Mere Instinct

One moment she was sleeping.

The next, she was falling past bright lights with hot air scraping over her.

Sam hit the ground hard, muscle memory keeping her from shattering her knees on the rocks. She stumbled only slightly as she pushed herself to her feet.

Where was she?

A sound like an airhorn shot through the air, burrowing into her brain and triggering some deep-implanted instinct. Her body lowered into a crouch and she found herself looking over her shoulders, surveying the terrain, without consciously deciding to do so.

She was on some kind of ledge, tall, thin grass covering reddish-colored rocks. Arizona? Utah? Somewhere else out West? The ledge ended about fifty feet to her right and a hundred feet in front of her; if she squinted she could make out what looked like maybe another ledge across the gap. Was she in the Grand Canyon somewhere?

Thoughts on her location vanished when she saw what she was wearing. She was covered neck to feet in what appeared to be a one-piece, skin-tight, magenta bodysuit. A thin green stripe was the only break in the getup’s pink coloring.

She liked pink, but there was such a thing as too much.

A primal shout echoed across the cavern. Sam tensed up and ducked lower into the grass, wishing this bodysuit wasn’t so vivid. Another shout came, followed by a solid thump that felt much too close to her hiding place. She started slithering on her stomach through the grass, her breathing coming faster and faster until something hit her in the back, knocking the air out of her. She gasped and something in her mind told her to move, now.

She twisted her body to the right and felt the ground shudder as something struck the exact spot where she had been. The attacker grunted in confusion and Sam rolled onto her back, finally seeing who or what stood above her.

It was a boy with a sword in his hand and armor on his body. A red cape flowed around his legs and his shaggy, black hair covered his eyes. His mouth was set in a hard line as he raised the sword again.

Without thinking, Sam flipped her legs over her head, the momentum pulling her upright to face the boy. He stalked towards her and swung his blade so fast Sam could barely see it glinting in the light.

But she felt it. Oh, she felt it as it struck her ribs and hips and legs. She sank to her knees and for the first time saw a blinking light on her wrist.

ARMOR: 86%

More blows fell and the number decreased to 80%, then 78% and lower still until it clicked.

Her bodysuit was armor too.

Another buried instinct rose up. An instinct to survive. Sam reached toward her hip, somewhat surprised when her hands closed around something hard. The boy’s mouth hardened even more and he swung his sword once more, but this time Sam was ready. She whipped her arms up, bringing with her an oval-shaped object she assumed—and hoped—was a weapon of some kind.

The sword crashed into the weapon, the impact knocking the sword from the boy’s hands. As he scrambled for it, Sam held out her own weapon. Her finger fit perfectly on the smooth, swooping groove that she somehow knew to be the trigger.

All these instincts. The body flip.

How had she known how to do that? Why did this...gun feel so familiar? She still didn’t even know where she was!

Sam lowered the gun just as the boy stood upright, sword back in his hands. He sneered when he saw her.

“You’re not even going to defend yourself?”

His voice startled her. It was loud, louder than she would have expected, and smooth, but hard with anger.

“You could at least try and make it a challenge!” he sneered again. He raised the blade and Sam took a step back.

“Who are you?” She jumped at how loud her own voice was. She tried to lower it before speaking again. “I don’t even know where I am! Do you?” Despite her efforts, her voice still seemed to echo from every direction. 

The boy glared and cast a hasty look at the sky. “Shut up,” he hissed. “Are you trying to get us both killed?”

“What are you talking about?”

The boy swung his sword against her gun again, but this time he pressed his weight forward, forcing Sam to take steps back until she felt her heel sink into nothing but air.

The ledge.

Sam cried out in shock and fear, grabbing for the boy. He pushed hard with his sword and Sam tipped over the edge, dropping her gun as she fell.

She screamed, but it seemed to only be an instinctive reaction. Her mind was clear. Calm, even. She kicked her right heel against her left ankle and blue flames shot from the soles of her boots, propelling her through the air. 

The boy had been on the ledge, watching her fall, but as she flew towards him she was satisfied to see his face go slack with shock.

