Ashes

Seven: Ashes, Ashes

I come to with a shock as icy, brownish water is poured upon my head. I splutter wildly, droplets dripping though my hair as I spit some of it onto the ground.

There are two burly Burned men, one on either side of me, with heavy, rusted assault rifles slung over their shoulders. I'm kneeling on cracked pavement, in the center of a street. Something tells me I should be afraid, but I'm too in shock to process anything right now. Including fear.

It strikes me as odd that there's no sunlight anywhere. It's clearly not nighttime anymore.

A quick glance upwards explains why. And nearly stops my heart.

The ceiling, with a distance that I find all too recognizable, is made of glass. We're in a dome.

Except this dome is underground.

Sand covers the entirety of the dome, and I wonder how far underground we are. This is terrifying.

The buildings are much like those of the Refuge and of the dome where I grew up, but there's graffiti all over the crumbling walls. Dim, dirty lights keep the place out of the dark, but only by a little.

The Burning city smells like ruin. There's the smoke of cigarettes around every street corner, the reeking stench of alcohol from every other bystander. The air is thick with darkness and kicked-up dust, and the choking sneers of the Burning in the streets is deafening as I kneel in their streets.

"Hello, Darling," I sickly voice sneers, as a Burned man steps into my field of vision. Tall and built like he could snap your neck, his appearance alone is petrifying. A ragged trench coat is draped over his shoulders, but you can still see the edges of tattoos creeping up his neck and hands. There's ammo bolstered to a holster on his leg, and a scary-looking handgun is strapped to him. His hair is shaved into a buzzcut, stubble growing around his warped features.

Carelessly, he tosses aside the bucket that had probably held the water that's now all over me.

"Where am I?" I spit, my voice sounding thick and sleepy in my own ears.

"Welcome to Astheneia! The Burning city," he laughs, and I can't do much other than stare at him blankly. I didn't even know that the Burning had a city, let alone that it's an underground dome. The Burned man merely laughs at my blank expression.

"Oh, don't worry. We know who you are. You gave Dakros and his people a whole lot of trouble a few months back, and you gave us Fox and Terra," he sneers and I struggle against the hands of steel on my shoulders.

"Liar! You took them!" I roar, throwing myself against the guards to no avail. The man finds some sick kind of humor in my frantic anger, chuckling sadistically as he merely watches.

"Careful with those accusations, dear. We don't even know each other's names," he says, and I cease my struggling as soon as I really it'll do nothing. I'm too angry and shocked to feel fear, but the tightening in the back of my throat tells me that's about to change.

"Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Daedalus, and I'm the leader of any organized group of Burning people you will meet. I'm the king of Aestheneia, and all Burned crews answer to me. And you are?" he says, and I freeze up a little bit. He's the cause of so many of my problems. This guy, Lockman, and McGregor.

I refuse to answer him, which for some reason strikes him as amusing.

"I know your name, Miss Thorne, but if you won't tell me, then I'll tell you. You're Ariadne Thorne, sister of Titus and Echo Thorne, and daughter of Athena and Ezekiel Thorne," he tells me, and where I should feel concern at his knowledge I feel confusion. I don't have any sibling other than Titus. But then who's Echo?