CHAPTER 14: SHEPHATIAH - THE PRINCESS AND THE TITAN

Shephatiah Jones hovered between wakefulness and unconsciousness, drifting in a pleasant haze. Her body tingled with a deep, satisfying numbness. Every sensation buzzed like an electric hum, making her feel almost weightless. She didn’t want it to end.

One half-open eye caught sight of the large man slumped nearby, sleeping upright. Somewhere outside came a deep mechanical noise, a rhythmic “ruum, ruum, ruum,” like the low growl of distant machinery.

Her skin felt hyperaware, as though she could sense every hair, every pore. She became fascinated by the small details—like her tongue moving around her mouth, mapping the contours of her teeth as if they were unfamiliar terrain. She knew she should be uncomfortable, the cold biting through the vehicle’s exposed frame, but she didn’t care. The high had her cocooned in a layer of ambivalence.

Another noise drifted in, different from the hum. White noise, perhaps? Or was it a vibration? The vehicle trembled ever so slightly. At first, she thought it was just the familiar rush of blood in her ears or the usual side effects of her buzz. But no—this was something else.

Suddenly, the vehicle rocked violently. A shudder rippled through the floor, and a loud crash shattered the air. The door was torn clean off. In an instant, the temperature plummeted, icy wind whipping into the vehicle. Her companion, the big man who had been resting nearby, was yanked out of his seat by a sudden, brutal force. His body twisted in the air as if caught in a cyclone.

Shephatiah blinked sluggishly, her drugged mind struggling to process what was happening. Her gaze followed the movement, and then she saw it.

A massive, spinning drill—about the width of a human leg—had bored through the door, tearing it from its hinges. The same monstrous drill had impaled the man she’d been with, driving through his shoulder and leg, dragging him away with a violent, spinning motion. His body and the door became one indistinguishable blur, spinning together with a sickening whirr like metal grinding against metal. Blood sprayed everywhere, drenching the cramped space in a wet, sticky mess.

Still half-naked and now soaked in the man's blood, Shephatiah sat up, her motions sluggish. She looked through the gaping hole where the door had once been. Outside, another robot loomed. This one was larger than any she’d seen before, painted a dull orange. Its shape was odd—like a hand with a thick, heavy thumb and a few broken fingers that it used to crawl forward.

At its center was the massive drill bit—meters long and gleaming, a heavy-duty ice borer. It had turned her companion into a grotesque shish kabob, impaled on the monstrous machine. The big man’s lifeless body hung limply as the drill lowered him to the ground, where the smaller white spider-like machines swarmed over him, efficiently detaching him from the spike.

He was just another casualty, now being picked apart like debris.

She didn’t scream. She was too high to scream. But not too high to flee. Remembering her former friend’s nanomachine healing, she quickly rummaged for her nanoregeneration pod, found it, and decided it was time to go.

Clad in little more than a white one-piece swimsuit, she briskly exited the wrecked vehicle, jumping down to the ground from the gaping hole in its side, and broke into a run. Behind her, the mechanical monster shifted, its bulk stepping back and forth while its minions busily removed the man's body from its sharp, elongated finger.

When she finally called Alan, her lawyer, she was never going to stop screaming at him. This mess—all of it—was Alan’s fault. She imagined the lawsuits, the prosecution, the endless retribution she would rain down on Huis Hohenzollern, the producer. She didn’t deserve this. She was going to make sure someone paid for her suffering.

Though she wasn’t yet feeling the cold, she knew her body wouldn’t survive these conditions much longer. She was going to freeze to death—at least she wouldn’t feel it. Keeping her thoughts together was hard, her mind fogged by the drugs, but her instinct for survival pushed her forward.

As she rounded a corner, she accidentally slammed her hand against the wall, her coordination as sloppy as a drunkard’s. The impact should have hurt, and in her mind, she visualized it as white, flashing energy coursing through her body. Under normal circumstances, she’d be screaming. Instead, she giggled as she kept running, her bare feet slapping against the cold ground. The thought of the consequences—the pain, the frostbite—only floated vaguely in the back of her mind. She’d pay for this later, but only if she didn’t find the right drugs or tech in time.

