Downgrades: we are far from broken

5 day one

Austin;

          The day had been mostly uneventful, the high light of the day was this morning; when a security bot woke me up by sliding food into my cell through a slot near the floor. The food, if you could call it that, was essentially a murky yellow sludge in a shallow white bowl. It smelled like sewage, and tasted about how I imagined sewage did as well, but it was food. At first I had to choke the stuff down, but as I became accustomed to it, I started guzzling it. Somehow, the sludge had left me even hungrier than before. I put the bowl by the slot, and was just lying on my cot for hours, dying of boredom. Maybe a voice in my head started it would be worth joining the resistance, just so you could have something to do. “And to stay alive” I added allowed, assuming she was telling the truth it said.

          I ignored its last statement; I just had a gut feeling that I could trust her, even though the same gut feeling told me that she would immensely enjoy watching me fail. It was a strange feeling, going with my gut, and not relying on predictive models or observational statistics. My mind really began to drift then, but it seemed to focus on the strange girl who had called herself ‘Tat’. I wondered how she had gotten her scars, how she got around without the bots detecting her, and where the hell she slept at nigh- my line of thinking was interrupted by a loud clang above me.

          I looked up at the shoe box sized vent, which I hadn’t noticed last night, that was directly above me. The words from last night resonated in my head; the overseers, frosting, the consequences of my ‘stunts’. The voice that had spoken when I was talking to Tat, was screaming that I was being frosted right now. But the logical part of me was saying that it was just a noise, and that I should get some sleep before tonight. I rolled over to go to sleep, and pulled the sheets up higher to bloke off the chills. 

…

          “Vot der'mo!” cried a familiar voice, and I stirred slightly, but I ignored the voice and tried to go back to sleep. Then, it felt like something was pressing on my chest. I tried to open my eyes, but something was keeping them closed, whatever a voice in my head said just go back to sleep. “Wake up! Wake up you Moron!” suddenly my right cheek began to tingle, and felt a thick liquid coat my tongue. “okay,” said the girl, whose name I now remembered to be Tat “I’m really sorry about this” she covered my mouth with her hand, it smelled of motor oil and dirt, it was a strangely pleasing scent. I felt something puncture my neck, and then it felt like my head was on fire. The pain became everything, and the only thing I could do was scream. I tried to sit bolt upright, but she held me down.

          My eyes shot open, breaking a layer of frost that had formed over them. My vision was blurry, but I still could make out the fearful expression on her face. I now realized that she was crouching over me, one knee on either side of me. I stopped screaming, and settled down into heavy breathing, and she removed her hand from my face. The pain was still there, but the shock of it was starting to dissipate. “Sorry” Tat repeated, slipping a tiny plastic syringe into her pocket. “But I need you conscious to get there” She jumped off of me, and started pulling on my arm. “I know you feel like you’re about to die” she said “but believe me when I tell you this; you will die unless you get moving right now!” I heard her words, but they were garbled, and hard to understand. However, I understood enough to get the point, so I began trying to get out of my cot. With every move I made, there was a loud crunching sound, as I broke up the sheets of frost all around me.

          It felt like I had lead weights attached to my limbs. This feeling was so powerful, that instead of rolling out of the cot and on my feet, I rolled out of the cot and landed on my face. I spat out the liquid that was coating my tongue, and saw that it was blood mixed with saliva. “Come on!” cried Tat, who lifted me unsteadily to my feet, “work with me a little bit here!” She draped my left arm over her shoulders, and helped me hobble over to the door. I looked over at her and caught a glimpse of my hand. It was almost entirely grey, except for my fingers, which were a deep purple. She pressed her right forearm against the door, and it slid open. We slipped out side, where it must have been warmer, because I couldn’t see our breath anymore, but I still didn’t feel anything besides the fire in my head.