Goddess of Thunder (Short Story in Progress) Chapter 5

V

She was on the road once again, the storm had just begun, the winds were becoming more and more hostile but they were nothing that she couldn't handle, the journey was steady the danger was being ignored. But then everything changed with the appearance of the tornado at the end of the road. There was no way of her to change directions by know, so she had no option but to be consumed by it.

Ailine opened her eyes from the terrible yet predictable nightmare, all of her thoughts of last night returned as instantly as she saw the trees that surrounded her. It was already morning and she quickly realized that Da Speller wasn't longer there, but the remaining pieces of the bike were still under the tree, so she knew that he could not be too far away. She stood up and began to look for him.

"Da Speller? are you still here?"

She walked a few meters and she quickly found him. He nailed down facing the ground, she didn't understand what he was doing but as she approached he could saw. He had buried Oly with his bare hands. He spent all the night digging the hole with his hands and he had finally buried his friend.

"Da Speller?"

All covered in dirt, he stood up tired as hell, his task was over. He looked exhausted, but with a great calm and serenity.

"You had a good night sleep?" he asked her.

"Heh... not exactly, but... forget about me, are you okay?"

Da Speller smiled; it was a tired but sincere smile.

"I'm just fine"

He began to walk away from the site of the grave.

"I suppose that they won't be looking for us by now" he said.

"I... I don't think so, they must have concluded that we died in the fire" responded Ailine as she followed him.

They returned to the same site where Ailine spent the night, Da Speller returned to the same tree where he had left the remaining pieces of the flying bike, he picked them up and began to observe them closely.

"What are you ... planning to do now?" she asked him, thinking it was a bad idea to say that so soon.

"I have a plan, I thought about it all night" Da Speller responded without looking at her. “I can't do, what you told me."

Ailine didn't know what he was talking about, suddenly she remember, the flying bike.

"You... you can't reconstruct the bike?

Da Speller laughed a little bit.

"Of course I can reconstruct it. In fact, I'm going to upgrade, the old design will look as a damn chance compare to this new one. But I cannot give it to you just like that, you must earn it in some way." Da Speller responded.

Ailine didn't understand what he was trying to said.

"Earn it? What do you mean by that?"

Da Speller was still analyzing the pieces; he was already sketching in his mind the way that he was going to reconstruct the bike.

"Do you want the same thing that happened to that biker happen to you?" He asked her.

"No, but... that happened to him because he didn't earn that bike?"

"Of course!" screamed Da Speller "The goddess only grants an opportunity at those she seem worthy, how the hell does someone expect to be worthy by climbing that mountain with a stolen bike? The Gods hate stealers."

The Gods were more conscious and present than Ailine previously though. She though that they were just mighty and invisible beings that just appeared or acted at random times, but soon she found out that there was nothing random about them.

"So, what do I have to do? How can I become worthy?" she was dying to know.

Finally, Da Speller looked at her with a penetrating view.

"Ailine!, I didn't want to give you this chance, but it seems that I have no other choice. In two months, I'm going to organize a big and mortal race; the one who wins the race will get my bike".

It seemed like a good challenge but there were so many details absent.

"If you want to, you can participate in the race, the entrance cost is $200,000" he said.

"But why are you organizing a race at this precise mom..." when she finally heard the number, she didn't need to ask further.

Da Speller began to look at the sky.

"There's a big part in me that is craving for a change, a great change. I think is time to say good bye to this part of my life, move on. And I need the money to move on."

Ailine was completely amazed as for how he took his own tragedy. He had no idea how he had done it, a great part of her wanted to know. But then she concluded that they were extremely different after all.

"But... how are you planning on organizing that race and how many bikers are going to compete?"

"I just have to leave that to my brother, he will market the hell out of this idea; after all, everybody will want this bike. He will probably contact all the gangs in the region, since they are a lot, only one member of each gang will be allowed to be a racer. Independent bikers can also join in, if they have the money."

The idea was becoming more and more frightening for Ailine and that was exactly what Da Speller was trying to do. All of the gangs were going to be there, so there was no question that it was going to be a big and violent race and she didn't even know where it was going to be.

"Where is it going to be held?"

Da Speller smiled and said:

"The Gray Canyon"

Ailine's face turned into the color of the canyon itself. She knew where that was. She didn't think that it was possible to held a race there, the gray canyon was infested with an eternal mist, it was almost impossible to see anything ahead while driving there, you had to use all of your instincts to sense the curves and the rode itself, otherwise, you would fall into the abyss. Ailine was amazed by the challenge that this was going to be, she was scared and she felt lost for a second, but for her, there was no other option, she had to do it, there was no other way.

