The Only Hope for Me Is You

I finally make it to Battery City, and I see that dawn is nearing by looking at the dim horizon and I know I must be quick.

For the whole of my travels I have had a feeling that someone has been following me, just that feeling you get that you’re not alone and I’ve constantly had one hand on my gun, keeping on red alert.

I shake it for now and journey to the heart of Battery City, making my way towards the HQ of BL/ind once again.

While I walk, I think about my relations with Exploder, how could my mother have done this to him? How could she have done that to my father…to me? No…she wasn’t a bad person…she was confused. I need to talk to Exploder, resolve everything, make him realize that mother wasn’t bad, that I wasn’t his enemy, but his sister.

That’s exactly what I’ll do when I find him.

Before I know it, I find myself in the opening outside the headquarters, luckily, there’s no one here…which is odd. Very odd.

I take out my gun straight away; I’m too suspicious of this. I keep my eye sight dotting everywhere, covering every inch of the opening. There’s not even any cars, just the sand that goes on for miles.

I walk slowly up to the doors, slamming my back against the wall next to the glass doors, I take a breath and then take a glimpse through the glass. There’s nothing, no one, no signs of life not even from the monitors, everything’s shut down.

Confusion mounts on my face as I carefully enter the building, my gun still cocked, this could all be a trap. I look around the white darkened room, it looks the same as before just less Dracs, life and brightness.

I decide to look for Exploder anyway, just in case so I run down the corridor we came back down last time and stop as I come to the room that had the bomb in, I glance through the window of the door. It’s spotless, not a trace of blown up Scarecrow in sight.

I shrug and move on down the corridor, trying to remember where I saw Exploder, I walk to the left and I come to the door that Mikey got trapped behind, I take three steps back and look to my side, this is the room.

I glance through, I remember seeing him laid out on a clean white bed, attached to something, it could have been a life support machine, but now I see nothing. Not even the bed he lay in. I panic what if it wasn’t this room? I continue to look through others around me, panicking more as my disappointment grows until I’ve looked through almost every door in the headquarters.

I’m out of breath by the time I stop, slumping down against one the doors I feel tears starting. I can’t stop looking, I can’t give up now.

As I get back up and make my way towards the exit and decide that I’m going to look for him further, there’s no trace of the other boxes either so I decide to look for those two, in the place where I was hoping I wouldn’t have to go, into the town of Zone two.

I jump over one of the desks at the front of the headquarters, looking for anything that tells the time and I almost fall over a dead Drac body. I hold my nose with one hand, the stench is awful, as I reach down to his wrist, pull up the white sleeve and look at the watch inhabiting his wrist.

I’m not going to be back in time. The guys will come looking for me, at least I know they have an idea of where to look for me, but I decide to leave some sort of trace anyway, so they know that I was here and where I’m heading next.

I scramble under the desk for anything of use and manage to find BL/ind logo riddled pens and pads, I grab one of each, then I realize that if I just write down all the details, someone else might see it and know where I was, someone who I wouldn’t want to see it.

I sit on top of the desk and think of how I could do this, and then I remember, they’re all absolute nerds and should all know a bit of Gungan. I begin to write and have to change pens about fifty times because of the crap quality, I finally get to one that works and start to write out my message, I write: ‘Could not find Exploder, will be in Zone two, and look out for more notes.’ in Gungan.

I fold up the paper and look around for somewhere to stash it, somewhere I know they’ll look. I find a vending machine next to some monitors, I know one of them, and especially Mikey will try and hack it so I put it in the bottom of it, where the guns and batteries come out of.

I feel a sense of relief, now knowing that they’d be able to find me as I walk out of the HQ. I take my gun out and keep it out as I walk towards Zone two, and straight away I have that sense that someone is following me again, the same feeling I had on my here.

“Alright,” I begin, making sure I sound stern, “show yourself.” I stop in my tracks, gun resting on my shoulder, finger on the trigger.

“I know you’re there, just give it up already.” I say, slowly turning around, eyes wide as something moves behind me and I jolt in the direction, aiming my gun at a figure which now stands in front of me, hands raised.

It’s a boy, just a fucking kid, skinny and short with scruffy black curls, a grazed face covered in dirt, he had deep blue eyes and old clothes.

“I’m sorry…” he interrupts my thoughts, “…I just…I want to help you.” He says, his voice weak and shaky.

“Help me?” I ask, finally lowering my gun. “With what?”

“…Finding…finding your brother…that’s what you’re doing isn’t it? I'm trying to find people too...2

“How do you know about that?" I ask him,

“I’ve…I've just been watching you and the guys…I'm not a spy though!"

"It's okay, I believe you."

“I just want to be a part of your gang..."