They stand and look on in confusion at the story this scene is trying to tell them. "Isis? Chevron? Are you there?" Ethan asks aloud. To little surprise there is no response. Not one. Chloe is the first to move into the room, careful not to trip over the drones all around her. Ethan is more hesitant. "What are you doing?" He asks. Chloe continues silently, carefully dodging the drones beneath her.
"Chlo, seriously, where are you going?" He continues. In a matter of seconds she reaches the side of Isis' core and picks up the large cable the little drone is wrapped around. "This cable needs to come out. Help me." she says as she begins to pull heavily at it. Ethan shakes his head and slowly enters the room. Chloe continues to tug at it as Ethan dances around the drones.
"Come on cable... budge..." she whispers to herself. By the time Ethan arrives beside her, there is little doubt the cable has not moved at all. Ethan takes a deep breath and bends down to pick it up with his free arm while carefully grasping it as firmly as he can. "Ok, on three." He says as he braces for the pain to come.
"Right. One."
"Two."
"Three!" They shout in unison.
Together they pull at the ridiculously sized cable with all their might. It begins to slide out, but only barely. "Keep going! It's coming out!" Chloe says clearly strained. The seconds continue to pass as they pull at it relentlessly. The cable begins to slide further and further out. The pain in Ethan's broken arm begins to take its toll and his grip on the cable begins to wane. Finally, with a loud thud, the cable comes free from the core.
Ethan nearly falls onto his back from the sudden lack of resistance from his pulling. The cable is finally free, but nothing has changed. Chloe looks silently at the dark core in front of her and then at the cable still in her hands. And then her eyes begin dancing around as she tries to come up with her next plan. She takes the cable and shoves it back into its slot in the core. Still, nothing happens.
Ethan sits down in his place as the pain in his arm reaches a breaking point for him. Chloe pulls the cable back out and shoves it back in. No change. Suddenly she begins walking around the core pulling out every single cable attached to it. Ethan wants to help her, but at this point he is just trying to keep from letting her know just how bad things are for him.
Chloe then begins plugging in each cable one by one. After no more than two minutes, she has finally plugged all of them back in. But of course, there is no change. Isis is just gone. Chloe kicks the core and screams out as her hands angrily grasp her head. "Chlo, it's okay. We will figure this out." Ethan tries to assure her.
"You don't understand..." Chloe replies sadly. "The last thing I said to her was 'Leave me alone, I don't want you around'... And now she's gone... They both are and it's all my fault..." she finishes. Ethan blinks in utter confusion. "How is it your fault? How is any of this your fault? I was beside you the whole time and nothing you did could have possibly caused any of this to happen."
“It just is Ethan. Trust me.” She replies, trying to justify it to herself. Ethan stands and slowly walks toward the door making a single glance back to her as he leaves. At this point there is little he can say or do to change her mind. He walks out silently and begins the pain journey to his room. Chloe continues to repeatedly unplug and plug the cables into the lifeless core, just hoping for something to change.
A few minutes pass and Ethan is still trying to make his way back, but the pain has become absolutely unbearable. He collapses to his knees- his eyes forced shut from the endless pain. And then, he falls over completely; blacking out there in the hall. Several hours pass as Chloe grows furious over her inability to change the state of things. She grabs a handful of loose cables and outright pulls them all in a fit of rage, screaming out in a mixture of rage and sadness.
She drops the cables and falls to the floor sobbing greatly as she slams her fist against the metal plates beneath her. After what seems like an eternity sitting there alone, she decides she should no longer remain there. She has tried everything she could think of. Sitting up, she wipes the tears from her eyes and looks toward the empty doorway. “Where did you go?” she asks aloud, thinking of Ethan. Composing herself, she lifts herself up and brushes off the dust she accumulated for who knows how long.
