Chapter 6: Bonds
“Mila!”
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The door banged over and over, threatening to come off at the hinges.
“Mila! Open up, Mila!”
BANG! BANG! BANG!
“SHUT UP!!!”
The door swung open as a furious brunette glared at the nuisance before her. Shifting her coffee stained glasses, her gaze landed upon the limp boy in the man’s arms.
“Another poor sod, Nel?”
“I might live in a cave but I’ve made it my home. This isn’t my medical office.”
“I know, I know! I rushed to the infirmary but I couldn’t find you there. I don’t trust the other medics with the skills they have compared to you. So please, help the poor boy.”
“You know they’re actually quite good right? You just bring them zombies and expect the poor laborers to revive the dead. Just let them die.”
“Mila!”
“Alright, alright. I have some medicinal supplies on my lower floor, and put the boy on the table already, you fool!”
‘I had to move this goddamn medical table to my living space just because of you!’
…
“Another one. Another one just an inch away from death. No, this one should have died.”
“Will he li —”
“Get out. Now. I need to focus entirely on the procedure. I cannot have you distracting me. Get. Out.”
Nel looked at her, stunned, before quietly withdrawing and exiting the room.
“Even when Tyr’s missing arm bled all over her floor in rivers she could still find the time to quip at me…”
…
In the wide, spacious slave caverns, many men and women, boys and girls, sat aimlessly as the rain continued to pour.
In a particular room a mother was arguing with her young daughter.
“He wasn’t trying to take my food mom! Why did you have to do all of that?! Why!?”
The adorable little girl wailed and pouted but her mother paid her no heed.
“Everyone needs to know what’ll happen if someone even touches a hair on you, or your sister’s head! The world is dangerous, baby...”
The mother sighed.
She said sweetly,
“For you and Kara, my dear, you’re young and you don’t understand yet, but you’ll be thankful when you grow up.”
“No mom, I won’t…”
The girl sniffled as tears threatened to come out once more.
The mother walked up to her child, spreading her arms wide, she softly yet firmly embraced the crying little lady.
“You’re going to be safe. Mommy will make sure of that.”
‘And I’ll make an example out of anyone who dares to touch you…’
“Mommy you’re hurting me!”
Vivian snapped back to her senses.
“Sorry baby! Now go get Kara from the other room, I’ve got some extra bread for us that you girls can have.”
…
A boy with dark red hair laid down on the hard stone as his companions loitered about senselessly.
Staring at the ceiling, he gave a bored yet pondering look.
“Do you think he’s alive?”
A girl with black long hair and long legs replied,
“He looked like the type to hang on to life, so probably.”
As if on cue, all of them simultaneously looked to the girl sitting on a particularly elevated piece of stone. She appeared aloof, detached to the world around her. Her distant sky blue eyes shone like jewels in the dim darkness.
Hesitantly, the lovely black haired girl asked,
“So…what do you think?”
The beautiful princess turned her head. Her unconcerned, wandering eyes gleamed, turning sharp and purposeful as she looked down at the pretty black haired girl from her elevated stone throne. An invisible pressure descended upon the youths, making it hard to breathe.
An enchanting melodic voice passed through her lips, mesmerizing them.
Nonchalantly,
“Hmmm?”
“No umm…well…uhhh…”
The black haired girl stumbled upon her words as the air of royalty bore down upon her.
“Umm well…your hi…uhhhhhh…”
The princess tilted her head, blinking her eyes in playful ignorance.
“Kkkka —...Ke…Ke…Kae…….Kaerys.”
The girl smiled.
“Yes?”
“What did you…no uhh…what do you think abou—”
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“Why did you let him see through your veil?”
The dark red haired boy interrupted. The black haired girl stared at him with her mouth wide open, glaring him down in disbelief and exasperation. His companions meanwhile, stared at him like an idiot, wondering if there was anything, anything at all, going on in his head.
The girl showed a pondering expression before the corner of her lips moved, turning wide, she shined a beautiful, captivating smile.
“I didn’t.”
…
Cole sat on the cold stone floor, hugging his knees in shame and self hatred.
A group of his fellow slaves approached him.
“You were the one who told on your friend, didn’t you?”
“We heard the shouts and men screaming when they chased after him, right into twenty others.”
“...”
“Say something coward!”
Cole was silent, burying his head further towards the ground.
A man grabbed the lifeless youth, holding him up above the floor before they surrounded him.
“Stop my brothers!”
A bearded, stocky man limped forward, behind him, a small group of followers.
“Don’t you know what the red haired boy was trying to show with his actions!”
