Breached Horizon: Marooned Ch. 11

*-*-*(Author's Note: I'm sorry for the delay, I have been doing rewrites and drafts of all the last remaining chapters, which is about 5 big chapters. It's safe to say that I have finally laid the path to connect towards the last chapter of the Marooned storyline. I've been debating whether I should just finish all chapters and release it at the same time but that would take too much time, I think. Now it's just a matter of pushing myself to write the last third of this arc. I would like to thank you all so much for your continued patience and patronage. End Note) *-*-*

Falling in darkness, I screamed.

Or at least I tried, as I open my mouth and expel the air deep within my lungs only to hear none of my voice while I fell through the endless chasm I find myself in. Spinning and flailing, trying to grasp any purchase that could stop my fall to no avail, there was no end to the sensation of powerlessness as I hurled in this.... this limbo.

My name.... what was my name? It feels like a memory on the tip of my tongue and yet the knowledge never making over the precipice. The details of my life as before eludes me and I cannot remember the last thing before my endless falling in this eternal darkness.

Worse was this feeling.

The taut pull at the back of my spine for the sudden sight of the end, by which I mean the ground. Would it hurt, I wonder? Sometimes I yearn for it to be over, this uncertainty of never seeing the end. Sometimes, indecision grips me and I would rather fall forever than meet that gruesome conclusion. This going back and forth between mindset is a torture in and of itself.

This is.... fear.

I know it to be fear and yet..... the sensation feels alien, as if I had not felt it in all my life.

Odd.

What have I done to deserve such malicious purgatory?

It was difficult to ascertain the passage of time. There are moments where I feel like I was at the beginning and had just stepped over the edge, and other times I have the sensation of falling for what seemed like ages.

There was an oppressive sound as well. The rhythmic roaring of an iron beast. It echoed somewhere, beyond the veil of this impenetrable darkness. It made my bones tremble whenever it roared loudly, quaking the very darkness as well. Metal struck metal, forming into a cacophony of a single mighty creature.

But it was an old beast, I could tell from the occasional iron creak and groaning steel as parts refused to move in what I think is rust and grime. But If I could, I would have glided towards that place, just to escape from this falling prison.

All the while I fell in this endless void...... I saw things, for it was not a complete and total darkness.

There were layers of darkness here. One that is uncaring and nonchalant of my falling and simply let things be, making up for most that surround me, like air itself. Another can only be described as soft, cool and thick, I feel soothed whenever my hand clamps around these things as I fell through the void like rivulets of rain water.

But the dark edges of this never-ending chasm, there was another kind of shadow, they protruded out of the farthest edges like stone walls composed of an ever-churning mound of bodies. I sense great malice in them. Where the other shadows were indifferent, these were Horrible things. Eyeless things.

It was like an oily colossal wall of gloom, churned by the constantly moving forms within. Hundreds, thousands... all of them gasping for air that would never come, an end to their agonized existence. I could not make sense of their individual shape or form as it morphed from one thing into the next. I saw mouths twist into eyeless faces, then to claws and back again into mouths; screaming in agony. I feel them reaching out to me in their untold millions.... their numbers were so mind boggling to me as their claws, fangs and maws seek out anything to end this insatiable hunger for the demise of all things.

They must have taken note of me, the lone light in this unending purgatory, for as one they turned to face me. This... this organism composed of millions upon millions of fanged, toothed and clawed monstrosities all sharing a single purpose.

The nonchalant darkness acted like a barrier of sorts, stretching and resisting as the ever-shifting mounds of abomination reached out towards me. All that stood between me and the nameless things in the dark was that thinnest fabric of reality. An entire world hurtling towards me. I could not look away. I was entranced by that ever-expanding enormity, each new detail brought out as it lunged towards me, dreading for that final devastating impact.

Then I woke up.

****

In all my life, Never have I feared the dark....

.... until I opened my eyes.

I awoke from that nightmare realm to be met upon by unceasing shadows, so much so that I could not even see what was in front of me no matter how many times I blinked. I cast my gaze around, trying to acclimate myself and wait for the darkness to go away. No such luck. I could not even make out the merest outline of where I was.

