"Get up already." Burnt punched me in on my shoulder. We had already landed, oh well, I was glad to get off this piece of ship that was made to fit two. Burnt must have counted at one and a half.
"Shouldn't we be at an airport of some kind?" I looked around. The place was barren, save for the sparse vegetation and sand. Burnt punched my shoulder again for asking a stupid question. Oh right, we'd have to register this flight at that airport, and nonetheless go through a gate-check to see that we weren't criminals. And anyway, we were suppposed to meet a contact.
"See the ba-" Burnt asked and self-censored himself.
"No," I continued eyeing the horizon searching for somebody. Then I saw a small vehicle... it must have been a lift, and at the very least wasn't a patrol officer. We could at least get the info from there. "Over there," I nudged burnt. Then nudged harder when he didn't seem to notice. "Over there," I repeated and pointed towards the rectangular vehicle. We started walking.
---
Crystallis looks a lot shorter to the eye than it feels to the foot. "Hey!!" Burnt shouted now that we were in distance. I looked closer, it looked like another rabbit, he was all black, maybe dyed that way. "Black?" Burnt boomed out again. It almost sounded like a name. "What's that right next to him?" I asked low enough so 'Black' wouldn't hear me. Two barrels with what was probably a five-pointed flower on it, a bit green. "Looks like a trashbag except with fur," Burnt replied. I squinted and saw it bled. Did you torture the rabbit for that? I wanted to shout at him. Then I realized it probably wasn't him that did it.
We got there finnally. "We'll be taking these now." Burnt said, I kept silent as I didn't know what formalities I'd miss.
"Did you bring the goods?" Black asked us once we got up there.
"Yeah," Burnt replied and reached into his pocket for a diskette. I thought of all the dirty things that he would accept as payment. "Where'd you get all of this stuff?" I blurted out as the landscape was barren and there wasn't exactly a shop.
"Somewhere around here there's a monastery," Black replied, and with that last word the trashbag of fur struggled with its burns and writhed.
"$@(# IT'S STILL ALIVE!!" Black jumped away from it. Whatever it was... it was deemed dead soon as Black reached for his gun. As soon as he drew it out of it's sling, Burnt seemed to step towards him and with one swift movement stab below his ribcage to pierce upwards into his heart. I didn't even see him take out his knife... "Do you always go for the heart?" I asked. It would have been nice if he went for the shoulder of the gun, then I could ask if he always went for the shoulder. No response. I was certain that murder would be the most compassionate thing I'd ever see Burnt do. He found pity for the trashbag and somewhere I did too, but didn't act as fast.
"Grab a barrel." Burnt instructed. The merciful one I saw a while ago was gone. "What about the..." I looked closely and made a lucky guess, "girl?" Burnt had already gotten one barrel on his shoulder. "If she lives, she can use the cart to go somewhere," he replied. Not our problem... but something inside of me told me she wouldn't live if we left her out here. I looked closer. She had twisted over in the sands with all those cuts, it must have hurt. I looked even closer at her face and realized what how damaged the eyes were. Whatever caused this bleeding I now saw was soothed by a goo of amber color. "Yeesh.." I looked at them. It's okay, she can't tell I'm staring. and I moved her arm to cover her eyes with the Advil-like glue. She moved back.
"Where the hell do you think we'd take her? Back to headquarters to live out her life alone there?" Burnt had come back and noticed my fascination at this blind one.
She turned to face Burnt and moved her mouth without any words coming out. I wondered how badly she bled and burned. Burnt sighed a bit angrily and asked "Where?"
"Pn um click" she rasped.
"Forget it." I said, it didn't matter and she was taking up time. I think I saw tears, it might have just been the amber.
"I need to go to Pneum Arklik..." she sobbed and coughed. Finally an answer.
"That's out of our way by a longshot." Burnt responded. She seemed to sob even more and faced Burnt. Even without a complete face, she still gave the look of sorrow perfectly.
