RECAP: Saxon wakes up frozen in a pod. The pod is opened by a woman who tells him to protect a baby by the name of Kate. Saxon breaks out of the ice with a yell after the woman leaves with a weapon in her hands. He somehow has all these facts in his head without knowing where he learned them, he doesn't know why this baby is there and who he is and why he was in there. In the room, there are over a hundred other pods exactly like his, only they are all empty. The story continues…
Chapter 2
The figure continued its flailing around for several moments. I had no control over it, hell; I barely had control over myself. Standing was an enigma for me at this moment, the balance, the shifting and maneuvering of each leg muscle, easy task for any other man I would come to learn, but for now I was as uneducated as Kate was. I found that leaning against the pods helped me support my body, yet to master this art of self made transportation. I tried walking towards the baby, still flailing but quieter now, probably also coming to accept the fact that whatever it…she…wanted, she wasn’t going to get it. Amazing how similar a mere child can be to a grown man…listen to me, I’ve only been aware of my life for a couple of minutes and I call myself a grown man. For all I knew she could’ve been older than me. Damn, this was so confusing. It’s fortunate that I didn’t go crazy thinking about it, among all these facts popping through my head. North, East, South, West, and all their combinations, the process of digestion, how to calculate the odds of success and failure down to a tenth of a decimal. Who taught me all these facts?
The figure was silent now, content, its squealing forgotten, dry tears staining her face. She now looked at whatever her brain interpreted to be, staring with blank eyes. I felt a desire to approach her, my body still shivering and wet from the ice that had encased me. Leaning my right side to the pod to the opposite side of mine, make no mistake, knowing what I was doing made my head feel like it had cracked open, I approached her. I lifted up the foot on my right side to my hip. My balance was taken and I fell to my left, and my naked skin crashed against the strong steel floor. I made the noise of my pain again, loud again. It had to have been loud because the figure on the table started to squeal again. Frustration dictated my getting up, and using the pod to my left side this time, I slowly grasped it and leaned up against it for support, slowly getting up again, the cold metal of the side of the pod chilling my bare skin, making it crawl. The fall had not been helpful to the ache in my head, and the squeal from the baby made me cringe as a result of it. I wanted it to stop, but it wouldn’t unless I got over there. I thought of the fall I had taken, and it discouraged me from trying again. My desire to not fall was too much.
Suddenly, in my head I heard a voice. It was the voice of a woman, but it wasn’t like any voice that I would ever hear again. It had no accent at all, but more like a mixture of all accents combined together. Her voice brought me a strange sense of security. “Do not lift your leg so high. You’ll lose your balance again.” The voice came from nowhere, and yet it somehow came from everywhere. “You only need to lift your foot about 14 inches off the ground, and when you have reached that height, bring your foot down on your heal, followed quickly by the front of your foot. And make sure you extend your leg. Otherwise you won’t go anywhere.” I lifted up my right leg again, to about one foot in height, and, leaning against the pod, I retained my balance. “Good. Now, lean forward and extend your leg.” I did as she asked. I then brought my foot down to the ground on my heel followed shortly by the front of my foot, just as she had described. “Excellent. Now bring up your other foot beside it. Lift your left foot up off your toes, bend your knee, then straighten it and rest your left foot beside your right. You’ll need to let go of the pod.” This disheartened me. I didn't want to leave the sanctity of the pod. Surely my balance would be lost. “Do not worry. You won’t fall, if you put your foot about 8 inches from your other one.” The voice somehow emitted a trustworthy atmosphere. I trusted it and did as she asked, bending my knee, and straightening it again beside my foot about three inches away. I found that was making me lose my balance. “Bring your legs apart or you will fall!” But it was too late, and I fell straight onto my back.
“Why didn’t you put your legs apart like I told you? You are not ready to leave your legs close like that and retain balance. Now get up.” I found myself in the middle of the divide between the pods on the right and the left. “You can’t lean on those pods without furthering yourself from Kate.” How did the voice know the figure’s name? “Sit up.” I did not know what she was asking of me. “Bring your shoulders up so that your shoulders are directly over your hips.” I did as she asked, but I found that when doing this with straight legs they were strained, and that doing this with bended legs relieved the stress. “Now bring your legs to you so that your knees are close to your chest. Then use your hands, push up from the ground, lean forward, flatten your feet on the ground and stand.” I did all that she said of me, but when I stood, I still leaned forward and I felt myself falling again. “Bring up your hands!” I brought them up as quick as a flash and caught myself. There was strain on my arms. “Now, bend your knees so that they touch the ground.” I did as such, and the strain was relieved. “Now, using your arms and legs, spring up from the ground, bring up your knees so that your feet come up under them, and spring up.” I did as such, and I was amazed that I did it so quickly. And when I stood, I made sure that my feet were 8 inches apart like she said. “Straighten your back too so that you don’t fall.” I did so, and I found that it greatly improved my steadiness and coordination. “Good. Now you know how to get up from your front and your back.” I came to trust this voice.
“Now let’s get to Kate.” I understood her and I looked towards the pod to my right that would serve as my stability. “No. You are going to walk by yourself.” What? That was preposterous, how could I walk all that way (which was really only 20 feet or so) without the support of the pods? “You’re going to do it.” Like hell I was. “You can do this Saxon. You can.” Saxon? What was a Saxon? And how did she know my thoughts? “I know all your thoughts Saxon. And unless you prefer to be called Super Soldier 5273-89 that is what you are to be called.” I didn’t know how this made sense, but this voice had just taught me how to stand up, so she knew what she was doing. “And by the way, my name is Mother. You’ll find I’m going to be very much like one.” Mother. So that was her name. Great, more things to contemplate in my screwed up, aching mind. But I had come to trust her, and I followed her guidance as I learned to balance myself as I walked, slowly, towards the baby, whom by now had ceased her squealing once again. I fell a great many times in my short travel, but with Mother’s guidance and support, I got back up, balanced myself, and walked again towards the child, memorizing her teachings so that the last 5 steps I found that she said nothing to me to guide me. When I reached the baby and the flap on the table that Mother told me was called a journal, she was proud, just as a real mother would be. “Congratulations, Saxon,” she said. “You now know how to walk, and how to pick yourself up.”
I felt proud of myself and of my accomplishments. I felt a sense of invulnerability almost. A sense of pride in my actions. I felt so proud in my accomplishments that I didn’t notice the mechanical slide of what I later found out were called doors on the far side of the room. I just looked at the baby, smiling and it smiled a golden smile back at me and giggled a heavenly giggle. But soon it’s gaze turned away from me and to something behind me on the far side of the gap between the rows of pods. I turned to it, and I found that it was like me. Human in the way it looked legs, arms, and a head. But it was not flesh. No, not flesh at all. It was made of metal, an alloy of some sort that was grey so that it was practically camouflaged standing there in front of the steel wall. And it held something. At first I thought it was a bulky club with a blade at the end of it. But soon I noticed that a belt of small gold cylinders was leading into the top of it, and that at the end of it above the 9 inch long blade was a thin barrel, with a hole at the end of it. It was just like the weapon that the woman who awoke me had held when she left, tears in her eyes. The voice in my head spoke to me. “It must have heard the yells you made when you fell down.” “What is it?” I said aloud, surprised that I somehow knew how to speak. “Move. Pick up the baby and move!” But I just stood there, watching its one blue-lit eye in the center of its head as it pointed the weapon at me.
So that's it for Chapter 2 of EMPEROR! If you found it confusing, check out Chapter 1 on my page. Also, leave a comment below with any questions, comments, compliments, criticism, or whatever you want to down below!
Until Next Time...