Jackie tried to wrestle with herself, force herself, to get up from rock bottom. But she found herself sinking further down.

In a shock, she realized that she was slowly but surely being swallowed by this… metal. What she thought was her making an indent to where she fell—now it made sense of how that happened in the first place.

Aiko was there to rescue, frantically pulling her leader up by both her arms with a notable struggle. Jackie shrieked out, due to the back pain shooting up her back all at once, causing the Aiko that once did whatever she wanted, to pause again with big, fearful eyes.

“Please please please please, keep going! Keep going!” Jackie shouted at her, emotions bursting out in a surge.

Aiko jumped in her skin, and jerked Jackie upwards, causing the girl to be in so much pain, that her shout was caught off by own herself.

Jackie unscrunching her eyes in pain, they trained on the drenched, stressed face of Aiko looking at her.

“You need this-this thing, more than me--!” she bleated.

“NO!” Jackie screamed, causing Aiko to jump. She had to close her eyes again, and desperately catch the breaths that have long since winded out of her.

In that brief moment of clarity within this prolonged agony, that she remembered using pain as a spark. A motivator.

She shot siVis down across her back, tensing up and hearing crackling as it progressed as she shook on the spot.

And then she went further.

From this area, she further extended the siVis onto the back of her arms and legs. Creating a backbone in the most literal sense, with the added ability to use her arms as it worked as silts.

Looking back at Aiko when she was done, all she saw was a brave face stretched into worry.

“I did this,” she strained. “This is all my fault… For… For once… Let me take it all… On me… Instead of you…”

“Jackie…” Aiko sounded pained. Distant.

“I know… You want to help… Just…”

She forced herself to move, moving from the front of Aiko and ending up at her side.

“Ease the weight… Take me to her…”

Aiko nodded. She allowed Jackie to hook her arm around her neck, as Aiko wrapped her own arm gently around her side. The duo supported each other, limping within the green-tinted darkness.

The sense of time. The sense of distance. It was ebbing away from both of their minds, but more scrapping away at Jackie’s mind. Every forced movement she made, the pieces she constructed clattered audibly and the pain dug further and further in.

But they made it.

The scene Jackie stumbled into, was too heartbreaking for words.

Tracy was cradling herself, within a massive hole. Back shown towards them, her once lovely dress just a gathering of tossed-away cloth. Still.

River was staggering, shifting on her feet, at the edge of the hole. Trying to figure out how to get down there to save her. But, there was no calculation on her face. Just blank. A blank mind trying to think of something, but incapable.

“Where’s Maddie--?” Jackie looked to Aiko, feeling her move up and down by the second.

Jackie was turned around and got her terrible answer.

The small girl was twitching, on her side. Her lifeless arms covered most of her face, twisted in pain, her curls matted all over her cheek, mouth, and nose. The breathing was slow and haggard. She wasn’t even awake.

“Help her,” Jackie told Aiko. “Plug the thing into her, carefully.”

“And you…?” Aiko looked at her.

“I’ll handle River and Tracy…”

Aiko nodded, and slowly left Jackie to her devices. Which clicked into place, as she took slow, arduous steps towards the two girls, positioning herself to face River.

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“What’s going on, River…?”

River shook her head, not meeting Jackie’s gaze. While River never meets anyone’s gazes, this was, again, blank. Blank and drained.

“I’ll just help her out, help out her out because I managed to get myself out, I’m tired but that doesn’t matter, I’ll just help her out, helping her out means that I help everyone else out, and we need out, so I’ll just help out-“

Her tone was droning. Raspy. Blank. Drained.

If Jackie was lost to talk, to help River before…

She knew she had to nip this in the bud, and quick.

Launching herself on her side, she positioned herself using her control and slid down the hole’s walls. Gritting her teeth and letting the beads of tears blast away by the wind.

And just as quickly, found herself slamming into the other side.

Groaning, buckling once again under her own pathetic weight… She struggled to rise again.

“You have the power… To get out of this, Tracy…” Jackie began. “We have to push through this… Just one more…”

“It’s always ‘one more’. Something in the way.”

Tracy was unnervingly lucid. Jackie couldn’t see her face.

“But all the same, it ends. It’s a sign, Jackie Jackson. It’s a sign that we’ve ruined our lives beyond repair. And we rest in the pieces of it. Until we break apart slowly ourselves.”

“We’re not having this conversation…!” desperation defined Jackie’s voice. “Not when someone you know is dying of sickness!”

