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lillaxtrigger · 3 years

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Young Hope: Chapter 33

A soft and cooling gale blows down a steep and rocky solid, traveling down through a lush valley of elm sitting along the very base of a giant mountain; the gentle breeze breaking off whatever leaves remain loosely attached to the twigs to ride the descending mountain winds. Right underneath these very twigs do the pair of angels causally stroll along the woodland grounds, the blue haired boy among them taking in a nice refresh breath of the mountain breeze that bellows through. “Ahh...Nothing like a little nature hike through the woods to loosen up and mellow out, all with comforting nature sprawling all around. The gentle cool breeze brushing past, the last of the birds echoing their song as they prepare to take off to the south, the actually bearable temperatures that don’t make you feel like you’re in a humid hell hole; and best of all, not a single swarm of bugs itching to pierce through any part of my skin. Heck of a better change of scenery from the thick southern tropics. Not that I’m hating this nice nature hike here, Mall; but why’d you take me all the way over to the base of a mountain? If you’re wanting climb to the top of the world, I know some that are way taller than this one.” “Dear lad, can you think back to when I told you of how the Kybr hold countless foe’s in this universe?” “Uh, yep. Ain’t like we all don’t make a few enemies in our lives. We could’ve just flown out here in just several hours; but what is about the Kybr that those guys want us so dead that we gotta hide?”

A few moments of silence pass between the two as Mall remains silent, left to ponder upon the young angels curious question. Breaking this pause does Mall finally answer him with: “Those very foe’s we’re once determined to pick through the entire universe and sentence my kin to imprisonment within an outside dimension all out of a single primal drive: fear.” “Fear?” “A deep and palpable fright over the power we could hold over the very dominion that they shared with us. A fright so desperate that they were willing to hunt down and cast away human’s who have ascended thanks to our kinds blessing; a blessing that you have clearly been bestowed; my boy.” “Whoa, really! You know what this blessing is?” “Hmm. Those humans that have proven themselves to the Kybr were gifted with their lineages very souls the path to their greatest potential; to awaken the blessing we have bestowed upon the swathes of humanity and unlock the potential to change and control an aspect of this very reality.”

“So does that mean that all humans could have powers like mine?” “I imagine with the countless eon’s that have passed, the Kybr’s very blessing lingers deep within the very soul of humanity itself by now; left unnoticed and forgotten to the march of time. Of course, this is something that we have naturally prepared for. And in our eager preparations for this, my kind have constructed several cities and utopia’s designed to house young blooming human gifted with our blessing. Left to grow and discover what piece of this vast universe they held control over. And though a good number of them were occupied by those very humans, those that had made it their home were swiftly flushed out and dumped within my kin’s dimensional prison like the rest. However, their imprisonment came before all of them could be even occupied. A couple of these cities remain untouched; preserved in a snapshot of time for countless millennia and away from the universe’s prying eyes or hands. But today is the very day that one of them shall be unlocked and opened; all in pursuit of what we had searched for; one of the search nods that I had snatched away and hid within this very city. And since nothing but Kybr were allowed within this metropolis; it remained one of the perfect places to hide it.” “So why’d we bring the Halo here if you knew where it was?” “Well, would you wish to trek through the tropic’s again to go back and retrieve it?” Just hearing this very questions leaves the boy’s face stiff and silent; Tore grasping the places where his arm had been bitten. A jesting chuckle escapes from the cosmic angel’s lips, taking his silence with: “I think not then.”

Strolling right out from the elm forest, the angelic duo begin to climb up from the very base of the mountain; the grassy grounds beneath their feet slowly replaced by the rough and course rocks decorating the ascending sides. Gazing up towards the peak of the mountain, the blue boy sees nothing out of the ordinary; the solid stone inclines slowly covering with more pure white snow the higher to the peak it ascends. “Ain’t really seeing any buildings here. You sure that this is the right place?” he questions. “Certainly.” Mall answers as he leads him right to the very entrance of a dark cavern no far from the base. “Simply just through this tunnel.” “I...Oh! Now I get it. You put the city inside the mountain to keep people from finding it.” “Precisely, my young man.” As soon as the two of them set foot within the rocky cavern, Mall suddenly takes off down towards its depths; his wings glistening among the advancing darkness. Tore then rockets on after his spacial partner, his white wings illuminating the void as he catches right up to him. “Kinda wish we could glide somewhere that wasn’t so tight and rough.” he then complains. “Fear not, young ward, for soon you shall fly freely through the air like the open sky itself. We have constructed these cities to be as open and wide so that the young human’s blessed with our gift freely practice their skill and craft. You shall soar as freely as the wind its-”

Before the cosmic man could finish stating this to the young angel tailing him, Mall looks on ahead and stops dead in the air; Tore having little time to stop himself before unintentionally tackling straight into the guys backside and right onto the rocky ground. Letting out a little pained groan, Tore rises right off the cosmic angel and shakes off the little crash; asking him: “Why we stop for? We taking a piss break?” “This can’t be...” “Huh?” Upon hearing his space bound mentor utter this disbelieving statement, Tore looks back to witness Mall rocket further down towards a light at the end of the tunnel; a pair of what seemed to be open doors set along the sides of the exit. “Mall!” he exclaims, taking off after the worried angel and piercing right through the illuminating end of the rocky tunnel. After dashing right through the end of the passage, Tore stops to cover his eyes as they adjust to the heavenly glow shinning before him; slowly lowering his arms as he squints out to the site that remains spread out before him.

The blue angel’s eyes suddenly widen when beholding dozens, if not hundreds of buildings and structures that all float through out the vast and hollow inside of the mountain; their bronze, silver, and gold surfaces all left twisted and warped into unimaginable and unique shapes. All of them sat hovering above dozens of rainbow colored crystals that glisten in the sunlight that shines through the rock above; glistening a myriad of lights and colors. Decorating the air between these buildings be dozens of distorted art pieces and sculpture reminiscence of abstract artistry; warped and curving outwards to strange shapes. Sprouting from the crystal be miles of long and warped wood vines that sprawl out in almost every direction imaginable; baring plump fuchsia fruit baring black strips that end right at the base. Above all of it could he see the cloudless blue sky through the transparent ceiling; all with countless animals, bugs, even a couple of travels could be see waltzing right over with next to no idea of the shining utopia below them. Wow, all this look so shiny and strange. All the twisted buildings, glistening against the colorful rocky underneath. And everything above; the very sky so clear to gaze up to. What sort of city did the Kybr try and build for the human’s back then?

Breaking his amazed gaze away from the near overwhelming site, the blue angel discovers is cosmic escort refusing to take in the entire site with him; simply just weaving right past all of the art, sculptures, branches, and buildings to instead rapid ascend towards the very top of the hovering utopia at breakneck speeds. Jeez, he doesn’t seem like he’s in much of a mood to take in the scenery. Then again, he did look pretty panicked when coming to the way in. He didn’t even welcome his new guest to the untouched city or anything. Wonder what got him so high strung?

Concerned with the cosmic angels rash ascent up towards the top of this shimmering utopia, the blue boy rockets right up after Mall; rising up towards a whole gallery of floating art pieces up ahead. A circular figure with dozens of points stretching out form the middle, a twisted pillar decorated with stripes of pure light, a frozen spurt of silver with a bronze angel standing atop, the warped wood stretching out from between the colorful crystals, every one of them he swerves right by without so much as a passing glance; keeping his eyes glued straight up to his retreating mentor. Ascending right beside one of these towering tree’s, the blue angel brushes the palm of his hand against the curving chocolate brown surface; the smooth, but hard bark of the wood feeling a tad familiar to him. Feels a lot like birch, but the bark seems way too darkened; and that isn’t even going into the fruit that seems to be growing off of it. Doesn’t look like any sort of other fruit out there. Guess that the Kybr grew these fruit personally for the humans they blessed to eat. As tempting as it is to take a juicy bite out of one, there’s hardly any time for one. Gotta catch up to Mall and see what’s got him so worked up.

With the floating buildings around them turning from gold to silver, soon enough does the young angel start to catch up to the cosmic Kybr; Tore gliding over to his side and requesting that: “Mall, slow down! What’s got you so wound up?” “The gate...It was opened.” “What?” “The gates weren’t meant to be left wide open like that. The Kybr and the humans we had blessed are the only beings in this entire universe that can unlock their seals. And were the only two that know of this city’s existence.” “Well, maybe there are others, you never know.” “Tore, if there were others, I would know. Something else barged its way into this sacred untouched utopia and had stained it with their hands.” he claims with trembling anger, suddenly speeding further upwards towards the very top of the city. As Tore continues to pursue the racing cosmic angel, the afternoon sun shines its ray’s right through the translucent roof of the city and reflect off the surrounding floating structures; their hue turning from silver to bronze as the boy continues to rise.

Eventually does the blue angel follow his spacial comrade all the way up to the theoretical crown of the shimmering city, seeing Mall finally stop right in front of the small bronze building perched at the very top; the cosmic angel zips through the hole set through the front, with Tore following right in after him. As the blue boys eyes start to adjust to the mild bronze light reflecting within the abode, he starts to make out spots of bright blue littering the smooth curving walls. Fluttering up through the first room, the blue angel discovers a piece of furniture standing atop one of the bronze platforms; a fancy empty bookshelf holding mahogany carved dragons ascending along the sides. Damn, that bookshelf be looking real good. Wonder why they have something like this here? While pondering this do his eyes trail up to the very top of the bronze room, where he witnesses his spacial mentor gliding up through an open hole in the ceiling without so much as saying a single word. The blue angel ascends right after the speechless Kybr through a thin darkened bronze tunnel, the glow of his wings lighting through the darkness on his way up. The young angel finds the starry glow of his mentor’s wings glistening through the hole atop the vertical hallway, Tore zipping past the other ports decorating the side and gliding straight upwards.

Soaring right through the hole, Tore rises up into a much smaller room then that he entered from below; more of those blue panels from there littering the curving bronze walls and flat platforms. Gazing throughout the chamber does the blue angel discover Mall staring down to what seemed like a tiny luxury carved bed, all with more dragons and Chinese symbols decorating the frame and sheets. Touching this elegantly carved bed with just the tip of his finger, it swiftly dissolves before their very eyes, every bit of it retreating into the blue panel that lied underneath. “Uh, are you...” Tore reaches out to him with. “This was meant to be her home. A home she could raise her own family in.” he hears the spacial angel growl out.

“Mall?” he meekly calls out. The cosmic angel begins to calm himself upon hearing his blue pupil call, letting relaxed breath from his lungs as he quells his shaking fury; he then turns back towards the boy and apologizes with: “I-I’m terribly sorry you had to see my rash behavior there, Tore. With the seal closing off this glimmering utopia from the rest of the world broken, any living creature could just walk right in and prowl about like it they owned the place; caring little of what it meant to those who had left it locked tight.” Gazing around the small bronze chamber, Mall’s fist start to tremble as he remarks with a furious contempt: “And of all the places they could have meddled in.” Taking a quick look around the chamber himself, the blue angel is left to question his mentor: “Was this your home?” “It was meant to be for my daughter.” “I-You-uh-Whoa! Wait, you have a daughter!?” “Had...A human woman who I had bestowed a part of my own self with had given birth to a baby girl. The very moment that she had come into the world, a powerful and palpable emotion surged throughout the depths of my very soul; one that I had never felt in this extraordinarily long lifetime of mine. That feeling magnified 10 fold watching her grow up and passing the trials. The countless possibilities started racing through my very mind, wondering what roads she could possibly take in her life; such thoughts piercing through my subconscious overwhelmed me to flowing tears.” The cosmic Kybr slow turns back towards the blue panel that the small dragon decorated bed once stood, where he reaches a single finger out to the glowing sky blue as he continues with: “I had personally foreseen the construction of the very abode that we hover in, all equip with to help live out her life and raise her own family if the time ever come.” Gently tapping the blue panel does it suddenly glow alight, the luminescence starting to take shape before the two angels very eyes; the light starts to slowly fade to reveal a freshly formed baby crib of bronze left with a soft and fluffy pillow. “All if it perched high above this utopia, with her own personal view of the very stars above.” Gently touching the freshly made crib once again does it suddenly shatter into pieces, the shards of light returning to the bright blue panel whence it came.

“And before I knew it, she was taken away from me; stolen from this very reality like the rest of them. All of those utterly overwhelming emotions that had blossomed within the depths of my soul now left hollow and empty. Those few precious years that I had watched her grow now remain nothing more than a torturous memory that haunt the countless millennia within my existence. And yet despite it all, I had failed to grasp what I felt really was. Was it something that had laid dormant within me all this time, or was it something inflicted by her very presence? I just never knew what to call it.” “Love?” “What?” the spacial angel utters as he glances back towards his blue protege. “That feeling. It was love. You loved your daughter. That’s why it hurt so much.” “Hmm. I suppose that would be the closest to what I felt.” he responds with a soft grin and a tear in his eye.

“How long has it been since all that even happened?” Tore curiously questions. “Oh, I could never recollect how much time has passed; all the countless eon’s just blur together for me. All I can really remember from it all that my daughter was around...15...16 years I wanna say. Close to your age really.” A hint of doubt waves through the blue angel’s eyes, his eyes wandering away from the man as he attempt to claim how: “Mall, I don’t know if your daughter might be-” “But, we didn’t travel all this way for nothing, did we? No, we’ve come to correct this horrible atrocity and bring our fellow kin back to our side once more. I swear to you, Tore; with them back to this reality, nothing in the universe will ever separate us again. Nothing...” After promising this much to the blue boy, the cosmic angel starts to flutter down through the port that he had glided in from; a slight worry starting to form in the back of Tore’s head as he follows the man back down.

The two angels descend down through the dark vertical tunnel down and return to the front room of the bronze abode, quickly discovering one of the blue panels left on one of the flat perches broken into tiny shards. Landing down upon the perch to investigate, the blue angel picks one of these shards right off the bronze floor, turning to every side of the broken piece of bright blue and questioning: “What do you think this could’ve been?” “It could’ve been practically anything anyone wanted it to be.” “Uh, xcuse me?” Tore then utters out, glancing over to his cosmic mentor. Picking up one of the broken pieces himself, Mall explains to the boy how: “This was once part of a Kybr constructed panel that we had made from a distant morph matter; a material that could reconstruct and reshape itself into whatever creature touching it thinks it to be. A chair, a bed, a set of sharp blades, an arcade cabinet, whatever sort of thing whoever laid a hand on it thought of, no matter the depth or detail involved. That very bookshelf over there even, with how unique and complex the carvings are can be creates in mere seconds.” Glancing back to the broken panel from the shelf, he continues to claim how: “This one however seems to have been attempted to be uprooted from the floor and was left shattered to pieces; perhaps by the very same ruffians that had barged their way into this sacred city.”

Tore then leaps away from the broken mess and lands right next to the shelf adjacent to them, slapping the palm of his hand right on the side of the dragon carved bookcase. Before the boy’s very eyes is the Asian piece of furniture enveloped in a bright sky blue light, the angel backing away as its very form twists and writhes about; Soon does the light begin to reform itself into what the young boy had wished it to be and starts to curve outwards. The light that had wrapped around the piece at last dissolves away and reveals what had been changed underneath; a gleeful smile stretching across his cheeks as he beholds an odd chair made from technicolor bricks and a leather cushion in the middle. His smile still wide, Tore starts to repeatedly tap his finger on the piece of furniture and watches it transform into whatever he pops in his mind. A fridge in the shape of a huge jeep, the front and passenger doors being the freezer and fridge respectively, a dinning table with legs carved in the shape of dolphin flippers, a lamp with the cover of a smiling face, and then then right into a decorative statue of Marlin Brando wearing a telephone pole as a costume. “Tore!” he then hears the cosmic angel suddenly exclaim. “Uh, yeah...” “Come along, we still have business matters to take care of.” “Right, sorry.” Jumping right down to the bottom of the chamber, Tore and Mall glide right out from the hole that they had entered the abode from; neither of them seeing the broken panel above let out sparks of a sinister lime green.

Out from the shinning bronze abode, the two Kybr descend down around the rest of the small twisted and pointed shaped homes; Tore taking the moment of peace between them to ask: “So, you know exactly where the nod we’re looking for is?” “Indeed I do, but I have some business to attend on the way down before we can get it. The very fact that this hidden utopia has been discovered still brings me worry. I’m hoping to find out what sort of trespassers dare soil the grounds of this sacred city.” “So how you gonna go bout finding that out?” “We shall study the library that have been built within this utopia.” “How are some books gonna help us figure out who broke in here?” “Oh ho ho, the archive we have crafted here pales in comparison to the one’s that humanity have built for themselves. While theirs as humble and quaint as they are, their tomes of paper and leather, ours constantly gathers information from every corner of this very planet.” “So it’s like the internet.” the blue boy compares. “Excuse me?” “That’s pretty much how our internet works. People around the world record new things and post it online for all the world to take a look at. It’s how I found out how most non human mammals eat their baby’s afterbirth...wonder what that must taste like?” “Yes...Well our archives work differently than that, all with a powerful light that draws in knowledge from every corner of the globe; spoken or otherwise. Certainly more advance than what human’s have made for themselves. All that and with the plus side of not being overwhelmingly brimming with smut...Just a tad less of it really.”

Moving past all of the small bronze homes, the buildings that hover all around them drop their shiny brown surface for a far more shimmering silver; boasting more complex shapes the further down they go. As the blue boy gazes along his descending surroundings, he asks his spacial teacher: “So, how will we know when we found the library?” “Fear not. I still remember the distinct shape that it was crafted to even after all these years. The archives should be housed within the most remarkable structure within the silver section of the city.” “Kinda like that one over there?” the young angel asks, his finger pointing out towards a part of the silver city. “Oh, yes. That’s it.”

The twisted structure that the blue boy points out boasted a design of more geometric structure; the top sporting a point with a glowing halo set to the tip that draws in bits of light being drawn into it. The triad sides boasting angular corners that bend up and point towards the buildings top; their bottoms curving out until meeting back up dead center at the base to create a sharp tip. Held between the trio of rising points be an oval egg; the light from the halo pulsing through the surface like a heartbeat. The structure of the entire surface sporting a beautiful coat of shinning silver; the traveling light reflecting off the metal shell. From the very top of the egg, the two angels glide right down along the glimmering silver side and towards the hole along the bottom; the two of them gazing upon their reflections within the silver as they drop down. Gazing up do they find the pulse of light traveling down towards them; the two hovering away just inches from the silver wall as the light passes right in front of them.

Both of them then glide right through the front hole leading right inside the silver egg, where upon Tore once again feels himself flying right against the spacial angels backside; the pair of angel left to tumble down the curving bottom of them inside. Once they finally stop sliding along the smooth silver surface, Tore starts to crawl out from underneath his mentor while advising that: “Ya know, it wouldn’t hurt to give a little warning before you suddenly stop like that.” “Tore, underneath the entry port.” the cosmic angel utters. Peering over to where Mall had directed, the blue boy looks right under the way they came in to find large pieces of silver left scattered along the side of the curving floor; all of it pieces of what seemed to be a table and chaired decked with sharp silver blades. “What is all that?” “It was one of the defense systems set up as one of the research tables left to guard the archives. Why is...Why is it left in pieces like this?” Noticing a lime light glimmering right behind them, the young Kybr glances back for shock to suddenly strike him; stating how: “I don’t think that’s the only thing we should be worried about.”

Peering over towards the blue boys direction, horror and astonishment are painted across the cosmic angels face when beholding the cases of the archives flashing out spurts of lime green; rectangular slats holding holograms comes spewing out from the shelves and sporadically fly off in different directions. The show of absolute chaos and mayhem sends waves of panic crash through the spacial man; Mall left to utter: “No...No!” “What’s with the flying circus act?” “Something has wormed its way into the intelligence flow and has infected the entire system! All of the knowledge tablets have gone haywire from the corruption! If nothing is done about this, the disease festering through the system will corrupt all the gathered intelligence and will cast it into the void of obscurity.” “What!? Is there anything we can do!?” “I may know where the source of the infection may stem from, but we need to act fast. Follow my lead!” With his cosmic trainer demanding such, the blue angel follows Mall as he and Tore take off down towards the archives up ahead.

Thrusting themselves straight into the storm of haywire tablets, the pair of angels weave around the rectangular slats that frantically careen and fly about. When noticing a couple of them daring to dart straight in their direction, the blue boy smacks both of them away moments before they could strike the angels. “Tore!” the cosmic angel shouts. “What!?” “Do not damage these slabs in any way while we navigate through this chaos. We still don’t know how much of it can be salvaged from this mess; just keep evade.” “Right, but...how you think were gonna dodge all that?” the blue boy wonders, pointing out in the direction they fly in. Gazing on ahead, the two discover a thick flock of knowledge slabs all blocking their flight through; Mall offering with a determined smile to: “Let me take care of that.” Gliding a little ways towards the sea of swarming slats, Mall thrusts his finger tips right between the thicket up ahead and starts to push both of his hands away through the air before them; the cluster parting ways as his hands separate. Rocketing right down the freshly open path, Tore glances through the tunnel of tablets to find not one of them able to pierce through the space that Mall had made for them. Beyond the whole storm of frantic slabs, the two angels finally make it to the back of the front hall; both of them immediately racing to the far left and heading straight down a tight oval tunnel leading deeper within the library.

Out from the main hall of the library do the two Kybr start gliding down a tight oval hall of glimmering silver; the glow of their wings reflecting off the curved walls. The duo continue to fly forth and come across another obstacle obstructing their way, discovering an entire mess of spikes and swords all constantly popping out and withdrawing from the very walls of the oval hall; all of their sharp edges and points covering every bit of space that they could fly through. “I ain’t seeing anyway through. Let’s back track and find another way.” Tore suggests. “No need. Simply creating another opening shall do.” his mentor denies with. Hovering out to the front like the swarm of tablets before, Mall places both of his balled up fists back against one another as they approach the impenetrable wall of stabbing blades. Its then that he begins to slowly uncurl his fists to let the air within open right up, the wall of deadly silver in turn bending itself open for the nearing angelic duo. The two causally proceed through that very hole that had seemingly bend itself open, Tore left amazed of how the stabbing spikes and swords simply curved away from them rather then thrusting straight through; as if they’re redirected around the very space the two of them occupy. Flying past the thicket of silver blades and pikes, Tore see’s his cosmic teacher take a sudden turn right into a glowing hole left in the wall; the blue boy following the spacial angel right on in.

