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Chapter Twenty-One: Lissa

  Aliapanacea

  a panic attad slight body horror.

  [colpse]You've been warned.

  (Also, if you get the distinct feeling that you've missed something, it's on purpose.)

  Your sed card is: The Tower, Upright.

  Abrupt ruin. How fitting, am I right? For us who fight against the tides of reality, we’re surrounded by death aru seemingly stantly. Yet, this card means far more to you, no? A lost home ot be pleasant to gh. I must, however, tell you that while it might be hard to recile after what you went through, the Tower, as are all catastrophes, is not something that be sidered truly bad.

  For in ruin’s wake es needed ge.

  Man ‘Sanctum’ Brandt, in a three card reading for ???, December 2056

  ***

  On-off-on. On-off-on.

  Light, then darkness, followed by light once again, a.

  Sitting in a daze upon the cracked streeter beh the flickering streetlight, I keep track of the patterns from behind my eyelids as my muscles and lungs scream at me for my insolehe familiar smell of salt and rust, the New Houston signature, is marred by figes, a siiallic st I will likely never get used to.

  Blood.

  My head throbs as I choke a sob, my brain uo grasp the reality of the situation. There’s a dull pain in my left eye, which is in stark trast to the fmes trailing down my skin from the right, zigzagging in a line all the way to just beh my ear. Chest heaving, I hug myself tightly as I try and fail to calm myself down.

  On. Walking through the street while gathering points with Dad and Pop.

  Off. A sudden cttering from below.

  On. Pop, the world bees the sun.

  A faironic hum drones from the fixture, melding with the faint ringing in my ears in order to form a background track to the devastation of all I’ve ever known.

  Light. Total disorientation, garbled voices I don't reize mixing into the chaos in my ears.

  Dark. Someone grabs my hair and yanks me back.

  Light. I scream as cold steel pierces into my right eye.

  My fingers dig into the skin of my upper arms as I begin to feel weightless, the interval between my breaths ing sooner and sooner with eae I mao plete.

  White. I feel the bde begin to pull out.

  Bck. Jerking myself around, I rip myself away, but my right eye stays with them as their ks ay face.

  White. Leaving my parents behind, I run.

  LISSA! If you hear me, take slow, deep breaths!

  I gasp at Raya’s panicked voice, which pulls me baough that I take oiny step into reality. Trembling, I mao follow her dires, breathing in, then out. In, then out. Slowly but surely, the world once again solidifies, my senses regaining their substance.

  “S-Sorry… Raya…”

  You’re wele. Regardless, we don’t have any more time to sit around here. Is there anywhere near here that you know you hide away until you get your bearings back?

  I tilt my head as I run through where I was when it all went down, how long I ran and what turns I made, then mutter, “We’re on… thirty-five thirty-twht?”

  How in the…? Do you have the bloumbers memorized or something?

  I shakily stand, then begin to walk without actually giving an answer in respoo be fair, I haven’t actually memorized all the blocks on the fourth.

  Just the ones in the ses I actually go to.

  Still, thanks to that, despite my ck of vision at the moment I don’t o see here.

  Ign the small differences between them, mainly the minuscule individuality that the residents mao create for themselves, the Fourth is nothing but a single destitute city block copy-pasted above, below, and beside itself until there was no more room on the floor pte for even a single crete brick more. Still, from the stories Dad sometimes tells, I know we have it better than the Fifth through Ninth, sihey hadn’t gotten the formu for it exactly right yet while doing ours.

  Well, not better for navigating if you don’t know your way beforehand, but certainly quite a bit easier to lose someohin.

  Walking dowreet without being able to see is strao say the least, especially iate the city is in at the moment. Even just yesterday this pce was lively, and I probably wouldn’t be able to move through it without bumping into someone. Now, it’s deathly quiet, and as far as I tell, nobody around for me to run iher. The zombies are sort of a missing anomaly, but that had been a sort of sistent thing tonight, they just don’t seem to show up where you’d expect them to be.

  So where exactly are you going?

  “Erm, well…” I hesitate, then sigh as I expin, “They’re going to have knowledge of the normal pces we’d be in right?”

  Assuming this wasn’t a random assault, yes.

  “So, I sorta only have one pce I think they wouldn’t possibly know about.” I hit my foot against a random solid surfad stumble, but mao catch myself. “It’s a hideout my sister and her ex would use whehey got a ce. I’m really not supposed to know about it, but at this point I’m thankful I do.”

  I’m guessing you followed them?

  I nervously wring my hands as I reach the end of the block. “It’s uh, a little sister’s right?”

  Pff, more like an older sibling’s woes.

  I quietly sigh, then turn down a street before I duto an alleyway. Then, running my hand along the wall to help myself navigate, I take a left turn, lumber under a sheet of metal, take another left followed immediately by a right, then climb over a half wall to drop a few feet into an abandoned building’s small yard. I rush over to the stairs, and thankfully find the entrance is unlocked. I clumsily lock the door behier stepping ihen turn around to find… I have a small problem.

