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My Friend has been Living in An Alternate Reality - (Part 7)


Hey guys, sorry for the long wait. The job's been pretty unforgivable lately. Really had to focus on it this past week. However... it's been hard to do that. Especially after reading the next few entries of Clint's journal. This shit just keeps getting crazier.

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ENTRY 19:

It’s been one month and I'm already sick of this fucking place. It’s hard to find motivation to even write. Thought I’d give it a chance today. I gotta hold on to some semblance of sanity somehow. The rules here are fucked. If the guards catch you sitting down more than once while you’re mining in the hole, you get pistol-whipped. If you can’t physically work anymore, you get dragged away and dropped down a shaft. It doesn’t even look like they want to do it… I think they’re scared of something. Scared of the warden. Following the days where we make slow progress, we’ll usually be met with a new set of guards. Who the hell knows what happens to the old ones. Well… I have an idea but… whatever. The new ones are always harsher. But it’s hard to blame them. I guess they have to be. I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up. People drop like fucking flies here. I haven’t had an opportunity to formulate an escape plan. Hell, I’ve got nobody to talk to other than Buck and Lauren. We don’t get leisure breaks. We stay in our cell for about ten hours before being herded to the mine. This is bad. But… we’ll see what happens.


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ENTRY 20:

It’s been around seven months now. I’m not counting… Buck is. Says that’s his hobby. I mean, I guess there’s nothing else to do. I’m pretty much sleeping whenever I’m not working. At least they’re not starving us. The energy bars aren’t bad, actually. I’d rather not think about what they’re made out of, though. But still… nothing’s fucking changed. I… I don’t know what to do. It seems like the last revolution’s made everybody complacent. Nobody’s willing to take a chance anymore. Well… almost nobody. Two new guys were assigned to our section of the hole today. I eavesdropped on a conversation the guards were having about why they were here. I heard the word “genocide” drop a couple of times. Yeah, they were crazy fuckers. As soon as they stepped foot into the working grounds, they went after the guards. Using only their pickaxes, they managed to massacre most of them before finally being shot down. This was an opportunity, obviously. But nobody took it. I guess everybody thought there was no chance of getting out, even if we managed to take out all the guards. To be honest, I’m starting to understand them. I don’t want to think about it but… if my plan is to come to fruition, then we’re going to need to face the Warden at some point or another. And based off of the stories, that sounds like a fucking nightmare.

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ENTRY 21:

It’s been about two years since that last entry. I have to say, it’s been pretty rough. I’ve had no motivation to fucking write anything down. I’ve teetered between bouts of depression and unresolved motivation. I don’t think Lauren’s said anything in months. She just kind of just sits around now with a glazed look in her eyes. Just a corporal shell. I mean, I can’t do anything about it. Buck’s the same. Although, I’m really starting to question his own sanity. There were a couple more work incidents. Just a few guards and prisoners killing each other here and there. In spite of that, more and more prisoners seem to keep piling in. The mine's starting to get crowded. A lot of the newbies complain claim they didn’t even do anything. That the whole system's corrupt. I mean… I believe them. Morality seems to go out the window here. But… something happened recently. One of the guys who worked near me – Jackman found something. And apparently, it’s what we’ve been digging for this whole time. You see, one of the few rules here is that if we find something that isn’t pure rock, we were supposed to hand it over to the guards. Usually, there would be no way around this. They checked all of our pockets before we were done our shifts. However, it’s pretty obvious that the guards themselves don’t really want to be here either. In fact, a lot of them are forced into it, mere prisoners themselves. Smoker was one of them. Not his real name, but you’d rarely see him without a dart dangling from his mouth. It was one of the few guard privileges. The name kind of caught on.

Anyways... years ago he and Jackman came to a secret agreement. If Jackman ever found anything, he would be the first one to “search” him. You see, Smoker had inside knowledge, being here for decades. He knows what we’re digging for… why the hell this prison even exists, all that shit. And he doesn't want any part of it anymore. But he can't leave.

I started talking to Jackman a few weeks ago. We worked so close to each other that we’d sneak in conversations whenever the guards were out of earshot. Eventually, we both came to the conclusion that we were after the same thing. Freedom. Albeit, Jackman’s been here much longer than I have. He’s a bit hungrier. Also unafraid of death. He was getting out of here no matter what. He told me about his alliance with Smoker and what the hell we were actually looking for. They were called imperium shards – small, dense, white crystals that upon cutting yourself with, would make you invincible for around 15 minutes. Keep in mind – they don’t make you stronger. Just impossible to kill. Enough of these could turn a mediocre standing army into an empire. And that was what the Warden was after. He wasn’t planning on running this prison forever. No, he wanted more. That’s why he forced all of us to dig for 14 hours a day. But here’s the thing... the Warden only knows the general location of where clusters of these crystals are supposed to naturally occur. Jackman actually knows how to find them. Before he’d been locked up, he was an excavation leader on a mineral-rich island. That was before something called "Neo-Civitus" came and ruined his whole operation, sending him here. “They killed my whole team.” He told me. “But instead of taking me with them, they sent me here - as a fuck you to anybody trying to take the resources that they think belong to them. And that’s all of it” He was nearly foaming at the mouth as he said this. “Yeah… well I’ll show those fuckers. I’ll make them wish they killed me.”

