When Arch Extent wakes up, he hears the muffled sounds of talking not far from him, his vision blurry and darkness creeping up on the corner of his peripherals. When he tries to move, he feels the restraints of tough rope grind against his wrists and his ankles. He was tied down firmly to a metal chair, registering that he was alone in an empty dark room. The only light sources were from the wooden walls of the building, sunlight pouring in between the crevices to at least let him know there was a table not too far from him decorated with a few metal contraptions. He tries to move his arms, but they’re restricted to the metal arm rests.
Shit! I need to get out of here! I can’t panic.
“Damnit, Sean! I thought you knew how to hack one of these.” A woman’s voice shouts out in the next room. Arch Extent’s eyebrows raise, realizing that his captors weren’t just average residents of Divon. There’s only one enemy that comes to mind. Nexus.
“It’s an Arch of Atlas’s watch. They’re not THAT easy to crack, alright? I don’t think Nexus has even gotten one of these damn things before. Even more, it looks like some files are even programmed to be restricted to this Arch. Think that’s how they try to keep their top info on lockdown?” The man’s voice who emitted must have been Sean, according to what the scientist deducted.
“Maybe? Don’t know, we never really got this close. If this Arch is here in Knyocke, then that must mean they have a base of operations nearby. We just have to find it.” The woman stands up from the chair, her footsteps growing closer to the door Arch Extent is in. “I’ll make sure to go give him another round of anesthetics. BKs never stay out for long on them.”
BK? What does that stand for? And they gave me sedatives already? Arch Extent looks around the room, trying to see if there was any way he could escape his captors. It’s possible he could try to scooch his chair closer to the wall, yell for help through the slim cracks between the wooden boards, but that seemed like a fruitless endeavor. He contemplates whether he could break the chair and get the rope around his hands free. His best bet might just be that, but the only thing he’ll need is time to do it.
The same Blazerock woman that the scientist saw prior to being kidnapped walks into the room, pouring light in through the doorway. She gives a distasteful look in the Arch’s direction, shutting the door behind her. “I see you’re awake. That was a lot quicker than I imagined.”
“How long ago was I out?” It’s still day time from what he could tell, but he has no idea if he’s been out overnight, or just a few hours.
“I’d say fifteen minutes since we got here. Not long.” The woman goes over to the table to grab what looked like a metal box, opening it up to reveal a few syringes. “Luckily for you, I need to put you back to sleep just for a bit longer. And oh–looks like that injury on your head has already healed too. I think we actually cracked your skull a bit.”
That’s right. I was hit in the head… at least that’s what I remembered. I don’t feel anything, unless it’s just lingering effects from the anesthetics I overheard.
He stays silent at her response, trying to see what other tools awaited him on the table with the Nexus agent. The woman walks over, placing a hand to his head, pushing aside thick black locks to get a better look. “Oh, it definitely healed up. Don’t worry, we’ll make sure it’ll be a much harder hit next time.”
“What’s a BK?” Arch Extent inquires.
“You don’t know what a BK is?” The woman looks genuinely surprised at his response. “You’re an Arch, aren’t you? I believe you’re Arch Extent if your watch says who you are. Or rather Reuban…if you prefer going on a first name basis. Unless Seraphic is calling BKs a different thing now.”
“I still don’t know what a BK is.” Arch Extent watches as the woman frowns at his response. He’s never heard of the term, and not a single inkling as to what the woman was referring to. The only thing he could think of is if it was related to why his arm healed.
“You can stop playing dumb. But I do wonder how much of our conversation you overheard earlier...If that’s the case, gotta dispose of you sooner than I thought. But before we do that…I think we should have some fun.” The woman walks back over to the table once more, smirking deviously as she places the syringes she previously grabbed down. There’s a few sharp tools she picks up, one decorated with a salient edge of metal. It looked like a standard saw, which made Arch Extent’s heart rate spike up.