Activating the healing device she carried would help, but only so much. It wouldn’t stave off everything the cold could do, but the drugs would make it bearable for a while. The device would prevent frostbite, maybe even keep her alive. But it wouldn’t last forever. She needed another suit. Or warmth. Somewhere that wasn’t cold and buried underground.

Behind her came the now familiar sound: “ruum, ruum, ruum.” She glanced back, seeing shadows stretching on the walls as something closed in.

Ahead of her was an intersection. She veered right, choosing it because the other two paths looked like more of the same—cold, endless tunnels. This one had some kind of heavy equipment parked midway down.

She sprinted toward it. It was a six-wheeled land rover, painted hazard yellow. It sat about a meter and a half off the ground, its simple steering setup and small seat leaving most of the space for cargo.

Dried blood caked the driver’s seat, dripping down the side of the rover and pooling beneath it. Shephatiah followed the trail without thinking, unknowingly retracing the steps of whatever had dragged the driver away, however long ago.

A big, white plastic-looking key was already inserted into the ignition.

She slid into the driver’s seat, dislodging tiny icy crystals from the vinyl surface as she settled in. Her eyes darted back toward the intersection, where the oddly-angled silhouette of her pursuer cast eerie shadows. Panic set in, and she hastily ignited the motor of the small conveyor car. It rumbled to life, but she quickly realized she had no idea how to drive it. Even sober, she doubted she’d figure it out. Now, it felt impossible. The interface was a mess of buttons and levers—like trying to solve a puzzle without knowing what the pieces were.

Her instinct was to call someone for help, her lawyer, or whichever guy she was seeing at the moment. But that wasn’t an option—the damn producer’s ship was jamming all communications. She shook her head, trying to clear the fog from her mind. Get it together. She had to focus. She’d faced worse situations and survived. She could do this.

With no better plan, Shephatiah resorted to trial and error. She pushed every lever, flipped every switch that lit up, and finally pressed down on the right foot pedal. The cargo car reversed—slowly. She began turning the wheel, but by the time she figured out which way it turned, the vehicle had almost backed into the wall. Now she was stuck, the car positioned perpendicular to the tunnel. Great. It wasn’t going anywhere, but at least it might slow the thing chasing her.

She heard the monster’s robotic call again, that ominous “ruum, ruum, ruum” sound. Turning her head, she saw it—standing in the center of the crossroads. It had collapsed in on itself, like a drowned spider with its drill appendage tucked into its “palm.” A small oscillating object, like a weird head, spun atop the machine, emitting that haunting noise. As the head retracted into the main body, the robot began to advance toward her.

She stared at the controls one last time, but gave up. There was no hope of driving the car. It was just a barricade now, one that wouldn’t hold the creature for long. She glanced toward the fork at the end of the tunnel. Without hesitation, she bolted for the right path—it was closer, and she didn’t have time to think.

She was glad she chose that path. After a sharp turn, the tunnel opened into another large terraced room, similar to the one she had first entered. Unlike the earlier area, though, this one had no stairs—but it did have an elevator.

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Shephatiah stumbled toward the elevator, moving as fast as her weary legs would carry her. She slapped the largest button on the control panel, and to her relief, the doors opened. She practically threw herself inside, frantically searching for the button to close the doors. Thankfully, they shut on their own.

As soon as they did, warm air flooded the small compartment. Shephatiah exhaled a long, satisfied sigh.

She sat down in the corner and allowed herself to relax. She had earned it. The thing chasing her was stuck far below, and she was nice and warm. That was basically that, as far as she was concerned. Sitting still, it felt as if her body had never moved before and never would again. She tucked herself in, letting the exhaustion pull her into sleep.

In her slumber, she wasn’t so much dreaming as she was hallucinating—visions haunting her like distorted versions of reality, frustratingly fragmented. It was like trying to complete a task but only ever getting one step done, unable to move forward. In her normal life, she spent much of her time on stimulants, hyper-fixated on her various hobbies. But now, even the comfort of her usual distractions seemed just beyond her grasp.