  “Raya,” I hiss, “I know the building yout cause it’s always the fug same but I have no clue whi they used.”

  I legitimately don’t see why that matters.

  “What if there are zombies or something in one of the rooms?”

  It’s an abandoned building Lissa, there’s going to be a ce for that in any of the rooms.

  I relutly agree, then after a slight moment of hesitation, I cautiously slide over to the first apartment, and twist the doorknob. It opens, but I don’t immediately head inside. Instead, I wait a moment to listen for any movement. When nothing happens after a few seds, I slip inside, keeping my back to the door as I shut it behind me.

  I take a moment, my heart smming while waiting for the seemingly iable attack, then blink as I murmur.

  “In hindsight, I probably should have just bought a fug camera, so you could be my eyes.”

  That was indeed an option. To be ho, I was expeg you to do just that when your remaining eye didn't show any sign of rec from the fsh-bang.

  I groan as I slide my back down the door, my legs slowly giving out beh me. I pull them up to my chest as I hit the ground, taking deep breaths to calm my ragi. I lean my head back against the door, then ask:

  “Hooints do I have again?”

  Four-huhirty-two.

  I gingerly reach up to my face, fling at the small sting I feel when my finger brushes against my cut. “What would you reend I do about… my wounds?”

  Well, the bleeding has stopped thankfully, so you actually have options about what you could choose. My personal reendation is the Css-I Bio Adaptive Cyberware Catalog, which runs for one hundred points.

  “C-Cyberware? Not meds?”

  It’s more prudent for the situation at hand. Simply repairing your eyes would just leave them vulnerable to the same methods of attack that damaged them like this in the first pce. This catalog’s items are desigo adapt to the state of your body in addition to being able to be installed without surgery.

  I groan but nod as I mutter, “Fine, what are my options?”

  Depends on what you want.

  “I want to see, Raya.”

  If I could roll my eyes, I would.

  “Ditto!” I respond, then begin a list before Raya quip back. “’t be gouged out, ’t be fshbanged, better visie, thermal sight for if they use smoke, maybe something that will make me invisible to cameras? Am I missing anything?”

  Visible cole? Emp resistanbsp;

  “her seems particurly necessary, so just the stuff I talked about.”

  Okay, it will be one hundred points for ah all of the things you want, mostly because of the stealth thing, so two hundred points in total. You could repair both, but that would leave you somewhat g on points fetting items that would allow you to bat a trained bat squad.

  “I’m fih one for now, best case I get an eveer upgrade for the other.”

  Sounds good, which eye do you want it for?

  I raise an eyebrow as I gesture upwards to my empty eye socket.

  Figures.

  Css-I Bio Adaptive Cyberware Unlocked!

  Points reduced to: 332

  New Purchase: PHNT-Assisted Sight Matrix

  Points reduced to: 232

  As my new eye drops into my palm, I mutter, “Hearing you say that in my ear is weird.”

  Put your oy in, and I give you a table ime.

  “Touche.” I roll the maery around in my palm, and unsurprisingly it’s a sphere. “So what, I just hold it up to here?”

  The eye shifts, growing what I assume are legs before it leaps up onto my face. “Wait, shouldn’t I take ahesia for-”

  You’ll be fine.

  I don’t get a ce to retort as the mae slips itself in through my eyelid, then begins to grow. A million tiny needles stab into me ingly deep into my skull, digging themselves in deeper every moment, but I don’t scream; at least, until the eye decides the zigzagging y face is part of my eye socket, sending a tendril of needles dowrail, the cavalcade of needles causing enough pain that I pass out for a moment.

  When my sciousness flickers ba, I have sight again.

  The small apartment I’m in is utterly empty, beside a single flipped over chair right beside the unit’s small bathroom. I sort of doubt this pce was ever actually used as a living space, since most of the time people at minimum put some aper on to cover up the horrendous grey. Not here, though, there isn’t even a speck of a sign that this pce is inhabited beyond that chair.

  I push myself up off the ground, releasing a quiet, “Bwuh…”

  There are better pces to take a nap than the ground, you know.

  “Oh, fuck you.”

  You wish you could.

  Uanding the futility of attempting tue, I stiy tohen hobble over to the bathroom, finding to my slight delight that there is actually a mirror, though it’s absolutely covered in dust. I approach it, then reach over and press the button on the side, which flicks the holo-s on.

  Unsurprisingly, I look like utter shit.

  My typically thick curly hair, that I had bleached to match my sister’s shade a while ago then never redyed, making it almost look like fn with burnt caramel, is just an utter matted mess that makes me want to cry. My face is covered in blood and dirt, my natural dark blue eye is a bit unfocused, but those just serve to highlight the two major things that have truly ged about my facial profile. Namely, the literally glowiric blue cyber-eye, and the long jagged metal scar illuminated in that same blue within its ter stretg to just below my ear.

  I reach up, running my fingers along the scar’s length, feeling the touch as if it were my own skin. “Raya, this…”

  I’ll admit, I didn’t expect it either. At least it won’t get ied now.

