Memory transcription subject: Lewis Blake, human refugee

Date [Standardized human time]: August 23rd, 2148

[Day 16]

“Oh god, oh god,” I muttered as I popped off the helmet. Charlotte sputtered and coughed. I made eye contact with Ivan, who was white as a sheet. A light spattering of blood coated her lips that I wiped with my sleeve.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, tilting her head.

“Nothing’s wrong,” I replied, tears stinging in my eyes. “We’re gonna keep moving, okay?”

“Okay, Lewie!” she smiled, blood between her flat teeth.

I peeked outside again, then consulted the holopad’s map. My hands were almost too shaky to read it. Charlotte put her paws on my wrists to stabilize me, which shattered my heart. We were closer to the woods now, the border was just ahead. “Stay strong, little lady,” Ivan whispered, “let’s keep moving.”

We exited through a side window, putting us right on a sidewalk that turned about 4 blocks out, with the forest directly in front of us. We ducked and weaved down alleyways, only spying on one exterminator along the way that we thankfully did not need to dispatch. Charlotte’s coughing got worse as we went on, I had to turn down the output volume on the helmet just to keep us from getting caught.

I twisted the dial on the front of the mask, her coughing went quieter. “If you need to tell us something, just twist this, okay?” I explained while we were ducked between a bakery and a flower shop. She toyed with the dial a little, her giggles boomed, then silenced, and she gave a thumbs up. I patted her head and scooped her back up into my arms to keep moving.

By the edge of the woods, I was starting to lose steam. It was hard running in the higher gravity, but running while carrying a person is even harder.

The sidewalk was along a pretty steep, muddy slope that led down into the woods. It was the worst possible place to enter. Ivan gestured for me to go first. I slid down the mud, trying my hardest to maintain balance while accelerating through the slick sludge. The bottom of the slope was covered in brambles that slashed my legs as I zoomed through them.

“You okay?” Ivan called. I pried myself from the bush onto flat land, set down Char, and rolled up a pant leg. My leg was covered in dirt and blood. “I’m a little sliced up,” I answered, “But I’ll be okay.”

Charlotte hugged my leg to make me feel better, staining the suit and burning the wounds. I rolled the pants back down and lifted her up while Ivan slid down to meet us. He narrowly avoided the brambles and ushered me along a small path through the trees.

~~~

We walked maybe an hour or two. The wetness on my leg dried soon enough, and Charlotte turned up the mic to speak. “Lewie?” she asked.

“What’s up, Char?”

“I’ve gotta go,” she was wiggling in my arms.

“You’ve gotta go? Now?” she nodded quickly. I locked eyes with Ivan.

“Plenty of bushes and trees about, we have time,” he said simply.

“Okay, yeah,” I set the pup down and helped her out of the suit. “Go find somewhere private, okay? If you need us, just yell. We’ll be right here when you’re done, alright?” I told her.

“Okay, Lewie,” she replied, bounding off. I sat down on the forest floor, thankfully dryer than the slope we slid down, and idly picked at the mud coating my shoes.

“Are you alright, Lewis?” Ivan asked, sitting down in front of me. He was a lot taller than me standing up but sitting felt like like we were almost on eye level.

I shook my head, trying to keep myself from crying. “I’m worried about her, really worried. I don’t even know how she caught the- the flu. And god… the death toll… I can’t- I can’t lose her,” I muttered shakily. “What are we supposed-” a shrill scream broke our conversation. In an instant, I was up and sprinting toward her. My heart was pounding, and tears stung my eyes and clouded my vision.

I broke through thick brambles into a clearing. Charlotte was standing alone in the center, thank god, but looked petrified.

“Char-” I huffed, “what is…” my words cut. Leaned up against a tree was a body left decomposing and swarming with insects. It was almost skeletal, with bits of fluff clinging to its rotted chest and dark orange skull. It had a gun in one hand, and a hole in its skull. It had clearly been out here for a while. The ground beneath my feet felt shifty like the dirt was freshly dug up.

I ran to the pup and swept her up, trying my best to cover her eyes. “Hey, hey, don’t look,” I whispered. “Don’t look at that.”

My hands were wet, and she was crying into my shirt. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” I cooed. She wrapped her arms tight around me, and I carried her away from the rotten corpse. “Did you go?” I asked her. She nodded a teary reply. “Okay, that’s good. We’re gonna keep moving. It’ll all be okay,” I shuffled to get a better hold of her.

“Ouch!” she cried.

“What? Hey, what happened?” I asked. Ivan approached, glancing at her legs.

“Looks like she had a run-in with the brambles,” he observed. I craned my neck to see past her fluffy head. Her legs and tail were cut, and splotches of orange were vibrant against her snowy fur.

I adjusted again, making sure there was no chance I accidentally brushed the wounds again. “We’ll get you all patched up when we get to town, okay?” I asked.

She tried to reply but ended up coughing heavily into my shirt, and a splatter of warm blood hit my chest. I held tighter.

“Ivan, can you fish the holopad out of my pocket and help me figure out where we are?” I asked. He obliged, pulling out the device and opening up the map. We were another hour from the border and 4 from the highway.

“Let’s get a move on, we’ll rest when we’re out of the city’s limits,” Ivan affirmed.