I made to stand, only to fall.

Hot white flashes struck the back of my brain as searing pain erupted all across my body. I feel tears well in my eyes, a rasping sound reached my ears. It was my voice, pathetically alien to the point I did not recognize it, as if I had been drinking the scorching sands of a desert for days.

I try to speak but cannot utter so much as a word, the air unable to form into the merest syllables as wounds in my throat opened up like I swallowed molten shards of glass. I writhed in the shadows, calling for help that would never come.

It took considerable effort to just be able to breath without having the sensation of needles raking down my esophagus as the air passed through. In my torment, another sensation crept up from the deepest bowels of my mind. A feeling I had hoped would disappear.

Terror.

I was imprisoned in my own body, unable to stand, scream or shout for help. I tried to move my hands, but I cannot move them, could not feel them.

Hell. I am in Hell.

"Heeelp...," I finally managed to rasp for what seemed like an eternity. Just that one word alone hurts with the burning points of nails, leaving behind scorch marks at the back of my mouth.

"Oh God. Vaelora?" a voice pierced through the shadows, familiar. A ray of hope filled my chest. I was not alone.

I feel movement despite not being able to pierce the shadows. Why was it so damn dark? Where are the lights? I hear further movement, the sound of metal against metal as the person moved closer, hitting and dropping things in his haste to get to me.

"Vaelora don't try to move. You'll reopen your wounds and they are still being molecularly reknitted as it is," The voice advised.

Vaelora..... That is right. My name is Vaelora Cygnis. And this voice.... this could only be....

The name was still a fuzz of information within my head, like static. But I was glad someone was here with me. I settle down as I feel the warmth of somebody else's touch on my shoulder, reassuring me.

"C-cannot.... see..," I uttered. I know my eyes are open. And yet all I behold is darkness.

"Shit," was all he could utter. I felt his fingers just above my cheek, seeming to check my eyes sockets. "The Instability implosion, caused a lot of internal damage to your body: muscles, organs.... and even nerves. That includes your optic nerves. Hang on, the medbay is still underway with possible remedies. It prioritized your life-sustaining vital organs, working its way from there to your other... appendages. Sorry. You are not suppose to wake yet with this level of damage... it's too soon.... still..."

Implosion.

That word broke the dam within my mind. Memories flooded back to me. The Horde. The Battle. And the Stars-damned Apex Centaur.

Stars Above, I am blind. What has become of me? As soon as I hear the words, a wave swept my mind's footing, sending it careening into a downward spiral. My eyes are gone. But that was not the worst part.

I try to call to the star within me but all I receive is a cold hollow reply. I listen to the ones in the cosmos but dead silence was their song.

I could feel it, my core. It is there.

And it burns no longer. A dead star.

My core..... God... My core. Crippled beyond belief. H-how could this be? Never in the annals of Astralborn History were one of my kindred has ever been brutally crippled as I have.

And then there was the pain. A lingering phantom at the far edges of my mind. It ebbs and flows like the tide, never stabilizing into a constant steady frequency, constantly rising and falling without rhyme or reason, thus never giving me a chance to acclimate, Like a fresh stab of a thousand needles prickling beneath my muscles every other minute.

IT. IS. MADDENING.

"Please.... Please...." I begged, the prayer of the weak and helpless, foreign words coming from my lips but it did not matter. I just want the pain to be gone.

Hands were on mine, trying their best to soothe, "Allright, allright don't move too much. Everything's gonna be fine." His name..... His name is Alden Slater. Yes. Jittery but reliable Slater. I remember now. I have to warn him. The Horde may be shattered but another will take its place.

He has to prepare.

No.

No time left.

He has to flee.

I try to voice my thoughts but I am spent, the pain in my throat surmounting. Seeming to sense that I wish to speak, Slater brought something to my lips. The cool refreshing feeling of water spilled from my lips and down to my scorched throat. It stung for a brief second before being satisfyingly quenched for the time being.

