Eighteen: Foe

The weird dream was still boggling my mind when I decided to get up and check the floor I was in. There was nothing to see though, so I decided to just find my companion. 'You ready?" Elliot asked when he saw me going down the stairs from the wooden chair he sat on. And as one would expect in a house abandoned for who-knew how long, the lone furniture smackdab in the middle of the room was filled with dust and molds and rots. Funny how it didn't give up and crashed from the weight of my friend. I went and stood by the seat opposite to him. 'Yeah." I didn't bother sitting down, we were about to depart anyway. I couldn't help but still swivel my head from sides to sides knowing that I would find nothing, the supposedly white walls were washed with a yellowish tinge and streaked with something brown in its corners and edges. It must've been a beautiful house in its prime days, but when the phenomena hit and everyone evacuated, the place started to deteriorate. 'Let's go." I nodded when he stood up and walked to the door. We were about to cross the house's threshold when I felt Elliot tense. His back was ramrod straight and so still, that it made me think something happened to his system. A second after, he moved, still with the stiffness, and started walking. 'Thirty-Five they're here." He whispered. 'We should go, we can outrun them." He was still speaking in a hushed tone like they were in a hearing distance. Why would we run away from them when we could take them out? I mean, what were our abilities for if not use them to our benefit? 'I don't understand why we have to outrun them. Won't they keep on coming at us if we go about it that way?" He sighed. 'I know, but they can and will knock you out and use that to subdue you plus you can take them on, I can't. I can only run until they get tired of coming after." That shut me up for a second I completely forgot about Elliot not being able to do combat. He told me this before that a fault in his system rendered his physical form not able to fight or learn how to. 'Okay." And I commend him for all those attempts to take me out of the laboratories despite that. We picked up pace and were running at full speed and by full speed meant roughly ten meters per second. Elliot led the way while I followed behind. 'Just follow me, I have the coordinates—" His voice was cut off when something large landed in front of him, it backhanded Elliot and sent him flying to the side. My friend's dark hair was the only thing I could see of him. I was stunned. The thing grew even larger as it walked—stomped—towards me and it grew larger and larger until we were just an arm span away. My arm span, which was about five-foot five and my head was just leveled to its abdomen. It didn't stop and my eyes were fast enough to catch the movement of its thick, meaty hand that was on its way to my direction. I stepped back, narrowly avoiding its limb, but immediately zeroed on the thing's throat and lunged. Although my steps were much smaller than it, I was fast. Its tan skin—could be scales—were rough on my palms. Having managed to grab its thick neck with both hands, I stabilized my hold and like wringing wet clothes, I squeezed and twisted. No growl nor grunt came from it as it tried to shake me off, but it was futile, my hands were anchored to its thick neck. I was on autopilot, my senses were on high alert that any movement around me passed through my system. My brain seemed to have zoned out while my body had a mind of its own. When I didn't pop its head off its body, I used its chest to gain foothold and swung. The back of my legs rested on his shoulders, and pulled. It still didn't emit sound as it clawed my small hands off its neck. Its stomps and the crunches of the fallen snow were the only thing that could be heard from him. Bones cracked and muscles snapped under my hold. It was like stretching a very large, very thick rubber. The creature let out a small painful grunt as I pulled the last muscles holding its head. Silence fell as the creature's body slumped on the ground with me still on its shoulders. My then-white clothes were now stained with the fluid that spurted out of the thing's neck when it got decapitated. There could be more of them, but setting that aside, I threw away the giant head dripping with a gooey orange liquid—that was probably its blood—from my grip and run towards Elliot's body. His chest was rising and falling indicating that his system was working fine, though he really didn't need to breathe. It was part of his programming to mimic humanity as close as possible. 'Elliot, get up." I ordered his body like it would do so. He didn't respond, so I had no choice but to carry him on my back. 'This freaking asshole gets to sleep while I get to be his goddamn horse." I could only mumble my frustration and worry in the snowy air as I started to trudge on the waist-deep snow. What was that thing? It sure wasn't human with that built and size. I took one last look at the dead creature before walking away. The light fog had settled around the body but with my eyes, I could still see the skin that I thought were scales because of its roughness. The head that I threw a while back, settled next to its owner and was staring at our direction with dead, brown eyes. Was it actually a human but on a much larger scale? 'I heard that." He whispered weakly. 'Then get off and walk by yourself if you're awake." I started jogging with him still on my back. 'Can't, legs are broken." As human-looking as he was, he couldn't feel pain from a physiological aspect, he just knew that some parts of him were inefficient at the moment. Funny, he could feel the pain from a heartbreak but not with his broken legs. 'Do I have to carry you until the mine?" I didn't mind, somehow a bond unknowingly formed between us those times when he tried to take me away from the laboratories I was confined in. A bond that told us that nobody would be left behind. 'I can fix it, but first we have to go as far as we can to create a distance which will give us time." I nodded. 'What was that thing, an elephant?" As far as I knew, it was very far from it. 'Hah, no and my friend, you're going in the wrong direction." I could hear his shoes dragging on the ground, so sorry for being a bit shorter. 'That one was like you." He pointed the opposite direction where I was going. I couldn't help but shake my head. What drastic appearance did Nathan's experiment made? 'Were they even real people?" 'No, they were DNAs of different things—I couldn't even name all of them—stitched together to form them, though they are hulking things of strength, they're no match to you." 