9 Days Before

Within the frame of the ceiling window, the sunlight's purplish-orange hue vanishes from the marble room, coating the large cubicle layout in a dark palette.

Within a moment the dark-gray shadows changed into a pale cascade by a single flip of a switch, a Tower worker waltzes into the room, their fragile shoes tapping onto the marble.

A reflection on the wall glimpses the figure, displaying their long brunette hair draping down to their upper back, following along their black silk dress as they walk by.

She stops in her tracks, inhaling a fresh lemon-lime scent of the room's fragrance.

The woman appears to be examining metallic gray rods plumping out of the walls grasping onto a large tube, she looks down on an electronic board, carrying it gently with one arm, tapping into the glass screen.

With the reaction to rhythmic dancing on her fingers, the rods move down with a mechanical purr, dropping the tube onto the floor.

Her gaze looks at the tube and then up-around it, seeing several of them clinging onto the wall by the metal arms.

She looks within the tube, it's filled with a hazy dense liquid with ribbons of darker colored waves spiraling against its enclosure.

Her gaze drifts down onto the pad and does a pattern, tapping on the screen, then she does a solid tap and swipes her finger down, leaving smudges against the glass.

Collection of sounds speak about the liquid being drained from its container, it drools down—revealing a body drooping down into the tube.

Thinner wires connecting to the body leave it hanging like a puppet on its strings.

Her brittle fingers waltz across the screen again, sounds of steam spew out into the room, being muffled by the canister it's coming from.

She steps forward as an opening had been created to release the body—catching the figure before it plummets to the marble.

Her cumbered arms drag the body, their bare feet skimming the floor as she hustles the body to a padded bed, the comforter lifts up with hydraulic legs.

The woman looks down at her electronic device and does a final marking of her work.

She places the pad into a pocket on the side of the bed and begins to push, rolling the bed out of the marble room—flipping the switch as she heads into the corridors.

Rolling of wheels fester within the hallways, her flowing dress bouncing as she hauls the cargo into a different location.

Skidding of the wheels squeak as she turns a corner, gripping the handles tightly to pull the weight.

Passing other rooms down the empty corridors, she looks at a number that's carved up-top of the headpiece of the bed, then checks the room numbers, passing several rooms before she reaches the correct entrance.

Halting her movement as she swipes three cards to get the green light to enter the designated room, the doors sizzle as it opens, the woman walks backwards into the room—pulling the bed with.

The figure lies unphased by the movements their carrier does.

"Here it is!" She says doing a robust salute, the other worker thanks her for the delivery and relieves her work, the woman bows and grabs her tablet from the side pocket of the bed before she exits the room.

The man lifts up a clipboard of his work amongst the unconscious figure's details.

Stating: homunculus 326, Ready for injection, area for drop off, time and date of its creation, and what type of injection the body will take.

He flips the pages, confirming any other details with a grunt then places the clipboard down onto his desk and begins his work on the body.

Grabbing a syringe that holds a densely milky serum, injecting it into the vessel, pressing the top with firm pressure.

The liquid floods into the veins spreading through the body, the frame jolts causing him to flinch momentarily, he twists his chair over to his computer doing a series of keystrokes and the body's chest jumps as if being shocked.

He lifts up the clipboard and checks off his work with a pen, the man picks up the radio.

"She's ready for delivery at 9151" the radio clicks off as he places it back onto the desk, a group of guardsmen enter the room escorting the body out of the room, they haul the figure into another room for dressing the body in specific clothing before they take off.

After another group had finished dressing the body with the information that had been given, the guards haul the homunculus into the carrier, buckling it down tightly for the travel ahead.

The roads were slightly bumpy disturbing the sleeping figure, with a few turns and lights they were at their destination, they hauled the figure out of the back.

One of the guards pulls out a pen—lifting up the piece of clothing and injects a clear liquid into the body.

They scurry back into the carrier and speed off into the night, leaving the body laying on the front porch of the house.

With another jolt, they awake. Darting their vision around them to get a sense of where they are, breathing heavily like they had just ran, they place their hand on their knee as they get up.

Remembering the house in front of them as their home.

With faint memories trickling into a picture, they knock on the door, lights turn on and the front door opens.

"Welcome home sweety, how was your time over at your friends house?" Their mother welcomes them into the home.

