***

It was a matter of time that pieces of Stark’s hands begun to shoot off.

She looked in panic, causing her Shifting to end just as abruptly, causing the force to kick back all the good will she was doing—her “influence” shrinking back down onto a segment of it’s surface—not the quarter she grew.

Holding back the power of the force in any way she can, caused part of her palms and the backs of her hands to become projectiles, firing away from her.

The poor girl started to shake, started to tear up once more, knowing that her Breakdown was soon to follow. There was no way she can overcome this now.

Her body twisted her to look down.

Her legs gave out and caused her to fall onto her knees.

And soon, her arm bended itself out of the way, twitching and recoiling—due to her mind only seeing despair.

It’s been a while, since she’s suffered from the Breakdown Effect. Her body once again fighting itself, churning and bubbling violently under her skin—it trying so desperately to keep everything together.

“I… Caaaan’t…” she lost control of her throat midway, her head snapped to the side with an audible crack. “I can’t… I jussst… Can’t…”

The girl who took great pains in trying to battle her speech problems, could only say that phrase—reduced to just repeating it, over and over—soft to silence.

The unhealthy light from the sphere begun to shine down upon her, giving her a ghasty shade as she contorted into a mess—her pitiful hand still raised against it.

This was a reminder. A reminder that in the end, she’s a pitiful, strange, purposefully low level creep. Her little-by-little ideology, her own pace mentality—all it did was stall. Stall and unable to tackle problems with the force needed, versus some… Some gentle, detailed hand.

Said hand, despite everything, is holding out against the raging light.

Stark snapped her head forward, pitiful siVis around her neck that crept up to her chin, cheekbones, and eyes.

Said eyes, now covered in a pitch-black darkness.

“I… Can’t… Let… You … WIN!” She forced herself to say, looking at the sphere as if directly talking to it’s creator. “I can’t… Overwhelm… But I can always… Find a way!”

She balled her hand into a fist and screamed out.

No longer her influence was some segment, it turned serpentine, lancing forward and out within the sphere itself, searching for it’s very core.

She could feel more pieces popping out, but she pressed on as she continued to scream, increasing volume by the minute.

“IT TAKES—THE LIKES OF THE MEEK—TO BRING THE WEIGHT OF YOUR HATRED—DOOWN INTOOO IIIITSEEEEEELF!” she screeched in pain.

As she was striving and searching for a weak point, Stark kept herself in a place of weakness. For the sense of stakes, survival. People were counting on her, even if she hasn’t met them yet.

And damn it, she will after when this is finally over.

***

Jackie looked down within the gaping hole, as her hair blew due to the updraft created and the smoke still clouding her enhanced sight.

Getting down, it’s all apart of this test. To see if all of her talk, if all of her beliefs of stepping—being able to within this terrible time…

Finally, during a weak wisp of smoke, she could see a curled up part of the structure from within. She could see these things to slowly jump down until she sees solid ground.

And with that, she jumped towards the damage, landing with a thud as her legs briefly once more flickered into siVis but didn't maintain.

What scared her that the pain has become... “Normal” for her body. There’s no spot that exclusively hurts—everything did. It was to the point that it was more of a throbbing numbness and it took for her to mentally remind herself that her legs should be experiencing a shock of hurt, versus it actually happening.

All she could do right now was keep it in mind.

Once again, she waited for the view to see another makeshift ledge, spots one and jumps further down. The pattern created a rhythm of blunt metallic banging, surely signalling to someone that something was coming.

She spotted the solid ground and made a great leap for it.

Jackie landed, her legs giving out, opting to curl into a ball to keep going forward, ultimately getting up on her knees with her head down, panting painfully.

She heard the various gasps. A crowd of people, but at the barest minimum.

Lifting her head, she saw herself before a white office of multiple rows of computer desks, all before a towering beckon of information.

She saw how they all reacted in fear, earnestly trying to figure out what’s happening now, and she slowly rose her hands, palms towards them.

“I… I come from above…” Jackie creaked out. She was having trouble talking, she knew that she was running out of time. “It’s… There’s a way out…”

She heard the murmurs, and opted to continue.

“We… We managed to save 6 or 7 people before… This happened… All we want… Is you to go… Maybe even save the really hurt ones… But… It’s up to you… Please…”

“The situation outside—” she heard a voice, androgynous. “Are you sure that there’s a way—that it’s safe? Because the world can’t afford to lose more people with the jobs everyone’s now scared to have.”

Jackie found herself sighing.

“We’re working. We’re trying. The only way to make it that way… Is to help in… Making it so…”

There was a pregnant pause, and the only audio was the gulp Jackie took being crushed by the silence.

