CHAPTER 9: In it Together
What happened after was a blur. A sharp pain in the core later, and Orsel found himself awake in a dingy cell, facing a just-closing cell door. The moment he came to, he bolted towards the gate and banged on it, only to receive an electric shock designed to nullify his aggression. Orsel slammed his fist on the ground.
“You can’t DO this to me! I-I don’t deserve this!” Ven led Eyve back up the staircase.
“And yet here you are.” She provoked smugly, punctuating her statement with the slamming of a heavy metal trapdoor. Orsel balled his fists with rage and pulled his hood over his face, muffling his indignant screaming.
“I CAN’T— WHO DO THEY— I SHOULD— RRRRRGGGHHH!” He rattled the cage’s bars again, hoping his anger could override the pain they caused— no such luck. A sudden JOLT forced him to let go, grimacing from the pain. As he turned around to try and rest his wounds, he unexpectedly learned that he was not alone in this cell. A scrawny-looking flauna and a towering earth elemental sat on opposite sides of the walls on benches in his cell.
“Hey there, uh… little buddy.” The earth elemental greeted. Orsel slumped over, mortified at his outrage.
“Leave me alone.” He grumbled. Despite his dissatisfaction, the giant seemed earnest. “Ah, what’s wrong?” He continued.
“Oh, nothing,” Orsel spilled, “I lost my job, my life fell apart-” A growling began to emerge from a nearby cage, and Orsel was able to take a good look at who exactly his neighbors were in this prison. “— and I’m probably going to be turned into one of those things”. The flauna stepped down from his bench and approached Orsel cautiously.
“Hey, things are going to be alright. What’s your name?”
“Orsel.” Orsel sniffed. “Orsel Jino.”
“That’s a nice name,” The stranger consoled, stretching out his leafy hand. “I’m Vino and this is Jake. It’s nice to meet you."
“It’s nice to meet you, too, but it doesn’t change the fact that we’re grandly screwed.” Orsel griped, wiping some dirt off of his cloak. Vino made his way towards his wall, and began to wedge a brick out of its socket.
“You know, this doesn’t have to be our end,” He proposed. Orsel was still shaken.
“I mean, sure, maybe they’ll do something else to us, but—”
“— We’re bustin’ out of here.” Jake interrupted, moving over to Vino’s half of the cell to lift him up and assist him. Orsel recoiled at the words.
“You want to escape?”
“Bingo” Vino affirmed.
“Oh, what good is that going to do us?” Orsel complained, pacing back and forth in the cell. “There’s nowhere we can hide in the city that they won’t find us.”
“We’re not staying here,” Jake clarified.
“You’re going to leave THE CITY?!” Orsel exclaimed, his eyes wide with shock, “that’s impossible!” Vino continued his focus behind where the wall’s brick was removed, at the wires hiding in plain sight.
“Not impossible,” he sighed, “Just very, very, hard.”
“Now look,” Jake explained, “We’ve been cookin’ up a plan to get out of this joint, but neither of us know the city well enough to get all the way.” Orsel pondered the situation.
“So… You want me to help you navigate?”
“Yep, and after you do, all three of us will be out of here, smooth as silk.” Vino said, still fiddling with the wires behind the wall.
“But there’s no place for someone like me out there!” Orsel bemoaned, “If there’s one thing they make clear in here, it’s that shayd are pariahs! Especially after the Umbral Incursion…” Jacob winced at the words as Vino continued to abate Orsel’s concerns.
“Well, I can tell you that whatever’s out there is a hell of a lot better than what we’ll face if we stay here. Besides, if we pull this off, we’ll help you get your bearings in the mainland if need be.” Orsel’s intrigue piqued at the prospect of a new profession.
“Promise?” He asked. Vino Signaled Jake to put him down on the bench, and stretched his leafy hand out to Orsel in affirmation.
“We’ll shake on it. Jake?” Jake grumbled hesitantly, but he had to accept working with a shayd would be a necessity he had to face if he wanted to escape. The three wayward souls joined their hands together for a momentous three-man handshake. As soon as Vino and Orsel finished wiping the dirt off their hands from Jake’s contribution to the ceremony, Jake piped up.
“Now, tell us how to leave.” He firmly requested.
Orsel racked his mind for a moment, wondering what the best way to go about this would be. The walls surrounding the city were formidable, sure, but in truth they protected as well as they contained. The wastes that Shaydon was home to, with its cruel plants and creatures that hunted for anything that moved, would be difficult to deal with if they were to make their escape on land. The canals that snaked through the streets, however, provided Orsel with some semblance of inspiration.
