[Can’t Opt Out]

The world sputtered back into normalcy as the raid vanished. Everything just as it should be. No blood across the grass or broken mechs littering the roads. No dents or shattered glass or broken benches. Everything, sewn back into perfect existence by the system.

Everything, except Emilia. Physically, she was fine. She hadn’t even ruined her clothes, being forced to keep her distance from the mechs and all, although they were already pretty worn out to begin with. Her soul was another story. Her soul felt like it was a million pieces, scattered uselessly over the sidewalk. She needed to pick them up. She didn’t really have it in her.

[Em: hey want to go get smashed?]

[Pria: Always~ where to?]

The sound of people dragging their way through the streets slowly began to fill the area as more medical staff arrived, nurses, mostly, from the local clinic. Medical skills vibrated through the air, searching for anyone in need of attention. There wouldn’t be many serious injuries—the raid system was powerful enough these days to even catch people stupid enough to fall out of the sky.

Catch a falling hero, make them fight again another day.

“Fuck!” a woman nearby spit out, their limping form appearing out of an alleyway along with half dozen other people. “That shit is rough!”

“Dude, yeah,” one of the other men sighed, his eyes catching on Emilia. “At least we managed to take out a few invaders. Bet there were a ton who didn’t do shit.”

The eyes of the girl hanging off his arm followed his gaze, her fancy clothes torn up from whatever had happened to her inside the raid. “Totally~” she agreed, eyes sliding over Emilia in a way she was far too familiar with, even if she received it less and less these days. “These raids should, like, totally give us extra credit for having people like that holding us back,” she said, cruel amusement filling her voice. She reminded Emilia of the girls she had gone to compulsory school with, before she’d become friends with kids that no one fucked around with.

“Shut up,” a younger man hissed, his voice not quite quiet enough that Emilia couldn’t hear it. “She might hear you.”

The first man sneered at his friend. “What do you care if she hears you? You got a thing for sub-300 sluts?”

“You don’t know she’d sub-300. Physical, irregular deviations don’t always affect D-Levels.” His eyes caught Emilia’s, his face simultaneously managing to go ghostly white and burn hot with embarrassment. “Sorry…” he muttered, looking away and trying to hurry his friends along, shushing their laughter and teasing as they went.

Sorry didn’t make up for keeping company with purists. If anything, it made it worse. Sorry didn’t mean shit if your actions didn’t reflect your beliefs.

Emilia watched the group disappear, medical personnel sliding up to them and offering them a few boosters. No healing—for all they appeared injured, their clothes ripped and torn, they were overall fine, just a little worn out. They clearly didn’t even need the booster, although that didn’t stop them from taking everything they could off the woman, their entire vibe one of threat and dominance.

The nurse shot her an apologetic look when their eyes met, a vague message about being out of supplies flashing across her Censor, before the woman disappeared the way she came. Just like always, raid medical support was questionable at best.

[Pria: I don’t wanna wait in a line tonight.]

[Em: i think mazi’s bouncing at the grint this week]

[Pria: Ooh, yeah~]

[Pria: Meet you at the station?]

Emilia fiddled with her ratty clothes, hastily pulled on as she’d headed to that morning’s lecture. It had been a shit lecture, traumatic and filled with misinformation that Emilia had itched to correct her douche face teacher on. She couldn’t, though, not without revealing more than she wanted about who she was—about the things she had seen and done during the war.

So, she’d sat there, listening to him drone on and on about things he apparently knew nothing about. All she’d wanted was a snack, something sweet to help her miserable mood. Instead, all she’d gotten was a raid filled with mechs. A normal raid she could have dealt with, as much as she still hated them. The mech part had just added a bonus to the general shittiness of the day.

[Em: can you bring me something pretty?]

A laugh echoed through her connection to her roommate.

[Pria: Sure thing, love~]

✮ ✮ ✮

The world melted and Emilia’s hand slid through it, wet and sticky and—

Whoops. That wasn’t the drugs. That was the waterfall that stretched along the walk to her dorm.

Emilia giggled, her head tipping back into the water, glimmering drops of the world sliding across her skin, seeping into her soul and cooling the burn aching through her. The world melted and swirled, the stars above her mixing together to create constellations that belonged to another world. Laughter of other students returning for the night swung through the air, pink and purple words vibrating against one another, and then the Strats were towering high above her. She hadn’t been to the Strats in years, wouldn’t be there anytime soon if she had anything to say about it.

She glared at them, a wash of wonderful and terrifying and nauseating memories surging through her. She glared harder, as though her will alone would be strong enough to counter the song of drugs crawling its way through her blood and forcing such unpleasant things to appear before her. Go away. It needed to go away.

[Warning: Balance Levels—]

Emilia mentally swiped the notification away. Her Censor could fuck off, thanks. She needed to focus.

One. Two. Three. Focus. Breathe. Years of training—of death and blood and smiles exploded into the aethernet—flashed through her. Her willbrand, currently in its regular necklace form—a tube of purple chemicals hung from a long gold chain—vibrated against her sternum. It wouldn’t be any good against a hallucination, but its power was comforting. Its power was courage given physical form. The Strats disappeared, and the colours sang, and Emilia pushed her thoughts away. She hadn’t gotten this high to think about the past or battle with mountains of glass that were out of time and place.

