Prolouge: Heartbeat

232 12 5
                                    

Warning: Swearing in this story will not be censored.
Updates may be slow
--------------------~*~--------------------

The amber glow flickered, blinding as his eyelids began lifting to release him from darkness. Close to the moment he opened his eyes, he forced them to shut once more from the seething pain dripping into his orbs. Past the insufferable buzzing, a loud rhythm replayed on loop in his ears.

Bum, Bum, Bum...

A heartbeat. He was alive.

A soft groan escaped passed the mans lips once noticing a painful throbbing that convulsed from his head down across his limbs. The back of his head was wet and stuck to the floor, the red of which he could hardly see in front of his blurred vision mixed with another liquid substance. The liquids clashed, creating swirls like a mesmerizing piece of abstract art.

It was warm. No, it was much worse than that. It was scorching. It was only then that he recognized the pops of exploding cylinders and crashes of burning objects giving way to the flames. The ache in his head was not enough to drown the ache in his chest caused by the heart pounding against his rib cage. However, the stinging across the rest of his body did the trick.

His fingers wiggled and twitched as they regained feeling, struggling to roll over and hoist himself up to his knees. The first few times he had slipped on the liquid that had pooled beneath him, hitting the ground before eventually managing to maintain stable leverage. It didn't help that he couldn't see.

His hands were soaked, making it impossible to wipe away the substance covering his eyelids, preventing him from opening his eyes for more than a few seconds. The heavy drops fell from his lashes.

"Where are they?" The screams had long since faded, and for that he did not know rather to be frightened or grateful.

"Ferox?" His quiet voice shook before coughing heavily as the smoke in the air entered into his lungs.

Forcing his eyes to open for as long as he could, the man looked around to search for any signs of life. The tips of his fingers and palm of his hand instinctively jerked away from the plashet of blood and other liquid chemicals before he forced them back into place. The coat he wore was no longer white, now stained in streaks of red and ripped or burnt at every inch. The different aromas of metal, smoke and blood clashed in his nostrils, close to triggering his gag reflex.

He wanted to look for bodies but he knew his eyesight would not last. Aside from that, he was not sure if he wanted to know what comrades had died in the attack, if any. The inhuman shrieks grew louder as his hearing slowly recovered.

"It hurts."

He took a chance at glancing to the containment tubes, glass shattered with flames enveloping the insides. The bodies of subjects previously stored within the containments laid in the flammable liquid, flesh of artificial bodies burning. They were never alive to begin with anyway...

A blur of white and orange laying upon the floor was all he needed for a sliver of comfort before crawling toward the mass.

"Please...please don't be dead."

The man on the floor groaned, ginger hair made darker from thick blood. His wild blue eyes fluttered open, muttering his friends name in a shallow breath. He groaned as the other assisted in lifting him up, assuring the ginger that he was okay and that they would escape from the flames before the ceiling had an opportunity to collapse. However the man had to admit that if he kept his eyes open much longer, the chemicals would make him permanently blind.

Experimental Rebooted (The Haunted FF)Where stories live. Discover now