Breed and Burn: Faceless

Chapter 14 - Trigger (II)

"I was actually starting to feel slightly less cold after all those exercises Thorne made us do," murmured Trent, grumpily, glancing at Axel. "Can't tell me what happened, can you? I was one of the only ones to hear the mirror cracking." For some reason or another, Trent sounded proud.

"You know I won't." For the first time, Axel realised he hadn't done so much as a star jump and from what he could hear they were doing a lot of it. "What does he make you do?"

"Hey, Axel. Don't you think its odd that Seven isn't affected by the cold?"

"They're a lot of odd things about it that could easily exceed that..." However, now that Trent placed that seed in his mind the thought was starting to grow rapidly. Doubt filled his face. Eyes widening, Axel tried to recall a single moment where Seven had responded to the vile, relentless cold. Right now, he couldn't even imagine moving his crossed arms from his chest. "I'm nearly bloody dead of it."

"When Seven was controlling you- don't laugh- I slapped it across the face and it felt warm. Only it wasn't really warm. It was less cold than us so it felt that way. Much less cold. I don't know how to explain this but it has a different freezing point to us. I don't know what that is or whether it's a really good robot doppelganger but that is not human. It's telling the truth."

Trent had stopped whispering and it didn't matter anyway. Silence had fallen the moment he began to talk about Seven. Giving Axel a look that said 'I'll tell you later' but Thorne interpreted this even though he couldn't see his face. It was just a feeling.

"Okay, Trent I think you're onto something here. You can carry on once we talk about what you guys heard."

"It was a gun. I heard it. I don't care if no one else did. I could. I'm not going mad. I'm not, Chane." Heated whispers had been crossing back and forth between Roman and Chane for a while now. It was a dreadful talk to listen to, especially when the nervousness in Roman 's voice became hysterical. Finally, he had reached the breaking point and shouted so loud he had cut across Thorne and let the air shuddering.

Axel and Thorne exchange heavy looks, the sudden fear and confusion multiplied by the flickering shadows. They both knew they heard the gunshot and it would explain why there wasn't more of an uproar.

It was quite a while before anyone decided to speak. Meanwhile, the silence stretched thin and dreary.

"You're not going mad," Archer said, finally. "I heard it too."

There was a burst of voices. Confused. Conflicted. Disbelief. Distressed whines. But above all resonating sounds of fear. Their plumes of breath dissipated into the air, frightening them further.

"We're going to die in here," supposed someone in a shrill voice. It sent a shiver down Axe's back but he said nothing.

"Zip it," Thorne shouted, his voice pushing above all the noise. "I've had enough of you idiots. Do you want Seven to know we have a gun?"

That was probably the worst thing he could have said. Everyone knew something unexpected would happen but it still came as a shock. Much to Axel's relief, the voices began to die down more from fear than curiosity.

"Everyone else be silent or I'll knock the stuffing out of you. Even the person who's speaking has to whisper. Seven, the thing that looks like Axel, might wake up. After we finish this meeting you all have to take turns to shower because I don't want his place stinking like pig shite on top of all things. If you're waiting to shower run back and forth in the dark room with Chane in charge so we can keep warm. If you've done both you'll swap with me and look over Seven. Then we'll sleep and have four people up in the main carriage, two to look outside and look out for something weird and report immediately and the other two to look out for Seven. Then you'll swap. We'll figure out names later." Hearing Thorne whisper in such a soft, steady tone sounded more sinister and scarier then if he had been shouting. It was felt unusual and unsettling. Unbalanced even. "Oh and use the code name pen for the thing just in case Seven does wake up."