I’m going to be tortured before I die. Aren’t I?
“That woman you were with, the one with the fuschia eyes...Who is she?” The Blazerock woman walks towards Arch Extent, standing in front of him with a look of malice. She inspects the metal saw briefly, wondering just how well it could cut.
She wants to torture me for information on Winter. So, it’s not really me she wants. It’s Winter…
“I don’t know much about her.” Arch Extent knows he can’t give up a lick of information about the Winterlance accompanying him. His greatest fear would be Nexus getting their dirty hands on Winter. No matter what they do to him, he wouldn’t allow himself to yield.
“You’re really gonna make it this hard? Suit yourself, Arch of Atlas,” the woman groans out. She takes a few steps towards the Arch with the saw, placing it at his elbow. There’s a wide grin that smears across her face, and her red eyes stare directly into Arch Extent’s. “You’re a BK, so this shouldn’t be much of an issue for you to deal with. But…I know you don’t have any of those pain meds on you, so it’ll feel like a bitch trying to heal up.”
“I don’t know how many times I need to tell you that I don’t know–,” the scientist hisses out, quickly clenching his teeth as he feels the saw push down, breaking through the fabric of his brown jacket and into his skin.
“Wrong answer.” She didn’t look pleased. “Enough of the BK talk. I need to know about that blonde woman you’re with. Tell me about her.”
“Like I said, I don’t know much about her.”
“Wrong answer, again,” the Nexus agent pushes the saw further into his arm. She eagerly watches the scientist clench his other fist into the armrest of the chair tightly. “I need you to cooperate or else I’ll make sure you bleed out a lot sooner.”
“What’s so special about her, anyways?” Arch Extent spits out, hissing his breaths in and out with the alloy stuck in his arm. His best bet would be to try to at least gather some answers from this Nexus agent, if it means he could have some reassurance to his grave.
The woman pushes the saw deeper into his arm, watching crimson spew outwards and drip down from the armrest to the dirt floor. The scientist takes it that he answered wrong again as he swears he can feel the metal down to his bone. The pain is excruciating and if she slams down the metal any further, or tries to saw through his muscles, she’ll definitely be able to cleave right through the bone.
“You already know the answer to that. Or else you wouldn’t be wandering around with her. She’s just another product from Seraphic…I can tell with the eye color. So, you aren’t hiding anything about that, Reuban.” She’s ready to pierce into the scientist further.
Eye color…Is that not a possible trait from being a Winterlance? Arch Extent looks up at her, ready to spew out another question. He knows it’ll result in piercing through the bone, leaving him to wither in more unbearable pain. But he swears that he is more than willing to lose an arm over protecting Winter.
“I know you’ve been traveling with her. She’s a huntress. She would be a fine-looking gal if it wasn’t for all the gnarly scars on her body. I actually almost had a drink with her at the bar the other day when we were in that village. Oh well…At least I know where to find her. I mean really, if you don’t want to tell me anything…I can just go get her myself.”
Somehow, a key detail about Winter’s biology being leaked out isn’t what sets him on edge, but that this woman was so close to Winter in proximity. Alone with Winter. How could he have allowed someone else to get that close to her? Arch Extent figures it had to be when she walked away from the argument with Neil and he found her once the sun set that day. He swears from this moment on, he’ll keep Winter by his side; at all times, within his sight. He’ll never allow it to happen again, even if it means making sure the Winterlance stays in constant personal quarters with him.
“What are you going to do to her once you find her?” Arch Extent clenches his teeth.
“You’re really bad at this. You’re not the one who's supposed to be asking the questions.”
With that, the scientist lets out a shriek, feeling his arm being sawed through. She’s working hard at the bone, making sure the edge grinds right through the calcium and past the marrow. Arch Extent attempts to mentally endure it, wishing he at least had something to bite on as he watches his forearm disconnect from the rest of his body. The Nexus agent retracts her saw and watches as it simply falls lifeless to the ground.
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