LinkUp

It only takes an instant to flip somebody’s life around completely. The butterfly effect, it’s called. One small instance, and their entire life derails. They say that the world is deeply interconnected, that every little thing matters in the Great Scheme- that the flap of a butterfly’s wing can cause a typhoon on the other side of the hemisphere. So far, all of the biggest changes in his life could be traced back to a thousand micro points.

When he had first decided what he would dedicate his life to, he hadn’t known what he was getting into. Not really. Not like this.

He should have been much more suspicious when they had first introduced the idea. Linked Up, it’s called. But he was young, naive. He wanted to believe everything they had to say. Because why would they ever lie? Surely it was as good as they said it was. So why question? He thought he’d unlink in a few months, and everything would return to normal. Looking back, he doesn’t even remember what excuse they had used to sway them. He never expected to find himself here, like this.

“A.. deviant?”

“Who did this?!”

“Someone- catch it!”

Voices float around the echoing white halls, footsteps increasing in number as they do distance. He blinks and looks around, his mind a whirlwind. If he gives himself another second to think, he’s sure he’d break down. So he does the only thing he can think of as the voices draw closer, and he runs.

He can’t think about the bodies with closed eyes and a red light piercing from the side of their skulls, a stark difference from the colorless area. He can’t think about the voices thundering his direction, or the footsteps following. He can’t think about his own footsteps, loud and heavy against the pristine floor. He can’t think about the way he hardly remembers how to walk, his knees wobbling like a newborn foal, bumping into the wall and tainting it with his fingerprints. What- no, not now. File it away. He’ll deal with it later. He can’t think about the white walls, white floors, white blinding lights, the white white white everything. He can’t think about how he doesn’t remember anything right now. He can’t take time to think right now at all. He runs.

A voice crackles through a nearby device. “Code 7, deviant. Yeah. Can someone alert the Supreme? Yeah. On it now.”

He freezes and his hands go cold. Hide. There’s nowhere to hide! Just endless white void. Maybe-

Someone tackles him from behind. His face slides against the white and he hisses through his teeth.

“Yeah, got ‘em.” The woman informs the device, and crackles respond. The weight presses his airway, his hands behind his back. Then a bar strikes the side of his skull.

“-Yes, please inform the Director.”

“-are they going to-”

“Wait, he’s a-?!”

A booming voice cuts through the chatter suddenly. “SILENCE. Now. Let’s begin.”

He blinks into consciousness slowly, head pounding and confused. Someone stands behind him, his arms bound tightly behind him in their grasp. He doesn’t attempt a struggle for long before falling limp. His head lolls and blood trickles down the side of his face.

A woman pale woman with sagging eyes that bore into his soul steps towards him, a thick white device in her hands. People surround them of different ages and classes curious with wide eyes. His brows furrow, his breathing in ragged pants. He barely lifts his head when she reaches him, tired of it all. Whatever they do to him surely will be better than years more in this white prison of a place. She presses it to the side of his head, and he hears a beep and click. A high pitch rings in his head, so loud he jolts away, wriggling in the tight grasp, desperate to get away. She grabs his chin and jerks it towards him, sneering. Her nails press into his cheeks and his eyes hold glares of years of resentment to the faction. He leans forward as much as able and spits on her shirt.

He can hear the gasps from the audiences and the anger boiling from her. She chuckles and whispers a threat, waterlogged past his tired comprehension. She grabs his face again with a sharper attack and presses the machine against his skull again, this time pulling it as it clicks to his chip.

A piercing scream escapes out from his lips without him realizing.

His face contorts with tears and he shrieks from the excruciating pain as her lips curl in a cold smile. It feels as if it pulls his entire brain out, the wires wrapped and engraved so deeply in his system that it really is ilke pulling roots out from the ground. Blood splatters on the pavement, a cleanup crew feet away and ready like every other time. The circular chip, small at the temple but long and dangling hundreds of wires now, is thrown off the side. His eyes widen. Oh.

~

No one knows what’s on the other side. When the planet first began to split open, the Council decided for the people to stay on the Left. And that was that. The Right was mostly sea anyway. Or desert. Not much livable, so it wasn’t a difficult transition. Now, though? No one knows what happened in the decades since to it. Some say it’s covered in toxic waste or radiation. But most say it’s a graveyard of ruins. Grey and dust, nothing left but death. It’s impossible to get to it now anyway. When the halves split apart, billions of rocks and debris filled the vacancy, creating a rift of an asteroid belt in between. Anyone who dares to cross would never make it. And thus, the other side became the one of death. Where trash, waste, and corpses are thrown. It’s kept the Left healthy and free space from the garbage.

It’s also where the traitors, the Deviants, and the dead are thrown.

Red leaks from the hole in his head and he can’t hold it up longer. The person holding him conscious now walks him to the edge, the void looming underneath. Rocks fly through the ring and he knows he won’t be able to survive past a few feet.

A rift rips through the sky. Screams erupt a moment later. Most stand in shock, deer trapped in curiosity. And, before he can process any of it, a yell cuts through as a human comes barreling from the space rift. The boy who falls from the sky tackles him in landing, and the two fall tumbling off the edge of the world.

Air rushes by at an increasing speed, wind loud in their ears. The Deviant crashes into a meteor blood floats from his cough as the wind knocks from his lungs. The strange, young man with thick white shades looks around frantically, analyzing.

“We’re not going to make it!” He yells.

The recently freed man blinks in and out of conscious, and when the two move around one meteor, another follows. Gravity sucks them to the other side faster and faster. The man who fell from the sky takes a deep breath and furrows his brows, contemplating the only decision that will save them.