Her gun, she saw, had landed on another, smaller ledge when she’d fallen. She grabbed it as she passed and landed back where she had started. She kicked her ankle again and the flames extinguished.

“Oh good,” she sighed, her voice magnified again. “I was really hoping that would work.”

The boy adjusted his grip on his blade and had the decency to look nervous. Sam lifted her gun again, aiming it straight at the boy.

“Who. Are. You.”

He shook his head frantically and Sam stepped closer.

“Why are you trying to kill me? I’ve never seen you before!”

The boy tripped over a rock and fell, scrambling back as Sam advanced closer.

“We never see each other before fights! That’s the point!”

Sam stopped. “What do you mean?”

A deafening boom shook the ground before the boy could decide whether or not he wanted to answer. Sam looked wildly around and the boy took advantage of her distraction, kicking her legs out from under her. She fell and he clambered to his feet, striking her with his blade before sprinting away, looking at something behind her with fear in his eyes.

Sam saw her wrist counter drop a couple more percentages and her lip curled. She coughed and rolled onto her side, raising her gun and letting her finger fit comfortably on the trigger. She took a deep breath and squeezed the trigger as she exhaled.

Sizzling blue and yellow light burst from the gun and splashed against the boy’s back, wrapping him in tendrils of electricity. Sam watched in mild horror as he cried out and fell. Sam pulled herself up and walked to where he lay, twitching, on the ground. She noticed a similar device on the boy’s wrist as his own armor dropped from 98% to 74%. She looked at her gun, impressed, before turning her attention back to the boy.

“You,” she panted, “are going to tell me what you—”

Another boom shook the ground, this time knocking Sam over. Before either of them could stand, more explosions—what else could they be?—made the ground shake continuously. Sam tilted her head back and saw some kind of machine silhouetted against the sky, firing ammunition that made her bones and teeth rattle.

“I told you!” the boy spit. Even amidst the explosions, his voice was still impossibly loud. “You are going to get us both killed!”

“Since when is asking questions a crime?” Sam demanded, her own words perfectly audible.

The boy groaned and flexed his arms and legs. Sam wondered if he was stiff from the machine’s gun or from hers. All that electricity had looked painful.

“You have to remember on your own! I cannot tell you anything!”

“Remember? Remember what?!”

Alarms rang through the air, deafening when paired with the shots still coming from the machine. The boy’s eyes widened and though he winced he scrambled upright as fast as he could. He started to run, but before he even took a full stride something shot over Sam’s head and grabbed the boy.

A huge, metallic arm. Sam craned her head, her own eyes wide. It was the machine, holding the boy in its claw-like hand. The arm began to retract, pulling the boy past Sam and toward itself.

 The boy’s mouth was open, but Sam could no longer hear him speak. He vanished as the machine dragged him over the ledge. Through a second-long break in the blaring alarms, she thought she heard a scream, though it was instantly cut short and replaced by a stream of red light that arched across the sky.

Sam lay, panting and paralyzed, on the ground until she realized it had stopped shaking. The alarms were still going, but at least she didn’t see or hear the machine anywhere as she slowly stood up, hugging her gun to her chest. 

“Remember,” she breathed, stumbling over the torn-up ground.

Remember what? She didn’t remember anything before falling into this place.

“What am I supposed to remember?!” she screamed, her voice fractured and her survival instincts nowhere to be found.

The alarms seemed to grow louder. Sam started to run, not sure where she was going or what, exactly, she was running from until it grabbed her the same way it had grabbed the boy.

The machine.

Sam thrashed and screamed, barely able to hear herself through the screeching alarms. The machine had pinned her arms to her sides and was holding her so tight she quickly ran out of air to cry out. 

It brought her to itself, lifting her until she could see its horrible, metal head and brightly lit eyes. Through her terror, she thought she could see dark shapes moving behind its eyes. Human-like shapes.

“Please,” she whimpered. “What is going on? What am I supposed to remember?!”

The machine’s grip on her tightened until she could no longer draw in breath. Her vision darkened, and the last thing she knew was a grating voice mutter, “Nothing.”

Sam closed her eyes and a band of blue light flashed across the sky.