~~~

The sun remained in exactly the same spot, it was impossible to tell how far we moved. I tried to keep Charlotte’s spirits up with road trip games my parents used to play, stuff like I Spy or Twenty Questions. After the millionth “I spy something… blue,” we started seeing signs of activity.

There were old hiking trails, which definitely helped make the walking easier, but there were also stumps where trees had been cut and signs that warned we were approaching Ransu’s city limits. One read “PLAGUE” in bold script.

I realized then that we forgot the suit way back when we found the corpse. “Try and keep your voice down, Char,” I whispered.

The map showed we were very close. I turned it off to keep the glow from potentially giving us up. Ivan clicked off the rifle’s safety and pointed it forward.

Up ahead the trees thinned, and the forest floor was bare dirt with a shoddily constructed concrete wall. Parts showed exposed rebar or were partially crumbled, likely from other people coming through here. I noticed parts of it looked scorched too, and hoped no exterminators were near.

Ivan led the way, breaking free of the forest and glancing along the border wall. It didn’t look very thick, and it was only about 8 feet tall. We could get over it. Ivan gave me a leg up, and I balanced on top of the wall. It felt very weak, and it was sort of rounded, so I couldn’t balance well. He lifted Charlotte up, and I held her while I leaped down to the other side.

“Lewis, catch,” Ivan yelled. I heard a few clicks, then the rifle flew up over the wall. I caught it, then the magazine slapped me right in the face. “Aw! Shit!” I cried.

“Lewie! That’s a bad word,” Charlotte scolded me.

“Sorry, Char,” I said. I heard Ivan start climbing over, and soon enough he landed next to us. I handed him back the rifle, which he hastily reloaded. “We’re home free,” he smiled.

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“Let’s go-”

A gunshot rang out from far away. I fell to the ground, landing hard on my arm. My thigh suddenly felt warm, wet, and burned painfully.

“Lewis!” Ivan yelled, throwing me over his shoulder and scooping Charlotte up in his other arm.

Another gunshot echoed through the woods, crashing through the tree next to us, and leaving a sizeable hole. Ivan’s shirt was drenched red.

“Fuck!” I cried, putting a hand on my thigh, which came back completely soaked in blood. They kept shooting. Ivan was sprinting full force, I could hear voices behind us.

“Cover your ears, little lady,” Ivan boomed while I took the rifle hanging limply around his shoulder. I could spy far-off glints of the exterminator’s suits, and aimed for their centers. I squeezed off a few shots, feeling the vibrations of the sound reverberating in my skull and making my ears ring.

Most of the bullets missed, but I spied at least one ochre splash from an exterminator’s chest. He fell, but we were still being tailed by a lot of venlil.

“Lewis,” Ivan said quickly, “Can you run?”

“What? Uh, probably?” I kicked my leg, it still worked fine, and the adrenaline kept me from feeling the worst of the gunshot.

“Yeah, I can,” I answered.

He roughly set me down, “Good. Take her and go,” he screamed.