Jackman knew how to mine. Probably more than anybody else in the entire prison. That was how he caught the eye of Smoker. He wasn’t digging at random like everybody else. He actually had a strategy. And a few days ago… he struck gold. He’d found a few crystals. After the shift ended, Smoker pretended to search him. After that, he went to his cell, where he started a stockpile. He was in one of the older, single capacity ones, so he didn’t have to worry about people snooping around. He hid them in a discrete hole in the wall. We’ve been finding more and more every day. I’ve been storing some in my cell as well. I don’t see Buck or Lauren selling me out. And the other guy’s insane, so whatever. I was a bit skeptical, though. Crystals that made you invincible does seem like an outlandish idea. In retrospect though… I guess nothing’s too strange for this world. I tried it out on myself. I made a small cut on my shoulder and waited a few minutes. After that, I tried stabbing my hand with a pencil. Safe to say… it works. Jackman told me to start recruiting anybody that I really trusted. A revolution was brewing. I’ve informed Buck and Lauren about this. They seem optimistic. The other guy in our cell’s still insane, so I didn’t bother. But… it seems like something's changed. And I can’t fucking wait.

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ENTRY 22:

It’s been about another six months. Our little group’s grown to about eighty. Most of the guards in our section are even in on it, through Smoker’s persuasion. In addition, we’ve mined more of those crystals than we know what to do with. It’s just a matter of time now.

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ENTRY 23:

It’s been three more months. We’ve got 600 in on this now. We’ve pretty much convinced everybody in our mining section, and they’ve gone and convinced their cell mates. All the guards are now part of it as well. There were some Warden loyalists, of course. All we had to do is get rid of them until we’ve found suitable replacements. However… we’re going to need to act quickly. The original plan was to get 1000+ people from all around the prison, but we seem to be drawing in a lot of suspicion. We can’t just kill all the guards who are here voluntarily and hold allegiance to the Warden. There’s too many of them. And they’re getting antsy. Some cells have already been searched. They haven’t found any of the smuggled shards yet, but there’s no way in hell that I can hide all the ones that I have if they search mine. But we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.


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ENTRY 24:

A few more weeks have passed, but we can’t afford to keep going. Jackman got searched yesterday. Of course, there was no way he was hiding all the shards, so he just killed the two guards and stuffed them under his bed. We had to create a quick plan. At this point, we’ve gotten at least 800 people ready for this. We had to create an impromptu plan. It's happening tomorrow. Once the guards come around, unlock our cells and start leading us to the hole, we strike. If they’re loyalists, we kill them. If they also want out… well, the more the merrier. After that, we’ll start making our way towards the surface. The elevators will probably get shut down, as they did during the last revolution. We’ll have to use the stairs. I estimate that there’s about thirty floors above ours. Shouldn’t be a problem, though. According to the guards, there’s a bunch of planes and boats on the surface of the main entrance that we can use to get the hell out of here. Where we’re going next… I don’t know. Baby steps, huh? As for the Warden… he can’t take all of us, especially if we have these shards. The last revolution was also considerably smaller than this one. But… maybe I’m being optimistic. Guess we’ll find out soon. Even if I don’t make it out alive, at least I wouldn’t have died complacent, rotting away in this shithole. At least I’ll have done something interesting.



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ENTRY 25:

Well… that was fucked. If I sound a bit discombobulated, it’s because my whole body hurts right now. I can barely fucking move. Anyhow, the plan didn’t really go the way that we expected it to. Let me explain:

It all started during the middle of the night. I woke up in the dark to gunshots being fired off somewhere near us. That’s when I heard our lock being opened. As it turns out, the suspicion had reached a boiling point. They decided to do a thorough search on all rooms. I scrambled towards my shard stash, managing to slash my wrist just as a guard started pulling me away. He took the butt end of the rifle and slammed into my chest. However… I felt nothing. From the solitary, dim, flickering light bulb above, I could make out his face. One of pure shock. He shot at me a couple of times before I managed to disarm him. The other guard just ran away. I looked back to see Buck and Lauren waking up from the commotion. It was now or never.

