>>6322777>>6322804>>6322838>>6322938>>6323047>+1 to SanguineYou close your eyes. The lights continue to dance, pulsing with every heartbeat. The air still reeks of dust and decay, but it somehow feels less suffocating now.
This place is dead. The people who built it, who lived and died here, are all gone. Scattered either to the winds, or huddled in the 111th’s provisional settlement.
And yet –
Somewhere deep inside, something stirs. A small, stubborn spark. You don’t remember who you were before all this, but maybe that doesn’t matter. Maybe what counts is what you do after.
You inhale though your nose, tasting metal and stale air, then exhale slowly. The smell doesn’t fade.
You inhale again. This time, you catch the lingering smell of warm MREs and the delicate scent of Harper’s cologne.
You’ll rebuild better. Not just shelters or systems dictated by unfeeling efficiency for the sake of survival. But something worth <span class="mu-i">living</span> for.
The thought settles in your chest like an ember that refuses to die.
Footsteps crunch softly on the debris-strewn floor. You glance up to find Harper approaching, his inventory check finalized. His expression lives at the junction between exhaustion and concern.
“You look a million miles away,” he says quietly. “Everything alright?”
You nod. “I think so. It’s just been a long day.”
“Welcome to my life. If it’d just been me, this whole operation would’ve needed another day to move everything downstairs.”
“But would you have gotten into the Watchtower?”
He adopts an exaggerated expression of hurt that doesn’t quite hide the twinkle in his eyes. “Ouch. But to answer your question…eventually. Faster if the colonel loaned me one of his netrunners, but it’s easier to send me out with a crunch key on a USB stick. Less of a loss.”
That sounds completely within character for the surly Estevez.
He settles besides one of the supply crates with a soft grunt. “Still,” he says after a moment, “Place like this…even I wouldn’t want to life here. I’d be clawing at the walls within the first hour. Off the grid, I had the sky. Trees. Real air that didn’t come out of a can.”
The one-way window offers a view of the desolation – an endless canyon of concrete and glass, dark and hollow. “Maybe that’s why everyone was miserable. They gave people everything except room to breathe.”
He gives a small, tired laugh. “You say that like you remember it.”
In a way, you suppose you do. Even if your mind had briefly flashed back to the initial panic of your awakening, banging and screaming against the lid of the cryopod.
“…I don’t. But I think I understand it,” you offer quietly.
For a while, neither of you speak. The wind hums through broken vents, spurred on by the rasping shudder of failing circulation systems. They stir the dust into pale wisps that glide along the floor. Harper finally exhales, long and slow.
(cont.)