“Ethan?” she calls out looking down each end of the corridor. He doesn’t respond. She lets out a deep sigh. “Not you too…” She turns and walks in the direction of the galley. Perhaps he went to grab some food; it has been some time since they had actually eaten anything after all. Soon enough she arrives at the galley entrance but it is clear he is not here; hasn’t been here in some time by the lack of any dirty dishes. With no drones to actively clean as they once did, any usage of these facilities would be noticeable.
Her attention is pulled to a distant clink of metal on metal as the sounds reach her ears. Clink clink. Clink clink. The sound is coming from one of the other two unlit entrances to the galley. "Ethan?" she calls out. Clink clink. Clink clink. "Ethan is that you?" The sound draws nearer. "Hello?" she asks.
Through the doorway, her brother emerges from the darkness. Chloe lets out a deep sigh. "Ethan, you almost scared the crap out of me. Why didn't you answer me when I-" She says, stopping herself. Her brother's face, arms and hands, everything not covered by his heavily torn and tattered clothing has been sliced open over and over; small streams of blood slowly flow from his wounds and drip to the floor. A small piece of jagged metal pierces through his left shoulder from his back, lodged in place.
"Ethan, what happened?!" She screams in horror and disgust. He chuckles under his breath. "Oh Sharon, what are you doing here... You know you shouldn't be..." He says in a low, rough and slightly annoyed voice as he limps forward a single step. Chloe takes a step backward as she stares at him. "Sharon- where are you going Sharon? I'm right here Sharon."
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A quick glance down toward his left hand and she can now clearly see a heavily warped and broken piece of metal covered in fresh blood and torn flesh. She takes another step back. “Don’t you remember all the good times we had together Sharon?" Chloe looks back up at him. "Why do you keep calling me Sharon?" She asks, taking another step back in stride with his limp forward. Her heart is beating out of her chest.
He cackles. "Oh Sharon, you can't even remember your own name... You always were good for a laugh..." Chloe looks behind her as she approaches the door she came through. "I told you they had spoken to me Sharon. They called on me, told me what I needed to do. I did what they wanted. I'll make everything right again, just wait and see." He says, continuing to move toward her.
"Stay back." Chloe says firmly aligning herself to the doorway. "You smell... So good, Sharon." He smiles and his empty eyes flood with only could be described as dark emptiness. He takes another step forward, but this time, his limp is gone. Chloe spins around and dashes out and down the hall. He chases after her with the blade in his hand scraping alongside the wall as he runs. He laughs with such joy. "You have no idea how much I have missed this Sharon!"
Chloe takes the first door she comes to on her right and disappears into the black of an unlit passageway. The grinding of metal slows as she can hear him begin to walk. She hugs the wall and slowly moves further down just as his dark figure emerges from the light of the other hall. He just stands there quietly, as if waiting for something to happen. In the increasing silence, she begins to hear her own heavy breathing.
"Sharon." He says slowly, ominously. "Sharon, I know you're there Sharon. The longer you hide, the more fun you are making this for me." She keeps moving further and further back, trying hard not to make any noise. He steps into the darkness and disappears from sight.
"Sharon. I can smell you Sharon." You shouldn't have stopped running Sharon." Chloe takes another step back and feels a dip in the wall; a closed door.
She pushes against it with her hand ever so softly but the hinge squeaks louder than it ever should in this situation. She closes her eyes and holds her breath. Sure enough he heard that and is now running at her. She keeps herself pressed against the wall bracing for the inevitable. She doesn't remember where the door leads; if it's safe or dangerous, she just can't remember. His footsteps grow closer and closer. And then, he stops.
She opens her eyes. She can't see him, but the sound of his blood dripping to the floor makes it clear: he is right in front of her. "Oh Sharon, what fun this is. The last chase only lasted a couple of hours. Will you beat your old record this time? It makes me all tingly just thinking about it." He says as he walks through the door. She blinks rapidly. Did that really just happen? She slowly starts making her way back down from where they both came. The clinking starts again. Clink clink. It grows faint. He is moving away.
