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“Zoe, I can’t reach it!”
Dylan shouts as he’s trying to float to the diving bell, his heart racing as he starts to panic.
“Do you copy? What’s going on down there? Dylan? Dylan!”
The room turns red as the Hiss gets in through the hole in the ceiling. Dylan doesn’t know what to focus on next. Zoe’s desperate calls are still ringing in his ear like an echo. The aberrant appears in his hand as he takes a deep breath to calm himself down; breathe in, breathe out. With another deep breath in he jumps down from one of the patterned rooms onto the back of a Hiss Ruiner.
Zoe’s pleads can still be heard from the speaker attached to the diving bell, every word hurts him more than the Hiss ever could. His fingertips feel cold, like blocks of ice, even though they are covered in the warm blood of the Ruiner. He tries to shout back, hoping for Zoe to somehow hear him calling her name, saying that he’s still there, but he knows damn well that the diving bell’s microphone has a push-to-talk system.
He stabs the Ruiner one last time. As it falls to the ground the room once again fills with a moonlight blue glow.
“Zoe?”
Dylan’s voice breaks a bit. He looks around himself then above. There are islands of apartment rooms floating around the diving bell’s power cord. This might be his only way out. He slowly parkours his way up to the hole in the ceiling. The diving bell’s speakers crack.
“Hello?”
The despair in Zoe’s voice shatters something inside him.
“Zoe! I’m here!”
“Are you reading me?!”
“I read you! Can you hear me?”
Dylan reaches the diving bell. It’s destroyed.
“I don’t know if you can hear this, Dylan, but we lost the bell.”
‚Yeah, I can see that…’
“The Sinkhole shifted and closed up on us. Research thinks diverting the resonance weakened its structural integrity.”
Zoe sighs.
“They could’ve figured that out before it happened…”
Dylan pushes the microphone button on the bell.
“Zoe? I’m here! Hello?”
He is still hoping that somehow his voice gets through. At least one word. One word so she knows he’s alright; that he is trying to get back to her. The speakers crackle with more and more static as the bell loses signal.
“Okay. Look, I’ll try to organize a rescue party, but… I’m not sure we can reach you, Dylan.”
She really can’t hear him.
“Ugh… Fuck!”
Dylan’s hands start to tremble. He can’t stand hearing Zoe like this. The thought of her being worried, feeling any sort of discomfort because of him, made him sick.
“Listen, I’ll do everything I can to… <static> … but Arish… we both know how he feels about…”
Zoe sounds defeated. Dylan leans against the diving bell, feeling weak in his knees.
“He won’t authorize the resources to help me. I served my purpose.”
His mind starts spiraling. He should’ve listened to Zoe when she said that she doesn’t think getting down into the Sinkhole is a good idea. She’s his handler, not Arish, nor Pope. Fuck Arish, fuck the FBC, fuck the whole goddamn world. Zoe is now miserable up on the surface and it’s all their fault. No, it’s his fault. Fault of his existence. If he didn’t exist, Zoe wouldn’t be~
“Listen, the bell’s losing power. You might have to-- <patterned speech>”
“Zoe?”
Catastrophic scenarios cloud Dylan’s mind, flashing right in front of him. All he can see now is the patterning getting Zoe, turning her body into something horrifying yet beautiful. He cannot let that be, he needs to at least try and save her.
Dylan looks around, seeing that the diving bell’s power cord leads somewhere through the patterned rooms. Maybe it goes all the way to the top of the sinkhole? He rushes up, jumps from room to room, wall to wall, through patterned furniture, until he gets to a room full of wall studs covered with drywall on some places. The power cord stretches across the entire place. He keeps following it until he gets to the ceiling where the opening used to be. It’s blocked now with the power cord ending there. Dylan stares at it with horror in his eyes, his chest tightens and his hands start to tremble.
“Zoe, I can’t follow the cable any further. I’m not gonna make it out of here.”
That’s it. This is where his story ends, right? Exactly how Arish wanted. Dylan has fulfilled his purpose as a disposable asset of the FBC. He sits on the edge of the room and pulls his knees to his chest. He thinks about Zoe. About what might be happening to her now. About when he last heard her, the patterning; was it because of what was happening around him or was it because she turned into a pattern? Is she okay? She might be hurt, or worse, dead, and it would be all his fault. She never should’ve met him. Maybe she would be in an office lined with black rock that would protect her from all this. She would be safe without him.
Upon these thoughts, his vision starts to blur as the tears fill his eyes. Small droplets run down his cheeks and he just lets them. Suddenly a light appears in front of him and a slight TV static fills the room.
There’s a man, he’s waiting in a house~
He slowly gets up, wiping tears off his face. A song starts to play from a TV across the room.