The vroom of someone sliding to a stop echoed nearby. She knew even without looking who it’d be. She could hear them, the familiar patter of their heart and stretch of their lungs as they slid closer, closer. She shouldn’t be able to hear them. Slides were silent, and the nearest exit wasn’t that close. Must be the drugs—they’d had some kind of hearing enhancer mixed into them. Pria had said she wanted to hear the music better, feel it echo straight through her soul. Emilia hadn’t, but she wasn’t the one buying. Where was Pria, anyways?

[Location: {Pria}] flashed across her eyes, distant and blurry. Back at the club, back in the city. How had she gotten back to the school?

[Receipt: {Bubble+}]

Blurry lines of psychedelic lights flashing through a rainy window filled her mind at the reminder. It wasn’t raining. Fuck. She’d paid extra for a rainy vibe? Stupid. She’d have to work extra to pay that off.

[Current Account Balan—]

Emilia aggressively willed her money problems away. No. Just no. Her lack of funds was a tomorrow problem.

Her hand brushed leaves, they grew under her hand, stretching up and over the ceiling of—where was she? Not the walk back home anymore.

Emilia smiled and twirled, thoughts and worries and her stupid Censor—currently trying to ruin her adventure by telling her her {Current Location}—spiriting off into the universe. The universe. Wide and open and spinning and black, and Pria had looked so beautiful dressed up in it earlier. That one girl—the one with the too dark tan, but killer eyes and purple hair—had been looking at Pria like she wanted to lick the stars off her skin. Star eater. Would her roommate bring the star eater back to their dorm to fuck? Emilia hoped they’d be quiet. Hearing them fuck while she could hear the stars sparkling would bite.

“Em.”

Emilia fell backwards, trusting Elijah to be there—trusting him to catch her. She smiled up at him, her silver bangs obscuring her view of his face. “Sup, pretty boy?” she asked, drugs pulling the old, condescending nickname out of her. She didn’t call her boyfriend that anymore, not unless she was mad, not unless she was high as fuck. Her smile widened as he frowned down at her. He’d been doing that more recently, she thought, the frowning. She didn’t know why. He didn’t say anything about it. She wasn’t going to bring it up. She’d already programmed her Censor to stop encouraging her to.

“You’re in the fitness centre.” His frown deepened and her smile widened.

“It’s nice here,” she sighed, letting him pull her upright and giggling as the world spun. She gazed around. The greenery had stopped growing. Sad.

Elijah pulled her by the arm, away from the plants that had stopped growing under his influence. Too sober. The plants knew. “It is. Shall we get you to bed?”

“You gonna join me?” Emilia asked, her ass bouncing on her bed a moment—or maybe it had been a thousand moments?—later. She hadn’t made it that morning. She’d woken up late and meant to make it when she came back from class. She hadn’t come back. Class had sucked, then she’d gotten stuck in that raid—which had also sucked—then there had been all the drugs. The drugs, at least, had been nice.

“No,” Elijah said, as he should. Sleeping with someone as high as she was would not be a good look, even if they had been dating for nearly a year now. A year and now he was done with her and didn’t know how to say so. “I’m not done with you,” her boyfriend added.

Whoops, hadn’t meant to say that out loud. Hopefully she wouldn’t remember this in the morning.

[Memo to Self: Do not remind Emilia of this conversation]

Elijah shot her a look that seemed to say, “You’re saying plenty of things out loud that you probably don’t mean to.” Instead, he asked her if something had happened. No, she said, letting him manhandle her into bed and cover her up with fluffy clouds. Clouds and nebulae were calling, softly whispering in her ears. Her Censor was silent. She’d long since programmed it to stop telling her to be more honest. Honesty is overrated, little Censor! Didn’t you know!?

“Class,” she added, offering a little piece of honesty as she snuggled into the clouds. They were so soft, one of the few things she’d bought with her savings when she left home, before locking that money away—one of the few things that would give her away, if anyone bothered to think about it, how she could have afforded something this bougie. No one ever thought about it. Well, maybe Sil did. Sil was good at not asking, though. Sil had his own secrets he hoped no one ever thought about. Past Emilia would have thought about those secrets—would have let herself be consumed by curiosity until she figured them out. Current Emilia barely spared them a moment’s thought. “Bad lecture.”

[Warning: Balance Levels—]

Great. Just thinking about that stupid lecture was enough to set off her Censor.

“Been more of those recently,” Elijah noted. He was further away now. Was he further away now? Had he moved, or had she? Dreams sent from the aethernet were tugging her away. Dreams were nice. Dreams while high were even better. The drugs kept the nightmares at bay, and tonight was a night for nightmares even her Censor couldn’t stop. Elijah wouldn’t hold it against her if she needed a little escape.

Elijah didn’t know, though. Not about the nightmares she ran from, hiding in drugs and sex and adrenaline and so many knots she couldn’t even count them anymore. Not about the reasons why they chased her, or why she dragged her D-Levels as high as she could stand. Not about her, either.

No one knew about her. Not here, anyways.

“Sleep,” Elijah said, his hand brushing over her forehead. “I’ll see you in the morning, Em.”

A kiss brushed her forehead too, she thought, a strand of light and love lingering around her as the dreams pulled her down, down, down, pressing back against the darkness lingering at the edges of her happy, dreamy world.

Or, maybe that was drugs, keeping her safe.

Yeah, it was probably the drugs.