Da Speller felt that he had finally talked Ailine out of the idea of pursuing that bike and that mountain. But soon, he found out that he was wrong.

"How much you said it was the entrance cost?"

That question left Da Speller in shock, she couldn't believe this girl's obsession, there was nothing good in it, but he figure that there was nothing that he could do about it.

"$200,000"

"Ok" she said, her voice was full of determination.

"Are you sure that you'll get the money by that time?"

Ailine had already something in mind, but she needed to get her bike back.

"Yeah, I will"

Da Speller felt sad for Ailine's response, he was trying to scare the girl off by making the challenge even more ridiculous, but his plan didn't work at all. In fact, Ailine seemed even more focused than ever.

"This ain't gonna be pretty, Ailine. Chances are that you hadn't seen a race like this before. A lot of people tend to die, I don't really recommend..."

"I've heard enough warnings" said Ailine, interrupting her "I'm sorry but they are not going to do the trick, I'm going to be there."

And that was the end of the conversation. There was nothing left to say for the two of them, they weren't going to see each other again until the day of the race. They could only wish each other farewell. Ailine began to walk away to the exit of the woods and Da Speller returned to Oly's grave. He stood in front of it, clenching his fist, biting the pain as it remerged once again.

Ailine was already reaching the road, then he heard a scream.

"Ailine!" it was Da Speller, screaming at her without taking his sight out of the grave.

The mechanic had one final phrase for her.

"One must accept one’s losses!"

The phrase arrived as an echo to Ailine. An echo she ignored, holding tight to what she considered to be hope.

With the wind erasing the words, she continued walking, leaving behind the man who had lost everything.

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Solitude Adventures, A Science Fiction Novel: Chapter 4

Fourth chapter of this science fiction novel. I've been working on a short story right now, so that's why Solitude Adventures is in a small hiatus right now, nonetheless I bring to you Chapter 4.  I'm thinking on posting this short story than I'm currently working on in chapters because it got way longer than the story I originally envisioned. I don't even know if it's a short story anymore, but I guess that I'll posting it here while I finish it. I hope you enjoy this new chapter, and thanks for reading.

Piece of Heaven

The brutal sound of water was the only thing that surrounded my head at that moment; I didn't need to open my eyes to see what was going on. Time passes slow in the waters but fast at the same time; so slow to realize its empty harmony yet so fast that you're not longer aware that you're not there. My feet were stepping on solid ground, my eyes were still closed, a tree behind me, a rope in front of me and a fist inside my stomach. Being tied up is no funny business folks.
"You're a hard son of a bitch to find, I'll give you that" he said as he punched my face next.
I open my eyes and I look at him. I didn't even know the guy, yet he saved my life and was about to take it away. I guess that you should know the name of the person who did those two things to you.
"I almost drown trying to get your sorry ass... but it was worth it" he punched once again in the stomach and I started to spit blood.
"What is your name?" I asked him with my blooded voice.
"What, my name?" he asked me back.
"Well yeah, you just saved my life and now you're going to kill me, I guess I should know your name"
He got closer to me and then he grabbed my neck; I clearly saw his face smiling. He was a little bit younger than me, with dark hair and from Asian decency, probably Japanese.
"But I'm not going to kill you sweety, not yet" he then grabbed my hand and he   pulled out a knife that was under his pocket.
A part of me thought that I was already dead and that this place was some kind of hell with my torturer in front of me, but then I quickly realize that I was still alive. The knife went through my hand as if it were butter, now I know the pain that Jesus Christ himself felt and let me tell you folks... it's no funny business.
Immediately after that, he began to twist the knife. The more he twisted, the more he smiled. I screamed at levels that I wasn't even aware that I could.
"What is your goddamned fucking problem?!" he smiled even more while I was screaming that.
When the knife gave a rotation of one hundred eighty degrees inside my hand, he pull it out. My hand was a fountain of blood.
"I guess that's the problem" he said while he was cleaning the red knife with his white shirt. "You see, I didn't even paid you to hack up my exam, I was one of the few ones who actually passed by their own".
He grabbed my other hand and he did the same thing.
"I just heard that the guys were up to kill someone tonight and I just decided to join in."
And that moment, I finally realized who that fucker was, I resolved and long forgotten mistery in probably the worst way possible. A few years ago, a series of horrible murders took place inside and outside the school, must of them we're girls who had been tortured and then killed by a series of painful knife wounds, finally they we're crucified in the forest. He quickly became known between us as the Stigmata Killer, this was the first major treath that we faced together, and what did we do? we immerged ourselves in fear and paranoia. The Stigmata Killer was one of us, but who? we couldn't trust in anyone, we couldn't trust in ourselves. We had a serial killer in our school, he had killed seven girls already and we didn't know what the hell to do. We were expecting that the Luvic Corporation would carry an investigation about this, but they never came. We filled the report at docent times but we knew that this was not even necessary, they had systems of surveillance, they knew what was going on here... or at least we thought they knew. The Stigmata Killer episode was a particular devastating one, because after that, we knew that the surveillance systems of Luvic Corporation were no longer activated, those systems represented the law and the order of this civilization and they were no longer there. There was nobody watching us, no punishment for crimes, it became just another planet without law.

