2067.
October 22nd, 10:02PM.
The more Zephyr and co. progress, the more the pit closes on itself. It is narrow. The flashlights are now able to illuminate the other side.
Checkpoint "11 109th" is another platform that connects between the two walls, but considering how the walls are connecting closer, its scale is smaller by comparison to the halfway point. It's also thinner, about 8 to 9 meters large.
When Zephyr and Riley arrive with the animals, they see Alister lying on the floor. He collapsed due to exhaustion, panting heavily. He holds his left hand on his face, as if his eyes are burning. Zephyr looks a bit concerned but stays puzzled as what to do. With one bag of supplies remaining, the others left out during the frenzy of their escape, he doesn't have that much water or food to feed his companions: three remaining cans of beans and only 2 liters of water.
Everyone sits down. It's an awkward silence once again, only accompanied by Alister's pained breathing.
…
Until Riley starts mumbling to himself.
"I cannot believe this...You ran away?"
Zephyr starts breathing in and out loudly. He gives a sign to the scientist to shut up. Riley looks at him for half a second before turning his attention to the assassin. Alister replies nothing to the doctor.
"We discover something in this darkness, finally! After years of daydreaming of this place, I can say out loud and with pride that I went and found something incredible! Orbs of lights that can self-destruct to evaporate heat sources near them! Marvelous species!"
Riley speaks loudly, aiming for Alister's attention.
"I could have ANALYSED it! I could have made remarkable progress about this underground world with a sample taken, studied! Anything! Instead, you had to show your true colors! You had to get in the way of my research! YOU WERE PLAYING WITH ME!"
He screams at the hunter with visceral, gut-wrenching anger. Alister responds by lifting his head up and saying "Doc, can't you... can't you see I'm tired? Go. Go fuck around a bit. Don't care, didn't ask." before putting his head back on the rock and keeping the breathing.
Before the scientist, in his melancholy, can throw any more jabs at his arch-nemesis, Zephyr places himself between the both of them.
Zephyr Yundath looks tired.
Zephyr Yundath looks frustrated.
Zephyr Yundath is done with the mind games.
He places a can of beans in the hands of the doctor.
"You're going to stop and eat. No more of this, you hear me? No more of this mess. I will not stand you two fighting and putting our lives in danger any longer. We almost died out there because you guys couldn't keep your emotions in check. So, since I'm the one who calms down the fastest, of all people, the ball's in my corner again. No one will change that, not even you, Alister". He looks at the hunter, commanding respect from him. Alister simply smirks.
"Wow. Good luck, kid. Wait till I'm one hundred percent, and-."
Zephyr gets ups, grabs his torch blade and points it directly at the assassin's face before he can finish his sentence. Alister feels the chills down his spine the second his eyes meet the tip of his sword, almost touching the base of his nose.
"Alister, you look very tired. Would be a shame to cut your legs and leave you to die while you're vulnerable. A tragic end to what was a lustrous career, don't you think?" Finishes Zephyr.
They stare at each other. Alister slowly gets how Riley felt during his meltdown.
The tamed hunter lifts his hands up in the air, signaling that he gives up. Zephyr brutally pierces the ground with his torch blade without saying another word. He grabs the two other cans of beans, one for Alister and one for Urth and Eylventh to share.
Everyone eats quietly.
Urth sometimes looks at the young blacksmith's direction. The bullfrog can sense distress. Zephyr just promotes himself to leader of the pack without warning.
If Alister is tired, if Riley is losing his mind, then Zephyr believes he's on a no return policy.
What he saw wasn't an opportunity to take charge and calm things down, but an opening for him to think of anything else then his mother, his father, his village, or the twisted things he wants to place Riley through. Of course, the least he ponders about the last few days, the better. That attempt to escape from his mind is impressive, but it's just that: An attempt.
Zephyr Yundath wants to cry.
Zephyr Yundath wants to burst in tears.
Zephyr Yundath wants his rage to be heard, his sorrows to be understood, his pain to be felt, delt with, ended.
Zephyr Yundath wants to give in.
Zephyr Yundath wants it to be all over.
But he'd rather pretend to be a man, a commander, someone who has his thorned heart in check and can move forward, for being himself is too much of a burden to carry on his meager shoulders. He's battered, broken, but pulls through because he'd rather be a nobody, another pretender, than Zephyr Yundath.
Forging forward? That's too hard to handle.
At some point, the role the young man places himself in takes a toll, and he falls asleep, as the rest finishes their beans.
#
A couple of minutes pass by. Alister is feeling better, enough to stand up and walk. He spends his time watching Zephyr sleep. The teenager looks dead, his soul and his heart wide open. Exposed. This kid is wounded, traumatized and in dire need of love.
Alister, looking at him, relates to that deeply. His inner child wishes for something too. He's preoccupied by his thoughts as well.
