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Water pooled on the floor of Umbri’s apartment, trickling down from something wet and shambling dragging itself in. Mindlessly, swinging at the air and anything to lean on, pushing forward against the groan of a bone that could no longer support this perseverance. She threw herself, from wall, to cabinet, to a door frame. A fluorescent light flickered on automatically, blaring down on a bathroom, about the size of an elevator shaft, with tall white walls stretching up to an unusually tall ceiling. A few tropical fish darted around in a small aquarium. It hummed. The lights buzzed. Umbri threw herself at the toilet.

She retched and coughed, choking on the fluids rushing out of her throat. Her hunched figure warped in the glassy eyes of the fish. Chunks of the bugs she’d eaten earlier splattered and swirled around the bowl. Then the purge was complete. She staggered back up, the glaze on her eyes lifting, and looked around, confused - [i]for just a moment[/i] - by how she had gotten here.

[i]You need to stay here. Stay and hide,[/i] the cyberpsycho had said. She didn’t listen. Of course she didn’t listen. He didn’t know what she had to run from. The kind of danger she was really in had nothing to do with the beast he fought now. She had to pack her bags and be ready to run again the moment he came back with the…

Umbri gingerly brought a hand up, watching herself in the mirror. A vein of neon green had coiled around her neck and stolen her attention. She winced as her fingers nudged the wound. They came back, tips coated in a radioactive green that tingled.

[color=#A4303F][b]“...”[/b][/color]

This was the stuff that was going to kill her.

That stomach-churning thought wouldn’t go away. She wanted to not think about it. She wanted to pack her bags and be ready to go and just let somebody [i]save her.[/i] But she didn’t trust the Rogue who had set out to do that. Didn’t trust him, didn’t believe in him. She smelled burning rubber when he held her. Seen the smoke rising from tears in his synthetic muscles. [i]He won’t come back. He won’t come back for you.[/i] He’d either be too dead or too cruel. 

[color=#A4303F][b][i]If he doesn’t,[/i][/b][/color] she thought, [color=#A4303F][i][b]If the poison shuts my body down…[/b][/i][/color]

A fragile memory. Pulling back curtains to gaze upon a girl, her little face hidden under the tubes and mask keeping her alive, disappearing into the sheets of a hospital bed.

Umbri lurched over the sink and grimaced, shaking her head. She groaned as she fought off the memory, but in her head, she couldn’t stop the drag of her feet against the tiled floors, bringing her closer and closer to her nightmare. [color=#A4303F][b]“No,”[/b][/color] she whimpered under her breath, then slammed the side of the sink with a frustrated shout. [color=#A4303F][b]"No, [i]no![/i] Fuck!"[/b][/color]

[b]IT CAN’T.[/b]

Her painted fingers stretched out to her reflection, dragging a line across the nose.

[b]And she can’t rely on a cyberpsycho to ensure that it [i]WON’T.[/i][/b]

She stared at herself, huffing and sick and dressed in its venom like warpaint. She knew that she had to go. [i]She was so scared.[/i] She KNEW that she had to go. [b]Her body wasn’t hers to let die.[/b]

She packed. Slower than she wanted to move. Every time she put weight on that ankle now she wanted to scream. Photos, clothes she didn’t look at, her hologram gear, wigs. Talcum powder. Sports strapping tape, from days she sommersalted around poles instead of danced against them. Almost everything she had in a single backpack. Before she left she pressed her forehead to the tank and bid it, [color=#A4303F][b]“I’m sorry.”[/b][/color] A whole open tube of fish food floated to the bottom and settled on the aquarium gravel as she left.

She took the apartment's fire extinguisher in the corridor. Used its butt to smash in the glass cabinet holding the axe. Then she moved up. Up to the very top floor, out onto the rooftop, to look for blooms of fire and green light.

…

There.

[right][i]She knew that she had to go. [b]Her body wasn't hers to let die.[/b][/i][/right]