Seeing that no one else responded to the treat, a friend of mine and I decided to investigate the case but we didn't resolved anything, the Stigmata Killer left no tracks, nothing, it was almost impossible to trace him. After a few more kills he just stopped, there we're no more killings left, the Stigmata Killer disappeared, but the damage he made to us was almost beyond repair, when everybody figured out that there was no surveillance in our planet, violence, crimes and murders became pretty normal in this new civilization of ours. This changed nothing for me, until this precise moment in which everybody was trying to kill me. I was always a criminal but I worked in the shadows without harming anyone, but now, with this paradigm shift, working in the shadows seemed redundant.
"You were one of those bastards who was trying to track me down eh?" said the Stigmata Killer.
I found this practically unclimatic, I didn't even know who this guy was, he was just a skinny little dude who looked really sick and weak, I couldn’t believe this person would be able to cause so much chaos.
"Why did you stop killing?" I asked him.
He walked near me and he took my right hand, he quickly purred some kind of spray over it and my hand began to heal immediately, once this happened, he stabbed the knife once again.
"I stopped killing because I stopped receiving orders" he responded while I was screaming. He was rotating the knife even more slowly than the last time.
"What the hell are you talking about, orders from whom?"
"You don't need to know, you're going to die anyway and I don't think that you would understand it."
"I'm gonna die? So you have orders to kill me?"
He didn't respond to my question and he proceeded to the torture.

My screams became a permanent resonance in the woods, unfortunately, the attention that they demanded wasn't met, but I don't think it would have made any difference otherwise. Soon, he was going to move to the kill, a victim more, this was not vengeance, no revenge of any kind, just a pointless homicide, I guess that I preferred to be killed by someone who really had strong intentions and good reasons to kill me, like any of the other fellas.
Now, the knife was inside my right shoulder, this was the greatest moment of pain in my entire life, a part of me felt that I was about to black out, I guess that wasn't a bad idea after all. The pain was beyond my limits of resistance and this weren't going to get nicer, so I was preparing to close my eyes and say good bye to everything I ever knew, when suddenly, an event that saved my life and change my entire perception of the world occurred.
It all began with music, I started to hear music and I wasn't the only one, he was listening to. To be honest, it wasn't music; they were just sounds, really powerful resonances that seemed to have some kind of harmony. The sounds became louder, like if they were approaching the place we we're on. He pulled the knife out of my shoulder, the pain moved around my entire body and my scream was the loudest of the night, but it was also silent, for the sounds were to loud and powerful that my scream became silenced by them. He began to look around us, trying to find the direction in which the sound we're coming from, but there was no direction, the sounds we're all around us, they came from all directions.
Suddenly, he stopped to look around and he froze completely, as if he had just made some kind of realization, he dropped the knife, and he grabbed his head with his two hands. Somehow, he knew what those sounds meant, and he began to worry as they approached, he looked at me and then he looked at his hands, all tainted with my blood, the sounds we're near and he tried to clean his hands, of course it was impossible.
When he realized he couldn't clean the red of his hands, he began to cry. He began to weep like a little baby. He then quickly run towards me and healed my shoulder with that spray he previously used. I saw his face and his tears closer, his eyes we're full of terror and regret, as if he was asking for forgiveness or something of that kind. Immediately, he picked up the knife that he had drop and he headed towards me once again.
I was sure that this was going to be the final moment; it seemed that his time was running low, for some reason, and he was just going to finish me off quickly. I was just praying that he didn't cut off my throat; that was the worst death imaginable, a death without screams, however, filled with blood, pain and slow agony.
He went behind the tree and I knew that he was going to do it that way. I closed my eyes and hoped that my dead would be faster than I thought. I felt a shallow coldness in my neck, the sounds approached more and more, my neck felt colder and colder, exposed, waiting for the final cut. A final cut did happen, but my neck was still intact; the rope that was around me was the one that received it. The Stigmata Killer (or whoever he was) freed me from his own trap; he rescued me from his own attempt of homicide.
I felt to the grass, tired and weak, the sounds had reached us, even though my body had never experienced these kinds of extreme circumstances, I got up quickly. The Stigmata Killer pushed to the other side. He was still crying, desperately, but he was also screaming something at me, of course I wasn't able to hear anything because of the beautiful sounds that apparently saved my life. I didn't understand a thing he said to me, but I didn't need to, his two arms we're clearly telling to get the hell out of there, to run as fast as I could, and I did as I was commanded.
While I was running away, which actually was at a much slower speed than the one that you're imagining, I could help but to ask myself: "what the hell did it just happen?", "why he didn't kill me?", "what the hell we're those sounds?". I had to know, I had to go back and see what those sounds were, yes I know, probably one of the most stupid decisions that someone in my situation could have made, but after all, I don't need to explain myself to you, you don't need to know how fucked up I am.
As I returned to the scene of the almost crime, the sounds we're still there, I was hiding in the trees, approaching really slowly, trying to find my friend. The sounds finally stopped and immediately after that, I saw him. He was kneeling down and facing the ground, his hands were in his pockets and he was still crying. I noticed that he was saying something, I thought that he was prying or something like that, so I approached a little bit to find out. Now, a little bit closer, I could clearly listen to what he was saying, unfortunately, I couldn't understand a word; he was speaking in Japanese. However, I quickly noticed something, he said a short stream of words, then he stopped, then he said another stream of words, stopped once again, he then raised his head, showed his red hands and screamed something as if it there was someone in front of him. He was having a conversation. I put my hand inside my right pocket, and found that my pocket recorder was still intact. I quickly started to record everything that he was saying, so that later I could find a program able to translate it.
I still wanted to know with who he was speaking with, his voice was the only voice I could hear, so, once again, I moved a little bit further to see if someone else was there. To my surprise, there was no one. I quickly look at him once again, and I couldn't see any kind of attachments or gadgets in his ears, eyes or head. It was easy to dismiss him as a complete lunatic, after all he was a serial killer, but, what's up with all of those sounds that we previously heard. I clearly felt that something was approaching and he to. It was unlike anything that I have heard or experienced before. I knew that it I wasn't just watching a lunatic speaking with himself, there was something more to this, there was something else going on.
He stood up, he was still talking and crying, I was recording everything. After talking and crying a little bit more, he hugged the air. He just jumped and hugged the air as if he was hugging someone, he then cried some more. "What the hell is going on?" that was the only thought in my mind. After hugging the air for a couple of minutes, he stopped and he cleaned his tears. He was nodding his head, as if he was listening to someone, he then stopped nodding, he stopped moving completely for a second. He suddenly turn around and look exactly at the place where I was hiding. He saw me.
At that precise moment, I thought that I had probably recorded enough. In less than a second, I put my recorder inside my pocket, turn around and I just ran; this time, at a much faster speed than the one that you're imagining.

