“That fucking... can’t even rest for a few hours... one day I’ll... last thing I do... bury her head three miles beneath the ground...”

Samanta Zemzaris looked on as her captor muttered angrily to himself, so absorbed in the resolution of a battle in some other country that he’d forgotten the reason that he and she were even together. He’d called her in for a lesson—the first in several days—but not even a quarter of the way through, his strange boxy skitter that always followed him around these days had started to scream. It was like she’d disappeared at that moment.

On the one hand, watching Blake have a mental breakdown right in front of her was always enjoyable. On the other, she’d really hoped to get one last lesson in before tonight. She wanted to get as much knowledge as possible while she still could, but that didn’t seem possible anymore.

“Why don’t you marry her?” she grumbled.

Blake froze for a moment before twisting back to stare at her. “What was that?” he asked, an unhinged glint in his eye.

“She’s all you ever talk about anymore,” Sam shot back, refusing to back down. “Since you care about her so much, why don’t you just marry her and get it over with?”

“What are you, a middle schooler all of a sudden?” Blake snarled at her. “Get the fuck out of here.”

“What about-”

“I said go! I have more important shit than you to deal with right now.” He impatiently shooed her away and turned back to the screens.

Samanta knew that she wouldn’t be getting anything more out of him today, so she did what he said and left, making her way back to her nearby room. With a beep of protest, Alpha unfolded from his curled position and hurried after her.

Once she’d returned to her room, Sam shut the door behind them and sat down on her bed. Leaning down, she gently stroked Alpha’s smooth back. The machine rubbed up against her leg while letting out a series of beeps, boops, and clicks. Ever since Blake had upgraded him with the ability to make simple sounds, the robot had become quite vocal in its affection. Samanta sighed. Even though he was nothing more than moving metal, and even though he was a creation of the asshole in the other room, she’d come to really appreciate Alpha’s companionship. He would be the one thing she missed about this place.

Lying back onto the soft mattress, Samanta reached into her pillow and pulled out a piece of parchment. Several days ago, when Blake had been unveiling his “train system” or whatever, there’d been an incident. Two children not much younger than herself, too busy chasing each other to realize where they were, had crashed into her in front of a shocked and terrified crowd. Blake had nearly killed the children but had instead let them go since they were just children being children. He hadn’t caught the moment when the first one had run into her, nor when a note had been sneakily deposited in her pocket.

“We have watched you. We see how you bristle under his yoke. We know the pain of your suffering. It shows us that you are one of us. You are an important piece in the battle to return Otharia to its former glory. Now the time to strike is upon us. On the fifth night from today, wait on the north wall. When you see the light of the glowfly, jump and we will catch you. Join us, and get your vengeance! —The Resistance”

The fifth night... that was this night. Every time she read those words, she had trouble believing that it was real. She’d hoped and wished for somebody to save her from this man for so long, but never dared to believe that it would ever come. But here it was, proof that somebody was on her side. Tears formed in her eyes, but she blinked them away. It wouldn’t do to get the note wet.

With her lesson prematurely ended, there wasn’t much she could do until the sun went down, so she pulled out a small ball and threw it against the nearby wall. Alpha ran after it, trying his best to catch it as it caromed around the sparsely furnished room. Watching the tiny robot, smaller front to back than her two hands put one after the other, try to corral a ball half its size with nothing but its four legs was always amusing. For how much practice the thing had, it still wasn’t very good at it.

*     *     *

Samanta stood atop the north wall, leaning against the railing that kept anybody from falling off. She wasn’t really sure why there was a railing up here, or even why there was a walkway on top of the wall at all. It wasn’t like there were any guards here. There were a few robots that roamed the area, but they didn’t need a walkway to do that. Well, she wasn’t going to complain about it now, not since it meant she could escape this place more easily.

Back in the beginning, there was no way that she would be able to be up here, all alone in the night. Blake had always been very strict about bedtimes and that sort of thing. At least, he had been until this business with the war. Nowadays, he was seemingly far too distracted to care. He would come to regret that, she told herself with a smile. She knew more than anybody else just how vulnerable he was now.

Down below, in an alleyway on the other side of the street that circled the fortress, she spotted a soft light. It pulsed quickly twice and then paused for a moment before lighting up again with a longer pulse. A few moments later, it came again: short pulse, short pulse, pause, long pulse. The pattern of the glowfly, a creature that everybody in Otharia grew up chasing about in the summer evenings. It was time.

