ok well here it is, just as a warning there is some language in here, but it is needed for character deffinition, not to mention the stiuations wouldnt have the same effect without it...

chaper six

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Colonel Jonathan McDaniels strode down the dark steel corridor briskly. The man who knew of the Duke’s involvement in arming his troops had finally been caught. Now his plan would be able to go along unhindered, once this variable was dealt with.

He walked into the room and nodded to the guards standing behind the captive. They saluted.

“He hasn’t moved for hours sir, not after the brief time he woke before screaming and falling unconscious again.”

“Thank you sergeant,” the colonel replied as he switched on the interrogation light. When the man didn’t stir he picked up a bucket of water in the corner and threw it over the captive.

“Wake up you piece of sh*t” he shouted.

The man stirred and looked u into the light before turning away in agony.

“If he wont willingly look at the light force him too” the colonel snarled at one of the guards who forced the man’s head up and lashed it to the chair.

“I’m going to ask you a series of questions Mr. West, and I expect you to answer them.”

The man just sat there, dazed.

The colonel walked over to the prisoner and looked down at his face.

“I don’t think this man is in any condition to be interrogated sir,” the sergeant informed him.

“Quiet! I will be the one who decided that!” McDaniels yelled, punching the man in the stomach. The man convulsed like he was going to throw up.

Suddenly the man opened his eyes, a smirk on his face.

“There, see he…” the colonel stopped as the man slumped limply. He was unconscious again. His nose flared, the interrogator was obviously frustrated, “take him to the infirmary, make sure he survives. Idiot mercenaries can’t understand simple commands.” He walked out of the room

A BAF defector; Jonathon McDaniels left his post to become part of the Black Sunday Crime Syndicate, the most powerful and secretive criminal organization in Bretonia. They controlled all molly activity and a surprising amount of corsair and outcast activity in this part of the sector, as well as a variety of other smaller criminal organizations. Colonel McDaniels was infamous in BAF hierarchy, as he managed to commandeer his ship, the HMS Furious along with her escort and vanish with out a trace. No one knows what happened to his crew, whether they were all so loyal that they went with him, or whether they were all murdered. He had an impressive record as an officer, Second in his class at the academy, rising through the ranks faster than most to reach his final rank by the age of thirty-seven. The loss of three bretonian battleships, two cruisers, eight gunships, and a full contingent of fighters to a defecting officer would have been humiliating and scarring for the BAF and the High Command changed the logs to show that it had been lost in a raid by pirates.

Of course that wasn’t that far from the truth. The Colonel had been sent to explore a disturbance in the Tau-Thirty-one system, and upon arrival released an airborne neuro-virus through the air systems of all the ships. He had done so from his ready room aboard the HMS Furious with a simple push of a button. Canisters in all thirteen ships released the extremely potent, but short-lived virus in clouds through every cubic inch of the ships while he sat in his ready room, safely encased in a vac-suit. After five minutes he checked the ship’s computer and to his satisfaction there were no life signs on any of the vessels. The thirteen BAF warships sat dead in space, except for a single occupant. Kilometers away a flight group of twenty armored transports received a weak signal containing a simple message, “It’s done.”

Since then the BSCS had developed a sizable presence in the Edinburgh system. Relatively unpopulated and remote, the only thing most people cared about there was the presence of the Luxury Liner Shetland, which in most people’s opinions wasn’t luxurious at all. Bretonians were sick of hearing about Gaian attacks on Planetform operations and so they ignored most of the news that came out of the system. The system was dying, and that made it a perfect place for the BSCS to set up shop. Parked here, completely unnoticed, the fleet had undergone some refits to bring them to BSCS specifications. A large installation had also appeared in the system, complete with a full naval construction yard; all of this hidden within the gravity wells of the twin blue stars.

Another thing the people of Bretonia had failed to notice was the hundreds of millions of credits that had left the Duke of Edinburgh’s bank accounts. But it would only be a matter of time before they found out where it had ended up.