Flying straight into the room do the two of them discover the source of the illumination, a towering pillar of pure colorful light beaming down from the roof of the chamber; sparks of lime green overshadowing the colors that descend down into the floor. “That right there! That is the source of the chaos that plagues this very library. We must reach into the stream of knowledge and pulling the infection right out to stop this madness.” the cosmic angel declare. “You mean with our bare hands? How we gonna do that?” “Simple really, just follow my lead and I shall instruct you to-” Just moments before his spacial mentor could finish explaining how they will fix all this, a set of silver bubbles all expel out from the walls of the chamber; their tops opening up to reveal curving turrets aiming their barrels at the two. “Just a moment.” Facing the armada of silver spherical guns, Mall holds both of his hands out between the entire fleet of silver bubbles and swiftly clasps them together; every single piece of the silver armada crushed together into a mess of scrap. The crushed together silver crashes right before the two angel’s; Mall hovering right over the scrapped silver as he suggest that his blue pupil: “Come along, we have no time to waste.”

Following after his starry mentor, both Tore and Mall each land on opposite sides of the glowing pillar; the blue angel hearing his cosmic teacher explain how: “Right, so what must be done is that we shove our hands straight through this light and attempt to extract the corrupt infection from its very bowls. I shall isolate the energy and keep it from escaping, all while you reach in and pluck the source right out.” “Gotcha.” Out of the two does Mall first thrusts his arms straight into the pillar of light; a small hiss escaping his teeth as he shuts his eyes tight. “Nnn...There! I have it cornered! Now Tore, reach in and root this infection out!” “On it!” the blue boy exclaims, swiftly piercing through the glowing column with his own pair of hands.

As soon as the young angel shoves his hands straight into the stream of knowledge, he could feel the light forcing itself through his body and delve straight into his very brains; countless pieces of random information and thought flood and overwhelm his mind as he keeps himself within the stream. “Aggh! What’s going on!? My brains feel like they’re about to explode!” he wails out. “I still have the source of the corruption trapped! Just fight through the pain and grab it!” Like his cosmic mentor encourages, Tore bares the blistering headache while he feels around for the energy that Mall claims he has trapped. The blue angel soon starts to feel something amiss among the constant onslaught of light and grabs hold as tight as he can, feeling the corruption refusing to move as he tries to jerk it right out. With every bit of strength he can muster does the blue boy start to uproot the lime green out from the streaming light; slowly pulling the green away from the center of the pillar. After a few moments, the blue angel finally tugs the source of the corruption right out from the column of running knowledge; careening back to the end of the chamber once free from the pillar.

Withdrawing his own arms from the stream of knowledge, Mall swiftly glides over to his blue wards side; witnessing the boy rise from the floor with what seemed to be blob of lime green. “Tore, are you alright?” “Yeah, just gotta take a few minutes for this migraine to go away. But what I’m wanting to know is what exactly I pulled out?” he answers, the blobs glowing on his face as he stares deep into it. “Whatever it is, the flow of knowledge should be troubled no more once we destroy this dastardly power.” “I’m not sure if we should go that far.” “Why? It’s caused so much chaos.” “I know, but...Something about it just seems oddly familiar to me. Don’t know how well I can explain it, but it feels like a friends that I’d briefly met popping into say hello...I kinda wanna say hello back to be honest.”

In that very moment of acceptance does the blob suddenly seep itself right through the palms of his hands, worming its way through his arms and straight into the center of his body; every bit of lime green dimming until none of its luminescence was left to shine. “Hello...What was that all about?” the blue boy questions. “Curious indeed. Perhaps its your very soul beginning to bloom out and reveal what part of this reality it can control.” “Same thing happened when I held some parts of flesh and plants back inside the warp gate. Think that might have something to do with it?” “Perhaps...In any case, the library should be calming itself from having that piece of infection removed. Hopefully, we can check who exactly had the nerve to prowl around within this shinning city. Come.” While the two angels start to glide back towards the port they had fluttered right in from, Tore takes one more look to the freshly restored stream of information flowing behind him; still left curious as to where he had felt the power he had uprooted from it before. It just felt so familiar…

Hovering back into the main hallway of the archives, Mall lets out a relieved breath to find the countless slats that were once fluttering amok now neatly organizing themselves once more; each rectangular tablet sliding itself back into the shelves in an orderly fashion. “Now this is far better. Seems like only a tad bit of the information stored here had been destroyed, quite relieving to find most of it left intact.” Mall admires. “Wait so, if only a little bit of it was lost, then how long it was going bonkers like that?” “I imagine not very long at all. If that’s true, then who knows how long the gate might’ve been open.” “I can’t help but wonder who might’ve left them open?” “That’s what we’re about to find out.” the cosmic angel claims as he drift off towards one of the massive bookcases, with his ward following after.

Out from the countless sets of tablets that stand within the bookcase of pure silver, the cosmic angel slips one out from the shelves and hovers it before him and the blue angel; pinching the opposite corners to pull and enlarge the slat. The holographic screen glows alight when Mall lightly taps his finger upon its surface, the light from the tablet slowly forming together into a cohesive picture; revealing to them who dare trifle through the air of this metropolis. The blur finally clears up to show them a pair of figures that race through and combat what was the defense table; a small teen girl firing out green flames and a grungy teenage boy donning in a torn suit and dressed in bandages. “Hang on...” Peering closer to the boy in the video, the pieces start to fall together as he glares upon the green shaded glasses on his face. “I know that guy! Ha ha, I thought that the power we pulled out from the pillar felt familiar.” “You know them?” his cosmic mentor questions. “I know one of them. That guy in the suit and wraps, he was running an underground superpowered teenage fight club in the underbelly of town I went and busted. God, I still remember trading blows with the guy in an all or nothing fight to the death. He was running around blasting lightning, transforming into animals, wrapping me in bandages and slamming me in the floor; I think he turned into a girl at one point and kicked my rib cage open. Good times.” “You...enjoy fighting like that?” “Yep, have ever since I was about 7 or 8.” the blue boy remarks with a hint of perverse glee. “Hmm, you’re a rather strange child aren’t you?” Mall remarks with a smile.

The pair of angels glance back to the holographic screen to review the rest of the footage left within, watching the boy battle against an odd winged foe within a glass dome arena, the girl gliding through and trashing a tunnel with a bunch of spherical robots, both of them prying through the bronze abode they had visited before. All the evidence stacking together leaves the cosmic angel all the more angered, Tore looking over to see his fist trembling in bottling fury. “Do these ingrate have no respect? Do they know not the sacred grounds they trudge?” “M-Mall...” Upon hearing the boy behind him call his name, the starry Kybr withdraws his heated fury with a calm breath; his fist trembling less and less until uncurling into an open palm; where he turns back to the blue angel and claims that: “I’m sorry you saw that. There shall be another time to enact revenge for this travesty. For now, descending down to the citadel and retrieving the search nod is paramount. I can only plead that their meddling has only caused chaos here.” That very statement instantly backfires upon hearing a resounding boom echo from outside the archives; the pair of angels look towards the open port to witness a powerful explosion blast just right outside.

As soon as the pair of angel flutter right out of the archive, they come to behold the chaotic site that had caused the explosion; an all out war between two armies that destroy all that lay before their eyes. Hordes of hovering living armor decorated in golden swirls and diamond shell fight back against hordes of silver orb droids; the robot’s silver shells glistening a hue of bright green as they fly utterly rampant and haywire. The panic in Mall’s face continues to grow as he watches the battling armies wreck what parts of the city stand in their way; the carefully crafted sculptures and décor, the twisted and warped tree’s that tower up towards the top of the city bent and on the verge of breaking like twigs, even the hovering buildings are dented and busted up as the armies slam right into their sides. “No no no no! Has our intruder influence spread even to the repair sentinels!? Their minds have been left utterly scrambled and deranged from their power.” the cosmic angel tells. “Okay, but should we be worried about the living armor fighting them?” “They are the reason why this city hasn’t been reduced in pieces by now; those sets of armor are partially designed to be this utopia’s defenses; utilized to not only protect the metropolis, but to train blooming Kybr in their powers. Our uninvited guests must have awakened them from their sleep.” “So, the armor’s just gonna stop all this, right?” Tore wonders. “I’m afraid they can only do so much. If we wish for this skirmish to end, then we must hurry to the sentinels manufacturing tower and flush whatever causes the automatons plight.” “Alright, lead the way.” Stating this does the blue angel follow his cosmic mentor as they take off towards the onslaught ahead; piercing straight through the army and weaving around the combatants.

Just when nearing the end of the two warring armies, the two angels discover two whole hordes of armors and sentinels on the verge of clashing right between them; charging out towards them at breakneck speeds. Everywhere the pair looked, be it from above, below, or somewhere in between, neither of them could find any sort of escape from the approaching armies; the angels hovering back to back as they prepare for the clash. Facing the nearing army of living armor, Mall thrusts the open palms of his hands out towards the platoon, halting the armada with a wide wall of solid space before they could advance any further. “I’ve stopped the defense force! You take care of the sentinels!” he demands out of his ward. “Gotcha!” Upon this order does the blue boy rocket away from the cosmic angels back and out to the cluster of frantic spherical droids, firing out beams of bright white out towards the army. Though his rays blast away a couple of the circular robots, it does little to quell the overall armada; left with little choice but to race right in and pound them all away. With kicks, punches, headbutts, and knees, Tore attempts to beat away whatever droids attempts to approach; leaving sizable dents upon each of their glistening silver shells. Yet despite successfully beating back some of the sentinels, their numbers begin to overshadow him; the blue angel swinging and shooting frantically about just to keep them all away for just a few moments longer.

While busy holding the army of living armor back, the starry Kybr glance back to witness his blue pupil struggle against the numerous sphere droids; left only to watch as the boy struggles to fight back against them. “Tore!” “Ah! Mall! Help!” “Tore, listen. Every aspect that a kybr has the potential to control exists within everything in this universe. You must tap into that part of reality you can command!” When told this piece of advice, Tore tries to think back of what that part of reality he had used before; really only one recent example coming to mind. The dimensional warp gate looked like a steel machine, but was really made of living flesh on the inside; all it needed to fix itself was a little boost to change itself back to normal and get rid of the parasite. All of it was alive, the machine was alive; which must mean…

Remembering his revelation he had back then, Tore decides to test something and clutch his glowing hands to two out of the dozen sentinels that pin him down; the multicolored light from his hands seeping right into the bubble body of the droids and spreading through to the nearest others. The lime green hue that haunts their insides is quickly consumed by the radiant rainbow power that invades their body; that entire chunk of the cluster glowing a brilliant radiant light that reflects off the dented and broken buildings and art pieces nearby. The bright light show soon comes to its dimming conclusion as Tore’s power fades away and leaves the sentinels to return to their natural silver sheen; every droid orderly spreading apart and deploying themselves out to the very pieces and builds they had broken and bent.

Shaking off the cramps and bruises that the sentinels had left, the blue boy looks over and watches them all repair and fix the damage they had done; bending the surfaces of buildings back to normal, spraying a lush goo onto the splintered trees, even reassembling the broken pieces of art left hovering in the air. Feeling a firm hand grasps his shoulder, the young angel glances over to find Mall right at his side; praising him with: “Nice work. But we have very little time to celebrate. If those sentinels had come from the production tower, then the core that had breathed life into them must be tainted as well. If we wish to end this for good, then we must travel to their origin and cleanse the power infecting the very heart; else this nightmare shall never end.” Declaring such, both of the angels take off down towards the edge of the wide and open utopia; the sets of living armor gliding right behind the tails of their wings.

Soon enough do both the pair of angels and the living sets of armor behind them come to witness a spiraling silver set along the very wall of the city; soon witnessing a myriad of shining lime green droids all pouring out from the sides. The army of living armor that trails at their backs suddenly dashes out from behind them to meet the approaching incursion head on; the Kybr watching as their forces clash with the sentinels as Mall states how: “The core of creation lies just in the very top of the chamber. We just need to peer through the roof and let ourselves in.” The angelic duo speed straight through the two clashing armies and towards the very top of the spiral, weaving themselves around every skirmish that breaks out between them.

Passing right through the dueling armies do the angels roost right atop the very tip of the spiraling down, Tore glancing back to discover a couple of corrupt sentinels charging their way. “I’ll hold them off, you find a way inside.” he offers, ready to face the approaching droids. “That won’t be necessary. We’ll just create one.” “Huh?” Glancing back to his cosmic mentor, Tore watches as Mall waves his glittering wings down upon the face of the tower; several feathers from his wings showering down and piercing straight through the silver surface to take a circular pattern. Thrusting his open hands down towards the starry feathers, each one of them flattens out on the silver rooftop and connect together to form a complete circle. The gold between the feathers dissipate to let the lime green light within shine out. “Quickly!” the spacial Kybr demands as he jumps down into the light.

Without question does the blue angel jump right down into the freshly made space after his cosmic mentor, hovering down to discover a giant pale white orb shimmering within; a swirling green flame left churning in the middle of the light. Landing right along the side of the chamber, Tore quickly looks up to find the pair of repair droids still racing after; Tore warning that: “They’re gonna crash right in!” “No they won’t.” Mall denies, holding his open palm out to the hole he had made. While the spacial angel closes his hand up, the open space he had left agape shrinks away in tandem as the pair of droids close right in; the hole fully closing before they could dash right inside after. A booming crash echoes from above them; Tore gazing over to his mentor with an eager smile and mentioning how: “You gotta teach me how to do that.” “Another time. Right now we have business to attend to.” Mall claims as he glares over to the source of the lime green glow.

As the two of them slowly approach the glowing orb of pale white, Tore can’t help but cover his eyes from the overwhelming luminescence; remarking how: “Jeez, this thing is hella bright. Almost like staring at the sun.” “Well, that’s what to expected from directly looking at a star with your naked eyes.” Taking as much of a closer look as he could stand, the blue boy notices the surface of the orb is left littered with cracks of lime green stretching out from the flame burning within. “You remember what we did with the pillar of knowledge back in the library?” “Yeah.” “We’ll do the same thing here. I isolate and corner while you grab and pull.” “Gotcha.”

While continuing to look away from the insanely bright glow, Tore shoves his arms right inside the core alongside his starry mentor; Mall looking over to his ward and informing how: “You need to look right into the light if you want to grasp the scourge within.” “I can’t! it’s burning right through my eyelids!” “Gaze past the blinding light and behold the power within.” Like his cosmic trainer instructed, Tore aims his head towards the shinning core and slowly opens his eyes to it intense light; almost instantly does he feel the glow’s burning pain as he fixes his gaze upon it. Even with the light before him continuing to sting his site, he remains ever focused to the illuminating core as he searches for any traces of lime green within; his eyes welling with streams of tears as he continues to search. Moments before his pupils could give out on him, the blue boy finally finds the green flame burning within and immediately reaches out for its blazing glow; feeling the fires warmth as he tightly clutches it. “I got it!” As soon as he feels the flame crackle in his hands, Tore jerks himself back to try and uproot the fire from the bright core; the pyre losing more and more ground with each tug. Finally are the flames pulled away from the center of the core and back into the open air; Tore falling on his back as he tightly holds the flames in his hands.

Mall pull his own hands out from the bright core and hover over to his young ward’s side, helping him right off the floor as he asks: “Tore, are you alright?” “Yeah, but where’d you go?” “Wh-what are you talking about. I’m right in front of you.” “I don’t see you...I don’t think I can see anything.” the blue angel exclaims, he once pupils left utterly pale and lifeless. “You can’t see a thing!?” Aiming his fogged gaze down towards where he feels his hands are, something pierces through the void that overshadows his eyes; staring upon the blaze of the lime green flame he pulled out from the core. “I’m seeing this little fire here. It’s not like the blob of green from earlier...It honestly feels way more spoiled than that.” “Excuse me?” “Buts that’s just on the surface. I’m feeling something else here, something deep inside. It almost feels insecure and...alone?”

Right before the young angel could go into any further detail, the burning green flames suddenly leaps out from the gentle palms of his hands and right into the blue boy’s blind eyes; crying out as the embers seep through his sockets and worm their way into his head. “Tore! What happened!? What’s it doing to you!?” Mall cries out, watching as the blue angel covers his eyes. As the indigo angel slowly uncovers his eyes to the world, a colorful gleam could be seen shimmering along the surface of his oculars. He then shakes his head about as he rapidly blinks, his site returning as the blue in his eyes do. “Hey, I can see again. Alright.” “I-...That fast? How?” “Don’t know. I’m usually healing myself from injuries all time. Guess my body must’ve learned to do it on an instinctive level.” “Hmm...How peculiar… I-In any case, now that we have purified the creation core, the sentinels outside should be calming from their frenzy and should be repairing any damage that they have done.” Floating a bit away from the freshly healed indigo angel, the cosmic Kybr swings his wings upwards and flings his starry feather up towards the roof above; the tip of those feather piercing straight through the silver ceiling. Like before do they connect together to form a whole circle and opens up a hole leading right out. “Right now we must descend down to the very bottom of the city and enter the citadel. That is where I’ve hidden one of the search nods we seek.”

Hovering right out from the spread apart port are they greeted with the site of the droids patching up and fixing the damage they had done to the surrounding hovering buildings and structures. Among them all floated the living pieces of armor that had fought by their side, each of them showing their silent thanks and respect by bowing to the two as they continue their descent down.

During the pair of angels descent further down the metallic utopia, the surface that makes up the art pieces and buildings scattered around them start to replace their silver sheen for a for more dazzling color; gaining a more golden hue the further they drop. Among all the golden buildings are they soon able to make out the colorful crystals that litter the very base of the city; their rainbow glow reflecting off the bottom of the shinning structures that hang just above them. The closest to these rocks hovers a massive upside down crown, the outer walls of this glistening castle decked out with shinning jewels of all colors and shapes; columns and pillars sporting elegant carvings and depictions of mighty warriors.

Hovering right beside these very etchings, the blue angel takes the moment to admire the depiction of them fighting up against ferocious beasts and people; armed with nothing but the power they wield in their hands. “Whoa. Wonder what those guys might’ve done to get their pictures on the wall?” he ponders aloud. “Those, my young boy, were some of the earliest humans that had been bestowed with the Kybr’s gift. Those who were granted with our power used it to fight off the scourge of their very world and charted a course for humanity to follow in; taking the very world they dwell in and molding it in their very image of nirvana.” “Wow. What sort of monsters did all of them fight against?” “Well, if you truly wish to know, then the treasures of their exploits are proudly displayed right in the entrance hall of this very citadel.” “Really? Yeah!” the indigo angel exclaims, suddenly rocketing right through the nearest port leading right inside the crown; all with Mall hastily following after the eager lad.

As the spacial angel flutter right into the entrance hall, his warming eagerness is shattered when seeing the inside; waves of shaking horror crashing through his body as he finds the golden inside to be dented and bent asunder. Littering the very bottom of the curving tunnel could both Kybr find rare and numerous artifacts of all shapes left spilled onto the floor; with nothing but shards of glass surrounding them. The hollowed out remains of a frog; its entire body covered head to toe with glistening, almost dragon like scales. An elongated gecko tongue made out of shining diamond. A pair of predator eyes left as black as darkness itself with nothing but a white slit peering through the void. The mysterious floating remains of a detached heart, still left to beat to the rhythm of life. A cluster of brains all stitched together by a line of bright string, constant electric pulsing from its very cerebrum. A pair of cat like paws with claws that constantly burn out red hot flames; Tore feeling the heat emanating out as he hovers his palm over the blaze.

“This stuff looks pretty crazy and all, but ain’t it meant to be in like some sort of case.” the blue boy remarks. “What...what could’ve caused this horrible mess? All these artifacts meant to inspire the future generation of Kybr, left broken and littered thoughtlessly on the floor like garbage. Did the rogue repair droids worm their way in here?” Watching as his cosmic mentor slowly lands on the curved floor of the hall, Tore flutters to Mall’s side as he drops to his knee’s; reaching to his shoulder as he utters: “M-Mall?” “Such hopes were dashed before any of them could flutter even a wing through these halls. All that was left for these items were to be reminders of a prospectable age. Can they not even be left as that?” “Hey, uh. If it makes you feel any better, I think these treasures are pretty neat. Can’t imagine what sort of adventures must’ve been had getting them. Maybe hope isn’t as dashed as you may think.” Hearing such words from his young pupils starts to perk the distraught Kybr up, rising off the curved floor and hovering in the air once more. Before another word could be said between the two, a powerfully loud bang echoes out from deep down the golden halls up ahead. As the loud crashing keeps sounding off, the two of them dash out towards the tunnels ahead and deeper through the citadel.

Just a little further ways down the golden hallway, the pair discover the very source of the loud and violent commotion. Before them to the angelic duo behold several mounds of pure liquid gold constantly thrashing through the halls; the pile constantly shape shifting into humanoid warriors, animals, and objects as he tosses about. “What the hell is all that!?” the young angel exclaims. “That right there is meant to be the citadel’s very own security system. An amalgamation of living gold left anchored to this very building, bound by duty to combat any intruders that dare trudge through these sacred halls. Considering what all we found today, finding like this surprisingly isn’t shocking.” “No problem, we just find and clean up the core controlling it and the rest will just sort itself out, right?” Tore guesses. “I’m afraid that this rogue system runs not any central core. Rather that, this golden liquid is controlled by the souls of those fallen. Given another purpose in this very existence in the form of this very citadel. Something has clearly left them angered and confused, no doubt thanks to the meddling of our uninvited guests.” “I think I can fix it.” the indigo angel offers, suddenly dashing over towards the unstable glob of pure golf. “No!”

