[The Host has…

paralysis…

rerouting… for…

kinetic… restart…

3… 1…]

Existence came back like a bolt of lightning from the void.

Leta’s eyes flew open wide, and she gasped before immediately coughing as it felt like she’d nearly swallowed her tongue.

She must have left her thoughts back in the void because stringing together words was out of her grasp as she tried to fill her lungs with oxygen but felt like she was suffocating.

She was alive.

She knew she was alive, but everything else was a jumbled mess. She was still in the darkness of the void, unable to see or feel anything except the pounding of her frantic heart that thumped close by, most likely in her ears. She thought she was facing upward, but other than that, she had no sense of her form or if she was hot or cold.

[The Host’s neural functions are back online. Welcome back, Host.]

Leta blinked furiously, face twitching as she tried to understand what was happening around her. A fog had settled over her brain, leaving her flailing in darkness.

[Host has suffered significant fall damage due to being ejected from the vehicle and has life-threatening injuries, among them paralysis, several broken bones, ruptured ligaments, and you have seven broken ribs, two of which have pierced the Host’s left lung. Nanites have been rerouted to heal damaged facilities and restore motor functions. However, the Host will feel extreme pain as nerve endings are repaired. The repair process is to start now.]

Leta’s jaw locked open in a silent scream as her brain could suddenly register the feel of her skin. It felt like every layer of skin was on fire as she felt hot tears trail down her cheeks, making the burn of skin even more agitated.

It felt like the unbearable pain was chasing her tears as sharp pain-like needles peppered the muscles of her face before blood sprayed from her body as her nose suddenly snapped into place with an audible crack.

Leta choked, then let out a whimper of pain that was so muffled from her damaged ears that it sounded like it came through cotton balls.

She felt something wet against her face for a moment before her vision suddenly and forcefully came back. The transition from seeing nothing but the void of darkness to blinding light was so sudden that she felt her retina seared.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

[The deflated eyeball has been repaired.]

‘Oh, god… why am I on fire…’ her jumbled brain was finally able to put together.

[The burning sensation the Host is feeling results from nerve damage. The Host will only experience this as nerves are returned online during the repairs. Please endure the pain.]

A slight whine in her ears, like a note so high it was barely perceptible, suddenly increased as if a toddler had gotten hold of a volume button and cranked it up to full blast. It was too much all at once, and Leta’s head rocked from side to side as if trying to escape it without success.

The prickling needles of pain were working their way down to her neck, and her world rocked on its axis as the Nanites repaired her broken neck.

They moved over her clavicle and to her shoulder blades before her arm suddenly wrenched in its socket as the Nanites forcefully popped her bones back into place.

[Dislocated shoulder has been repaired.]

Leta yelped in pain, the sound of her agony centering her for a moment where she could register the feel of dry grass and the sharp stabbing of stones underneath her.

She felt the prickling running down her right arm and turned her head to look at it. She only had a heartbeat to think, ‘That’s not supposed to be bent that way,’ before her arm suddenly twisted back into place with a wet snap that nearly knocked the wind out of her. It was so unbearable.

She had no time to scream before she watched fingers that were facing the wrong direction twist into place on her right hand, and her shattered left forearm cracked audibly as it righted itself.

[Skeletal structure of arms has been repaired.]

[Nanite internal repair power has been depleted. Nanites will now consume the Host’s energy reserves to complete emergency repairs.]

Pins and needles in her chest foreshadowed a wet sucking noise as one rib slowly pulled out of her lung, hot blood pumping out of her in its wake.

Leta closed her eyes and sobbed at the agony. When she felt it start to diminish, she looked down at herself to see the damage in time to watch the second and third ribs begin to extract themselves from her organ.

She threw her head back and screamed, which only added to the torture of feeling her body put itself back together as the Nanites stanched the blood flowing from her chest.

[Lungs have been repaired.]

Leta ground her teeth against the pain as she pushed up on her elbows, catching a glimpse of a mangled left leg that was bent in the wrong direction at the knee and whimpering at the agony that was to come.

Her femur on her left side felt like a hundred blood pressure monitors were compressing it as the shattered bones were fused. Through the pain, she tried to catch her bearing to figure out what had happened.

She was on a sloping hill above a residential road, the tops of vacation rentals visible between the expanse she’d landed on and the sea below. The storm brewing that night had arrived as fat droplets started to pelt her feverish skin and hair.

Above her was an extensive rock cropping that was only a few inches tall, but at the angle she was at, she could barely make out the wreck of the truck uphill.

And it was a wreck. Not far from her, she could see debris like the broken crossbow, Koa’s duffel bag, and a bent fender. Intermingled with the smell of rain, Leta could taste the bite of ash that had her stomach turning in fear.

‘The Minotaur!’

Leta felt the pinpricks in her shattered leg and clenched her teeth as a wave of pain swept over her. It snapped in the right direction, salty tears blinding her as she took deep breaths.

Steeling herself, she pushed over onto her stomach and scanned the terrain. The truck was resting on its hood, smoke rising from around the engine and badly mangled.

She could make out a form she thought was Koa in the driver’s seat, held upside down by his seat belt.