildly, almost like the surface was fractalized water. The shadows itself seemed to bend against it, deforming its surface tension. Conversely, that would explain the muffled screams, and how it seemed to be straining forward, compared to its quick fluidity from when it last chased her.
Something external was holding it back, an unconscious portion of her mind whispered.
The scientist and Sally weren't handling this new development nearly as well. She had been forced to go behind the two, pushing and shouting at them to keep running.
He struck her as someone with no formalized training, someone without her experience, yet judging from their little conversation earlier, knew more than someone like him should have. Essentially, he needed plenty of prodding to keep going. The other was a literal child; even if she was an aberrant, Emily was tempted to carry her. But then that would've hampered her firing arm, something she really needed right now.
Well, may need. Her pistol wasn't all that effective, but it was something.
Her rationalizations were the only thing keeping her sane. Even through her helmet's protective measures, she could feel the utter rage of the Blob. Whoever had installed the noospheric dampener in the APP prototypes was a saint, someone who didn't deserve to die the way they did.
As it stood, she was having to prod him and the child forward, shouting anything to get them moving, begging, abuse, whatever it took. She was essentially herding them forward, following the golden path all the way.
The Blob was being held back somewhat, and when she took a shot at it with her pistol, the shadows briefly let up. It surged forward for a moment, screaming, but soon slowed down once more.
Sally was nothing more than a blubbering mess, almost incoherent. The Polaris Scientist, on the other hand, had shut down emotionally. From when he turned his head, she saw his jaw had been screwed shut, and his eyes held no light behind them. He would follow orders, at least.
But, they were running out of time, and fast.
She could feel the compass's line coming to an end, not far from them. Yet, the Blob was growing faster, and she could feel its psionic emissions growing stronger. A pounding headache had grown behind her eyes, making her want to vomit. Sally already had retched.
Emily all but blazed through the decrepit tunnels, chasing the golden line through tight corners and more goddamn maintenance hallways. The others behind her kept up as best as they could, having been properly galvanized. Finally, they were in gear, knowing full well that slowing would equal certain death.
The writing on the walls even gained a hurried quality as they ran, the once smoothly carved or painted on text becoming harsh scratches and quickly spray-painted symbols.
KEEP GOING
JOIN US
HARD LEFT RIGHT AHEAD
GIVE UP ALREADY
EXIT
As she rounded a corner, she saw it - there!
At the end of the hall - below a hastily welded on EMERGENCY EXIT sign - the golden line terminated at a door! Mag-locked, but a door nonetheless, their way out!
"In, in!" She shouted, gesturing wildly at the unassuming doorway. The scientist tried to wrench it open, but the magnetic door locks held firm. The red LEDs indicating the door's 'locked' status glowed almost maliciously at her, as if it were possessed. They had roughly fifteen seconds before the Blob reached them, by her estimates.
As such, she certainly wasn't in the mood for a slow and subtle, yet clever solution,. And when you had a hammer, every problem was a nail.
Without thinking, she brought her pistol to bear. Gesturing for the other two to stand back , she held the trigger down, pushing the barrel of the gun into where she thought the electronics of the mag-lock were. Bracing herself, she released the trigger, sending an overcharged blast of plasma directly into the door's control systems.
…
In her blind haste, she had forgotten just why doing so was a horrible idea.
Energy was an interesting beast to play with, especially when too much was applied at much. While say… she didn't know, a railgun's explosions were caused by the sheer stress of a hypervelocity projectile forcefully transferring all of its kinetic energy to the target, her weapon worked on the principle of the sheer heat of its projectile melting whatever stood in its way. And usually, such a harsh temperature differential between the projectile and te environment would result in quite a violent reaction, typically an explosion. The plasma losing its magnetic casing certainly didn't help.
As such…
One moment, she'd stood braced against the door, and the next, she found herself sailing through the air, and then on the ground, dazed.
"W-we can't just leave her!" Sally shouted, thoroughly winded. Despite her overworked body screaming, she was still sprinting.
"Shut it!" he roared, "T-there's nothing we could have done!"
When the plasma had exploded (he still couldn't believe such a weapon existed), he had watched Emily's prone form fly through the air like a ragdoll, hitting the ground with a sickening 'thump!'. His memory after that was… hazy.
He stared at her fallen form, bile welling up his throat. As if trapped in molasses, he slowly turned back, seeing that the Blob was almost upon them, about to cut them off from their only true escape. Sally stood frozen in shock, her face a pale white blanket.
Emily stirred on the ground a fair distance away, alive, yet, she had to be crippled.
A mute horror had overtaken him, the pain in his head growing almost unbearable.
