Chapter 6

It's the fifth time in when she finally decides to enter the rubble town.

Curiosity had been grabbing at her each time she had looked to the horizon and saw the town. Finally, she decided to let her curiosity lead.

She managed to pull a mask over her face before entering quietly, tense. The city was quiet, empty. She expected that much on the outskirts, but as she went farther in, it troubled her to see it was empty still.

"That's odd…." She muttered, searching the buildings that were now upstanding. There had to be some sort of life around here…..

She let out a gasp as a force hit her in the back. She was thrown off her feet and hit the wall. She turned, blindly throwing a punch. Someone grabbed her fist and twisted her arm. She yelled and pulled out of the grip with another twitch of pain. She turned to run but had to stop quickly when she almost ran into a masked figure with red and white lights on his suit. She backed up and turned to run but was once again stopped. Panting, she turned and in every direction, a masked figure was circling.

"What do you want from me?" She finally asked, her voice coming out much weaker than she had wanted, even in the digitized voice alteration.

They didn't answer, but continued to close in. The pants were beginning to catch in her chest and so desperately, she lunged out at the nearest attacker. Taking him down, she quickly got off him and began to run. She heard the commotion of them trying to follow her, but she didn't dare look back. However, she tore into a sprint and turned down an alleyway, hoping to lose them. She pressed herself against the wall as the men ran past the alleyway. Sighing, she bent over to catch her breath. When she looked up again, she was face-to-face with a mask, whose eerie laugh echoed onto the street.

She gave a short cry of fear and pushed him away from her, and tore out of the other side of the alleyway into the next street. She could hear footsteps behind her, and she turned her head back slightly to see the man and his posse stop. Under her mask, she let out a smile of relief.

I'm losing them! I did it_
She had looked back, though to see a large pile of rubble. Gasping, she stopped and looked for a side exit only to find none. The gang continued to her, and she turned in fear and bent to run. However, as soon as she had started off, someone's hands gripped around her wrist and pulled her back. They pushed her to the ground, where two of the men held her there. One of them touched the nape of her neck and her mask fell away as the supposed leader came forward, his red and white circuits glowing brightly.

"Aren't you a lot of trouble for something as small as you?" He said and the posse members took that as a cue to laugh. Nico glared at him and he laughed, before kneeling down next to her. He slid a finger down the shape of her face and she pulled away, making him give another distorted.

"So much trouble…to just get your disc." He looked up, "Hand it over."

She felt one of their hands grab at a spot in her upper back and she tensed.

"She doesn't have one."

"No?" He didn't sound disappointed, though. Rather, he gave a low chuckle. "No matter. She'll be of…value to me."

Nico felt her nose wrinkle and as he drew close, she took the opportunity to headbutt him. His mask shattered part and when he pulled away, he had a blue substance running out of his nose and down his face. What little she can see of his face twisted into anger, "You piece of malware! I'll show you!"

His hand curled around her neck and she was pulled off her feet. Her head hit a wall suddenly with a loud CRACK and spots danced before her eyes. She attempted to blink them away and fought against his steel grip on her neck. The oxygen had been cut from her and she tried to kick him, but he was just out of reach to her. His grip was crushing her neck, cutting her air, and her eyesight was beginning to go out of focus.

Just out of sight, she heard the sound of struggle and suddenly she was pulled away from the wall, but not out of his grip. They were moving, to somewhere darker and someone was following them. Suddenly, she was still, uplifted and she felt a burn across her mid-section.

"Come any closer and she dies!" Her antagonist called.

There's silence.

Then, a flash of light soared right in front of her and her attacker screamed, "My hand!"

"Now step away before you lose the other one." Another called in a grating low voice.

Suddenly, she's on the ground and sucks in a breath of air before coughing. There was a SLAM and a groan, which is then followed by a click.

She continued to cough, her throat sore from the pressure put on it. Her vision was still blurry, so when she looked up and saw the dark figure coming towards her, she scooted away as far as possible.

"Easy." The voice said gently, "I'm not going to hurt you."

He put a hand on her shoulder and she pushed it away.

"G-Get away." She whispered in the best aggressive voice she had considering her voice was almost missing.

"I'm not going to hurt you; I'm not one of them." There's a soft click and the blurry mask disappeared to show a man with dark hair, dark eyes, and features that made him look old, despite the fact that almost everything else pointed to him being younger.

She felt herself relax slightly and he gave a cautious smile, "See?"

She didn't say anything for a moment so he continued.

"I'm going to help you to your feet and we're going to go to the hospital to get this sorted out, alright?"

She gave a slow nod and he went over next to her left side. His hand went around her back and gently gripped her other side as her arm went over his shoulder. He stood after a moment, but not fully, since he was taller than her. He glanced back to her back to make sure he had her when he saw the empty spot on her back that one of the posse members had touched earlier.

"Where's your disc?"

"…My what?"

"…Oh. I see."

"What?"

"You're a stray."

"A what?" She began to cough again and he stopped with her. Her legs shook and only then did she realize how tired she was.

After a moment, he spoke again, "We'll talk about it later. But for now, we're going to change things up."

His hand went away from her arm and after a moment, he scooped her up. She didn't argue, mainly because she was too tired to.

"I got you…."

But her head leaned into him and she heard nothing more.