In Search Of The Neon City

5- Lo

(A/N - I decided to draw the characters in this book, this is Lo ❤️)

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"A little at a time Lo, a little at a time!" Jo warned and angled the water bottle down so that the precious drops fell back to the bottom of it.

My hands trembled, my lips ached and stung, but I did as she said, but narrowed my eyes and sighed heavily. Holding a full water bottle in my hands but not being allowed to drink all at once was like torture.

"You don't want to start vomiting, do you?" I met Carl's wide grin with a tired nod

"I thought I heard your bike" I mumbled.

"I was there" he confirmed, "but they were too many." He sighed and gave me sad smile.

"They were too many for you, so you let us take care of them ourselves? What the hell is the logic in that Carl?"  Hannes hissed from the pile of car tires we used as a seat.

"I knew you would make it, and I was right," he said, waving his arms, "I could not risk loosing my find."

"So it was more important than us?" my brother insisted and I knew he was close to snapping at the older man.

"I wouldn't have done it if it wasn't important for us, all of us. For our future Hannes" he said firmly and narrowed his eyes at him "go out and unwind on the sandbag, kid."

"You talk like you care, but without Lo's bomb our corpses would be sunbathing in the sand right now," he hissed so spit flew "talk about your own fucking future, we were obviously not part of it."

They both sat staring intently into each other's eyes as if they were measuring each other and trying to decide what the other was going to do next.

The mood was strained and the seconds dragged on, Carl looked almost cold while Hannes was boiling with anger, but both were equally stubborn.

Until the younger of them finally looked down and began to finger the cork on his water bottle.
I knew why.
We had a good life here, Hannes knew that too.  But he just couldn't agree with Carl's decisions sometimes, and Carl in turn hated to be questioned.

I sighed and took the opportunity to take a large sip from my own bottle, which resulted in a long, stubborn cough attack.
After two hard thumps in the back, Carl extends his hand "come on boy, I need your help."

"Damn, let him rest Carl" Hannes muttered, but the tone was not as angry anymore.

"He will, in a bit," he said with a smile and helped me up from the pile of pillows and led me through the awning and into the caravan.

I stepped over piles of cords and collected tech stuff that lay just as I left them. I could finally throw myself on my worn, lumpy old mattress on the floor, I had bloody missed this shitty place that was my room.

As soon as I closed my eyes, I felt something land on my stomach.
"I want you to connect and search the chip for information."

"Anything special?" I mumbled sleepily.

"Someone who calls themselves Twelve."

I nodded and put my arm over my eyes "just give me a few minutes."

Before I was enveloped by the pleasant darkness I longed for, I noticed how he got up and bent down over me, I felt a pat on the cheek and heard a low rumble from his lips "sleep well Lo, you deserve it."

"Do not throw him out." I pleaded.

"You know I'm better than that," he replied softly, leaving the room.

I barely had time to snooze when I heard new steps entering my room, "Are you sleeping?"

"Yes."

Hanne's laughter echoed in the room before he threw himself down next to me among the sandy sheets, game controls, cords and the occasional screwdriver. "What did he want?"

"Let me sleep," I moaned wearily.

"Just tell me what he wanted."

"Help him look for someone important."

"Who?" He asked curiously.

"Someone who calls themselves Twelve."

The mattress sank down even more next to me and one of the pillows disappeared from under my head, but I was already so far into the world of dreams that I could not care and soon we both slept just as heavily.

Four hours later I woke up with a aching back and completely drenched in sweat.
I realized with a sigh that we had fallen asleep in our dirty clothes squeezed together on the cramped mattress and the air in the caravan was anything but pleasant.

I moved away from Hanne's warm body and defied my aching muscles when I sat up.
The small chip slipped off my stomach and fell into all the debris with a small thump.  I immediately reached down and caught it between my fingers.

I could not help but wonder what was so fucking special about that Twelve person, while I took off my sweater and the worn jeans that I threw away in a scrap filled corner.
A glass bottle of lukewarm water stood at the edge of the bed and I soaked a piece of cloth to pull the damp cloth over my dirty body.  No rain means no shower and I had to settle for rust-colored water and a terry cloth.

Despite my aching head, I stood up, put on a cleaner sweater and changed my underwear before I cleared some shit off the desk, turned on all the electronics and soon hundreds of small lights started flashing in front of my eyes and three large monitors lit up the room with blue light.

I glanced at Hannes' back before attaching the electrodes to my neck, he was still sleeping heavily.

My fingers moved fast over the keys before it was time to insert the chip.
It was always risky to connect to unknown databases, but if Carl said it was important, it was nothing I wanted to question.  Also, I loved missions like these, exploring foreign worlds online.

With a smile, I picked up my glasses and fastened them tightly around my head.
It was time.
Without a doubt, the ring finger moved towards Enter.

The stinking air of the caravan disappeared and my world suddenly consisted of ones and zeros.  Code after code flickered before my eyes for hours, until I finally found a trace of something that could be a person.

The fingers moved systematically over the keys, but the further I dug, the more I realized that Twelve did everything they could to stay hidden, they clearly did not want to be found.  In real time!

My fingers moved faster and I decided on a new tactic, instead of hunting I could try to be nice?

[10] <12?> I typed. No answer. <Are you Twelve?>

I knew the person, or the software, or whatever the hell it was, saw me, I knew it was there, right within reach but protected by firewalls and security systems that were updated every five minutes.

My stomach screamed with hunger when I felt a hand on my shoulder and was pulled back to reality.  Hannes shook me again and I was just about to disconnect when three words appeared before my eyes,

[Unknown] <Who are you ..?>