Breachers

Breachers – Path of Steel

17

I

Memory Lane

- - -

 

An hour later

 

‘We need you, Marcus.’

 

Marcus woke up as if struck by lightning, his body suddenly jerking upright before firm hands guided him back onto the hospital bed. “No! I need to go,” he protested in his confused state, struggling against the cables hooked up to him and the hands on his shoulders. Slowly his haze lessened, allowing him to see his Uncle and Felix by his side, their worried expressions mirroring his own confusion. His uncle exchanged heated words with Felix before his friend rushed off. His uncle stayed behind and offered a reassuring smile, urging Marcus to stay put. As the pressure lessened, Marcus relaxed, taking in his whereabouts. He stared at his right hand and the marks there as if it were a foreign object to him. “I’ve got a hand?” he mumbled.

 

His uncle's eyes welled up, a tear escaping as he grinned at Marcus. “Yeah, boy... you’ve got a hand,” he whispered, hugging his nephew tightly, but careful not to overdo it. “You’ve got two whole hands.”

 

“I...” Marcus stuttered, his thoughts in disarray, overwhelmed by conflicting emotions and memories. “I heard you... You told me that… you needed me.” He then gripped his head with his hand, fingers sliding through his long black hair, as if confused by what he was remembering.

 

His uncle slowly leaned back, his confusion visible in his facial expression. “When did you hear—” he started, but the door slammed open and Felix rushed in, dragging a doctor behind him who quickly shot into action when he noticed Marcus’s conscious state.

 

Seconds later, a nurse also rushed in, before the two professionals put Marcus through a battery of tests and questions. His uncle and friend hovered at the bedside, their faces a blend of concern and relief, while both of them pretended everything was fine. “What happened?” Marcus questioned, his hand gently touching his nose, causing him to flinch because of the pain.

 

“I have no idea. One minute, we were on the hospital roof for some fresh air. Then, out of nowhere, you started shaking like you were possessed and howling in pain. Next thing I knew, you blacked out and fell out of the wheelchair, headfirst,” Felix said, casting an unsure glance at Marcus’s uncle, as if dreading the consequences. “Laurens, had I known—”

 

“Don’t worry about it,” Marcus’s uncle assured him, giving his shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “You had nothing to do with this, and our family can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done already.” He then shifted his attention to the doctor, who was just about done with another test. “So, what’s the verdict?”

 

The doctor set the medical instruments aside with care, then faced Laurens. “Well,” he started, “it seems Marcus had an episode of sorts that caused his blackout. Given his recent recovery from his coma, it’s not unusual to experience occasional episodes like this, as the body readjusts to its active state again. The episodes could be related to a sudden change in blood pressure, stress, Mana drain, or dozens of other factors contributing to it. His vital signs are stable from what I can see, but I’d like to order a blood test and a few scans and rule out any potential concerns. In the meantime, rest is advisable.”

 

Facing Marcus with a gentle expression, the doctor asked a few more questions before he explained that the nurse would come back in a few minutes to draw a blood sample. After nodding in acknowledgment, Marcus watched as the doctor and nurse exited the room, leaving him alone with his uncle and best friend. “How long... was I out?” he inquired, his mind still trying to piece together what happened.

 

“Roughly an hour, I think,” Felix said with a hint of awkwardness, scratching the back of his head. “I shouldn’t have been as rough with the wheelchair or taken you up to the roof—”

 

Memories suddenly flooded into his mind, recalling the way Felix had made him laugh and how patient he had been with him on the roof. “Piss off! I had fun,” Marcus said, a big grin spreading across his face as he looked at his friend. “And you better... treat me the same... next time, got it?”

 

“Alright,” Felix said as he nodded, then glanced at the clock. “I, uh... I’ll let you have some rest now. You have my phone number, so just shoot me a text if you need anything, alright?” He then said goodbye to Laurens before he left, pausing for a few seconds at the door before stepping outside, leaving Marcus alone with his uncle.

 

“You’re lucky to have a friend like him. Loyal to a fault. He might not want to talk about it, but he’s the reason why you’re even alive today. Thirteen years ago, he dragged you out of that rubble you were in and carried you for hours until he reached a hospital, despite the world going to shit,” Laurens said before he explained that Marcus’s sister was out on a job and couldn’t be reached, while Marcus’s younger brother had been stuck in traffic, so Laurens had gone in their stead. “I already sent them a text that you’re alright and that you need some rest.” As if on cue his phone started buzzing, indicating several new text messages that he quickly answered. Afterwards the two of them chatted for a while longer, with Laurens doing his best to distract his nephew when the nurse came back to take the blood sample.

 

Marcus’s uncle opened up about his work, coworkers, and even the string of failed marriages that he had been in the last few years, all to lighten the mood a little. As the conversation wound down, and the nurse was finished with her task, he could see that his nephew was getting tired. “Get some sleep. I’ll come visit you soon,” Laurens said with a smile before leaving the room, turning off the lights and closing the door behind him. A few seconds later, the door suddenly creaked open again, with his uncle’s head popping back in again. “I’m glad you’re back, boy... hands and all,” he said softly before disappearing from sight again.