---------

Dylan woke to find himself bound to a chair in a dark room. The cool air of the room soon overcame him and he began to shiver. He had no idea how long it was since those bruits had attacked him but judging from how hungry and thirsty he was he surmised it had been a while. He then noticed his throbbing head. The burn of his injuries on top of his dehydration made his vision blur. With all of this he failed to notice his other broken bones until he shifted to check his bindings. Dylan screamed out in pain as his broken bones and other injuries overwhelmed him. Everything went black.

“WAKE UP YOU SORRY PIECE OF SH*T”

Dylan felt a coolness envelop him as someone in the shadows threw a bucket of cold water in his face. He opened his eyes in shock only to be blinded by a powerful bright light shining right at him. He groaned in agony, closing his eyes turning his head away from the light. Suddenly he felt pressure on his head as someone’s hands turned his face back towards the light, and then he felt a rough fabric become tight across his head as another person tied his head in place. The whole time someone had been barking words at him, but his spinning head prevented him from hearing anything more than throbs. He felt someone strike his stomach and he dry-heaved, his stomach empty from the days of starvation. He felt water running down his face, dripping from his hair. He opened his mouth and it dripped in. it tasted like blood, sweat, and dirt. He didn’t care; it was water. He opened his eyes and watched the white light turn into a swirl of color before falling unconscious again.

When Dylan finally came out of his coma three weeks later he found himself in a medical bed, his entire body in traction. His head was still swimming, but he felt better. He struggled to open his eyes but stopped once he heard a voice, a female voice.

“Its remarkable he is recovering after the way those mercenaries treated him.” She said to an unknown person.

“Well he’s no good to us dead, when he wakes up I want to know immediately” replied a man with deep commanding voice.

“Of course colonel,” the female responded.

Dylan remembered that night in the park, that one fateful night. Whatever happened to her? That amazing young woman who had stolen his heart that night. All those months, maybe even years since then, what had come of her? She was probably happily dating, engaged, married perhaps; such an awesome person didn’t remain available for long. Whatever the case may be; she was light years from this hell he was in. When he first heard the doctor’s voice he had thought that maybe, just maybe he had gotten away from that pain, that suffering that was so vivid in his mind; that torment that had replayed over and over in his head, leaving his mind screaming and his body motionless. Alas, it was not to be. Thinking about woman in the park had made his heart rate quicken, which of course drew the attention of the doctor.

“Sir just relax, I’m sure you’re confused as to where you are and what has happened, you should be thankful you aren’t dead after what they did to you.” The lady said soothingly.

“Let me guess, I haven’t left that place?” Dylan retorted dryly.

“Well, in a way. You are in the same facility, but I wouldn’t consider this room the same as the one you woke up in originally.”

“And what is such a kind person such as yourself doing in such an establishment?” the patient asked in a scathing tone.

“Look,” she replied, “I don’t know what it is you know, or what you did, but I believe in their cause, they are trying to do a good thing.”

“That’s hard to believe.” Dylan replied, wincing in pain, “but you know what they say about one man’s freedom fighter.”

“Just lie their Mr. West, the colonel will be in shortly.”

“Think he’ll bring me flowers and a ‘get well soon’ card?”

“I doubt it some how,” the doctor said as she disappeared out of the room.

Shortly after she left a tall man in a long black coat strode into the room. He had wide shoulders and the coat failed to hide his large arms and torso. His head was bald and lips were wrapped around a large cigar.

Dylan laughed, “You have got to be kidding me” he managed to get out before wincing in pain.

“What the hell do you think you’re laughing at sh*t stain,” the colonel growled.

“Just that you’re the epitome of a ‘big bad guy’ that’s all. You look like you’re right out of a novel or something.”

The colonel walked up to him without saying a word before extinguishing his cigar in the sensitive skin where Dylan’s hip met his abdomen. Dylan clenched his teeth and eyelids together as the man slowly turned the cigar, burying its ashes into the burnt flesh. The colonel smirked.

