Nas'Librion, the City of Hope, the Gem of Eastshore, the City of Future, the Profane Capital, the Corrupted City, the Den of Evil, or just a stinking shithole. Nas'Librion had many names throughout history and passing its front gate, Cirse could not help herself but feel shivers pass through her body. How many times had she wanted to return here, staring at the high wall with longing? Actually she would have been jumping with exhilaration, if not for the gloomy state of affairs regarding her arrest.

It was surely the fault of the smiling idiot marching in front of her, he knew the android, they had come for him!

She could tell the white haired monster was the spawn of The Gifted, there was no escaping if one was caught by their dogs, the machines that looked like humans, but had no souls, murdering without a warning.

Clenching and unclenching her hand constantly, she entered a van. They had been handed over to the guards and were apparently going beyond the second wall. She watched the android leave, but it was no relieve when she understood there were at least fifteen guards escorting them in four cars.

Apparently the time of the headhunting android was too precious to spare it on escorting prisoners.

Sitting opposite each other with Victoria, she watched passing lights of the megapolis with its thin, incredibly intense beam of light that soared above the clouds, lifting up from the city center.

The last marvel of the civilization at its peak, an orbital fusion power plant, she wondered when it would fail considering the state of the city, but the corrupted leadership knew their lifelines well and the beam still shone brightly. The plant itself was located in space where it was much easier to keep larger quantities of plasma in check. The miniature sun that was the center of the plant was encased in a soplicated system of mirrors resulting in the single beam of light, directing its energy where needed.

It was both a fusion power plant and a beam weapon, it was just a matter of changing the direction of the beam.

Her spacing out was interrupted by the loud noise of metal grinding against metal and she could watch in awe, as Victoria opened a hole in the side of the van. She looked left and right only to find out the guards sitting next to them no longer had heads. Her crazy companion gripped her wrist and nearly tore her arm off, dragging her in the direction of a pet shop at the corner of the street. She heard yells, but they shattered the door of the shop and entered even before the guards managed to shoot their first shots.

Her small flame of hope died out the moment Victoria dragged her down the cellar, they had to keep moving! There was no escape from a cellar, they would be trapped!

Startled, she watched her unwanted companion looking around and wanted to say something venomous, but held her tongue. Whatever mutant Victoria was, she was too dangerous to provoke, but she was a stupid cow anyways!

The moment she thought that, Victoria kicked the sole wooden part of the cellar, shattering it instantly. In a flurry of splinters, she continued to drag Cirse along.

"It hurst damn it! I need to separate from her as soon as possible." She decided to run off at the first opportunity.

* * * *

"We should be good." Krogar nodded and let go of Cirse's hand, she immediately began to rub it with her other hand, looking at the floor to hide her expression.

"You were amazing, we have actually escaped." She lifted her head and smiled at him brightly.

In response, Krogar slapped her face.

"Uh-h."She fell over, holding her bruised cheek. She tried to stand up, but Krogar was not finished, slapping her even harder, causeing her falling to the ground, her back pressed against the cold floor of the underground tunnel.

He made a step closer and positioned himself to stand over her, with her chest between his legs. He bent his torso to reach her easily and lifted his hand above his head, extending his claws. On the last second, she instinctively lifted her hands to protect her face

"The hands, put your hands away." Krogar said coldly.

"Please no, I will do whatever you want!" She began to sob, trembling, while watching the clawed hand hovering above her like an executioner's axe. Still, she reluctantly withdrew her trembling hands, leaving her face exposed.

Krogar swung his hand swiftly, halting only an inch away from her face and slapped her tenderly a few times.

"You failed, you cannot go with me." He sat next to her as if nothing happened.

"Wh-what?" Cirse tried to silence her sobs with little success, looking at him with teary eyes.

"You did not fight." Krogar said dryly. "If I am to have a companion, I need one to fight against unfavorable odds, against stronger foes. You are not a fighter, nor you are honest with your words.You think nothing good of me, nor you trust me, but when I try to kill you, you just give up."

He looked at her, as she was slowly sitting up, trying to stealthily back away from him, creating a distance.

"Do not be foolish, you know you can't outrun me. You do not need to be afraid, I am not ungrateful. I have learned a lot from you and protect you until we find a place for you to stay."He slowly stood up, waiting for her to collect herself from the ground.

"And Cirse.. " He turned at her before continuing their march. "I appologize for the violence, I had to be sure."

She was looking away, unable to respond. Krogar saw he might have overdid it with his little experiment, leaving her in shock. There was no way she forgave him the stunt he had pulled off, he was not surprised.

Whatever, time was the best healer.

* * * *

Cirse gulped and suppresed her intense feelings, it was hard and she had still a tendency to cower when Victoria focused her attention on her, but they had to continue and she was apparently the only one with at least some knowledge of the place.

"We are in the first ring of Nas'Librion, it is the last stop before people get kicked out of the city." She glanced over Victoria. "It was a suburb without a wall, the today's second wall used to be the outer wall and smugglers used these tunnels to make quick buck."

Bitch, what did she know with her strength?

She was always the cripple, always at the bottom. Fighting? No amount of fighting can help if you are just a cripple against street gangs and groups of thugs and all the talk of standing up and fighting again was just crap. How many defeats can one take before breaking?Five? Ten? Fifty? Hundred? Everyone has a limit, poeple are not machines for god's sake!

She was so pissed, but she could not let it out. She never could. Talking the truth was the privilege of the strong.

"So, we can use the tunnels to infiltrate further into the city?" Victoria asked her.