“Time to see what this power of mine is capable off.” Racing out to the mushy mound of shinning gold flailing out before him, Tore dodges the countless sharp weapons and claws that come popping out from the face of the blob; weaving around swing axes and maces and paws, stabbing swords and horns, even whipping away whips and tongues that all come out. Once getting close enough to the mound of liquid gold, he casts his palm out to the mounds very face and smacks its smooth surface with an audible squish; the liquid waving about from the suddenly blow. With his hand smack in the middle of the monstrous gold, Tore spreads his own energy throughout the inside of the mound; commanding that: “How bout we take a little break here?” Despite his orders, the lob of shiny liquid refuses to calm down by even a little hair and continues to mindlessly to rampage like a wild animals; expelling out a loud roar as it flails it forming weapons and limbs. “What!? But why-” A massive hammer from the collection of freshly formed weapons is swung against the young boy and sends him careening straight into the solid gold wall beside them; the impact causing the entire hall to tremble and quake. Recovering from the unexpected blow, Tore opens his eyes just in time to witness another of the golden mounds swinging out a scythe arm right towards him; its fresh golden tip ready to pierce through his head. Right when the scythe was moments away from stabbing straight through the young boy, its tip halts just mere inches from his very head. The monstrous golden blob wails the scythe repeatedly to the indigo angel, each of its swings stopped by the invisible barrier. Turning over to where he had flown from, Tore discovers his angelic mentor commanding the space between him and the beastly gold; giving the chance for the boy to pry himself off the golden wall.

Once pulling himself off the side of the tunnel, the blue boy leaps right back to the cosmic angels side; the duo facing the approaching globs of liquid gold as Mall elaborates on how: “I’m afraid this security shall not be easy to sway as the droids, its made from the countless other souls of the fallen and will not be as willing to obey the way it’s acting now.” “Well what can we do then?” “I wonder that myself. Just what have those interlopers done within the citadel that drove this golden security so mad?” While ponder this does the golden blob before them start to charge forth, roaring out a quaking screech as starts to lunge out to the two. While thinking back to the footage that he had reviewed of those two children, the answer suddenly hits him; whispering out: “That’s it.”

From the palm of his hand, the cosmic angel fires out a powerful star shaped blast towards the nearing pile of liquid gold; the star splattering the beastly blob in an explosion of twinkling glitter and drips of gold. Despite being blown to dozens of bits, the pieces of gold almost immediately begin to pull themselves back together from across every inch of the smooth tunnel; each of the pieces gathering before the pair of angels. “No good. It’s just coming back together.” Tore remarks. “Nevermind that. I know how this whole debacle can be fixed.” “Really? How we gonna do that?” “Both of us are going to race past all these misshapen fiends and split off towards the fork in the tunnel ahead. While I race off to retrieve the search nod, you shall descend down to the very bottom of the citadel and fly straight to the chamber of reflection. There you should find a golden throne perched atop the middle of a glass dome overlooking the crystals underneath. You must take the seat and affirm that the Kybr still live.” “Why can’t you sit on it then?” “The throne shall only respond to those Kybr that are still fresh in this world. I’d say about 38 years should be the maximum.” “That is surprisingly generous. Alright, sounds like a plan to me.” As soon as the spacial Kybr hears his young blue ward accept his plan, both of the angelic duo take off down the tunneling hallway and rockets right past the pile of forming golden goo in streaks of bluish white and starry skies; their sheer speed off deforming the blob the zipped past before it could get itself together.

Their racing flight soon has them coming up to a divide in the golden corridor; the blue boy hearing his mentor claim how: “The chamber of reflection should be down the right. You just need to sit in the throne for a moment and everything shall sort itself out.” “Right, good luck in finding the search nod.” “The sentiment is mutual.” After wishing one another luck, the two angels split off down their own paths, Tore gliding down to the right while Mall rises up through the left.

The young angel drops down through the glistening golden corridor towards the way to the chamber his teacher had mentioned; the light of his wings reflecting off the shinning gold of the tunnel. During his descending race down, the blue boy gazes ahead to discover an entire stamped of charging golden animals all with arms holding weapons popping out from their back; their bodies seemingly on the verge of melting right off as they hurry. Seems easy to rush right through. Just gotta watch out for the weapons and we’re all good. Coming to the first cougar of the stamped, the angel evades the swing of its blade and swings his fist right down upon its back; the beast standing little chance against the blow and splatters on his fist. A buffulo charging right after, Tore weaves around point of its spear and kicks the golden bovine in the side; the monster splitting in half against the young Kybr’s foot. After that does the blue boy find a bear jumping up and threatening to slam its spiked stomach upon the angel; Tore simply blasting the ursa apart with just a single blast. Still seeing a whole host of golden animals up ahead, Tore surrounds himself in a light colorful aura and lunges straight ahead towards the approaching pack; effortlessly cutting straight through the horde in a single charge. Once through the stampede of golden beast, the blue angel start to spit out pieces of liquid gold from his mouth; nearly gagging from the taste alone. Eh, pleh, eh! Oh god! So bitter! So pale! So metally! Why does liquid gold taste so bad!?

Mall meanwhile continues through the rising shinning tunnels up above; the stars along his wings glittering against the golden walls as he streaks along. His flight comes to an expected roadblock when finding a giant amalgamation of several golden beasts and people lumbering down ahead; the horrid monster numerous limbs crawling along the tunnel sides as it nears. It’s voracious mouth swiftly is open agap before the cosmic angel, an ear piercing screech sounding out from its depths and echoing across the golden hallway. Mall remains as ever resilient as the outcry rings against his ears; proceeding to fly forth towards the beast nonetheless. Before the spacial Kybr flies closer towards the terrible fusion of monsters and people, Mall clasps both of his hands together and aims his fingertips out toward the very center of its maw; a cosmic starry power engulfing the tips of his fingers down as he lunges forth like a spear. The cosmic angel speeds right into the monstrous amalgamation of liquid gold’s open mouth; piercing straight through the shinning horrors back and nonchalantly continues down the hallway. The beast behind him explodes in a dazzling flash of stars, its liquid remains splattering against the walls of the tunnel.

Fluttering down the rest of the golden hallway, Tore finally descends through the end of the tunnel and finds himself hovering inside a glistening chamber. The first thing he sees stand out from it all being the glass dome lining the bottom and giving a good view of the colorful crystals below, their glistening light reflecting off the ceiling of the chamber. Despite being at the very bottom of the citadel like Mall had described, the indigo angel fails to find any sort of seat laying anywhere in the room; just a triad of horizontal arches with a platform right in the middle. The heck is going on? Mall said it should be right in this room. The dome, the crystals, the room, but no throne. Did those two move it around when they were here?

As his gaze wonders around the room for any sign of the throne his mentor had mentioned, the blue boy feels something drip down on the top of his shoulder; glancing to his side to find small drips of liquid gold dribbling down from above. He aims his eyes towards the ceiling and discover the source of the golden droplets, the liquid metal dribbling down from the massive maw of a monstrous blob of shinning gold; its set of several hollow eye sockets glowing lime green as it stares upon its potential prey. When their eyes lock, the horrible beast lets loose a screeching roar that reverberates across the entire chamber; Tore noticing something lodges within the monster’s very throat. A large golden throne etched with swirls and carvings, left stuck within the neck of the beast. It-it ate the throne!? How far down even is it!? It doesn’t look like it can even be reached without getting a leg bitten off.

Before the young angel could even star t thinking on how to approach all of this, he witnesses the monstrous blob of shimmering gold stretch out from the ceiling with its mouth wide open and it sharp fang straight at him. Just when the living glob was ready to bite down upon its prey, the indigo angel flutters back towards the side of the chamber to evade the beasts metallic jaw; swiftly kicking himself off the wall and back towards the monsters elongated neck. Tore delivers a clean tackle right to the side of the horrible abomination neck; the blow strong enough to send the entire monster careening right into the wall, quaking the entire chamber from bottom to stop. Landing right along the surface of the curved glass dome, the blue angel glares down the beast open mouth to discover the throne still lodged within. No good, it doesn’t even look like it budged an inch.

Shaking off the blue boy’s dazing kick, the golden beast tries its luck again and lunges forth once more; its glistening fanged baring towards the angel’s head. Seeing the monstrous gold coming, Tore ascends off the glass dome and bounds over the beast terrible bite; delivering his own strike back in the form of a pale white beam that crashes down upon its side. From the resulting smoke of the blast, the monster could be seen prying itself off the transparent floor of the chamber and glares right towards his hovering foe; the blue angel able to peer into its throat to find the throne still left stuck within. Not even got it moving a little bit. The hell does this thing got it glued down his throat with? Well, if the seat won’t come out, then let’s go to it!

With his next move planned accordingly, the indigo angel wastes little time to let the monster act and delves straight down towards it; forcing himself through its sharp toothed maw and down its throat. When left just a few feet away from the golden throne, a bright luminescence suddenly disperses right before him and fires right upon the boy; the powerful beam blasts the angel right out from the monster’s throat and sends him careening off to the side of the chamber. While left on the wall, Tore opens his eyes to witness the very beast charge right after with its golden maw firmly shut tight; not even a single bit of space to squeeze right back in. The blue boy acts fasts and leaps right off the wall before the approaching monster could ram its solid gold face straight into him; feeling the entire chamber rumble from the impact. Right, so it definitely caught on what’s going on; which means its time for a change of plans. As long as the seat in its throat is empty, then all this won’t just stop with a good old fashion beat down; it’ll just pull itself back together for another round. Just need to get in there a take that seat.

Gliding through the upper halls of the golden citadel, Mall continues his search for the nod he seeks out from the palace; his gaze glued to the sides of the tunnel ahead. The room has to be around here somewhere. All those eons ago it was hidden away from the world; kept locked tight under the seal of the Kybr. Even if those pair of interlopers dared to trespass through this city, neither of them should’ve been aware of where the nod was kept. Even if they had searched every inch of this crown.

The cosmic angel’s flight is then comes to a screeching halt when a pair of blue barriers suddenly appear between him; seemingly left trapped within as the two barricades start to close in on each other. Huh, forgotten about these, plasma walls meant to entrap what it encases and nullify most universal power. However… Mall then thrusts his hands to each of the barriers that threaten to pinch him in; pure black space coming out from his palms as they approach him. The very moment that both of the walls touch the angel’s palms, their blue essence starts to be absorbed into his very hands; his palms sucking up every piece of blue like a voracious black hole. Such trappings should give a Kybr little trouble. As soon as every bit of blue is swallowed by the black in his hands, Mall palms then return to their normal color as they ball themselves into fists; the spacial angel left to race right on ahead.

Continuing his flight up through the shinning tunnels, the cosmic Kybr’s eyes are glued to an open port left atop the peak of the hall. Mall zooms straight up through the hole to be greeted by the bright glow of several crescent moons each shinning out their own unique light; all with a simple golden crib floating right in the middle of the cylinder chamber. His starry wings reflect along the crescents and add a glitter to the light that they shine throughout the chamber, as if the angel was ascend through the stars themselves. Fluttering straight up to the golden crib left perched in the middle, Mall gazes within to find nothing but a small comforting pillow inside; the Kybr swiping the pillow out to see his own reflection in the middle of the inward curve underneath. Gently reaching both of his hands into the crib, the cosmic angel pinches the very bottom of the inward curve and begins to stretch the center with both index fingers and thumbs; the golden surface opening wide to show the near hollow inside of the crib. He then reaches his hand down into the inside and slowly pulls out what seemed to be a near wrist sized ring holding a glass lens shaped into a single eye; its outer rim decorated with detailed wings of pure white. So long has this been hidden from the world; and now, it shall help bring it back to its prosperous age once more.

Breaking away from his admiration of the search nod, the cosmic angel’s ears then catch onto the strange sound of gurgling echoing underneath. What is… Peering down beneath his feet could he witness the open port he had flown up from suddenly close by a pool of liquid gold bubbling up towards him; the blobs surface littered with the bodies of malformed soldiers and beasts that reach up for him. Oh for the stars sake, there’s no time for this. This temper tantrum has gone on for long enough. Left fed up with the security system bullshit, Mall rises up towards the top of the cylinder chamber where the crescent moons shine down; the angel points a single finger up to the moons for them glow bright in turn. As soon as he points that very finger down towards the bubbling liquid, their lunar light rains down upon the amorphous gold below; every ray of light pummeling down from the above hitting its very surface in splattering liquid gold and moonlight.

Failing to take in the constant lunar beating, the amorphous blob withdraws out from the cylinder crib chamber and opens the way back down into the halls below. Odd, the young Kybr should’ve sat on the throne by now and ended the security’s ravenous fit. Did something happen to him on his way down to the chamber? No, certainly he can handle himself with it...But best check on the ward just to be careful. With that certain worry brewing in the back of his head, Mall causes a bright glow to expel out from his very chest; his skin reflecting the stars and planets of the cosmo’s itself. The spacial angel causally tosses the search nod he had found straight into this very space; where upon the cosmos shimmering upon his chest fades away. Having secured the precious nod safely within his very body, Mall than swiftly descends down to the bottom of the chamber and through the hole leading back into the tunnel; the worried Kybr speeding off down the way that he had came.

Dwelling back down at the very bottom of the citadel, the blue angel continues to evade the nonstop assault from the golden abomination; dodging every bite it takes, every swing it makes, every sword and spears that pops out from its skin, every claw and hammer that it swipes and swings, even every beam it fires out from its maw. This thing just won’t quit, will it? It’s like it knows that if it stops attacking; then the throne in its throat is up for grabs. Trying to dislodge it from its throat won’t work; and trying to brute force down it will just make it spew up lasers. Gotta be something that can be done here. A way to stun it long enough to climb down and plant a seat down on the throne. While strategizing on how he could create a long enough opening to swoop in and take the throne, Tore evades another of its lethal chomps by gliding right above its head; where upon he sees its burning lime green eyes staring back at him. Don’t know if that might work, but we gotta try something here.

A strategy solidified in his head, Tore immediately takes the first step and rockets towards the base of the beast left hanging along the golden chambers ceiling; the head of the monstrous amalgamation following after the young angel. The blue boy lands right along the very end of its stretched neck, glancing back to discover the beast it belongs to lunge after with its shimmering maw closed tight. The horror tilts its entire head over to the side and swings its solid gold cheek out to the indigo angel, lobbing its entire weight out to hits prey in hopes of batting the boy right off its neckline. As the horrible golden beast rapidly swings out to him, Tore suddenly leaps right off the base of its neck and out to the rapidly approaching amalgamation; aiming its hands right towards the nearing monsters many glowing lime eyes. Tore manages to grasp the top edge of the glistening terrors eye sockets and clutches down as tight as he can; holding on like no tomorrow as the beast begins to maddeningly flail about throughout the throne chamber. Despite continuing to flail across the room like a writhing worm covered in salt, the boy clinging to two of its eye sockets remains holding on; the blue boy taking the moment of panic to thrust his arm down through the lime green eyes and reach deep within for that very glow. That glow has to be the same one that guys left at the archives. Just need to reach in this hellish golden thing and yank it out. That should daze it long enough to get down its throat.

Right when the young angel reaches in deep enough, the golden horror cries out a paining wail and starts bashing its head against the solid chamber walls. Digging deeper down does Tore finally feel the very source of the monster’s lime green fury; the very feel of the energy reminding him of the same sort he had extracted from the pillar of knowledge back at the library. Even with the power grasped in the palm of his hands, the blue boy struggles to keep it in his grasp as the monster he rides repeatedly bangs its head against the sides of the golden room. Come on! Just stand still!

Its Tore’s attempts to pull out this lime green glow that the head finally manages to slam him straight against the hard gold wall; feeling a good few of his bones crack from the intensely harsh bashing. Despite the overwhelming pain coursing through him, the indigo angel remains indentured and continues to hang on within one of the beasts many eyes; soon to take a tight hold of the lime energy glowing within the monstrous gold. The boy swiftly yanks his bruised arm out from the depths of the abominations insides as hard as he could; keeping his grasp tight upon the light as he continues jerking on it. Finally does he uproot the lime green glow lodges within the eyes of the beast, the overwhelming force throwing the boy right off the monsters head as it shrieks in agony.

From the beasts forehead, the blue boy careens right down and flops upon the glass dome along the bottom of the chamber; the lime green power clutched within his grip seeping right under the palm of his hand, with its distinct glow vanishing underneath his skin. Tore arises from the glass floor and looks back towards the golden horror to discover it frightened and confused; as if it had just sprung out from a horrible nightmare. Without hesitating another moment longer, the angel dashes out to the crying abomination and thrusts himself straight through its open maw midst one of its pained roars. Once the blue boy forces himself right through the beasts throat, utter silence is all that passes during that very moment; with nothing but the reverb of the golden walls filling the quiet. This deafening quiet is then accompanied by a silent, but powerful light that starts to inflame out from every open hole of the monster; the light swiftly proves too strong for the amalgamation to contain much longer, left to explode in illuminating blast of multiple colors.

Hovering in the middle of this intense bright light, a figure sits upon the golden throne as it reflects the tandem of colors that swirl and rise around him; within this very figures eyes do countless images rapidly flash before him. A plant rapidly sprouting from the soil, a human baby wailing out its first cry, a chick breaking through the shell of its egg, a fish piercing through the embryo among it’s siblings, cells dividing among each other and continue to rapidly multiply, countless other signs of beings coming into this world fresh and anew sprawl within his mind. The colors that swirl around him start to take their shape as well, all of them forming into people that have entered his life. Roy, Mally, Mall, Kingsley, Chloe, Cayenne, Renee, Bianca, Lequan, Ty’quell, Alex, Levi, Melvin, Persephone, Circe, Damian, Ryu, Raleigh, Hank, Vivi, Victor, Biz, Warron, and many many more; each of them taking a singular color among the spectrum that surrounds him. All of them then start coming together one by one; slowly melding before the figure into a being with the torso of a human; long hair, several rings to make up its arms, hands with dozens of fingers and thumbs, a single eye along the face of its head, several wings along its back and bottom of its lower torso, all of it reflecting every single color of the spectrum. Soon do every single one of these people all race within the figure itself; coming in all at once like a crashing wave of spiritual life.

Along the glistening tunnels above, the cosmic angel flutters back down the way he had came and takes the sharp turn right up ahead; soon to discover a small platoon of golden soldiers and monsters that dare stand in his way. Before Mall could engage with the entire army ahead of him, he witness a colorful pulsing light travel out from behind the entire troop; the glow phasing along all the soldiers and beasts and urging them all to stop dead in their tracks. After the colorful pulse of light surges all around him, the spacial Kybr suddenly breaks in the middle of the air to behold a relieving site; every single golden beast and person bowing to the man, soon melding back into the curved sides of the tunnel. They’ve calmed...He did it.

Back within the glistening throne room, the blue boy finds himself reawakening back to reality; softly clutching his forehead as he sits upon the very throne within the monster, now left perched right in the middle of the golden arches in the middle of the chamber. Left utterly dazed and overwhelmed by the strange experience he had gone through, Tore slowly pries himself off the hard gold of the throne; his arms and legs quaking as he attempts to stand on his own two feet. Once standing back up, the indigo angel teeters and wobbles about along the platform in an attempt to get back his balance; both of his hands holding onto the sides of his head as he steadies himself. What the...hell? What was all that? So many things just barging in at once. Honestly felt like that ride would never end. Those lights, those pictures. What did they all mean? Why did all that up to happen now?

“Tore!” his ears manage to catch among the ringing; the indigo angel peering over to the very tunnel he had entered the chamber from. While his eye site starts to sort itself out, Tore sees his cosmic mentor descend down from that very hole and flutter right in front of him; hearing the man claim that: “My young Kybr. You’ve done it. You’ve saved this citadel from tearing itself apart and have quelled the rage of the golden guards. I don’t think I can ever thank you enough for helping me save these sacred grounds. I-” Before his spacial mentor could tell him anything else, Mall watches the young angel wobble about in an effort to keep himself from tumbling off the platform. “Is something the matter?” he then asks the blue boy. “Yeah...I-I just had this weird ass trippy hallucination when I sat my butt down on that chair. Saw a bunch of things being born like eggs hatching and plants coming out of the ground. Least I don’t have to look up how babies are born anymore.” “Anything else?” “After all that, I saw a bunch of people I knew hover around me in this freaky and insane light show; they dance around me for a bit before they all came inside me.” “Umm...” “I-I mean they all rushed right inside my body at once.” “Interesting...”

At last does the blue angel manage to shake off the dizzying and wobbling feeling coursing through his body and stands straight back up; offering to change the subject with: “So, you find the mcguffin we were looking for?” Hearing this does the cosmic angel break his puzzled stare and reflects the cosmo’s along his chest as he claims that: “Uh-Yes! Yes, I have.” Dunking his arm straight through the space glittering along his chest, he ruffles through what lies within and quickly pulls his limb out to show off the search nod he had retrieved. Gazing upon the overall size and design of the tool, Tore can’t help but smile as he lets a little snicker escape from his lungs; wondering: “That it? I thought it’d be way bigger seeing those hole along the warp gate.” “Hrmph! I’ll have you know, young Kybr that these nods are capable of shrinking and enlarging on of their own accord; they were made to do that for convince.”

Seeing his cosmic teacher thrust the nod back within the cosmo’s in his body; Mall’s chest returns to normal as he hears the blue boy then ask: “So, where you think we need to go for the next one now?” “Well...” From the pocket stitched within his glittering toga, the starry angel pulls out the very Halo they used to track the first nod here and lets the holographic radar rise out from the middle of the ring. Running along the holographic map of the entire earth, both of them find one of the glowing dots blinking on one of its mountains; the spacial Kybr stroking his chin as he utters: “Hmm. How quaint.” “Ya find it?” “It seems that whatever dastardly scoundrels that had pilfered the other nods had the sense to hide one of them atop the very Earth itself.” “And that means?” “It means that we must set forth and climb to this lush planets highest peak.”

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The first Chapter of the new year. Thanks to everyone who has stuck around and read up to this point.

I wanted to have it take place in a familiar location that was visited by another pair of characters last season; only to have this chapter give some context to the whole place. Figured it would be a situation that I would dabble in for this case. Hope I nailed it here.