“You have some information that I want. The colonel snarled at him.

“Sir, I honestly have no idea what you are talking about.”

The colonel cut the string holding the weight used to keep Dylan’s left leg up. His leg slammed down onto the bed. The captive groaned through his teeth.

“I’ll ask you again, you have information I want.”

“Sir, I mean no disrespect,” Dylan begged. “I apologize for my earlier comment, but before I can tell you what you need to know you need to be more specific about what you want.”

“Two years ago you were at waterloo, you overheard certain information there, what do you know, and who did you tell?”

“What, you mean how the Duke of Edinburgh is involved in illegal arms shipments? I told no one, that information ruined me, for no reason. Yeah, I heard it, but what could I have possibly done with it? Sold it to a newspaper? Like they would believe that. Yeah I could probably get some credits from a tabloid, but who believes that crap. I mean that story they ran about aliens with little blue ships invading Sirius, taking over Government officials? What kind of crap is that?”

The colonel laughed. There was a long pause before he spoke again. “Well this has been an unfortunate series of circumstances hasn’t it Mr. West?”

“That’s the biggest f***ing understatement of the year” Dylan snapped.

The colonel didn’t say a word; he just turned around and walked out of the room.

“What happens to me now? Dylan shouted at him.

“Get rid of him,” he overheard the officer mutter to a guard as he left.

Ok so this, in my opinion, is the worst chapter I think I have ever posted... poorly written and thought out... I should change it, but I don't know what I'd replace it with so Its going in so I can move on......

Chapter 7

It was weeks before Dylan could walk again. Left for dead by most on the station, the one doctor who had aided him originally brought him food every so often, but soon she forgot about him as well. He spent most of his time sitting in the dark, cold and extraordinarily hungry. After being interrogated by the Colonel Dylan had been moved to a slightly less hospitable environment in the deep forgotten sections of the station. Mechanics coming to fix the power plant or other faulty systems were his most common visitors, often slipping him some bread or anything else left over from their lunch. Left down there in an alcove, it didn’t matter there wasn’t a door between him and hallways to the vital systems. He had been taken straight from the infirmary to here, casts and all, and now, even though he had healed he still couldn’t move, left in his own filth. He had tried walking once, and only once, failing miserably. Without being able to bend his knees and having limited mobility in his hips, Dylan looked more like a penguin than a man when he tried to walk. Soon after he started he lost his balance and plummeted to the floor with out being able to prevent it. His arms were still in casts attached to his torso, holding his arms straight out. He couldn’t bend his elbows to absorb the fall and as a result most of the force went to his shoulders.

Dylan’s screams of pain echoed throughout the chasms of the station. His only reply was the quiet reverberation of his own anguish.

Finally a man came down to work on some plumbing. He was an old and getting past his prime, his eyes sank, and his beard covered the rest of his sad face. It was obvious he had seen a lot, and Dylan was sure most of it wasn’t pleasant. The man was small, not short, just small. His arms hung limply by his sides when he wasn’t doing anything, anything more would be exerting too much effort. Everything about him looked worn out, his jumpsuit, his toolbox, his body; it all looked over worked and over used. His skin was surprisingly dark, and he was dirty. If it wasn’t for Dylan’s current condition, he may have pitied this man.

Dylan didn’t know how long he had been in this dungeon, but he knew it had been a while. The man had large bolt cutters with him and after hearing Dylan’s story was kind enough to cut him out of the casts, now black with filth. When they came off Dylan found his legs and arms debilitated and boiled. Weeks, maybe even months in the casts had caused his muscles to deteriorate, and his limbs were covered in infected boils, purple and black, oozing with a foul liquid. His body had consumed all fat and most of the unused muscle on his body, and he could barely move his limbs by the time the plumber had found him. His face sagged and his facial hair was patchy at best, his body lacking the nutrition to grow anything more.

