CoLoR-LeS

The shriek of glass echoes throughout the district, The racing winds as I fell from the shattered window. My arms are before me as I roll from the impact, the slight ache in my shoulder as I scramble to my feet and run even faster, holding the yellow file close to my side.   “Stop them!” A voice called from behind me, a nun from the room I just leaped out of.  I could hear the guards of the base panicking and scrambling on their way to catch up to me. As I skid my boots and turn the corner, ducking through the alleyway. Looking up I see the chained fence at the end of it and under the fence are the lower levels of the city. Just from this jump, I can make it back to Alabaster Town.  “This way!” I hear the church guards call out as the fence comes closer to my vision. I was going to have to make this jump now! Shoving myself from the ground as hard as I could, My body practically flew as one hand linked onto the top of the fence, pulling myself up quickly as I stomp my foot on the top of the fence and propel myself forward.  My hands over the small yellow folder as my feet stomp down on a roof. Looking back up to the guards and nuns alike who are stopped by the fence. Their gas masks barely muffling their screams at me. I wave at them with my tongue out and jog to the next rooftop. Jumping onto the next house so I could see the lower districts. Seeing how the monochrome roads whip and weave around each other as people walk along through dusty grey smog. I see the lines of dark steel gray light poles as I jump to one and slide down slowly.  “On the roofs again? Zephyr what are you? An animal?” An older woman calls out to me as I tap my feet on the sidewalk. Finally on solid ground without being chased. I wave to her with a grin. “Hey, whatever I gotta be, Mrs. Lorn.” The older woman with pale features and white hair sighs at me and shakes her head, a small kid beside her with similar white hair cheering at me with a vibrant wave. As I begin the trek back to the clinic, everyone around me waves and calls out to me. Replying with smiles and waves, to all of these pale faces and white streaks.  The street was crowded today, and kids were lively as they ran past me. Looking down at the yellow folder I stole, I pull it from under my arm and look at its front. Clean, if a bit rustled from the running. I don’t know exactly what the hell was even in this thing, but I knew that damn nun thought it was important, and anything important to the church is good for us to know.  Jogging my way down the roads, I weave through it easily, comin up to a small building with a dark gray door with glass window, on it reads ‘The Clinic of Dr. Joon’. Before I give it a knock and quickly enter. “Doc!” A sterile white room, walls with some holograms aligning them and a white table, and on the back wall a large black machine that whirs quietly. From the backroom, a woman emerges from behind the door, a gas mask over her nose and mouth and glasses over her eyes.  “No need to slam the door so hurriedly.” she walks to her desk and taps the surface, a light beep echoing as a white screen slowly appears over the table, swirling and spinning aesthetically.  “Don’t need anymore Miasma getting in here. Don’t want you getting sick, Doc.” I walk over to her as she slowly lowers herself into her chair.  “I have a filter, Zephyr. The Church of Saffron was kind enough to provide me with an updated one.” “Speaking of the Church,” I walk over to her desk, slapping down the pale yellow folder. For a moment she stares at it, pulling out her dark gray wheeled chair and sitting as she opens it.  “Did you really infiltrate a work base of the Church? You didn’t tell me.” Joon looks over at me with annoyed eyes under black frames. Placing my hands in my jacket pockets I shrug, as she sighs and continues to shuffle through the papers.  “Look Joon, you know how I feel about the Church of Saffron.” I step back, waltzing over to the wall with the map of Void City along its wall, and the crudely highlighted areas of yellow, blue, and red. “They are always up to something. And I think this is the best way to get their dirty laundry out and open for us. Just in case if they try anything to Alabaster Town.” “Zephyr,” She starts, annoyance in her tone, “I know you mean well, I know that. But that still doesn’t mean you can just go-” She pauses as if something got caught in her throat, and when I turn back over to her she is staring at a sheet in the pile with her eyes wide. I make my way over and lean a hand on her desk to get a better look as I read the sheet.  -Meeting with the Knights of Amrin 3/23/4566 at Noon on Canary Road- “A meeting with the Knights?” I blurt out.  “That can’t be good.” Dr. Joon mutters as she slowly places the paper down.  “No s**t!” my hand meets her desk the hologram against it glitchy as I lean back with a scoff.  “I knew it! They are planning something!” I look back up to that map, My finger angrily pointing up to the yellow section, slowly the map screen glows and opens up to reveal a more detailed outline of the Saffron District. Sliding my hand around, the map adjusts to my movements as I try to find Canary Road. Once I zoomed out enough I could see it finally! “Joon! Canary Road is not that far from the Town! There’s a church base there! They could be planning an ambush.” “Zephyr, why would they attack Alabaster Town? That’s ridiculous!” I feel a hand on my shoulder as I turn back to Joon.  “I’m not taking any f*****g chances! And you should know that Joon!”  “Zephyr!” She calls out to me as I march over to the door. “What are you planning on doing?” “I’m going to check it out!” I rush out of the building, making sure the door is closed, the less miasma in that building the safer the doctor is.  I rush my way through the streets of the town, weaving through the people. Running up the streets to the higher districts of the town. Canary Road was after the Amber Wall, where blanks and Church members are granted or denied access into each section. If I can sneak around the wall then I can get to the Saffron district. Coming up along to see the hill as the armored guards stand there at the large golden brown wall. I dip into an alley, pressing my back against the wall of the building and peeking over. I can see a pipe driving up the alley’s wall. Gripping it as my boot stomps onto the brick wall, with a few hops I start making the climb up with the leverage of the pipe.  When I make it to the top, I climb up to the roof while sneakily jogging over the flat roof up to the wall. Looking down, there is a bit of a gap between the wall and the roof top, and peeking more ahead I can see a tree. If I jump far enough, there is a chance I can catch a branch. A deep breath as I take multiple steps back, glancing down as the guards talk amongst themselves. I lean down and lean forward on my hands, a sprint-ready position to make this as easy as I can.  I jumped from a chainlink fence down to roofs earlier, what’s a jump from a roof over the border wall into a tree?  With that, I blast off, my feet rushing to the edge of the rooftop as I run as fast as I can, before I stomp my feet at the edge of the roof and spring myself forward. Through the air, my body spreaded as I reach out with my hands. Catching the top of the wall and pushing myself off of it for extra distance. Just when I past it my hand roughly catches bark, feeling it stab into my hand a bit as I swing violently, as a snap echoes from above my hand. Before I knew it, a free fall I was in as my side met another branch.  “Fuck..” I let out, my side pulsing in pain.  “Who’s there?” A rough voice yells out as I see one of the guards on the other side of the Amber Wall peek out, looking right to left. Scrambling up the tree, I take a chance to hide behind its large trunk. My breath comes in as a bit of a wheeze and my head is spinning, but I lean back and look down at my midriff. I could see my side already bruising against my pale skin.  From my side of the tree, I see a backstreet extending alongside the length of the wall. As I slowly jump down from the branches, peek back to see the guard returning to his post as I rush off down the street.  My legs ached a bit from the fall and my side was definitely feeling the ache. Leaning on the wall I bit I keep going on ahead, as I peek through the buildings looking onto the main street that was full of Church members. Most people with gas masks as the miasma still floated quite heavily around this area of the districts.  Moving a bit forward more, I find myself coming up to the main streets slowly as the curve of the wall comes to an end. Looking up I see a certain roadsign, as the yellow screen flickers, showing a name- Lemon Street.  A sigh as I start my way down the street, seeing church nuns all with their golden brown uniforms and gasmasks, some without. The Church always held a mixture of Blanks in their ranks, white hair and pale skin mixing in with the normal human. I lift my hood over my white hair, lowering my head to hide myself a bit better from the members. Surprisingly, it was smooth as I slowly followed roadsigns to Canary.  