"Everything is gonna be fine," Slater assured to me. I feel the draw of darkness, the darkness of exhaustion, beginning to overwhelm my mind.

Slater's words echoed in my mind. Lies, I think to myself. And yet, like a fool desperately clinging to whatever that is offered, I allowed myself the delusion. Everything's gonna be fine. The darkness was emboldened by those words.

But I had to warn him again. All I managed to produce was a wretched gasping sound. Failing that, I tried to gesture with my arms. Wrong move. This time, I could not bear the pain. More than enough to slam me back down as my seared muscles screamed loudly into my brain.

I would have slammed hard back into the medical apparatus were it not for Slater catching me. I let him settle me back into the cold embrace of the machine, oblivious to the coming destruction to him. Does he not know? No, he has to know. If what he had said about his childhood and homeworld is true, then he must know what comes next...

"All right, the medbay suggested a viable solution. It can heal your vision and help with the pain but..... it's going to need additional organic elements for it to catalyze and its going to take a shit ton of time and power. It cannot create something from nothing and needs organics to weave into your damaged flesh and help with the healing process and we don't have the--"

"DO... IT," I cut slater off, fueled by desperation as another wave of white-hot fire trailed my hypodermis to form the two short words. Was this what my fires feel like?

A moment of silence passed. Even blind, I could hear the thoughts inside Slater's head. He would think of something. The man was driven and when pushed to a corner, could come up with an ingenious solution. "Allright," he finally said. I feel a weight to his words as if he decided something very difficult. Was it more difficult than my current state? Impossible. "I... may have an idea how to boost the medbay's healing capacity.....," he added somberly.

With no eyes of my own, I could feel his gaze on me and he sighed. He sounded tired. Pitying. Was my state so difficult to elicit such pity in him?

"Rest, Vaelora. You're safe," Slater tried to reassure me.

You are not, I wish to say to him but between my burnt esophagus and lost vision and shattered body, I could not further enunciate the simplest of warnings.

I felt the slightest prick on my neck, "I'm going to give you a nanite concoction to help you sleep and ease the pain, if only to a little bit. Hang on, the needle on this one got.... bent. Again. Let me try another one."

Before I could muster the stamina to warn him of the coming threat, Slater injected me with the a much-needed sedative.

The darkness reclaimed me in a dispassionate embrace, despite my protest to warn Slater of his coming doom.

******

I returned to that place once more.

I know it was a dream now; which means it is nonexistent, intangible and yet still I fell uncontrollably.

The formless things did not instill as much fear as it did before but they unsettled me nonetheless. I know they are a mere figment of my pained imagination. Despite this realization, they did not dispel in this unending limbo within my mind. I tried to pay them no heed. I try to manifest myself out of this delusional limbo. No such luck. I have heard of lucid dreaming but I never understood its intricacies, even all the time I have in this dark vision.

At least here, I could see, move my hands, despite being a useless attempt as it was as it did nothing to stop my fall. How long have I been falling? A minute? An hour?

The flow of time in this... this purgatory is indiscernible.

But it will be alright. This nightmare will come to an end.

And so I fell and fell.

To pass the time, I try to do inventory of what my faculties were capable of. I try to peer into the deep dark, beyond the outlines of walls of moving claws and flesh, of which were numerable and towering, seeming without end in the farthest reaches of the Dark. But this was far as I could get.

Until an idea occurred to me. I was the sole light in this place and I am reminded upon when gazing up at the cosmos when I was at home in the city. The light pollution made it so that I could not see much of the stars lighting up the night sky.

And so I tried my hypothesis.

In this dream, I glowed, able to perceive myself. Then I thought of lessening my light. I stared at my luminescent hand, which appeared as it usually did when I am in that zone in the midst of battle, floating in the cosmic melody of the universe.

There was no song here.

But the light did obey me.

I was able to lessen the light I exuded to only a fraction of its strength. At first, I saw nothing different. But as my eyes began to get used to the darkness, a revelation occurred to me.