"No, the successful smuggler families got integrated into the government, the corrupted judges know of most exits using them to their own ends." They arrived at a crossroads, one of the tunnels appear to be connecting to the sewers. "We should go to the sewers now, than straight and the second crossroad to the left to get to the more complex part of the tunnels."

"You know a lot" Victoria looked at her doubtfully.

"I worked here in the past." Cirse smiled. The high and mighty Victoria knew nothing of what she did in the past, she used to smuggle for one of the judges from the inner city, always doing the worst jobs and when the time was right, they had used her as a scapegoat, exiling her from the city as punishment.

* * * *

"Ok, first one straight, second to the left." Krogar mumbled, looking at the sewer water that flowed in the middle of the tunnel. They passed the first crossing, when he heard footsteps of several people.

"Hurry up, someone is behind us." They sped up, running towards the sharply curving part of the tunnel to be out of sight, but they were not fast enough.

"Stop, or we will shoot!" Someone shouted, five men appearing from behind the corner with their guns pointing at them.

Krogar ignored the warning, but noticed a second too late that his companion stopped on the spot. He gritted his teeth when a bullet pierced the muscles of his right arm a second before he ran into the curved part of the tunnel and saw the next crossing.

"Don't shoot, I yield, I yield!" Krogar heard Cirse's voice.

"Which fork bitch?!" An angry yell followed immediately after as the men had apparently caught up to Cirse and roughed her up a bit.

"The right one, we went for the surface." Krogar heard her blurting out and his eyebrows rose high.

"Hou . . .That is . .unexpected." He held his breath and submerged into the sewer water flowing in the middle of the tunnel, facing the ceiling. Using his improved eyesight to his advantage, he could still see above the surface, but ordinary men should not be able to see him under the water.

Only a moment later he saw four shadows passing him by and launched himself up, surprising the two men immediately next to him.

"Got you." Krogar hit the temple of the first one with his hand and kicked the head of the second one in a single fluent movement, sending them both to the lands of dreams.The remainig two wanted to shoot at him, but he quickly hid behind one of the unconscious men and threw a gun in the face of one of the remaining two, causing at least a light concussion.

Throwing the gun, Krogar realized he had only one option left to incapacitate the last man. He gripped the unconscious man he was hiding behind and ran towards the one still standing with him as a meat shield.

"Damned slut!" The remaining one tried to dodge the meaty battering ram by jumping across the sewer canal in the middle, but Krogar just threw the body at the point where the man would be landing, their bodies crashing against each other with considerable force. After the successful throwing maneouver, it was easy to knock out the remaining man, who was struggling to regain his faculties.

"Splendid execution." Krogar clasped his hands, applauding himself. "There should be one left."

He picked up two guns and headed in the direction of Cirse. He could have picked up just one, but it looked too cool to have two guns.

At first, he was nervous when he saw a body lying on the ground with blood oozing from the back of its head, but calmed down, when he came closer and recognized the still standing person being Cirse.

"My, my, . .I would never expect this from you." Krogar smiled.

"Nor would I expect you to stop and get rid of them instead of running away." Cirse was still breathing loudly. "You have probably managed to suppress you animalistic nature for a moment."

Cirse went pale the moment she realized what she had said and tried to quickly suppress the levels of adrenalin flowing in her veins. It had been long since she had been in a near-death situation like this one.

"Huh? Good. That was probably the first honest talk I have heard from you." Krogar burst into laughter.

"What? What are you looking at? Do you think I am some selfish prick hating people for speaking their minds? Oh come on!" Krogar thought her reaction was priceless.

"Well, that is usually what happens with people who have your level of power." Cirse commented. "But If I am to be honest, why did you call that android Lucy? How can you know her? And if you do, why does she work for The Gifted? Do you have a connection with them?"

"Eh .." Krogar paused, taken aback by the sudden questions. "Lucy is a . .a comrade."

"Comrade? That is why she pumped bullets into you? Seriously?" Cirse frowned, unsatisfied with the answer.

"Look, I do not know. Something had to happen, something .. not good." He had already thought about it, but he had no clue whatsoever. "It is better for you not to know about Lucy and her origin."

"But she IS a machine, how can a person befriend a machine that is just . ."

"I am not a person Cirse . ." Krogar interrupted her next prying.

"Even a mutant. . " But she apparently insisted on getting out something from him now, when it seemed to be safe to talk with him eye to eye.

"I am a machine just like her Cirse for fuck's sake, can you please let it go? I am not a human, nor a mutant, not a women, not a man! I am a fucking artificial intellifence!" Krogar was almost yelling at this point.

Cirse was so stunned, she forgot to be afraid of him. At first, she thought Victoria was joking, but it did not seem that way.

"We used to be one body ok? We have separated about a month ago, something serious must have happened."Krogar continued, sadness in his voice.

"What are you going to do? It seems like a solid connection being in a single body."

"I do not know Cirse, I do not know." Krogar stared at the flowing sewer water absentmindedly. They stayed in silence for a while, listening to the sound of the flowing water.

"If I may ask a question, have you been serious with the AI thing?" Cirse almost whispered.

"Hmph." Krogar growled.

"So, you are like a calculator of something?"

Krogar facepalmed.

"Cirse, a damn calculator? For real? I am no damned calculator. I am beginning to regret that whole honesty thing."

"But the modern calculators are quite smart Victoria!" Cirse perked up, when she found out that she was not the only one with defects.

Krogar just shook his head, enduring his companion's newfound honesty, as they walked further through the underground tunnels.