OGENUS EARTH 🌎 🌊 {Dystopian Sci-Fi Adventure}

Pacific

"Looks like we lost them...for now." Harrison's chest heaved with relief as he delivered this news.

"For now?" Arturo scrutinized their surroundings, everything was in disarray as if a tornado had come through the tiny space.

"Well, I didn't exactly make any new friends with that little maneuver." Harrison chuckled darkly to himself. 

It wasn't just his balls that Chantilly would be looking to cut off now, she might just take his head.

"Who were those people?" Olivia wondered as she staggered about looking for who knows what.

"People you don't want to piss off." Big Joe supplied, puffing his cheeks out at the thought.

"I think she means, where did those people come from? None of the Arcs have a ship that size or make if I recall." Arturo supplied, prompting Harrison to answer the true mystery here. "I think you called them pirates?"

"Those are real pirates," Harrison told them, his eyes resting on Arturo with a hint of accusation. "Your precious Arcs saved only the best and the brightest minds for survival, but you forgot about the people out there with the strongest spirit. The men and women that you abandoned for dead, you know, the people you deemed not genetically evolved enough to live?"

Meg snorted from her seat at the table, making everyone turn in surprise. She had a knowing smile on her lips but offered no further explanation for her outburst.

"A few were able to replicate your tech enough to build sustainable underwater ecosystems." Harrison continued. "Never underestimate those on the bottom rung of society, they're the ones who are determined to survive, because no one else will."

Arturo was well aware of the other humans roaming the seas, but the citizens on the Arcs were mostly kept from this information. 

"And how do you know this, Chantilly?" Olivia asked, disapproval lacing the question.

"In the biblical sense if that's what you're asking." Harrison snapped, not amused that they didn't seem to grasp what he was telling them. "The Arc Cities sea fleet may have to answer to you when they come and go, but out here, whoever has the fastest ship and the most firepower wins, and Chantilly commands one of the biggest ships in these waters."

The group fell silent, taking this all in.

"So, what you're saying is, we're not alone out here?" Midge whispered.

"Your own eyes and ears confirmed it," Harrison said, then, thought better. "No Offense." He threw the comment to Meg feeling like a complete ass.

"None taken." She replied in her unaffected tone, keeping her injured arm fixed to her bruised waist. The pain wasn't subsiding and she was afraid that she might have suffered a cracked rib (or two) when she was dangling from the improvised ceiling.

"We need to clean this place up," Midge observed, not exactly sure what to do with the pirate news.

Yes, millions of people were left behind when the Arc Cities launched, but how many could have possibly survived the relentlessly savage warfare? And what sort of technology did they have at their disposal? Perhaps the Arc City Spheres were not as well protected as they thought.

"Big Joe and I need to remain at the controls, for now, so do what you need to do," Harrison smirked, gleeful that he had a crew to boss around for stuff like this.

Midge sprang into action but thought the better of it when her sore body protested the sudden movement.

"Perhaps they should lie down." Big Joe chuckled, hefting out of his seat to offer his arm in a chivalrous gesture to Midge. "They've had a big time, and I think we may need to have someone on concussion watch."