#younghope #lillaxtrigger

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lillaxtrigger · 4 years

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Faded Land: Chapter 20

Creeping out from beyond the mountainous horizon, the morning sun casts its soft orange glow upon a calm clearing set in the middle of the woods; a bovine of metal and flesh softly descending down to the grassy plains to rest. As the steel cow helps itself to munch upon the naturally grown grass presented at its feet, the young woman that it had carried upon its metal backside dismounts onto the plains; Clara’s gaze focused to the mildly dense forest ahead. While her bovine rides is busy partaking on the natural meadow grass, the scientist starts to wanders out through the forest of pine surrounding her in hopes to scout ahead for any towns that are near; the call of the cyborg cows digital cry invading her ears as she ventures forth.

Beginning her trek through the pine needle littered woods, the young lady takes a quick moment to shuffle through her bag; pulling out from its depths a tasty bright orange carrot. As she starts to bite down upon the orange goodness in her hand, a ton of questions start to flood and swirl within her mind as she continues her stroll through; her foot tracks uncovering bits of metal hidden among the needles.

Just what in the world could’ve caused the nuclear war that had left the U.S. into nothing but a lifeless, cruel wasteland of its former glory; the people still surviving within attempting to rebuild their societies in one for or another? How did the Canadian government reach such new and astounding levels of technological prowess; the very things that science fiction had once told made into reality? And what could’ve given them such an immense boost in their militaristic power; to where everyday soldiers are equipped with hard plated armor and unbelievable weapons? Not to mention the fact that it was Canada of all places, they’re practically the nicest people on the planet; you gotta do something really fucked up to make them wanna fight you. And how did they even win in the first place, the U.S.A had one of the most powerful military forces in the world back in the present; you don’t just topple something that massive in one night. Dammit, wish was another neural terminal to look all this up around; all this questions wouldn’t be constantly itching at the brain.

While all of these subjects swirl within her head, the scientist begins to notice slight glints shining from the foliage she walks past; some of their branches holding flakes of metal that reflect the morning sunlight. The deeper she strolls through the seemingly ordinary forest, the more she begins to notice the parts of the trees, plants, and ground itself housing larger pieces of stainless steel fused onto their surfaces; some of the tree’s revealing wires under its torn off bark. Seeing the gradual mutation of her surroundings takes the scientist back quite a bit, with bit of chewed carrot falling from her gaping mouth. What the f-what...what is all this? Why is so much steel coating on everything? Where did it all come from? Kinda creepy to see it all run through these trees, almost like a parasite or infection digging through the bark. It’s wonder what exactly might’ve caused all this.

In the midst of studying her curious surroundings does she feel something nudge at her ankle, causing her to lose her balance and begin to stumble back. Before she could fall back on whatever she had bumped into, the young scientist throws one of her legs forward and takes her balance back; firmly planting both of her feet onto the partially steel ground. A heavy breath escaping from between her lips, Clara takes a glance back to what she had nearly tripped over; discovering a hollow stump of wood and metal hold nothing a deep void. Slowly nearing the seemingly bottomless hole set before her, the young lady takes a look down the hole for anything that may lie within; finding nothing but more of the abyss as her ears catch the harsh sound of clanging metal.

What the hell could something like this be doing out in the middle of nowhere? Is it why everything here is coated in metal? Are some people running some kind of weird experiment out here?...Shit, did the cow land in a testing site!? If it is, then it might not be a wise idea to stick around and see the results this close; for all we know, all this steel could rip off the trees at any moment and lunge like face huggers. Just pouring liquid metal right in and consuming your organs from the inside; hell no! Ain’t stickin around for that nightmare.

Planning on making her swift departure from the metal woods, the scientist starts to sprint back towards the direction of the outing that she had landed in; shocked to find the metal bovine she rode in standing right behind her. An astonished digital moo escapes from the metal beast when Clara bumps into it; the cows sudden outcry causes the young woman to jump back in a panicking scare, causing her to loose her balance as she stumbles back towards the hollow metal stump. As the scientist starts to fumble down into the stumps inside, she attempts to grab hold of its edges in hopes of catching herself; her fingers unfortunately slipping from the smooth wood and steel and plunging right into the holes dark abyss.

Traveling through the seemingly never ending void of the hollow tunnel, Clara could feel something carry her further through the abyss; feeling a pressuring wind fly across her body as she stumbles through the darkness. To where this unseen gale could be hurling her to exactly is something that she fails to predicts; feeling only the tunnels rough wood and smooth steel brush against her clothes. It honestly feels like several minutes pass as she continuously forced through the lightless tunnel, the constant, unending bombardment of dizzying vertigo starting to scrape at her nerves; a sickening sensation starts to bellow from the bowels of her stomach the longer she tumbles through. And yet, the young woman nonetheless steels herself from vomiting; keeping herself centered among the unseeable chaos.

Enduring the constant travel through the almost unending tunnels soon pays off when Clara finds herself heading to a glint of light at the end of it all; site of the welcoming glow already being a relief for her. Once passing through the light ahead, the young scientist is quite literally launched out from the darkness of the tunnel and catapulted through the air; her eyes adjusting to the sudden glow as she roughly lands upon a floor of steel and wood. After her little crash landing does the young woman pull herself up from the ground to find herself within a small alleyway; the walls beside her showing to be made from rough bark and tough metal, a lot like the trees she saw before falling in the stump. Sitting between the two walls be a lone gap leading out to what awaits beyond the alley, the young woman hugging one of the walls as she carefully nears the way out.

Peeking out from within the alley that she had emerged from, the scientist beholds a vast and wondrous site of dozens upon dozens of buildings and homes stretched across before her; all of them made from wood and metal like the tree’s before. Drifting her gaze to whats above, Clara finds ramps, roads, and walkways all ascending further up into what seemed to be more of the city overhead; all of it trapped within a massively wide and monstrously tall cylinder of steel and bark. Where she wound up still proves to be a mystery to the young lady, failing to find a single hint of the morning sky shinning its natural twilight anywhere from where she stand; only more of the city she had been thrust in awaiting above.

Her eyes wandering back to the streets waiting beyond the alleyway, Clara immediately noticing the small crowd causally waltzing on by; Clara slowly backing away into the shadows when noticing a couple of mountie police officers among the people and retreating back to the way she came in. Coming to the stump she had been thrown out of however, the scientist finds the hole leading into the dark tunnels to be sealed shut by a coating of steel; Clara clawing the hard metal in the vain attempt to open the way out. Calming herself from her panic, she starts to realize that the only feasible way she could escape from wherever she wound up is to attempt and blend in with the local populous; her current appearance being the first major concern.

It’s no doubt by now that the law enforcement has a pretty good description of the perp they’re after by now; though a couple things might’ve change since their last sighting. Its doubtful that the lack of eye wear would be enough to throw them off though, the blood stained bullet holes in her cloths being a big red flag for almost anyone passing through. Like what’s anybody’s first reaction when noticing somebody walking past with burnt holes through their shirt be like: “Holy shit, how the hell you wind up with bullet holes through yer shirt?” An interesting story to tell no doubt, but it be an attractive conversation piece that would not bod well for her anytime soon. No, what’s needed right now is something to conceal it all from the public eye; preferably to keep the attention of the police away. Something to cover her hair wouldn’t be that bad either; as great as these locks are, they’d no doubt be a dead giveaway for any passing police.

Thinking its time for a little change in clothes, the scientist waltz back to the end of the alleyway and peeks out to the streets once more; the walkways of steel and wood only having a few sparse people stroll through. Finding not a single hint of the Canadian cops around, Clara takes the chance to venture out of the dark alley and into the wood and metal urban streets; keeping her eyes peeled for any clothes her size. The very walkway she steps on echoes footsteps the likes of which she had never heard off before, almost like a mixing echo of solid bark and metal resonating into her ears. The buildings that she passes share the same features as with everything else within this whole city; an odd blend of rough wood and stainless steal, with branches and limbs protruding out from the untouched bark. The lady’s lookout for new wears eventually has her spot a woman of her stature with garbs of her size; boasting the designs and color she had seen back in Smithville with the shirt and pants hosting cartoon characters and logo’s. Hate to do something like this to a random stranger, but what other choice is there.

Having discovered the perfect disguise to blend in with this mysterious cities populous, Clara starts to quietly stalk the unsuspecting young woman; digging out a regular can of chicken stew from the depths of her backpack. When realizing the woman she pursues on the verge of glancing back, the scientist leaps behind the nearby corner to hide; her back hugging as she peeks around and waits for the woman to continue walking. Finding not a soul to speak up behind her, a mild worry starts to creep in the back of her head as the oddly dressed woman gazes back towards the walkway ahead; her anxiety urging her to pick up the pace a tad bit.

As the suspecting woman continues through the city streets of steel and wood ahead, she starts to notice the people that pass by her starting to thin out in number; her anxious worry growing when she finds barely anybody around her. With the horrid feeling of being followed all that’s left, the young woman hurried waltz turns into a rushed sprint; urged to take every corner she could in hopes of losing whoever might be on her tail. This panicked race soon has her wind up trapped in the middle of a dead end street; the only option she could take then was to knock on the surrounding doors in an attempt for help, a fruitless effort which leads to not even a single light glowing from any of the windows. Its then that she notices a looming shadow start to encroach from behind and swiftly turning back to see who or what could possibly be trailing her, only to find not even a single person standing at the end of the street. Still left frightened from these creeping events, the scared young lady digs through her purse to soon pull out a tiny gray box; pressing the lone button planted on top to cause the block to unfold and expand. When the box transforms into a small holographic screen, the anxious girl starts to frantically scroll through the contents of her little device; left unaware of a shadowy figure rising from behind and ready to strike. With but a single swift blow to the back of her head, the figure knocks the lady cleanly out; the woman collapsing onto the wood and metal floor as the contents of her purse spill out.

Coming out of the concealing darkness, Clara quickly puts away the can she had used to render the woman unconscious; the label of the can stain with traces of ruby red blood. With her target left lying on the floor, the scientist kneels down to grab hold of her oddly designed shirt and readies to strip the woman of her garbs; her attention soon baited to the device she had dropped onto the ground. Picking up the curious gadget to take a little look almost immediately reminds her of the phones that she had back during her time; thinking these to be a far more evolved take on their design and portability. Taking the moment to feel the edges of the holograms solid borders, the curious scientist unintentionally causing the screen to widen further; a feature that perks her interest even more. A curious gadget to be curtain, the burning desire to snatch it to pick apart and inspect its properties being a tempting opportunity to the young scientist; though she knows all too well of what the risks may be if she were to take it with her. With technology as advance as this, it would be moronic to think that the manufacturers didn’t install a way to track it in case anybody stole it; it be a real quick way to get your dumb ass caught. A shame. Something like this would no doubt help tremendously out in this grueling journey.

After a little while, the mugged young woman starts to finally reawaken and arise from the wood and steel city floor; thankful to find herself left in the dead end streets where she had passed out in. Its instantly that she starts to feel a harsh pain throb at the back of her head, immediately placing her hand right where she stings to feel a slight wet spot under her palm; withdrawing her hand to discover traces of blood staining the skin of her palm. Gazing out from behind her hand does she notice the contents of her purse having been spilt onto the wood and metal ground, kneeling down and perusing through for anything that might have been stolen while she was knocked out. She’s left surprised when she finds everything that she had taken with her left untouched, even her little holographic device wasn’t stolen; the fact of everything being right where they were leave the young lady relieved, if not a tad confused of why whoever was tailing her struck her from behind took off with nothing. Her questions are swiftly answered when she hears whistling along with the cat calls of some men going: “Loving the show your putting on sweetheart. You got a nice bod on ya.” These calls cause her to take a quick glance to the rest of her body, soon find herself nearly stripped of all but her underwear; this realization causing her to cover her exposed breasts in embarrassment.

Garbed in the fresh set of Canadian clothing that she had just pilfered, the young scientist causally waltz through the somewhat busy streets; paying attention to the people she strolls past for any sort of suspicious glares aimed her way. Clara only manages to garter a few passing gazes from the people she walks by; nowhere near as much attention she attracted back in Smithville. The lack of attention isn’t the only thing she notices out from her new apparel, the stitching and fabric hugging her body feeling simply comforting to the touch; warm and soft almost as if the comforting sheet work of a bed was enveloping her her body. Compared to her old and tattered clothing she wore beforehand, it just feels simply blissful to wear.

With a proper disguised now donned, Clara could now focus on gathering information on how this whole nuclear war between Canada and the U.S was kicked off the first place; not to mention how the land of Maple leaves won out in the end. Knowing the last time the scientist was able to have access to this worlds internet was through a sort of neural terminal, she figures that a city this big has to have a sort of place where they’re publicly available; like a sort of library or something. Where she could find one within this massive wood and steel metropolis proves to be another question on the table; most of the buildings spread through here sharing the same sort of material and style as all the other, with only a few holographic signs to differentiate between them all. Noticing someone about to pass by, Clara feels comfortable enough to risk asking someone with: “Hey, you got minute?” Hearing the young woman call for him, the middle aged man turns back to the scientist and responds with: “Uh, yeah. What’s up?” “You, uh...You know where I could used a computer anywhere near here?” “Sorry. Don’t know anywhere you could? Don’t you got a holo phone on ya?” the man wonders, pulling out a similar device to the one that the woman she robbed from had. “Nnnno, not really. Thanks anyway.”

In her efforts to get some directions for a public terminal, Clara attempts to grab the attention of a lone woman wondering by with: “Excuse me. Mind helping out a bit?” “Fuck off!” The woman's aggressive comment takes the scientist back a little bit, watching the woman she attempted to ask storm off in a huff. Kind of a bitch move, but okay. Guess some people are too busy take just one minute off their important lives to give somebody some direction. Honestly what crawled up her ass and fucked it?

The few more people she tries to ask from almost all act as the two she had questioned before; either with genuine clueless and apologizing or down right pissed telling her to scram. “Nope, Can’t help ya.” “Can’t you see I’m busy?” “Ain’t got a clue for ya?” “Oh what, like you can’t find it yourself?”

Her search for somebody willing to give her direction to a computer terminal has her approach a couple of people hanging around a desolate corner of the city; the scientist asking the man and woman if: “Either of you know where I could find a computer to use?” “Oh yeah, yeah; we know couple places around that have computers. He he...” the man claims. “Mind if we take ya to one?” the woman offers; aiming a less then trusting glare to the scientist. “Uh...” From their attire to their mannerisms to their glares, Clara finds it rather difficult to fully trust the two strangers she had just met before her; politely declining their offer with: “N-No thanks. Direction are good enough.” “Oh, but we can let a fine lady like yourself to run around this part of town unsupervised.” “Yeah, good number people around here would kill for the chance to come across a woman like you.” Witnessing both the sinister grinning man and woman arise from the street corner and start to slowly approach the young lady, Clara starts backing away from where she came from; insisting to both of them that: “Uh, that’s nice. But I think I’m good. Thanks!” Saying such does Clara finally bolt away from the duo, the man and woman who she had spoken two start pursuing her out through the neighborhood

As she dash through the dim streets of metal and wood, the scientist takes a look back to witness the man and woman she had declines still in hot pursuit of her; gradually closing the distance as they taunt the fleeing girl with: “Where you running, lovely? We’re just wantin to show ya around town.” “Yeah, we were hoping you’d be up for having a little bit of fun.” These sarcastic claims fully displaying their malicious intentions, Clara immediate instinct is to call for any nearby help; taking in a deep breath as she prepares to scream. Before even a single people could escape from her lungs, the scientist covers her mouth; swiftly realizing why calling for help would be more of a hindrance in this case. Just who do you expect to rush in when hearing somebody scream for help; that’s practically the police’s job to dash to the aid of anyone in need. Getting them in this mess and they’ll be a ton more problems to deal with. No. Best thing to do right now is to try and lose these two scumbags and hope they’re bad with directions as much as they are with personal hygiene.

In her efforts to lose her pair of scummy pursuers, the young scientist takes as many turns and corners through the streets of fused wood and metal to try and gain as much distance as possible; taking a quick glance back to find the duo continuing to persist in pursuing. Jesus, what the hell could these assholes deals be. It ain’t like this girl has anything valuable on her...or maybe the girl is really what they’re after...Oh god. There has to be a way to lose these pair of flaccid dicks, fast. Gazing ahead for any escape from her grungy chasers, the scientist finds herself rushing towards busy intersection filled with people passing through and going about their day; the perfect opportunity to blend in and escape.

Lunging straight into the crowd without any hesitation, Clara almost immediately feels the rushing stream of the passing people push her forward; like a raging river pulling her through its harsh current. It all proves intense enough for her to risk losing her footing, though it might be worth it to her if she can elude her pair of pursuers. Halting just at the very edge of the busy intersection, the two scumbags poking their heads over the passing crowd as the woman asks the other: “You she where she went?” “Nope. Nothing.” “Dammit, bro. This always your fault?”

Despite being whisked away from her scummy pursuers, Clara is yet to be free from her hellish rush through the crowd; attempting her damndest to keep up with and not be trampled by the overwhelming river of people as she search for a way out from the storm. While she persistently races through the rushing masses, the scientist starts to feel the crowd surround her spread itself apart; the easing pressure actually letting her move her arms around. And soon does Clara make it out of the rapid river of passing people, the young woman ambling towards a set of steel steps as she starts to catch her breath.

As she lets out an exhausted breath, the young lady tilts her head to the side and finds a lone man nearing her; the guy stopping to ask the fatigued scientist: “Hey, what’s the matter with you?” “Ah...nothing. Just trying in vain to get directions to the nearest computer from any sort of decent human being that can bother. Almost everyone I talked to so far either doesn’t know or told me to fuck off...or worse.” “Well if its a terminal your lookin for, there’s a cafe not to far from here with some that you could use.” “Oh my god, thank you. You’re the first guy in this hell spawned city of cheap wood and tacky steel that’s actually helped me.” “Uh, sure. No problem. You can use them to look up whatever you want. Just don’t try and search for anything too saucy while your there. Those kind of restaurants monitor the stuff you search twenty four seven; a lesson that I certainly learned the last time I went.” As the man chuckles aloud, Clara can’t help but blush from his remark; a part of her mental checklist being scratched off.

Taking the directions given to her by the kind man, the scientist is lead to climb further up the city of steel and wood; glancing back to see the overall part of town that she was just traveling through. It doesn’t exactly look all that well kept when seeing all come together like this, the metal that coats about half of the district seeming like it can’t even shine a single glimmer; all of it just so grimy and dirty. Kinda starting to see why some of the people down there are asshole. Anybody would be pretty pissed if they have to live like that.

Putting that part of town behind her, Clara ascends further up the towering city to soon find herself entering what seemed to be this part of towns shopping district; discovering countless stores, shops, and restaurants all lined along the sides of the streets. Perusing along the windows of the dozens upon dozens of establishments, the young woman finds almost each and every one of them holding a sort of distinct feel and look to them outside their bark and metal structure; doing as much as they could to stand out from their competition with holographic signs, décor, sales and offers, almost everything they could feasibly do to attract customer. Guess even in this new technological post war age, competitive marketing is just something that seems to always persist; perhaps until the human race comes to the horribly agonizing end that it’ll lead itself to. Sorting through the nearly colorful and attention grabbing shops does she finally find the place that the man had told her about; finding before her a lone restaurant boasting a holo sign saying: “Bottom of the cup Computer Cafe.” Alongside the title be another sign depicting a brain with a wire attached holding a steaming mug of fresh coffee, the face set in front of the brain winking as it takes a sip. A rather odd way to represent your restaurant, but what the hell does this nuclear physicist know about marketing.

As soon as the young scientist passes through the cafe’s intangible doorway, the calming scent of freshly brewed coffee starts to fill her nose; gazing around the scene to find people at the tables taking their time to slowly drink their caffeine from a good old fashion cup or just straight injecting it through their arms from needles. Set at the other side of the front counter be an entire line of people awaiting to place their orders, those that do moving to a table and wait for their drinks. Set along the rim of the calming cafe being dozens of computer terminals, each well equipped with a visor helmet connected to its top; those already hooked in sitting almost completely comatose. Jeez, these people look close to brain dead just sitting there; it’d be a pretty worrying if these computers weren’t in a public coffee shop. Kind got a lucky break over at Winny’s come thinking of it.

Wishing to waist not another moment dawdling about, Clara immediately sits her ass down in front of one of the terminals and snatches the helmet from the desk; soon putting the helmet right atop her head. Despite having donned the helm, she fails to see a single light from within its pitch black visor; not even finding a spark light in front of her as she awaits for the terminal to activate. With next to no light flashing in front of her eyes, the scientist takes the visor for a moment to check what the problem could possibly be; looking to the sides of the console for any sort of broken pieces or loose wires. Its then that she soon finds what keeps the young woman from using the terminal proper, discovering along the side of the console a slot for money or a card to be slid in; the description at the top reading out: “5 dollars for an hour.” Fucking kidding here!? 5 bucks for just one hour on this thing!? Christ, that’s robbery!? Where the hell this girl gonna find money like that?

In the middle of pondering this do her ears catch someone beside her sucking in a much needed breath; the scientist glancing to her side to find a lone, middle aged woman taking off the helm connected to the terminal she was sitting in front of; a small sigh leaving her as she swipes the purse that lies on the accompanying desk. As she watches the woman waltz out the cafe door, she glances back to the desk she was sitting at to find that she had left her wallet; the front printed with rhinestone patterns.

While the middle aged woman strolls through the streets of steel and wood, her ears soon catch someone calling out to her with “Hey, wait a sec there.” From hearing this the woman glance back to witness a young lady racing her way, the rhinestones on her wallet glittering brightly as the lady waves it through the air. “My wallet?” When the young girl finally catches up with her, the scientist presents the glitzy wallet to the middle aged woman as she claims how: “You left this at your desk.” “Ah, thank goodness. I’d be in real trouble if I didn’t have this. Tons of important licenses, card, money, all that good stuff in there. I can’t thank you enough for catching this for me.” the woman thanks as she takes her little wallet back. “Hey, ain’t no problem. With as much of this city that I’ve seen so far. You kinda have to watch out for people, ya know.” “I couldn’t agree more.” Saying such do the two then split their own ways, the middle aged woman walking off while Clara makes her way back to the cafe; the scientist secretly clutching a 5 dollar bill in the palm of her hand.