Samanta looked down off the wall and tightened her grip on the railing. It was a long way down. Did she really have the courage to just jump off? The note said that they would “catch” her, but how? She didn’t see anything down there other than cold, hard ground.

Her desire for freedom warred with her instincts for self-preservation. On the one hand, there was no guarantee that anybody would “catch” her at all. It was possible that she would just fall and die. On the other hand, she didn’t really want to live like this anyway, did she? A prisoner to an Elseling, subject to his every whim for the rest of her life?

As if to remind Samanta of her daily life, a soft beep sounded by her feet and she looked down to find Alpha rubbing himself against her ankle. She bent over and picked him up and gave him a hug. Holding him out in front of her, she looked at him from all sides. It was startling how lifelike he was. The way he moved, the way he acted, it was all an excellent imitation of an animal... but it was still fake. No matter how much he tried, Alpha would always just be an imitation of the real thing. Just like her life, were she to stay here.

“Thank you,” she said to the little robot. Then, she turned and threw the tiny skitter back towards the fortress as hard as she could. A plaintive beep faded off as Alpha fell out of her view, causing her to feel a twinge of guilt as she turned back towards the railing. She shoved that feeling away from her thoughts and squeezed through the railing bars. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes and jumped.

The air roared in her ears as she plummeted towards the earth. Quickly the wind rushing through her hair and buffeting her face and body increased in intensity. She opened her eyes again to find that a strong updraft was pushing against her fall, slowing her down. She was still falling, however, and the ground still approached with startling speed.

Sam let out an “oof” as she smacked into the street belly first. The impact knocked the wind out of her, and she laid there for a moment as she tried to regain her composure. It seemed she’d be getting a lot of bruises from that sad excuse for a landing, but luckily that was the extent of it. No broken bones, as far as she could tell.

Pushing herself to her feet, Samanta hustled across the street, ignoring the startled looks from the few people still awake and walking in the area at this time of night. Sprinting as best she could into the alley, she ran towards where the light had been, eager to meet the people who’d finally come to save her.

Around the corner, she spotted several men and women huddling just out of sight of the fortress. One of them waved her hurriedly towards them. There they were! Her saviors! She rushed forwards, fighting back emotions as she ran. It was strange, getting so worked up over strangers she’d never met before, but just the thought of others on her side was enough right now to bring tears to her eyes again.

Then somebody threw a sack over her head.

*     *     *

“Take it off.”

Samanta blinked as the world around her shifted from darkness to... less darkness. She looked around fearfully, wondering where she was. Judging by her surroundings, she was in a warehouse of some sort. Large crates and barrels were stacked all about, lit by several torches burning along the walls. The roof above was rather high, perhaps two stories or more. She could see three hatches of some sort in the middle of the ceiling, two of which were open to the night sky. Those things didn’t matter, however. What mattered were the people surrounding her.

More than a dozen of her fellow Otharians stood in the dark warehouse, their faces grim. Intimidated by the many adults twice her size, Samanta wilted slightly under their harsh stares. Something in their eyes told her that these people were dangerous and that they were not her friends, but before she could turn and run, two strong adult hands grabbed her arms and held them behind her back, keeping her from moving.

A woman stepped forward. She looked to be in her forties, with long white hair and a scar running across the side of her head. The woman eyed Samanta with contempt.

“Well, what do you know, the Elseling’s Pet right here in the flesh,” she sneered.

“L-let me go!” Sam squealed as she struggled futilely against the hands grasping her arms.

The woman laughed. “After all the effort we went through the get a hold of you? Of course not.”

“Why are you- why are you doing this? You said that you needed me! That I was important to fight him!”

“And you are, both as bait and as a hostage,” came the reply. Samanta paled as the woman laughed again, this time with the others all joining her. “You didn’t really think you would get to join us, did you? You, the greatest traitor our country has ever known?”

“B-but I’m not a-”

Samanta’s protest was cut off as the woman backhanded her across the face with violent force. She cried out in surprise and pain, as she reeled from the blow. The tears she’d been holding back all day resurfaced, and this time she couldn’t stop them.

