Chương 1: Arrival

Ch 1 - Arrival Cold. Bone penetrating. Jaw clenching. Lung searing. Cold. As her awareness grows she stills further. Fear drives the cold deeper into her body, trapping her in a cage of frozen flesh. Increasing her fear. Hardening the cage. Her head hangs awkwardly over her shoulder, the crown of her head pressed hard into an unforgiving surface, the weight of her arm strewn across it adding to the painful pressure. She blinks. Squinting reveals nothing but smears of grey and charcoal black. Her eyelids are heavy.

Her eyes reluctant to seek sense in the murky blur of shapes. She needs to move. She knows this but cannot gather the understanding of how to move. Her body feels as if it has been scattered. Her mind is trying to piece back together unfamiliar limbs, trying to recall the mechanics of how a muscle flexed in her hip will trigger a twitch in her calf. There is a bitterness in her mouth, a sting at the back of her throat. She tries to swallow, discovering her tongue is a lethargic slab of sandpaper. Help.

The plea forms in her mind, trapped. She needs to move. A sudden gush of wind kindles her efforts into urgency. Grit and stones pelt and bounce on her in a frenzy as if angry that she has blocked their path. She curls, drawing her knees to her chest, crooking an elbow down over her face. The wind's icy breath bites at her ears and pulls at her hair. She whimpers. With determined effort she rolls her head forward, tucking her chin to her chest.

Pain pierces from her temple, spasming like white hot lightening across her cheekbone and sweeping across her skull, creating pathways down into the back of her neck. Her feeble anguished howl is stolen by the roaring laughter of the wind. ………. The world is bouncing. No. It is her head. Her head is bouncing. Up. Down. Up. Down. Pain spasms with every bounce but it is not the searing pain of before. She is being carried in someone's arms, her head bouncing in the crook of their elbow.

Their hands hold a firm grip on her ribs and thigh. Her right arm is sticking out, flapping up and down like a broken wing. Moaning, she pulls the wayward hand up to her head, her fingers exploring a layer of sticky grit on her forehead.

"We're almost there," a muffled voice says, panting the words with the rhythm of his run. His grip tightens in response to the startled jerk of her body. The man's face is covered by a balaclava; thick goggles mask his eyes. As panic courses through her a cold wind whips at her hair and face, bringing with it the stinging assault of grit and sand. Instinctively she curls into his body.

"Open the door!" His chest rumbles as his muffled voice bellows above her.

"Open," a voice shouts back, "Erro close out the rear!" The roar of engines firing up greets them as they enter the craft. She finds herself being lowered down into a seat in the centre of the cabin. A harness is woven across her, the same hands that carried her onboard are now securing the central clasp. Looking up she sees her distorted head reflected in his goggles. Her hair is plastered to her head. Bright red blood is smeared across her forehead, down her left cheek and topped with black grit.

Darker blood has crusted around her nose and upper lip. Her look is completed with a liberal splattering of grey dust. He pulls at her harness, confirming the fit. Behind him a confusion of people moves at haste, filling up the small cabin. She tries to ask him what has happened but the effort to form the words triggers a pounding in her skull that results only in a whimpered groan.

"Rear door secure," someone yells.

"Secure all resources," a female voice commands, "This is going to be a rough one. This storm has built fast. Clearing it is calculated at 0. 34 of 1. Take off in ten count." The man helping her takes the seat on her left. Another person buckles themselves in on her right. Two figures in black are strapped into the mirrored line of seats opposite hers. They are all wearing similar balaclava masks and goggles. She can't see their eyes, just herself reflected in every pair of goggles.

"Five. Four. Three. Two," shouts the woman from the open cockpit. The noisy thrust of engines booms. The craft begins to vibrate as it lifts upwards. They are jerked sideways as soon as they leave the ground. Her head snaps forward as the craft struggles to stay its course. She winces against the sharp pain that spears from the cut on the side of her head as the craft's vibrations shake her body. If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

A loud WHUMP-POP noise thunders through the cabin, painting her body in a rigid panic. Lights flicker, frantic alert buzzers shriek. Her torso tries to throw itself out of the harness as the craft begins to spin. The figures around her sway silently in their seats.

"Large tornado one point two clicks south-east, lots of debris in the air," the woman's voice announces.

"Another tornado about to form on our left side. Adjusting course."

"Fucking look at the size of it!" a man's voice adds in fascination, "Grew down out of nowhere!" The spin of the craft forces her head painfully to the right. The straps of the harness press hard into her chest. The scream that is about to explode from her throat is thrust back into her lungs as the cabin flips violently.

"Almost," the woman says, with only a touch of tension in her undertone, "almost." Vibrations rattle her teeth. Her stomach somersaults. Her hands wave wildly in the air, one smacking into the chest of the person next to her. She fights and fails to gain control of all four of her limbs.