“Hold on!!” He finally shouts, lunging out to grab the Deviant’s hands. The air slides around his slick outfit and his thick goggles miraculously manage to hold place. He swims the falling air and strains to reach him, swinging a grasp but missing by inches.

“What are you doing?!” The Deviant screams. “We can’t make it- no one does!”

Although the he can’t see his eyes, the small smirk that forms conirms the glimmer in them from the man.

“That’s because no one’s seen me yet,” he says. Their hands connect and he latches a tight grip. His sleeves reveal metal fingers, sparking under the other man’s touch. If they’ll die either way, it’s pointless to not trust this stranger. Besides- he did fall from the sky once already.

Their hands link with a tight grip. He notices a rock barreling towards them, and if they don’t do something right now, it’ll be over.

“Do something!”

The man takes a deep breath, blond hair above his head and floating in the rushing wind.

“Hold on- and don’t let go!”

Then the world pauses. The air in his ears disappears, the rocks still in a float- nothing falls, nothing moves. The endless vacuum feels as if it could suck their head out through their ears, it’s a heavy sound of silence. The stranger’s limbs are spread out, legs out and hair floating, but their hands remain tightly in between the two. His white goggles float inches from his face, but his eyes lay gently closed. He carefully breathes in a full breath, and the sight of the space is mesmerizing. Endless void dotted with billions of dots of fire scattered across the abyss.

The boy releases the breath, the soft exhale of his lips the only sound heard, a soft fog almost visible like a chilly morning, and his eyes flash open a starking green.

The world turns blue, then blips out of focus.

He coughs cloud and the whistling sound of the wind speeding by returns. He opens his eyes to find the giant, rolling waves of deep grey clouds stretching on for eternity. They’re soaring through the sky, albeit less flying rocks this time, but at a deathly fast speed. His eyes widen and a scream escapes his lips.

“Oh- miscalculated, sorry!” The man has the plain white glasses on now, hiding the bright green eyes revealed earlier. He latches onto him and the world twists into a sea of blue that blinds him.

They crash into the water with a splat. Everything silences and the liqiud fills their senses, breathing in and coughing and choking. He releases the breath of oxygen left and wriggles from the sea, eyes pressed tightly from salt.

Soft murmurs flood the silence after a moment, noticing the disarray. His body falls limp with effort and sinks slowly.

It doesn’t take long, however, before they’ve been dragged to the surface, breaking the barrier and gasping for air.

The man with goggles sits up and looks across the plain in bewilderment. The Deviant, however, lays motionless in the bright grass.

“Wait- no!” He shouts. “Please! Can’t you do something?”

The fish look to each other, murmuring in languages beyond his understanding, helpless. They can only aid in their territory. They’ve never seen a Breathing survive the fall, and through their astonishment, they wish to help.

“Thank you, for saving our lives,” he tells the fish. One leaps from the water in a spin, and they return to the deep.

The man searches frantic through his online inventory, for a way to save this person he’s roped into his mess. But nothing can help, not like this. His chest feels heavy.

Only moments later, the fish return with a guest. A seasnake with beady eyes slithers from sea to land without a blink.

“Can you- will you help us??!” He gasps with tentative, hopeful eyes.

The snake nods softly and slides by the Deviant’s limp body. She slides down his arm and climbs the body, a purple, glowing substance left behind. She covers him like a spider catching its prey, but in the end, she slides off, satisfied with her work.

“Thank you, so much,” he breathes. “We are forever in your debt.” She nods in acknowledgement and joins the sea once more.

He gasps awake, eyes darting open.

“Whoa now, maybe don’t sit up that fast after you almost died,” the white-goggled boy chuckles.

He blinks, surprised and confused. His breathing is heavy and eyes wild.

The boys collapse onto soft grass, chests heaving and air coming in quick pants, thankful for the ground once more.

“We-” he pants, “just survived- The Fall.”

“See?” The stranger lifts a half smile through breaths. “Told you-” he chokes, then flashes a playful grin. “They just hadn’t met me yet.”

He rolls his eyes and falls back to the ground, sighing heavily. “I just escaped.” His brows draw closer and he realizes everything that’s happened with terrifyed eyes. “I just escaped! I left!” He looks around. “I’m a- a Deviant. And I’ve escaped. And I survived the freaking fall to the Other Side!” A long sigh leaves him.

“Yup.” The boy pops the ‘p’ with a cheery tone. “I don’t know what half this means, but yeah, probably.”

He turns to him with wide, estranged eyes. “I escaped the Supreme. This is awful! Or.. amazing? I’m not sure yet.”

“Hey, hey- deep breaths! I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

He stands suddenly, hardly listening to the stranger. “I’m a Deviant now,” he checks each item off on his hand, “I’ve escaped the freaking Surpreme. And- oh, I need to go back!”

“What?”

“I need to go back! I-” he reaches his hands up to claw his face in frustration.

“What’s going on?” He asks in a gentler tone, hands steady and out.

“My memories! They’re still there! I- I have to get them back. What if there’s someone waiting for me?? I need to go back!”

“But.. can you even do that?” He frowns in confusion.

He slumps with a sigh. “I don’t know.”

The stranger puts a hand on his arm softly. “Think about it tomrorrow. For now, let’s rest, yeah?”

“Yeah- yeah, you’re right,” he lets out a long, tired breath. He glances at the just-set suns, the sky in a twilight sort of purple now. “Yeah,” he whispers again.