We filled our pockets to the brink with the shards before heading out. As soon as we did, the lights came on. The war had officially started. I watched as guards got tossed around and executed by the now invulnerable prisoners. I started running along the corridors while getting shot at from all angles, with Buck and Lauren close behind. We scrambled up the stairs, getting closer and closer to the top. It was apparent that the more and more we made it up, the more and more guards were being sent down. That’s when I realized something... we could handle groups of three or four of them… but not an entire army. We’d get overwhelmed eventually. I picked up a rifle just in case. I think we made it up about twenty sets of stairs before we were met with the fucking cavalry. The corridor was congested with about six of those armored guards me and Lauren saw when we first landed on Ghost Hazard. “Fucking hell.” I remember Buck saying. “What are they supposed to be?” A bunch of them started trudging forwards, lugging along massive Gatling guns. I pricked myself with a shard again in anticipation.

We ducked into a nearby cell, just as the shells started flying. My hand touched something soft and squishy as I stumbled backwards into a wall. It was a prisoners spilled guts. I had to shudder at that. My heart dropped when I checked my pockets. I guess most of my shards had fallen out at one point or another. Luckily, Lauren's were still mostly there. We sat for a while, knowing that we wouldn’t be able to move forwards, given the constant stream of bullets. It lasted longer than I’d expected. Eventually, Buck had enough. “Fuck it” He said. “They can’t do this shit forever” He stabbed himself with a shard before walking out, hands up high. I heard him say “Come on, you cunts” before being drowned out by the gunfire. I watched as he was slowly pushed backwards by the force. After a while, the stream of ammunition stopped. We rushed out of the cell just as Buck was slowly getting up. His clothes had pretty much been shredded away by bullets at this point. It was a strange sight, for sure.

However, we realized that a new problem was right there in front of us. Although the guards couldn’t hurt us, we sure as hell weren’t going to make a dent on them. And they also outnumbered us. I looked around to see the other prisoners being tossed down by them, into the void. Their echoed screams signified potential doom for us. I looked back in front of me to see the guards approaching. If they got a hold on me, they’d have no problem just throwing me over the rails. And I don’t think the shards would’ve helped with whatever the hell was down there. I guess Buck and Lauren also realized this, because they’d already started running the other way. However, their paths were quickly blocked by a couple more armored guards that had jumped down from a higher level. To be honest with you… I thought we were goners right there and then. I didn’t see any way out of it. We backed into another cell right as the guards closed in on us. I was considering slitting my throat, just to avoid whatever the hell was down in that pit when I realized that I couldn’t. I’d cut myself with a shard mere moments ago. I just closed my eyes in preparation. I felt myself move forward a bit before being shoved to the ground. I opened them in confusion. One of the other guards had dragged the one that was pulling me and pushed him over the rails. I watched as he went after the others. It was a guard-on-guard fight. I didn’t move for a while. I was just too stunned.

Eventually, one of the guards stumbled back into the cell we were in. He looked up at us, panting heavily. It was Smoker. There was blood running down his face. “Shard ran out. This ain’t gonna work.” He uttered out. “We gotta get the hell out of here.” At that, I snapped out of my trance. All of us got up and started booking it down the corridor. I took a quick glance behind to see two armored guards sprinting right at us, gaining ground every second. We reached the stairs sometime later, scrambling up to the next floor. We were nearly there when Lauren was dragged back down by her foot. I watched in horror as she was lifted up, ready to be tossed at any second. That’s when I heard a voice coming from above us. “Get out of the way!” I looked up. Kunz was standing right there. He looked half dead, with bloody wounds covering a good portion of his exposed skin. Despite that, he was holding what looked like a large fucking rocket launcher. I did what he said, moving out of his shooting path. He fired it, stumbling back as he did. The rocket made direct contact with the guard, who flew backwards from the explosion, right over the rails. The other one was close behind, meeting a similar consequence. Lauren went airborne, barely managing to catch onto a rail as she made her descent. She pulled herself up before screaming out in exasperation “What the fuck!” She took some deep breaths before composing herself. We looked back up at Kunz. He just gave us a bloody smile. “You got any more of those crystals? I could sure use one right now.”

We continued making our way up the floors. At this point it was me, Buck, Lauren, Kunz and Smoker – who was still in the armor. As it turns out, he and a bunch of other prisoners had managed to overpower one of armored guards when they were still being sent down as singles. Unfortunately, Jackman died in the process . As for Kunz, one of his cell mates had told him about the shards and gave him some weeks before the revolution. However, he quickly lost all of them when he was tackled by a mound of guards. Eventually, he fought them off, grabbing the launcher in the process. I looked upwards. There were only about four floors to the surface. But... it was still pretty much war. We sure as hell weren’t in the clear. Luckily for us, the amount of armored guards had drastically thinned down. With Smoker paving a way for us, we kept running. At this point, we were running dangerously low on shards. But... it was the home stretch. We were almost out. However, I had this creeping feeling that wouldn’t go away. This thing that just kept nagging at me. Deep down, I knew what it was. I looked at Smoker. There was definitely a look of frightened anticipation on his face. That’s when it happened.