S-she…
…
Five seconds.
He closed his eyes, taking a breath.
Turning away from her, he grabbed Sally's arm and wretched her towards the doorway, their only chance of escape. He ignored her cries of protest, and the tears that streaked down his face. It was the only logical option; they were out of time, and if they tried to help her, the Blob would cut off their escape. If that happened, they were all dead, and if he died down here, humanity would render itself extinct.
That was what he told himself, at least. Yet all the justification in the world couldn't stem the guilt and shock that crushed his soul.
Behind the door was a plain, utilitarian stone staircase, the walls of the passage scratched to oblivion. The two raced up the stairs, not that they particularly cared. He no longer felt anything, his innards gripped by an icy numbness that blocked out every sensation. Sally, on the other hand…
"We could have saved her!" Sally screamed.
"We would have died!" he shouted back. Sally could hate him if it meant they both got out of this alive, and humanity still had a chance to live on.
He shook his head, trying to clear his vision. Behind them, he could see a part of the Blob ascending up the stairs, a tidal wave completely engulfing the passage behind them. Like flames licking at his heels, they only served to spur them on.
With burning legs and singed lungs, the two eventually reached the top of the stairs, where a solitary, windowed steel door stood, open. A scorched shadow was engrained in the wall, like an inversed nuclear shadow. Without waiting, he and Sally crossed through the threshold, which promptly shut behind them.
Not a moment later, the window was stained by the Blob's ink, trying in vain to break through, yet its shrieks and violent thrashings were in vain.
For what felt like hours, he and Sally stared at the door, until finally, the monstrosity gave up, slinking away in defeat. The headache was gone.
"I… think we're in the clear," he mumbled, slumping against the wall, "Oh god, we're free…"
"But… she isn't," Sally stated, the ramifications catching up to her, "She's still down there…"
"I…"
What had he done.
"...She'll live," he finally said, "We have to hope."
Was he trying to convince her, or himself?
Emily's lungs were working overtime, drawing breath back into her winded frame. She struggled back to her feet, shakily stowing away her pistol, which she had held a death grip on. Inertial dampeners and carbon-nanotube frames certainly did make it resistant, nearly as much as her own armor. She would have died easily, were it not for her taking most of the impact.
But…
She sucked in a breath. W-where were they?
The door had vanished from sight, with the Polaris scientist and Sally along with it. And… she couldn't feel the compass in her hand. The line was gone.
Did they… leave her?
For what felt like the first time in a long time, she felt a cold pit open in her stomach.
Shit! Why now! Why NOW!
Right on cue, and as opportunistic as ever, the Blob approached her form, ready to kill her for her lapse of judgment.
She did the only sensible thing she could; run.
And run.
Emily gave little heed to what she ran through. Without the Compass, she was running blind. Bursts of fire and electricity licked against her insulated body, acid feebly splashed off her hydrophobic coverings. Adrenaline and raw, emotional panic kicked her body into overdrive. The cold realization that she had been abandoned threw her logic out the window, leaving only recklessness and disregard.
It was this same recklessness that led her into a particular narrow hallway, shimmering and tinged.
Immediately, she felt her skull crack under the sheer, psychical presence. Were it not for her protection, she would have died on the spot. Stumbling with a hand to her helmet, she pressed forward, the Blob already at her heels.
It was through sheer will alone that she took every step, survival instincts overriding every other sense she possessed. Every step was a fresh wave of psychical agony, driving a white hot spike between her eyes, down her spinal column, setting her nerves alight in phantom pain. She fell to her knees, crying out in pain.
And yet, she crawled.
Her mind, delirious with pain and the overwhelming urge to live, succumbed to the ever-present whispering around her. In a fit of insanity, she pondered her own mortality. How things could have gone if factors had been… tweaked.
Were these her own thoughts?
She could feel blood running down her ears, tears running between her sealed eyes.
…
Something pushed up against her shoulders, dragging her back up to her feet. She was barely conscious at this point, only vaguely aware that something was supporting her. Her tongue was between her teeth, bleeding.
A terrific headache exploded across her mind, stars flashing before her eyes - shortly followed by the familiar reassurance of the Collective's psionic influence.
She… could see now.
Visions danced across her mind, an encouraging air to them…
A man sitting on a darkened dock, four Aberrant workers sitting with him.
Herself sitting on a patio within the Aberrant city, sipping on a delicate cup of coffee.
Two humans and multitude of Aberrants, holding back an endless horde of horrors from the deep, polluted sea.
They were showing her scenes of human collaboration, possible futures where she and the scientist managed to eke out peaceful, cooperative existences alongside the Aberrants.