Canary Road held one of their larger bases, looking up and seeing the flicker hologram sign and a church before me. Slightly in the distance, I could see the Main Church as the yellow flags wave from their steeples. It was simple, it was stupid. Even stupider than the golden metal fence that went around it, I would climb it if my side wasn’t still aching from my crash landing.  I look around the fence and jog to the other side now looking at the back of the church, up top I see the yellow glass-stained windows. From them I can see some silhouettes from the nuns inside. If I want to hear that meeting I better get over it. Under the windows is a back entrance with a golden brown door, there’s my ticket in when I get over the fence.  A sigh as I step back before running forward and jumping up, my hands gripping the higher areas of the fence.  A shriek of metal with the force of my collision as I quickly stomp on the horizontal bars balancing the metal together. Jumping again to grab the highest point of the fence and pulling myself over. Groans as I landed on the other end while I rub my bruised side, looking up again to see that same silhouette move.  Shit- maybe I can still catch them! I rush to the back door, stepping back a bit as I go to kick the golden handle. Only to hear a click and my foot not connect with anything.  My stumbles forward only being stopped by a rough hand on the doorway, I hear a bit of a yelp from in front of me. Looking down to see a girl who fell to the ground, a long white dress with a purple cross over the chest that dragged downward into lace. A similar purple sleeve detached from the dress on her arm and when I looked up completely, I met yellow eyes framed by soft green hair.  For a moment, we both stare at each other before hearing.  “Saint? What’s wrong?” She gasps at the calling, turning her head to the voice. The hallway was long but the footsteps were drawing near. I bolt inside and run to the nearest door, seeing its small frame. Though when I went to close it the girl grabbed the handle and slips in behind me. Closing the door forcefully leaving us both in the room as we listened for the footsteps.  I lean over her, my ear to the door as I heard the clicking of heels get closer…and then turn away. She was gone, whoever she was.  I step back and look around the room, this was a closet, full of brooms, mops, and other cleaning supplies. Not much different than the dingy ones you find in Alabaster Town, bigger though.  “Who are you? How did you get here?” I hear the girl ask me.  “None of your business, and if you keep quiet we can move on our merry way.”  For a second I can feel her gaze stare at me as I look around the closet, there must be something here- a knife- anything to help me deal with what I imagine to be a tough fight.  “You’re hurt.” Turning to her, my eyebrow raise. Her finger pointing to my exposed midriff.  Looking down now, the bruise on my side is looking quite bad, that tumble from the tree did more damage than I thought.  I turn away from her, tugging my hood closer to my face as I begin to zip it up, she stops my hands. The gasp I let out as I step back frantically. She approaches me again, and I step back again.  “Lemme see it.” Her voice was quiet, still trying to ensure no one found us, but her hands worked fast as she grabs my jacket and holds it open, looking at my side. Look at her closer now her skin was quite pale, is she a blank? Wouldn’t be surprising.   “I don’t have time for this. I need to catch the damn High Priestess or whatever she is called.”  She glances up at me, turning to the shelf beside us and taking the first aid kit beside us. Before grabbing a quick salve and an ointment of some kind.  “What do you need the High Priestess for?” she puts the ointment on the salve, after removing a thin clear veil from it.  “Like I said, none of your- ow!” Her hand was quick, slapping the salve on my side as I twitch and shake from the sudden jolt of pain. Before a sudden cooling feeling washes over the ache.  “I won’t let you out if you plan on hurting anyone. The people here, they’re kind.” She crosses her arms to me, a glare from yellow eyes as I rubbed the salve on my side. A sigh, as I march back over to the door, but my arm is grabbed harshly. Looking over to see two thin hands over my jacket sleeve as she continues to stare at me. I look down and shuffle closer to the door her following me stubbornly.  Putting my ear to the door I listen in, hearing more footsteps in the distance.  “I’m here to listen in on the meeting with the Knight of Amrin.”  