Some Thing Called Myself (Complete)

LX: Something Familiar (Part One)

Ch. 60: Something Familiar (Part One)

The key turned in the lock. As soon as the door opened, Alessa tilted her head back and screeched.

Mara slapped her hands on her ears as all the others in the dungeons, the pain shaking her bones with the strength of a thunderclap. Her breathing quickened, the symbiote inside her reacting to the violence of the sound. She growled and raised her head, fingers curling into claws, but her head felt empty.

Through the blur in her eyes, Mara watched as Alessa shoved the stunned Sents aside and made her way to Jano. Mara breathed in and out. Kiki and Falchi groaned in their cell, and so did all the others. She needed to use this opportunity. She needed to get her sister to safety and—

No.

No, Kiki wasn't...Mara shook her head, pushing the thought away.

"Fuck this," she mumbled. She looked around and stumbled to the front of the cell. The set of keys was still dangling from the neighboring iron door, so it was easy enough to stretch a hand through the bars and snatch it.

Mara fumbled with the keys for a few seconds until she finally unlocked the heavy heap of metal. With unsteady hands, she held onto the bars. The effect of Alessa's attack wouldn't last for long, so she needed to be quick.

"Falchi," Mara called. She stopped in front of their cell and tried one key. Two. "Get up. We need to leave!" Mara whispered, voice quaking.

The Sents stumbled toward Alessa, pulling their guns, but she needed less than a second to toss them away again. Alessa moved with incredible speed, downing the Sentinels one by one.

"Get them!" Jano shouted. "Don't let them escape!"

There was a loud clack of the door unlocking, and even before she released the key, webbed, wet fingers were already tugging at her arm, asking for them. Mara handed the set to the fish-like beyond-flesher in the other cell and yanked Falchi and Kiki's cell open.

There were tears in her eyes as she reached for Kiki's outstretched hands, her face turned to her general direction as if she already expected Mara to show up for her. Mara scooped Kiki into her arms, gripped Falchi's hand, and turned to leave.

"Oh, no. Oh no, you won't," Jano growled, his voice rising above the fight. "Sentinels, to the left!"

They obeyed. Mostly.

A hand rested on Mara's shoulder and shoved her hard against the iron bars at the same time that a crackle filled the place like the soft, brittle sound just before a thunderclap. Something whistled past Mara, leaving a cold wind in its wake, and after half a moment, it bashed the cement wall on the far side of the dungeon. The wall burst, and a shower of debris and dust gathered around it. As Mara turned around to look at the damage, she found a fine red line slowly running across Alessa's arm, splitting it in two.

Dark blood splattered as it fell, cut as if an invisible guillotine had bitten it off. If Alessa hadn't pushed Mara out of the way, she and Kiki wouldn't be alive right now.

A low whimper escaped Mara's lips, and she hugged Kiki tighter—her scream way too weak to escape. In the corner of Mara's eyes, the same lines appeared on the fish person who had just left their cell and also on a Sent who was about to attack them.

Flesh and beyond-flesh dropped to the floor together.

Split in two. Dead.

Mara pulled Falchi close, holding them so they wouldn't look at the carnage. A horrified scream came from the opened cell. Another fish person fell to her knees, tears in her eyes, reaching for the one on the floor. Outside the cell, the human closest to the cleaved Sent did the same, their painful wails rising over the sounds of the fight.