"Clear," the woman announces. Silence bursts into her ears as the alert buzzers abruptly stop. Her heels slam into the backboard under her chair, the foam soles of her trainers ricocheting her feet forward. The cabin judders into a low humming calm. The large figure opposite her lets out a celebratory whoop.

"We're not out yet," the woman in the cockpit cautions.

"We've lost nearly half our thrust. I can see two, no, three more forming up ahead. We need to seek shelter. We're about to fly over Xiatt ArraPort-X883. We can ride out the storm and get new transport there. Orange?"

"Can you make it to the Arras-Osco settlement?" a man replies from the cabin. She's unsure who is speaking. No one has removed their balaclava or goggles. No one has turned to face the cockpit.

"It's 15 clicks," the woman thinks out loud, "should be achievable." The man on her left, the one who carried her, huffs and shifts in his seat.

"Bring us as close to the outer doors of Compound XAO-09 as possible. I'm just confirming a vacant bunk house we can use to ride out the storm." It's the man opposite her next to the large figure who whooped. His gloved hand is stabbing and swiping the air in front of him. He's dressed head to toe in black, they all are. His clothing seems excessively bulky; angular pockets jut and bulge away from his frame, down his legs and along his arms. None of their outfits bear hi-vis markings nor identification badges.

Nothing to portray who her rescuers are. Rescuers from what? What sort of incident would require a special police unit or some sort of army rescue team? Her attention drifts to the cabin walls above him. Smooth metal curves form both wall and ceiling as if they were sat along the inner walls of a pipe. A single strip of light illuminates from the band running the length of the dim cabin. Other than the two rows of seating they are occupying, she can see nothing else.

She's watched a few of those reality rescue programmes on daytime TV whilst curled up on the sofa, fatigued by doom scrolling. The rescue helicopters in Air Ambulance were cluttered with equipment strapped to every surface; first aid bags, oxygen tanks, drugs kits, defibrillators. All in bright packaging designed to attract the eye to the right piece of equipment.

She had paused her scrolling to marvel at how the medics had worked in such close quarters, squatting on slimline seats inches from the patient laid out on the stretcher next to them. She glances around again. No obvious emergency equipment. No windows. No signs. Not even an exit sign. No crackling radios. No discussion of what had happened nor interaction with other emergency teams. No activity at all. Just silent figures, every inch of them covered in black, goggles hiding their stares.

Unease snakes up her spine. She tries to recall the place names the woman and man had exchanged. They were more like codes than the names of London suburbs. Pain pounds in her skull as she tries to recall what had happened. She had been running. Running not from something, she had been out for a run. Her black leggings and trainers, both now encrusted with dirt, attest to that. It had been cold.

Cold enough for her to snooze her alarm multiple times before scolding herself out from under the duvet; promising herself she could return to bed once she'd completed a lap of the park. So, she had made it out. Hair scraped back into a messy ponytail. Front door key tucked beneath the large stone under the corner of the hedge by the gate. Six lunges to the end of the road to wake up her sleepy legs. Turn the corner. High knees the short length of the road.

Then a gentle jog as she turned into the avenue, then through the park gates at the other end. And then? Her head pounds blows at the back of her eyes. She squeezes them shut, trying to squeeze back the pain. Then fear. Then terror. Then unrelenting spinning and twisting. Her limbs being pulled in every direction. A wind so fast she couldn't breathe. Then a sudden stillness. A cold stillness. An awareness that she needed help. Then? Then these figures in black. Being carried into this craft. A rescue?

A rescue that doesn't feel like a rescue. A lump in her throat traps her breath. Her fingernails dig into her palms. Looking down at her hands she is surprised to find them balled into tight trembling fists. It isn't just her hands; the rest of her body is shaking too. As she becomes aware of the shaking it becomes worse. She uncurls her hands and places them on her knees, pushing down, trying to quell the shake in her legs but this just makes her arms shake even more.

She takes a breath, trying to use the expansion of her lungs to calm the shakes. She can't stop breathing in. Short intakes of air, one after another, after another. In and in and in and in. Panic bubbles and froths up from the knot in her stomach. Huffy Guy on her left shifts in his seat, his arm brushing hers as he removes his glove. He places his hand on top of hers, squeezing gently.

"Slow, deep breaths. Relax your shoulders," he says in a low, soothing tone.

"You are going to be ok." His hand is large, easily engulfing her own, and welcomingly warm. The unexpected intervention is a circuit breaker that trips her panicked breathing. The touch of his skin on hers is more reassuring than his words. She forces herself to breathe out. He is helping her. Breathe in. They are helping her. Breathe out. Life doesn't have to look like it does on TV. Breathe in. They will explain what happened. She closes her eyes, focusing on her breathing and the gentle pressure of his hand.