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Solitude Adventures, A Science Fiction Novel: Chapter 3

Third chapter of this little novel of mine.  Thanks a lot for everyone that has read and liked the previous two, I've already wrote more chapters but I haven't had time to edit them, however I think that they would out soon. I hope you enjoy this one.

Woods of Memories

Dying is not what it just to be, and I talk as if I were an expert. This has only happened to me once but I felt that it didn't happen the way it should. I don't know what was it like for all of the other folks that have left this world but for me it was pure pain, there was no calming piece, no serenity, nothing; the pain still went on for an eternity. But I guess time behaves differently when you're not in this world anymore. I was suspended in time at the moment that it happened; I was lying there, my murderer was hugging me and I just wanted to kill him, I was too weak to do anything about it, imagine that scene lasting... for an eternity.

Eventually, I guess I moved on, I'm not sure what happened but I felt that I wasn't part of that world anymore, and I couldn't help to feel so relief, I suppose that this was the peace and serenity that everybody talks about. If you had live in my world, it’s not a world that you would miss. Now that I'm no longer part of it, I guess I should be worried about my parents, I guess I should be watching them but the problem is that I never met them. None of us ever did, we don't have any idea how they look like, we are not really sure where they are, the only think that we know is that they're still alive and they were keeping us alive (well, for me, this was no longer the case, but for all the others it was). The planet where I and all of the others lived was called Bena, this was a planet owned by the Luvic Corporation (who pretty much conquered our entire solar system). We lived in Bena because all of us were sons of workers of the Luvic Corporation. That's right, if you worked for the Luvic Corporation and you had a child, this child was taken away from you and sent to Bena were he was going to be raised by teachers and young adults. As a parent you didn't even get to meet your son, but you still have to work for his education, that's right, your son being in Bena wasn't something  free, parents had to continue working to pay their education and their staying in Bena. If you stopped working, your child was simply expelled from the planet and he would have to become a space nomad, no matter what age.