“Silence!” the woman snarled. “You were with the Elseling from the beginning! We saw you with him when he attacked this city! You were there when he declared his rule through the Manys! You were there when he slaughtered our brothers and sisters in the army! You were there through it all! Don’t lie to us, you treacherous worm!”

“I’m sorry!” Samanta wailed as tears streamed down her cheeks. “I didn’t want to but he made me! He forced me to help him! I-”

This time, the woman silenced Samanta by driving a foot into her abdomen. Sam gasped out in pain and her legs lost their strength. Only the strong hands holding her kept her from dropping to the ground in agony.

“I said silence! You dare to pretend that you aren’t on his side? You have had entire seasons to kill the Elseling, and yet he still lives. And what about that abomination he calls a ‘train’? If you oppose him, then why does it speak with your voice? You have no right to call yourself an Otharian!”

Samanta quivered as each sentence struck her harder than the physical blows. She wanted to argue, she wanted to fight back, but she couldn’t find the words. Maybe they were right. Her deepest fears, the ones that had tormented her for days on end at the beginning, the ones that caused her endless nightmares, the ones she’d finally thought herself free from... maybe they’d been right all along. Maybe she’d been right all along and she really was a traitor to her people. Maybe it really was all her fault.

“Let’s just kill her now and get it over with,” somebody said.

“Hmmmm, perhaps you’re right,” the woman replied. “We just need the Elseling to know we have her. He won’t know that she’s dead until it’s too late for him anyway.”

“N-no! Please!” Samanta begged. “Please, I- help! HELP! SOMEBODY HELP ME!”

“It’s no use,” the woman sneered. “Nobody knows you’re here but us. No one will help you.”

Samanta writhed about, struggling against the grip holding her fast, but she was only a child. Her weak strength could do nothing to free her. She watched in horror as the woman drew out a blade, the metal gleaming in the red torchlight. Her heart pounded in her ears and she trembled as she watched the blade grow closer.

Tack tack tack.

The woman froze as the sound of three small, hard objects bouncing on the ground nearby echoed through the warehouse. “What was that? Somebody’s here!” she hissed.

“Commander! There’s something here!” one of the others called out as he bent over and picked something up. He held it up and inspected it in confusion. The object was small and cylindrical, with a small flame coming from the top. “It’s a... candle?”

Without warning the “candle” erupted, pouring dark smoke into the man’s face and the area around him. He gagged and dropped the object, letting it fill the air with thick clouds of smoke. Almost simultaneously, two more plumes of acrid smoke spewed forth amongst the group. Quickly hacks and coughs filled the warehouse. Sam was no exception; she gagged and sputtered as the most noxious smell she’d ever experienced filled her nose and mouth.

Her own body warred with her mind. She wanted to get away, to seize this opportunity and escape, but her body was too busy threatening to vomit every meal she’d ever eaten out onto the clay floor. Deep hacking coughs came from above and behind her and the grasp on her weakened. Still coughing herself, she writhed and twisted even harder than before, but her small body still couldn’t find the strength to break free.

That changed suddenly as a shadow fell from above. Samanta heard the sound of a heavy impact coming from behind her, and with a loud “URK!” the man holding her collapsed to the ground, knocking her over as he fell partially on top of her. Still gagging and choking, she pushed herself up onto her hands and knees, struggling to free her one foot that remained trapped beneath the man’s body.

The hem of a cloak entered her view, and her eyes followed the garment upward to the hood. She couldn’t see much, between the haze and the tears in her eyes and the dim lighting made even weaker by the smoke, but what she could see was enough to make her blood run cold.

Two inhuman eyes gleamed back at her through the darkness, their irises seeming to glow with an eerie yellow luminescence. Unlike the proper round pupils of a person, these eyes had the slits of a predator. An instinctual shiver ran down Samanta’s spine when she saw those pupils contract as they focused directly onto her. She immediately knew that she had locked eyes with something wholly and manifestly evil, but for some reason, she couldn’t look away.

The... thing... whatever it was, drew nearer, for some reason completely unaffected by the toxic smoke that filled the warehouse. Leaning closer, it stared directly into her soul, its piercing gaze holding her in place against her will, and it said, “Pari saved person! Person be Pari’s friend?”