Meanwhile, Riley is living through another mid-life crisis, alone. Sometimes he's staring at the emptiness of the Bottomless Pit, sometimes directly at Alister. As much as the words of advice from the new leader seems tempting, his lust to see the enemy suffer creeps through the remaining treads of his sanity. He's clenching his fist, poking through his palms with his now disgusting fingernails. He too is tired, instead looking like the mad scientist people portrayed in him for decades.
Riley gets up.
"The more I look your way, assassin, the more I feel like I am going to puke. I have never, in my whole life, wanted to break someone the way I want to break you! Yes, I am scum myself. Yes, all accusations against me are true. But I will not pretend what I seek isn't valid for your amusement! I have a chance to redeem myself here! I have a chance to prove all these people that it was not in vain! I have a chance to prove my mother, Gallows, all of those who doubted my work as madness, that they we're WRONG! I HAVE TO PROVE IT TO YOU!"
He takes a pause to breathe. Alister doesn't respond, nor does he look his way.
"MY name... My name is Riley J. Smith! I am worthy of redemption, you hear me!? I AM WORTHY! I AM WOR-!"
"Doc. Just... stop." Let's go Alister, in pity.
They both look at each other, one with chagrin and the other with indifference. Riley is conflicted between keeping the anger and letting the surprise of the response reveal itself.
"Maybe the kid's right. We have been through a lot in the last 3 days. Hell, I have been chasing your trail for over a week now. You're a good runner. People younger than you had a harder time staying away from me. For an older man, you got tricks up your sleeve, I'll give you that.
Just... I am so tired. I didn't want to admit this to myself but it's true. I am tired of running and I'm even more tired of... chasing. I had my reasons to hunt you other than money, but I am going to die with you. I know that. I'm just moving right along to keep my head busy. I don't see the point in killing you anymore."
Riley listens to this vile man stumble these words out of his mouth with forthright fatigue. It baffles him.
"That... I'm... No, you're...Lying, you are lying! That hunger is still there! I know my hunger is there, so yours...your hunger, your thirst is there, just like me! We are the same, remember!? How could you say-!?"
"No, SHUT UP! This is not the FUCKING WAY! I don't want to kill anymore! you shouldn't want me to kill you either, what kind of bullsh-!"
Alister's voice is now trembling. Riley is stunned. Tears start flooding on Alister's face.
"I... Look, the second I laid eyes on these stupid firefly things, I knew then, in that moment, that I wasn't going to kill you! You're boring, predictable, two-faced in one breath, but a coward in the other. No. WE are boring, WE are predictable. WE are cowards. We are fucking insane!
We got baggage that no one will ever have and it's not something I'm proud of. I don't want to wear that like a badge of honor. That badge is stained with shit! I don't want to do this anymore! I don't have the energy and the patience to deal with you! Just... I don't... I'm sick and tired of being a disappointment!"
Alister starts thinking about his father.
He doesn't want to tear up in front of his worst enemy, so he turns the other way and places his hands on his face. He can't help but cry.
Riley is left with no words. He wasn't prepared for this barrage. It shows.
The two stays silent. There's but the sound of a torch blazing in the night to keep them company. Alister then quickly wipes the tears away, gets up and moves further towards Zephyr, leaving the doctor to wonder.
#
What in the world just happened.
Riley looks at himself. He thinks about his state, how he feels, truly.
This conversation got him to ponder. This conversation awakened a part of him that he had shoved in a box. Akin to a wake-up call.
His eyes darts towards Alister again. Seeing someone he categorized as ruthless and boiling in murder intent, cry in front of him, begging him to stop. This hits Riley to the core of his being.
There is a human in there. There is a human in the boy.
In his desperation to clear his name, he forgot the focus, the real WHY he came down here. He used it as an excuse to operate the way he did, but he forgot to embody it, to practice what he preaches.
What he's been doing for the last 3 days, it had no purpose. Vitriol.
Riley J. Smith's eyes are opened. He succeeded in his goal. He broke the man. For what? For naught. He gained only one thing. Not even satisfaction.
Comprehension.
In the pitch black of the Bottomless Pit, where the night reigns during the day, where fools like him gallop, thinking of immense treasures and discoveries, only to be brought down by the hammer of ruin, the weapon of earth, the realm that shatters humanitarians and monsters alike, Riley J. Smith, profound scientist and biologist, finds himself rekindling something that, to him, means the whole world.
His purpose.
He mumbles words of self-reflection to himself for a good while. Like he did with that poor puppy, he will heal himself. This time, he will not let it burn. Out there, in his situation, he's his biggest supporter. He has a chance to return to the source, to his purpose. Nil and his last remaining supporters, whoever they are, they would not be proud of the last 72 hours.
He has work to do. The broken man, trying to send his spite down the throats of everything, is not gone. The denial however begins to fade. The purpose is no longer an excuse to justify himself.
The purpose has returned, and so did The Scientist.