Once a son finishes maternal education, he would be ready to enter hologram education or as the corporation called it: "Educational Palaces" gigantic crystal buildings that resembled the ancient universities that existed long before. Here you'll son would have to decide what he was going to become for the Luvic Corporation and he had three options: Colonist, Engineer or Maternal Teacher, after choosing one, he would then face endless tests and trials to determine whether or not he was worthy of being a worker for the Corporation, if he managed to past all of the tests he would have to still complete the final test which was almost impossible to approve and only the best of the best succeeded and began to work for the corporation in the area that they had mastered, for everyone else, space was the only place left for us.

Things were not always this difficult.  Generations before, 60% of students managed to succeed on the final test and became active Luvic workers, but for our generation it wasn't the same, the Luvic Corporation had already conquered everything it was needed to be conquered, they controlled and developed every resource that they needed. We humans already possessed an excellent longevity and everything look well and prosperous for them but not for us, not for the children of Bena; we weren't useful anymore, young blood just wasn't needed, the corporation had just the right amount of workers in all of its areas: The colonist had already conquered the solar system, so there was no need for more. Engineers had discovered and developed the finest ways of preserving energy and food, not much improvement could be made in that area. And Maternal Teacher was the most overpopulated job in existences (which was the career path I chose, by the way). The idea of interacting and educating the future generations seemed to be a beautiful thing to do, plus I loved kids, everybody kept telling me that it was the worst job ever, that I should have chosen engineering as everyone else but being a teacher for this kids seemed to be far more important and transcendental.

"What's transcendental about indoctrinating a bunch of spoiled brats that will have no future anyways?" Net always reminded me.

Even thought our planet was mind-blowingly boring, all schools and educational palaces were surrounded by beautiful and enormous forests, where everyone just liked to hang, drink, fuck, whatever.

I met Net when I was camping in the woods with some friends, he was the friend of a friend, when we had our first conversation I was completely loathed by his fucking pessimism, I just hated that pretentious asshole.

"How the hell you know that?" was the first thing I asked him.

"Went to maternal schools myself and look at me, I have no future." It was true, but I just hated being wrong.

"Don't be a pussy, nothing is easy in life, you have to fight for everything, so man the fuck up, would you?" He just laughed at me when I said that.

"I like you, sister" he said and he grabbed my shoulder

"Who the hell still says ‘sister’? What are you an old man?" he laughed once again.

"I like you, sister" he repeated...what a fucking idiot.

After I met him, Net began to change a lot, at first I thought that he was only doing this to comply me, but I was wrong. What I didn't realized at the moment is that he was actually showing me his true self and apparently this was the first time he had ever done that with anyone. After few months of dating him, I realized he was another person completely, he was like me or better yet he had always been like me but he just hid it because no one else would accept him like that. In reality, he was extremely vulnerable and I was the only one who could see this because he let me. Now, I don't know if this was the real Net.

"You know what... even though I never met them and probably never will... I miss them. I know that I'm the only one who feels like this but...I do". And he was right, nobody else felt like him.

He was the only one who had a particular interest in finding his parents and meet them. Maternal schools always taught us that parents were unimportant figures and that they only did what they had to do. They were only responsible in founding our education, which we hated. So no one developed an actual love or curiosity towards them. Bunch of strangers who just gave money and force us to do something we hated. But Net knew that what they've taught us was not the true.

"How can you create a life and just hand over it to a bunch of fucking strangers, who will never let you see it again and you will never know in what type of person it became?"

That particular piece of the puzzle didn't seem to fit well and he made me realize this, I guess that he made me interested in finding my parents and he also made me uninterested in doing what I was doing at the moment.

"I know that you have good intentions but your idea of that job is not what it really is, you're not changing anything, you're not improving anything, you're just helping the indoctrination to continue to the next generation: The Luvic Corporation is the only place in which you're gonna be safe, you don't wanna be in space, you're going to die alone out there. So, you better try the best to become a Luvic worker. Ohh... and for your information, there is pair of workers out there who are founding your education so that you can become just like them."

He later wrote a poem about that, I think it was titled "Solitude Adventures". That was our greatest fear, to die alone out there. To embark on a quest that was going to rip us a part. Nobody wanted that and you could see the desperation and anxiety that a lot of us went through because of that fear.

I saw that desperation and anxiety... but only once. It was the last thing I saw in this world, his face was full of it. I returned to that moment once again and I realized that everything that happened was just a result of that same desperation and anxiety we were all imprisoned by. On top of all, I actually knew him. I think his name was Roger and for the little I knew him, he was actually a nice guy. But every nice guy turns into a monster given the right conditions, but those conditions weren't his fault. While I was looking at him, I think that he assumed exactly the opposite idea, that everything was his fault, in reality it wasn't, that was the moment when the eternity disappeared.