She imagined herself back in her own reality—in her pod, or maybe at home—searching the System Mundo feeds for mentions of her name. But every search led her in circles, each result linking back to the beginning. It was maddening.

At some point, the awful noise of the creature pursuing her began to bleed into her hallucinations.

She was back in her teenage years, watching a scene unfold from her past. Her father was arguing just out of earshot with his secretary, after she had beaten up a girl for having the same hair color as her. After that incident, her father had started leaving her care to the staff. She could hear the secretary's voice now, eerily distorted, saying, "ruum, ruum, ruum."

In another memory, she was recording her first big performance. The stage manager had offered her stimulants beforehand, and she gave the best performance of her life. It had felt like unlocking a hidden potential she didn’t even know she had. She remembered belting out the words, "ruum, ruum, ruum."

More memories came. She was back at her home on Terra, surrounded by people admiring her friend Ripley’s new baby. She had wanted to be as far away from it as possible. The thought of being responsible for something so small and fragile was infuriating. What if it just fell off a table and died? The idea seemed ridiculous, and yet... something primal stirred when the baby was placed in her arms. An odd mix of revulsion and fascination. She had felt an urge, not to harm it, but something more disturbing—an urge to protect it, even as she resented it. The baby had wailed, "ruum, ruum, ruum."

She awoke with a start, yawning. It didn’t feel like she had been asleep for very long. The same eerie noise echoed in her ears, this time from the world outside her head. It was close. Too close.

Shephatiah got to her feet and made her way to the edge of the cliff outside the elevator, leaning against a red guardrail. Looking down, just two meters below, she saw her pursuer.

The creature was slowly scaling the cliff, using its telescopic drill bit to bore into the rock, then pulling its massive body upward, inch by inch. Each movement was deliberate, methodical. It was coming for her.

Fueled by the urgency of her idea, Shephatiah rushed back into the elevator, frantically pressing the button to send it back down. As the doors slid shut, she quickly darted out again, watching the cell begin its descent. Moments later, she heard the sound of it coming to a halt, followed by a cacophony of metallic groans. The whirring of the drill started up again, and sparks flew up from below the cliff’s edge. The support structure of the elevator trembled ominously.

It was coming for her again, and there was nothing she could do to stop it. So she ran. She ran for ten minutes straight until her lungs burned and she couldn’t catch her breath. Despite the freezing air around her, her body felt unnervingly warm, almost feverish in its paradoxical nakedness. The cold didn’t bite anymore, which she knew was not a good sign.

She tried to pick up the pace, but in the dim, erratic light, she lost her footing and collapsed. Looking down, she noticed the bottoms of her feet and the scrapes along her arms and legs were bleeding. Tiny sparkles of red glistened in her wounds.

She pulled herself back to her feet, and a sudden warm current of air brushed against her. She followed it down a narrowing tunnel where the lights grew increasingly sparse. The air was warming, but the path was becoming darker, more confining. Soon, she could barely see. Each step forward forced her to brush against the icy walls. Her third fingernail snapped off while she was feeling her way ahead, and the ground beneath her feet began to slope upwards.

In the distance, a faint light broke through the darkness. She hadn't been able to see it earlier because of the contour of the path. She hurried toward it, desperate. When she finally arrived, she looked down at her feet—her toes were blackened, frostbitten beyond repair. Only her painted nails retained their original shade of Oînops Póntos. The bottoms of her feet were similarly ruined.

The regenerator was working, but it just couldn’t keep up.

Far below, beyond the curve of the path where the light disappeared, came the haunting call of the chaser: “ruum, ruum, ruum.”

Standing beneath the pale light amidst the encroaching gloom, Shephatiah felt more exposed and terrified than ever. The flow of warm air tugged at her, urging her forward. She plunged back into the near-darkness, heading toward the next island of light.

From her new vantage point, she glanced back at the previous light. Nothing. She waited, expecting to see the thing emerge into the light at any moment. But instead, a flash of movement on the far side of the lit area caught her eye. The creature had already bypassed it—it was much closer than she had realized.

