Prisoners of Sol - Girret Storm Riders (5/11)

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As the concrete skidded along the rapidly fraying rope, Narol lost his grip on it from above. I’d felt it scrape against the top of my hood, like a jagged breeze that darted against my skin, before I released the rope and went careening back down. With my injuries from the last fall, I couldn’t let myself crash with the bruising again, but I didn’t know that I had any choices in my present situation. My training allowed me not to lose my senses despite hurtling downward, though fear crept through all the same.

My pupils darted around in the closing half-seconds of my life, sensing that I was about to strike the ground. The walls were indiscernible now that my headlamp had flickered out, and any tiny slivers of light that would’ve gotten through the dust storm were blotted out by falling rubble. Was there any hope to raise my odds of survival? Any makeshift shelter? One of the shadows looked deeper in the pitch blackness, and I contorted my body toward it, flailing. 

My arms latched onto an edge, and I scrabbled to roll inside. I snapped my tail back toward my body, as I saw a falling object right above it; I barely dodged the massive jump of concrete that would’ve dislodged my grip. I tried to fit my back half into the tiny alcove, as the building’s remains filled up the ground below. I hugged myself tightly and covered my head with my tail, waiting for the crunching sounds to subside. My eyes blinked open in confusion, to find a wall of rubble inches from my face—blocking me in and blocking out the air.

I survived, somehow. How the fuck do I get out of here, or signal to Narol that I’m alive? A slow death is worse than the heroic one I would’ve accepted, whether it be by suffocation or starvation.

I tugged at the rope around my waist, to find that it’d been severed by the downfall. “HELP! Narol, can you hear me?” 

There was a long pause, before I heard muffled banging atop the rubble. “Redge! Hang in there, buddy! I’ll find a way to get you out!”

My squadmates must’ve been scrambling to get the rescue equipment out. I stared at the wall in front of my face, torn between itching to get back out there to save more people and horror at the darker possibilities of being trapped down here. Straining my hearing, I could detect Tunia’s lighter slithersteps moving around; from the groans, she seemed to be shoring up the few remaining walls to prevent further collapse on their head. 

Narol got to work with a shovel, though that was slow work. I was coughing from the dust in my lungs, and my injuries pulsated more as my throat got drier. Each shovelful’s scraping sound was too far away to be anything more but grating on my dust-coated ears, and eventually, my partner took a break from exhaustion. Tunia stepped in for a few rounds of digging, which was more work than she usually did; I guess she did care about me enough to put in any effort toward saving me. Still, progress was glacial.

I have to look on the bright side. I have immediate rescue working toward freeing me, unlike many people in earthquakes who are trapped for days while rescue workers search a large area. This’ll give me more empathy for what they’re going through, and why I have to work nonstop to save them. I trust Narol; I’m going to get out of here.

“You still there, buddy? Are you hurt?” Narol shouted. “Do I need to hurry?”

“Ugh.” I rubbed my throat, needing water. I hesitated to yell back, knowing it’d make it hurt worse. “YOU CAN REST! Mild injuries.”

“Okay. Good. Tunia, could you please dig a few more shovelfuls. My back is…I’m beat. I need a minute.”

“I really wish you’d do it, but fine. For Redge,” she responded. “But I mean, I already looked after the child.”

“Is the kid stable?” I shouted, my concern for the little one I’d rescued spiking back up immediately.

“She‘s fine, thanks to you. She’s with her grandfather!”

Well, that was music to my ears. I relaxed a bit in the alcove, since there was nothing else to do, satisfied with a successful rescue. If my partners could dig me out of here before I expired, this was going to be quite the story to tell. It was unlikely that helpless family, who’d already had the floor fallen out beneath their feet in their generational business, would’ve survived to see the dust storms end if I’d been too cowardly to go in. Perhaps it was foolhardy, but I didn’t regret saving two lives. I felt proud and honorable.

I replayed every second of the rescue to distract myself from my predicament. There wasn’t much time to make decisions in the moment, so it was helpful that I’d known I’d take the plunge no matter what. I could say, beyond a doubt, that I was willing to lay down my life to rescue others. It wasn’t in my blood to turn and walk away from people in need. The shovel sounds got closer, and I cried out in a hoarse voice to tell Narol which direction to dig. His scoops intensified despite the hours of backbreaking work, as he was frantic to get me out.

Narol is truly my brother in arms, working day and night to get me out. Perhaps I should’ve told him to rescue others and come back to me, if they needed help more urgently. Why should I be rescued because I’m a Storm Rider, when others are suffering?

Narol’s shovel began striking the wall, so he dug straight down. A crack of sunlight peaked into my cramped hiding spot, and I uncoiled from the tight bind with relief; every muscle in my body ached and longed to stretch out. I hadn’t realized how bad it was until I reached with my arms for the opening, trying to help push aside the debris. Narol and Tunia spotted my movement and reached down, hoisting me up. I yelped in pain, feeling a tenderness in my sternum. 

Tunia laid me on the ground and began checking me for injuries. “Redge, you almost got yourself killed! You’re lucky to be alive. You have internal bleeding, too; you need to rest.”

“I want to keep working,” I coughed, grateful my filtration mask had stayed affixed to my snout. I lifted it briefly, chugging the entire water bottle I’d been handed. “We’re lucky there were…no more quakes while I was down there. Could be another round. Have to keep looking and get people out now.”

“Absolutely not! You’re in no state to be helping anyone,” Narol chastised me. “You’re no good to anyone if you get yourself killed. How many rescues will you not be around to do?”

“But—” 

“I don’t want to see you die, besides the fact you can hold back rescues if you’re working with these kind of injuries. Rest and recover! It’s going to be a long storm cycle, and we need our squadmates at his best. We need our squadmate not to take risks that jeopardize all of us and our mission!”

I groaned, seeing that I wasn’t going to win the argument…and feeling a wave of exhaustion fogging my senses. “You’re right. I’ll take it easy, and try to be a little more careful. Resources are better spent not rescuing me. But thanks for the assist.”

“Yeah, don’t mention it. I couldn’t leave you down there.”

My squadmates helped me move away from the buildings, before they set up a makeshift shelter. We laid down to recuperate from our first rescue, and I closed my eyes with a deep-rooted satisfaction burrowing into my soul. This was the start of building a reputation as a daring hero, worthy to follow in Bneria’s path. I was lucky to make it out alive, but my close brush with death wasn’t going to deter me from taking hardcore missions at all.

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A/N - 5! Our narrator is able to twist his way into an alcove, but that leaves him buried far below ground in a terribly tight space. Redge’s partners get the two civilians healed and to safety, and spend hours digging him out of the rubble. Narol and Tunia both beg him to be more careful, though he seems to be exhilarated by the overall success of the mission.

Do you think that Redge will exercise more caution and discretion with his missions, and that his squadmates were right to tell him to do so? What will their next missions look like?

As always, thank you for reading and supporting!