Chapter 2: Chapter 2: Waking Up
He was in darkness.
He blinked his eyes to try and see something, anything. But there was nothing, only darkness. Endless, cold, darkness. He couldn't even see his hands or body it was so dark. Or perhaps he didn't have a body here, he thought.
'So,' he thought to himself, 'is this what death is? Am I dead?'
He stood, sat, layed, crouched there, he couldn't tell, for what felt like an eternity. Waiting. Just waiting for something to happen. For something to shift or change around him. But only the darkness was there to greet him.
But, where was 'there'? Here? He wasn't sure. And after a while he truly began to believe he was actually dead. That was until he sensed something move. He wasn't alone here.
"Hello, who's there? Where am I?", he shouted.
After a long moment of silence he began to think he was just losing it. But then he felt a presence all too familiar and realized exactly where he was. And he froze in place as he felt the presence come closer and closer until it might as well have been breathing down his neck. Shivering he began slowly backing away from where he felt the presence.
In response to his retreat the presence began making a low rumbling noise. It was growling. Only it's source wasn't where he thought it was. Instead it was all around him, almost like it was trying to trap him in place. He began whipping his head back and forth and tried to lock in on it. And then a deep guttural voice spoke from all directions.
"It's time to wake up!". It sounded ancient, feral, powerful, and most of all dangerous.
Hearing it made his stomach sink in an overwhelming despair that made him drop to his knees. The voice invaded his mind and body. Prying him open, exposing him. Involuntarily his head sunk and his chin dropped to his chest. Looking down he could now see his body and hands only they were thickly coated in crimson. Seeing this his mind began racing as the metallic, sweet smell entered his nostrils and filled his lungs making him gag in desperation to expel its scent. But then he tasted blood in his mouth and began vomiting, trying to get the familiar taste out of his mouth. Weakly he looked back up to look at the presence. And as he looked back into the darkness a large glowing red eye was now looking right back into him.
"WAKE UP!!!", the voice ripped into him, causing him to scream out in pain. As tears sprang forth and ran down his face they mixed with the blood.
The voice left him shaking and frozen in place. And as the entity's presence overwhelmed him he found he couldn't breath. He began coughing and gagging in desperation to find air. His lungs started to strain and burn in their thirst for oxygen. White spots danced across his eyes like fireflies in the night sky. As he felt his body begin to slowly shut down his vision darkened and tunneled, focusing onto a single point.
That point turned a crimson ruby color in the center of his vision. Then it started growing bigger and bigger until it enveloped his sight entirely. And quickly it began to grow brighter and brighter, blinding him.
"WAKE UP!!"
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She couldn't believe she was still alive. And with minimal injuries at that. If she worshiped one of the deities she would've been praying to them now, thanking them for her miraculous survival. But right now she had other things to do. Case in point the heavy body of the Landrian soldier on top of her. She knew exactly which one it was from the 2 of them by the bitten in half tongue grotesquely sticking out from his mouth 3 inches away from her face. His face was now a mess of lacerated flesh and exposed bones. His eyes were bulging slightly from his sockets and his pupils were a dead gray. Worst of all though, thick dark blood was slowly dripping from his mouth onto her cheek.
Gagging at the sight, and the smell, she gathered what strength she had left from the crash and started pushing the body off of her. Grunting slightly she was able to push the dead body off of her to the side. Breathing heavily she slowly sat up. Her sore muscles screamed at her but she gritted her teeth and clenched her jaw. Letting out a long breath through her teeth she sat up fully, supporting herself with her hands on the ground behind her. Looking around she blinked, slowly taking in her surroundings and unique situation.
She was still in the bus, or what was left of it. It was currently on its side with broken windows straight above the girl. And to her right there was a giant hole in place of the windows and seats that should have been there and replacing them was a dirt ground. And the windows above her had beams of sunlight coming through. Had the circumstances been different she would have thought it looked beautiful. With the beams of warm yellow light contrasting against the dull gray interior of the bus. And the red splatters of blood glinting off of it. But, this wasn't that kind of circumstance. Instead it was the kind of circumstance that caused the girl to nearly gag again when she saw the pieces of gore and flesh stuck to the bus's floor and walls.
Forcing her attention to her own well being she took notice of the immense soreness all across her body. Feeling her arms start to shake she shifted her weight to lean against the surface behind her. The surface previously being the floor of the bus. As she shifted her weight her hands slid backwards across the pieces of sharp glass that she hadn't yet noticed. Their sharp edges sliced into the soft meat of her palms and fingers. Cutting deep and jagged, they reached up into her tendons and ligaments.
At first the screaming of her sore muscles masked the sudden feeling of small pieces of tempered glass burrowing into her hands. But as soon as she laid back against the surface behind her the burning sensation began. It danced across her hands and fingers, traveling up into her forearms. It was sudden and excruciating. This unwelcome sensation let loose a quiet sob of pain from her throat.
"Ah shit! What the fuck!?", she cursed out loud.
As she felt this new rush of pain she shakily brought her hands up in front of her. She looked at her now bloody and torn hands through wetting eyes. There were still pieces of the round jagged glass chunks embedded into her palms. They jutted out from her smooth flesh covered in her blood.
"Well...that's not good.", she said in disbelief.
