Steel Horizon

Chapter Twenty-Two

I never dreamed. Just black.

Always black.

Then I slowly began to feel. Cold steel brushed against my skin. I tried to recoil but my body wouldn't respond. I was in a black void with nothing to control except my thoughts. At least it was safe within my mind. They couldn't hurt me here. They couldn't find me when I wasn't even sure where I was to begin with. I was lost within myself. It was only place where I felt comfort.

After a long time, I felt tugging on my skin and then my muscles. It wasn't uncomfortable, so I ignored it. I drifted into the darkness and wondered when I would die. I knew it had to be coming soon.

The tugging pricked my mind again and I found it becoming more painful. Past the point where I could ignore it. It was everywhere. My body flinched and jerked, but I was being restrained by something strong. Something I couldn't fight against.

I gasped when fire touched my body.

It started at my shoulder and worked its way through my muscles and bones. I tried to draw myself away from it, but it was clinging to me like nothing I'd ever experienced. I couldn't escape.

The pain came on stronger. More than I've ever felt.

A scream erupted from me, sounding different. Wrong. It was full of something I'd never heard. I thought dying was supposed to be painless and easy. It wasn't supposed to be like this. I wasn't supposed to be feeling like I was being sliced in half. Another scream rippled from my mouth and my throat was feeling hoarse, like I had been screaming for hours.

Maybe I had. I couldn't tell.

I was beginning to wake. I was supposed to be dead, not alive. The pain was so overwhelming I didn't know what I would see when the world would become clear again. The reality of dreams was so much easier and simpler to deal with.

I blinked my eyes open—slow at first, until things started to come into focus. I squinted against the blinding light and stifled another gasp of agony as more pain ripped through my body. My cheeks felt wet with tears I hadn't known I'd shed, and my skin felt hot and sticky under the bright light, each tear burning into me.

I couldn't breathe. The pain had the air sucked from my lungs. I didn't know what was happening. I blinked again and focused on the shadows around the light, trying to make sense of everything.

There were faces staring at me. Probably a half dozen of them, all silhouetted against the dark room. I was slightly elevated on a hard table, so I could see them. All around me. My gaze flickered over them and my heart pounded like I was on the edge of a cliff, ready to be dropped below. Their black eyes were unmoving and lifeless, staring so hard I could feel them.

Jude's voice whispered in thoughts of something he had said. "They were just waiting for me to die."

Was that what they were doing? Were they waiting for me to die? If they were, that would mean—

I didn't want to look down, but I had to. The severe ache in my left shoulder was too hard to ignore, too surreal. I didn't want to believe it. I wanted to wake up from this nightmare and have my life back to the way it was.

I blinked away the tears in my eyes and slowly let my gaze drift down to my arm.

I stopped breathing.

I stopped hearing.

They had done it to me.

My arm was gone.

And what replaced it made me want to hurl. I didn't know where my T-shirt was, but I was only left with my white tank top. I studied the fingers and slowly made my way up to my shoulder. The thin metal disappeared under my skin like it had grown from it. I sucked in air, but it was difficult, like there wasn't any air at all. A shudder ran through my body.

My arm was gone.

I became unfrozen and started to shake. Panic was building and I struggled against the bonds holding me to the table. I gritted my teeth and pushed against them harder but nothing happened. I refused to look down my left side. I promised myself this was just a horrible dream. It had to be.

I leaned my head against the cool table and relaxed my body, letting the tears flow from my eyes freely. My head swam with the amount of air I was getting and the exhaustion my body had already been through.

The Scrappers were still staring at me. When another wave of pain rolled through my muscles, I suppressed a groan. My heart pounded unevenly, like it might stop at any moment.

"She is still alive." My eyes flicked towards the female Scrapper who had spoken. She stared back at me, just like they all were.

"For now," another answered. "We can only hope it will stay alive as did the last one. If she dies, we do not have any other humans to operate on."

"They are becoming more scarce."

"They are learning to hide from us."

I gasped as another stab of pain punctured my heart. "It hurts," I whispered. I couldn't hold the words any longer. The pain was clinging to me just as the arm was doing. I wanted to tear it off. Anything to take away the fire.

They stared blankly, then one of them to my right spoke. "The process of it fusing with your nerves is the most painful part, it will subside soon enough." He looked up to others around me. "We need to deploy out several pairs of teams if we are to find the other."

"Do you think the effort will be worth it in the end? That is a lot of time consumed with looking for one human."

"The knowledge we will gain is priceless. This is something we have never had the chance to study. This may be the key to everything." He waited to see if anyone would argue, but my throat was too choked up to say anything. "We will leave this one here to rest. It will give us time to look for the other."

They nodded silently in agreement and started to leave the room one by one. I was relieved and scared. Relieved because I couldn't handle their staring black eyes, waiting for the moment I might die. And scared because I didn't want to be left alone in this room, with the only thing to look at being an arm that wasn't mine.

The light shining down on me blinked out, leaving me in the dim room with just a single light on in the corner.

As the last Scrapper left, he shut the door and I was alone. My breathing was still shallow and the silence echoed off the bare walls right back into my own ears. My gaze drifted over to my arm again and I wished it hadn't. There were more restraints holding it down than my other one, but I tried fighting them anyway.

My heart pounded faster, my breathing one step away from panic. The arm shone under the dim light and I couldn't tear my eyes away from it. It really happened. I heard screaming before I knew it was coming from me. More tears rolled down my cheeks but I kept fighting against the restraints even though I was going nowhere. I kept fighting because I wanted to run away from the thing now replacing my arm. It was like running away from myself.

I didn't want this to happen. I didn't want to be like one of them. And I sure as hell didn't want to be here. I fought until I couldn't fight anymore. The leather straps dug into my skin on my right arm but they still held strong. I was done.

I lowered my head on the table and my chest rose and fell in ragged gasps, my stomach turning over multiple times. I stared at the ceiling and thought of everything away from here. I thought of Luke, and his laughing smile. I thought of the few months I traveled alone before the Scrappers came. And then I thought of Jude.

After a few moments, my body was still and my breathing was steady. Even away from him, he still helped me.

The small light in the corner blinked out, and I was in darkness.