“PLEASE CALM DOWN, PLEASE CALM DOWN, PLEASE CALM DOWN, CALM DOWN PLEASE”
Jackie looked over her shoulder as she saw the advancing drones rush after them in an army formation. The thing they shouldn’t have done when they programmed these things, she thought, was telling people to calm down. That never calms down a person in recorded human history.
Never mind them chasing the girls, never mind being immune to their superpowers, and never mind the fact they can emerge and merge with buildings around them. The fact they’re screaming “calm down” over and over added to the anxiety of the situation.
Abilities do not work, and even if they did they’re not at 100% when 100% is needed right now, and the one with the ability to become steam and the only one that can escape through that, is holding the item they need or else this is for nothing. And above all else, the street kid that usually knew where to go isn’t here right now, and they have to get her once this is all over too.
Maybe it was the fact she was used to it at this point, but Jackie just sighed through the nose, nodding to herself. The usual unwinnable scenario they’ve been plunged in.
At least, now, they understand their true strength was their crippling weakness: they had to run and run for a long time.
She could feel it. While she was getting tired, it was like her body was starting to set into a mode of contingencies. Her legs from before would’ve been burning in agony, but now? Hurting, but siVis added automatically to stabilize and ease off the effort.
It was because of her bare feet that she sensed the streets starting to writhe.
Jackie turned to the others to warn them, only for the various blinking lights around them, that told them for her.
The robots’ eyes activated all around them. Flickering on the walls, the sidewalks, the streetlights, even erected street advertisements.
“There’s none of them chasing us--!” Aiko reported. “So they’re all in the ground, guys!”
Before Jackie swallowed in concern, she felt the tides literally change.
The street—the ground under their feet itself—begun to push against them. Still asphalt mutating into a makeshift treadmill. Full power and prejudice, despite moments ago, these machines wanting to aid, “help” them.
Of course, the sudden change of movement was more than enough, to cause them to stumble forward, in the case of Tracy screaming as they feebly try to regain their balance. siVis use from before, once focused on the lower bodies, now scrambling as much as they were, shooting across the body to somehow save this.
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In the series of thoughts flurrying within her mind, Jackie knew more than enough that this was bad. Once they fall, they’re tumbling until they feel like stopping. And it’s going to take less than two rounds of rolling and slamming back onto the moving ground to batter them. Everything was in their court now, and if they can do this, then any surface of the city is compromised.
As she heard the screaming, the clearly strained grunting, and the soft muttering of determination—Jackie tried manifesting a solution in her pounding head. But nothing came.
In that precious split second, she then wondered… Why not surrender to that nothingness?
Closing her eyes, now floating in her Mindscape. Nothing there, but her thoughts and experiences projected against the “walls”.
Looking up, as if it were calling to her, she saw the one memory.
She realized and screamed.
“The Mangrove Mall! When we tried getting through! The fuck with the ground siVis! We’ve been through this before!”
And like that, the realization gave her siVis the moment to surge, target across the pivotal areas that she needed, as she focused on that moment. Remembering the frustration, realizing how fast she went in that moment of anger.
Her foot slammed down, sending the shockwave of siVis to flare up the leg, locking at knee cups, the core, the spine as she was forced forward. Jackie started to sprint, leaning as her arms swung and her brow furrowed.
She turned to turn her head, but she snapped forward again. “Girls, tell me that you’re still with me--!”
“Yo—aah—you’re ahead, but we-we’re behind you!” Tracy struggled to shout from afar.
“Good thinking—” River forced out while coughing. “—Saved our asses—”
Jackie exhaled in relief, and how she was immediately consumed by aching. Looking forward, she immediately realized the folly of this plan.
In the case of the siVis user, there was the user. A target that they could focus on, to give them the boost to keep pushing on. This was the street pushing back, the city itself pushing back. No visible area ahead that the effect stops, no other pathways forking to give them an out. It dawned on her that this is just going to be an endurance match, and despite having the edge, to engage in it so soon is crushing.
So, when the speeds begun to ease down, Jackie was mentally and visibly confused.
The street ceased its movements, and Jackie bolted forward in full force. She made it at the end of the street, and as soon as she saw a turn they could take, she did not hesitate.
She didn’t care if it were a tactical mistake, Jackie forced herself out of her sprinting run. The weight of such flowed down her body, only for the strain and exhaustion to rise up.
“The hell was that—” she asked, looking back to see the girls also doing the same, as they caught up. “What the hell was that?!”
“If you don’t know, we don’t know—” Tracy panted out.
Before Jackie tried to argue back that they have minds, River shouted out.
“Maybe there’s a limited timetable--?”
Jackie paused, then looked forward.
“Of course--!” Jackie looked back at River. “No one in their right mind would surrender all of the control over the place they’re sleeping in—maybe they do have a limited timetamble—timetable, sorry!”
“DON’T GET TOO COMFORTABLE, GUYS!” Aiko screamed out as she pointed forward. “THEY’RE TRYING SOMETHING DIFFERENT RIGHT NOW!”
Snapping her head towards that direction, Jackie huffed in mild panic at what she saw.