“How in hell have you survived in this place?” the plumber asked after he got the delirious man out of his casts.

“I’m, uhh, I got mem’ries, good mem’ries, mem’ries of b… better times.” Dylan replied, struggling to speak, his eyes glazed.

“Damn kid, it’s a damn shame you got tied up in all this. You seem like a nice kid who got dealt a bad hand, a really bad hand. Look, I’m gunna see if I can get you some more food down here and maybe some medical stuff to dress those boils. Maybe, just maybe I’ll be able to get you out of this place and you can attempt to go back to your life.”

“Why are you doing this for me?” the dying man managed to get out, softly.

“Because it’s something I can do, something that has some meaning.” The man paused; he was getting emotional. “I know stuff happens here the most of us don’t hear about. While the cause is good, some of the methods employed are anything but. This is my chance to right a wrong. A guy like me doesn’t get those opportunities much. You’re young; you have the potential to do great things. Look at me I’m old, worn out and just about used up. Soon I’ll be no use to anyone. All I can remember doing is fixing crap in some sh*t hole no one else wants to go into. You deserve better than this, anyone deserves better. ”

With that the man left.

It felt like days before the man returned. With no concept of time, no windows, no clocks, hours felt like days, days like months. Dylan was so bored, so hungry, so lonely, so cold, and even colder now he didn’t have the casts as insulation.

The plumber brought food and clothing for Dylan. Even though they were old, the clothes were clean, and they were a godsend after the tattered rags Dylan had been wearing for however long it had been. The food was good too. Dylan felt a surge of strength just looking at it, and he began to tear through it like an animal before the kind man warned him not to eat so fast. The shock on his body could do more damage than good. His mouth salivated as he smelt the sweet aromas and tasted the food, such a feast.

In reality it wasn’t much. The food was far from sweet. It was comprised of mostly hard bread softened in questionable water and synthe paste that was starting to go stale. Synthe paste was never supposed to go stale. Perhaps it was Dylan’s delirium, but this would turn out to be the best meal Dylan would ever eat.

When he finished he smiled. The food was good.

This ritual continued for a week and Dylan gain strength quickly. Finally something changed.

“I’m going to check and see if any transports are leaving soon, maybe I can help sneak you onto a train or something” the old man mentioned to Dylan.

“Are you sure you don’t want to come too?”

“Kid I’ll only slow you down, and anyway, if I go missing they’ll just come after you again.”

“Thank you sir, I wish I had some way to repay your kindness.”

“You can kid, do something great. Don’t do a half-assed job at anything, be proud of what you do and don’t end up like me.”

There was an awkward pause.

“Enough of this sentimental crap” the old man said loudly as he got up. “Have to get you out of here first don’t I? I’m going to check the Transport logs tonight, hopefully there’s something, do you care where you end up?”

“Just somewhere with solid ground and breathable air”

Likey. Likey very much.

Keep up the good work.

---Revenge is a dish that is best served cold...

Whee! update. Tis good

alright everyone, I' finally got my act together and finished the update thats been sitting on my computer for weeks. hope you like it....

-----------


It was weeks before Dylan could walk again. Left for dead by most on the station, the one doctor who had aided him originally brought him food every so often, but soon she forgot about him as well. He spent most of his time sitting in the dark, cold and extraordinarily hungry. After being interrogated by the Colonel Dylan had been moved to a slightly less hospitable environment in the deep forgotten sections of the station. Mechanics coming to fix the power plant or other faulty systems were his most common visitors, often slipping him some bread or anything else left over from their lunch. Left down there in an alcove, it didn’t matter there wasn’t a door between him and hallways to the vital systems. He had been taken straight from the infirmary to here, casts and all, and now, even though he had healed he still couldn’t move, left in his own filth. He had tried walking once, and only once, failing miserably. Without being able to bend his knees and having limited mobility in his hips, Dylan looked more like a penguin than a man when he tried to walk. Soon after he started he lost his balance and plummeted to the floor with out being able to prevent it. His arms were still in casts attached to his torso, holding his arms straight out. He couldn’t bend his elbows to absorb the fall and as a result most of the force went to his shoulders.