The more I think about this world, the more I remember Net. The more I remember how  he changed with the passing of time. In the final moments I spent with him, he became so obsessed with everything, especially with the idea of meeting his parents. Before, when I think I used to love him, he just live in his ideas, he just moved back and forward, but later, he just became obsessed with them. He began doing experiments in the Bio-Lab, he managed to hack a long list of data containing the personal and biological data of a lot of Luvic workers. He then began to do DNA experiments, comparing which worker matched with his DNA. Of course, this was going to take him years, but he didn't care. He hired hackers to acquire all of the information necessary to tracked them, after that, I think that he actually hacked a file pertaining to the Luvic Diaphora (The Elite researcher group for the Luvic Corporation), he thought his parents were part of that group, those files were almost impossible to acquire by someone like us, but he did, and he became more obsessed than ever.

I already hated the sex and I knew he to, I already hated being with him and I knew he hated to be with me to. He was always lost in the woods, never available when needed and with the passing of time, he became never needed. I naturally decided to fell in love with someone else and that someone else got me killed...

I don't want to remember more of this stuff but it seems that I'm just trapped in these memories; I just want to escape them. I now live in the forest where I died, at first I thought that this was just some kind of illusion, more like a dream, a death dream, however, every time the essence of the forest seems more vivid, every time I can smell the trees, flowers and shit more intensively. I can feel the grass as if I had feet, as if I were still alive, lost in these woods of memories. I would like to know if I'm the only one here.

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Solitude Adventures: A Science Fiction Novel, Chapter 2

Second chapter of the Solitude Adventures series. This chapter is narrated from the point of view of Roy, one of the guys patrolling the forest looking for Mata.

 

Late Night Judgement

 

The death of that asshole was the only thing that I had in mind. But killing him was something that I had to leave for the others to do. For me, it was already to late. Somehow, I always knew this was going to end like this. I was patrolling the forest, my rage was the only thing that was pushing me forward. We trusted in that incompetent piece of shit and, now he cons us and disappears, I had no other choice but to become a space nomad because of his fucking fault and ineptitude. All my life, all my plans, everything that I had done and everything that I had endure in this godforsaken planet was for nothing. At least, before I leaved to encounter my dead, I needed to kill the bastard who ruined us all. Those were my thoughts while I was driving the motojet looking in the darkness of those woods alongside the others. We were closing in on him, I knew it. I took a detour because I thought I had heard something coming from the waterfall that was near us, so I headed there. I arrived to the waterfall but there was nothing to be seen, however I knew that the bastard was close. My motojet still had a good amount of energy so I was able to activate the tracking pulse radar, it was a relatively new device that detected any human pulse in the area, it required a lot of energy to be activated but I felt that this was the moment to use it. The radar detected a pulse moving quickly to the east at less than 15 kilometers away.
I took out my magnum and I headed there at full speed. He felt into that waterfall and in a few minutes he was already 15 kilometers away? He was using a vehicle, unfortunately for him, I was using my motojet. He was just a few meters away, he was completely alone, he was there for me to kill. I was only looking at the pulse radar. It was so fucking dark and I was driving at full speed. The pulse radar wasn't able to detect any other types of objects, so if a tree or a rock or something else was lying in front of me, my face was going to smash that at full speed while my motojet exploded. But I didn't care at that moment, I just wanted to kill him, that was the only thing in the world that matter. The energy levels of my motojet were dropping, that damn radar consumed a lot! My motojet had only a few seconds left of life, I looked ahead and I finally saw him. A dark figure running in the woods like crazy, he was still a little bit far away, but not for my magnum. I fired the first shot and missed, however I saw him and after I fired the first shot, he just stopped running and he raised his hands. My motojet died and I was still a little bit far away. I just saw Mata's dark silhouette raising his hands. Although we were some meters away, I was still able to imagine the way that he was going to beg me to spear his life, it was already to late for that, my rage at that night didn't allow those types of negotiations. I just got off of the motojet, I looked at him and I fired four times, he fell to the ground.
Just at that moment, my whole world changed. All my rage, anger and violence disappeared all of a sudden and I was just left with an emotional void and the resting consequences of my actions. But still, as I was walking to see his corpse, a part of me felt that it was worth it.
I started to hear some motojets approaching the area, "too fucking late you poor idiots" I was thinking "I was the one who haunted him down like a pig", I guess that was the only part of myself that felt it was worth it. My whole world changed for a second and consecutive time, when I saw her blond hair lying on the grass and her white jacket all covered in blood.
"Who the fuck are you?", "What the fuck have I done?!"; those were the two questions that governed my mind and my being at that moment.

