LERISTORY
Episode Five
KyraGeneral Moore slams through the door to The Flat and demands orange juice from the Service(tm). His contingent of following secrataries and staff scuttles behind him taking notes, dictation, and omitting curses for the bullshit news release.
"That news bitch, James, won't fucking leave me alone. Give her that shit and tell her there won't be another for 12 hours. It will shut her up at least," he snatches the juice from the Converter(tm) and liberally adds whiskey to the brim.
"Fucking aliens. They give you technology then screw you over with it. Have you found the Inter.Lopers yet?"
A meek looking man steps forward, holding a VirtualClipboard(tm) and pronouncing the Inter.Lopers still missing in the flux. "The Scan Boards(tm) the Ynder'thians gave us are searching each quandrant, but the entire thing could take weeks-" the man stops short as he is busy ducking from a flying glass of orange juice and whiskey.
"Whoever did this is going down with me," and General Moore adjourns the impromtu meeting to take a shit.
It is very dark but Rez can tell something is very wrong. First of all, he can't feel his lower body, then there is someone breathing very hard and from what he can tell, agressively right in his face, and the last thing, is that there seems to be a Stimstick stuck under his jaw, which feels rather unpleasant.
"Are you awake, my rescuer?"
"Well, glad to hear you're feeling livlier, Lorelei. Um, would you mind moving that Stimstick so I can feel for my legs?" he attempts the slick voice that's carried him this far in this slimy existence.
"Fuck you. Where are we and why did you bring me here?" the Stimstick is pushing at his neck harder now and he is worried that in her anger and inexperience she'll fire it unknowingly.
So glad I was in the mood to rescue the scariest bitch in the Perimeter(tm).
"Lorelei, I don't know where we are. You dropped like a hit fly and I was trying to get you to a PowerPortal Station(tm) when these people came out of nowhere with plasma weapons (fucking things are getting popular these days) and politely told me if we didn't come with I'd be as dead as you- very fast. That's the last thing I remember," the Stimstick stays up but the pressure is less. "Come on, shit, why the fuck would I kidnap you and then black out and paralyze myself so you could kill me with my own Stimmy?"
The stick drops abruptly and Rez breathes for what seems the first time since being in The Camps.
"Where are we?" Lorelei actual sounds close to some vague emotion, one that involves hopelessness.
He gropes around and discovers his legs, judges they're still attached and figures that's as good as he's going to get for now. He feels for Lorelei and finds her hand, or something that passes for it, and tries to be paternal. Forgetting that the only paternal influence in her life was treating her like chicken in Crisco, he quickly is reminded of the Stimstick in her other hand.
Suddenly the darkness is gone and so is the Stimstick at Rez's throat. Something resembling a voice tells them of their imminent death.
Veronica James is sludging through The Camps searching for something she knew she shouldn't be looking for.
"If he's going to give me shit to report on, then I'm going to dig up my own..." she's muttering to herself as she avoids the lying bodies in the sewage ducts, but is not bothered by them as she is covered by the EnviroSuit she had known would come in handy.
She climbs up the a vertical duct and sees what she Might Be Looking For(tm).
Nothing like ambiguity in journalism, is there?
It's a spot. It's a splatter on the shit covered street made up of a different kind of shit. This shit glows.
This is what Moore was hiding. Fucking alien technology.
She turns on the HoloCorder she towed all this way and begins catching the 3-dimensional scene, complete with chemical analysis of what the glowing shit is.
Vern smiles to herself, "If this is a teleporter trace, Moore's going to need to cover his ass in more ways than one."
And then Vern isn't smiling anymore, because she's not there.
The light is gone and so is their sight again.
Lorelei almost attaches yet another emotion to her words- frenzy, "What the hell was that?"
"We're with the Ynder'thians. We're with the aliens... What the fuck do they want with us? Why not grab someone from The Dome(tm)?"
Lorelei is groping around in the dark, searching for something.
Maybe her legs, Rez thinks.
She seems to have found whatever she was looking for because there is no sound except her funny breathing. "What aliens?" Rez registers that there's something wrong and forced about that question."And that doesn't tell me where we are, it only tells me we're going to die- and after they do what they're going to do to us."
The Perimeter doesn't even know about the ET's, he thought.
But SHE does
"Okay, now we're not going to die by the hands of some fruity alens who fuck up and can't even tell us from important people. They'll figure it out, or they should, if they have the technology to fucking transport us here, and let us on our miserable way," Rez is convincing himself well.
"You're right, we're not going to die by the hands of aliens," Lorelei's voice has regained that healthy apathetic note to it, "We're not going to be hurt by them, or tortured, and they're Not Going To Find Out Anything."
Rez eagerly concurs, "Well, now that we have that settled, shall we find our hosts and ask to be let off at the nearest skyscraper?" he smirks at his own horrible humor, "You know, Lor, I like you. You're not afraid to take care of yourself. Once we get back in The Camps, we can ta-"
"Yeah, you're alright too, my Rescuer. I would love to be WITH you."
Rez starts at the connotations, "Umm... yeah, whatever. But that kind of stuff will have to wait until we're out of wherever we are... and I would preferably like to feel my legs again, also."
"I'm afraid we can't wait. We're going to be Together(tm) right now. There's No Other Way," and Rez suddenly feels the Stimstick at his neck, with Lorelei touching it and his skin at the same time.
"What the fuc-"
"We can't let them kill us. It will involve much more pain than this, I assure you. WE know too much- they CAN'T," Lorelei is sounding calmer every moment.
"WAIT! You- I don't know-"
She sounds like she is laughing with the darkness, "Oh, but I do know. Believe me it will be better this way..." she pauses for a moment and Rez is about to grab her when he feels that beginning of the deadly jolt as she says:
"Nothing is more intimate than pain."
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