“We should be fighting the slavers, not amongst ourselves!”
“...”
The leading man looked at them in disdain, scoffed, and then dropped the dull bag of bones.
THUMP!
The boy fell to the floor with a miserable expression as if tears were about to come out again.
“You’re not even worth being beaten, boy.”
The men did not look back as they left the scene.
“Wait.”
The bearded man stopped them.
“What?”
“Jole…they don’t seem like the type…”
“Please, hear us out and see if…if our ideas interest you.”
“What the hell are you even talking about?”
“It’ll be in the darkness of the further caverns — our discussions, that is. Please come, even if only once.”
“What the hell…”
“Let’s go. Leave the guy and his looneys behind.”
…
Echoes of their steps grew more and more distant as they walked away.
The stocky bearded man approached Cole as he knelt on one knee,
“Boy, are you alright?”
“I’m sorry if those men were rough to you, they are just like us, frustrated and tired of these unfair chains that have been put upon us.”
“Their focus is wrong but their heart is right.”
“Would you…would you like to come with us, boy?”
“No…not boy…what is your name, child?”
“..........”
“...Alright.”
The man got up from his position,
“Just let me know if you are in any trouble, dear child. A child as young as you should not have to handle…this…all of this, alone. We, your fellow slaves, fellow brothers and sisters are here for you.”
The man limped along as his followers took one last glance at Cole, before moving forwards too.
Cole sighed and continued to look towards the ground.
Suddenly, the color brown covered half of his vision. He looked slightly upwards to see that it was a piece of hard bread.
Cole shook his head, he didn't want it. He didn't deserve it. And he simply did not feel like eating.
Then, the bread poked at his cheek. He looked upwards, annoyed.
What he saw wasn't the bearded man, nor any of his followers, but a small five year old girl. The baby fat still lingering in her cheeks made her as adorable as she was.
He looked at her for a long moment before taking the piece of bread. Slowly he raised his palm, placing it gently on her soft silver hair, and patting her head.
The curious child raised her own hand above her head, and started patting Cole’s head too. She smiled a toothy smile, with all that she had.
Cole…started to smile too. For the first time in a long time, he had smiled without thinking about anything else.
…
“Nel. Get in here, it’s done.”
Nel’s heavy head rose as he got up from the wooden chair. He entered the stone room to see an exhausted but alluring woman in a bloodied white lab coat. She put her hands on the table for support, clearly she needed it to even keep standing. Bloodied rags and bandages laid on the floor messily as various unknown tools, tools with unknown purpose even to the best medical practitioners, laid on the table and the floor in complete disarray.
The black haired man turned his head to the table where a boy could be seen. A cast on his right heel and right fist, bandages all over his body starting at the head, all the way towards his toes— they wrapped tightly around him, afraid that he would shatter into pieces for good.
He looked like a mummy.
The bandages on his back especially, were dyed red once again. In fact, the most bandages that laid red around him were from his back.
“If it was anyone else they wouldn’t have the confidence to say this, but he’ll make a full recovery.”
“Really!?”
“Yes, it’s me you doofus so of course he will.”
“Everything was pretty much standard. Multiple contusions all around the body. Broken hand, broken heel, broken ribs.”
“I admit the slight depressive fracture on his forehead was interesting, must have headbutted another poor fool. But his back…the muscles were destroyed, his skin and nerve tissue were heavily damaged if not almost gone from certain parts of his back. Seems like some cruel and especially callous slaver loved seeing his work. Maybe closed his eyes when he was whipping him, hoping to see a surprise at the end.”
Nel felt tears around his eyes, he might have cried if he wasn’t about to puke, as he ran out of the room.
“Nel!?”
…
“Are you done? You puked right outside my damn home!”
“I have to see and smell that whenever I get out of my house in the morning!”
“...It was me.”
“What? Of course it was you who made this mess, what the hell!”
“I did it…his back is because of me.”
“...”
“You’re not the type to do that.”
“Yeah but I still did it.”
“You’re pathetic. You think I don’t know that Delon probably had a hand in this?”
“I should have…”
“Yeah you should have stood up to him. Or done something, or anything. You have the same standing and birth status, you’re even physically stronger than him. I don’t know what’s stopping you but the more you let him do whatever he wants, the more poor fools I have to deal with.”
“Actually, all the people you’ve brought to my house were indirectly or directly because of him!”
“Get the hell out of my home!!!”
“Wait! What about the boy?”
“I’ll handle him! Get the hell out! I don’t have the time or energy for you.”