Two shots in the stomach and one shot in the leg, she wasn't moving at all. I could see her eyes were closed and her face impregnated with pain and suffering.
"This wasn't my fault, this wasn't my fault!" came after.
"What the fuck was this girl doing here?". No one else was supposed to be on these woods, but there she was, and it was me, the one who killed her. If it wasn't for my dead motojet I would had fled the scene, but there was nowhere to go for me at the moment. The other motojets arrived.
"Holy Shit Roy! What the hell did you do?" one of them asked.
"We were supposed to kill a dude!" another wisely added.
"This wasn't my fault! Who the fuck is this girl and what the fuck is she doing here?". There were only two of them and they were observing the corpse of the girl.

"Oh crap, she's Danna, Net's chick. Dude, you just killed Net's chick!"
"Danna?" I thought, "Yes, I know her, Net's chick, jesus, did I really kill her?" I was asking myself. I looked at her one more time to verify if this was really happening and when I looked at Danna, her eyes were open.
"Oh crap, I think she's still alive dude"
I looked at her face, she looked at me and for a moment, I felt all her pain and suffering by just gazing her eyes.
She closed them, that horrible pain was gone and I returned back to the real world, where I was still able to save her.
"One of you, give me your motojet, she needs a medic fucking now!" I asked, expecting a "no" for an answer.
One of them just laughed and asked.
"What's wrong with yours?"
"I have no juice left" I looked at her once more and the pain was returning "this girl is dying! I need another motojet, give me one!"
"No, no, no man. Your dead girl, your responsibility, we have the right bastard to kill, we have no energy or time for this shit."
They just turned around and they left as quickly as they came.
"Useless pieces of shit!" I was screaming at them. Then, I looked back at the girl. It was game over for her, I had no idea where the hell we were but I was sure that the only clinic available was far away in the center of the city. She was just there, those bullets were consuming her life bit by bit and I was the one to blame, I did this. I just kneeled besides her and I held her in my arms, she looked at me.
"I'm sorry, I'm so fucking sorry" I kept telling her "This was an accident, those guys, they left you here to die"
After I said that, she just looked at me, with a face of deep contempt and anger, that face was so full of energy, so full of rage, I understood her final words never uttered by just looking at her face. Those emotions were frozen and she just closed her eyes. That was the moment in which I understood that everything was my doing. I was the one who paid that hacker, I was the one trying to kill him. There was no one else to blame, not the girl, not those pieces of shit that abandoned us, not even the guy I was looking for. I killed that innocent girl, I cause her death and I was the only one to blame.
A couple of motojets were patrolling the area near I was. I looked at them and I just asked myself "What are you looking for? This is all fucked up, what's the point of killing that bastard, it's not going to solve anything, everything was our fault to begin with". But I guess that's easy for me to say because I've already tasted the flavor of immediate vengeance when I killed the girl thinking she was the hacker... we were pathetic, we deserves the worst.
I couldn't just leave her there, her name was Danna, she was Net's girl. I had only met her once, but I never crossed words with her. I knew Net , he was a good guy and he was going to be my judge. I carried her and I crossed the dark woods by foot. I found a way back to the city, a way back to school with her body in my arms.
I needed to see Net, I needed someone to judge what I had done and I didn't care for the outcome, if he killed me, that was fine and if he forgave me, the space was going to kill me anyway.

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Solitude Adventures: a Science Fiction Novel, Chapter 1

So this is the first chapter of a new novel I've been writing, its called Solitude Adventures. I've been writing articles for two years now but I also write some fiction and I figure: what the hell, I'm going to publish some early drafts of this story to see what you think. Solitude Adventures is a science fiction novel about a bunch of youngsters living in an isolated school planet, when suddenly some fuck up shit starts to happen. Every chapter is written in the point of view of a different character, I hope you enjoy this first chapter.

Children of Bena

 

As the dwelling on the field continued, we gazed into the black heaven which was no more colorful than our years to come. The smell of failure came to me as an awaited and relaxing fragrance, destined to fail, the unknown and the nothingness unfolding in my mind and presence. Laying besides me, for her it was the same, destined to fail. Lying. As the dwelling on the field continued….

Out of the silence, while I was lost in the emptiness of it all, that emptiness got interrupted.

"You should be moving" she told me.

"I'm trying to enjoy possibly the final moments of my life, when I run I feel that I'm spilling the final moments that I'm able to enjoy" I said.

"Don't be such a fatalist Mata, you can still make it out of Bena if you wouldn't take so many fucking detours".

I appreciated the enthusiasm that she showed regarding my situation; the fact of the matter was that even if I managed to escape this goddamn planet I was doomed anyway. Those who became space nomads were forever lost in the memories and knowledge of the other ones that were able to stay together. Nobody is able to survive in the dark and cold pool of space and all the unknown nightmares that kept. In the our world, solitude kills faster than any cancer.