- - -

 

An hour had slipped by as Marcus lay in bed, worn out but unable to sleep because of his bruised face. The darkness inside of his room gave way to a faint glimmer seeping in from beneath the door, broken up by the occasional passing of a nurse. Sweat covered his body, and he felt tired, as if something drained his energy away. His head began throbbing again. It was the same he had experienced on the rooftop, but this time, it seemed to happen more slowly. With each pulse of pain, fragmented dreams and nonsensical thoughts flashed through his mind. One moment, he remembered being confined within his own body for years, listening to doctors’ voices; the next, he felt trapped amidst filth and rusted metal, as if buried somewhere. Occasionally, he caught glimpses of something descending the stairs, every footstep bringing another jolt of pain.

 

It worsened over time, affecting both his hearing and vision. His ability to see clearly dwindled, and every sound seemed distorted, echoing strangely. It was as if he heard the same sound coming from two different places. ‘Something’s not right,’ Marcus thought, attempting to call for a nurse, but his voice faltered due to his pain. As he noticed the change in the light by his door, as though someone stood outside. He froze in fear, despite not knowing why. The door creaked open slowly, and his headache intensified. Seconds later, a shrouded figure entered and closed the door behind it. ‘No face,’ Marcus thought, his eyes widening at the sight of the demonic figure moving towards him.

 

As the demon advanced, each footstep seemed to amplify Marcus’s fragmented thoughts and memories. His mind distorted in on itself, granting him a fleeting glimpse of himself in bed before the pain forcefully yanked him back into his own body. He tried to escape the demon’s approach but found himself frozen in fear and fatigue, incapable of moving. His heart pounded as he witnessed the creature’s steel left hand reaching for his chest. Then everything suddenly stopped.

 

The pain faded away as the demon’s thoughts and memories merged with his own, slowly intertwining and becoming coherent. He no longer saw the demon; instead, he gazed upon his own steel frame, its singular camera peering back at him. Simultaneously, he saw his frail body lying in bed, looking back at him with confusion. ‘What is happening?’ Marcus thought, raising his right arm and noticing the robot mirroring the movement with its broken right stump. He couldn’t quite explain it, but for the first time in what seemed years, he felt complete, as if all the pieces of his mind were finally reunited. The haze that once clouded his thoughts had vanished, and he grasped this strange reality. More memories flooded into him, and he sensed his consciousness leaving the robot and settling inside him, rejoining him. The robot wobbled for a moment before collapsing on the ground with a clang, as if its strings were cut. While that happened, Marcus’s mind struggled to process years’ worth of memories. He vividly remembered each dreadful moment he endured as a robot and now also recalled the time he had spent comatose, helplessly witnessing it all without the ability to respond, tortured within his own body.

 

His eyes widened as he recollected every time his brother and sister cried out for him, hugging his frame or talking with a doctor next to his bed. He relived hearing his uncle silently sobbing in the corner, how the man desperately tried to maintain composure while crumbling on the inside. He recalled hearing Felix dragging him out of the Tech-event while monsters and carnage was everywhere. He could suddenly remember feeling how Felix had carried him for what felt hours, despite the danger it had posed to him. The surge of emotions overwhelmed Marcus, forcing him to sit up abruptly, his body trembling with the heaviness of lost years and loved ones. He couldn’t contain his nausea, causing him to vomit and shake uncontrollably. Afterwards, his gaze settled on his right hand in disbelief as he felt his fingers moving, no longer seeing a broken metal stump. Struggling to catch his breath and make sense of it all, more memories flooded his mind, reminding him of his family’s desperate pleas for him to wake up.

 

After what felt like hours, his mind slowly recovered some semblance of normality. “You’re a fighter, just like your father,” he muttered, remembering his uncle’s words. Now, with his entire mind united, he could finally mourn the loss of his parents properly, as well as Oscar and everyone else who had been close to him. For a while, he just sat there, covered in vomit, tears, and a lifeless robot lying on the floor next to his bed. Despite mentally feeling whole again, he couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something off about him, raging inside of him, as if he still needed to do something.

 

Despite that feeling, he also felt something within his body recover, as if gradually something was filling back up. “Is this my Mana?” he whispered, recalling the sensation from before, after the whole rooftop incident, and the feeling of being drained of something when he had been a robot. ‘I think the robot needed Mana to function. Like some sort of power source.’ Marcus thought, remembering how ‘it’ could operate for a couple of hours with a full charge, and even longer if it remained still. ‘So, the other me hid in a vent on the roof,’ he remembered, recalling how his robotic self had spent what little time had left back then rushing up the stairs before removing the vent cover with his steel fingers. He had crawled inside before blacking out again, waiting for the moment he could syphon Mana from himself on the roof several days later.