Dylan’s screams of pain echoed throughout the chasms of the station. His only reply was the quiet reverberation of his own anguish.

Finally a man came down to work on some plumbing. He was an old and getting past his prime, his eyes sank, and his beard covered the rest of his sad face. It was obvious he had seen a lot, and Dylan was sure most of it wasn’t pleasant. The man was small, not short, just small. His arms hung limply by his sides when he wasn’t doing anything, anything more would be exerting too much effort. Everything about him looked worn out, his jumpsuit, his toolbox, his body; it all looked over worked and over used. His skin was surprisingly dark, and he was dirty. If it wasn’t for Dylan’s current condition, he may have pitied this man.

Dylan didn’t know how long he had been in this dungeon, but he knew it had been a while. The man had large bolt cutters with him and after hearing Dylan’s story was kind enough to cut him out of the casts, now black with filth. When they came off Dylan found his legs and arms debilitated and boiled. Weeks, maybe even months in the casts had caused his muscles to deteriorate, and his limbs were covered in infected boils, purple and black, oozing with a foul liquid. His body had consumed all fat and most of the unused muscle on his body, and he could barely move his limbs by the time the plumber had found him. His face sagged and his facial hair was patchy at best, his body lacking the nutrition to grow anything more.

“How in hell have you survived in this place?” the plumber asked after he got the delirious man out of his casts.

“I’m, uhh, I got mem’ries, good mem’ries, mem’ries of b… better times.” Dylan replied, struggling to speak, his eyes glazed.

“Damn kid, it’s a damn shame you got tied up in all this. You seem like a nice kid who got dealt a bad hand, a really bad hand. Look, I’m gunna see if I can get you some more food down here and maybe some medical stuff to dress those boils. Maybe, just maybe I’ll be able to get you out of this place and you can attempt to go back to your life.”

“Why are you doing this for me?” the dying man managed to get out, softly.

“Because it’s something I can do, something that has some meaning.” The man paused; he was getting emotional. “I know stuff happens here the most of us don’t hear about. While the cause is good, some of the methods employed are anything but. This is my chance to right a wrong. A guy like me doesn’t get those opportunities much. You’re young; you have the potential to do great things. Look at me I’m old, worn out and just about used up. Soon I’ll be no use to anyone. All I can remember doing is fixing crap in some sh*t hole no one else wants to go into. You deserve better than this, anyone deserves better. ”

With that the man left.

It felt like days before the man returned. With no concept of time: no windows, no clocks, hours felt like days, days like months. Dylan was so bored, so hungry, so lonely, so cold, and even colder now he didn’t have the casts as insulation.

The plumber brought food and clothing for Dylan. Even though they were old, the clothes were clean, and they were a godsend after the tattered rags Dylan had been wearing for however long it had been. The food was good too. Dylan felt a surge of strength just looking at it, and he began to tear through it like an animal before the kind man warned him not to eat so fast. The shock on his body could do more damage than good. His mouth salivated as he smelt the sweet aromas and tasted the food, such a feast.

In reality it wasn’t much. The food was far from sweet. It was comprised of mostly hard bread softened in questionable water and synthe paste that was starting to go stale. Synthe paste was never supposed to go stale. Perhaps it was Dylan’s delirium, but this would turn out to be the best meal Dylan would ever eat.

When he finished he smiled. The food was good.

This ritual continued for a week and Dylan gain strength quickly. Finally something changed.

“I’m going to check and see if any transports are leaving soon, maybe I can help sneak you onto a train or something” the old man mentioned to Dylan.

“Are you sure you don’t want to come too?”

“Kid I’ll only slow you down, and anyway, if I go missing they’ll just come after you again.”