"Lin missed you," their mother teased as the door shut, closing the living room lights and their silhouettes from the outside world.

{●}

Rin and the boy that accompanied her through the doctor's test, stayed in refuge in a fairly comfortable building—the hosts bringing in anyone that'd been evacuated by the Towers sudden construction around the premise.

Leaving most residents in speculation of their assembly, although most are suspicious of their acts, they still have a sense of difference towards their departure: having memories that they're re-establishing them for the sole purpose of a new Tower, summoning anger towards those who believe that it's 'bullshit' to have their homes taken for such a project and those who are compliant see it as a new era.

However this isn't the real case that Rin and the boy know—they've experienced the horrors, witnessing what the lightning had created, along with the horrible nightmares.

Everything passed that was a void, besides some warry memories—waking up in a different place to where they originally fainted during Rin's travel with the group and the boys collapse gazing upon the structure.

There are some rugged memories about the boy being transplanted into the Towers hospital-like housing then a rough memory of a person in a lab-coat.

With Rins' foggy recalls, she was following along the crew to a different location with the boy who she saved, when they reached a certain distance, there was an elapse—guiding to the other memory of a needle being sunken into her neck by a person wearing white.

With these vague memories they didn't take any chances of being noticed—dying their hair and wearing other fashion choices to blend with the refugees.

They're still not sure if these hosts are connected to the Tower or not, unwilling to test their luck to find out.

Rin felt a dash of homesickness towards the situation, wishing she could crawl in her own bed to forget that this had ever happened.

She lays down a sleeping bag next to the boys, giving it a brush to swipe off any dirt that may be littered on it, crawling into the opening–sliding her frame into the sleeping bag, she leans over to the boy and whispers "I don't think I ever got your name."

He scoots himself closer to Rin, putting his hand up to his mouth to block the response. " Mivel '' his dark curled chestnut hair sways from him darting his gaze to a sudden commotion.

Rin focuses towards the communion as well, both hearing and seeing a person screaming, hollering, their feet making bumps inside the sleeping bag as they fling their arms and legs to escape a nightmare they're having.

Another person besides them panics, looking around the room—catching a gaze with Mivel for a second then looks up to people calling them to assist, placing their hands onto the terrified civilian.

With the only gap visible of the commotion being blocked by another supporter, Rin looks at Mivel who's staring back at her with a vigorous worry, drifting their focus back onto the crowd.

Hearing the person recuperating after being woken up, muffling unintelligible sentences and a shortness of breath.

Part of the crowd disperses back to their spots, talking amongst each other about the occurrence, others stay around trying to comfort them, giving them water in hopes that it'll relax them.

The individual with them thanks the group who stayed around, they place their hand gently on the disturbed giving their back a gentle rub.

Within moments the rest of the crowd leave them to themselves trying to keep the sudden fright to themselves instead of making it a conversation point like the others.

Rin and Mivel lay stiffly in their sleeping bags, having a sense of stress towards their own night-terrors that they had encountered during the events they remembered vividly.

Mivel turns to Rin, daring the question with a whisper—nudging close to her to ask. "Have you—-have you ever had a night terror" he gulps. "Like that?" She turns to him, unwilling to answer the question as she's currently remembering the experience.

He turns away, his stare facing the ceiling lights as the others dim around them except for the lights above the person who had the fright and a few others including their own.

In an elongated moment, he shifts around into a scrunched up position, facing the right.

Rin is still in lock with their light above them, she blinks rapidly before she does the same, turning towards the opposite side.

"To answer your question…yes—-I have." She responds with tension tugging at her voice, unknowing if the conversation will carry as silence stirs between them.

Rin lays her head flat onto the sleeping bag's built-in pillow, her gaze blankly observing others unwinding down for tonight's rest with murmured conversations of their own.

Mivel speaks, vanishing the silence between them while his vision is firmly on the person from earlier who seemingly stared right back at him with widened eyes.

"I'm sorry that has happened to you." He breaks the uncomfortable eye consistent with the individual, turning to face the back of Rins head.

Pressure is forming at the back of his own head—feeling that the person is still watching him.

"If you ever want to talk about it, I'm open ears." He suggests, hoping his intentions are clear that he wants to help, however she doesn't respond, Mivel is okay with this as it could be a touchy subject for her.

