Chapter 2: Prologue: The Darkest hour is just before…

When one imagines what their future selves would be doing, 'normal people' tend to imagine things based on their expectations and dreams. A comparison of sorts with what they know in the present and leaving enough leeway for the uncertainty of the future.

Of course, this is NOT how I think about said hypothetical, comparing yourself with other people and knowledge is meaningless in the end. One is simply oneself, and therefore, you should compare yourself with your past self, as long as you are moving forward, it should be good enough for you.

‘I’m tired…’

But even then I have to keep moving, there are no real words for how to ascertain my situation…

Let’s see, 30 years ago I was in the slums of a backwater planet with no hopes of survival without getting into shading dealings with the local drug lords and mafias…

15 years ago I was running away from my enemies, even though I wasn’t a big shot myself, I did pride myself in being the most wanted person for the people in high and low places.

And today… I’m held captive at the Deep End, to rot for all eternity, OR until our local dwarf star shrinks and blows up with us…

Was it really necessary to prolong our life span to reflect on our mistakes? I don’t think so, or more like I won’t reflect on fucking anything!!! That planet deserved to get Schwarzschild-ed into fucking nothingness.

Now I’m in a cell, a pretty secure one at that…

“Well… it is what it is. Am I right or am I right guys???”

“FUCK OFF!!”

“Later Idiot”

“NO! FUCKS OFF NOW!!! FOR GOD'S SAKE”

“Ugh sorry! I guess my birthday means nothing to you HUH?”

“IT’S… A… Cursed…day”

“Not you too!”

“YEAH BACK ME UP 239!!!”

“I’ll grunt… indifferently… since… I hate… you… both… *ugh*”

“What a disaster…”

So yeah… behind bars, or more like this sturdy steel glass shit that they got going In here… waiting for the approaching embrace of death, in the most secure prison since the fiasco of The Quantum Quarantine.

Seriously that place was awful, glad that it fucking got reality flickered into ceased to exist, the old boss did not like to experience thousand-lifetime sentences in a year.

*knock* *knock*

Upon hearing the knock on the translucent glass, it slowly cleared up from its foggy state, on the other side, two guards and an officer are looking inside my cell, the one in the middle is smirking at the disarray that the cell is in.

It is simply chaotic, clothes and tools are fucking everywhere, making it a chore to travel from one side to another, and there are paper plates stuffed in the only garbage can in the entire room.

The walls are not much better, since it is not permitted to cover them with posters, they are instead, graffiti with strange symbols and numbers they seem to be simply Pythagorean triangles, all spray-painted in green, red and blue colors with some other garbage thrown in it.

The officer nods in approval at the disarray, it is confirmed that the more cluttered the room, the more unhappy the person inside is… And this girl was definitely getting hit hard, she was not as feisty as before.

‘Too bad she has someone that still cares for her’ he thought while looking at the small plate in his hands.

“YES!” She lit up upon seeing the guard, a normal thing for her, but this was an even grander occasion. It was her birthday, and the prison let one of her ‘guardians’ get her a slice of cake…

“Here you go! Now you get to skip work today b-”

“FUCK YEAH! CAKE AND A DAY OFF”

“─ut you have to make up for it, through the course of next month”

“WHAT YOU MOTHE─”

“Glad you understand dear prisoner, Cheerio”

“OH I can play that game too you know,” She said as she coughed loudly as he tried to walk off even faster than before.

“Blimey! What a thick-headed space plank you are Dave”

“MY NAME’S NOT DAVE, IT'S ORION... AND I'M NOT BRI─”

“See you later alligator”

The officer was fuming as he glared at her, she no longer cared for him and only stared at her cake with admiration, he stomped his way out of the cell and stormed off out of her sight. Truthfully she didn’t actually believe the guy was British, but since she found that he got a bit of a complex with them, she had used it to her advantage.

’And what an advantage I have…’

She took the plastic spoon that came with the cake and stared at it for a few seconds.