“Thank you sir, I wish I had some way to repay your kindness.”

“You can kid, do something great. Don’t do a half-assed job at anything, be proud of what you do and don’t end up like me.”

There was an awkward pause.

“Enough of this sentimental crap” the old man said loudly as he got up. “Have to get you out of here first don’t I? I’m going to check the Transport logs tonight, hopefully there’s something, do you care where you end up?”

“Just somewhere with solid ground and breathable air”

-------



After what felt like a millennia the man finally returned. Dylan’s heart was in his throat and he could feel the adrenaline surging through his body, this was it.

“Alright I’m going to have to take you the back way, hope you don’t mind getting dirty,” he said, sounding rushed.

“Me? Dirty? You do remember what I looked like a few weeks ago right?”

The man laughed. “Alright lets go.”

They walked deeper into the depths of the station avoiding piles of trash and junk, climbing over what they couldn’t circumvent. The lights were so encrusted in filth Dylan could barely see.

“Where are we going, isn’t this the wrong way?”

The man laughed, “No, we’re almost to the main air cleaning center.”

“You mean to say the system to clean the air in this place is amongst all this filth. Isn’t that a little bazaar and absurd?”

“Well as you’ve probably figured out these people are a little bazaar and absurd.”

Dylan followed the man to a panel on the large air duct that circulated air around the base. Checking his watch quickly he turned to Gabriel.
“In 2 minutes the fan will shut down while the computer analyses the air quality. This pipe comes directly from the hanger and is the best way you can get to a transport. This pipe is part of a system meant to move fifteen cubic meters a second through that hanger, and it will only be shut down for a minute and a half. You have to get up this pipe and down another before the fan restarts. The entire trip is about two hundred meters, and if you don’t manage to get to the other end I can assure you that you will be back here passing through that fan within seconds of realizing the fan has switched on.”

“You aren’t coming too?” Gabriel inquired.

“Ha, you kidding me? I could never move fast enough to get to the other end in time.”

Some friends of mine have disabled the security systems in the duct, and there should be a rope in there to help you get up the seventy-five meter shaft to the hanger level. Don’t worry the shaft doesn’t fork, it leads straight to the hanger.”

“And if there is no rope?”

“Well you’ll have plenty of time to get back here before the fan restarts.”

He checked his watch again, “alright its almost time, I guess this is good bye and good luck.”

“Thanks for everything, I wish there was some way to repay you.”

“Kid I don’t need anything.”

“Hey, I don’t even know your name,” Dylan suddenly realized.

The drone of the fan stopped.

Flinging the panel open the man said, “That’s unimportant, now go!”

Dylan ran as fast as he could down the pipe, turning briefly as he heard the hatch slam shut. It was then he saw the fan; each blade the size of a person, he started running faster. Within twenty meters he got to a rope suspended from above. The climb was straight up. He paused in awe looking up the three meter diameter tube before realizing time was of the essence and began climbing. The exhausting climb seemed to last forever. “There must have been an easier way to do this,” he thought. Finally he got to the top, there couldn’t be much more time left. He started running down the tunnel. From behind him he heard the whine of the fan’s engine; it was restarting. In front of him he could see a grate. He sprinted as fast as he could, his feet were numb, his legs were screaming, his head pounded. He felt like his lungs were going to burst, but the fan was getting ever louder, the air started to rush past him, faster, faster, much faster than he was running. The gray walls of the metallic pipe were rushing past him. Dylan felt himself slowing; he was so close to the grate, only five more meters. He held back a scream as he took a few more steps and leaped for the grate. He prayed it was open. He hit it with a bone jarring force and it flew open.

Dylan felt himself falling.