I became aware of further detail of my surroundings. There truly was no end to this chasm. No, it wasn't even a chasm. It was just an associative idea my mind conjured to make sense of this strange dream-land. There was not even an up or a down. Only that something has been sucking me farther and farther to a certain direction. My mind filled in the gap and perceived it as the feeling of falling. To where, I do not know.

This dream-place was, to my best approximation, infinity.

I was able to peer deeper into the Dark, beyond the towering shades of Horrors, just to see how far I could cast my gaze.

Then I feel something.

A presence, beyond this chasm of callous dark. Nothing complete, only mere parts of it that I could see but I feel it somehow in the darkest recesses of the deep shadows. Its enormity. As if sensing the same presence I perceived as well, the mosaic madness of tooth, claw and maw ceased and quieted at the merest suggestion of this... entity.

A calm has settled in this place in between dreams and reality. The darkness no longer billowed like a rushing wind, the soothing rivulets of darkness that fell with me quieted as well and paused like bubbles in the air.

All was still. Even the echoing movement of the Iron Beast.

It did not feel peaceful.

I realized that I had stopped falling, now floating in midair. I did not feel in control.

This thing was the size of a mountain. I could make out the vaguest humanoid outline of a living being of titanic proportions; an arm that could part storms with the merest brush, a torso so massive that it enveloped the farthest horizon, encompassing and blocking to what lay beyond. And its eyes..... Something primal deep in my instinct prevented me from gazing too deeply where its head should be. It told me not to meet the eyes of this thing.

A darkness, not malicious but..... something old and ancient. I.... I cannot discern the intent of this thing. The ones closest to me, I can feel and interpret what they feel. But the thing out there, in the Darkness Beyond..... My head began to hurt. I forced myself to stop looking. Things did not return to what they were before. I cast my gaze down towards my feet. Still I feel the entity beyond, picturing it in my mind. I closed my eyes. And I feel a blanket settling over me, like a heat atop my bare shoulders, as if someone watching me from a far distance.

I think.... I think it has noticed me.

And the very idea filled my bowels with cold dread.

This is not real.

A conjuration of my mind, brought about by the immense pain of my injuries and nanite medication. But whatever this thing is, I feel a disturbance deep within me. I do not know which was worse: the millions upon millions of claws and mouths lunging at me or the gaze of this...... incomprehensible entity. It's head was so high up in another layer of Dark, obscuring it for my scrutiny. And I am thankful for that blessing.

All I know is at that moment I hoped never to garner the full horrible attention of this.... thing. An existence that dominated a singular direction, in what is supposed to be infinite darkness itself.

I hoped to break from this nightmare. To wake up.

Wake up. Wake up.

Wake up!

WAKE UP!!

****

I opened my eyes in tears as a great suffocating weight was lifted off my chest. It was a dream, just a dream I tell myself, the last vestiges of it still clinging my mind as if a malaise. I had trouble distinguishing the waking world from the dream, like a grime sticking to my skin. Fear once more made its presence known in my life. Over the short span of time, I have been acquainted with the varying palates of fear. It took me minutes more as I forced that dredge of nightmare from my mind as I fully settled back into wakefulness.

Just a dream. Nothing more. It cannot hurt me.

I blinked. Everything was blurry but I could just make out the roughest outline of things. The light was low, coming in from the narrow slits of this dark room. I could make out the familiar shadows of tools and machinery hanging about the various walls and chains. I was in the Garage.

I could see. Stars above, I could see again!

"Slater... Slater," I rasped.

"Vaelora?," a voice answered from the other side of the room, encased in deepest shadows.

I proceeded to sit up. My body groaning in pain but it was a manageable one, like the faint embers of a dying flame. It was annoying but the pain no longer screamed into my brain like daggers of fire and I was thankful for this small mercy. Too much time was already wasted, we need to act now. The fact that Base Camp still stands could only mean I was unconscious for little less than a day. Two tops. And then there would be the case of the turrets as well, they could buy some additional time and which would explain why Slater and I are still alive.

"W-why is it so cold? No matter. We have to flee. You..... have to flee. The Horrors will retaliate with overwhelming force. For penance of my hubris, I... I will stand and hold them off."

