I'm so sorry for this huuuuuuuge delay. I've been so busy that I've only had time to write and draw in lessons! And, since dragging the pc along to history isn't really an option, it's been impossible to get more than about a paragraph written at a time! Plus, I udes to post using HTML but now I've got Microsoft Word instead of Microsoft Works 4.0, and I've lost my faithful little HTML option! Noooo!

Hele Thanks very much. And I'm sorry for not checking your poetry recently, I'll be sure to do that when I have a spare moment. And as for the spelling thing, I'm pretty sure those riveting 4-page books about Biff, Flipper and Dildo (or whatever they were called) from which I was taught to read and write had correct spelling, but to this day I'm still making mistakes!

Foxtails Yup, the story is moving forward, which is kind of a problem because this is where writing it gets reeeeaaaally tricky. (.)

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this birth was bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, With an alien people clutching their gods, I should be glad of another death.

-Eliot

Chapter 4

On and on she climbed, for what seemed like decades, up that narrow tube. Her hands shakily grasped the bars, the rusted metal digging into her palms, as she shook the dust and rubble from her shoulders. Finally, she reached the end, a metal trap door, looming above her. The numerous locks hung unsecured from their places - that wasn't like Li. Usually she was meticulous almost to the point of obsession about keeping the annex secure. That last emergence into their world, the super-human world, must have affected Li deeply. . . very deeply.
Aara's stomach felt twisted inside her. Every muscle was tense and she could feel her cheeks grow hot, her heart was beating with such force, it felt as if her entire body was throbbing with it.
She hauled the door open and squinted upward. A grate, and above that. . . darkness. Aara could not control the shaking throughout her body as she used her frail arms to haul herself out of the hole and on to the damp stone ground above.
The first thing that struck Aara was the smell, or lack thereof. Li had used vinegar to keep their fruit and vegetables sin the annex. Coupled with the constant heat if two bodies, with only a cup-hole vent through which it could escape, was almost suffocating. Now she was suffocated by the air, she had grown so used to breathing heavily to drag out any oxygen from that tiny room, that now, as she was surrounded by it, her lungs felt limp and disused, yet at the same time, it was relaxing and pleasant. As she sucked in the cold, clean air, her body felt invigorated.
Aara surveyed her surroundings. She was in an underground train station. She recognised it immediately from Li's description. Ahead of her, the tracks disappeared into a familiar darkness, and behind, the same. To her right was a whitewashed wall. Clean and tainted only by a towering poster with an image of a crowd of beautiful figures holding their fists together above their heads where the caption leapt from the wall in bold letters 'UNITED WE STAND.' To her left was a stairway. . . to Heaven. . . or Hell, she knew not which.

* * *

Aara was hit by a sudden nausea as skyscrapers loomed above her and all around lights and sounds crashed and flickered in an intense ballet of life. She had to contain her wonder and disgust. Li had told her about the world, about the cruelty and the hatred, the lights and the buildings, the fields and the sky, the animals and the jobs. She had learnt everything there was to know about this place, without ever having seen it with her own eyes. All her life, the world had been nothing but the four solid walls that she knew by heart. Now it had been ripped open and all around her was this vast expanse of Metropolis. Just as she had once been pushed screaming from her mother, now she was thrown into this pit of light and sound and life. It was the first time she had seen the sky. The stars, tiny pricks of light scattered across the dusty black of an endless night. And above it all, the full, round, glimmering moon, like a splash of liquid pearl in the sky, the clock of the world.
Aara was not an idiot, she was careful to stay in the shadows. Though the Intigres had a strict curfew (ten o'clock imperial time [the Intigres used metric] to ensure exactly eight hours sleep, earlier for children), there were exceptions - some jobs required workers to do night shifts. Aara's greatest fear was to be caught by the Intigres. At night she could hear the drilling, on and on. And she could feel their silken hands grip her neck, and the world go dark as she awoke to find herself struggling with the bed sheets.
Aara realised that she felt very alone. Where did she go from here? How could she ever find her way back? She did not know. But she did know that she must carry on. For the survivors. For Li. But most importantly, for herself.
She took a step forward, and another, and another, until she was walking at a regular pace, towards what? It did not matter, as long as she was moving, at least then she had some sense of purpose.
The air, although think with pollution, to Aara, was sharp and cold; she plunged her hands into the pockets of the jacket. Her fingers settled on a small, irregular object. She pulled it out to scrutinise it more closely. Aara could see what it was: a tiny golden ornament in the shape of a swallow.