Icarus: Enigma Project Part Six

Owen turned, legs still trembling beneath his own weight. The girl was crumpled on the concrete. His breath was erratic. The space around them, while still abandoned, he could tell was on the south side of the city. He gave an irritated growl, crouching down beside her. Two fingers went to the pulse on her neck, and nodded as he felt a slow steady beat under his fingers. She was alive, just exhausted by the look of her. Owen stood, and turned to walk away... and stopped.

With a sigh, he dropped beside her, a hand on her arm. "Xi?" he called.

“Mmm” She stirred a little, not wanting to push up off the ground. Her legs, even now without using them, felt like they were wiggly spaghetti, and her head- “Mmmnnnn” Her hand came up, digging into her hair as if she was trying to hold in her brain. With one hand (forcing herself, because she knew if she didn’t she would just lay on the ground forever) to sit up. Owen watched as she too started to gag and retch.

“I’ll be fine....”

She was breathless still, obviously not fine. Still holding her head with one hand she opened her eyes, looking up to Owen.

Owen snorted a little, nostrils flaring in irritation.

"Well," he growled, pulling himself to his feet, refusing to allow himself to back away from heR. The truth was that he was rather frightened of the creature who he'd been sent to find. He'd seen the photos of the damage that she had done.

"Well, I must be the first person in the history of the universe to have been kidnapped by their project. What was that, anyway? How did we get here?" He held up his hands in defeat.

"You know what, I don't care. Good luck."

“Wait- stay. Don’t- Don’t you have to-”

He turned away as the heavens opened. The clouds above them started a downpour, and she stopped, still not accustomed to the idea of water just falling from the sky. Her eyes closed, one hand turning to a fist against the wet, rocky concrete.

“You’re just going to leave me to kill an entire city?”

He stopped dead, slowly setting down his foot, shoulders tense.

“Fuck.

I will get you sorted, get the reactor stable then you are on your own.” He slowly turned, still trying to keep the fire in his eyes. "We'll get to a hotel - not the one that I originally had booked - and get you sorted. Then, you're on your own." He sharply offered his hand, only afterwards flinching.

The rain was really coming down really heavily, swiftly soaking them both to the skin.

With a small struggle she stood, leaving her legs to shake slightly.

“It won’t have the same problem again?” She looked him in the face, trying to be as strong as she could in this state.

Owen shook his head, and shrugged before sighing.

"Its had the same problem for the last... two years?" he said frowning, resisting the urge to yank his hand away from her.
"Of course I can't let you blow up the city... It'd kill everyone..." he said and actually did pull his hand away from her, this time, to rake a hand through his hair, exasperated.

“-well, come on," he said, and turned to leave the alleyway, a hand over his head, trying to shield from the rain.
She followed after him, eyes wide, taking in his shape, and then she started mimicking his position by putting her own hand up over her head. She was too tired to keep it up for long though, and soon dropped her arm back to her side.

“What was that?” she asked him.

"What was what?" he asked her, exasperated.

“How did we get here?”

Xi wrapped her arms around herself, looking anywhere she could other than at Owen.

"You mean... You didn't intentionally carry me off?" he asked her, the exasperated hand running through his hair. It was a very bad habit, and flicking his hair out his face was sending rivets of cold water down his spine.

"Teleportation, Xi. The ability to will yourself from one location to the next. Now hurry up. Electronics and rain do not mix," He hitched the backpack onto his back, grabbed her wrist and marched through the rain.

Eventually they came to a small hotel, hidden away in the back streets. He paid for a room for him and his 'sister,' and dragged her up. He was surprised she showed no resistance. His hand loosened on her wrist. No surprise, she was raised to obey.

Coming out of the rain wasn’t as wonderful as she had hoped, it just left her soaked through and freezing, instead of soaked through and cold. She kept her mouth shut, but her eyes wandered over everything they could reach, taking in the new sights. Ratty carpet, dented furniture, musty curtains, and pamphlets on the bedside table.

Bed- her shoulders instantly fell. Her feet together, she stood rooted to the spot.

He followed her gaze to the bed. "You can get in it, if you like, but I’d recommend having a shower first..." He paused, turning to look at her, for the first time, really look at her.

She was frightened, that much was obvious. Frightened and tired, and confused. "You really have no idea what you are doing, do you? Christ, they told me you had no experience in the normal world..." He trailed off, and opened the bathroom door for her. "Bath. Go."

“Ah, yes sir.” She stepped inside, closing the door behind herself with a small click. But she didn’t let go of the handle. Instead she rested her forehead on the door a moment.

Eventually though she was getting clean, really actually clean, for the first time since... everything had started. She couldn’t keep her eyes focused on things, but she was welcoming the feeling of shampoo and soap.

Once she had dried herself off, she did her best to dry out her clothes as well. They weren’t going to get all the way dry, but at least they weren’t dripping anymore.

Slowly, she opened the door, looking for him and rubbing her neck once more.

"There's coffee in the machine - be warned, it tastes like pond water," Owen called from his position on one of the beds. He was sitting back against the wall, legs stretched before him, peering at the laptop screen and annoyance written all over his face.

One hand drummed on the keyboard, a series of 'tap tap taps' that was as rhythmic as it was annoying. The other hand went to the cup beside him, and downed a mouthful of the liquid.

"Mmm," the coffee cup went down as both hands went back to his keyboard, something apparently having caught his attention. "Gotcha, you basta-" the gleefulness vanished as readily as it appeared, replaced with an expression of horror. "No no no no!" He slammed the lid of the laptop closed.

Taking a look over to the coffee, Xi shook her head. She approached him slowly, watching his expressions.

“What’s wrong?”

Her hair was loose now, but she was already reaching up, tying it back in a ponytail and starting to braid it, her fingers working independently from anything else, as her eyes stayed tracked to him and the laptop as she sat on the side of the unoccupied bed.

He glanced up at her and sighed. "I’m trying to access the Enigma project systems from this computer. Not just the cybernetics department, I'm trying to look at your files," His eyes locked onto to hers.

"Are you warmer? Shall we sort out the damn reactor before you unintentionally slaughter more people?"