The Bellators

1:7:2

Soothing hums of still water supply as the base beneath the melodic breeze of cold air. Abundant silence, the serenity of solitude, reflects off a vast blanket of dimly lit water, seemingly stretching eternally given no clear borders.

Beyond the black horizon is an ominous void, for the ruling shadows sheath all in the distance. It's as though there was nothing far past, and yet at the same time, there was everything. The lack of clairvoyance left ample to the imagination, yet nothing at all, confined to a perpetuated state of perplexion, isolated in a cold chamber abandoned from the outside world till there is no reference to substitute the void with.

Above the abyss and waters, high up in the eternal night are countless chrome disks, hovering without a surface. The disks exude gentle illumination of a blue hue from below, stationary as they cast the soft light into the lake underneath. The disks vary in size, petite and titanic, with a particular gargantuan one residing in the center of a cluster.

Surpassing the disks is the ceiling of this cutoff cavity, a ceiling that protrudes a substantial swarm of stalactites, an infinite array that dots the entire ceiling for as far as visible given the low light from the disks. The colossal stalactites point down at the disks, varying in size but generally extensive. Their tips razor-sharp, the horde seem to stretch far beyond the chasm, some even extending to the level of some disks.

The disks are full of an assortment of equipment ranging from hovering tables and machinery of boundless diversity, odd chambers fit perfectly to house a patient and stange mechanical stations with different devices connected in a network of tubes.

Some of the disks appear to have small cages enclosed with translucent blue walls reminiscent of a prison while others have commodious contraptions covered with capsules containing chemicals of copious colors.

The central disk houses several white curved tables, with four along the outer quadrants and another four surrounding the origin. There also appears to be other constructs on the pad, other chambers and boxes. Projecting from the four central tables are tall holographic screens that fully entrap the origin.

Within the confinement, in the very origin of the pad is a hovering chair with flint cushioning, and seated on that chair is the man in the leather jacket, observing the screens.

Soft breaths release from the man's breaths, pacific yet intent, his four distant white locks of hair resting against the side and back of his pale head, reaching down to his shoulders.

His oceanic blue eyes observe the screen in perdurable contemplation, his darkened bags below his eyes carrying wrinkles of skin.

Surrounding him, the encapsulating screens display images of colored maps, images of symbols and buildings, a particularly low yet enormous one in the middle of the desert, and portraits of a vast array of people. Many of these images seem linked with virtual red string to databases with lists of miniscule text, with those rectangular databases being linked with other windows containing more illegible text.

In front of the man are several windows displaying videos in play, exhibiting footage of brawls familiar to him, with one being within the bar earlier the other day against the armed forces, and the other being within the house later that same day against the empowered marauders. All of the footage is shot from a first-person perspective, seemingly the man himself, recounting the various injuries he both dealt and suffered.

The footage reflects off the optical canvas, the lens which he stares through as he examines and analyzes his own memories replayed.

After humming softly to himself, he denotes, "These past couple months have been far more intense, from both sides. The wildtypes have been employing far stronger equipment like that dagger that pierced my armor, but the mutants seem to be getting tougher too, not only are their damage outputs greater but they're far more refined than they once were.... For the humans, I already noticed them starting to take more land with facility production, I've been stalking them for a while now and I noticed a sudden push. In fact it was likely my hubris alone that let me get stabbed, but for the Exhumans...I'm not so sure what they're doing differently...why they've been getting so much stronger."