“The docks!” He blurted out, “Our canals get water from the sea, and we dredge out there for gravel and stuff. The place is locked to common folk, though.” Jacob made a fist with the glass talons he used as fingers.
“We don’t have to worry about locks.” He declared. Vino pulled out the brick he had been using as a map and showed it to Orsel.
“Now, how do we get there?”
“I’ll show you when we bust out.” Answered Orsel. A pause blossomed between the prisoners, with Vino and Jake knowing that now there was a chance their plan wouldn’t be as foolproof as they had thought. Vino continued to goad an answer from Orsel, emphasizing his crudely-made map.
“Yeah, but I think it would be better if we knew beforehand, you know?”
“Trust me, I’ll lead the way when we get out,” Orsel replied obliviously. “Speaking of which, what’s the plan?” Vino and Jacob looked over at each other. It was clear that this was far from the best-case scenario in their plan, but pushing any more insistence on getting the directions now could cause their ticket out of the city to lock up. It was apparent they had no choice but to trust this newcomer.
“I’ve got some exposed wires here that link up to this place’s security systems,” Vino explained, pointing over at the hole on his side of the cell. “Once things are good and riled up, Jake here will break down the walls.” Orsel tilted his head.
“Wait— why would you want to rile the place up?” Vino made his way over to the wires and began to tamper with them.
“Trust me, every great escape has a greater diversion. Jake, you ready?”
“On your signal,” Jake affirmed. Things were moving a bit too fast for Orsel.
“We’re going NOW?” Vino continued tampering with the wires.
“No time like the present. BREAK IT!”
CHAPTER 10: Out of it Together
Jacob’s hand began to whirl around like a drill, his glass fingers forming a light-blue, conical blur that loudly bored through the stone wall of the cell. Rubble and bits of metal were flung around throughout the cell as Vino held his place by the wires. When he noticed Jake had made it to a certain point, he twisted the two wires in his hand, and a deafening alarm began to blare throughout the building. All the other cell doors in the prison opened at once, and the creatures that resided within began to stir from the cacophony.
“ALMOST THROUGH!” Jake shouted, still maintaining his position, when the twins Eyve and Ven opened the door leading down into this horrid space.
“WHAT IS GOING ON?!” They both yelled synchronously, when their answer was plainly in front of them. Their hard work had begun to creep out of their living spaces, one by one, with one of such spaces being home to a desperate breakout. With a mighty CRASH, Jake had finally dug through the building’s foundation to make a tunnel to the surface above. He shoved Vino and Orsel up out of the building and soon followed. At the sight of this, Eyve converted her hand into a shocking apparatus and began to follow them, before finding herself interrupted by the other subjects who had turned their eyeless faces towards their captors, growling and sizzling with anger. The scientists were smart enough to know when to run away from a conflict, and soon found themselves back up the stairs, throwing their weight against the trapdoor to lock it. As it locked, with clattering and screeching still occurring behind it, Eyve cowered behind Ven, who still stood stalwart to face the door.
“Get Yuttoguln.” She commanded.
CHAPTER 11: The Hunt
After a long day at work, Yuttoguln had finally found a moment to himself. He sat down at his desk in his dimly-lit office and threw his newly-obtained funds on top of his workspace. Dispensing justice was a difficult thing to do in Shaydon, but Yuttoguln was absolute in his belief in the system. Unfortunately, his division was somewhat underfunded, so he took it upon himself to source payment from… other avenues, like Eyve and Ven. He had just begun to divide his new haul into different piles when all of a sudden, his radio rang. Always being the investigative sort, he picked it up.
“Law enforcement. What seems to be the-”
“YUTTOGULN, THEY ESCAPED!” Ven’s shrill voice yelled from behind the receiver.
Yuttoguln took a deep breath and closed his eye, rubbing his temples with his free hand.
“What. Happened?”
“I don’t know, one minute they were all in their cell, ready for testing, and the next, all of our subjects were loose.” Yuttoguln’s eye widened.
“Those THINGS are loose?! You made a solemn promise to me that you understood there was no room for error.” He hissed. Ven stuttered.
“Yeah, but-” Yuttoguln hung up his radio and slammed a button on his desk. The lights that flashed throughout the building glowed dimly from white to purple. He retrieved his boltcaster from beneath his desk and barged out of his office to the waiting eyes of the other officers.
“LISTEN UP, FOLKS!” Yuttoguln barked. “We have three fugitives on the loose within the city. Prisoners who think they can slip through the bars of our judicial system.” He balled his fist at the statement. “One terrian, one flauna, and one shayd by the identification Orsel Jino. You have my orders to bring them back broken or whole, and if you see anything else suspicious during the pursuit, you let ME know first, understood?” His speech was met with a sea of salutes and raucous approval. “Good.” He croaked. “Let justice be done.”