Through her eyes focused on the floor, she saw a shadow creep and grow before her.

Looking up, she saw the source for the voice. A very sharp bob, with the fringe being diagonal. They had very soft facial features like their lips and skin, but their face was angular as well—cheekbones, sharp jaw and chin and a very furrowed brow. Dressed in a dark dress shirt, pants, accented with pencil-lined stripes and white tie.

With hands on their hips, she looked up—at the gaping hole and sighed aloud. “Suppose that’s anything better than what we had.”

They turned on their dress-shoed heels.

“Everyone! We’re leaving! Make it towards the surface, if you’re too infirmed or broken to aid, then make it towards this evac route! Godspeed, each and every one of you.”

The crowd of workers nodded, all going towards the ruined walls. Opening them up, and climbing inside, using the Shiftication exits.

The Sharp Researcher offered their hand, Jackie grabbing it, being hoisted upwards on her two, likely broken, legs.

“Should I carry you with me?” they asked.

Jackie shook her head, admittedly lacking the strength to keep it up or stable. “There’s still… Them… They’re trapped within here still…”

Their eyes widened subtly. “Playing the gambit of being so ruined, that you help others ahead, knowing you may not make it…? It’s not really logical even the extremes you’ve been pushed.”

“Sure… But sometimes… the logical solution… Isn’t the most helpful one…”

“Not really. But I get the spirit of what you’re saying.”

Jackie laughed, despite herself.

“If you do wish to continue… Then I’ll help you along. I owe you that much.”

The Sharp Researcher helped Jackie walk towards the wall. They shoved their entire arm into it, causing it to quiver violently and open haphazardly. They put Jackie into the cavity.

“Child. I really you don’t push yourself more. Pushing yourself, making this into a feat of strength… It’s going to kill you. Listen to your fears, hide. This isn’t a day for heroics.”

Jackie could only nod, practically laying within the enclosed space, her eyes somehow getting heavy as well.

“…And hopefully, you’ll help them like you helped us. Just know that even with this, you helped today. When it was the most hardest.”

Jackie nodded, and closed her eyes before the slow darkness enveloped her being entirely.

***

Even in this time of crisis, River sat there in the dark on her laptop.

Within an indent craved basically for her, she sat there, typing away, as she heard Tracy giving it her all—opening the right pathway towards the vans.

Staring at the forum post she made, and watching it become insta-buried, what to do next if there was something else to do weighed on her.

She just wasn’t smart. Never cut out to be.

True genius is using knowledge in new, brilliant ways—making it work and proving that it works.

All River’s worth is that she knows things.

But never what to do.

She looked up, and where she was… Somehow filled her with more dread.

11th Grade era, as she was surrounded by lights and somehow more piercing eyes.

On a stage, trying to verbally tapdance—where persuasive speeches were to be heard to win a scholarship.

She never took the stage in school, let alone for it. It was maddening that she was even doing this.

But she glanced down, into the moving black figures. And saw her dear parents, right in the front row—where it had to have been hard for them to get there. Along with Wayne, who just nodded and gave a thumbs up with a smile.

It was for them, more than her. To ease them of their terrible lives, after doing so much for her.

If she had to act all smart to do it, then she would.

“…So, if you continue to indulge me for a bit, the girl that decided making her super important speech about the wonders of watching TV—” she begun near the end of the speech—this trance abridging things. She re-experienced the laughter, and how that tingled. “—Y’know, wondering if she even wrote the dang speech this whole time and just watched more TV—” The laughter nearly cut her off, causing her to smile, to think about how to best deliver this final stretch.

“Fiction… Is merely a collection of our experiences. Told in far off lands of wonder, to even the deepest space where no man has ever gone before… It’s never just about the fantasy. It was about us… Having something to reflect upon. If we’re truly good. If we’re truly intelligent. If we could truly change. And it’s with our imaginations, how we truly take these questions and answer them with that vividness, that we gain the reassurance that we need. So, if you do see your child mindlessly looking into that idiot’s lantern… Just know that it may be another guiding light they need. Thank you.”

She was caught off guard by the rounds of applause. So much so, she just looked around stonefaced, not really processing what’s happened.

And despite what ended up happening next… River snapped back into reality with a vigor.

She clicked on her thread and replied to herself.

Did it over and over, providing information—the same information, that they needed someone—anyone, to be near the vans to help aid in the effort.

She performed this, over and over, even adding in “please” in the last few rounds.

Before clicking her thread again on the homepage, she noticed a red 1 above her message icon.

