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 Posted: Wed Dec 24, 2014 12:45 pm
Stage Seven
He wasn't sure how much time had passed. An hour, a day, a week, a year. Everything seemed to blur together until there was nothing else, until he could feel nothing at all. It was a relief; the pain had grown to be unbearable at times, Shaheen's ruthlessness proved over and over again; but now all Gale felt was a certain numbness, a blankness.
Some of his answers were half-truths. Some were lies, carefully crafted to sound like the real thing. Some were honest, as there was no harm in revealing them. But overall, in spite of the agony, Gale could not betray Deus, and he could not let too much be known to the Horsemen, of all people. His thoughts worked frantically to try and discern the proper method of answering, and sometimes he thought he did it right.
Sometimes he didn't, and her wrath was blinding.
(He couldn't even really hear Jinhai anymore, though he knew the dragon was there, curled up in his mind.)
The sound of something snapping drew Gale out of his haze. Slowly, sensation began flooding back into his body, and then he wished he'd stayed in that tranquil state of nothingness, because every part of him hurt. The right side of his face was swollen to the point of being unable to open his eye properly, and his head spun violently, nausea rising in his throat.
Slowly, painstakingly, Gale tugged at the rest of the chains with bruised fingers. They fell away with loud clanking noises that made him wince; he dragged himself to his feet and swayed dangerously on unsteady legs. The door to the pen was open, and he staggered towards it, hardly knowing what he was doing.
He'd lost his pendant probably back when he'd first been attacked by the insects. His fingers still fumbled for it anyway, though he couldn't find it beneath the tattered remains of his shirt. Gale traipsed through the lair, looking for the exit, and when he finally found it, he stumbled through and kept walking, even though his legs threatened to give away at any moment.
He had no idea where on earth he was - if he was still on earth, that was.
(Maybe he was dead and this was all a hallucination.)
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Posted: Thu Dec 25, 2014 2:55 pm
Stage Seven
As he walked (or rather, dragged himself without much thought), he could feel the FEAR shield attempting to work its way back into existence around him, Jinhai's thoughts wavering in and out like a bad radio signal. At least the dragon was still there; that was certainly reassuring. Gale thought, or maybe he thought he thought, that if he went northward somewhat, he might be able to find some shelter.
That would depend entirely on a) how long it took him to get there in the first place, and b) if he could even get there without collapsing first.
After about twenty minutes - or maybe an hour - or maybe two - he decided he needed to take inventory of his injuries. This would give his mind something to do, and hopefully keep his brain active enough not to give out on him while he traipsed blindly on.
His legs, thanks to Shaheen, felt weak and stick-like; the blood had long since congealed on the front of his pants, and the cuts were throbbing agonizingly with each step that he took. The right side of his face was still swollen and tender; he tried opening his eye, but the sweep of pain throughout his body made him nearly retch, and Gale decided that it perhaps wasn't the best idea. His hands were fine, if not a little sore, but his arms were bloodied and bruised from some of Shaheen's more brutal methods of persuasion. His head was spinning, but that was mostly due to whatever was broken - likely his jaw - but his back and his torso were relatively untouched.
That made things easier. Not hardly bearable, and not hardly less painful, but at least breathing didn't hurt too much.
Gale couldn't figure out how long he'd been walking.
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Posted: Thu Dec 25, 2014 2:59 pm
Stage Eight
"Rhodes. Hey, Rhodes, do you copy?"
"I copy. What do you see?"
"I think I see him. The hunter kid."
"Are you shitting me? He's still alive?"
"Yeah, something's moving about twenty feet to the left of where we are, and I'm pretty sure I'd recognize that weird hair anywhere. He looks kind of banged up, though...yep, it's him. Still got his coat on, though it's kind of in pieces."
"Well, the fact that he's still alive is a ******** miracle. Call ahead to the techs, tell them that we're gonna be coming through the portals in about five minutes with him."
"Right. Jeez. What about the rest of our mission?"
"No sense in finishing something we were never gonna finish anyway. Might as well call it a day."
"Roger that."
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