It was cold down here, Quinn would feel that first. The further in she went, the less ventilation there was, the less thought there’d been put to the idea that anyone would want to stay down here for any longer than they absolutely had to. Indeed, the idea of a “[i]holding cell[/i]” on an installation like Aerie Station was almost absurd; without curated the staff was, how fine-toothed the door to entry to a program like the RISC could be, why would detaining anyone be a worry? 

She had the right of it—this place had been turned to storage. The empty cells were stuffed with boxes and tarped outdated equipment that would stay here until someone remembered to ship it down for scrapping one day. [i]Stuff[/i] didn’t complain when the air was bitter and cold, when it seemed like the only thing between you and the frigid void was a metal box and your imagination. 

The light in the cell flickered as Quinn approached, as though her presence had thrown off some tenuous balance in its wiring. It returned, spitefully dimmer than before. It cast the bars into sharp shadows around her, as though she herself were imprisoned as well. 

The breathing she’d followed fell quiet, and in its place was an utterly vacuous silence. When she had finally sat down, and raised her eye, it was not a pleasant sight waiting for her. 

The first word would have been: “[i]cramped[/i].” It was a closet, ungloried for how lifeless it was. Cold, gray metal on three walls, a floor, and a ceiling broken only by a single—tempestuous—light. The bars before her were close-set and black like a Modir’s bones. Inside there was only a steel slab welded to the wall, upon which was a blanket no thicker than Quinn’s pinky, and a pillow that looked like it had been dehydrated for shipping, and never quite recovered. A toilet was tucked away in the only dark corner, a dull sink beside it. 

A shape sat beside the slab, head uncomfortably leaned against its edge. It wore the thin smock of a medical gown over the short-sleeved shirt and papery pants that were the color of seafoam. One sleeve hung empty, and one pant leg was tied off just below the knee. The other was tied up much higher, almost halfway up the thigh. An avalanche of white hair draped it like a sheet, matted and unwashed and so dirty it was more gray-brown than white, now. 

Quinn would recall dun silver eyes on a ghost-scarred face. They seemed somehow duller now for how sunken they were, and unabashedly red. The ghostly scars had expanded on the left side, almost like an entirely different layer of skin, just as dirty as her hair and broken only by now-dried tear streaks. 

It took several moments to even tell if the girl had heard her. Her head turned slow, creaking—shivering. Her knee was pulled in close to the chest, but she had to let go to lean off the wall. It looked like she could hardly sit upright on her own. 

Dry, crack lips parted, took in a chilled breath. When she spoke, her voice was hoarse, sick. It sounded like she hadn’t spoken in days. 

“[color=ec008c]What the fuck do [i]you[/i] want?[/color]”