Quickly, she saw that her thread had a new reply.

“normie here

But I’m near the guys

They said they’re on their way and can see the people coming

Thx @RiverSux”

River closed her eyes, throwing her head back and exhaling. A weight of years lifted, like it did there.

Even if it was temporary.

***

“Push deeper! Dig deeper!”

“III’m… Trying…!”

Tracy found herself in the spotlight, and just that. Surrounded by the nothingness, her feet under wooden flooring that was unfinished.

“I just can’t do it!” Tracy stomped in frustration. “I can’t do it, Felix! Nothing I do is remotely genuine! This whole comeback idea is terrible!”

Felix appeared within the darkness, represented as Broadway style headliners. The neon-strobes still detailed his flat-top hair, his thin mustache, and goatee. Simple dots for both his eyes and his “moving” mouth, a set flickering while another turns off, vice versa.

“It’s because you’re putting the past into this when this is supposed to be your second chance, Trace—”

“Don’t you think I know that?!” she snapped, turning to him. Her eyes miserable and baggy, her hair a mess, and sweat clinging to every surface of her pale skin. “It’s a weight! There’s nothing that could be done about it—because regardless if they see me, they’re still going to push more onto me! Hold my head high—be confident?! I can’t walk anymore! I only crawl!”

“And crawl’s gonna be the only thing you do if you let yourself continue like this!” Felix shouted back, with angry eyebrows being “animated” for good measure.

Tracy fell onto her ass, looking down at her legs. “Maybe I can do voice work, yeah. Honest living in that… And no one has to see my face, only my voice.”

“And there we are, you tryna take the easy road again,” Felix sounded exhausted.

“I can’t walk on the other ones,” Tracy strained. “Especially when I destroyed them myself.”

They both sat quietly, stewing in her mood more than her words.

“…You says it’s weight, yeah?” Felix asked.

“Yeah…”

“Then it’s my fault. I was sure you could make that pain and mistakes the biggest fire of your life—the reason for living past all that—and I couldn’t see that, well, you’re tryna get away…”

“…I have, haven’t I?” Tracy rose to her feet again. “Running away from these feelings because they fucking suck. Nothing but pain, and drawing from them only made me dig and dig and dig—and ended up scratching up my reopened wounds… I think I got it.”

Felix smiled. “What is it, Trace?”

“It’s an anchor,” Tracy stated. “Can’t go further than that ever again, even if I wanted to. Keeps me grounded, gives me…the perspective I need. The strength that I don’t have.”

Tracy soon found herself grunting—continuing to raise the ceiling of the lair of junk as people struggled to crawl the trenches.

She was sweating. She was grunting. She was crying.

But she was here, and it was where she needed to be.

In her role of being the best woman-take on Atlas she could be.

***

Aiko looked vacant and that was because she was. Once again, due to spamming her siVis way too many times, her “soul” is muted—taken away.

All she can think back on is the other day when she didn’t have a “soul”.

She found herself under a tree, in the dead of night. Back leaned against it and her leg up, resting her draped arm over it. Looking at nothing, but the dancing fireflies that faded in and out of the dark.

Instantly tensing after hearing rustling, she shined her flashlight, only to find her brother, Hiromu.

“… I know you share your name with a spy hero, but that doesn’t give you the excuse to sneak around,” Aiko bluntly snarked at.

He just walked close to her, which made her confused. He just sat down, next to her.

“When does this empty feeling go away, onee-san?” Hiromu said, with a twinge of sadness in his voice.

Aiko found herself paused within a pause.

She sighed, and put her arm around him, as the lonely brother leaned on her. “I’ve been trying to avoid talking about this and here you are… What a troubling brother you are.”

“We could’ve… We could’ve been gone,” he proceeded to continue. “And that would’ve been it.”

Aiko nodded. “Yeah. I’ve been thinking about that, the cruelty of our existence. We are, and express and can become all these wonderful things… And then it’s gone. We’re gone.”

Hiromu made a pitiful noise. Muffled within Aiko’s shirt, a cry and a groan.

Aiko looked down, and then up towards the dancing fireflies.

“I’ve been distant lately… Because I think I’ve found some sort of absolution. In all of this.”

Hiromu rose his head back up, wiping his eye. “A what?”

“A solution, I think,” Aiko answered.

“How could onee-san gain an answer from something like that…?”

Aiko chuckled to herself, just staring at the fading lights.

“Because I understand that I have to simply be. Be around. Be here. In the moment and moments like these… Enjoying every single last detail… Because…”

Aiko found herself tearing up as well.