The trio of prisoners snaked their ways through the backstreets and alleyways of the city of Shaydon, with Orsel leading the way.
This late in the day, the locale’s normal curfew was in effect, so the canals and walkways were thankfully clear of civilians for their escape. The group made their way over a bridge to meet a three-way intersection.
“We make a right up here, come on!” Orsel declared vigilantly. As he scuttled forwards, his compatriots struggled to keep up with him, especially in Jacob’s case. His girth may have helped for demolition tasks, but his body wasn’t exactly suited for quick getaways. Still, his time lagging behind gave him an opportunity to convene with Vino.
“This wasn’t…supposed to happen.”
“Just keep going,” Vino affirmed, “We’ll deal with it later.” A narrow alleyway found itself in the path of the absconding group, littered with bins of refuse and a myriad of junk. Orsel, knowing these streets and what would support his weight, leapt from can to dumpster to get to his destination as fast as he could. Vino, being the careful sort, cautiously weaved his way between the obstacles presented before him, sucking in his gut and contorting where necessary so as to not come in contact with the filth. Jacob, being the last one to arrive at the shortcut, barged through the barriers and junk with reckless abandon. He had a place to be, and he wasn’t going to let anything smaller than him get in his way.
“How much farther?” Queried Vino, scouting up and down the city’s winding roads in a manner as if he actually knew where they went. Orsel made his way to a bridge leading to a large roundabout where the city’s canals circled around.
“We’re halfway there! C’mon!” As they made their way forwards, klaxon sirens and purple lights began to creep their way into the city’s evening silence. The guttural roar of jailboat engines whirred throughout the canals near the three escapees, and they soon found themselves, quite unfortunately, surrounded.
“Uh, fellas? We got company,” Jake astutely observed. Shaydon’s officers hopped out of their vessels, boltcasters in hand, and began to make their approach towards the gang. They, in turn, huddled closer together, preparing for either their doom or at least a good scrap. Orsel felt something beneath his tendril as he winced them away from the oncoming threat— the cold and metallic surface of a grate. This particular kind of grate happened to be an entrance to Shaydon’s labyrinthine maintenance tunnels. Without a second thought, Orsel revealed the metal disc to his allies.
“Jake, do you think you could-” Before Orsel could finish his sentence, The earthen behemoth had bent open the bars and dove into the darkness below, ushering his two cohorts to join him. Once they had jumped down, Jacob twisted the bars above him, ensuring their pursuers couldn’t get down the same way.
“Alright, where to from here?” Vino asked, shaking a bit of filth off of one of his legs. Orsel was a bit unfamiliar with the territory considering Shaydon Municipal Construction hadn’t needed to do work down here for some time, and had to regain his bearings.
“I think I can get us to the docks from here,” he proclaimed after some hesitation. “Follow me!”
As the fugitives descended further and further into the tunnels, frustration began to well up from within their pursuers. An officer by the name of Nudot called his leader from his radio transmitter.
“Yuttoguln? We lost them. They escaped into the maintenance tunnels. Permission to pursue?” Yuttoguln was far behind his squad, performing the secondary task of solo patrol through his quadrant of the canals, as was important to any search.
“Permission granted,” He replied through the radio in his jailboat, “Exercise caution.” “Affirmative,” Nudot rallied as he watched his fellow officers use their boltcasters to
finally remove the mangled gateway to the maintenance tunnels. As the diligent Nudot eased his tendrils over to the pit, an ear-splitting shriek pierced his sense of hearing. This was followed shortly by one of the jailboats his group had taken here being thrown clear over the troops’ heads onto where the maintenance tunnel was, crushing a hapless officer beneath its weight. As the dozen-or-so shayd looked over to see the source of the new disturbance, they saw before them a 7-foot tall behemoth of stone and shadow lumbering out of the depths of the rancid canal. Growling and crushing chunks of scrap metal between its asymmetrical, claw-like hands. Another twisted creature of blue, sputtering flame and darkness wreathed its way over the bridge of the canal opposite its earthen brother, sparks feathering off of its twisted form as it lurched towards the group of officers. Nudot thought it prudent to turn his waveform communicator back on.
“Uhh, Yuttoguln? We have another problem here.” Yuttoguln perked up.
“What do you—” His communication was hastily interrupted by crackled screaming. The chief turned off his waveform and stepped down on the accelerator. Deep down, he knew Eyve and Ven’s dealings were nothing but trouble, and now that they had caused this many problems, especially to his own subordinates, he had to put a stop to it, whatever the cost.