Mindless

Chapter Three - 046

 Standing. Why would I even think about something like that? The probability that I would be terminated is high. Very high. The girl who said that was probably terminated. At the very least is waiting to be terminated.

As the lights dim to darkness, closing out the most exciting day of my life, the first time I have ever seen anything abnormal besides purples, I find that I can't sleep. So I put my uniform back on and train. Push-ups. A lot of push-ups. There isn't really any equipment here for anything else. And I haven't had a chance to go to training this Seventh. I had education.

Once I hit the 200 mark, I decide to stop and try to sleep again. Except as I stand up, I see a pair of bright silver eyes peek out at me from inside my air vent. I jump almost two feet in the air, and then back slowly away from the air vent.

Silently, ten gloved fingers reach in between the white, decagonal holes of the grate and dislodge it, then pull it inwards. A small, hooded figure jumps out of the vent. Can't be taller than five two. As the person steps out of the shadows, I notice it's a girl. The hair is too long to be that of a boy-- it covers half of her face in an almost deliberate way, as if she put it there herself.

But still, in my room. Illegal. Abnormal action. I should be running over to the small silver assistance button hidden behind my drawers, but she sees my eyes dart in that direction and starts speaking.

"I'm not here to hurt you, ok? I'm here to help... er- I need your help."

She has a strange voice. Like nothing I've heard before. Not human. Abnormal. I should press that button. She's too small to stop me-- five foot two on close to six four. She can try. Her chances of success are low.

But something in her eyes stops me. They remind me of something... of the eyes of the girl who spoke. They had that same look, something that I can't interpret but somehow understand all the same. Silver, green, shining with something nobody here knows.

"Help with what?"

"You were there, at lunch. You're the gray that stood up," she says, phrasing it like a question. Her voice goes up, at the end of the sentence. "Yes," I reply, somehow knowing that she will see it if I lie.

"Do you have access to the purple wing of this building?"

"Yes."

"Are there normally guards there this late?"

"Yeah. Purples can't be left alone." She winces as I say it, as if that statement hurt her.

"Do you have access to a weapon of some sort?"

"No."

"Could you take on other guards bare-handed if necessary?" She asks. The probability of this conversation ending well for me is not high.

"Yes."

"Good, if it comes to that," she mutters to herself. Then, to me, "How many at once?"

That one, I don't know. I'd have to guess maybe two, three at best. I tell her that and she winces again. "Really? Only two?"

And we talk. And I know that this is going to get me terminated in the end. But when we make a plan to take the girl who spoke out of termination waiting, and then leave this base, for some reason I go along with her.

Although I am a little shocked when she just climbs into the air vent with no warning. "What are you waiting for, a direct order? Get up here, soldier," she says. Some strange sensation rises up in me. I really, really want to slap her right across that out-of-line face of hers. She doesn't give me orders. Until she is issued to a job, I rank higher than her. I slowly shove that impulse down and then follow her lead, just as the pair of silver eyes disappears into the darkness.

"Come on, hurry. If she's terminated before we get there, we're going to be purples or worse. Let's go." I try to hurry, I really do, but this girl is small. I am not. These air vents may be a great place for her to sneak around unnoticed, but me? I wasn't even sure I would be able to pull of a tight army crawl, whereas she has about three inches of space on either side of her. I would just crawl, but she also does it army-style, maybe out of habit and maybe to prove a point.

I just try to keep up, pondering what kind of madness I was going through. I'm going to end up a purple or terminated. I can't trust someone I don't even know. But... if there is an innocent life in danger...

At this point, I choose to shut down my brain. MoonBase 001 would never terminate someone without good cause. That girl thought differently. Is that a crime enough to be terminated? Transferred to purple, maybe, but terminated?

Oh. Well, so much for shutting my brain down.

"Almost there, just one more..." I don't hear the rest of what she says, because there is a five story fall before us, the ventilation system opening into what appears to be a massive fan.

The girl jumps, sliding her hand against the wall as she goes. Five stories, like it's no big deal. Ok, so maybe I couldn't have fought her back in my living quarters. She lands gracefully on a huge, spinning blade of the fan, pulls something out of her glove, and presses it to the blade. Somehow, she's still on the fan, rather than being flung into a wall and cut into a million pieces. I realize about thirty seconds later that her boots are magnetized.

As she presses the shining silver thing into the blade, the fan stops, little blue electricity bolts running through it. She then, balancing on the end of one blade, messes with a panel on the wall until a large metal ladder slides out of the wall to where I am. I climb down it.

And here I thought I was a good soldier. I should've jumped. We can't waste time.

I follow the girl down another air vent, this one able to be walked at a low crouch for her. I still have to crawl, but not army-style this time. She suddenly stops and looks down. And I peek past her to see that we're right outside the elevator for the purple's guards.

"You came from this elevator, and you're on duty. When they turn their backs, knock them unconscious and unlock 022's cell. Then follow these. I'll meet you at the shuttle bay." She hands me a small tangiscreen with a map on it, a little red dot marking where we are, followed by a red dotted line tracking through the vents to another red dot.

"And what are you doing this whole time?" I ask. "You'll know when you get here," she says, touching the tip of her finger to the second red dot, our destination. "Now go."

With that, she disappears back into the darkness, a little flash of bright silver eyes the last I see of her.

I really want to slap her.