If one was wondering about the nature of said cake, it was a normal cake, a slice of cake, with decent fluffiness, icing, and some chocolate on top of it, it surprisingly had a strawberry on top of it, making it very cartoonish, all things considered.

The cake had nothing in it if one excludes the frosting, filling, and bread of course. This IS the most secured place in the Coalescence, so a cake with a file or other ‘escape tools’ would neither work nor get in through the eyes of the officers…

Still, things like the cake, being able to talk with other prisoners, and even the very little socializing time we get are given to us for a reason. It is difficult to be punished if we simply accept it.

By giving hope with the cakes, socializing, and other things, we get a bit of hope for a better tomorrow, and therefore, allows the guards to punish us by taking said hope from us.

And so, the fleeting feeling of hope is given to us via these weird methods, after all, if one loses their hopes, they are better off dead.

‘I’m… so tired…’

Shaking my head of useless thoughts, I began giggling at the cake, Of course, this cake was special in the grand scheme of things, it was a signal, a few months of preparations were put into this cake, maybe a bit too little considering the things that need to be accomplished within the next 2 to 100 hours, after all, escaping prison is not an easy task.

There are no simple ways to break out of prison, normal prisons are, even by themselves, tough to get out of, but the Deep End was another beast in it itself.

‘Let’s see!!’

First a rundown of preparations and the overall plan…

First, I needed to have the means and cooperation of at least most factions in the prison, having been here for more years than me, they have established themselves pretty decently here, and even some of them don’t want to get out of here.

After all, they are thinking ‘can’t get killed by your enemies while inside of a prison’ and if you are a loner is even better, very peaceful indeed.

Of course, getting people to even agree to get out of this shithole was difficult, but I got around decently. News about my adventures had somehow sneaked their way in here, not too much of a surprise considering the smuggled newspapers in here.

Once that was secured, we needed to simply get things ready, and get communications devices, old ones that still used radio waves should be enough for this tiny section of the prison.

Some cold weapons, small enough to be hidden in cells and even in the cafeteria and courtyard. We also managed to get some outsider influence through engineers and even janitors to get a decently detailed map of the whole prison planet in here.

But most importantly, we got my cell. That bitch seemed like a chaotic mess that makes no sense, but it is actually the center and beginning of our little operation in here.

My little bed here is filled to the brim with weapons, kind of unnerving to sleep on top of a pile of swords, but what can you do? The toilet is rigged with some audio stuff so our contraband gets flushed if it detects guards sneaking up on me, those guys are always doing random checkups on me.

One might argue that doing random checkups regularly makes them no longer random but it benefits me so I won’t complain…

Now, most of the stuff littered on the ground is meaningless, but it serves to trigger the overcompensation effect on the guards.

These guards are tasked with checking up on the cells, so they are always on the lookout for anything out of place, but they are still human. Because it is their job to look for imperfection, they will do just that, they will look for even the tiniest of dust, but only if they didn’t find anything out of place first.

So, by giving them garbage to see first, it will increase the probability of them overlooking the more important aspects, you know standard diversion tactics.

The graffiti on the wall is actually a code, the result of it being a date, more specifically, my birthday. So inmates near here that passed through here could know when I was going to make the plan work

‘Time to blow this bitch up! Maybe I will get to rest after this… I’m tired of running away from everything

With a grin, she inhaled a lot of air, making the guards that were still looking at her cell raise an eyebrow at her sudden calm demeanor, she dismissed this as she started.

“Happy birthday to me~

Happy birthday to~ me~

Happy birthday dear Emmy~

Happy birthday to me~”

The guards didn’t really care that she sang a song, even if copyrighted, there was no harm done, and oddly, it meant that she had hope left, hope that they could squash later on.

“NO ONE GONNA WISH ME A HAPPY BIRTHDAY YOU FUCKERS!?”

“AHHH WHATEVER YOU DUMB BIMBO!”

