Glass Worlds

Chapter 5

I trudge out of the surgery room with the half-empty backpack weighing on my shoulder. I feel weightless, in the worst viable way a person could feel weightless. Someone died in my arms. She died in my arms and I just watched her.
Please forgive me, Riss. There wasn't anything I could do.
Her request rung in my ear
I don't what to be remembered
What did you mean, Riss?
I rush back into the prison quarters, as fast as one can, running with a hastily stitched hip throbbing at their side, anyway.
"Christina's locket is still outside. Must -argh- get it" I groaned, instinctively clutching at my side, the crutch dropping along the stairs.
"Not now!" I whine, and jump down the stairs, switching the remaining crutch to my other arm and using the railing as a hold.
Now there's not much more distance to cross. Just through the labyrinth of corridors to the change rooms

I quickly snatch my clothes from the cushioned seat, sitting -or rather, collapsing- on them, gasping shallow breaths. I reach out for one of the thinner dresses, and forcefully rip their hem, layering them, spitting on them, then tying them tightly around my waist. I rip out a few more; just in case.
the new pressure soothes the pain eventually, enough for me to put on my clothes again.
Goddamn it! They took my knife, I quickly realize, after reaching out into my jacket's pocket and swarming my fist into nothingness.
I'd put it in the stocking under my dress. I'd go back for my spare in the cell, but the ever-rising anxiety about the locket is proving to be more tempting.
Now that there's less pain when I shift, I can run considerably, or walk without the crutches.
my legs slowly ease back into their natural position. But I'm still skeptical. Is it supposed to work this fast?
The gates are gaping open. Where the doors once were, are now just jagged metal and ashes.
What was the strength of the explosion?
Why was my ship there?
Who launched it?
My heart suddenly sinks as the complete effect finally settles in.
there were 500 people in that building, all innocent children and unsuspecting adults. They're all dead now.
I wonder how much I could've stopped if I'd just sucked up my own desires and just goddamned danced.
The speed of the disease is also shocking. Hours? Is that how long it takes? I've heard of diseases that kill in matter of weeks, but nothing this fast.
The air outside is warm. Hot. Too hot for a winter night.
I spot the rock instantly. florescent colors. typical Riss. I run towards it, lowering onto my good side, and lift up the rock.
Unscathed, my locket was buried under the blackened soil. the opal center of the heart is dull. it's always been dull. knowing Christina, she probably meant something by it. something I still don't understand.
I pull it out and find a small paper with the chain threaded through it.
"Callista. go towards North. The rebel camps will let you in. I assure you a warm welcome" she'd scribbled hastily. I smile, for no real reason. It's not like I'm smiling at Riss. She's dead. I'm not smiling for myself because I'm free. I'm lost.

the sky darkens again, with more radioactive clouds. I remember when they'd made us go into irradiated rooms; building our endurance against them; genetically modifying us, correcting us so that we're much stronger against 'nature's forces'
I think over what Riss told me again.
"You're immune, Callista"
How'd she known? How'd she manage to survive for longer than everybody else? Maybe she was farther from the explosion site? Maybe she was planning to run away to the rebel camps too.
I begin walking. The northern boarders aren't far away. I know because I've gone there. They couldn't have left already.
The houses and all general signs of civilization begin to taper to a few houses every five hundred steps. i find myself counting, my feet stepping to the rhythm of the water drops in my cell. Not a soul in sight. Not after I'd passed the last hospital, anyway. It was lit from ever possible crevice. The windows gave off enough light against the darkness it could've been considered a second sun.
I sit on a worn-down bench. The pigeons are dead, I quickly assume, because they'd never leave seeds to be left on the ground unclaimed like that.
I go over what I'd bought at the last department store
two and half bottles worth of water left. A foul-tasting painkilling energy drink, just in case. Two pre-made sandwiches, still cold from the refrigerator.
I couldn't' find goat milk or disinfectant. He seemed to have some, but they'd been hastily taken, judging by the mess surrounding where there was an empty slot in the wall with 'isopropyl alcohol" price tag. Some Jack Daniels were also missing. Interesting.
I'd left the nonexistent vendor twenty Notes, and three extra for not bothering me while I shopped. A pathetically empty promise that he'd ever return to the overworld to recollect his money, that he'd use it to feed his kids, that he'd one day grow past a small corner store and into a blissfully successful business. He should be used to it, I think hatefully. Empty promises are everything the government had given him besides a deadly disease.

The wound at my side is raging with ache again, and I look at the fragment of dress I'd wrapped. Its creamy white had turned to a velvety red color. Not necessarily attractive. Just a shade. A shade of red that will soon overcome The Reinstitution.
I reach out for another of the ripped hems, and roll up my shirt enough to not irritate the wound, and hold my side while I unraveled the roll of fabric.
It continues to pulse and throb under my palm as I bite down on one end of the silk and wrap it around my waist.
I tug it tightly, and stand up
I chug a quarter of the energy drink, and wait for the painkilling elements to take occurrence.
Civilization continues to disappear behind me, and now it's just roads among roads of emptiness and Deja-vu in reverse, except for the asphalt. or ash. Whichever it is. It continues to stretch
I notice a dried-up-stream-like indentation in the distance, and I quickly realize what it is. I recognize this place. I recognized the dead bushes. It's a memory.
This is where I hid my ship
this is where they dragged it out to the front of the plants.
I begin to ponder on the thought of how fast it would've taken me to reach the northern boarders using my ship, instead of what I'm doing now.
There should be self-automated train leaving a few minutes from now, so I pick up my pace.

I'm hugging Mum and Christina, while Dad and a nine year old Jonathan play basketball.
"With your wrist!" he guides, while carrying him over his shoulders. then Christina is looking at me, her eyes glinting with the vague emotion.
"Iridescent lights in crystal worlds. like fireflies under the night's sky" she says, before pulling me forwards. I trip, and I'm falling
My eyes rip open, and I quickly catch myself against the back of the seating front of mine. They're still gone. My chest stings, and I fight to draw a proper deep breath that isn't stained with the preface to a sob. I'm at the northern boarders.
I haul the backpack over my shoulder, and trudge to the front of the trailer. My side doesn't hesitate to send a pulsing pain through the rest of my body, and I force myself to lower down the steps and onto the asphalt. My foot clings onto the rail tracks, and I almost fall forwards.

Incandescent lamps? I rub my eyes for assurance. I could be hallucinating, but the bright lights are following in a straight path. The asphalt road ends where the lamp stands, replaced instead by gravel. Too realistic and consistent
The camps.
I begin running again my legs and knees are aching, and I could almost sense them collapsing. But every time one leg nears faltering, the other leg had already stepped on the gravel, and I rise again. the sun has begun to rise.
Something's different about these areas, but I'm too tunnel visioned to pin point what exactly is different about my surroundings.