"What about your boyfriend?" I asked her "Does he want me dead too?"

"I seriously doubt it" she said, "he wasn't that angry when he looked at its failed results, I think that he just wants to speak with you."

"Really? Well... Net has always been a reasonable guy, it's good that you're with him."

I smiled at her, but her face was full of confusion and sadness after I uttered that sentence. I don't know if she was also in love with me but at least she cared about me.

"Mata... I can't believe that this is happening to you, I can't believe that you're in this situation, why did you accept the job if you weren't able to pull it off?"

"I WAS ABLE TO PULL IT OFF!" I shouted at her, she looked at me, biting her lips.

"Someone got me screwed, that wasn't a common preprogrammed system of security, someone knew what I was up to, that system was prepared to counter all of my codes".

I knew it from the moment that I started to enter in the first screens, I had just a terrible feeling after it was already too late to back off, I have been hacking EP systems for the last 4 years, and I have been able to hack the final exam results 3 consecutive times, the security system shows improvement over the years but nothing I can't handle, but this year, it was different, it was modified by a human.

"I was screwed before I even began the job"

"So you're telling me that someone in school set you up?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying and I want to know who, I want to know who bested my abilities"

She just stared at me more worried than ever.

"You really want to die here, don't you?" she asked.

"Becoming a nomad equals death, staying here equals death. I'm already dead" I replied.

"And you're creating paranoid delusions in the process, no one updates or modifies the security systems of Educational Palaces, the only ones who are capable of doing such a thing are the engineers who designed it, and they're long gone."

She had a point, the Educational Palaces were magnificent school buildings that were abandoned many years ago, however, we, the students, still attended to classes. No professors to be seen just artificial, holographic ghosts of them. Their systems were never updated and they always taught the same things generation after generation. The Educational Palaces remain the same with the passing of time. The technology in which they were built is almost ancient, only a geek like me has studied that type of obsolete linguistics to be able to understand them; I found the books that taught me such skills in an abandoned ship, close to the Alic Sea. I burned those books after I learned what I needed to learn. I was the only one familiar with its system, the only one capable of hacking the final test results. At least, that's what I thought but I have a tendency of underestimating people. Now that I think about it, if you would have lived my life you would have that same flaw to.

"Wait a minute" I was starting to put the pieces together. I stood up and began walking around in small circles in the grass. "Pretty much every one of my clients wants me dead, correct?" I asked.

"You told a bunch of guys that you would be able to hack probably the most important test of their lives at a ridiculously expensive price and then you failed. Yee, what is our friend Mrs. Logic telling us Mata?"

Oh!, my beloved Danna, I had just the perfect comeback to that.

"Ok, so we can conclude that everyone is pretty mad at me. Net was one of my clients for this job." She quickly stared at me, she knew where I was going. "Can you please repeat to me what was his reaction when he knew that I fucked everything up?"

She looked at the grass.

"You son of a bitch" she said laughing while nodding her head. "So you think that Net was the one who got you screwed?"

"You said that he wasn't mad at me, If I were him I would be pretty fucking mad at me."

I just looked at her while smiling.

"I'm just repeating what our friend Mrs. Logic is telling us Danna."

"Well, stop listening to that bitch!" She stood up. "Net would never betray one of his friends. You talk like if you didn't know him."

"The only thing I know is that we don't know no one at all, plus, you said that he wanted to speak with me, isn't that the case?"

"Mata, just stop that train of thought of yours. It's going to lead you nowhere."

I was starting to hear some motojets in the forest, approaching the field we were on.

"Why does he want to speak with me Danna?"

Danna listened to the motojets approaching to.

"Shit!, Mata they're coming!"

"Why does he want to speak with me, Danna?!"

"Damn it Mata I don't know!, he has been behaving so fucking strange these days, I think he wants your help."

"Strange? strange how?"

They were just a few miles away.

"Get fucking moving!"

"Where is he?"

"I dont' know"

"You're his girlfriend and you don't know?"

The motojets were about to enter the field.

"Fuck, I'm sorry Mata."

She began to run away to the opposite direction and she hid in to the woods. I did the same but I didn't stop running and I encounter a slope. It was the first time that I was running on that kind of environment. Hell, it was like the third time that I ran in my life. So, I image that you can guess what happened next. Every single and irrelevant little rock had the power to destroy the balance of my feet completely. There was a waterfall near me and I just kept rolling towards it. I was praying to the gods that I didn't believe in, to stop the fall, but their existence disappointed me once more and Mr. Gravity made me pay my lack of balance by escorting me to the lair of Mrs. Waterfall.

Thanks for reading :)

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