“Yeah… whatever… you say… senior”

The shouts were heard from cells around her own, making her genuinely smile, these guys did deserve to rot in hell, but so did she. Making her days a bit more bearable was enough payment for what was to come.

“From… good… friends… and true”

“From old FRIENDS AND NEW~”

The guards were actually surprised to hear prisoners sing with her, well it wasn’t their problem what the prisoners did with their time but they were looking around with amused expressions.

 """MAY GOOD LUCK BE WITH YOU~"""

""""""AND HAPPINESS TOO~~""""""

 “HAHAHA, ANOTHER VERSE C’MON GUYS” Emily shouted with a voice that sounded elated, happy, and very exhausted...

“YEAH!! WE GOT THIS!!!”

“Fucking hell shut up!” One of the guards yelled, but his voice was drowned in the sea of vibrations, making some of the guards flinch in reflex at the decibels reached by the prisoners.

"""HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU~"""

"""HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU~"""

"""HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR EMMY~"""

While Emily was laughing her ass off, the guards were starting to try and quell the noise by shouting through the intercom, problem was that every person that heard the song, started singing it too, so their orders were obscured over a… birthday song.

“My wish is to escape this hellhole, please dear Santa or Satan, hear me out and make my wish come true,” Emily said with a sigh as she directly look at the guards.

“What are you talki─”

The steel glass exploded into bits, sending one of the guards flying to the other side of the room, it caused one of them to look at the commotion in shock.

Everything was confusing as hell at the moment since the song was continuing in the background. In an act of anger, he simply turned to Emily to shout at her

“THE FUCK AR-” The guard stopped as he felt cold steel puncture his neck, a sizzling of his blood as it boiled along with his flesh charring, making him scream silently as blood started to pool on his throat.

He watched Emily, the little prisoner, spinning in the air, dancing elegantly as she slit the throat of the guard she sent flying in a swift motion, the sentry turret tried to kill her with a hail of bullets but it kept missing, but she smiled at the face of danger, pulling her dagger and immediately twirling at the sentry, slicing it cleanly in half.

“That was nice” The words were muddled by the song in the background, his senses were leaving him as she watched her looking at him with pity.

“Sorry Dave, but the grinds... await no one,” she said as she pulled the hot knife out of his throat, making blood splash on his armor.

‘My name’s not Dave’

With his fleeting thoughts out, a dead guard slumped over in the hallway of cells, after making sure that the cameras were properly turned off by the bribed electrical engineers, she decided to simply let everyone out.

“Shit easy with these things, Can’t believe no one’s thoughts of this,” She said to no one as she connected the USB to one of the nearby electrical outlets. With a simple ding, every single cell in the vicinity opened.

Countless prisoners slowly stepped out of the cell, some of them with incredulous steps, they had stopped singing, as they had taken the first step toward freedom. Some of them were taking their contraband weapons while the others were quickly taking the weapons she had. She was strapping her falchion sword to her hip.

‘Alright looks good, just how many times I’m going to have to strap myself with weapons… just to keep running

Emily’s thoughts were interrupted by two loud thuds beside her, as she looked to the left she saw a grown man with many muscles, he had a scar over his eye and a perpetual frown, the brute known as Ken.

“TIRED OF WAITING FOR YOUR BIRTHDAY YOU HAG”

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Then she looked to her right, a young woman with neon-colored hair, she slowly brushed to the side revealing a pair of cold blue eyes, she seemed completely emotionless as she looked at her, but a tinge of a smile was seen in her mouth, the ice princess, or Gwyneth for short.

“I’m glad… I trusted… you… senior”

Emily smiled at the youngsters beside her, they and the other prisoner certainly fit the descriptions of the prisoner in here being ‘weirdos’. After all, those who break rules are not a normal bunch of people.

‘Look at them… so full of energy and hopes… do I even have the right to lead them anywhere? Can’t I just delegate the leadership to someone else? Someone more energetic?’