 

He spent the next few minutes just staring at the lifeless robot on the floor, its form obscured by filthy rags. Occasional swallows accompanied the disgusting aftertaste lingering in his mouth as he thought about his situation. ‘This robot is the reason why I’m still alive,’ he realized, recalling the fierce struggle to reach the hospital and the monsters and other threats he had encountered along the way. He wrestled with the decision of whether to call for help and reveal what had happened to him or to keep it a secret for now. ‘I attacked two guards back at the junkyard... used a gun to destroy hospital equipment... and stole and used up five of their Monster-Glass pieces. There’s no way this won’t become a problem for me... and my family,’ Marcus thought, narrowing his gaze at the robot’s singular camera lens.

 

‘I need to get it out of here before anyone finds it,’ he thought, groaning as he pushed himself out of bed before dropping on the floor with more force than he would’ve liked. Slowly, he crawled over to the robot, positioning himself close to it. He examined the steel frame, observing the peculiar veins on the inside and a blue round object pulsating within. ‘Is that an Orb?’ he wondered, having heard about them, yet never seen a picture. ‘Did it always pulsate like this?’

 

He examined the machine more closely, noticing broken wires and rust on some parts that weren’t connected to the main chassis, and were mostly just lodged in place. Strangely, there was no rust at all on the bits of machinery and steel that had the weird blue veins attached to them. ‘The veins and Orb are connected… It almost looks like a weird heart and blood vessels.’ He touched a vein and felt a strange tingling sensation when he did so. “Now, how do I wake you up?” he whispered as he tried tapping the robot a few times, even prodding at the pulsating Orb inside its chest, but nothing worked.

 

The minutes ticked by, and the robot remained motionless. “Come on, wake up,” he urged in a hushed tone, scared a nearby nurse might hear him. After that, he tried banging his fist against the robot, but nothing happened. His desperation grew, and he tried slamming the robot’s hand against his chest like how he himself had woken up, hoping for something, yet only managing to bruise his own chest. ‘Come on, you piece of shit!’ he thought as he felt more and more desperate. Every sound outside his room freaked him out, as if he was seconds away from being discovered. “Think Marcus… remember what everyone told you. Use your head for once in your life,” he said to himself as he closed his eyes and tried to think more about his problem. ‘It’s a machine… and it drains Mana… perhaps it’s run out completely?’ He then placed his hands on the robot and attempted to channel his own Mana into it. However, accessing his Mana was difficult, like flexing an untrained muscle he had only just become aware of. It took a while, but a trickle of his Mana reserve slowly began to leave him and flow into the robot, intensifying the pulsating glow in its veins, but nothing else occurred. He continued to do so until he felt drained, having poured all he could within the robot, but even then it didn’t move.

 

Marcus felt his typical anger and irritation bubbling up, but he pushed it away, forcing himself to focus on the task at hand. ‘The robot is intact… or most of it is... and it has fuel now… I think.’ He studied the machine a while longer as he sifted through his jumbled memories until he recalled how he had created the HUD by fragmenting a part of his mind. ‘Perhaps that could work?’ he thought before taking a deep breath. He closed his eyes and placed a hand on the robot. Seconds later, he delved into his own mind, replicating the steps he had taken before. The process made him feel sluggish as more and more of his mind splintered off, but he pushed through, forcing it out of his body and into the robot. The process felt incredibly strange and horrifying at the same time. He could ‘feel it’ settle within the Orb and spread throughout its frame. Then, he suddenly felt whole again as his camera came online, granting him two perspectives—one from his frail body on the floor with closed eyes, and the other from the robot. “It worked,” he whispered, opening his eyes to witness himself from two different angles.

 

It was difficult to gauge how much of himself he had poured into his other self, but he didn’t sense any loss. He still felt whole. However, everything changed when he let go of the robot and witnessed his steel self slowly stand up and stumble backward a few steps, the Orb now no longer pulsating, but constantly glowing. When the robot was further away from him, it shattered their shared perspective and left him feeling incomplete and sluggish once more. “Are you alright?” he asked himself, fully aware of how bizarre all of this actually was. The robot nodded, then extended its arm toward him in a silent inquiry. “Yeah... a bit sluggish... but I’m alright. This is weird.” The further they got away from one another, the more he realized they were like two distinct versions of himself. As he crawled a bit closer, a sense of wholeness returned, along with their shared perspective. ‘So, there’s a range to it?’ he thought before he reminded himself of his current predicament. “I... You need to hide. Go to the same place as before, and don’t get seen. We’ll meet up again tomorrow,” he said to himself, observing the robot nod before it walked over to his bed to press the alarm button. The robot then positioned itself in the corner of the room, right next to the door as both of them could hear the commotion in the hallway. “Good luck,” Marcus whispered before the door swung open, and a nurse rushed in to see him on the floor covered in his own vomit.

 

Seizing the opportunity now that the nurse was distracted, the robot slipped out of the room while Marcus rolled over on his back. “I’m alright. I felt sick... then fell out of bed,” he said, reassuring the nurse as she came to assist him. Though tired, dirty, and still puzzled by the newfound memories, he couldn’t resist a smile as he realized that he had become whole again for a few minutes, as well as learn something important about his situation.

 

‘I’ve got an Ability.’

 

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Copyright: OsiriumWrites