Estranged [Completed]

Escape

Kalei began to slip in and out of consciousness. She remembered the smoke receding, but the flashing red lights persisted. She remembered awakening to the sounds of screaming and crashes, but her grip on the world slipped again before she could make sense of it.

She floated through a dark, murky haze, somewhere in her mind. There was no up, no down. Eventually, she heard a metallic screeching in the distance. It seemed to be coming closer. It became louder and louder until it seemed to fill her skull with noise, and even then, the sound continued to grow. Kalei launched herself upright, frantically searching for the source of the sound. But before her eyes could focus, she was overwhelmed with a wave of dizziness and nausea. It was all she could do to put her head between her knees.

"Whoa, easy girl." Jenna's voice sounded close, and Kalei felt her weight pushed forward, as though they were on a vehicle that was stopping. Kalei took a deep breath and the dizziness abated, but the screaming headache and nausea remained. She opened her eyes.

She was sitting on a plush leather couch, and behind her, to her left, were two matching leather armchairs. Between them was a sleek, metal coffee table. But the walls behind the chairs didn't make any sense. They were a shining, silver color, a shade that matched the coffee table, but the windows were oblong, and beyond them, she could see the passing grey walls of a tunnel. The screeching brakes, the tunnel out the window; she could have sworn she was on a subway. But she was sitting on a leather couch. Kalei began to wonder if she had taken brain damage from the fall.

Jenna sat in one of the armchairs across from Kalei. She still wore the bikini and shorts, but somewhere along the way, she had picked up a pistol and a pair of black gloves. If anything, the new additions seemed to complete her outfit.

Jenna said, "We're on Landen's personal light-rail. He built it between his mansion and the Tusic office."

That made sense. But if this was Landen's light-rail... the details started to come back to her in a flash of images and sensations. Kalei jumped off the couch.

Jenna jumped up with her, arms out to catch Kalei if she fell over, and she said, "Ho, easy, sister. You feelin' a'ight?"

Kalei looked around. "If this is—Where's Landen? What happened?"

"Don' know, don' care. We got out of there, you're safe, tha's all tha' matters. I say fuck everyone else."

The train gave a final lurch as it stopped. Kalei pitched forward, catching herself on the arm of the couch. Jenna stepped up to help her, but Kalei waved her off. Then, with a click, the power shut down, followed by shouts outside the door.

"Shit, the assholes caught on to us. Quick, out the window. Go. Go!" 

Kalei ran to the window and pulled the escape release. For a recovering head trauma victim, she felt surprisingly alert. The only pain that lingered was the bite of the darkness running rampant through her body. 

Oh. Yeah. 

The darkness had probably finished the recovery process for her.

The shouts had turned to grunts as the guards started to pry the door open behind them. Kalei shoved the windowpane out of the frame and scrambled through, falling haphazardly onto the cement and fresh glass below. Jenna followed; a wave of bullets ripped and exploded through the air above her as she stuck the landing with a perfect tuck and roll. She was already on her feet and running as Kalei finished pulling herself upright.

Jenna fired a couple shots back at the train as she ran, shouting, "Come on! Let's go!"

Kalei ran after her sister, the guards behind them returning shouts and bullets of their own. The tunnel was completely dark ahead, and soon it was all Kalei could do to make out Jenna's outline in the fading light. Luckily, the ground was flat and even beneath her feet, or else she was sure she would have tripped.

She caught up to Jenna, and the young woman greeted her with an increase in pace. "I can get us to the surface, but I dunno where we gonna go after that. No way in hell we can use a Tusic safe house now."

Kalei panted, "You said we're by the Tusic building, right?"

"Yeah."

"I know a place." Kalei suggested an abandoned office that wasn't more than a mile from the Tusic building. Kalei knew it because when she was a cop, she had visited the building several times to bust kids who were breaking in to vandalize the place.

Jenna led Kalei into a narrow service tunnel as she asked, "Untouched kids? What if they show up?"

The shouts of the guards were far behind them now, but the sounds of their boots echoing down the tunnel still put Kalei on edge. "They won't. They haven't gone back since one of them was turned Estranged there."

Jenna nodded and stopped to climb a ladder. Unlike the ladder in the sewers, this one was clean and dry. Kalei appreciated the minor luxury.

They emerged in an empty alley, the sky above them still dark and shining with the few stars they could see from the city. Kalei suddenly realized how conspicuous they looked in their halter-tops and short-shorts, but decided that no one would look twice at a couple of prostitutes slinking around the city at night. She helped Jenna replace the manhole cover, and the two women disappeared into the streets.