She suddenly notices everyone looking at her, she was honestly a bit flustered that they saw her as their leader. She couldn’t really blame them, she DID convince everyone of the plan she had created, so she had to take responsibility of some kind.

‘I guess this exhaustion is of my creation…’

She simply gritted her teeth and pushed through it, like every other time.

“ALRIGHT THEN GUYS” Emily screamed, making every criminal look at her with interest.

“LET’S GIVE EM HELL”

“YES”

The screams of the prisoner filled her ears as she grinned to such a degree, that it seemed unnatural. The prisoners quickly got things from her cells, weapons, and communication devices to pass on to other blocks.

“FOLLOW MY LEAD,” She said as she dashed forwards, on the east wing of the prison, where all the big shots were.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME~”

"""HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU"""

 

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The officer in charge Orion Smith was having the worst day of his life, he had to wake up with his left foot to not only have to meet prisoner 256, but he also had now a real riot on his hands.

“Report”

His voice startled the security guards, they started shuffling around atom papers as they composed themselves.

“At 1100 hours guards reported a commotion on the central wing, floor 153, from th─”

“Define commotion officer”

“R-right, prisoners on mass all over the core started singing a…” The officer actually froze at the report, he gulped loudly as Orion piercing gaze made him utter the rest of the report.

“A happy birthday song to someone named Emmy… we figured it could be prisoner 87, 201 or─”

“Fucking 256 isn’t! It’s her birthday today, FUCK!!”

Orion cursed at his luck, the fucking cockroach that 256 was made his skin crawl, if anyone could stage a successful prison break, it was her. Sweating bullets, he started shouting orders at his subordinates who scrambled to get things under control.

The Deep end was in utter chaos, like a wave, or an infection, every prisoner who heard the song started singing along at maximum volume. By now, all of the lower floors were completely infected with the birthday song, and slowly, the infection of the said song spread to the upper floors.

Even if they were not on the plan ─or had any idea of what the fuck was happening─ they would join in, the herd behavior would at least compel them to propagate the song along, like a wave of confusion, and a call to action.

Orion was not having a good time, he kept thinking staring at the monitor that actually worked while the escapees were slowly crawling back up through the east wing of the prison, with multiple splinter groups trying to take control of specific parts of the prison, like the cargo bay and even the docks…

‘It doesn’t even seem right… even if she had some plans, our defense crumbled too quickly, so there is something else going on'

Orion started thinking about the possibilities, there were a bit underprepared to have a situation like this, especially since it’s been decades since anyone even attempted something like this.

He looked at the monitors of the engineer in charge of sealing the escapes routes, he noticed that although he was doing his work, he seemed to strategically divide the prisoner on more than one occasion, making them more spread out and unintentionally making the escapees grow on numbers.

‘Unintentionally? No… Some of us have been bribed to some degree'

As Orion wondered about the ramifications of that information and weighed the consequences of his action he got progressively angrier. 

“Agh! whatever… Mackenzie!”

“Yes sir”

”You’re fired”

“Wha─”

Orion did not hesitate to shoot his subordinate, covering the monitors with blood and brain matter. He put his revolver away on his hip, the silence in the room was loud and clear.

“Gentlemen, our security measures AND personnel have been compromised to some degree, so I give permission to any high-ranking officer to execute any individual suspected of treason”

“…”

“NOW chop-chop! We got some prisoners to neutralize”

“YES SIR!”

*BOOM*

“WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT!”

“SIR our core has been severely damaged along with our spare fuel sources being rerouted to... the escape pods”

“You gotta be KIDDING ME! Get someone to those pods, and I need personnel to start fixing the damage NOW, we can't take a blackout right now!”

“Umm, sir…” The guard slowly raised his voice as Orion looked at him with cold eyes.

“Speak”

“We might not be able to repair the core”

“If I survive this stuff… I hope I at least get some good retirement money”

 

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“─RIGHT THEN, SEE YOU SOMEDAY I GUESS”

“Alright then big guy, see you around”

“Take... Care…”

We finally fucking reach the escape pods of this whole planet. Even with the help of all these people and insiders it was a battle to even get to the surface, so we bid our farewells to our loud companion as he got onto an escape pod.