“Huh?” I exclaimed incredulously, “Where are you going?”

“To buy you an escape. They won’t keep following you if I can take them. We’ll meet back up, okay?” He was lying and he knew it.

“You don’t know how many of them there are!” I exclaimed. “You’ll-”

“GO DAMNIT!” He roared. I listened, feeling guilty as I heard the gunshots amp up behind us. The sounds of the flamethrowers were faint but audible, but I kept running. I didn’t turn around. I couldn’t.

I kept sprinting, even after the sounds fully ceased. Long after my pant leg was fully soaked red. I was dizzy by the time I stopped, and Charlotte was passed out in my arms. How long had I been running? I swept some leaves into a makeshift pillow and laid the pup down carefully. The poor girl was worn out.

I lay down on the hard ground and stared up into the purple sky between gaps in the tree leaves. The blood loss was really affecting my vision, so I used my knife to cut a chunk off the pant leg and tie a makeshift tourniquet above the wound.

When I was finished, I scooted closer to Charlotte, making sure she was still breathing, and then cried.

~~~

Memory transcription subject: Lewis Blake, human refugee

Date [Standardized human time]: August 24th, 2148

[Day 17]

I woke up with a dry mouth and a bad headache. I rolled over to see Charlotte still fast asleep, with noticeably more blood caked on her lips. I stood on shaky legs, my thigh where I was shot was in agony, but thankfully had stopped bleeding for the most part. It was pretty far to the side, almost a graze, and the bullet went straight through. I was really lucky venlil had such bad aim.

I picked Charlotte up carefully after consulting the map and began walking toward the highway. Without Ivan, we were defenseless now. I couldn’t pull off any daring saves with just the tiny knife sheathed at my waist. I noticed while walking, that the cuts from the brambles on Charlotte’s legs were looking a lot darker than they should have been. Dark orange, almost black in places, and the tiny bits of skin I could see beneath the finer fur on her legs were discolored.

I quickened my pace, accidentally jostling her awake.

“Good morning, Lewie,” she yawned.

“Heya there, Char, how’re you feeling?”

“I feel funny,” she replied. “My legs are tingly.”

I grimaced, “We’re almost to the highway, we’re gonna get you to a doctor, okay?”

“Okay,” she said. “My daddy was a doctor, he said he and Mama made me in a tube,” she said matter-of-factly.

“Yeah? Tell me a bit about them,” I said.

“Mama was a human, but daddy wanted to have babies, so they had to make me in the lab,” she said. “That’s why I have a nose and daddy doesn’t,” she sniffled.

Well, that explains a lot. “What was your dad like?” I asked. She smiled fondly, “He was real smart, and talked with big words. And he was really happy all the time, even when I was bad. He told me it was okay to be bad sometimes because you learn to be good.”

I nodded my head, “Solid life lesson. I don’t think you’ve been very bad since I met you,” I said.

“That’s cause I learned,” she answered.

“How about your mama? What was she like?” I regretted the question when her smile faltered, and her eyes betrayed her emotions.

“Mama was sick, daddy had to stay with her at the doctor’s. And one day he came home, and he told me she was gone,” she sniffed. “He gave me a big hug, and he was crying. But I was really little, I don’t remember what she was like before she got sick.”

“I’m sorry, Char. I didn’t know she- I’m sorry,” I said.

“It’s okay, Lewie. Daddy says hard questions are important to answer,” she said, hugging my neck.

We kept walking until the trees started to thin. I spotted pavement and knew we were almost there. “There’s the road, Char,” I exclaimed.

The pup gazed out across the blacktop. She nodded, very slowly. Too slowly.

“Charlotte?” I asked. “Char?”

She rested her head on my arm, not giving a response. I held her out, examining her up and down. She was limp, and burning up. I hadn’t even noticed how hot she was. “Shit, shit, shit!” I muttered, trying desperately to wake her up. “Charlotte!” I cried.

I started running. The wound on my leg spurted fresh, painful blood, but I had renewed vigor. My feet heavily slapped the pavement. Far in the distance, I could barely spy the skyline of Dayside City. The sun was hotter overhead here than it was in Ransu, with the rainy season coming to a close, there was hardly a cloud in the sky.