Sitting herself back down in front of the terminal she was stationed at, the young scientist slides the 5 bucks she got straight into the computers payment slot; trying her luck again in donning the visor attached to the terminal. Once donning the helmet is the black visor covering her vision swiftly replaced with a flash of bright light; the scientists eyes adjusting to the sudden glow, soon be greeted with a familiar white void that surrounds her. Glancing back does she find the search engine set being different then the one she used last time, picturing an entire group of people all connected together through one giant brain that floats over them all; the brain itself labeled as: “Unity” Tapping her finger down on this icon nonetheless proves to do the same as the last search engine had done, firing a teal light straight into Clara’s very brain; knowing full well to focus her thoughts on the history of the nuclear war between Canada and the U.S. Right when these thoughts start flowing through her mind, the pale white void that surrounds the scientist filling with pictures and links concerning the subject at hand; some of the photo’s presented depicting armored soldiers in the midst of heavy combat. As tempting as it sounds to spend all day just reading up on the political inner workings of those on both sides of this mysterious war; thanks to strangling monetization, time of the essence here. And as borderline lazy and apathetic as it might sound, there might just be enough time here to skim through the beginning and end. Surely the whole middle concerning its political venture through the years sounds interesting; but we got a deadline to keep dammit. Who knows how long it’ll take before the mounties stop to realizes their perp is hiding in plain site.

Glazing through the countless links that the search engine had dug up for her, Clara looks through the web page to behold how polarizing some of these articles may be. “How the vile greed of the U.S. was finally defeated.” “Why the Canadian’s mercilessly reduced part of North America to a nuclear scar.” “The reason Canada pulled the trigger.” Simply going off these titles alone, she could really tell how one sided these history pages were; the overzealous confirmation bias these titles sported being more of a turn off to the researching scientist in this case. We need facts here people! The kind of unfiltered truth that would make upcoming politicians shit their pants if it wound up getting into the public eye. Upon thinking of this does the search engine almost immediately start to refresh the page, the letters and photo’s swirling through the white void and rearranging themselves to match with the scientist’s thoughts, unveiling to the young woman pictures of people in suits with brown stains on the back of their pants. Oh, god! Why do these search engines always take things so literally! Unbiased war history! Unbiased war history!

Once again does the search refresh from Clara’s urgent thoughts, the words and pictures forming a whole new wave of articles, links; soon finding one of them peeking her interest that reads as: “The unfiltered history of the Northern American war: How it all started and ended.” Perfect. Quickly tapping the link in question do the photos and links that surround the scientist start to rearrange and transform themselves, swirling until resembling a whole new page entirely; lined with stylized texts, pictures, and ads that decorate the article. All of it presents to the young woman a long and detailed article concerning the war between the neighboring nations spread before her; her eyes locked to the very start of the article as she works her way down from there.

During the time around 2046, tensions between U.S and their maple leaved neighbors started to escalate when part of the American government concerning border patrol refused to let Canadian citizens visiting over the border for work return to their home country. This left less than minimum wage migrant workers little chance to return home and see their families, forcing those stuck in the U.S into suffering poverty; an issue plaguing people across the United states at the time. All of these issues sparked protest and anger from the Canadian government, resulting in many of heated debates on the issue; the prideful American government doing very little to correct the problem. Seeing their people beyond the border suffering urged the Canadian government to step in and attempt to take their citizens back; the American people seeing these efforts as more of an invasion and soon declaring war on their Northern neighbors. Though Canada was reluctant on fighting, an uncovered secret soon changed their minds; an agent planted at the United stated Capital building discovering the lax deportation being a scheme by a sect of the government to exploit the traveling Canadian populous into their working economy. This startling discovery was more than enough motivation to get the country of maple leaves into the fighting spirit; thus truly triggering the war between the U.S and Canada that lasted 4 decades.

Well, guess that would explain how the whole show kicked off in the first place. With the kind of crap going on with your people, kind of caring government would be pretty pissed. Still, none of that really explains how the hell they won against a country that has such a huge focus on its military surplus. Plus, what might be Arthur's involvement in all of this; dubious migrant exploitation does really sound like something he’d do? Still left craving more answers concerning this political and destructive war, the young scientist starts to scroll all the way down to the very last page of the long history document; reading on the very last events of the battle.

With Canada on the verge of losing the war; it was a miracle that they had survived to the surmounting U.S forces for over 20 years. At the maple leaved country’s darkest hour, the Canadian government had finally given in on their deal with the Russians; combining their research and development teams to create a scientific union that would benefit not only each other, but the rest of the world long after the war. This new group of researcher would go to form what they are now known today as K-labs, going on to develop way’s to help end the war once and for all; including beefing the nations military and developing technology to help aid those coming back from battle. The stress and productivity from the war then on had kicked off a new technological age, creating technology that seemed years away in only a short two decades. All of their efforts led them to develop powerful nukes capable of decimating entire chunks of the U.S.A, a tactic which they have held back from using until near the end of the 4th decade. It’s when Canada was left standing on its last leg that they reluctantly decide to launch the cluster of bombs all across the U.S; a decision that would be memorized as one of the most tragic and destructive bombings in world history. Many country’s across the eastern hemisphere criticized the Canadian government for the rash and overly brutal method they used to put an end to the 40 year war; killing millions upon millions and scarring part of the earth. In their efforts to make up for their brutal endgame, K-labs has gone on to develop and construct numerous devices and machines that have aided and help mankind into a new age; the likes of which have help keep the rest of the world from the results of the nuclear wasteland that had become of the United states. In order to secure that the mutated threats and vengeful terrorist would not escape from the wastelands, the Canadian military now heavily patrols what remains in the U.S; helping whoever might’ve beaten the odds and lived against the harsh war and the aftermath.

Well damn, they really weren't screwing around here, were they? The U.S got them on the ropes and in swoops Russia to help them out and build cool military shit for them; but why though? Could they have been trying to get back at them for the cold war…Nah, that business was long settled even in the present. Still, there had to have been some reason why they opted to help the Canadians rather than letting them die. There’s still so many questions that need to be explained, so much to research. Canada got upset because its southern neighbors were exploiting its border crossing citizens and attempted to return them back home. So then why did the U.S see it all as an invasion then? Did Arthur tamper with these events so that all of this would happen...But what could drive him to do something like that? There’s gotta be more to this thing than just immigrant exploitation, just need to look more up.

Before the scientist could continue with her research concerning the 40 decade long war, she starts to witness the page the surrounds her start to dissolve into a fine black mist; every shroud of white light that encompasses the page in complete darkness. When the scientist is surrounded by nothing but the deep, secluding abyss and all is consumed within the void, a prompt soon pops up before her that informs her that: “Your paid time on this terminal is up. You will be booted off in 5 seconds.” Once the countdown reaches zero, the prompt vanishes into the darkness as the feeling starts to return through her entire body.

Feeling herself reawaken back to reality, a low growl escapes from the young woman’s teeth as she takes off the terminals visor; aiming a rather pissed eye to the public computers payment slot. Gazing away from the cheap as hell cafe computer, her upset demeanor swiftly turns into panic when finding her backpack that she had set aside missing; glancing to the door to discover somebody waltzing out the cafe with it. Witnessing the man walk out with her precious pack, Clara quickly rises from her seat and sprints out the cafe doors; racing through the streets in pursuit of her backpack pilferer.

Strolling through the walkways of metal and bark with a snickering smile, the pack thief takes a peek inside to see what sort of stash he might’ve scored; his smirk slowly draining when finding in his eyes to be a couple of cans of food, some veggies, and a ton of useless junk. In inspecting what lies within the pilfered pack does the scumbag start to hear the echoes of clanging metal constantly sound off behind him; his disappointment morphing into panic when finding the woman he stole from to be right on his tail. In hopes of losing the woman that he had stolen from, the bandit takes off through the ascending walkway awaiting him; the scientist feverishly pursuing after the thief. As both race through the rising path through the enclosed city, Clara and the scum that had stolen her sack rapidly climb through several cases of stairs and ramps; the wood and metal making up almost everything that surrounds them gradually growing more lively and brighter the more the two ascend.

When the two finally reach solid flat ground, Clara’s chase for her stolen stuff leads her right into a part of the city that proves to be a bit more kept then the bottom she had just raced through; the little more populated streets showing an intersection of people that they both rush right on past. Realizing the thief that had stolen her was starting to gain distance, the scientist figures that rather than trying to outpace the bastard, it’s time to outsmart him instead. Having witnessed the man turning through the furthest corner, the young woman stops right in her tracks and starts retreating back to the intersection that she had just passed by. Once coming back to the intersection, the rushing scientist takes the same direction as her bag thief had and dashes to the next corner coming ahead; stopping right at the end of the street and hides behind the accompanying building. From there, she glances around the twisted corner awaits for her the bandit to show himself; well aware of what he’s attempting to do. Trying to take constant turns through a maze like setting like this would normally be a good strategy to throw someone off your trail; keep whoever’s chasing you constantly guessing where you went to and taking wrong routes while you cleanly escape. Of course, it be a sort of strategy that the scientist herself is all too familiar with; her experiences of being pursued more than once lending her to using such a method. The young woman's prediction seems to be on point when witnessing the man that stole her bag run right towards her; Clara hiding around the corner biding the time for when the thief comes around the corner so she can deliver a well deserved stinging kick to his droopy swollen scrotum.

With the footsteps of the thief banging onto the steel walkway, the scientist gazes to the steel streets to find the bastards shadow growing; Clara finally turning the corner and kicking out with all her might. Lunging out from behind the corner, the young ladies foot manages to wind up stomping straight into the bandits crouch; the unexpected and powerful blow to his sensitive area causing him to fall face first onto the hard and rough splintered bark. Too busy suffering with the pain in both his scrapped face and kicked dick, Clara swipes her bag back from the burglars grasp; dashing away from the thief and laughing at his misfortune while she escapes around the corner ahead.

Once putting enough distance from the unexpected bandit, Clara hides behind a bench set along the wayside to check her bags contents; praying for that asshole not to have thrown anything out. Compass, tea bags, water, cup, nuclear battery, canned good, veggies, knifes...alright, everything still there. Relieved to find nothing out of place, the scientist takes the moment to pull out a nice head of lettuce from the depths of her bag; partaking in the refreshing taste of its moist green leaves as she rises from behind the bench and continues through the city.

While chewing upon the rest of the delicious green she holds in her hands, Clara wonders through the streets of smooth metal and rough wood as she ponders where exactly she wound up. This city just seems so huge, so strange; like the wood and metal that make up this entire place is joined together in one incredible fusion of nature and machine. Not to mention how vertical the whole city seems, think there have been like 10 staircases and inclines in just the first hour. Its a towering city, for sure; but where exactly could it be located in this country. Considering the speed which that stump wound up, that tunnel could’ve led to anywhere; not to mention the lack of any holes or windows leading outside to give any sort of hints. Dammit, if only that cheap ass terminal had given more time; then figuring all this out wouldn’t be as brain racking.

Still, there has to be a way to figure out where this place is without having to use those neural computers. Suppose simply asking where might be just as simple as a solution, though it might be pretty off putting for someone to ask that in this new age of technology; especially with how far its come around here. Don’t want to attract any kind of unwanted attention, especially from those donning the standard mountie uniforms. Really, the only safe bet to figure out what place this is to try climbing high enough to find somewhere leading outside.

In hopes of discovering a way out from this enclosed city of wood and steel, the determined scientist continues her ascent through the rising metropolis; climbing up every stairway and ramp she happen to come across. During her trek through the twisted urban jungle, the young lady keeps an ever vigilant eye on whoever happens to pass by. This place has certainly gave a good enough first impression of what kind of scum lie within its underbelly already, the kind of people that would hesitate to take advantage of anyone ignorant tourists and visitors that happen to be dumb enough to wander through this city without any sort of sense. Even with the advent of this new age of technological advancement and reinforced authority, criminals and creeps still act the same as they always have.

During her continuing climb up through the towering town above, the emotional weight of her own constant paranoia begins to take its toll upon the young scientists own psyche; the threatening combination of being a runaway fugitive immigrant added with the looming threat of anyone that could pass by taking the fleeting moment to gank her out of the blue being too real for her. Her eyes constantly dart through her surroundings, shifting over from person to person that happens to causally walk by; ever keeping watch for whoever may try something on her. Clara’s paranoid glares eventually start to garter the eyes of those she passes by, her passively accusing stare causing the people that come near to move away as the waltz through the streets; starting trend of which causes the scientist to realize her own actions starting to draw attention. Get yourself together Clara, your starting to look like a hyped up junkie having just took the needle watching for any cops that walk by, people are starting to stare. Just chill out and everything will be fine. As long as you keep your cool, nobody will suspect a thing and everything will be alright. Relax. Taking in a few soft breath is all it takes for the wound up young woman to calm down from her escalating paranoia, shifting all of her focus to the metal and bark walkway ahead of her. From keeping her eyes to the path ahead, the fresh cavalcade of people that pass on through pay next to no mind to the scientist; the site which eases her mind a fair bit as she continues her ascent up through the city.

Her calming walk up the metro streets starts coming to an end once finding a long line that stretches for quiet a long ways; the scientist naturally curious of what the people could be waiting patiently for. Wondering what could be awaiting beyond the long line of patient people, Clara starts to stroll along the side of the folks that stand by; those that she passes giving her nasty and angered glares as she walks past. Its in coming towards the end of the line that she finally discovers what they’re all waiting for, a single toll booth line with impassible walls set all through out its sides; the holo sign above stating the charge to be about 15 dollars. She could plainly see that the toll in question was not for any cars to pass through, not for any kind of attraction or ride waiting on the other side, not even for entering anything; but to simply just pass on through a plain old walkway. A fucking pathway further up through the city! What the fucking hell!? Just a single way up to he higher part of town! Are these people taking the fucking piss here!? Do they really expect people to pay to just walk somewhere!? Just what the hell kind of neo capitalist bullshit is this!? Making people pay to walk somewhere! Who did it!? Who the hell-what kind of worthless, greedy shit bag thought of this scam!? Left clearly pissed by the restrictive toll booth set before her, the scientist rushes right towards the front of the line; shoving aside those that actively attempt to stop the young woman in her rage.

Right at the front of the toll itself, the guard stationed within the booth finishes taking the cash given to him by his latest patron; politely wishing the man: “Thank you. And have a nice day sir.” “You too, gent.” the citizen responds with. Just mere moments before the guard could open the gate leading to the other side of the toll, he comes to witness the man that just paid him be shoved aside by an unexpected young woman; the lady wearing an angered glare as she screams to him: “What the fuck is this 10 bucks cut throat business bullshit about!?” “E-excuse me?” “This toll. There’s not even anything beyond here that’s worth pay for; just more walkway leading straight up to more town! Why in the hell do you people have a literal pay wall planted right here on the way up through this cold and dark city of broken homes and crushed spirits!?” “Um...I’m sorry, ma’am. I don’t make up the rules. I just work here.” the guard defends with as he quakes in his boots. “Work here-...First the public computers, now this. How long has this money strangling crap been happening for!” “I...can’t say when for the terminals...But these toll booths were implemented during the city’s developing years to secure the sections of Hamilton from any sort of civil plight.” “Hamilton...And you don’t think this is pretty exploitative and classiest?” “Oh no no no. I completely agree with that. If I were in charge, I’d get ride of this kind of shit in a heartbeat; but that ain’t the kinda system were forced to live in sweetheart. Plus I got bread to put on the table, sooo...” The guards remark makes the scientist let out a frustrated growl; soon taking a calming breath before resuming to question with: “Is there at least a way out of here in this part of town?” “Oh yeah, sure. But I wouldn’t want to try getting out all the way down at this part of town.” “And why is that?” “Cause the exits down here are usually congested as all hell with people going in and out daily. Got people like business workers, transferred legal immigrants, people coming in and out for their jobs; all waiting in the same spots for potentially hours at a time simply to get come in or go back home. The exits perched higher through the city are typically less crowded and more streamlined then those at the bottom; maybe trying those would give ya better luck.” “Oh, of course they are.” the scientist sarcastically states.

In the middle of taking all of this in do her ear catch unrest from the line of people standing beside her; each of them expressing outrage from the young lady holding up the line with rather upsetting remarks such as: “Fucking bitch! Get in the back!” “Get the led outta yer sorry flat ass, ya scrawny shit!” “I’m gonna beat yer ass if you don’t start movin!” “Get her cunt ass moving right now! People got shit to do!” These raging comments proves to be enough to get the young lady to move away from the toll booth and waltz out of the line; the guard seeing her leaving politely wishing her to: “Have a nice day.” Arising from the wood and steel floor, the man that Clara had knocked over lets out a small groan as he pulls himself up; questioning to himself if: “Did I feel the sunshine daddy?”

While venturing away from the literal paywall standing in her way, the scientist wonders on how to go about scraping enough money to pass through the toll; her mind then wondering back to mugging people for some quick cash. Nah, that’s probably not gonna work a second time; last time was a sort of lucky break. Besides, too many people lurking around to get away with it again. Maybe trying more earnest ways to earn money would probably bode better...but there nowhere near enough time to get a job and earn a paycheck. The cops would catch on that their perp would be somewhere in Hamilton eventually and be swarming the city long before pay day. Pondering on how to get some dough does the scientist come to find a man in worn and torn clothes, holding a wooden sign with the face carved with: Begging for cash would be taking it a tad too far though; with how cheap, greedy, and dangerous this city’s been so far, more desperate people need that kinda cash more. “Homeless. Need money for food.” Think Clara, there has to be a way to make some cash fast…

Its when pondering on how to scrape up some dough that she winds up spotting a small holographic sign attached to one of the buildings that she passes, the hologram depicting an elderly woman holding what looked to be a small dog in her arms. Underneath the picture of the sign, she comes to find the old woman's address and contact number written alongside the date it went missing; the bounty posted for the dogs safe return being only about 100 bucks. Might just be a little small with how much this city charges for public use things like bathrooms, computers, even fricken walkways; but it could be just enough to continue the climb up through the city, maybe even stock up on some supplies and use the neural terminals. But where exactly to find this woman’s beloved pet? The dog doesn’t look that old judging from the picture took here, its sense of smell is probably still at its prime. The date written only seems to have been about a few days ago, almost like half a week from then. Assuming that it didn’t get picked up by somebody, then the poor mutts probably still wondering the neighborhood trying to get back home to its owner. Just need something to bait it out, but what to use to attract the prime smelling sense of such a canine.

Pondering on how to bait the attention of the elderly woman lost pet, the scientist decides to take a quick rummage through her bag for anything that she could use; shifting through her stuff to then find the can she had used to knock out the woman she stole from. Pulling the canned good in question out from her backpack, Clara found the ruby stained label to show its contents being a mix of chicken and vegetable stew; the juicy meat being just what she may need to lure her little canine prize.

Getting directions out from the few people who would bother to give her the time of day, the young woman navigates through the twisting corners of the vertical metropolis until coming to the street mentioned on the poster; the scientist finding herself facing wide straight path filled with twisted homes and buildings of fused wood and metal lining the sides. From the lawns of those home sprout tree’s grown like everything else in the city; grown in wood fused together with shining steel. Touring through the humble city block, the scientist makes her stop right in the middle of the neighborhood; taking out the can of chicken stew from her back and popping the lid open. From within the cans contents, the mouth watering scent of chicken and juice soaked veggies start to flood the air around the young woman; smelling just as fresh as it ever could. After taking in the amazing scent of the chicken broth, Clara starts to dump the cans contents out in the middle of the street; the juicy pieces of chicken splattering onto the dirty metal ground. Having planted her meaty bait right in the middle of the neighborhood, the young lady swiftly darts away from the spilled mixture of chicken and vegetables; racing over to the nearest tree and starts to climb up to its top. Brushing past the few leaves left remaining upon its wood, the scientist sits herself atop one of the partial metal tree’s branches and awaits for whatever would approach her delectable bait; the bark of the tree brushing against her jeans.

A good long while passes for anything to be drawn in by the chickens semi fresh scent; the scientist that planted the food resting peacefully upon the top of the tree of wood and steel, with her legs dangling in the air as she naps. Its in due time that the sound of sloppy chewing wakes the woman from her brief slumber, Clara stretching her limbs out and glancing down at what could possibly be partaking in her set bait. From where she sits, the scientist comes to witness the bottom half of a dog eating on her planted chicken; Clara starting to scoot back towards the tree to climb back down to the ground. Just before the young woman could start climbing down, she takes another look to the dog to find a rather peculiar tracks that make the scientist stop dead in her tracks. While Clara finds the bottom half of the small beast being the wagging back end of the happy dog, she discovers the top half of the animal belonging to a great horned goat; the fused beast kneeling to the mess of chicken stew before it and picking off the vegetables from the spilled mix. The site of the crossbred animal manages to catch the young woman off guard a fair bit, the physiology of chimera’s still being a rather curious mystery to the scientist. Clara soon comes to discover that the half goat dog isn’t the only mixed beast prowling through the neighborhood; coming to witness an entire array of chimera’s start to come out from the woodwork. From bunny chameleons, cat mules, bird sheep, guinea pig gecko’s, and much more; the scientist comes to find an entire cavelcade rummage out from the depths of the neighborhood; each of them taking the opportunity to partake in her dropped canned goods. Seeing all of the different fusions of animals takes her back to the time she had spent in the repairing city of New Columbus; where the people that were living within the city rode through its semi cracked streets atop giant mutated beast consisting of chimera’s that the scientist had gathered before her. Of course, being much smaller in scale.

Oh, that’s it, right? They can’t attached robot legs to cow because it would be unethical and bad for people; but fusing animals together like an insane zoologist attempting to fuck around with the delicate science of nature simply because they’d make pretty damn pets is okay? Columbus got a pass with this because the environment made the animals they rode, but this; what other excuse is there. Swear to god, these people, man.

