Chapter Text
I pull myself out of the ship's wreckage. There are burns along my arms and neck, and my leg holds a piece of shrapnel, and I am not at risk of death. First thing, get that shrapnel out. Don't discard it, though- any usable piece of metal will be worth holding onto. I tear off some of my uniform and use the cloth to stop the bleeding, at least for the time being. It's not the most sanitary way of stopping someone from bleeding out, but I'm hoping some medical kits will have made it through the crash. I'll also need medical supplies for these burns; they're mostly around where the shackles- right, the shackles. They're… not connected to anything anymore. Huh.
Check for other survivors- that's also pressing. I'll want to save as many people as I can- we'll need as many hands as we can over the next couple days. Looking around, I can see 2 other of the ships captives getting up. The first one of them, Razor- the one we call 'Razor', I don't know her real name- has all sorts of rumors surrounding her; people say that she's had most of her bones replaced with weapons, that criminal psychologists from across the unity have collectively deemed her "undiagnosable", that she was made by a madman as a weapon to kill a god, and so on. I've, coincidentally, been held at the same facility as her once before this, and i've seen first-hand that there's at least a little truth to some of that- my point is that I'm not especially surprised that she survived, and that she'll be good to have if we can convince her to not just kill everyone else. The other survivor is a small woman named Damsel- that's her real name, somehow- who's presence on this ship as a captive I've never quite understood. If Razor was the most deserving of her status as a prisoner, Damsel was by far the least. She was, based off the limited interactions I'd had with her, one of the sweetest people I'd ever met, and ostensibly couldn't be much more of a threat than an average person.
Neither of them looks to be aware of me yet, nor of eachother; Damsel seems preoccupied by panicking and crying, and Razor seems distracted by the large chunk of burning metal on top of her. I'll address Damsel first— She's curled in a ball on the ground, between a pool of burning oil and a jagged piece of metal jutting out of the ground. I carefully walk over to her.
"Hey, are- are you alright?"
She looks up at me with tears in her eyes. I realized I don't know what I expected myself to say.
"Y- you're… I remember you! You were on the ship too, right? You're… alive? I- I'm sorry, that's a stupid question, I-"
"I'm alive, yeah. Are, um… are you hurt?"
"I- I don't think so. I'll be fine, I think."
"Great, um… great. There's someone else over there, if you wanna come help them with me?"
"Huh? There's- OH! Yes, we should help them! Immediately!"
We each take one of her hands and pull back, and she thrashes wildly, which eventually got her out. I could see blades popping out of her legs, at any angle available, with increasing frequency as she grew more panicked.
"Ok, now, don't… stab us."
"Whaaat? Why would I ever stab you? Why would I stab anyone right now? That's a silly question to ask someone you've just met!"
"Oookay? Damsel- that was your name, right? Damsel, don't stand too close to her. We should- Also, we've met at least twice before this, and you tried to stab someone both times."
Razor smiles at us.
Damsel shuffled to the other side of me from Razor, "Um… you were saying something, right?"
"Right, right. If we don't wanna die of… bears, or something, we need to start on shelter immediately, and we should start farming in the next couple days. Assuming she doesn't just kill us."
"I told you that I'm not gonna stab anyone in the chest then cut their neck! Honestly, you're being very rude to me right now."
"...right. Anyway, shelter. We-"
"Sorry, um- sorry. You said… farming? That- that'll take a while, won't it?"
"Yeah, but we're gonna want to start now, so we have food when we need it. I don't think we want to rely on hunting and gathering."
"Um- how long are we going to be here?"
"Huh? Until we can get a ship, I guess."
"Hopefully we can scavenge something from that thing", I thumb at the crashed ship, "but if not, I'll have to start basically from raw materials, which will take a couple years under ideal circumstances. Best-case scenario, someone happens to land down here and we take their ship."
"…oh."