"We're wasting time," I told them all, "Let's just ride this with the barrels and drop her off somewhere." I indicated the vehicle which still had enough gas and space to carry us all to the ship. It's going to be cramped. Don't tell that to the big guy... She seemed to stop sobbing as much though and clung to me. Why me? Burnt's right next to you, why the heck are you clinging onto me? I dragged her over and sat her in the back. It was still gruesome to look at, but the trash goes in the back, with the jade dawn. "'Key's already here." I projected to Burnt. He was searching the dead guy and found a wallet. "Thanks" he seemed to say with a hand gesture and got into the driver's seat. "What happened to the third guy?" Garbage asked. Neither responded.
---
It felt like she knew what we were packing into the cargo area of the back of the ship. We were packing her with the cargo, I figured it wouldn't matter and she wouldn't mind as all she could see was darkness anyway. I thought so anyways, it seemed like she saw some things blind people don't see, and she cringed when she felt the barrel of poison. It was safely sealed, Burnt made sure. We'd be screwed too if it leaked.
---
"She has to get off here." I said, looking at the meters.
"Not here..." there was compassionate Burnt again for a second.
"Yes here, here or else we'll run out of gas and fail boss." Those words, fail and boss, seemed to make him cringe. He had forgotten of how we couldn't bring her home with us like a lost puppy and ask the boss if "Can we keep him?"
"Which planet is this anyway?" I asked.
"Dunno, we'll just drop her off in a rural area, a city will probably rape her."
Stupid sickos...
"Hey... isn't this the base for one of the corporations?" I asked. It probably wasn't, I didn't know how to even recognize ones nonetheless which ones they were.
"Yeah..."
"Boss wasn't specific on.." Burnt already shifted the ship and gravity was felt all throughout. At the very least, this ship had the technology to not burn up in atmosphere as the ship was guided into a freefall.
This planet was small, and looked grey instead of blue from above. #@(*#$ There's the ground already!! I cursed outloud.
"Stop whining." and Burnt seemed to be able to pull up from a dive. "Eesh.." I said. We could have crashed, but didn't... but we could have. "There, a landing pa-" "I already see it," he interrupted. The landing pad was suprising on the ground right next a parkling lot. We had landed somewhere in the city. Hotels, technology, a good neighboorhood with it's bad counterpart and the low-lives that we targetted.
"Unpacking time?" I asked. I wondered how she was doing.
---
When she came out, she was silent. She must have been thinking to herself a lot. Blindness must have been new to her. "We're here." I greeted her.
"Pne-"
"No, but you can probably ask somebody else to get there." She reached out to cling to me but I reacted and jumped back. Burnt came up behind me and handed her the pilfered wallet, free of ID to trace back to Black.
"Leave and ask somebody where a hotel is." Burnt coldly said to her. He had that sort of commanding voice that says "Go away or I'll shoot you," in the background. She immediately got up and tried to follow the concrete that would lead her to the sidewalk. She'll be fine... somebody will take care of her. I lied to myself.
"Do you know what happens when this mixes with water?" Burnt pointed near the back where the Jade Dawn was. How would he know?
"That." and Burnt indicated over to the bleeding trashbag that had been eaten alive but survived to feel the pain. Her head seemed to sink a bit lower as she kept walking away. She heard him, I knew it.
---
"Why are we getting in here?" I stared at the door that seemed to be the janitor's.
"Water supply." he replied. It all dawned on me, this was where one of the gangs inhabitated. I noticed the grafitti, and the brand name of a "Prochoice." Oh wait, I remember seeing that name in the order hackings. So they were the subordinates.
"Go ahead and open it," Burnt told me. I looked at it and reached for my ID card. I had cut a slit in it so it could go past the latch and open it. The door slid open as soon as I swiped the knob. "Cheap security" I said and noticed a large water pipe on the side. The one next to it was probably for sewage. The small tank must have been for derbis filterage. I opened it first to see that it was surprisingly clean. "What are you doing?" I asked Burnt, he was staring at a panel on the wall. He pointed at it, one which said 'lockdown test' and another that said 'fire simulation'. I started dumping the heavy barrel into the tank, and the second one right after it, they weren't that heavy afterall. But I still had to lean back and make sure not to splash it.
"Lockdown, sprinklers..." Burnt muttered to himself, "and we should start running." He flickered the switches.
"What?" It started to sprinkle...