While ranting all of this in her own head, her eyes manage to spot one of the crossbred animals in the herd that dines upon her chicken stew; the one she finds holding a doggy head while parts of its body boasted some more frog like features. Just from looking at the head alone, Clara could tell it to be the same dog shown on the lost pet poster; enforcing the fact that her little plan had worked. With an assortment chimera’s all gathered right under her, the young scientist starts to slowly shimmy to the branch closest to the pack of animals; feeling the rough bark and smooth steel of the tree rub against her bum as she scoots ever closer. Its soon that Clara finds herself looming atop the pack of small fused beasts, the calm scientist taking the opportunity presented to her to leap right out of the tree and down towards the mess of critters below; her arms reaching out to the particular dog frog with the bounty on its head. Upon the young woman landing right in the middle of the zoo of freaks, the horde that she had attracted all scatter from the mess of chicken she wound up landing in; each of them racing off in a different direction.

From the pack she had jumped into, Clara grabs hold of the amphibious dog before it could escape with the rest; the scientist struggling to keep a tight grip on the mutt as she takes a look at the glistening collar wrap around its neck. Hanging onto the collar itself be a tag revealing its name and address, good old Hopstop hailing from the same address listed on the wanted poster; confirming this dog to be the same one that the old woman had lost. Before the young lady could even stand back on her own two feet, the struggling amphibian slips out of her arms and swiftly hopping away down the city block. Wishing not to loose her only way of getting some quick cash, Clara immediately gives swift chase after the chimera mutt; rushing through the neighborhood and passing what few people stroll by.

In her race after the jumping frog dog, the young woman hugs and cuts through the corner of every sharp turn she takes to close the distance between her and the amphibious canine; seeing more and more of the frogs slimy skin the closer she approaches. Bumping through people, buildings, and even signs and benches; once the young woman starts to near the hopping mutt, she reaches her arms out as far as she can as she prepares to lunge forth. Finally, the scientist leaps out towards the tiny chimera bouncing in front of her; taking another tight grip of the mutts slick legs while sliding along the street of steal and wood. Having caught the frog dogs by its legs, Clara pulls the animal further into her grasp and hugs the beast as tight as she can; the amphibian canine eventually stop fighting and relaxes in the scientist arms. As she looks into the helpless eyes of the animal trapped within her arms, the scientist can’t help but let a nostalgic little groan pass through her lips; reminiscing of the time she had spent with the beloved hybrid that she had traveled across the nuclear remains of the country with. A more nostalgic time to be sure...if not for a more saddening departure.

While keeping the slimy amphibious mutt from slipping out from her clutches, the scientist ventures back towards the address engraved onto the beloved pets collar; drips of the chimera’s slime petering upon the walkway of wood and steel. Her struggling travels eventually lead her to the very bottom of a twisted complex, lined to the top with stairs and doorways that supposedly lead into other homes; the scientist forced to lightly kick the door in her attempts to knock. Upon the knock at the door, the solid wall in the door frame turns transparent to reveal the old woman depicted on the lost pet poster; her withered eyes widening when witnessing the chimera in her visitors arms. Passing right through the transparent doorway, the elder’s face glows abright from seeing her lost pet; stretching out a bright smile as tears roll down her wrinkled cheeks. “Hopstop!” From the old lady’s overjoyed call, the half bred canine jumps right out of the young scientist arms and straight into the elders own; the frog dog licking its elongated tongue through its owners face as the lady lets out a tickled laugh.

“I’d never thought I see you again. I just missed your cute little face.” Once the chimera stops smothering its owner in affectionate kisses, the elder gazes to the young woman that returned her pet to her side and thanks her with: “I can’t thank you enough for bringing my little frog baby back to me.” “Hey, it ain’t no problem. It wasn’t much that much trouble to wrangle the little guy up.” “No really, I can’t. Little Hopstop here is all that I got to keep me company in these times.” “Just him? Don’t you have any kind of family around here that can you can go visit?” “I so wish I could, I miss them all so much. But since they all live in the middle part of Hamilton, planning a trip to them and back is just too expensive to afford. There’s only enough money for this old lady to get the essentials; both for me and my little baby. And they barely have any time to visit themselves, always just so busy with everything; I think its been almost a year since I last sat down with them and just talked.” “Wow...I’m sorry to hear about all that.” the scientist states while scratching the back of her head. “Oh don’t be. You’re just a girl who brought my precious pet back. You don’t have to pay much attention to this random old lady...Oh, but I do have to pay you.” Saying this does the elder reach right through her intangible doorway and soon pulls out a floating purse; digging through her bag and pulling out a super thin wallet. From opening the wallet, the elders thankful smile starts to deflate into a disappointed frown; pulling out a couple of 20’s and a 10 as she utters: “Oh dear.” “Something up?” “I’m afraid to admit that I don’t got enough money to pay you right now. Only got about 50 bucks on me to spare. I hope that’s alright with you.” “Hey, it ain’t no problem. I’ll happy to take that much off ya.” “Oh, thank you.” “Oh no, thank you.” Clara returns the thanks as she takes the cash in the elders hand. With the 50 dollar reward in her hand, the scientist waltz away from the old woman’s home as the elder returns inside her home with her beloved Chimera in her arms.

Slapping the money she earned onto the toll booth window, the scientist presents the toll guard with the 15 bucks she needs to pass right on through; the guy manning the booth taking a close look at the cash before he claims that: “Alright, exact amount.” Saying this does the guard shove his hand into the hole on the wall and twist his arm; the solid wall that gates off the other side of the toll vanishing in a dim flash. “Have a nice day.” the guard leaves her wish. “Oh, believe me. I certainly will.” the young woman responds with as she crosses through to the other side.

Finally past the cut throat overcharging barricade, the young scientist continues her journey up through the ascending city of metal and bark; the streets that she travels through proving more busy than those further below. The concentration of people isn’t the only thing that she notices in her travel; the overall quality of the walls, walkways, shops, and homes that make up the middle quarter of the entire metropolis of fused wood and steel all presented to cleaner, bright, and more organized then the streets she ventured through before. All of it seeming to be a clear sign of this towering city’s warped priorities, those of which seem to stem from this city alone. Smithville wasn’t this cut and dry taxing and greedy; a little overwhelming for the first impression sure, but nowhere near this level of concentrated avarice. Didn’t Canada use to be a socialist country at one point in time; wonder what what happened during the war to make one of its cities turn into something so corrupt.

In the middle of pondering all of this, the scientist’s sight manages to catch what seemed to be a small convenient store nestled in the middle of a thick of curvaceous buildings; the simple store rooting itself along the floor and sides of its surroundings. Finding the store makes the young woman take a little peek of what stock she has on her; glancing into her back pack to find what spoils she has to consist of a single can of bean, a half eaten head of lettuce, a partially drunk bottle of water, and a couple of brown potato’s among the other tools in her bag. Even when the time comes to split from this towering metropolis of absorbent greed, all this ain’t nowhere near enough for a trip to the next town over; who know’s when there’ll be another chance to restock. Still got about 35 bucks left; even if they might charge more, still have to used this earned money somehow.

Waltzing right on through the stores intangible doorway is the scientist greeted with the amazing sight of the shop’s insides; beyond the checkout counter be a whole hall decked from floor to ceiling with twisting and curved shelves filled with numerous stocks of all different wares and produce. The people that walk through the shelves could be seen strolling from the curving paths that connect the walls and ceilings; the fine folks strolling from the walls to the floor through the ramps in question. The entire scene set before the scientist gives the conflicting sense that this humble little store is way bigger than it actually seems; the inside utilizing every single piece of space built within to lay out shelves and paths for the consumers wandering around. It takes a moment for the scientist to snap out of the admiration of twisted physics and structural design and to walk forth towards the curving shelves ahead; taking her time to first check through the produce section right beside the entrance.

While showing to be somewhat minuscule in stock, the convenient stores food aisle proves to house an entire assortment of various food, drink, snack, and all sorts of commodities; even housing some brands that the scientist seems to be familiar with. Like some of the names on here manages to wind up surviving the very messy test of war time politics and wormed its way right into this futures market. Still having shit like Betty Crocker, Mountain dew, Tostino’s, Dairy farm, Velvita, Kraft cheese, Wonderbread; its so surreal and insane seeing all of them still around after everything that happened. Guess even the most recognizable market brands prove to strong and iconic to survive the ravages of war. Though sitting beside the name brands that she recognizes, the scientist finds products that she had yet to see before; the produce presented to her confusing the young woman from their very names alone. 10x sweet cookies, goat milk, chicken and pig fused patties, atomically grown baby carrots, goat butter, nerual developing fish sticks, sun baked wheat bread, goat cheese...Lotta goat stuff stocked around here. Not really that surprising to be honest; with the cow population being so dangerously low, you gotta have some kind of substitute for the world’s dairy. What does goat milk even taste like?

What astonishes her even more being some of the prices put on these products, some fairing close to around 4 bucks for small things like bread; fucking bread for god sake. Has inflation really hit Canada that badly that they have to charge such exorbitant prices for something so basic as peas? Only got about 35 bucks left; how the hell is anybody supposed to stock up on the essentials and have money leftover for the tolls back. Flat out extortion is what this shit is.

Keeping in mind of how much cash she had to burn and the prices of the products that she browses through, Clara scowers through the convenient store’s twisted and curving shelves; climbing up through the walls and ceilings of the small shop in her search for any sort of cheap, store brand goods she could spot. While tracking her finances, the young scientist also keeps in mind of the variety of food she decides to stock up on; knowing full well that purchasing the same kind of food over and over again would get rather maddening pretty fast. It could be the best damn can of chicken mushroom soup in the world for all its worth and almost anybody would get sick of it if they had to constantly eat it for every meal.

As she searches through the aisles of food and drink for whatever was in her tight budget, her eyes can’t help but wonder off to the other shelves hosting all sorts of unique and strange products that help people through everyday life. Tempting as it would be for her to browse further through the shop in discovering what other sort of gadgets, toys, and other miscellaneous products that is putting up for crazy high prices they expect people to actually pay for like some curious kid wanting to see what new games they got; time is something that she can’t afford the most. Gotta pack up and get moving before the local cops suspect anything.

With wishes to get moving in mind, the young woman race walks back towards the checkout at the front of the store with all the stock she plans to by; the checkout manned by what looked to be a holograph of a single woman in a uniform who greets with: “Good afternoon, ma’am and welcome to our humble store today. Simply place your items on the convener belt and the holo square will scan them to add up the total and tax.” From instructing this does a square of teal green pop out from the end of the belt; Clara dumping what canned goods and water that she had gathered onto the automatic belt and watches it all slide down to the glowing square. One by one do each of the cans and bottles pass right through the holo square, their adding prices showing on the holo woman’s stomach; the result of which shocks the young scientist. “25 bucks!? But I-I did the math, everything I picked out added all up to 15 dollars! What’s with the extra 10!?” “We’re sorry ma’am, but the resulting taxes added to your purchase the result of buying the assortment of canned goods you’ve picked out. Some of their contents contain ingredients that take a long while to reliably grow.” “Are you people seriously taxing me over something as nonperishable as canned food!?” the scientist questions with a slight growl. “This establishment would like to remind customers that the holographic cashier serving you today cannot be distraught or harmed due to customer misconduct. Trying any sort of brute force tactics is virtually pointless; and makes you look like a stuck up twat with everyone to watch.” Knowing she can do little against the tax’s placed on her, Clara begrudgingly tosses the money she owes right through the holo girls transparent body; grabbing what she had bought and leaving in a huff as the cashier says her goodbye with: “Thank you for shopping with us.”

While the young woman waltz’s away from the small convenient store, she takes the moment to check how much cash that her grocery shopping had burned away; finding only about 10 bucks left of her name. Ain’t nowhere near the kind of cash that can let her pass whatever toll that might block her way. Might just have to risk leaving town while there’s still some cash left. With this in mind, the scientist continues her climb up through the towering city of Hamilton in hopes of finding a way out; rising through the countless stairs and ramps that lead her ascent. During her trek up the rising metropolis, she eventually comes to discover a lone elevator of wood and steel; the tube that it dwells in leading further up the town. It’d be a pretty convenient way up through town without having to risk a run in with the Canadian cops; pretty sure the legs would appreciate the break. But knowing the kind of bullshit this charges for stuff like this, just taking it up has to have some sort of price tag on it. Taking a quick peek within the lift of shinning metal, the first thing the scientist comes to find within be a holographic screen posted right at the side of the hatch; her guess on how it would attempt to scam her out of her cash being on point as she finds the elevator charging abut 20 bucks just for the ride. Swear to chaos theory, this city man. Takin every moment it gives to squeeze more outta you. How the hell do people even live like this? Wanting to save up what little money she has on her, Clara opts out of using the overcharging elevator and decides to continue her ascent up through the cheaper way; legging it further through the rising streets ahead.

During her seemingly never ending ascent through the multistory city, the young woman takes note of the overall quality of the homes and shops that line the walkways on her way up; finding these buildings to be cleaner and sparkling than those she had found when first crossing the toll. The scientist even starts to see some of the foliage and trees planted along the sides proving to be a lot more lively than those found near the bottom; the leaves that sprout through their wooded surface softly flapping in the air. Seems to be another one of those overly used metaphors for ascension through heaven; the higher you go, the better everything seems, right? Though this detail fails to convince the scientist of this city’s overall structure and design, the fact of this place being somewhat man made undermining the metaphor for her. Thing is, this whole city does have to be arranged like this, people could cooperate and help one another out; but those at the top are deliberately choosing to raise themselves higher than the rest. Come to think of it, some places have kinda always been like that; its just that this whole towering city might simply be cutting out the metaphor altogether and taking it a little too literally.

Distracted from her observation of the polished streets that surround her, Clara fails to witness a couple of mounties coming out from a fast food restaurant set along the side; bags of steaming food clutched in their hands. One of the cops glancing in the young woman’s direction with a suspicious glare across her face, starting to lose pace of her partner who can’t help but stare at the bag of food he holds; soon finally glancing back to his partner to find her distanced a few feet away from him. “Uh, Joey...Something up?” “Wasn’t there a report this morning about a woman being mugged of her clothes?” “Yeah, around 8 or so I think. A couple of the officers were eager to take the case as soon as they could. Pretty sure they just wanted to see the poor woman in her underwear...Why?” “I think we might’ve found our little clothes stealing perp. Maybe we should tail her so we can ask a couple questions.” “Right now? But we haven’t even ate yet. The food all the way up here ain’t that cheap, ya know. Blew about 30 bucks from my own wallet just getting all this for the both of us.” “Yes now, Jerry. I’ll get lunch for us later. We’re on duty.” “Ugh, fine.” Begrudgingly following his partners orders, the mountie toss the steaming food clutched in his hand aside as his partner starts to quietly pursuing the young woman in their site; the guy shedding a single tear as he starts to follow.

In her travels through the semi packed streets of wood and iron, the young scientist looks through the assortment of people that stroll through the middle of towering Hamilton; finding among the masses garbed in much cleaner and better quality clothing than those dwelling at the very bottom. Their cool color choices giving Clara the sensation of swimming through a sea of people. Not really that much of a surprise at this point now. Of course the better quality stuff would be sold in the higher parts of town, and to the very literal middle class. Wouldn’t be much of an expectation to find literal 50 foot mansions perched at the very top; just enjoying the view from their chairs made from their expensive silk and melted gold.

Its in glaring through the ocean of middle class people that pass right on through, her pupils shrink upon discovering the pair of officers quietly stalking her from the cover of the crowd; their bright red uniforms clashing among the sea of cool color clothes. Having spotted the duo of cops that shadow her, the scientist picks up the pace as she delves deeper into the crowd ahead of her; the two police in turn start rushing through the herd of people in hopes of not losing their suspect. As the young woman weaves herself through the masses, her back and chest brush against the clothing that the people she passes wear; the scientist feeling the soft texture of the clothes rub through her as she snakes past. While mildly jogging right on through, the young woman decides to take a quick look back to the cops that attempt to tail her, caught off guard when finding the pair of possie starting to close in; the scientist swiftly transforming her jog into a daring race through the crowd ahead of her. Finding the perp they pursue escaping from their site, the pair of police start to sprint after their fleeing suspect; the cop in front starting to push people out of the way in their chase. In her race away from the pair of cops that persistently pursue her, Clara finally squeezes herself out from the dense ocean of people that she had swam through and out into the open streets; sprinting out towards the district lined with stores that boasted bigger than the ones she had seen before.

Dashing through the middle of middle Hamilton’s vast shopping district, the racing scientist takes a glance back to the crowd of people she had slithered through to find the pair of police breaking through the crowd as she continue to chase after; one of the officers shouting out and demanding the young woman that she: “Stop right where you are!” As the officer demands this, his partner pulls out from her holster an odd pistol housing a needle like barrel; the pistol firing out small balls of blue light from the tip upon the pull of the trigger. From witnessing these oncoming shots does the scientist start to jump, duck, and sidestep out of their way; the orbs streaking right past the young woman and wind up hitting a couple of passing unsuspecting people. The moment that the balls of light hit the citizens, the people that were shot are in enveloped in a blue glow that stiffens their entire bodies; able to move little but their eyes as they watch the woman running from the police taking the corner beside them. Passing right by in turn, both of the police race right past the frozen people as one of the officers apologizes to the two who were frozen with: “We’re so sorry! We’ll come back to unfreeze you two later!” Continuing her fleeting race through the shinning streets of metal and bark, the scientist take a quick look back and finds the two officers still in restless pursuit of her; realizing that outracing them won’t be much of an option of they continue to chase her. Gotta find a way to lose these two somehow, maybe somewhere to hide and wait for them to go away.

Upon these thoughts does the rushing scientist take a tight left when coming to the walking intersection, the two mounties that pursue her doing the same and turning into the deeper part of the shopping district; stopping right in their tracks to find a whole crowd of shop goers strolling from store to store. Among them all, neither of the officers could spot a single hair of the perp they were just chasing through the street, the officer wielding the gun pulling out her holo phone and quickly punching in a number before stating to somebody on the other line that: “I’d like to request a search party to be deployed within middle Hamilton shopping district. My partner and I may have stumbled upon the sicko that striped a woman of her clothes this morning.” “10-4 chief, we’ll send a couple more cops your way.” “Thanks Dartigan.” “Uh, Chief?” she then hears her partner from behind utter. Turning over to her fellow officer, the chief of police takes the moment to respond with: “Yeah?” “Don’t you think it might be kinda overkill to send backup to catch just a simple mugger?” “Think about it, buddeh. This sicko didn’t even bother to steal any from the poor girl she mugged from beside her clothes. What do you think that tells you about them?” “Uh, they need a fresh set of pants?” “And why do they?” “Because they just pissed themselves?” “Ech, wrong answer pal. A bitch that just goes that far was planning on hiding out in the open, hoping to avoid the accusing alarm of the public eye.” “What are you trying to say chief? That were dealing with a runaway fugitive?” “Now you’re on the mark, Jerry! We could be dealing with somebody that’s bigger than the both of us here. If we wanna keep this as clean as we can, we gotta catch this bitch before she tries anything.” With this realization seeping into her partner, the police chief and her buddy split off through the shopping district in searching for where their perp may have ran off to; the woman they search for peeking out from the window of the pet shop that they had just passed.

From hiding underneath the shops display windows, the young woman watches the pair of police split off in different directions of the shopping district; a relieved breath leaving her lips as she rises from the shelf. Finally got those two to shove off. Would’ve been a real problem if they caught up and saw who they were chasing. If they did, they probably ordered the whole shopping district to go under lockdown.

While relieved of her escape from the mountie duo that feverishly pursued her, her eyes drift down to the display that she had hide behind; discovering a whole pack of fox bear cubs before her. Just simply hearing one of the little hybrids let out tiny meek squeaks instantly melts the young lady’s heart; a small coo leaking from her smile as she watches them all crawl along in their cage. The very site of these tiny cubs swiftly reminds Clara once again of the mutated ursa steed that had tirelessly carried her across the north eastern part of the dilapidated U.S. Sweet sweet Angelo. The fur upon her back being as fuzzy and soft as a quality blanket.

Despite these little cub pups reminding her of days long past, the young woman knows all too well that there is little time to spare of the moment; it only being a matter of time before one of those snooping mounties barges in her and bum rush her. Rather a shame to leave this shop so soon. The opportunity to discover what other animal hybrids they have here being a tempting venture to take. Despite this scientific offer begging to be taken, Clara waltzes over to the pet shop door and pokes her head out from the intangible doorway; glancing on both sides for any sign of the roaming police. When finding the coast to be clear, the scientist swiftly makes her exit and heads out of the shopping district.

From venturing out of the crowded shopping district, the young woman continues her ascending journey up through the towering metropolis of fused wood and iron; taking the occasional stop to ask for directions from the various people that bother to speak with her that tell her a range of things like: “Uh, yeah. Just take a couple of lefts and you’ll find some stairs leading up.” “I’d say it’d be about a 15 minute climb before you reach the way out of this town. Lovely view this time of day.” “You seriously trying to reach the top of town? You don’t look like somebody that has that much cash on you to burn.” “Yeah, you’d be better off risking the nearest exit out of town. Thank god the way out of this greedy hellhole is free.” “I’m not sure if the exit is busy around this time. Might be. Can’t be any worse than the exits at the bottom. I’d probably wanna get outta here as fast as I could if I stayed down there too.”

Taking the directions of the couple of people that had taken the time to talk to her, Clara weaves her way through dozens of turns and corners; climbing through every set of steps she could along the way in hopes of finding the way out of town. Traveling through on these directions does the young woman finally find the natural glow of the sun beaming through a huge hole in the wall. At last, a way out of this vertical burg. While the young scientist starts to near the promised way out ahead, her excited sprints starts to gradually slow as the smile on her face starts to turn into a disappointed frown. No.