A BOOMING crash from the other side of the prison. It was The Warden. Everybody had stopped to take in the massacre that was occurring some distance away from us. He was far enough away that I had to squint. But I could make out what he looked like. He towered over the regular prisoners. I think 8’5 might have been an underestimate. His skin was pale white and he had long, slicked back silver hair. His trench coat was bloody, sweeping along the floor as he moved. That was another thing. He was fast. I observed as he sliced through multiple prisoners simultaneously. He was wielding an extremely large sword that nearly resembled a butcher knife. Whatever prisoners that were invulnerable to the knife, he simply tossed into the blackness below. I snapped back to reality when the ground started shaking. I heard a deep, guttural roar coming from the chasm below. I guess whatever the hell was down there had been disturbed by the amount of bodies coming its way. At this point, the Warden had completely finished off the prisoners around him. A stampede of people had started running our way. Running from the Warden. He looked in our direction. That’s when I joined the herd.

I made a beeline for the next stairway, pushing others out of the way as I did. As I started making my way up, I heard another loud CRASH and the subsequent sounds of slaughter that were too close for comfort. I took a quick glance back. The warden was maybe ten meters away from me. He was probably twenty times that distance just seconds ago. That’s when I got a good look at his eyes. You see… they weren’t pure black like everybody said they were. They were dark, for sure. But there was also something else. When I caught his glare, I didn’t feel like I was looking at one man. No. I felt the anguished eyes of thousands staring back. That’s the best way I can explain it. Before I could realize what was happening, he charged at me. I think he tried grabbing me, but it didn’t quite work out. Instead, I was flung onto the top floor. I was met with sharp, unexpected pain. My shard had ran out. Still reeling from the sting, I looked around and located the exit. It was surrounded by dead guards and had prisoners pouring out of it at a torrid rate. My skin prickled as I felt a warm breeze for the first time in years. I ran for it, faster than I had ever done so before, ignoring the intense aches in my legs every time I took a stride. As I was nearing freedom, I heard another crash some distance behind me. I didn’t need to turn around to know what it was. The Warden was on the top floor.

I stepped out onto what looked like a combination between an aircraft carrier and an industrial dock. I watched as planes and helicopters soared away. There were no more aircrafts on the ground, only ships docked at the edge. Amidst the crowd of people, I spotted Smoker and the rest of them. I called out to him. He turned to face me and gestured for me to follow him. We started running towards what looked like a smaller sized cargo ship. Eventually, we made it on. There were roughly twenty other people waiting for us, including Kunz, Buck and Lauren. One of them called out: “That’s enough. We gotta leave now!”

“No! We can’t yet!” Smoker barked back at him. He turned to me and asked if the Warden was still coming after us. I nodded. “Fuck!” He shouted. He followed up by telling us that since we were in a ship, we wouldn’t be able to evade him if he ever reached the surface. “He will destroy each and every last ship that tries leaving this place.” He said with a tone of desperation. I asked him what the hell we were supposed to do, then. He sighed before speaking. Apparently, there was an absurd amount of explosives attached underneath the carrier. This was essentially a fail-safe in case of major disaster, like what was happening right now. However, since the guards were pretty much dead, nobody had detonated them yet. “If we can trigger it… that would probably take care of the Warden.” Smoker said hesitantly. I asked him how we were supposed to do that. He pointed to a large bag of small objects resembling futuristic grenades. “That should do the trick. All it takes is one person.”

At that moment, the Warden burst out, onto the strip. All the prisoners that were still alive had pretty much escaped at this point, so he instantly turned his attention to us. “Fuck me.” Smoker said under his breath. “Well… I guess this is it.” He reached back for the bag of explosives, but they were gone.

“It’s all right, mate.”

We all turned to look at Buck. He had the bag slung over his shoulders and was holding a pistol. “I was never much back on Earth, you know?” He grinned at us. “Least I’ll go out with a bang.” He hopped off the ship. “You guys better get going, yeah? No need to thank me.” Those were the last words he said to us before walking casually towards the advancing Warden. None of us knew what to say. We just knew that we had to get out of there. And that’s what we did. We left without Buck. We watched as he held the bag of explosives up, almost tauntingly. The Warden stopped in his tracks. He started backing up. The ship also started picking up speed. By the time we were a good distance away, we saw the explosion. It was a nasty one. A wave of heat hit us as we moved across the water.

It’s been a few hours now and nobody’s said anything. Guess there isn’t a lot to say. Or... they could just be enjoying the peace. It’s quiet out here. Tranquil. I almost feel at ease. Almost. Where we’ll end up next… who knows. But I don't have high expectations. And Buck, I know you told me not to do this but… thanks.

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Credits

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