We girls should get another escape pod, preferably not filled with men with extensive criminal records… Suffice it to say, it was hard to find one, and the one we found was thoroughly cracked, but it was usable so…

“We ridding this one”

“Un…”

Emily opened the escape pod with a smile, she was finally getting out of this fucking garbage dump, and she was thinking of what to do once she is free, yeah there were things still to do but even with this she could finally Re─

*Whoosh*

“Wha─”

The door was forcibly pried open on the outside, and someone immediately grabbed Gwyneth and pushed her outside. Emily didn’t even think twice as he tackled him outside.

‘Guards? They are here already???’

This posed a problem, they no longer have the numbers advantage since the objective changed from ‘get everyone out of here’ to ‘get the fuck out’.

‘I’m too old for this…’

The guard punched her square in the face, Emily growled as she kicked the guard back and grabbed Gwyneth ─who barely knew what was going on─ and threw her inside the pod.

Emily closed the pod and kicked the control panel to make it stay closed. The guard didn’t waste any moment, he opened fire on her with his gun, landing three shots on her back.

‘Fuck, those take long to heal…’

“Don’t fucking worry, I’ll find another way”

Ignoring the horrified look of Gwyneth, she flicked her hand at the guard, who didn’t notice the hidden knives inside her sleeves. She landed the knife on his hand. The guard's reflex made him clutch his hand in pain as he let go of the gun. Emily ran to the guard, kicking the gun off the ground onto her hand. She viscously hit the guard on the solar plexus with a palm strike and shot him in the head.

With the high-pitched sound of the motors turning on and taking off, Emily understood that Gwyneth had finally escaped, safe and sound... Although it was a bummer, she deserved it more a the moment, she was only a youngster in comparison to her.

*Sigh*

Emily tried to stabilize her breathing, she was too exhausted and needed a minute. Of course, as if mocking in her face, she heard an explosion in the background of the planet. The whole planet seemed to be collapsing, and apparently, it meant some sort of self-destruction…

‘They ARE the most heinous criminals of this coalescence, so I guess the planet is a small sacrifice for peace…’

As Emily pondered about the whole thing, in the middle of this no man’s land, she heard another explosion near her. Looking at it with her almost closed pupils, she noticed the com tower falling… in her direction. Her whole body tensed up in anticipation as her mind raced into making plans to escape this predicament, among others she had at the moment.

‘It’s tall but it’s disproportionately wide I would need to evade it by fucking shooting the window and hoping I don’t any serious injuries from the shock wave, then I need to go to the south wing to get in an escape pod butIneedweapons this gun ain’t going to last more than a few  shots at the─’

As the shadow cast upon her by the tower covered her, she saw everything move even more slowly, she was thinking at maximum capacity about what to do and how to do It correctly.

Her plans were created and deconstructed ever and over again to give her the chance to survive, to live another day, but the more she thought the more she didn’t move…

In the end, she arrived at a singular thought…

“Why I’m even doing this…”

Emily was tired, she was really tired… She wanted to believe that after this everything would be fine, but she knew better. Her situation rarely got better after incidents like this, maybe if she was younger she would continue running but…

‘I’m old and I’m tired…’

With this last thought, the tension in her body was released all at once… she felt free and, at peace. She stared at the collapsing tower, some guards and prisoners were running amok and getting crushed by it, and she… closed her eyes.

 

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[ November 17, the Cosmic Year 2344 

On this day, The Star prison “The Deep End” suffered a riot and subsequent self-destructions due to the hasty actions of the guards In charge of the prison.

In total, 8436 prisoners successfully escaped, and the other 1.5 million were reportedly deceased or missing. It is believed that “The Theremin Phantom” started the riot but was unable to escape]

[Emily Melody, Age 53, Current Status… deceased…]

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