The overhead lights turn into a softer orange having the area to be possible for sleep, Rin turns to face him, looking downwards with sorrow as she thinks about her night-terror, debating to air her experience out in hopes that'll soften the weight it's putting on her shoulders.

He sees this, "its okay—only when you're ready."

Rin does a weak smile and looks up at him, staring into his hazel eyes having a thought that this is the first time actually seeing his eyes up close like this.

"It started…" she gulps, tearing her gaze from his eyes to gather her courage.

Mivel pays close attention to her words as she struggles, wanting to say that she doesn't have to force herself.

"The day before I found this boy..." She darts her eyes around seeing that people are occupied with their own business, unwilling to have anyone overhear their conversation so she softens her voice to a peep.

"It started with a dream about…" Rin clenches her eyes, pulling out her hands from the sleeping bag, making a gesture with her hands like she's holding a small ball.

"This person.." She says, showing a bit of frustration, Rin pauses lifting up her head to scan the room again and continues.

"It was going normally like if we were having a normal conversation" she points to herself and then Mivel, he nods captivated to where it'll go.

Rin takes a deep breath, sighing it out. "I don't remember what the conversation was about, but I know that it felt heavy. " She faces forward, flopping her hands down, making a pat on the sleeping bag, trying to seek words to convey what it relates to.

Mivel glances at Rin, going to her nose, going to her arms that flopped down, and then back to the side of her eyes.

"Almost like if you're having a heart-to-heart with a family member—something in that sort of way" Rin turns to face Mivel, who's intently paying attention, his hand prompting his head up as he listens.

"Then it was like we said our goodbyes" she closes her eyes, her brows pressing down as she gets to the part of the terror, seeing it behind her closed eyelids.

"That's when—that's where things changed. The area around us became thick with this—with this fog, this dark fog that… "Her voice trembles as she recalls what happens next, Mivel leans in closer, readying himself.

"He got engulfed in it, he reached out a hand, but I couldn't grab onto it—it felt numb just trying to reach out to him, after he got swallowed by the dark fog. It—it swallowed me. " her hands start to shake, Mivel jolts, wanting to grab it to comfort her.

"I heard screaming, shouting, then a flash happened. I saw this—this thing." She tightens her eyes, a single tear escapes and Mivel is left feeling like he shouldn't have asked about the terror, but she continues.

"It had no eyes, no mouths—until it started to morph, it was as if their skin melted to cover their mouths." She looks at Mivel, his eyes widening as he slowly shifts up.

"Their jaws stretched and stretched—I tried to look away, I tried to even run, but I couldn't. Its skin tore revealing inside of their mouths showing jagged teeth…." Rin pauses for a moment, looking away bringing her fist to her mouth, recoiling. She looks back at him, her eyes glossy, having a film of tears pilling up.

"I felt—everything." Mivel leans in closer holding her hands, telling her that she can stop but she shakes her head. Needing to vent this feeling that's been festering inside her.

"It pounced on me," Rin sniffles. " Then after"—She pauses. "I started to float up, seeing a bunch of people frozen—like if they were statues, even seeing myself frozen in time." Mivel goes in for a hug, trying to comfort the shaken Rin.

After for a moment she calms down, the feeling lifting off of her chest and shoulders, Mivel slips out of his sleeping bag.

"I'll go get us some water, I'll be right back." He softly says placing his hand on her shoulder, she softly nods and he goes off.

Rin wipes her eyes and cheeks, feeling dried up tears that were on them.

Her gaze drifted from looking down from her hands, seeing around her that more people were asleep, some eyes darted towards her, but nothing screamed like they overheard the conversation.

She hones her vision to the right of her, seeing the person from earlier staring blankly back at her with widened eyes such as what they had done with Mivel, Rin gets an aching feeling in her stomach as there's no motion to the individual—tearing her gaze away from it.

Mivel comes back with a group of water bottles, two for her and two for him, placing them down between them in dividation.

Rin shakes the gaze off and takes one of her water bottles, taking a good swig off of it, Mivel does one as well and they both place down their water bottles.

She looks over at him, thanking him for listening and comforting her.

He apologizes for bringing it up, but she stares into his eyes saying it's okay—it's what she needed to gather the courage to move on.

They bring their sleeping bags closer to one another, moving their waters up towards the pillows to make room.

The two go on talking about other subjects, moving on from the previous conversation to keep them relaxed enough to drift off to sleep.