Samanta blinked and coughed. “H-huh?” she sputtered, unable to process the words or the high-pitched, childish voice that delivered them. And that voice... it had sounded almost... cute?

“Yaaaayyyy! Pari friend, Pari friend!” the mysterious imp sang as it hopped excitedly up and down.

Unsteadily, Sam pushed herself to her feet, shocked to find that the terrifying cloaked being was actually shorter than her by about the width of her hand. The figure reached out and a tiny hand grabbed her own. “Come with Pari!” it exclaimed as it pulled her along behind it. Still adrift in this sea of confusion, Samanta simply followed along as best she could.

“Don’t let her escape!” the woman hollered from somewhere behind them.

A man came barreling through the smoke, causing the figure leading her to jump out of the way with a ‘nya!?’. He grabbed Samanta around the waist with a bear hug and lifted her off the ground. “I got her!” he called.

Sam wasn’t about to let her one chance at freedom slip away, however. Extending her hands, she Observed the pressure building up in her right hand while removing it the best she could from her left and placed her palms less than a finger’s width away from the sides of the man’s skull. The technique felt almost natural at this point; she’d practiced it a thousand times since Blake showed her what to do, all in the hopes of using it on him one day. Samanta released her hold one the pressure and a “CRACK!” rang out through the warehouse as a small bolt of lightning passed between her palms.

The man’s body slumped to the ground, releasing her. In a flash, the cloaked figure re-grabbed Samanta’s hand and pulled her towards the closest exit. Pushing open the door, they paid no heed to the continued shouts coming from behind them and ran out into the open air. Samanta gasped and wheezed as the cleaner air worked its way into her lungs, slowly driving out the noxious fumes.

Together the pair ran as fast as they could down the alley, taking several turns. Soon enough, the figure began to giggle dementedly. “Friend is so cool! Friend was like ‘zap’! Heeheeheeheeheeheehee!” the thing stated, seemingly to nobody in particular.

As they came up to a branch in the alley, both of them froze in surprise as a large skitter passed by overhead, jumping over the alley from rooftop to rooftop. Then, down at the end of the branch to the right, Samanta saw another three skitter pass by, also moving at high speed. She paled as she put the pieces together. Blake’s skitters never moved that fast when patrolling. They only did so when on a mission. Given that they were headed towards the warehouse where they’d just been, it wasn’t hard to realize what the mission was. Blake was hunting for her.

Freeing herself from the small figure’s grasp, Samanta sprinted down the left branch, deeper and deeper into the alleys. She would not go back. Never in a million years!

“Friend?! Friend, wait!” the creature behind her called, but she ignored its cries. The only thing on Samanta’s mind was escape, at any cost. Checking behind her, she noted with alarm that it was now chasing her. Samanta ran faster.

“Pari! Pari, where are you?!” a woman’s voice called out from the right alley.

The figure let out a surprised “ah!” and her pursuit faltered.

“Pari, you get out here this instant!” the woman shouted, palpable anger in her tone. The figure halted completely, seeming to droop, before turning about and heading towards the woman’s voice.

Samanta gave silent thanks to the voice as she continued her flight. Finally! Finally, she could be free! Now all that was left was to... to what?

Samanta’s feet came to a halt as she pondered the sudden question. She’d escaped to join the Resistance and help bring down the terrible reign of her former captor, but she’d never expected to find that they hated her as much as they did Blake. What else could she do? Quickly she went through whatever options she could think of, crossing them off her mental list.

Staying in the city was out. The people here knew what she looked like the most out of anywhere in the country. Even if they didn’t recognize her face, they’d definitely recognize the large collar that she still wore. Plus, this was where Blake had the most robots. There would only be so long she’d be able to hide before being found.

That meant getting out of the city and trying her luck somewhere in the country. Maybe there people might not know as well who she was. But how would she get out of the city without being caught? Surely Blake would station extra robots at the gates in search of her. And even if she did make it out, would the people out in the country trust a stranger wearing a collar like the one around her neck?

The collar. The last vestige of Blake’s control over her. As long as it remained around her throat, she would never truly be free. Before anything else, she needed to be rid of it. That was the only realistic first step.

Slowly, Samanta’s steps resumed, her footfalls now slow and silent. With a proper goal in mind, she felt confidence once more. Carefully, she continued down the alley and began her search for a blacksmith from which to steal.