  “Does the light turn off? Actually, I ge the color?”

  Yes ahe eye’s brightness is just increased at the moment because of the ck of light to make it easier to see, and the color be set to anything.

  “Wild… Not being able to see out of my other eye sucks, we o fix that soon.”

  Let’s make a pn on what to do first, Lissa.

  I sigh, the the bathroom, propping up the pstic chair for me to slump down into. I’m already utterly exhausted after just an hour or two of this, and now I o go save Dad and Pop? It’s times like this I get jealous of Emme’s limitless energy.

  “Haa…” I lean ba the chair, reag up to touch the metal scar. “I hope Emme got out before this all happened…”

  A sudden infuriating voice from the other side of the room makes me jerk up in my chair.

  “Unfortunately, she’s probably dead.”

  Huh. Didn’t see this iher.

  g my fists hard I jump up to my feet, gring as if my life depended on it at the utter bitch of a woman standing with her arms crossed in the doorway.

  “Freesia Bayden. How the fuck are you here?”

  “It’s a real pleasure to see you Lissa, wele to my building.” The woman smirks as she holds up a set of keys, before she tilts her head a bit to the side, causing her curly bck ponytail to bounce a bit in tandem. “You look positively atrocious tonight, whatever happeo your eye?”

  “Someo it out, thanks for asking,” I growl, holding myself back from just running over to sm my fist into the whore’s face, “What do you mean that my sister is probably dead?”

  Freesia cups her in her hand. “Well, my ex-boyfriend, god rest his soul, informed me that he saw her going down to the Twelfth before we went clubbing on the sed floor. I also happeo overhear the admin talking about how that floor depressurized two or so ho.”

  I take a step forward as I bark, “She definitely got out, and besides, what reason do I have to trust your word?!”

  “Well, Miss Samurai, I have information you might want. he location of your parents.” Freesia sneers, then points at me. “All you o do to obtain it, is ehat I get out of this hell alive.”

  My eye twitches as I take aep forward. “If you-”

  “If YoU So MuCh As HuRt ThEm,” Freesia interrupts with a mog tone, “Ugh, you know how annoyingly cliché that line is?”

  The woman sighs, losing the amused look that she had been carrying this entire versation. “I’m not the one who took them, Lissa, I just know who did.”

  I stop ihen y arms. “Actually, how did you know I was here? To add to that, how do you know I won’t just use you to get to them?”

  “Lucky guess.” Freesia shrugs, putting a palm up in indifference. “And I know your type, you and your family are all the same. You wouldn’t go ba your word.”

  I take a deep breath, then spit:

  “Fine. If you hunker down in the dredge bell station, once I get my parents and enough points, we’ll dip.”

  “Ha! Hey, AI, do you hear that?” Freesia shakes her head, disbelief on her face. “Your samurai is a bit of an idiot. No, I’m going with you. The. Entire. Way.”

  She sort of has a point.

  “Not now,” I hiss under my breath, before I hatefully utter words I despise through gritted teeth, “Fine. You e with us, Freesia.”

  The woman iion cps her hands together thes her cheek against them. “Delightful! I’m pleased to be w with you, Lissa.”

  I turn away, then mouth, ‘I’m going to murder her, and it’s going to feel so, so good.’

  Wait, until she gives you the info at least.

  I blink. ‘I sort of fot you told me I don’t o actually talk.’

  Like I said, she had a point.

  I pause, then grin and roll my eyes.

  Tou-fug-che.

  Suddenly, Freesia’s face is right beside me and I have to actively hold myself back from pushing her away. “You two are talking right? Actually, Lissa, what’s your AI’s name?”

  I raise an eyebrow as I respond. “I’m not going to give you that info.”

  The outs, clig her tongue as she begins to walk away. “I’d make a joke about you not wanting to save your parents, but we both know how’d that go. I’d really prefer you just tell me instead of beating around the bush, so I don’t have to refer to them as AI all the time. That’ll get really old.”

  I sigh, then begin to walk to the door. “Let’s just get this over with, I’m already exhausted as it is.”

  I pause in the doorframe, turning to see a grinning Freesia looking right at me. “By the way, her name is Raya.”

  Freesia blinks. “Sounds familiar, ’t pce why. Regardless, a lovely name.”

  Say thank you for me?

  “She says you go suck a dick.”

  Freesia gives us aremely genuine smile. “You’re wele, Raya. I look forward t with you.”

  Flip her off, I wanna see what she says.

  Taken a bit aback, I do as Raya asks, to which Freesia chuckles and says, “Oh, Raya, thank you for being cordial, unlike your brat of a Samurai.”

  I snort, then step out of the room aure to the exterior door. “You be annoying while guiding us to the pce my parents might be dying at.”

  Freesia chuckles as walks past me and then outside. I take a single look back, a sludge of ay beginning to build up within my chest, before I relutly follow the devil I made a deal with.

  Let’s just hope it doesn’t bite me in the ass.

  Aliapanacea

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