Meant To Be

Chapter Fifteen

"I know a tunnel that leads right into No Significant Harassment's chamber so that we can avoid all of the anti-gravity. Come on, it's this way." Artificer followed Hunter as she entered the structure and began to navigate it with ease, almost as if she remembered the exact layout. That being said, it was possible she did. After all, she had been gone for just over forty cycles, which wasn't actually very long. "We're gonna have to crawl through here for almost an hour, but the shortcut is still worth it and takes less time."

As they crawled through the darkness, Artificer heard a faint crying sound from Hunter. The noise echoed around the small space, making it louder. "We're almost there. Just a bit further," she reminded the emotional slugcat and she turned to her, wrapping her in a firm hug. Artificer embraced Hunter back, feeling all kinds of emotions at once. "Do you want to stop for a little while?" She shook her head, wiping the tears from her eyes and they continued to press on in silence. However, it was not an uncomfortable silence. Both of them felt perfectly at ease as they walked, holding hands.

Eventually, they arrived at a vent on the floor with light streaming in from below. Hunter took a deep breath and pried it from the ground, looking down into the room below. "Here goes nothing," she said as she jumped down, trying to quell the nervousness she was feeling. An iterator with bright green skin floated around the room. He wore a royal purple robe and an even brighter green scarf, certainly quite the fashion statement for an iterator. He looked over in shock as Hunter landed gracefully on the floor, the screens he had for eyes growing larger. Dropping the pearl he had been reading, he approached Hunter,slowly at first, but eventually almost breaking into a run. "You're... alive...?" "Yes, father. I am alive as hard as it may be to believe. I'm home now." No Significant Harassment shook his head in confusion, wondering how his child was even standing before him now. "But... the rot! How did you manage to get back here and save Looks to the Moon?" "Well, I didn't make it alone," she said, blushing slightly as Artificer came to stand beside her. "This is the slugcat who travelled with me. Her name is Artificer. Honestly, none of this would be-" Hunter stopped speaking and made a strange face for a moment before she began to cough up blue liquid. Artificer caught her as she collapsed, gasping for air as she continued to cough. No Significant Harassment also helped support her and he began to rush Hunter to who knows where, Artificer following his lead. "We need to get her to my lab," the iterator explained. "I need to do a scan to see how bad it has gotten."

Hunter lay down in an old hospital bed No Significant Harassment had managed to find, her breathing shallow as she struggled for air. "I've never seen it this bad before. How long has it been like this?" he said as he observed the scans he had taken, a worried look on his face. "It didn't happen for a while until a few cycles ago... it hasn't hurt this much before, either." "That's not good. If you had made it back one cycle later, there would be no hope. Though, I might have a chance of saving you now, but it won't be easy." Hunter nodded, clearly understanding that it was entirely possible that she would still die even after all their hard work getting here. "Artificer, I thank you for helping my daughter," No Significant Harassment said as he turned to her. "I'm going to have to do an emergency operation. Please wait in the hallway."

Yay rot angst time! I hope you liked this chapter and I'm sorry about no updates for a few days! As always, cover art is not by me. Also, if you have a request for this book, please leave it now because I'm almost done with this one. Of course, I can just put it in another book, but I might take a small break once this work is done. And yes, I do have plans for two more Artihunter books after this one and that's only me trying not to have too many ideas. I'm sure I could write hundreds of these.