She looks at the light and begins walking towards it, leaving the side of the wall as she starts to tremble. SCREECH. She turns around and hears the grinding of metal on metal, getting louder and faster. "I see you Sharon!" He shouts as he gives chase to a now sprinting Chloe. She quickly emerges into the light of the hallway and takes a right turn, heading back toward the AI Core Room. He slams into the wall just outside of the dark corridor smearing blood all over as she stops to stabilize himself.
The metal in his shoulder dents and scrapes the wall upon his impact, but it doesn't seem to have fazed him in the slightest. He coughs as he tries to catch his breath. "Sharon, you're faster than you used to be." He says with another cough. Seconds later he is back to chasing her like he had before; and this time, he is gaining on her. Just as she reaches the Core doorway, she gets shoved inside by him. She crashes to the floor knocking aside all the little drones that were there. "Sharon. Sharon, Sharon, Sharon." He says, shaking his head walking up to her. "You didn't even last ten minutes this time. You disappoint me."
He raises his weapon up to within inches of her face. "I'm going to help them wake you up Sharon. And then we can be together again, just like we used to be. I just need to make a few, minor, adjustments. This won't hurt a bit." He says as he reaches down and grabs her wrist. "No!" She shouts. He cackles with laughter as his blade touches her arm and gradually tears into her flesh. She screams in pain, the blade just dragging along and through her skin. And then, the blade is pulled away and he falls forward fast and hard to her right.
No, he didn't fall; he was tackled!
"Ethan!" She calls out in a mixture of fear, pain, and relief. "Chlo, get out of here now!" Ethan yells back as he wrestles with the attacker. She quickly stands and runs for the door. Ethan gets thrown off and lands in a pile of loose cables. The attacker looks up at Chloe. "We're not finished yet Sharon." He says angrily. Blade in hand, he lunges toward her only to get tackled a second time by Ethan. "Damn you shadow! Get out of my way!" He shouts, now focusing entirely on Ethan.
Chloe runs over, picks up a drone and slams it into the attackers back. He grunts and swings a free arm around into her, sending her to the floor. Ethan wraps his arms around the attackers' waist and with a powerful push upwards, throws them both into a wall and into a power station of some kind. The following electrical discharge was both beautiful and horrifying to watch. Both Ethan and the intruder are sent clear across the room in a violent blast.
Ethan lands behind Isis’ core and the attacker into some hanging wires from the ceiling. “Ethan!” Chloe shouts as she tries to get to him climbing over cables, drones, and other mechanical boxes in her path. “Ethan, are you ok? Say something!” she says as she wraps her arms around him and pulls him onto her lap. He doesn’t move. The attacker however grunts and groans as he recomposes himself. “Sharon.” He says in that deep, dark and slow voice.
She looks over in his direction as he climbs out of his cable trap. “You will watch as I kill him, and then you will wish you hadn’t betrayed me again.” He adds angrily. She looks around for something to grab and throw at him, but there isn't enough time for that as he moves closer to Ethan. Instead, she dashes to tackle him much like Ethan had done prior.
But instead of hitting him with a great impact, she passes through him and lands in the cables. Chloe looks behind in panic and confusion, yet he isn't there anymore. She then sits there, silent but breathing heavily, trying to grasp what had taken place. Was any of this real? She looks over at Ethan who is slowly picking himself up off the floor. "Where is he?" Ethan asks, looking around. Chloe lets out a long breath. Yes, it was real.
"It was just like her; she was there and then she wasn’t..." Chloe says in a soft voice. Ethan looks at her, "you mean… What the heck is going on here?" Chloe lays back against the cables and sighs. "Isis, where are you…" She says looking up into the darkness.
>>Pinging AI Chevron...
>>AI Chevron Unresponsive
>>Pinging AI Isis...
>>AI Isis Unresponsive
>>Pinging AI Chevron in (30) Seconds...
>>Pinging AI Isis in (60) Seconds…