Despite the pain and horrific sight she still couldn't help but briefly compare the red chunks to berries. Specifically the Gale berries she and her mother used to pick when she was younger. An elusive fruit only found in the Gale plains along the occasional river bank. Like the glass, the Gale berry was prickly and if picked wrong would cut your fingers with its sharp exterior. But when you peeled its bright red flesh off you revealed a smooth pink inside that was a sour sweet flavor.
But this memory faded quickly as she brought her hand up to her mouth. Taking a deep breath she clamped her front teeth onto one of the pieces of glass. Hardening herself she jerked her hand away from her mouth. This dislodged the piece from her palm leaving a small crater in the flesh. The removal of the foreign object brought with it a feeling of relief and searing pain as the glass's edges cut even more on its way out, like a barbed arrow would. She mustered her way through the pain and spit the piece of glass out of her mouth before moving onto the next one. This one was deeper than the other, barely poking out of the skin. First she tried to bite down on it like the other one but to no avail. It was too deep and the blood made everything slick and hard to see. So she took a different approach and using her teeth she instead bit down on the area around the piece. And like a cork from a bottle the piece popped out of her palm into her mouth. She spit it out, along with some blood, like the other one on to the ground. Looking over her hands she counted five more pieces of glass to remove.
"This is gonna take a lot of mending magic once I'm done," she sighed to herself, "Welp! I'll worry about that once I get there." And she started back again painfully removing the five remaining pieces of glass. It took a bit of time, a lot of which she spent cursing and wiping blood onto her jeans careful to not get the red jacket anymore dirty. But after about 10 minutes she successfully removed the last piece of glass. Sighing in relief and exhaustion she decided it would probably be smart to try and find something to bandage her hands with lest they become infected. With that thought in mind she started picking herself up, careful not to touch the glass this time. Looking back to the soldier's body she considered looting him to see if he had anything that could help her. But she brushed that idea away when she noticed she had pushed him into a puddle of brown water.
'They can't be wet,' she thought while looking at her hands, 'I'm gonna need to look elsewhere for bandages.'
That's when it occurred to her. She hadn't even considered trying to find out if anyone else was alive! Quickly, she looked behind her and through the space between what was once the tops of the seats and the bus's roof. At first she didn't see anyone, but then some movement caught her eye. It was a couple of seats back from where she was, near the back of the bus. Thinking back to before the bus crashed she tried to recall who it was that was sitting near there. Then she remembered briefly seeing a young man sitting there when they took off from the bus station.
While she was thinking of this she heard something shift behind her towards the front of the bus. Her attention was momentarily drawn to the noise behind her and she started turning around. But before she could fully turn around, her attention was drawn back to the movement from earlier towards the back of the bus. She heard the sound of someone gagging followed by what sounded like the gurgling of water. Slowly she began moving towards the sounds. Getting closer the feet of someone lying on their stomach came into view. As soon as she saw them the slow, cautious movement became an awkward sprint towards the now spasming legs and body of the young man.
As she got to the body she looked around the seat to see the young man in the process of drowning in a puddle of dirty water and what looked like his vomit. He was going to die if she didn't do something.
"Oh no you don't!", she exclaimed with a demanding tone, "I refuse to be the only one who survives this shit!"
Kneeling next to his body she quickly flipped him over, ignoring the searing, sharp pain in her hands. She'd have to worry about infections later. Getting him onto his back she made sure that there wasn't anything left for him to be suffocating on. However, he was still convulsing and from the looks of it his left arm was in pretty bad shape. It was bent outward at the bicep and the shoulder was a couple inches higher than his other one giving him a hunchback look. She looked at his jerking body in desperation, unsure of what to do.
Then his eyes suddenly flung open and he let out a blood curdling primal like scream while jolting up into a sitting position. He continued screaming a few inches from her face causing her to jump in surprise and unintentionally clock him in the face. This whipped his head back and put an end to the scream as he quickly held where she hit him.
"Ow ow ow! I'm awake! I'm awake damni-", he started before noticing the shocked face of the girl in front of him. She was covering her mouth with her hands and stumbling with her words as she started apologizing, "Ummmm...are you okay?", he asked her concerningly.
"Am I okay? Are you okay!? You just started screaming out of nowhere! And what the hell do you mean you're 'awake'? Bro I just found you having a seizure and drowning in your own puke!", she started questioning him in a sort of concerned mother tone. At first he wasn't sure what she was talking about but then he remembered his dream.
"Oh um, that wasn't anything. I was just really confused," he explained while looking around his surroundings.
"Confused? How does confusion cause seizures and screaming?!", she asked him as he started standing up not listening to her.
"Whoa whoa! Careful man. You just woke up after a bus crash and I'm pretty sure your arm is broken.", she said worryingly. Standing up along with him she put a hand on his good shoulder. This is when he looked at her in the eyes for the first time.
At first she was confused. Looking into his unusually reddish maroon eyes she saw the eyes of someone who'd seen a lifetime worth of experiences. But that didn't make sense since he looked no older than her and she was 23. And as he looked into her lightning blue eyes he suddenly felt a wave of comfort wash over him. She looked kind. And yet she also looked strong. There was a brief moment of silence as the two took each other's features in. Maybe it was the consideration that they might be the only survivors, maybe it was the adrenaline, or maybe it was something else. But either easy the two suddenly felt a connection forming. After what felt like forever the silence was finally broken with a simple pair of questions.
"What's your name?", the young man asked.
"Olivia. What's your name?", Olivia asked in return.
"...Wes.", he answered staring at her.
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