an hour before Ramon. The whole world appeared as a blurry shade of white spinning around her. She had been aware of the activities happening around her, heard the caretakers talk to each other, the low hum of the bulky machine by her bed side, the tingling sensation of nano-surgeons within her arm as her bones were broken apart in bits and replaced with newly synthesized fragments in an attempt to fix her fractured arm.

All the while, she hadn't made an attempt to rise from where she'd been laying, or mutter a word to the attendants who were with her. Somehow, she could recollect the events from before she found herself in this white space of a room where she was. She could only imagine the shock that must have struck Ramon's caregiver when he got out of his unconscious state and grabbed the poor fellow, causing chaos in the room.

"Have you seen the others?" Ramon asked, those were the first words that escaped his mouth since his revival. He laid on the bed with his body aching from the throbbing pain the nano-surgeons inflicted while they worked on the injury on his torso.

"No, not yet," Jo replied, her voice held a positive note. She turned her head over to Ramon, they were the only two people in the room now. After Ramon's rampage, Lucien had instructed that the room be evacuated for security reasons, secluding both of them alone in the room.

Jo tried to remain calm, to stay strong for her team. Although she couldn't tell for sure what this place in which she found herself was, or who these people were, her mind still remained focused.

"Do you think we're being held hostage?" Ramon blurted.

"Hostage?" Jo scoffed at the sound of it, "you're thinking Cerberus Corp? I wouldn't expect to find myself on a bed receiving meds if that were the case."

"We wouldn't be worth much if were dead," Ramon answered.

"Calm your fears old lady," Jo said adjusting herself to sit properly without dropping much weight on her bad arm. "Whatever happens, we stick together."

The door swung open at the point. The two guardians moved their attention towards the entrance and watched two men walk in their direction. It was their second time seeing one of the two, the other was a new face. Both were dressed in a similar pattern of shaggy black sweat shirts and pants with gloves covering both hands. There was a noticeable difference in their age and Jo didn't need to be told that the older one, the stranger, held more authority than the other. He sat on a bed parallel to them.

"We're glad you're back to life," he started, "despite the injuries."

"Thank you for taking us in," Jo replied, keeping her tone neutral.

"I'm Eric and this is Lucien. I assume you've met."

"Might as well say it's a miracle you're alive," Lucien chimed in. "People rarely survive a crash of that nature, let alone being broken – on exposed grounds."

"Are we still in the Ruins?" Jo asked, the thought hadn't crossed her mind but now that he hinted at it, her mind could only wonder.

"Yes, this is one of two Ivory Towers." Eric's reply was direct. He watched the amazement glow in Jo's eyes, she sent a look towards Ramon who's face still wore no emotions at all he'd heard.

"Can't be true," Ramon blurted, adjusting to place his head on the headrest since he couldn't sit properly without hurting further.

"Many things are untrue big guy," Lucien said, his eyes roving about Ramon's muscular body. "But this right here, this is reality."

"There's a second base about 3 hours north of here surviving the ruins," Eric paused and took a sharp sigh before continuing. "Remember Souel 979?"

"Y'mean the missing passenger ship?" Ramon asked, unsure if it really was what he thought. That would seem the most bizarre thing he'd have heard of in a long time.

Eric nodded to Ramon's question, affirming the doubt which rose like troubled waters in his mind.

Flashes of the event came rushing back to memory. Soeul 979 had created much buzz around the world as hope for the rest of humanity to evade from the diminishing world they found themselves. The airship had been built to perfection according to its makers, with a capacity to carry twenty-five thousand passengers and travel at seventy thousand meters per hour, the largest and fastest of its kinds ever made with a primary aim to transport people to Phase II's safety.

The ship had lost signal barely 18 hours after it was launched. The world had given up hope in ever finding it after several months of search. Initial theories placed it as a hijack by the notorious Cerberus Corp but that was too much credit, too much of a feat to be pulled off by the scrappy gang. And so it was to the rest of humanity that Soeul 979 alongside its first (and last) set of passengers had disappeared from the face of the earth. Wouldn't be the first of such mysterious events in the history of mankind after all.

"There were a few survivors, if you would call us that," Eric said. "The rest of us from that day who call this place home."

"What happened to the others?"

"That's another story in itself."

Eric rose from the creaky bed where he sat and heaved a silent sigh as though to shed off the burden from the weight the memories of their existence bore on him. The past wasn't something he would rather dwell on, forging ahead towards a hopeful future while he still had a chance to was what kept his drive going.

"You'll have to rest for the time being, recuperation, especially with these set of outdated Next Generation methods could be tiring."

"The room's equipped with sensors to help monitor the progress of the nano-surgoen while they do their thing," Lucien added. "We'll be keeping an eye on reaction levels until they're stable enough. That would probably take the next couple of hours."

"Thank you," Jo replied, nodding in respect of their kind gesture. She hesitated for a moment before speaking, "there were others out there with us. Are they safe?"

"We're seeing to that, Jo" Eric responded.

The two men exited the room, leaving just the Guardians to their thoughts. A chain of questions had been aroused. Did the government know about their existence? Why hadn't they been evacuated? How did they even survive? And all the gears around, those surely weren't packed in Soeul 979 before it took off, were they? The whole ordeal didn't sound genuine, but then, doing away with the reality they found themselves was impossible.

Soeul 979 had been long forgotten – at least the government had seen to that – and so for this strange group to appear from out of the blue and claim to be from that experience sure did mean there was more to it. They wouldn't be able to tell for sure if there was something fishy until they could wrap their heads around what exactly it was they found themselves in.