He did not reply immediately. I hear the trilling of electronics nearby and feel the slight shift of movement in the shadow. Prevalent was the sound of some large machinery outside, large enough that I could feel vibrations coming from beneath the floor. What is that sound? Even unconscious, it permeated my dreams. The beast of iron.

"You will stay?" Slater answered after a moment. He sounds disbelieving of my resolve, "Vaelora you are in no position to fight. Much less stand and move around. Your body suffered critical internal damage and is still far from fully healed. I am only thankful that you are finally awake. It has been.... difficult, without anyone to talk to. Even if it is you."

The way he sounded.... he sounded odd. I could not point my finger on it.

"I.... have.... given you my word, Slater," I gasped, it took considerable effort to stay upright as it is. I feel the scars that now trailed my body, they snaked about me like a serpent made of molten fire. Though It compares to nothing to the hollowness within me. I have called and called upon the light within me, my starcore, but no matter the heartbreaking pleas and supplication, I heard no song from within.

"I would rather die than live on like this. Now go... We don't have much time."

He did not move. I hear him sigh in the darkness and at last shuffling, moving closer towards me. Why did he not turn on a light?

"Don't worry about that. You are in no condition to be worried about it. Just rest for now. You could hardly sit up in your condition, much less worry about the Horrors. Just know that... we aren't in any immediate danger."

"Not in immediate danger? Slater you told me that you've spent your childhood fighting these things, you know what would come afterwards. Wave after wave of Hordes is not something you could deal on your own."

I forced myself to take a step. Like a lightning strike, the litany of internal scars sung in a unified chorus within a split second and I buckled under their stinging reprise. Slater was there in a second, catching me before I could slam back into the cold embrace of the medbay unit. He gently settled me in a sitting position against the machine that repaired my body. I did not realize how cold I was until he put his hand to the small of my back, helping to steady me. I welcomed the warm touch and realized how cold the ambient temperature within the Garage was. Not only the lights but the heating as well? Perhaps Base Camp has suffered damage, as in the chaos of battle there must've been a few Horrors that slipped past me and headed straight for the Base. But it seems Slater have dealt with them, as he is standing with me now. Despite his polite and aloof demeanor, the man was a survivor. But something felt off about his hands as well.

"Don't make sudden moves, your body is still far from healed."

"I have been lying in this goddamn bed like a damned invalid. Help me up or do not, I will not spend another second in this thing if I could help it. I want to move, Slater. I NEED to move." I need to know if I could still able to walk on my own. So much has already been taken from me. Please let it not be my legs as well.

Slater made no reply. But after a while, I could hear a sigh of resignation followed by him moving my arm around his shoulder so I could use him to lean on. Gingerly, I moved my legs. I clamped my teeth shut as my scorched scars sing anew. The metal floor sent goosebumps up the soles of my bare feet. It was a welcome sensation, as it proved that I had not completely lost motor functions on my lower limbs. Taking a first step proved more challenge as my sense of balance and the atrophy of my joints took its toll on me.

I perceived another sensation as I am acclimated to being reawakened. The feeling of motion was unmistakable. I shook myself awake. Must be imagining things.

"How long was I under, Slater? I know for certain I destroyed that first Horde but that would make the Horror Collective send another one after that, if I remember my Horror Behavior theory is correct, at least 72 hours after the first one," I asked him within the shadow of the Garage. It was like learning to walk again. The dizziness in my head slowly abated and it was more trying to regain the feeling on my slumbering limbs. I need to know how long exactly I was out, so we may plan for the inevitable.

"I know, I've seen your handiwork first hand. You tore them limb from limb and made a mountain of their dead. That was... the stuff of legends." I recognize the sincere admiration in his tone and something lit up within me and it was not my starcore. Pride, on what is perhaps my one and only act of notable accomplishment.

My legend..... burned to ash just as soon as it began. What a joke. The well of pride was replaced by the harrowing pain of my body. The cost of my so-called legend.