She pauses, looking up at me. “How do you know about that?” “I have my ways, So-” I look down at her as her grip on my arm softens a little. “Going to let me go or do you plan to have me escort you back home? Cause if so, wait till the meeting is done.” She shakes her head, short green tresses following the movement. As she sighs, “If I get you to the room of the meeting- will you help me sneak out?”  For a third-no fourth time, this girl has surprised me. As I sigh and nod to her smile back was soft. She lets me go and I listen to the door once more- silence.  “We’re good to go, now make this quick and if there are secret passages use them.” she nods to me as she gently turns the gold handle and peeks out, stepping out from the closet and shuffling down the hallway.  I follow after her, trying to make my boots as quiet as I can alongside the porcelain floors of the church base. She leads me down the long hallway that leads to the back exit and peeks across the connecting hall. Gesturing to me as she quickly runs down the hall to the right. We stop again at a crossroads as we hear the hustle and bustle of other nuns nearby, the foyer was before us and across the way and directly beside us, a large staircase.  “Great, what now?” I whisper to her. “Hold on, I’ll distract them, while you get up the stairs.”  “How am I supposed to do that, I can’t be invisible.” I look back to the two large staircases. “Well, you climbed over the fence, do some climbing one more time.” I blink at her wildly as she gives me a thumbs up and walks out over to the group of nuns.  I hear the nuns gasp at her presence as I look up, seeing the top of the hallway frame with its decorative edge. My fingers curl over the edge, Jumping up as my hands clench it and pull my body upwards,leaping up as I grab the brown railing and climb the wall up.  As I step over the railing I see a nun staring over at me. I quickly grab her wrist and pull her into the railing as I rush down the hall. I hear her yelp as a thud echoed in the foyer as yelps and shrieks took over the bustling.  All the yelling as the church workers came together to go to the nun as I sink into my hood around the corner. As I see green hair rush up the stairs before grabbing my wrist and taking me even further down the hall.  “I told you not to hurt anyone!” She whispers at me with ferocity.  “Look, I panicked! Will she be okay?” She turns down the hallway and takes me further. The hallway is lined with golden brown doors I see a large one at the end.  “Luckily. But you still made her fall from the second level!” “Look! You told me to climb! I’m surprised she was the only one who caught me!” “I didn’t mean actually climb the wall!” “Well, I didn’t know that!” Our whispering argument seemed to end there as she pushed me against the wall, leaning to peek to see if anyone else is nearby.  “Here’s the door.”  “I would prefer a more sneaky technique, but a promise is a promise.”  I gently lean onto it and peek it open just barely. Peeking into the room as I see a woman with long peach blonde hair. Covered only by a veil under a nun hat. Her long robes are more extravagant than the normal church worker. She stares at a yellow screen, showing the face of another woman.  “Okko, is this really necessary?” She speaks to the screen, holding a paper to her chest.  “Aurelia, you know that I would offer our help if I could, but I was told no.” She looks down at the paper and sighs, “The people here and in Alabaster Town need as much help as they can get. Let alone the Revolt-” She places the paper on her desk as she crosses her arms.  “I know, but as a Knight of Amrin, I have to follow the order of my king. We cannot help you, Aurelia, I’m sorry.” Help? A proposal for an alliance?  “However, perhaps I can secretly send you some aid.” The woman on the screen speaks quietly as the Priestess looks up.  “Okko, are you sure? You just said.” “The supervisor left, I’ll do what I can for you Aurelia. I’ll send you a letter soon. I have to go, goodbye.” And just like that the screen vanishes and Aurelia is left to herself. As I step back my hand to my chin as I think about it. “Aurelia…” I hear the girl beside me mutter under her breath.  I missed most of the meeting, but a secret package? A possible alliance against the Revolt? I knew this wasn’t good news.  “There! That’s her!”  I look up frantically, seeing the woman I pulled over the railing pointing at me while leaning on a fellow nun. As many church workers start collecting before us.  The door to Aurelia’s office opens, a barrel of a gun to my face as her eyes widened in surprise.  “Zephyr! How did you-” she turns to the girl keeping her gun pointing to me, “Saint Lucilla?”  