Standing in her way out from this greedy city of fused wood and steel be a stretching tunnel congested with dozens upon dozens of people all wishing to leave as well; the entire crowd inching forward slower than snails covered in molasses and tree sap. Gazing out beyond the overbearing line of people, the young woman discovers a single mountie keeping the line fine and orderly; constantly glaring through the countless people that march on through. Even in the far off, technological future, frustrating shit like traffic jams still have to exist in some form. You think they’d solve this kind of crap with literal flying cars by now. Come to think of it, there hasn’t been a single site of a hover car anywhere in this towering town; most of this city’s been composed of climbing walkways and streets. Couldn’t they just make the city blocks bigger to accommodate for them; this town would probably have less walkway jams if they didn’t build this city so narrowly. Why would they even build it like this in the first place?

Gazing around the packed crowd set before her, the scientist attempts to search for another way out from this towering metropolis; her eyes soon locking towards several smaller holes set aside the accompanying exit that leak out sunlight. Finding the narrow path leading to these holes being far less crowded than the congested highway before her, Clara waits not one more moment to race out towards one of the holes beside her; retreating from the clogged highway and dashing down the thin pathways leading up. As the eager scientist sprints closer towards the welcoming sunny glow ahead of her, she feels a pleasantly cool wind blow past her entire body while nearing the light.

When the young lady runs out beyond the bright glow ahead, it takes a few moments for her site to adjust to the heavenly luminescence shinning upon her; shielding her eyes from the bright light as they start to come into focus. Once her peepers are finally used to the natural sunlight, Clara uncovers her eyes to behold a breathtaking site set before her; the young woman gazing out towards the far horizon set beyond the city, with a couple of small towns set out along the distance. Taking a gander down from her point of view, the young woman is taken aback when discovering herself perched nearly a thousand feet from the lush grasslands sitting far below; the very rim where the city stands behind made from rough bark and course iron. What is this place?

Begging for the answer to this question, the young woman lift her gaze high above from where she stands to find countless massive branches of metal and wood that stretch out far out into the towering sky out beyond; all of them connected to a leviathan tower that scrapes the very clouds themselves, a few branches that are connected to them leading down towards the lush greenlands below. In taking in this picture does she start to realize where she is, why there is little sunlight piercing within the lower parts of this tall city, and why this place is made from partial wood.

This whole city is all inside one giant tree… But that’s...How is any of this even possible? The kind of cellular growth to create a tree this gigantic this fast would have to be impossibly rapid and borderline physics breaking for it to be standing as tall as it is now; and that’s not even accounting how long it would take to hollow out something this colossal to put in an entire metropolis stretching from top to bottom. What did these people do to even make all this even remotely possible? All this in such a short time span...Is it all the metal coating this whole city? It all doesn’t even look like it was attached; seem like it was melded in.

Before the young scientist could even ponder upon single question that floods into her mind, her ears catch a loud stamped of frantic footsteps echoing out from the darkness set behind her; hearing a few voices sound off from back inside the tree. “I saw her run out here!” “Got her now! This is practically a dead end!” “Good thing its rush hour up here!” Oh shit, its the cops! Realizing the mountie’s swiftly approaching from her only exit, Clara frantically looks beyond the sides for another way out; any escape from the police closing in on her. Glancing down tree’s metal and bark surface, the scientist discovers another balcony perched right below the one she stands on; there being only several feet of open air between those two. The only practical escape she could choose. It’s only just a thousand foot drops towards certain death beyond them, no biggie or anything.

Emerging out from the darkness of the city within, a couple of officers race out onto the balcony with futuristic pistols in hand, all of the searching everywhere for a sign of the perp they pursue; none of them finding even a single trace of her anywhere in sight. “I thought you said she was up here?” one of the officers questions the other. “I swear I saw her walk this way. Where did she go?” In their search for where their perp may have went, the third officer takes a glance down from the balcony they stand; his eyes widening as he tells his comrades that: “Hey, I see her, she’s down on the one below.” “What?” “How?” As both of the other officer glance down with their partner, all of them witness the young woman hanging off the side of the balcony below; their suspect pulling herself up from the guard rail. “How’d she get down there?” “We probably took the wrong way.” “Come on, before she gets away. Planting both of her feet onto the solid floor of the lower balcony, the scientist can’t help but shutter from the risk she just took; knowing full well that slipping up her little drop would mean her utter demise. Once her body finally stops shaking, Clara wastes not another moment to delve back into the dark depths of Hamilton’s wood and steel insides, sprinting ahead to attempt and outrun the cops that so feverishly pursue her.

After racing her way down the balcony pathway, the young lady makes a break away from Hamilton’s descending exit and rushes out towards one of the streets ahead; the police that pursue her following their perp straight into a neighborhood set along the side. When first entering the suburbs of shinning metal and rough bark, Clara sprints aside many of the curving abodes that line the sides of the walkway; each one of the sporting a strangely shaped structure that proves more unique than the last. Some of these designs making her wonder how some people are supposed to live in them. This curious wonder is the last worry she had on her mind at the moment however, as the young woman takes a glance back to witness the officers that tail her coming around the corner and starting to close the distance. Dammit! These guys don’t know when to quit. Need to find somewhere else to hide. Sure hope some of these people don’t lock their doors. With the scientist in their site, the trio of police fire their stun guns out towards the fleeting scientist; the orbs that are shot streaking through the street and flying towards the young woman. Right before they could reach their target, the escaping scientist swiftly turns the corner ahead; the blue balls of light careening right into the wood of a home set across the street.

Coming around the next corner, the scientist leaps out towards the front of the closest house she can and swings her hand upon the doorway of the warped and circular home in her attempt to quickly barge in; the doorway proving to be as solid as cold steel. When finding the home before her to be locked tight, she decides to try her luck on the house next door; cutting through the flourishing green grass lawns and hopping straight to the next abode. Upon slamming her fist down onto the steel barring the inside, the young lady finds it solidly locked as well; not a single part of her hand phasing through the door. Knowing the police that pursue her could come around the corner at any moment, the scientist tries her luck on the final home over; racing through the yards and towards the doorway. If third time ain’t the charm here, than this scientist will have to run the 100 yard dash from the popo chasing after her nice ass.

Upon rushing right towards the neighboring abodes front door ahead, the young lady shoves her entire arm straight into the doorway; her luck coming around when her hand phases right through the metal and steel. Finally having found one of the homes unlocked, Clara wastes not another moment to leap right on through the intangible doorway; falling straight on the carpeted floor waiting inside. After scraping herself off the soft plush carpet, the scientist takes a peek outside one of the windows next to the front door; watching from inside as the police that had been chasing her continue through the neighborhood without making a single stop.

As she sees the trio of officers disappear around the corner, Clara can’t help but let out a quiet snicker under her devious grin; her ploy to outrun the cops running smoothly without so much as a single hitch. At least that’s what she thinks before she manages to hear a small gasp coming from behind; turning back towards the rest of the home for her smile shattering in an instant upon finding a lone little boy sitting in the living room. The young boy looks away from his futuristic video game console playing on the TV in the room, the child silently starring at the woman that had just intruded upon his home with frightened eyes’ Clara silently waving to the young boy in the vain hope of easing the tension. “Mom!?” the little boy blurts out. Hearing the young child urgently call for his mother, Clara almost immediately dashes out the front door and races down the middle class suburban streets; sprinting in the opposite direction she saw the mounties rush down.

When coming out off the suburban neighborhood, the young scientist continues her ascent up through the towering city that she discovered to be within the hollow inside of a giant tree; this urging her to ponder on these recent discoveries. Like there’s no possible way for a tree to get this big in such a short amount of time; forget 40 years, it would have to grow and keep standing for over eons just to possibly grow this massive. And even then, there’s so much factors to consider that would keep it from naturally reaching this high. They had to have used some sort of growth hormones or something to skyrocket its chlorophyll production, a sort of chemical mutation that would alter its growth structure to let it tower this high and be so hollow without the risk of structural integrity.

In wondering what these Canadian’s used to drastically alter the growth of the very tree she walks through, her attention is baited to the coating of thick metal plastered across parts of the ascending city block; its glimmering surface showing to grow brighter and sleeker the further she rises. Could all this metal be a part of why this tree grew so tall, or why all of it’s all hollow on the inside. The metal that was covering the tree’s and plants right outside of Hamilton didn’t really give that promising of a picture; especially how having witnessed it all plaster through this towering town. It kinda gave the impression of an infection more than anything, as if the metal was in the midst of consuming the vegetation. Kind of a creeping thought to dwell on honestly.

Breaking away from her own pondering thoughts, the young woman fixes her sites out to the road ahead to behold the next snag in her ascent further up; a vast golden wall stretching beyond the entire city block. Station right in the very middle of the imposing wall be a lone toll booth similar to the one she had encountered earlier; the line accompanying the booth proving to be significantly smaller than the DMV like line of people awaiting to cross through. Look to be only around 5 to 6 people standing around. It all would surely be the kind of time the young woman had to wait going through the wait line leading out the bottom part of town; that is, until she finally notices the absurd asking price to cross on through. 300 bucks!? Are they serious about this shit!? They’re expecting people to cough up 300 just to even take a trip to the very top of this scientific abominable tree!? Tourism here must be the absolute worst over here. Ain’t no way in hell anybody could scrape up that kind of cash in so little time. Time that the scientist unfortunately doesn’t have to spare. The mounties snooping around her could sniff her out at any moment, ain’t no time to spare dawdling around to try and figure out how to get some. There must be another way to sneak around these damn wall of tacky looking gold. Some sort of pass or hole that to squeeze through. Even the sewers would probably be ideal next to having to work up 300 just to cross some overcharging bullshit wall.

Upon harshly denying the overly high asking price that the toll demands, Clara wonders along the sector of the city in attempting to find another way through the literal paywall barricading her from climbing further up. From almost every single block that she wonders through in the sector, the young woman finds the borders top to be manned with armored mountie guards; each of them keeping a diligent watchful eye on those dwelling on the outside of the wall. The men perched atop isn’t the only line of security that she notices along the wall; the outside borders of the stretching wall housing its own set of guards that patrol through the area, keeping site of the group of people that protest in front of them. Though none of their weapons are aimed at none of the protesters that stand before them; the guards grizzly glares remain locked upon the crowd; refusing to waver even as the people in front of them scream directly in their faces for defending those that live along the other side of the wall.

No matter how far through the sector she travels, Clara search for a single breach in the walls defense fails to bare any sort of promising fruit; the entire golden rim lined with armed mounties from bottom to top. Her hope of crossing the golden paywall starts to waver when finding herself nearing the exact same toll booth that she had strolled away from, the very street it station being the exact one she had came in from; she realizes then and there that she had walked around the entire section without finding so much as a single hole in the barricade. Faced with the overwhelmingly tall blockade halting her from progressing any further up, she wonders on how to bypass such heavily guarded borders and continue her climb; her mind dwelling on one way she could potentially reach the top. Climbing the outside of the tree would be far too risky and would take far too long, the risk of falling to the ground at such a high point being too catastrophic to bear trying. There all those branches that are outside, some of them reaching out towards the top of the tree, but the cops are on too high alert by now to just let people casually pass by; not to mention if there are any more tolls that are set up around there. It doesn’t really seem like there’s any other way around it; just might have to risk climbing up.

The very moment the young woman turns back to enact her little detour, she jumps when finding right behind her a stranger garbed in shady attire that covers a portion of his face; a small chuckle escaping from his lunges before coming out from the dark corner and greets by questioning: “Me think’s with how long you’ve been staring at that big old wall, you wanna see what’s on the other side, don’t ya?” “So? What’s it you’re deal?” Clara questions as she starts to inch away from the man. “My deal is that you’re not the one who’s been feelin the strangling hold of our little money run society. All those people that are protesting around the wall, they got every right to be as angry to have their little trips up to the top stopped by some paywall. They know as much as either of us that it’s all gate keeping bullshit.” “And you’re reminding me of this because...” “Because I know a way to get people through that wall without them having to spend a single dime.” “Oh, like I’d believe that coming from a creep like you? I went all around this damn wall trying to find one opening through and found every single part of this border locked up tight with mounties packing heat. How’s someone like you supposed to sneak me over to the other side.” “Clearly, you don’t know a thing about customs around here. Willing to bet that your firsts hours running up this damn tree have been with a couple muggers and would be molesters, hasn’t it?” Hearing the strangers guess makes the young lady glance away, letting out a little growl as she crosses her arms. “Yep, pretty much what I thought. All you sorry tourists are the same. So, you got about two options here; either you try and stay on that high horse of your’s attempting to think of someway to get on the other side, only to fail and wind up falling flat off the horse back and straight into a jail cell or grave. Or, maybe you could take the chance to humble yourself a little and listen to what a local has to offer.” Going off the guys shady appearance and how he just came crawled out of the darkness, red flags were already frantically waving through the young woman’s head; the offer of being taken through the golden wall sounding like too good of a deal to be true. Then again, the scientist own alternative way past the borders doesn’t exactly sound that promising either; simply climbing only several meters up outside the tree already posing an insanely high risk, maybe even more so than what this guy might be thinking off.

“What do you have in mind?” “Glad to see you off the satchel. I was thinking something along the lines of doing a little postal work; cross through the border with a couple of packages claiming to go to those higher up.” “And let me guess, I’m gonna be one of these so called packages?” “That’s the idea.” “And you don’t think that the guards up front won’t be smart enough to, I don’t know, scan and check whatever you might try and bring over?” “Ah, but lower Hamilton isn’t the only section of the city that has its own seedy underbelly. The kind of rich, entitled bastards that live on the other side of that wall order some really shady shit in secret. I’m talking the bad stuff like illegal drugs, outlawed chemical technology and weaponry, even dabbling in a little bit of human trafficking. All while paying off the guards at the gate extra to keep their mouths shut tight.” “Why am I not surprised...But local or not, nobody goes outta there way to just help some stranger. What’s in it for you?” “Me, ah just wanting to look out for the little guy is all. Those money gouging bastards standing at the top think they can work us sitting below til we drop dead, just to milk us for every cent we’re worth; all just cause the jobs that make the real money happen to be perch right in this damn tree. Not me. This asshole is gonna stick a knife up their ass and twist. And it all starts with screwing their artificially placed prices. So waddya say?” “...Alright. I’m in.” “Bitchin! Just need to see what’s in your pack.” “What, why?” “Eh, somethings going through might still urge them to check. Just security reasons and all.” From the man’s explanation does Clara approach the shady man with her backpack wide open; the guy taking a quick peek of what lies within the scientist bag before confirming that: “Nope. We clear.” “Good, cause I’m warning you. If you try and do anything while I’m stuffed in a box, I’m gonna-” “Easy, Lady. I swear nothing’s gonna happen.”

Stationed at the toll booth of the golden wall that bars the rest of the tree, a lone guards stands ever vigilant for whoever may approach; soon witnessing a lone man garbed in a post workers uniform approach rolling a cart of heavy packages towards the toll. Once the man nears the booth with the cart full of packages, the mountie stops the guy right in his tracks with: “Hold it pal, you got the fee to pass?” “Come on, buddeh. I’m just a post man, I got me a couple of deliveries to make through her. Can’t you gimme a free pass?” “Listen, mate. You’re sorry ass is lucky that its getting the half off mail worker discount; try your luck any more and you’ll be paying full price.” “Alright, alright. No need to get so hostile. Got the cash on me right here.” Saying such, the post man pulls out from the depths of his shirt pocket a single card to hand to the guard; the officer swiping the card from his hand and running it through the reader set inside. As soon as the holographic light displays a bright green check; the mountie hands the man back his card and confirms that: “Right, you’re all clear.” “Thank ya kindly.”

Having paid the fee to cross the toll, the guard turns the doorway leading to the other side intangible; the post man phasing right on through and continuing on. Before the guy could walk even a few feet away from the gate, he stops right in his track when the mountie behind him then questions: “Hang on there. Mind telling me what might be in those boxes.” “Oh these. Trust me, mate. They’re a special surprise for the boys above.” The guards aggressive confidants is fractured when hearing the post man claim this, his scowl dissolving as he retreats back into the booth; stuttering as he wishes for the guy to: “Ha-Have a nice day.” “You too, pal. You too.” the post guy wishes back as he continues through the neighborhood ahead; the silver metal that coats the carved wood taking on a more gold hue.

Held within one of the larger boxes, the young scientist holds herself steady to keep from tumbling within the packages cardboard insides; a soft cheer escaping from her smile from hearing the post man delivering her beyond the guarded gate. Despite realizing this however, the discovered fact that those perch high above this greed control metropolis purchase such shocking and horrible stuff worries the woman quite a fair bit; making the scientist question what the man that sneaks her through may have within the other boxes next to her.

Dwelling within her transporting case of cardboard, it isn’t long before the young woman witnesses the lid begin to be cut open; the scientist ducking under the passing knife as she prepares to burst out from the box. When the light from the outside starts to leak through the cracks of the lid, Clara leaps right out of the box and into the glow awaiting beyond the box; her eyes adjusting to the heavenly light to behold the man who had taken her beyond the wall beside another well dressed gentleman. The scientist is caught off guard when noticing the guy in the postman uniform aiming the pointed tip of his pistol at her; Clara nearly falling out of the box she came in before loudly muttering: “Wh-who-whoa-whao-I how-what!?” “Well, what did I tell ya; ain’t she a fresh one or what?” the false postman questions the other man in the suit. “Well, I must say. You certainly did got yourself one sexy catch. Nice work as usual, Raymound.” the fancy dressed gent compliments. “Sexy-...What- just what the hell is going on here!?” the young woman harshly questions them.

Despite demanding for any answers from the two, both of the men completely ignore the scientist while the man in the suit himself asks: “Um, you did check in the little bag she’s wearing, right?” “Oh yeah. Ain’t nothing in there but some junk and a couple cans of food.” “Perfect, I bet the other slaves down in the dungeon will break her in just fine scraping through her stuff.” “Slaves? You’re selling me into human trafficking!? What about that whole speech that you spilled about those at the top working everyone to the bone and strangling everyone for all they’re worth!?” “It always works every single time. Tug on their heart strings with a few fake words of inspiration and you’ll get them all hook, line, and sinker.” Upon hearing the resounding speech that her delivery man had poured out to her to be nothing but false words coated in heart and soul, Clara’s boiling anger simmers into horrified realization; understanding that she had been play by this scummy son of a bitch. “Amusing. Ladies, take our new little slave and put her in the dungeon with the rest.” the gentleman in the suit orders with a snap from his fingers. From the fancy man’s finger snap do a pair of muscular woman dressed in suits appearing out from behind and forcefully take hold of both of the scientist shoulders; dragging her right out of the box and away from the two. As she’s dragged away under the firm grip of the two woman, the scientist watches as fancy man in the suit shake the hand of the man that had betrayed her trust, hearing both of them say before the doors close that: “As always, it’s a pleasure doing business with you.” “Likewise my good man.”

While being taken through the fine luxurious halls of manor made from carved wood and swirling gold, Clara can do little to escape from the pair of muscle bound woman that bound her to their sides; not just from the straight lack of any strength herself, but also from keeping herself from passing out as she contains her spiking lust. It’s already taking every ounce of will she has to contain her pining lust on feeling the firm grip from the pair of ladies that carry her through the hall, unsure if she wants this little trip to end. God, this might be too much to handle. Gotta focus on something else. Anything else.

Attempting to avert her gaze away from the pair of woman that take her through the hallway, the young lady’s eyes wonder over towards the open hall set along the side; with dozens of people dressed in fancy attire congregating and mingling among one another. Their garbs isn’t the only thing that sets the scientist off; being served to the people alongside various drinks and wine be little platters made from what she could tell was cooked beef, recognizing the mouthwatering scent from her days before she took the unintended trip through time. If the whole capturing people and making them slaves wasn’t a good first impression enough, then the fact of them munching on the endangered bovine just clenches it.

Dragged further through the golden manor, the lights that hang above start to dim more and more as they head deeper inside; soon taking through a downward spiral of stairs leading straight into a dirty iron wall. Phasing beyond the dirt ridden doorway, Clara found on the other side a dark hall plastered with mold and grime; echoing cries of agony and despair alongside the mixture of foul stenches travel through the dungeon as the scientist is taken further through. Stopped at the very end of the dark hallway, the young woman is faced with the rusted iron surface of a doorway; the pair of muscular ladies that held her casually tossing her right on through. Thrown face first onto the stained steel floor set behind the doorway, the young woman quickly pulls herself up and races right to the door she came in; repeatedly banging on the face in her frustrated fury. “Dammit!”

Noticing a ray of light shinning from behind, the young woman glances back to discover a single glass window letting in what natural sunlight it could; soon finding a set of dark figures huddled in the corners of the dungeon. The scientist can’t help but back away from the horde of mysterious people that dwell within the black corners; her mind racing on what sort of others could be lurking from behind the shadows and dirty ridden beds and tables. She begins to relaxes when the evening sun lets in more light into the room, revealing to Clara simple people with dirt ridden and torn clothing; all of them ranging from the young to the old, to the frail and the strong, to the able bodied and disabled. Even when some of them stay within the dark corners of the large cell, others approach the light that shines within to welcome their new cell mate; an old woman greeting the scientist with: “Oh my. Are you alright there, young lady?” “Uh...Yeah, I’m fine. Sorry about jumping from all of you.” “Don’t be, sweetie. Suppose its only natural for everyone’s first time down here. Nearly gave me a heart attack when I did.” “Well, she better get used to being down here.” another of the prisoners suggest. “Daryl!” the old lady barks. “What? It’s not like any of us didn’t. The only time those bastards up above even bother bringing us up is clean their crap, carry their shit, or flat out just use us as their own personal toys!” Hearing the sort of things that these people are subjected to causes a gruesome shiver to run down the scientist’s spine, the young man’s cynicism urging her to questions all of them: “How did all of you people get trapped down here?”