“Zoe? I hear something…”
Something, he cannot explain what, tells him he should go to it. He jumps and floats towards it. As he lands in front of the TV the display turns from static to warm white glow. The melody of the song starts playing somewhere else.
Where there’s an open door but no way out.
He follows the melody of the song until he eventually finds another TV. As he gets to it, it also turns from static to warm white glow and the melody, again, starts playing somewhere else. He rushes from one room to another, following the music like a lifeline. The music reminds him of Zoe.
And in this house there is a staircase going down to some place wanting to be found.
“Dylan? I’m…<static>”
Dylan’s heart skips a beat. He hears her. Her sweet voice coming through his earpiece. It’s as if a huge heavy rock fell from his heart. She’s okay and alive.
“Zoe? Zoe, hello?”
It must be her playing the song for him. Like a muse guiding him from hell. He continues following the melody.
Whispers of a calling from another world. Reborn in the dawning ~
“… explosives lying around… gonna try to… didn’t work… stay with…”
What are they doing up there? The melody continues to lead him.
There’s a root that’s growing deeper, past all of the centuries, pushing through the dark~.
“… something else… maybe we’ll… been six hours, Dylan…”
Dylan stops in front of one of the TVs he’s been following.
“Six hours? It hasn’t been that long… has it?”
Is the time passing differently in the sinkhole? He definitely wasn’t stuck there for 6 hours… probably? Not like he developed any sense of time when he was locked up in The Oldest House. Either way he cannot afford to lose more time just standing there. So he continues following the music. The radio buzzes again.
“… gonna keep talking… I’ve… PA system… hear the music?”
Dylan lets out a soft laugh of relief. He was right, it is her playing the music.
“I hear it, Zoe. I hear it.”
His heart starts racing. The thought that she was doing all this for him made him feel all warm and fuzzy.
There goes right up to the surface, out light of a purpose waiting to be found
“… ordered to give up the search…”
What?
“… you… MIA… reassigned… immediately… always another crisis… Goddammit! … sorry, Dylan…”
Dylan gets to a huge space full of patterned rooms of what used to be apartments. Combined with the words Zoe just said, it made him feel even smaller, cold feeling washing over his entire body. He wishes she could hear him. His mind keeps repeating her name. His only goal. His only reason to get out of there. He would give anything to see her right now. To hold her in his arms and never let go.
“No… Zoe, I’m still here.”
He cannot give up now. As he sees another TV flashing in the distance, follows it.
“…more of your file… lost your whole family in one day…”
Screw that. He might be losing something way more important right now if he doesn’t hurry. Her…
“… I didn’t… that really blows.”
Her soft sobs coming through the radio hurt Dylan in a way he has never felt before. He never meant to make her sad and he hates himself for it.
Mirror turning, future burning, unknown knowing, wanting to be found.
“… asked about my family… mom left when… sixteen… three days after… eenth birthday.. dad died… but, hey, I was… right?”
He felt so sorry for her. Nobody, especially her, deserves such pain.
“… I… as bad as you… not that… competition… but… well, you win…”
Dylan laughs a bit through his tears. Only she can say something stupid like this and sound so sweet at the same time.
Finally, he finds his way out of the huge, patterned room space. He can sense that he’s getting near the exit, so he picks up the pace and runs through the hallway, bumping into a wall every time the hallway turns. A sense of despair starts to fill up his chest as the hallway goes on, he feels like it’s never going to end, like a false hope, a fake sense of possible freedom.
“.. research says… wasting my time… no way you’re hearing this… not after… hours…”
In his mind he begs Zoe not to give up. The hallway starts to spiral into what feels like a loop. Is he going in loops? No…
Suddenly, the pastel green wallpaper changes into concrete with pipes lining it.
There’s a man, he’s waiting in a house where there’s an open door but no way out.
“Dylan? You just pinged on my radar. Can you hear me?”
“Zoe? Yeah, I hear you. Can you hear me?”
“Loud and clear. Hey, let’s not do that again.”
Dylan has to lean against the wall. He feels like throwing up, all the anxiety finally fading away. He’s absolutely overwhelmed with emotions, crying and laughing at the same time.
“Zoe… Thanks. For not leaving me alone down there.”
“Yeah, well. There’s a lot more paperwork to fill out if you die. And I don’t abandon people I’m in charge of.”
Dylan steps out of the laundromat and looks around. He’s back in the evacuation zone, the cold rain landing on his face reminds him that it’s finally over, that he’s back. He wastes no time and heads to the watchtower.
At the watchtower, Zoe leans over her table and flips through the paperwork. Dylan slowly approaches her.
“Dylan! Good to see y~”
Dylan pulls Zoe into a tight hug. It catches her by surprise. Zoe hugs him back and buries her head into his shoulder. They are finally safe now that they are together.