Emilia had never understood how people could hate The Strats. The Strats were great, even if she still had no intention of visiting them anytime soon. The wind in your hair as your fingers latched onto iridescent stone! The exhilaration of hovering over the ocean waves below, crashing up the jagged, sparkling rocks! Sea creatures and birds soaring and splashing around you! The thrill of knowing one little slip, and you’d be plummeting downwards! It was great fun! A nice respectable hobby, which yes, sometimes ended in serious injuries if the climber weren’t paying enough attention, but still!
But still, there was nothing quite like climbing The Strats, and Emilia had done and seen countless impressive things. Sitting at the top of those spires, taking in the stunning sunsets and the Grey Sands far in the distance with her friends. Laughing and drinking and taking so many ill-advised drugs because they were stupid and powerful and fearless…
Those were some of the best moments of her life—moments that were four decades removed from the moment she decided that no, actually, she did understand why people hated The Strats.
Emilia cursed as she climbed the rock wall that had awaited her behind the stupid giant door. It was an equally stupid rock, reaching so high that even though this room was lit up with the world’s near-perpetual light, she still couldn’t see the top well.
She was going to fall and die, go splat across the ground now far below her and turn into a weapon no one would ever find. There she and her weapons would sit, waiting for someone to eventually come along, but no one would ever come. The next visitors to come searching for the library’s heartcore would be sensible enough to wait for the damn shortcut door to open and not be forced to endure all this running and chasing and climbing of stairs and rocks and—
Her foot slipped and Emilia cursed harder, her knee slamming into the rock. It burned for a moment, whatever injury she had sustained stitching itself up. That was one of the few good things about this situation: that as long as she kept hold of the stupid rock wall, any injuries she earned would quickly heal. Her fingers were the ones taking most of the beating, earning her a constant burn of healing through them as she moved from ill-advised hold to absolutely insane hold.
Emilia sighed, glaring upwards as much as she dared—she didn’t really want to completely overbalance herself trying to see how far she was from the next section of the wall. Some twenty feet were left before she’d reach the small platform where she could take a moment to rest, her muscles screaming at her for all the effort she had forced out of them during the hundreds of feet she’d already climbed.
Fucking stars above was she lucky she’d made such a habit of climbing The Strats for most of her younger life. Without that knowledge and muscle memory, she definitely would have failed at this. Even now, due to her comparatively weak muscles, her body was making its complaints known. She’d stopped a few times in the more stable holds, urged her energy to cycle through her in an attempt to soothe her muscles even the smallest bit. It had helped, but not much. Climbing, catching her toes and fingers in the correct spots so she wouldn’t go sliding to her gruesome and potentially not instantaneous death took too much concentration, however, and despite her previous practice, she couldn’t get her energy to circulate while she moved.
A hold brought her body flush against the rock, her cheek scrapping against the blackish rock. It sparkled, bits of red shining through the dark rock if she looked close enough. It was pretty, if nowhere as beautiful as The Strats.
Almost nothing was as beautiful as The Strats, though. It really was unfair to compare anything to that mountain range, more towering gemstones than normal rock formations.
Emilia sucked in a deep breath, resisting the urge to adjust her bag, which she had stuffed her cloak into and turned into a makeshift backpack. It was awkward and terrible—she wasn’t used to climbing with anything save a few snacks, let alone a bag filled with weapons of destruction and her outerwear.
She lifted a foot from its hold, thankful that despite her relative lack of strength, she was bendy and light. The next hold was high, her knee rising to a point that even at her best, she definitely would have only tried something similar on The Strats if a monitor was hovering nearby, ready to whip out aether to catch her.
No, that wasn’t quite right. At her best, she had tried even worse holds than this, her body plummeting towards the ocean only for her to spark upwards, landing weightlessly back where she had fallen.
Only once—Emilia had only climbed at her best once, during the war. She and half of their division had descended onto The Starts during a pink tide for a little rest and relaxation. She and the few others who had climbed them before the war had felt the difference active combat had left on their skills. They had all been brilliant and terrifying sub-30s even before the war. They were even more terrifying then, flying and whipping and sparking themselves through the air without a care in the world.
The war was far away.
They were having a rare day of fun and ease.
Then, the world had exploded.
Then, only half of their division had been left standing, their hearts and soul ripped to pieces as they watched their friends and teammates die—as they listened to them die.
Emilia's muscles shook as she pulled herself up, trying to get enough weight onto her newly positioned foot to feel like she wasn’t a moment away from watching herself die too. She’d tried to find another hold—another path—to take, but the others had either been just as awkward as this one or had holds so small that one wrong pivot and you’d lose it.
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Shitty, too high hold it was and—
Her right arm shot up as her now free foot settled beside the other, her hand fumbling for a hold that she was so, so hoping wasn’t too high and—
A slow breath escaped her as she found purchase. It was a bit awkward, but she felt more or less stable. Just a few more transitions, and she’d be able to sit and breathe and lean over the edge and feel the joy of being so high up.
