Chapter Text
A starry night.
A meteor shower.
A rejection.
An end.
There are numerous ways to describe that fateful night in the stars where two young boys had a glimpse of freedom.
A freedom that one outrightly rejected, and the other followed to his eventual demise.
We all know what came of that decision.
That it bore no fruit, only blood, suffering and the end of so many bright stars in the sky.
But what if, it wasn’t Till and Ivan that found the exit, the once in a lifetime opportunity at freedom.
What if Mizi and Sua had found it?
------
The sky was blood red, meteors dancing across the sky, hitting the earth in an uncoordinated yet beautiful pattern.
Earlier Mizi had seen a left open door in their sim world, and they finally were able to escape.
One mistake led to this beautiful scene.
Sua whooped from behind her.
They ran carefree in the night, as loud as they wanted. There were no guard dogs to attack them. There were no Segyein evaluating their performance every few minutes.
They were free
She picked her up and they twirled together in a twist of gowns.
“We’re free!”
“I know!”
They giggled at the silliness of it.
But Till and Ivan weren’t.
They were still at Anakt, they were still going to disappear like all of her friends did because of Segyein.
“Ivan and Till are still there,” Mizi whispered.
Sua paused her victory dance. The dilemma hitting them like a truck. If they went back, would they all be able to escape, still?
Sua wrung her fingers in indecision, “I mean I don’t like Till very much”
“Sua!” Mizi gasped.
Sua shrugged in response, “But Ivan’s like family”
“So, we go back” Mizi nodded.
“I didn’t say that”
Mizi slumped on the floor, “Then what do we do?”
“I... I think we should go without them” Sua rubbed her neck absently.
Mizi’s heart stopped all thoughts of a fight disapearing, instead replaced by fear, “You’re right, we’ll go back for them later”
Sua nodded happily, her hand pausing its grip on her own throat.
The girls left into the sandy deserts of the outskirts of the city in the dead of night not looking back.
We’ll come back for you one day.
As the sun started to rise above, she could see Anakt Garden, the center of the city, blocking the sun.
Their prison, no longer.
Sua kissed her on the cheek and Mizi smiled ecstatic.
They had a future.
--------
Till hung over the precipice of a decision.
He took a step forward and for a second he was suspended in the middle of the his two choices. At least until the drop came. He expected to go rushing down and “go away” as the teachers at Anakt put it.
But he remained suspended. He remained here.
He still saw the fake sky, the fake grass, the fake clouds. The fake everything, meant to simulate a normal childhood on Earth.
He turned and Ivan grasped his hand harshly, a terrified and tender look in his eyes.
Slowly he pulled him back up.
“What was that?” he asked softly.
Till shrugged looking away, Mizi was... gone.
She'd escaped with Sua last night and left him here. His eyes clouded with tears.
In every universe he knew he would have waited for her, picked her. Tried for her.
She didn’t.
Bitterly he shoved past Ivan, “Nothing”
He wanted to feel nothing at all, he wanted to pretend that he’d always known that she’d pick Sua over him. And maybe he had but childish innocence was a wonderous thing.
Till it’s broken.
-----
Originally, Sua had been delighted by the sight of a real sun, holding hands with Mizi as they traipsed through the desert expanse.
It felt like a date. And she really wanted to go on a date with Mizi.
Now though?
Now she hated it; they really hadn’t planned the whole escape thing out.
They had no water, no food and no supplies if things went badly. They didn’t even have shoes.
Mizi cursed violently under her breath and leaned on Sua for support.
Sua winced but didn’t say anything.
“I hurt my foot” she groaned in pain.
Sua gently set her down, “You good?”
Mizi nodded, “Just give me a second”
“Let me see it”
Sua kneeled on the cracked ground, dirt coating her smooth and looked after skin.
A foreign sensation. One she didn’t enjoy.
She inspected the foot; it had a large shard of glass imbedded in it.
“Mizi don’t look” she whispered.
“Why what’s wrong” she gritted out in pain.
“You have glass in your foot”
“Glass!” she shouted excitedly.
Sua furrowed her eyebrows concerned, she’d read about this in class when people were very dehydrated they became delirious, “Yes, glass”
“That means there was or are people nearby!” she squealed in excitement.
Sua took a moment then her eyes widened in delight, “People?”
“People!” Mizi nodded.
“People!” they both shouted.
They sounded like idiots and they hugged each other crying.
Mizi wasn’t going to die.
Sua was so relieved.
Once Mizi let go, she ripped off the bottom of her gown.
Sua squeaked and turned away covering her face, “What are you doing?”
“Gimme a sec”
Sua peeked over her shoulder and found Mizi stuffing a large wad of the fabric in her mouth.
In an instant she knew what Mizi was about to do, “Wait!”
Mizi bit into the fabric and yanked out the glass crying, yet still some semblance of a smile on her face.
“Jesus, Mizi you could have asked me for help!” Sua shouted, cradling her head.
Mizi spat out the fabric, “You hate doing things that could hurt me”
“So?” she yelled, ripping fabric off of her own gown to bandage the wound.
Mizi’s lip trembled and Sua felt her neck close up on her, she pressed against the corner of her Adams apple, trying to calm herself down.
It had become a bad habit, after preparing herself for Alien Stage.
She knew the exact point of entry the bullet would have gone through when she’d be shot. She knew how it would crumple her lungs and shatter her vocal chords.
Rendering her a song bird who could no longer sing.
It had become a fixation, a painful thing that she had become an addict to
Mizi hugged her tightly.
“What’s wrong” Sua asked.
“Nothing” she whispered hoarsely.
A truck in the distance honked and the two turned their heads to face the driver.
They were saved.
Unless of course their saviour wasn’t sane.
---
Once again Hyuna had to drag Luka’s ass across the desert for their petrol run.
Luka still wasn’t very happy about his new… living conditions but they needed to leave before he developed a heart condition.
So now albeit very sulky and unwilling he was in Hyuna’s care.
It wasn’t as if she wanted to look after him anyway.
Hyun-woo had decided to stay at the depot, since he was really sick that day. He got sick easily these days.
But that was a problem for after the petrol run, the rebellion often had warehouses of petrol across the desert, to minimise the risk of fire.
Since they were still “kids” as Jacob liked to put it, they were limited to petrol runs and other kiddy errands.
So it was a huge surprise when she saw two Anakt kids in the middle of the desert.
She honked and yelled, the two girls flinching back, she winced. She’d forgotten that Anakt made the best of kids afraid of other humans.
It helped keep the kids inside the facility, so even if you were to escape there would be no guarantee that humans wouldn’t just ransom you or kill you.
This was obviously not true but still.
She could still remember when the rebellion had first hit her transit truck all those years ago and her screams and kicks were so out of proportion to what actually happened.
She parked the truck, leaving a grumpy Luka in the cargo area, and gently walked therds them.
“Hi” she said raising her arms in the air.
“Are you here to help us or ransom us?” the black haired girl said coldly.
“Help”
“See I told you” the pink haired girl squealed.
The glared at Hyuna assessing her risk.
“Fine” she relented.
“You kids are Anakt right?” Hyuna asked gently.
They nodded.
“I am too, see?” she showed them her name brand.
They instantly relaxed.
“Can we go yet?” Luka yelled from the cargo.
“I’m doing something idiot” she rolled her eyes.
Warily, the kids got into the truck and Hyuna took them to the base. She had a feeling that things were getting interesting.
At least more so than they originally were.
She didn’t care as long as she could keep Hyun-woo and Luka safe.