To answer the scientist’s question, a middle aged man emerges out from the shadowy corners of the cell and explains how it was: “Probably the same way you did. One reason or another, all of us climbed up the tree in hopes of reaching the top; some being just simple tourists, others sick of living such poor lives and hoping for better awaiting above. And those whose journeys lead them to the last toll leading to the very top were so desperate to continue climbing would do anything to see the skies above the clouds; taking any offers from even the most shadiest of folks that happen to promise to show them what lies on the other side of the golden wall. But alas, such promising offers proves too good to be true, our own blinded ambitions leading us all into lives of forceful servitude.” Following the middle aged mans explanation, a number of other prisoners begin to emerge out from the dark corners of the cell; each of them lamenting of their plight since being caught with: “I’ve been in here too long. I haven’t had a shower in years.” “I don’t even wanna see the top of this fucking tree anymore! I just wanna see my family!” “My baby girl’s probably all grown up by now, and I wasn’t there for her through any of it.” “My parents are probably wondering where I am. I’m sorry, mom and dad. I’m so sorry.” Hearing the confessions of her fellow prisoners boils up a mixture of sympathy, disgust, and fury from the scientist; her contempt for this towering tree growing ever more.

Its in her silent fury do her ears then catch the sound of agonizing groans echoing through the dungeon, almost everyone glancing to the corner of the cell to lay eyes upon an adolescent girl huddled over in pain. “Wh-what’s the matter with her?” Clara questions. “Poor girl is probably starving. It’s been around 2 days since any of us have even been fed.” somebody mentions. “Two da-? How often are you people fed?” “Clearly not enough. The times they actually remember to give us anything, all we get is nothing but their leftover scrapes; devoid of any sort of sustenance or nutrition beyond keeping us alive.” The scientist staring upon the girl groveling from her hunger pains, Clara lets loose a small sigh before opening up her backpack; delving through its contents to pull out one of the cans that she had bought from the convenient store. Upon witnessing the cans of food with their own eyes do several of the prisoners mouths start to water, their saliva dripping onto the wood and steel floor of their cell. Digging through her pack further does she also pull out her trusty can opener, stabbing straight through the can of peas and prying the top open; the young woman sliding the open can to the groveling girls side. Gazing away from the corner that she grovels in, the adolescent girls eyes glow alight when finding the open can of fresh peas standing by her side; the poor prisoner swiping the can and scarfing down its contents like there’s no tomorrow. “Glad that’s settled. Anybody else want some?”

Huddled together in the middle of the prison cell, Clara sets out what other food and water she had bought from the small store and offers it all to her cellmates; everyone sitting together surrounding the platter and gladly partaking in whatever the newcomer offers. In their little feast of the cheap store brand vegetables and soups, some of the prisoners can’t help but leak out satisfied moans as they east; savoring all the flavor they could from this opportunity as several of them claim how: “Oh god, this is incredible.” “I haven’t had food like this in a long time.” “I’d almost forgotten what carrots even taste like.” Watching the prisoners express their thanks for such simply store brand canned goods causes the scientist to question them if: “Do think any part of the police know a thing about thing about this.” One of the elderly men can’t help but laugh upon the young woman’s question, answering Clara with: “What do you think, kid? If any of them that actually cared did, we would have gotten out a long time ago by now. Practically the only ones that do are paid top dollar just to keep their mouths sown shut. Even got some top employees working at big companies in on all this shit.”

Hearing the old mans reasons to deny any sort of hope for their freedom pushes the scientist her last straw; rising on her own two feet as she rants on how: “This tree. This hellish greed filled forsaken tree! This whole time I spent working my legs to their breaking point bothering to climb to the top just to run into muggers, criminals, and asshole! Every single corner I take just seems to house another way that this city attempt to screw up up the ass! And all those people perched right at the top just sit in their golden mansions causally buying kidnapped people while having the rest of the city under their monopolizing boot and heel. I-Gah! It’s fucking unbearable! Is the rest of Canada run like this!?” From their new cellmates rage fueled rantings, a couple of the prisoners speak up on the rest of Canada beyond the tree; some claiming that: “Not really. I’d give anything to go back to the simple country town I grew up in.” “Even in other major cities, things weren’t this bad.” One of the old woman then cuts in to vouch that: “Though the rest of Canada is spared from this sort of madness. It shames me that its willing to keep such a parasite on its fine maple land. The very nature of this artificially grown tree drives even the nicest people to their darkest, hellish aspiration.” “If its just this place, then why is it still standing. Why doesn’t the government do anything about it.” “Because, my dear girl. This city is the reason why Canada’s is alive today.” “Wha?’”

“The industry at the time needed a way to stimulate the economy then more than ever after the war had ended; the sorts of debt that needed to be paid draining our economy of all it was worth. With so much debt skyrocketing and our money draining, the Canadian government expanded upon what was left of a destroyed Hamilton; the scientific division helping them deciding to infuse what was left of a dying oak tree with a self expanding metallic alloy. Almost within just a single year, that tree grew close to the very heavens themselves; its hollow insides lending the perfect ground work for a sprawling metropolis. In their ongoing efforts to make amends with what it has done to the world, the government offered a slew of international companies a top spot at the tree and the chance to create jobs for millions of Canadians. While this lead to saving the Canadian economy from a horrible dark age, it also created the tree’s seedy underbelly; with several sketchy people slithering their way to managers to those companies linked to drug, human, and endangered species trafficking. Those promoted at the top do all they could to remain hidden and in power, weather it be paying off officials or killing whoever would squeal.”

Taking in the elders little Canadian history lesson, Clara picks up one of the open cans rid of leftover food spread before her; glaring past the generic store brand label to the bottom of the can and spotting a lone seal planted on the side that reads: “Proudly made in Good Maple leaf country Canada.” Simply looking at the label alone grows within the scientist a powerful deep content, the hypocritical lie printed on the bottom causing her grip to tremble; ready to violently throw the can aside. Just before she could toss the empty can, her eyes glaze over the back of its label and through the list of ingredient; a couple that she manages to spot urging her to halt. When taking a closer look to the list set on the back of the can, she recognizes a few of the ingredients used within the generic store brand chunky soup. Potassium nitrate, traces of sulfer, Co2 and compressed oxygen. “Everyone, stop stuffing your faces!” the young woman urges everyone around her. Upon the scientist urgent demand, everyone almost instantly stops shoveling their mouths full of the food that she had bestowed them; one of them spitting out the food she had in her mouth and asking: “What!? What!?” “Just, gimme a minute. I got check something.” Saying this does Clara begin to wonder and crawl throughout the room, taking whatever cans that still held food within and checking the list of ingredients on the back; all the while the other prisoners worry as she mutters to herself. Once finished reviewing the ingredients listed on each and every single can, the young scientist springs up from the floor of rough wood and rusted iron; proclaiming to everyone that: “I know how we all can get outta here.” “What!?” “Are you serious!? How!?”

With the gears in the young ladies head rapidly turning, Clara has little time to answer for her sudden statement; instead gathering every single piece of canned food she snatched from her fellow cell mates and races to the glass window at the back of the cell. Once nearing the window, the scientist starts to shovel out the food left in the cans and starts splashing soup and vegetables on and around the window; the other prisoners watching in horrifying astonishment as she smears the precious rations across the wall. “Have you lost your mind, woman!? You’re wasting the only possible food we’ll have!” the young man exclaims. “Dear girl, what is happening to you?” the old woman question. “What’s happening...Is that we’re all gonna go out with a bang.” the scientist states as she stares back, the other prisoners show to be rather concerned.

Gazing back to the food she had smeared on the window, Clara further rearranges the mess stained across the glass more deliberately; piecees of food being mashed and separated from each other as the scientist works. Backing away from the arranged mess of food splattered across the window, the young woman lets out a curious groan before claiming that she: “Almost got it all set. Just need something to ignite it. Something to set a spark or ember going.” “Ignite? Are you trying to-”

Gazing away from the mess she made, Clara looks throughout the room for whatever she could use to get a spark going; turning over beds and tables in her attempt to find whatever could be set ablaze. When she fails to find any conventional means of starting a flame, her gaze then turns over to the pieces of wood alongside the steel set through the cell; some of the bark pieces protruding out from the walls. Waltzing over to a couple of these pieces, Clara grasps their rough bark and rips them straight off the wall; nearly falling over when they come loose. “We already tried that. The pieces of wood on the wall just grows back.” one of the prisoners states. Like the man mentions, the bark that she had ripped from the wall swiftly grows back; its rough surface restored as if nothing had happened. Despite this presented fact however, the young woman refuses to stop and instead begins to rub the to small pieces of wood together; the sound of course rubbing echoing through the cell. “You’re seriously trying to start a fire in here!? You’ll burn us all to a crisp!” one of the young woman exclaim as she starts to approach the scientist. Before the prisoner could stop her, the old lady clasps the young woman’s hand and halts her right where she stands; the lady glancing back to the elder to find the old woman shaking her head.

Despite rubbing the wood as much as she could, Clara fails to draw out even a single ember from the bark; the scientist growling a frustrated roar as she throws the wood down. “Dammit, can’t even get a spark going! I know the science behind it, but how do people rub sticks together to make fire?” “I know how.” When suddenly hearing this, the scientist gazes throughout the darkened cell for whoever may have answer; questioning aloud: “Who said that?” “Me.” Following the source of the voice, Clara finds the adolescent girl that had been groveling in hunger earlier emerge from the enslaved group of dirty prisoners; the girl approaching as she claims that: “I did.” “You honestly know how?” the scientist asks. “Oh yeah. It was the first badge I earned when I first joined the girl scouts” the girl explains as she picks off the two pieces of bark from the ground. “They still have girl scouts?” “Yeah. Did...you not know?” the young girl questions, tearing the bark right off of wood. “I...Course I did, I meant around here. Some place don’t have them, I guess.”

Once having striped the rough bark from the wood, the little girl starts to vigorously rub the two small pieces together; small strands of smoke trailing out from the wood as she rubs faster and faster. Soon enough is a young spark created from the girl’s constant friction, the newborn kindle illuminating the cell with its dim, but warm glow as the adolescent lady hands the flaming wood back to the scientist with: “That good enough?” “That’s perfect. Nice work, kid.” Clara compliments, swiping the tiny flame from the young girls grasp. As soon as the young woman takes the kindled flame from little lady, the scientist skips back towards the food and soup covered window; thrusting the tip of the ignited wood straight into the mush of the mess. Once penetrating through the mush of mixed foods, the young lady then rushes away from the window as she shouts for everyone to: “Find some cover! It’s gonna blow!”

Hearing their new prison mate scream such, everyone in the cell starts dashing as far as they could away from the food and soup smeared window; grasping the tables and beds that stand in the room and knocking them over to make whatever cover they could they could use. Once all of them hide behind what cover they made, all within the cell nervously await for the splattered mixture of food that the scientist had smeared to explode like she said; the smoke the kindled piece of wood she had shoved through it all escaping out into the air. Shielded behind one of the tables, Clara waits along with her fellow inmates for the mess she made to go up in flames and provide the escape her and the rest of the prisoners so desperately hope for; slowly rising from cover when witnessing the smoke from the embers start to die down. When the last of the smoke snuffs itself out; some of the prisoners start to rise from behind the knocked over tables and beds; some of which on the cusp of tears that their hope for escape seemed all for nothing. “No, why?” “Nothing happened?” “You said it was supposed to explode.”

Coming out from cover herself, the scientist gazes to the mess of food smeared across the window and ponders aloud to herself on: “I don’t understand. The chemical compounds in the food was supposed set it all off. What happened?” Its in questioning this that the young man confronts Clara in a fit of rage, anger stating that: “I’ll tell you what happened! You wasted all the food we could’ve saved up and keep some of us from dying of hunger for you’re stupid fucking stunt!” “Daryl, calm yourself. She was only trying to help us.” the old lady pleads. “Yeah, and look what she all gave us! Nothing but wasted food and broken hopes to leave this damn prison! Do you know how long some of us have been in here, wishing to escape and see our families again? All of us stuck together in hopes of making it out of all this horrible suffering together, sticking side by side bracing eachother for when that day comes. Then this optimistic bitch just comes outta nowhere and lies to us about knowing a way out; going “Ah, maybe if we all waste our food on this dumb fucking thing that I wanna do, it might work.” Not even considering the fact that maybe little plan would wind up with nothing but wasted food on our hands!” “Daryl, stop it!” the old woman demands. Running down the young mans rugged cheeks, a flow of tears begin to drip down from the young man’s eyes; soon to collapse onto the dirt ridden floor of metal and steel in a bawling cry. “Dammit! Why!” The young mans heartbroken sobbing sinks in hard for the young scientist; looking away as she thought that she gave these people a fleeting sense of false hope to cling on and snatch away like some cruel joke.

Its then that everyone’s ears catch the sudden voice of the adolescent girl; the little lady echoing through the cell for everyone to: “Look, the window!” Upon that call do everyone’s eyes swiftly gaze over to the mess of food and soup splattered onto the cell window, witnessing the preserves smeared across the wall to begin violently glow; a clear sign for the scientist to tell everyone to: “Get down!” With the young woman’s warning being the que for everybody; all in the cell lunge back behind the knocked over tables and beds as the mess of food covering the window grows ever brighter; its light illuminating the entire prison hold until it finally bursts in an explosion of raging flames and food. From the grand boom of combustible canned goods, the resulting smoke from the blast starts to dissolve as Clara and the rest of the prisoners begin to rise from behind the safety of the chard tables and beds; their eyes son beholding the natural even sun piercing the darkness of their cell through a large hole in the top of the wall. “It worked!” the scientist cheers. “Oh god. The day has finally come.” one of the prisoners sobs. “We’re finally free.” “Hallelujah!” “I can finally see my daughter again.”

Just when everyone’s hopes were starting to sky rocket, they all witness the remains of the prison wall start to pull itself together; gradually beginning to reconstruct and close itself back together. “It’s starting to close; everyone, start jumping out!” one of them screams. In a whole wave does everybody in the cell stamped out, squeezing themselves out from the hole in the wall and running right outside the side of the manor of gold and carved wood. When it comes for the scientist turn to make her escape, her ears then catch a painful cry echoing out from her back; glancing behind to witness two of the prisoners still in the corner. One of the lays in agony on the ground with a burn scar on his leg, the other kneeling to grasps the mans arm as she pleads form him to: “Come on, Barney! You need to get up! The wall will close any moment!” From between the trouble pair to the closing exit, Clara glances back and forth between the two in which to go for; realizing how little time there is left. When finally making up her mind, the scientist races back towards the duo dwelling in the corner; the young woman of the two attempting to lift her burned friend with all she has. In her struggle does she feel her heavy load lighten quite a bit, glancing over to the mans other arm to see the woman who aided their escape helping her pick her friend up. Holding the injured man together, both women start to heave their way towards the closing hole ahead; their being only a few moments left before the way out closes for good. Once coming to the gradually shrinking exit, the scientist tells the other to: “Climb up first and we’ll pull him up!” Doing as Clara ordered, the young woman of the duo jumps out from the hole and reaches both of her arms back down inside; the scientist struggling to lift the burned man up enough on her own. Right as she lifts the injured gent halfway up, the other woman grabs hold of the guys other side; both her and the scientist lifting the man right out of the cell with moments to spare.

With that troubling situation out of the way, it finally be Clara’s turn to make her escape; leaping up to the receding hole while there still space to jump out. Grabbing onto the ledge, the scientist feels the splinters from the wood dig into her hands; the sudden pain making her stumble and nearly fall. Before she could fumble right back into the cell, Clara feels something grab hold of her arm as she falls; gazing up to see the woman she had helped catching her. With one mighty pull up, the once imprisoned woman is tossed right out from the darkness of the prison cell, the hole she had made finally closing as soon as she makes her escape. Once standing within the inviting warm twilight of the outside, the scientist rises from the burnt wood and grass to find those that were trapped within the cell scrambling as fast as they could; the woman that she had help get her friend out glancing back and winking at her. Her face blushing bright, Clara opts to do the same and rushes as far from the golden manor as fast as she could; feeling the welcoming evening winds blow around her body as she races further down the neighborhood of gold and wood ahead.

While putting as much distance from her and the massive shinning manor as she could, the scientist takes a swift glance back to witness the suited man when first dragged here burst out from the front doors with a pair of mounties at his side; the rich gent pointing in her direction while shouting: “There she is! There’s the terrorist you’re after!” Hearing the suited man claim such, the pair of officers start to sprint after the young woman while drawing out their stun pistols; Clara picking up the pace as she races through the rich district lined with decorated curving homes that glisten in the twilight sun.

While dashing ahead through the luxurious outdoor neighborhood, Clara’s mind is on overdrive on how to make her escape from the pair of police that pursue her; realizing there being only one way out from it all. The cops are probably crawling through the levels below to block off the neighborhood and to prevent their perp from escaping; it’d be smart of them considering the last two times their suspect got away. But how to safely get down from this tall tree of overwhelming greed and monetization without being reduced to a bloody pancake of broken bones and bleeding organs?

Thinking on this, the scientist’s gaze constantly scan through her surroundings for anything she could use to help in her current escape; checking every direction for whatever was around that may give her some ideas. Glancing above, the young lady finds perched above her several more massively long branches that seem to stretch out for miles on end, there length certainly being something to behold, but nothing that could help her out at the moment. Gazing over to one of her sides does she find the rich homes beside her holding entire yards filled with lawn decorations of all sorts. Ya got your classics like lawn gnomes, flamingo’s, sniped hedges, flags, all that shit. But then there are some odd things like holograms of people dancing, warped sculptures with mysterious carvings, even what seemed to be hovering robots fluttering down petals that dissolve when touching the ground. Looks pretty, if kind of expensive. Of course, with the kind of cash these people must rake in, they gotta have way more stupid and useless crap inside their homes.

Despite the odd array of décor lined through the manor yards, Clara nonetheless cuts right through the open lawns in fleeing the police; snatching up the decorative flamingo’s that stand in her way and breaking off their legs. Having broken off enough flamingo legs for what she has in mind, the young woman glances back to find the police still trailing after her; one of them firing their stun pistols out towards the fleeting scientist. While dodging and maneuvering through the oncoming balls of blue light, their escapee glances through the upcoming neighborhood ahead for whatever could help ward off the barrage of stunning green orbs; her eyes catching the glistening reflection of a wide golden lawn ornament ahead. Snatching up the golden plaque, Clara turns right around towards the volley of stunning balls flying her way; shielding herself against their paralyzing light and deflecting them right back towards their sender. Seeing the barrage of orbs that he had just shot coming their way, the pair of police duck down onto the grass to evade their stunning light; one of the balls striking one of the officers in the stomach and enveloping her in its blue glow. After looking over to his stunned partner, the Mountie glances back to find their suspect racing around the corner ahead; shifting between his paralyzed partner and their fleeting perp.

Coming out of the curving turn does the scientist discover the final piece of her little escape plan, a proud Canadian flag waving along the passing winds; the signature maple leave flapping in the breeze. Coming to the pole where it’s perched, Clara starts to climb up towards the flag she so desperately needs; not for what it stands for, but for what its made of. Reaching the top of the pole, the scientist starts to untie the strings that hold the Canadian flog from flying off; taking a little look back to find a couple more mounties on the approach; some of them gazing up to the top of the flagpole and firing their pistols to the young woman. When having untied the flag from the pole, Clara takes a daring leap back down to the ground with the flag clutched in her hand; feeling the slight sting in her legs from the rough impact. Despite the pain in her calves, the young lady nonetheless continues her retreat from the police that pursue her; racing further down into the shimmering orange neighborhood.

Her hurry through the rich neighborhood of carved oak and glistening gold has her come to the very end of the stretching branch; stepping upon the observation deck to behold the vast view that awaits her beyond the guard rail. The seemingly endless twilight sky stretches out before the scientist, only few feet away from scrapping against the very clouds themselves; all of it overcasting down upon the miles and miles of earth that she sees awaiting below. Beholding all of this does the young scientist climb atop the guard rail that separates her from the thousand foot drop, the window bellowing against her body as she balances on the golden rail. Hearing rapid footsteps approach from behind, Clara turns back to find lined against the observation deck a dozen mountie officers; all of them aiming their firearms right at her as one of them emerges from the squad to announce: “For crimes of aiding the terrorist attack on the Buffalo power plant and illegally crossing the border from the U.S; you are hereby placed under arrest by the New Hamilton police department where you will be transferred into military custody. We have you surrounded on every end, with no chance of escape. Please, come quietly.” Upon these demands does Clara turns back over the vast sky awaiting beyond the branch, glancing down towards the distance to find a vast city of floating towers and lights glistening ahead; one of the buildings stretching out beyond the sky and into the very heavens themselves label as: “K Labs.” Weather you’re ready or not…I’m coming Arthur.

“Miss, get off the rail now and surrender.” the officer once again orders. The entire squad watches the woman standing before them raise her arms up towards the very clouds; their guns aimed to her backside as they await for what she action she takes next. In that instance are each and every one of the astonished to witness their perp takes the descends off the guardrail and takes the plunge down from the branch; all of them rushing across the observation deck and glancing down for any sign of their fallen suspect. “Why did she just jump off?” “There’s no way she can survive a drop this high.” “You think she just didn’t wanna rot in prison?” “I can’t see her anywhere. Did she already drop out of site?”

From the mile long branch she had dropped down from, the young scientist descend down beside the leviathan tree of shinning metal and dead oak like a falling comet; glancing to the oaks surface to find the iron that partly consumes it reflecting the evening sun. After dropping a far ways down, Clara decides it be the time to finally deploy what she had made out from the decorations she had gathered; unfolding the flag she had snatched out from under her shirt and holding it against the rising winds. Once the flag fully unfurls, its strong fabric transforms the young lady’s rapid descent into a soft and gentle glide down; keeping a tight grip of the legs she had plucked from under the flamingo’s pierce through the flag as she soars across the very sky. Having finally escaped from the cruel, greed fueled city of the towering new Hamilton, the scientist feels thankful to having finally escaped the cruel, greed filled city of the towering new Hamilton; putting the leviathan tree behind her as the evening winds carrying her through the skies and out towards the east, where the city of floating buildings await her.

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We're getting close to the end people. Just a couple more Chapters to the series finale. I want to again thank all of you for sticking around and hope all of you stay long enough for this little series of mine to finally come to an end.

#lillaxtrigger #faded land

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