“Our souls… Might not last that long. I’m still alive—as are you, and… We feel like they’re gone. So we have to treasure it, little brother. Understand that it always burns bright, before it goes. I just want to see my light, every single day!”

Aiko lurched forward, hearing Maddie’s shouting fading in.

“Thank you, siVis…” the girl found herself smirking. “I needed that.”

She darted, using her ability to chain-jump into various victims’ article of clothing—to drag them close enough for Maddie to drag them closer to the tunnel and help them along.

It felt like she was upping her record, every rest period.

Maddie just looked from afar, watching her stand there.

“You’re still with us, ghost gal?”

“As long as I can be,” Aiko said, standing there proud. “I’ve never felt more live in my life.”

***

Maddie snapped her head back, at the sounds of pained groaning. Scanning the mangled environment, see saw a young man trapped under the rubble.

Rushing over but soon hobbling and then crawling over, she saw the man—shoulders up, on his back, eyes closed and mouth open to only exposited pain.

“Hey-hey-hey, buddy, pal—” Maddie tried to reassure. “I’m here, just save your energy…”

“Noo—” the young man answered. Shaggy, even with debris all over him, visibly thin. “You got the wrong idea, just let me die here—”

Maddie blinked. “I’m sorry, what--?”

“Life’s meaningless anyways, it’s about time that I took everything into my own damn hands for once!”

Maddie looked the man up and down, out of confusion. The vibe and the type she’s getting—ain’t really be on the edge.

Then she noticed something. He was so thin, that he could slide out of his “prison” himself.

“…Chief,” Maddie sternly said. “You’re not doing anyone here any favors by making this all about you—”

“How dare you--! To take away my only agency in this fucked up hell hole! There’s nothing to go back to for me! Family always wanted me and wanted to get rid of me—so screw it! I’m rage quitting!”

This display was everything she hated about life and it’s people.

Always so “strong” until the second they aren’t.

She knew what was behind her, then. The teddy bears, the plush hearts, the photos. All literally tied up in various bows. Even two years in, she still couldn’t look at the shrine without sobbing uncontrollably.

But she had to look at it. To remind. To keep the sight with her, 24/7.

And that she did, as she walks towards school—carrying it and the block where she died on her back.

And somehow along the way, the old house slammed onto her back as well. Always trying to dart past it, but it still manages to hop on every single time.

She walked into class, and it all got caught against the door frame, causing her to trip. Cue the laughter of the students, as she just grimaced and took her seat. Leaning forward at her desk.

“They still won’t take you outta class for being a crybaby punk yet~?”

Lerone was just that—an ugly ass mouth with a human holding it up. Her cronies, literally nobodies with zero features and personalities—only parrots. Mocking birds.

“I guess we gotta work double time! Maybe even get you transferred, bony ass!”

“Bony ass girl cuz her parents got no money~!”

“Bony ass girl that keeps on crying~!”

Chirping and chirping, on and on.

This was the moment that she had it. Forever.

Maddie got up, turned around, and clocked Lerone right into her crusty lip.

The whole class turned into gasping fish, when this happened. Gasping, flopping around, and their dead eyes trying to gauge what’s going on.

Also, they stunk. Middle schoolers always stunk.

“THE FWAK--?!” Lerone tried to curse, and her quickly swelling in record time. “I’LL FWAK YEW UP--!”

“Do it.”

The two words gave everyone pause.

“W-whu--?”

“Do it. I know I’m going to get suspended for this, and it’s way better hanging around dumbasses like you. What’s the matter? I’m bony, right? I’m gonna cry, right? Fucking try me, fat lip bitch.”

Despite being a foot or two shorter than her and everyone around her, Maddie towered over them.

Because of the shrine, block, and house on her back.

“Alright man—” Maddie just grabbed his shoulder and dragged him out. “Playtime’s over.”

“Ack--!” the young man got huffy. “You bitch! Samaritan laws! Due process! You’re forcing this against my final will--!”

Maddie dragged him to meet her eyes, causing him to stop his ranting.

“Be lucky that it’s not by the throat. You’re a fucking quitter. At least you have a family, something to fucking fix if you actually had the compacity to not be pathetic. You think life owes you something, and that’s fucking disgusting. The reason I’m saving you here is that I want your life to be actually hard—for you to actually fucking experience adversity. Maybe you’ll shit from your mouth less.”

She then proceeded, to struggle to stand upright despite her legs buckling with every step.

Maddie was tired of sadsacks. Was tired of posturers.

Didn’t care that she was wrong. All she wanted to do was prove a damn point.

But it did prove one thing—that she is stronger than them, even at her worse.

***