“And that’s one me too…” Tracy said, solemn. “I tried to stick around. Because of that epiphany… That I could rebuild the life I single-handedly ruined by helping others. Being with you. But I can’t rebuild anything. All of the pieces broke already in my fucking paranoid hands. Always always always.”

Jackie strained her face, before letting everything out.

“IT’S MY FAULT! EVERYTHING! Every single thing—I’m the one that kept pestering you! I’m the one that kept telling you that there was hope…! It’s been me! Blame it all on me!”

Tracy then turned onto her back, looking up at the crippled girl.

“Just… You can choose… To leave. All of this… Just help us one last time…”

Tracy’s eyes still held that worried expression she was able to do so well, doughy, pitiful. But she was searching Jackie’s expression at that moment.

The woman offered her hand to Jackie, and she instantly took it.

Tears welled up in Jackie’s eyes, but had to clear them by closing them tight. She had to help Tracy, after all.

Pulling her up while wincing, Tracy stood up on her own, still looking defeated. As if she really will leave after all of this. If there will be.

Jackie looked down, and Tracy positioned her arms downwards.

PERSPECTIVE FLIP!

Jackie felt them rise, moving up slowly but surely as River got more and more bigger and focused.

Making it back up, Tracy quickly hugged a muttering River. This caused her to stop.

“I know you wouldn’t want this to happen…” Tracy snuggled her closer. “Even if you did save me. So here. Something you deserve.”

River struggled to raise her arm, to wrap around her beloved crush… But let it flop back to her side.

Jackie turned away, letting them have their private moment.

“Davenboy!” Jackie screamed at. “How is she?!”

Aiko was crouched down, holding Maddie’s shivering arm that had the badge implanted.

“You wanted me to stay silent for your comfort—” it answered.

“Tell me what’s the damage! Now!”

The lines turned flat. And within moments, came online again.

“I am sorry…” the Davenboy began. “This person needed help a long time ago. Now they face a very grave illness, and must seek medical attention right away.”

Jackie started to cry again.

“A-and is help coming…?”

The lines flattened and resumed in seconds.

“Now, while there are no signs of help—”

Jackie buried her face into her fists, as the same message continued to play. Sobbing messily.

She felt a hand squeeze her shoulder, weakly.

“Jackie. We’re the only ones that can get out of this,” River reasoned, still drained. “It’s not a matter of ‘if’ or ‘try’ anymore…”

Jackie looked up from her misery, and saw a poor girl on the floor, fighting for her life that she always made fun of.

She wouldn’t want this.

Jackie huffed, looking up at the wall before them

“Tr-Tracy…” Jackie sniffled. “Teardown that fucking wall.”

“I can’t just do that…” Tracy countered. “I never… I never did anything that big.”

Jackie paused, taking that in.

“Fine. Make a hole in that fucking wall.”

“That…” Tracy rose her hands and made them into fists.

PERSPECTIVE FLIP!

And soon, a hole was hollowed out, a “lid” that had the “fillings” being raised up on top.

Jackie rushed towards Maddie, scooping her up and putting her on her back.

“We’re punching our way out.”

She got low, as she walked towards the hole. Climbing in, and if it wasn’t for the Davenboy, would’ve been plunged into darkness.

The texture was too smooth and glossy. It was hard to grip, but her calmy skin stuck to the finish, giving her and the others the grease they needed.

Crawling. Struggling. Hurting. It didn’t matter, she was aiming to reach where this hole ended. Getting there after panting against the metal.

She raised her fist. Her damaged hand. And it glowed blue.

INNATE DRIVE

She swung, pushing the wall back and thus creating a tunnel.

The arm went limp, as she lay on it. Huffing through her nose. She pounded her fist against the ground, causing a growing dent from that alone, despite how instantly sore it felt when she was done.

“Are you guys here?!” she roared out, as it echoed.

“Yeah,” River sounded distant. But Jackie heard the soft pattering afterward.

Her arm came back to life, and Jackie continued the terrible grind.

That was their life at the moment. Jackie went forward, using her fist to tunnel further up. Having an agonizing wait as every single injury slowly takes its toll. Not even worms struggle to do what they were doing.

Jackie felt Maddie struggle to take breaths. She was burning, rising in temperatures.

They had no time left. They had to take ground.

But what didn’t prepare them, was feeling a certain dent again…

Jackie looked down, feeling it up, fueled by her nerves.

“What--?” Tracy began to ask, as the “lid” cut her off as it fell down, closing them in.