Nel hesitated, his mouth opened to respond but no words came out. He turned his head, moping, and walked off into the rain and darkness.
Mila saw him off. She slammed her door carelessly, entering into the medical room with the battered boy once again. She looked at him with pity and sweet attention as she caressed his head and ran her hands through his hair.
She sighed.
“He would have been just as old as you.”
…
Lightning flashed and thunder boomed as the flooding rain became apocalyptic. Zan awoke. Much earlier than he was supposed to, but the boy was an outlier anyway so it was not too much of a surprise.
He felt that his back and chest and every part of his mangled body had been bandaged, yet the pain in his back assaulted him first and he slowly but hurriedly sat up.
His stomach rumbled. Once again, he was starving.
Looking around he saw various medicinal supplies and tools laying on the ground, most of them covered with assumedly his blood. There were various tubes going inside of his veins as well, all around his body.
‘Weird…’
He ripped them off before hopping off the table with his left foot, limping along with some white shell around his right heel and right hand. His vague intuition once again warned him that he should probably keep the weird objects on…
‘Keep my bones together? Never really seen doctor-things before…Never been to a real doctor either.’
‘Why does my body feel even better? But I’m so fucking hungry. I’m hungrier than yesterday! What the hell…’
He lightly hopped to the only entrance and exit before looking back, taking a full view of the medical table he was laying down on. Various mechanical arms were lodged on to the table, bending at various strange angles.
Some of the mechanical arms ended with drills, some with pliers, one of them ended with a saw…were those straps on the table? It was a strange sight, but Zan assumed it was part of the doctor fiasco.
‘Really really weird…but whatever.’
He exited the medical room to be welcomed into a luxurious and open cave home. It was decorated with glass windows opening up to the southern open sky. The moonlight shone through, illuminating silken rugs, lavish decorative items and various plants that he had never seen before.
RUMBLE!
The gaping hole inside him demanded to be filled once again. Zan’s eyes gleamed. It was time to go on another raid…
The bread bandit wandered from room to room searching for food. Before he knew it, he was standing directly over the sleeping doctor.
‘She looks like my mom…’
A striking resemblance. Apart from the woman in front of him having brown hair, while his mother had bright red hair.
On her nightstand, there was a photo frame of her with what looked like her husband and her son. Zan was once again reminded of his orphan status, leaving a bitter taste in his mouth.
‘What am I even doing here…’
He hopped along depressingly towards the exit…
As Zan exited the bedroom he caught sight of a tunnel, hiding behind a beautifully intricate beaded door curtain. The tunnel sloped downwards at a comfortable angle to which Zan didn’t have to worry about tripping on his one good hopping leg.
Reaching the end of the tunnel, what welcomed him was an abundance of medical supplies, tools, and most importantly, food.
Fruits! Dry meat! Amazing! Delicious!
‘What is that over there?’
It was metallic and large, but there seemed to be a handle on its door.
Zan went over to the large rectangular thing, but first he closed his eyes and felt deep within.
It was something he would do when making decisions with unknown and possibly terrible consequences.
‘My senses aren’t firing up…no, instead…it should be something good?’
He yanked the metal handle, opening the metal box. A blast of cold air hit him as he got into fighting stance with his only working limbs. What he saw however, was not something potentially dangerous, but more food.
Cooked food! A kind of soup? What is this brown triangular slice? Rice lathered with some kind of yellow paste? Combined with vegetables of some sort?
‘Interesting, interesting…I should check if they’re poisoned to show my good will for taking care of me…’
…
Zan sat on the floor, he would have laid his back to the wall in pleasure, if doing so wouldn’t bring unimaginable pain to him. Still, however, he had gorged himself upon the contents of the strange metal box, to which he was now staring at in gratitude and satisfaction.
‘Mmm the food was a little cold but it was still delicious mmmhmmmmm…’
‘...Alright, time to go.’
Zan hopped along when he heard a strange but echoing sound. He stopped.
Thump!
Zan hopped in place.
Thump! Thump! Thump!
‘Hm?’
He removed the luxurious silken rug underneath to discover a hatch.
‘It is still the dead of night…’ he thought to himself.
Zan always liked seeing new things. Always dreaming of setting out into the wide world. He would not deny himself this opportunity to see more of it, although the hatch was a little odd.
‘I can just come back up in an hour, it should be fine.’
Humming a jolly tune, he opened the hatch to see a ladder that descended into darkness.
Good thing he wasn’t afraid of the dark! He had been living in pitch black for a year now after all.
Zan climbed down. The red haired boy descended, and descended and descended…