But they weren't her. They didn't understand her, what she had gone through, what she had seen! They hadn't seen how those dipshit Aberrants ruined everything they touched, how their carelessness killed everyone she had known in Borealis!
And now, she was in a non-Euclidean horror of human (descendant) creation. These… scenarios weren't having to contend with noospheric fuckery beyond comprehension, they didn't have to deal with any of this shit! She didn't have the luxury of luck or slack, just the reality of death.
And yet, the Collective disagreed, bombarding her senses with another round of visions.
She stood on the rooftop of an old apartment building, crying into a shoulder of the Aberrant whom she had kidnapped.
She and the scientist working alongside a group of Aberrants, exploring and cleansing an old human shelter, its biodome covered in snow.
The scientist was speaking with an older Aberrant man, Sally at his side. He was describing in earnest detail humanity's history.
A cabin in the woods, next to a lake. Serene, silent. She sat on its veranda, finally at peace.
Why were they showing her these? The scene changed, one last time.
She saw herself, wreathed in flame at the entrance to Borealis.
The facility far above, entrance shrouded in vile ink and overgrown foliage.
The golden line, streaming all the way down to the bottom of the Metro.
Kamabo, ablaze.
A medal around her neck, bearing a familiar logo she'd seen in the Aberrant city.
…
Oh.
…Maybe that was the explanation.
The Collective had tested all manner of outcomes, their minds coming together to create simulation after simulation. Stories where they managed to find common ground with the Aberrants, whether through true friendship or a common enemy.
Or maybe, they were trying to show her a different way, based on the memories of her and the scientist. A way in which they could co-exist, and perhaps achieve something greater.
They'd found a vector for collaboration, through that common enemy - the Metro. The Prodigal Son was going to be a problem for the Aberrants one day, and if the Collective could get anyone down here to fight it, it was going to be her.
Emily Hawthorne was a means to an end, a main character in a grand psionic play - the girl with the gun who'd save the day and kill all the bad guys.
It made sense, as weird as it sounded to her borderline comatose self.
The Collective had to have seen what she'd done to Borealis, and evaluated her destructive capabilities to find a potential attack vector against the Prodigal Son. They had to have known she would start going after Kamabo tech after torching Borealis, ensuring that she'd end up in the Metro no matter which facility she'd gone to first.
…Perhaps that was how she survived her forceful de-thawing when she initially woke up. It should have killed her otherwise. Divine intervention, as if from a deity. She… didn't know anymore.
The scientist from Polaris and his Aberrant friend weren't part of their plan, but they still had a role in this. Whatever they did, it had to have been the first phase of the Collective's coup de grace against the Prodigal Son.
Now, their role was finished, and they were taken out of the equation. No more dead weight to carry around. Just her, her gun, and one big Metro freak and a half to bring down before she could leave this place. Her eyes closed, head slumping down.
God, she hated being a pawn sometimes.
Whatever was dragging her around was also apparently keeping the Blob at bay, if the lack of being consumed and horrifically integrated into the macro-consciousness was any indication. They were banking everything on her, a sense that was sure and strong as iron, matching her conviction.
Her headache had subsided a bit, but she still didn't have it in her to move. If her luck held out, maybe she could use this time to rest a bit.
Emily drifted off into a borderline comatose state, only barely registering being picked up and slung over the shoulder of someone, or something. The din of a Blobless Metro was like white noise to her, and she eventually decided to call it for the night.
The last thing she registered before fully falling unconscious was the sound of a rusty door sliding open, and the loose sensation of being placed against a solid wall.
With a strange finality, the door clicked shut.
The more Four learned about the Metro, the more… confused she became.
She was sitting in the back of one of the Deep Sea Metro's subway cars, the oversized, worn seats making her feel like a child. As such, she was on her back on the seat, using it as a kind of pseudo bed. If she felt like a child, might as well live out the old memories from when she used to ride the school bus. The whole subway was on a much larger scale than her own frame, most likely to accommodate the regular travelers of the line.
The Denizens of the Deep. Oh cod, them.
As the subway train wove through tunnels, clear tunnels buried by the deep pressure of the ocean, and sights that simply defied logic, passengers got on and got off at the various stops they made. When she saw her first 'Sea Angel', a muscular, jock-like individual that utterly dwarfed her, she nearly jumped out of her own skin. Hence, why she was barricaded in the isolated back seat.
Their translucent skin gave her the shivers, never mind their imposing stature and the clearly visible organs. They didn't even have faces! Why couldn't they be like jellies, who were cute?