--------

alright, so I know it's a cliff hanger, this will get anyone who reads this an opertunity to bug me to continue it =P Will Dylan die? will he get recaptured? will he make it out of the station? hopefully you'll find out before another month passes =P

alright, so this is really short, but I havnt updated in a really long time, so I thought i should before this became just a distant memory. as always criticism is always accepted, Im sure theres a few mistakes I'll need to fix, its late....

anyway, sorry about the wait

-------------------------------

chapter 9(i think)

Dylan was in the park, that one fateful park. Nothing was different; yet, nothing had stayed the same. The buildings looked familiar, but nothing he had seen before. The constellations, as normal as they appeared, shone with a strange radiance he had never experienced. The grass was soft. Softer than anything he had ever felt. It wasn’t rough, or sharp, it didn’t make him itch and wasn’t damp from the dew that was so common at this time of night. He turned towards that woman, that girl, that person who had never left his side, but she too was different. No longer that person he once knew, a new being, a new presence, a new soul, like nothing he had witnessed before. A person who was an extension of himself. He knew it without really knowing her. He didn’t know her name, where she was from, but he knew she wasn’t out of reach. Perfectly untouchable, but still in his arms. He felt her warmth, her pulse beating against his chest, but there she sat, and arm reach away. Reaching up to slide her soft brown hair out of her eyes, her pale gray eyes, reaching out to hold her, feel her powder soft check, but there was nothing there, nothing at all. For an instant the cold, hard feeling of steel. Dylan was confused.

Dylan’s dream, or whatever it was, was cut short by a sharp pain in his jaw as it met the steel floor of the hanger. His head twisted sideways, his neck baring the force of the fall. The body of the fallen man crumpled into an incoherent heap, barely resembling a human being. Arms and legs twisted to angles even contortionists would be jealous of. Unfortunately for Dylan, he was aware of none of this, for him the world was dark.

Suddenly his mind erupted in a pain he had never felt. He saw a blindingly white light. This wasn’t like the pain you get from walking into the bathroom in the middle of the night and flipping on the light, this pain shot through his optical never like a lightning bolt. His body convulsed violently. His mind however was in a different place. There was nothing: he couldn’t see the park, he couldn’t see the station; his surroundings were blank. He held up his arm and all he saw was empty space. He existed but there was no physical manifestation. He could hear voices, hundreds of them, all talking. Some were exited, others in tears, some screamed, others whimpered. What was this? Where was he? He laughed, and it reverberated, echoing through this space like a scream into a giant chasm. He heard a sound, like a voice, but nothing he had ever heard before. There was a click, like a switch being thrown, and the whiteness vanished as quickly as it appeared.

Dylan found himself staring up at the vaulted ceiling of a hanger bay, his head throbbing, the taste of blood reminded him what just happened. He tried to wiggle his toes, they responded, barely. It was a good sign. As the feeling suddenly rushed back into his body Dylan realized everything hurt. His back felt wet, he prayed it was sweat. His left arm buckled violently as he attempted to push himself up. He yelped in pain before quieting himself.

“Surely someone would have hear me fall,” he thought to himself.

Luckily no one had come to investigate yet. Dylan’s ears were ringing due to the fall, perhaps the room was actually really loud due to the commotion of loading a cargo train, and the machinery and engines had drowned the sound his fall.

“Maybe this wasn’t suck a good idea after all,” he mused, “I was doing better in the garbage chute.”

Dylan rolled over and used his right arm to push himself to his knees. A dark red stain outlined where his torso had been lying, the diamonds of the textured plating glimmered dimly through the pool of blood.

“I’m never going to get off of this god-forsaken hell-hole,” he grumbled.

He stood up, carefully. His knees complained, but held. Using the crates as hand holds he slowly made his way to the end of the aisle of containers. He looked into the open part of the bay where the train was; there wasn’t a human in sight. Heavy lift robots were loading the train, not even a janitor was around. Dylan limped over to the train; the door to the crew quarters had been left open by whoever was the last to leave. The battered young man clambered onto the ship, knowing full well that there could be someone on board. He didn’t care; it was worth the risk to get off this place, how much worse could dying be anyway?

yeeesh. nasty

You know its monday when your handgun backfires into your face