"Vaelora.... What the hell took you down? I've been wondering about it all this time. The camera feed cut off near the end of the battle. For an Astralborn as yourself to be brought low--"

"I don't want to talk about it," I cut him off. A maelstrom of emotion erupted within me. Hate, loss, grief and shame. All of these churned and swirled within me in a violent concoction that just leaves me empty and confused. "Please... just not yet," I added, in a softer tone. He did not deserve to be snapped on. I owe him my life.... if it can be called a life, being a crippled Astralborn. I had just cleared my third step when my limbs betrayed me. I would have fallen a second time were it not for Slater. Or was it the third?

Slater seemed to understand as in the low light of the Garage I saw his head bob in agreement and decided to let the aftermath of the battle be for now. There are more pressing matters to attend to: Our survival.

He moved us to a far wall of the Garage. Even in the low light afforded I could tell by the contours of this particular wall that this was the large Garage door meant for heavy equipment to enter and exit. I managed to take a step. And then another.

I think back to that moment when I was struck by the Dark Matter Arrows by that accursed starsdamned Apex. How was I supposed to see that? Faster than light attacks? I have never heard of such a thing! Nor deemed it possible. I replayed the battle with the Horde in my head. The thing was clever. It had survived the first encounter and thus has hastened the mustering of a Horde, directing its attacks which might explain the odd coordinated behavior of the Horrors, maneuvering their numbers from the worst of my bombardments, thus making me expend stamina and focus. Yes, yes.... this was the reason of my defeat.

It has to be, I tell myself. And yet it did nothing to assuage the disquiet deep within my bowels. The series of events that led up prior to the battle. The reason why the Horde even mustered in the first place.

Slater hit a green button and the inner mechanisms whirred and clanged as the large door slowly opened its maw. I shook my head out of this depressing stupor. Light began to flood the dark room. I had been sequestered in the darkness for so long my eyes could not dare bare to behold the intense light that greeted me. That has never happened to me before. Has the light of the galaxy truly forsaken me? Has that accursed Centaur Apex damned me?

The wind howled outside. I began to shiver. I thought the inside of the Garage was cold, but this gust that greeted me was bone-chilling. I did not want to and yet for the first time in my life..... I feel cold. And hungry.

A frozen landscape greeted me. My jaw hung open. I took a step forward, unwrapping my arm around Slater's neck, not meeting his gaze and fixated on what lay before me: I scanned the surrounding vista of white-tipped peaks and steep cliffs. The sky was so clear and bright and appears so close I feel like I could touch it.

H-how.... what... how did we get here?

"You don't need to worry about the Horde, Vaelora..." Slater supplied, a step behind me and sequestered in the shade of the Garage, interrupting me from my troubled thoughts, ".... at least not for today."

The Garage moved across the landscape, propelled by All-terrain treads beneath graviton-actuator legs and suspenders to bear the brunt of the rough terrain.

A fragment of a conversation Slater and I had days ago, what seemed like another life altogether, of the capabilities of this Omond-manufactured structure. Something about being a mobile facility as well. Thoughts rushed in my mind like the torrent of a raging river. I find breathing difficult. Still, I cannot help myself but ask. All of these.... could not be done in a mere span of two days.

"H-How?"

"The Turrets held them off for four days before I managed to get the Mekanikan module of the Garage in working order," Slater explained.

"How long? How long was I unconscious?" my eyes were glued to the frost-blanketed scenery before me.

"...... You were badly hurt Vaelora. Quite frankly, you should be dead, I think, were it not for your Astralborn physiology. That's the only viable explanation I could think of. Aside from keeping you alive and for your condition to not deteriorate, the medbay was unable to fully heal you without pre-processed organic elements as catalysts for molecular repair. It had to keep you under for as long as it did as it repaired your nerve damage and internal organs."

Slater did not answer my question. Not precisely at least.

I was about to turn around and meet his eyes when my gaze wandered over the faraway mountain ranges that the Garage was moving away from. I narrowed my eyes, thinking it an optical illusion or a side-effect of my recently healed sight.