And that was just the Sea Angels! Oddly shaped fish meandered about, interspersed by oddly shaped jellies, their heads large and malformed like large balloons. Even a few individuals in dresses, with these… cellular trees for heads! It was surreal! For the first time in her life, she truly felt out of place, and it made her skin crawl.
There really was a whole society down here! From the stops they took, she spied underground towns and cities, their stations bustling with life, unlike Inkopolis's own abandoned stop.
If nothing else, they were content to ignore her, unlike a certain conductor…
"Miss," she heard coming from the edge of the seat, where the conductor, CQ Cumber, stood. He was a sea cucumber (Like his name implied. Did his parents enjoy puns or something?), apparently, yet stood on thin, spindly legs to elevate himself to her eye level. Well, the eye level she was at, laying on the seat, "While we value our customers safety and security, we do have policies against loitering."
Four blinked, "Oh… uh, I'm waiting for… a friend."
Technically the truth? Though, calling humans and/or a lost child 'friends' may have been stretching that thin line of truth too far.
"I suppose you have," he responded, "But we have been over the whole loop two times now. Are you sure you have nowhere else to stop?"
Two loops?! How long had she been on again?
"W-we have?" She looked down to check her wrist watch. Four hours since she had embarked. But, it didn't feel like four hours. Time felt like honey.
"Yes," the sea cucumber affirmed, "I take it this is your first time riding with us, or, for that matter, visiting the Deep Sea?"
"You… could say that, I suppose."
If CQ had eyes, Four was quite certain he would have rolled them.
"The environment shock is usually detrimental to those who live in the sun," he said, "You will get used to it in tim-"
A low rumbling took over the car, the kind that vibrated the very atoms of her being. The lights flickered for just a moment, and in the back of her mind, Four swore she could hear a whispered laugh.
But just as soon as the event had come, it was over. The ramifications reverberated for a moment, then stilled.
"...That is not normal, there is no need to get used to such a phenomenon," the sea cucumber conductor noted in a calm tone, almost as if he was telling her of the weather, "On a completely unrelated note, are you of any relation to the young Inkling who passed through recently?"
Another Inkling? Wait…
"Could you describe them, maybe?" Four asked, going off a hunch.
CQ looked thoughtful for a moment, or as thoughtful as a faceless and expressionless blue blob could look.
"A girl, approximately fourteen years old? She had short purple tentacles, similar to your own. Not many of your kind ride the line anymore, I imagine you're her family?" he said, looking back at Four.
That description seemed familiar, and a quick check of Four's gallery on her phone confirmed her suspicions.
She held the phone down to CQ, showing him a missing poster for a girl named Sally Ashens, who went missing a week prior when all this human stuff was starting to go down.
The conductor looked it over for a moment, then nodded.
"That would be her, yes," he said, his tone turning grave. "I can only assume you're down here looking for her?"
Four nodded.
"Ah…"
CQ fell silent for a moment, looking off to the side.
"I'm afraid this may be difficult to hear, but…"
Four braced for the worst.
"We believe she's already gone."
"Gone? What do you mean?"
Almost as if waiting on his words, the train slowed to a halt at a nearby station, catching the Conductor's attention. Four didn't get enough time to process Sally's apparent demise before the hydraulic doors slid open automatically, allowing two people to stumble aboard from the platform.
Two all too familiar people.
Four's jaw dropped.
Who else would step through those doors than the Stranger from the Dome, and the missing Inkling herself?
For a brief second, they locked eyes - his newly unmasked and very human face was a shock to Four, among other things (why did he have Three's eyes!?)
The missing kid with him looked between the two of them, confused at the incredible animosity. Before she could speak, the Stranger stormed off, walking down the aisle with an incredibly sour expression, Sally rooted with indecision.
Of all the words she expected to hear out of a human, she didn't expect to hear, in gravely yet perfect Aquatic…
"You've got to be shitting me," he muttered, loud enough for her to hear, even as he stomped away, shaking slightly.
So, mistakes were made. For now, this is the penultimate chapter of the Metro arc, and I apologize if it feels like this was a rather rushed conclusion. We're cutting our losses here, and hopefully moving onto Greener Pastures. But enough on dour topics!
I'd like to give thanks to Falken, Spoopy, and Ancient for helping me with this chapter; Falken especially! He managed to help improve some sections drastically, and sped up the production of the chapter by a significant margin. With any luck, we should be able to get roughly a chapter out a month now, hopefully, so more frequent updates should be occurring.
There isn't much else to discuss, except that one of the scenes was altered a bit, and if you want to read how it was originally, it will be available on the Discord server. The invite code is qCMxkGzzBg. We have Garry's Mod nights occasionally.
As always, thanks for reading and reviewing, and see you next time!
