Natasha sat in a daze for a long while as she took everything in; her mind lost in the replaying memories of the last few minutes. It stood her nearly half an hour to come back to reality and stand up again before being down to search through the first man’s pockets for the keys. Finding nothing, she moved on to the second man and finally fished them out of his front left pocket.
She made her way downstairs once again, crossing the kitchen and stopping in the living room to pick up the bows and arrows. The tips were badly bent out of shape from reuse and would only be suitable for blunt trauma instead of piercing targets. She pulled the first bow in a testing manner and noticed the pull was heavier than she was used to, but still manageable. It would be too difficult to pull it into a full moon such as in TV shows or movies, but a half moon would be enough to cause someone to pause or use as a bluff. She stepped out onto the lawn after testing the bow and looked into the distance.
There was an apartment building in the distance, a hospital farther away, a couple offices with large logos that she didn’t recognize and a clocktower similar to the one at her university. All of the high rises had multiple floors above the two-story houses in the suburban neighborhood. Natasha climbed into the truck of the two men and began driving towards the closer of the buildings which was the university’s tower. Eyeballing it, the hospital may have been closer, but she was sure the university had a pawn shop along the route where she might be able to find better weapons. With no other cars on the road or police to stop her, she made it to the pawn shop within ten minutes and exited the truck while leaving the door open, keys in hand.
She called out once she stood in front of the pawn shop’s glass door and waited for a response. After hearing nothing after three attempts, she went back to the truck, drew the bow and shot an arrow into the glass door. The blunt force shattered it with little resistance. Her brows raised at the shattering as the glass should have been far tougher to break and she had already loaded the second arrow.
Suspicious, Natasha held the bow in her left hand and kept an arrow between her fingers on her right as she walked into the dark store. Her head and body turned at the same time while she kept the bow ready and pointed down at a 45-degree angle. There were only three large counters within the store made primarily of glass with shelving on the back wall and cupboards beneath the displays. It was a very open space with a couple tables in the center area with fliers and chairs surrounding them. The card tables were very out of place and seemed to be temporary accommodations for a guest presentation. The text on the fliers were worn away and poorly printed. Crumbs on the tables showed there were some kinds of cookies on the surface previously. Perhaps some kind of scout troop selling cookies, Natasha thought to herself as she moved away and stretched her head over the nearest counter.
Still finding nothing, she pushed aside the unlocked counter door and checked behind the other two counters. There were no signs of recent activity within the store aside from the temporary tables and crumbs. The back area of the counters was clean, even the trash had been taken out and bags replaced. Natasha made her way to the Employees Only door, using her left foot to nudge it open after twisting the knob. Her body still kept in a nearly straight-shooting posture as she waited for any movement beyond the door. After thirty seconds of nothing changing and no noise, she stepped closer and shoved harder with her front left foot. The door squeaked open fully and shown a dark hallway with three more doors including a service entrance at the farthest end.
Natasha kept her bow and stepped back into the back counter space. Her eyes roamed the displays first while keeping the majority of her focus on the hallway. A few shiny blades caught her attention and she shifted to the display containing several decorative swords and two beautiful short swords with obvious marks of steel against steel. She still wanted to find a pistol or rifle, so she wouldn’t need to worry about getting close to her opponents again but there were none on display, only a binder labeled Firearms on its cover. Unfortunately, it was too dark within the store to clearly read the descriptions of the available firearms and it was very thin. Even with photos, she would still have to take apart the gun to ensure it worked properly and was not missing any required parts. Many shops in her city had guns stolen during burglaries and the owners took to removing the firing pin until the sale was made to ensure safety for themselves and customers.
Finding no keys within arm’s reach, she drew the bluntest arrow in her quiver and used both hands to bring it down on the corners of the glass display. As the glass began to crack, she shifted her body to continue pounding the arrowhead down towards the center of the glass pane. On the tenth hit, the glass gave in and shattered inward, just in time for the arrow to snap in half too. Natasha released the arrow before her hands could crash through the broken glass and used the snapped half nearest to the feathered end to push away enough glass shards to grab the two steel short swords.
Waving them in a testing motion, she felt satisfied with their weight and balance. The two swords had decorative guards that were likely attached after the blades were forged to make them more expensive. With the bow slung across her body, she kept the two swords drawn and at the ready as she walked back to the hallway with confidence. Her thoughts moved to the door on the right, where she hoped to find the sheaths for the swords as they weren’t within the display case. The slightly open left door had a desk peeking out of the opening. It felt more like an office than a potential backroom warehouse so she focused on the right door first.
Entering the hallway once more, she held both swords outward, covering both doors. When she made it to the right door, she paused momentarily, then pushed the left door open instead. Finding no one in the office, as expected, she went back to the other door and opened it slowly while holding the other sword hand horizontally, ready to pierce any attacker in the chest. The door creaked open without any resistance and she noticed an overhead glazed yellow light glowing above her. She didn’t realize the electricity was still working in the city until then and shifted backwards to flick on the hallway light before entering the backroom.
The room was about as large as a supply closet in a hotel and felt very small with layers of shelves from floor to ceiling. It was a claustrophobic’s nightmare and made Natasha’s skin crawl slightly. Fortunately, there was still no strange movement. Natasha placed one sword down by the door and then began searching the shelves with her open hand. After another few minutes, she found the sheaths that fit the swords and walked back out into the hallway, walking steadily towards the truck to leave and find more people.
She stopped short halfway to the entrance of the pawn shop when she noticed several people standing around the truck. Her eyes lit up slightly as she recognized two of the members of the group from the waiting room at Morpheus Labs. It was Tony and Tessa; she was sure of it as even their clothes were the same and they were standing with another three men and two women. Seeing their calm postures, she slotted her two swords back into their sheaths at her waist and exited the pawn shop with slight relief on her face. She may not have spoken with the duo, but familiar faces in an unfamiliar world was very calming.
Natasha approached the duo and opened her mouth to greet them when she felt something was off. Her palms slipped to the hilts of the two swords at her waist, grasping them slowly, completely ready to react at any time. However, before she could fully take in the situation around her, a foot slammed into her back and she was thrust onto the hood of the truck. Two of the men had snuck up on her left and right without her noticing and grabbed her arms while the third had kicked her in the back. The two women moved behind the truck and dragged another man out whose body was badly burned from head to toe, likely around 80% of his skin was charred at a glance.
Natasha kicked out randomly and felt her foot connect with the knee of one of her attackers. Unfortunately, he seemed to feel no pain at all as he didn’t budge even as his leg went limp at his side. The two men shifted her around and onto her back, before pressing her down onto the hood of the truck. Tony appeared at her front with a steel ring that he slipped into her mouth after pressing two fingers on her jaw’s pressure points, forcing it open. Then he stepped away as Tessa stepped up with the burned man, drawing one of Natasha’s swords and cutting his chest open and pulling out a slimy black worm. She then proceeded to feed the worm into Natasha’s open mouth, waiting for it slide down completely before pulling out the steel ring and nodding to the other two men. The two men released Natasha and she fell to her knees, coughing violently as she tried to retch out the slimy worm.
Natasha could feel something sliding around in her chest, twisting and turning in a random fashion. She felt a burning pain near her abdomen before it moved back up towards her neck. Her fingers moved to intercept it, grabbing and scratching at it with her nails to no avail. The creature entered her lower skull and a sharp pain blew away all of her fighting spirit like a lit candle blown out by the wind. Her arms sagged down to her sides as she lost control of the nerves below her neck and could only scream internally as her consciousness became trapped in her own body. The pain slowly faded after several minutes, leaving her with the ability to see and hear everything around her but make no conscious movements of her own.