The girl steps back and she puts her hands to her chest. “Um, Ms. Aurelia, I can-” Quickly, my fist met Aurelia’s wrist as I grab the gun and grab the girl’s wrist. Rushing into the office and firing a singular bullet into the window of the church, the glass cracking violently.   “Second times the charm!” I yell as I pull the girl up into my arms as I leap out of my second window for the day.  The girl in my arms scream as we fall from the height of the window. Landing on my feet with a stumble was messy, with a slight ache in my ankle as I let her down.  “Come on.” I rub my ankle through my boot as I turn the safety off on the gun.  “Why did you-” “I don’t go back on my damn word, now come on!” I take her hand and run around the front of the church as we make it to the locked gate, hearing the rushing church workers as the girl tapped on a yellow screen that appeared beside and typed in a code.  The fence opens and I take her hand, rushing down the roads of the Church of saffron section. Hearing her harsh breathing behind me, I yank her down an alley. Following the direction I went from my previous breakout from this morning, I can back to a familiar alleyway with a familiar chain-linked fence.  “Alright, hurry! Climb up and jump to that roof down there.” She blinks at me as she looks at the fence.  “I-I can’t climb this!”  “Well, you better f*****g try.” I come behind her, kneeling and wrapping my arms around her legs, the dress bunching up in my arms as She grabs onto the fence, pushing her up as she pauses at the top and them leaps on down to the roof. I step back and few times and create my act from the morning, jumping into the links and climbing up, and using my body to launch forward, landing on the roof with a roll.  I look back up, seeing no sign of anyone following us from the church base. We were home-free. “Alright, now you’re on your-” I look to see her on her knees, her dress lifted slightly to show her feet with bits of bleed peppering the roof. I kneel down, looking at her feet, realizing throughout this whole time- “Why the hell do you have no shoes on?” My voice was rough as she winces when I hold her foot.  “They tell me I shouldn’t when I’m in the churches as the Saint. Something about- purity.” I look at her incredulously, when I put her foot down she winces again as I sigh. Knowing that I can’t leave her like this. I scoop her up in her dress and lift her up once more, her arms wrapping around me.  “Th-thank you.” “It’s nothing, your feet are hurt.” I start running to jump to another rooftop, trying to find a better way to get to the sidewalk.  “I mean for getting me out too.” Looking back at her for a second as I held her in my arms.  “Just don’t waste my time, okay?” I see her nod as she holds on tighter while I jump to another roof.  “When we get down I’ll get out of your hair.” For a second I look at her, but I don’t reply. I place her down for a second and jump down the streetlight, reaching up to catch her. As she jumps over and slides down the streetlamp instead, wincing when her feet hit the pale grass.  “Don’t be dumb, come on.” “I thought we were going to split up. Where are you taking me?” She asks.  “To a doctor, of course. Can’t leave you with bleeding feet. Now, come on Miss-” “Lucilla. Just…Lucilla, please.” I come over to her and kneel down with my back facing her. I hear fabric shuffles for a moment before feeling weight onto my back as her legs and arms engulf me. I ignore the slight ache in my side as the salve struggles to stay attached to me. My hands gripping her thighs as I stand and start to make my way down the street.  “You are?” She speaks as she leans back a bit and finally removes my hood, my long white hair flopping out of the hood in a bit of a mess. She moves it over and I shake my head to get it out of my face. “Zephyr. And I guess-” I look up as the Blanks around us begin staring and waving, some even trying to ask questions as we walk. Lucilla shoves her face deeper into my shoulder as she looks around. Seeing how our roadsigns were still metal and some are even bent. Dumpsters being emptied by people, buildings more run down and strangely built, and even more just small groups of blanks leaning on one another to just survive.  Seeing the miasma bleeding all around us like a cloud of thick smog, this was it- the lives Blanks led here in Void City. As not fair as it is, it was the truth and no other faction was so gracious as to give us so much of a chance.  Here we stood, a town of Alabaster.  “Welcome to Alabaster Town, Lucilla.”