But no, as the seconds dripped I confirmed without a doubt that the faraway mountain range was slowly engulfed in shadow, the white of the snow that blanketed an entire mountainside was instead taken over by an encroaching darkness, a darkness casted by no overcast cloud and one that stretched several peaks over.

What the......

"They have been relentless," Slater spoke behind me, undisturbed by the sight, as if he was used to it by now. And that was all the explanation I needed. Horrors. Hundreds of thousands of them, blanketing an entire mountain range. No.... more. Much, much more. And they were all headed to our direction.

"Don't let the distance fool you. The Megahorde is a lot farther than it appears. We are about nine days ahead of them. So as I've said before, we're safe..... for now. The terrain really helps with maintaining distance and as always, the Horrors are needlessly reckless, especially with the size of their numbers. I've lost count how many times they've caused an avalanche because they wouldn't dare slow down. And besides that.... I've been leaving them presents. We've passed that particular peak four days ago, they should come about it any momen--,"

A series of white puffs erupted at an overlooking peak, just above where the vanguard of the Horde was passing beneath. A few seconds passed where nothing happened. Then the entire top half of the snow-blanketed summit collapsed and eroded down, slamming into the brunt of the frontline of the Megahorde.

Slater clicked his tongue. "Damn. I was hoping for a Size 5 avalanche. That was just a Size 4. The Horrors would only lose a half a day in their chase."

How could he be so callous? So matter-of-fact of our dire, hopeless situation?

All of these new information was starting to overwhelm me. My knees wavering not only at expense of my injuries but at the onslaught of our latest predicament as well. The immense size of our enemy. A doom that chases us with no concept of morale or exhaustion. But most of all, how long have I been under?

I finally turned my eyes to face Slater, to demand from him an answer.

For the first time since waking up I saw Slater as he is now. And my jaw dropped, whatever argument I had in my throat died there, never making it out of my lips save for a disbelieving gasp.

"Slater...."I said weakly. His cognac eyes somberly watched encroaching tide of Horrors swallowing an entire mountain in their near-infinite ranks. He must be thinking of calculations and plans already.

"Yeah?" he said, not meeting my gaze, seemingly lost in thought.

"Y-you....," I did not know what to say.

Hearing my hesitance, he finally meet my eyes. His red-brown eyes are bright and alive as I've ever seen them. But.....

"What is it? Is it the pain? Let's get you settled down. I told you not to push yourself too hard. The medbay still has a lot of work to be done."

"No.... Your face. Your body....."

It was Slater, or what's little left of the man that is Slater. He was all skin and bones, sunken cheeks and thinning hair. The only thing the same was his eyes. Those same cognac red and brown eyes that looked away or unable to maintain eye contact, still smiling.

He gave me a weak smile. He pondered for a bit, doing a mental calculation. Then something clicked in me.

Pre-processed. Organic elements. Catalyze.

"You used the MREs as catalysts for the medbay unit," I concluded. Slater only nodded solemnly.

I leaned all my weight against the awning wall of the Garage, the strength having left my knees as I slowly slid down to a sitting position on the ramp. Slater's skeletal frame kneeled before me. He gave me a tight-lipped smile and patted my shoulder encouragingly. The wind's cold howl grew louder to my ears and the bareness of the landscape made all the more pronounced as Slater's hollow cheeks. It was a wonder how he was able to withstand the strong northern gust of this harsh place.

"Don't worry about me. I owe you my life Vaelora. Several times over, I think. This is just repayment for all those times. Think nothing of it."

Think nothing of it?! He is a dead man walking!

All this time.... by himself.... starving... Oh my God....

"To answer your question," Slater continued on, unknowing of my inner turmoil, "Officially speaking, we have been marooned in VX-13 for a grand total of....104 days. Hey hey hey, Don't give in now. We'll make it, yeah? Just rest for now.... there might be a way out.... maybe, I think."

But I was not listening intently.

In that moment, all the weight of the choices I have made tumbled down within my psyche, the gravity of it all in my relentless hunting of Horror Lairs to sate my satisfaction and ego.

I have doomed us.