She didn’t have a second to spare. In this terrain, the thing had found its stride, and now it was closing in fast. The sound of its movement reached her, the relentless clattering echoing in the narrow tunnel.

Running was nearly impossible. With her ruined toes, she struggled to maintain her balance, slipping and sliding with each step. The incline grew steeper, and every attempt to climb sent her sliding back down. Her entire body was numb, but beneath that numbness, the pain screamed louder with every moment.

Going down on all fours, Shephatiah managed to scramble up the small incline, then pushed herself back to her feet. After only a few steps, the path sloped again—this time longer and steeper. She couldn’t see how far or how high it went, but she pressed on, lowering herself to the ground and crawling forward like a big cat, using her palms and the balls of her feet. Whenever she felt herself losing grip, she’d scrunch her body up, arresting her fall. Slowly, she reached forward with one hand, making tiny, cautious steps. She spread her arms, grasping the icy ground, and pulled herself forward.

Her legs followed, until she was almost perpendicular to the slope. She wedged herself in place, one arm pulling while the other kept her from sliding back down the slanted terrain. With a final push, she rocked onto her back and, in one desperate motion, rolled over and upward, finally reaching the top.

She barely had time to catch her breath before the path inclined sharply again. A few steps ahead, she could make out the shadow of the hand-like robot, its shape shifting ominously in the near darkness. It wasn’t far behind, and she heard its mechanical call echoing one last time. It was closing in fast, the slope that had slowed her proving no obstacle to it.

Just then, Shephatiah realized the source of the warm air she’d been following—it was blowing from directly above. She’d reached the base of an icy metal ladder embedded in the wall. With no other option, she pressed herself against the wall and grabbed hold of the ladder, not caring if her already damaged nails or skin tore in the process.

Each time she gripped a rung, pain shot through her hands, but when her frostbitten feet pressed down on the rungs, it was unbearable. She screamed, but used the pain as fuel to keep going. One agonizing rung at a time, she pulled herself upward. Sometimes, she had to hook her arm around the ladder to avoid losing her grip while she repositioned her feet.

Though the air was warmer than the freezing cold below, it wasn’t by much. Up ahead, a faint pinprick of light appeared at the top of the shaft, at least thirty meters up. She had barely made it one-fifth of the way when the relentless machine filled the space below her.

This time, the robot didn’t make its usual sounds. Instead, it began unfurling its drill-like appendage, aiming it directly at her. The bit extended, turning slowly at first, but within moments it was spinning at a blinding speed, a three-meter blur of destruction.

Terror flooded her veins, overriding the pain. She climbed faster, pulling herself up rung by rung with wild, adrenaline-fueled desperation. She could feel the disturbance in the air as the bore whirred beneath her. It couldn’t quite reach her, but that didn’t stop it from trying. Then the drill inched higher. The robot was climbing up after her.

The spinning bore struck the ladder, knocking loose rungs that clattered down the shaft, some bouncing off the wall, others careening down into the darkness below. Shephatiah barely registered the sound. All she knew was that she had to keep climbing, no matter the cost.

It wasn’t using the ladder; instead, the passage was narrow enough for the machine to brace itself within the walls, slowly gaining elevation through sheer friction. As Shephatiah climbed steadily upward, the robot ascended in short, stuttering bursts. Yet, no matter how hard she pushed herself, she always seemed to be just one slip away from falling into its grasp.

Her strength was almost spent, her limbs trembling with fatigue, but the top was near. She could hear voices—human voices. One of them had a distinct British accent. She began screaming for help, her voice raw with desperation, over and over.

Suddenly, bright light blinded her, and she flinched, nearly losing her grip. Had she not been clinging to the ladder with her entire arm wrapped around a rung, she might have fallen right then and there.

She cried out in a frantic stream of half-coherent pleas, her mind frayed with panic. She didn’t care what happened—she needed help, salvation, anything. The voices above her grew louder, more urgent, and she realized there were multiple people up there, scrambling to reach her.

A strong, masculine hand grabbed hold of her arm. She glanced upward just in time to see a glove drop past her face, falling into the darkness below.