Safe and Helpful

Chapter Two: Crash Site

Ethan's POV

I was burned.

Of course I was burned. Everything around me was still smoking, and I had blown a crater about a mile wide into the Earth my father had delicately created. My head pounded, and my body ached. Smoke drifted from the ground, enveloping my surroundings. Smoldering dirt burned my arms. Dust (and who knows what else) clogged my throat and nose.

I didn't move. I just layed down, staring up at the smoky sky. I used to be there, I thought. I used to be better than the filthy lowlife that roams this gift. They ruin it, they destroy it. Why can't we just destroy them? They were failures, a science experiment gone wrong.

Groaning, I pushed myself up and tried to rub the debris off of myself. Wiping the dirt and dust from my face, I looked around. The crater was insanely deep, and I felt like I was stuck in a reverse dome, just a zoo animal cast down and trapped. Some of the sand and dirt and rock had fried so much it had turned to a slick, hot and sludgy glass. I saw shriveled vines and burnt plants clinging on to the ground. Small sparks and fires were scattered across the crater, ashes floating through the air like dirty snow.

I started crying. I felt ashamed, being seen as just a lowly, stupid human and cast down from heaven without second thought. I walked toward the wall of the crater, trying to climb up. I was still too weak to do much but walk.

A sob escaped my throat. I wanted to throw myself halfway to hell for showing such emotion. I was supposed to be stoic and unnerved, uncaring and powerful. Not some sniveling little human at the bottom of a pit.

You can never be great, can you?

I sat down, hugging my knees to my chest. I was stupid. So, so, so stupid. I should've never opened my mouth. I was supposed to be this machine, this rule-abiding and obedient machine that just followed orders and didn't think twice. Now I was broken, broken down to this useless human body with... emotions.

I hated it. I hated me.

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