'Okay." We didn't talk more after that and Elliot's weight was affecting nothing of my speed. Was that thing already there before us? If that was the case, were there going to be more in the incoming cities? Did Nathan already foresee where we were going? But really, why do we have to run when according to Elliot I could take them all? I just have to take him to a safer area and then take on all of them. 'Elliot," We were traveling for more than an hour already when I got the urge to break the silence. 'Do you still miss her?" He was silent. We came to an agreement to not ever talk about his love life. I knew snippets of it though, like he gained consciousness because of that person and he tried hard to create a body just to be with her. And that was it. I didn't mean to be nosy but I knew so little of this only friend of mine. 'Are we seriously going to talk about that while I'm disabled and being carried by you? Add the fact that my feet had been wiping the ground for an hour now and I can now feel the brush of the ice on my toes." He said in a calm tone. 'You can choose not to answer." I gave him an out, maybe it still left deep and unhealed scars when she didn't choose him. His answer was a sigh and I let it go. 'I was on the way to forgetting her until you brought her up." He talked lazily, like he couldn't care less... Anymore? 'They say that a first love is unforgettable, be it a thing, an animal, or a human and I agree with that." Okay, he still missed her. 'The brain—a hard drive in my case—is a very powerful thing and can keep any memories one chooses to remember. But the heart, the heart forgets over time and mine took a very long while to do so." I stayed silent and kept my pace. 'We just passed by Al Kiwek, there should be a city a few kilometers after it." 'You want to stop by?" 'No, we just collect any metals we pass by but we must keep going." Metals? 'What will you do with those?" 'I'll show you later," His tone became lighter. Okay. I nodded. After another hour of running, we reached the city Elliot was talking about. And like the other supposedly crowded places, this one was also empty of any living being except the two of us. Rows and rows of buildings stood covered in ice and snow. The silence that was being broken by the howls of the wind from time to time was the only change in the sound and the crunch of my booted feet against the snow. 'This place is creepy. It's like we're in a dystopian story." Said the man behind me. I couldn't help but snort at his statement. 'We are in a dystopian setting with the world freezing and humanity at the brink of its death. Anyways, are we going in or just look for what you need around here?" 'Go straight ahead," He pointed at the space in front of us. It could be a road or an alleyway, but there was no way to tell for the height of the snow was up to my chest. 'There is an unfinished building ten blocks from here." 'Got it." I could radiate heat and put a couple of meters of space from me and the piled snow but I didn't see the point. I didn't feel cold, so as my companion and it didn't hinder me from going forward. We reached the said structure in no time. It was supposed to be a building with a lot of floors but it was not completed and it towered probably to the whole place. I wasted no time and went inside with Elliot still on my back. 'Is there a particular type of metal you're looking for?" 'Nope, just get anything we can find." Our voices—though they were at a normal volume—echoed throughout the whole area. We found pieces of metal cuttings here and there but as they accumulated, I could no longer hold them in one hand, my other hand was on Elliot's back supporting him. We needed something to hold them and every plastic or paper bags we could find were either corroded beyond usage or frozen so much that it crumbled away upon touch. 'Is it just me or it got colder?" He randomly quipped while I was looking for something to put the metals in to. I knew it was very cold but I couldn't feel the change. 'I have no freaking clue." 'Yup, it just turned minus thirty." My peripheral caught something blue and it was a bucket when I set my eyes to it. 'Will that do?" I nodded at the container's direction as my hands were both occupied. 'Yeah." It was not by any means a humble bucket, it was so large that I could put Elliot in it and it would seem like he was in a tub with his legs dangling out. We didn't waste any time on finding the metals and leaving the city. I followed Elliot's directions—he was still on my back—while he held the long rod that served as the bucket's handle. I punched a hole with my heated hand in it and bent the rod so it would hook on the just –made cavity. We talked about the things I missed when Nathan turned on us because I was put to 'sleep" for quite a while. Elliot told me that the forest which we were stopped was the talk of the country and a bit of the world because the place was warped beyond recognition. A chunk of the trees close to the highway disappeared without a trace, the rocks were melted and the road was a glowing pool of static lava for fourteen days. Scientists began theorizing about the 'strange" happening, others deemed it as a sign that the end of the world was close. I snickered at that last one. 'It was just me." I jokingly told my friend. 'But seriously, your last confinement was the longest. Thirty-three years of dreaming, your limbs must've been stiff when you woke up." Thirty-fucking-three years of being fooled that I was living the reality, that I was normal, that I had family. Thinking all about it now, it kinda sucked to be made the idiot one too many times and it hurt that I involuntarily believed each every time. 'I was a high school student there." The life I never had—well, everything that they simulated me with were the lives I wish I had. 'And you were an evil scientist." 'Tell me more, this is the only one that was not stored in me nor Dorothy. I wanna hear about my evil scientist-self." I told him everything, about my 'parents", Leib the 'brother", our 'friends", and the dreams. Elliot chuckled. 'Yeah, and the conditioning always fails whenever the simulated you started dreaming about you as a baby. From there, it won't take long before the simulation breaks." The metals behind us were clinking and clanging as the flat surface started to get rocky and bumpy again. 'This became a consistent pattern, for some unknown reason your mind fought with the program and no one in the entire team of lab people could explain it. That's why I always knew when to come and get you." I could hear the smile in his voice as he said the last sentence.