She needed a bit of joy because regardless of whether she had any intention of visiting The Strats soon, she knew one day she’d want to go back. She didn’t want to hate or fear them when she did, even if they still haunted her nightmares. She didn’t want to leave here, hating the feel of rock under her hands and feet or the sight of the world far below.
Emilia could understand now, why people hated the climbing aspect of The Strats. This was hard, and even if she knew most people visiting them wouldn’t be as weak as she was now, anyone with a D-Level above 50 and no perfect physical category would definitely find it challenging—perhaps even terrifying, and not in the fun, adrenaline rush way.
It was probably worse now, too. Even if sparking wasn’t exactly the most common skill outside of veterans and SecOps—and maybe sub-50s and sub-30s, she wasn’t exactly sure on that—it could definitely have become something common among climbers, looking for an extra ounce of safety so they could enjoy the risk of dangerous climbs—formerly dangerous climbs.
Trying to climb The Strats for the first time while people played carelessly around you? Relying on monitors to keep you safe while the best shooed them away?
Yeah, Emilia could see how that would make climbing The Strats even less enjoyable for people without the kind of experience she had. In all honestly, even now—even with the shifting love and hatred she had for The Strats—she was more the person who would be spinning through the air, shifting her skills to fly and spark and attach herself to the rocks via ropes of shimmering aether.
She’d always been something of a show-off, especially when she was younger, as long as it hadn’t been important. She had always been good at making herself as small as possible when it was important.
Her arm scraped over the ledge of her soon-to-be sitting spot. There were almost no holds here for her feet, and even the idea of trying to gain footing on the near vertical rocks had Emilia imagining her foot slipping, her balance sliding downwards with it and then SPLAT!
Emilia did not particularly want to splat, and was therefore stuck hoisting herself upwards on her forearms. Her shoulders ached, her makeshift backpack was too damn heavy, pressing her back towards the earth while what she really needed was to get it and her ass up into the air and—
“Fucking nebulae,” Emilia groaned as she collapsed onto the ledge, her legs still hanging half off it because she was too tired to look around and see if she could safely rearrange herself. Her eyes fluttered closed, and she had to make a concerted effort to not accidentally fall asleep. Now that was certainly nightmare material. Make it to safety and then fall asleep and roll off the bloody—ha—ledge!
“Okay, okay,” she cheered to herself, blinking her eyes open again and looking around.
It wasn’t the largest of ledges, but it would do for her brief respite before she had to climb the rest of the way up. She tugged her backpack off, setting it against the wall and planting herself beside it as she looked upwards. She was about halfway, maybe, but the rest of the climb would likely be easier. Unlike the lower section, where there had been no proper resting spots, the upper section was littered with them—and for good reason.
While the lower half was nearly vertical, the upper half was a mess of bouldering challenges. Overall, each challenge would be more difficult than the tedious climb of the vertical section, but at least there were rest stops. Of course, there was more risk of falling, less ability to correct mistakes when you have to fling yourself between holds and contort your body into less than ideal positions.
Emilia’s eyes flickered away from the climb—away from the wall—to the world opposite it. Even though this room was just that—a room—the view was still stunning. The opening of the giant door, which was just slightly shorter than the rock wall, had allowed light to fill the cavern she and Cade had been wandering through. While it was still empty, save the destruction caused by the creation of her {Blood Needles}, the view was still as beautiful as taking in the wide, empty ocean from The Strats, or even from the university—there were more than a few places in Astrapan that offered breathtaking views of the endless ocean far below. The Penns were sometimes visible from Astrapan, if the day was clear enough, nearly always visible from the eastern end of The Strats, where you could see all the way up to Roasalia on the best days.
The western view from The Strats was… something else. She hadn’t seen it herself, not the way it was now, but she had heard about it—had listened when Rafe told her to not look.
“One day,” he’d told her, his voice a whisper through their Censors, “I’ll take you, and we’ll look together. Don’t go alone, though, and not until you’re ready—and I mean really ready.”
For Rafe of all people to be telling her to stay away, emotion drifting through his voice even through the distance of the aethernet…
Yeah, she might be noted for doing some pretty stupid things—see: climbing these rocks without enough muscle strength or safety equipment, not that she had any other option—but she wasn’t stupid enough to do something Rafe told her not to… not with that much sincerity in his voice, anyways. Other things… Yeah, she had totally done tons of other things he’d told her not to, that adorable scowl of his deepening as he eyed up her exceptionally untrustworthy smiles and promises to be good.
Honestly, she was lucky to have such good friends. Not just the ones she had now, but the ones she’d left behind—assuming any of them would even consider her their friend anymore. Olivier, kind and sweethearted asshole that he was, could have just been an anomaly. Rafe she had stayed in contact with, even if minimally, but the others she had left behind…
Emilia swallowed down a wave of regret, scratching idly at her arm once again. “Time to move,” she mumbled to herself, blinking watery eyes away from the beautiful, empty land below to look towards the sky. “Fuck. This is gonna suck.”