“Hang on, Char, please,” I panted, tears spilling down my face and mixing with the caked-on mud and blood. A car horn caught me off guard, I nearly fell from just how hard I flinched.

A pickup truck was roaring toward me, the windows were too tinted to make out the faces of the drivers, but they were speeding frantically from the direction of Beiton. It honked again, and I moved off the road, watching it slow down and come to a full halt. It was obvious this wasn’t an automated truck, it had to be venlil make, and probably pre-war.

The passenger window rolled down, and the face of a venlil with white fur dotted with black splotches peered out.

“Hey! You going to Dayside?” he called out.

I was weary of the venlil but then spied a human in the driver's seat. He had red hair, green eyes, and a very concerned look.

“I- yeah, I am…” I said. The venlil turned and whispered something to his friend, then yelled back “We can take you and that kid, you look like you need a doctor badly,” he said.

“I can’t get in the car with you,” I responded. “She’s sick.”

“So was I, it’s hard to catch it twice. Now get in,” he said firmly.

I looked down at the pup, her breathing was shallow, then at the pair in the truck. If this was some scheme to take us out, it was very believable. It could be my only shot to save her. She was dead if I kept walking alone, so I quickly clambered into a seat behind the venlil, and they stepped on the gas.

“You just get out of Beiton?” The venlil asked.

I shook my head, “No, we’re from Ransu.”

“Oh stars, no wonder you’re so banged up. Have you seen the news lately? Exterminators have the entire city completely on lockdown. They’ve got snipers to shoot anyone that gets too close,” the venlil explained.

“Yeah, learned that the hard way,” I muttered.

“What’s your name, man?” the red-haired human asked.

“Lewis. And this is Charlotte,” I answered.

“Qwiv,” the venlil introduced himself.

“And I’m Earl. You’re damn lucky we got to you, she looks in bad shape,” the human said.

We kept speeding down the highway. It was unusually abandoned, with only the occasional broken-down car. Dayside’s skyline was rapidly approaching on the horizon, it had a similar border set up like the one in Ransu and was still run by exterminators. I felt my heart skip a beat as the truck slowed. A fully suited venlil waved us forward.

Earl rolled down the window, “We’ve got a sick pup and a human that got beat up trying to get out of Ransu.”

The exterminator was visibly surprised, putting a paw to the front of its mask and gasping. “Stars! We’ll make way immediately. Park your vehicle in the lot on the left, and bring the injured to the field hospital. We can’t fly them into the city just yet, but we’re well-equipped to help,” she explained. It was jarring seeing an exterminator actually care, especially after this whole fiasco.

We drove forward, the truck glided gently into a parking spot. “Thank you two so much,” I said, “I really owe you one,” I said hastily, flinging open the door and bolting with Charlotte in my arms.

“Lewie,” she groaned, “Are we there?” she asked, her eyes fluttering, but not opened.

“Yes, Char, we made it. You’re gonna be okay,” I said, nearly tripping as I sprinted into one of the medical tents. The camp was swarming with zurulian doctors, who were immune to the flu altogether. “You’re gonna be okay, look at the doctors,” I urged.

“Hey, human, get that venlil into a bed,” a doctor spoke. The tent wasn’t very full, so I was able to find one close. I laid her down gently and planted a kiss on her forehead. “You’re gonna be okay,” I rubbed her paw.

She opened an eye, just enough to see me, and smiled. “I love you, Lewie,” then she lulled over, passing out.

Several doctors were at her side quickly, ushering me away to tend to the hole in my leg, and treating her legs with antibiotics. I laid down on the closest bed to her and kept my eyes on the pup the entire time. I reached into the pocket just above where I was shot and withdrew the slightly bloody drawing she gave me yesterday. “Happy humans,” I sobbed. Charlotte had a big smile in the drawing, I could hear her reassuring me, and Ivan’s voice of reason, telling me to sleep now, that she was gonna be okay.

The doctors worked while my mind went hazy, and I slipped into a dreamless slumber.