Season 04 - Episode 12

‘them against who’

Ak comes to with a headache and terrible taste in his mouth.

Feeling hungover, he wonders whose party he was at last night. Then, as his consciousness spreads out into the room and his body solidifies, his memory catches up.

He scrambles to sit but then freezes and groans as a great gong of pain flashes behind his eyes. Squinting bleary, he finds he is no longer in his prison cell. Instead, he is sitting on a threadbare blanket on the floor of a small, dimly lit storeroom.

There are no lighting panels in this strange new world. Instead, weird little globular protrusions stick out of the ceiling, like glass mushrooms with tiny glowing wires inside. It takes him another minute or so to realise he is not alone. He jumps and freezes and groans all over again. Two figures are waiting quietly close by, one standing, one sitting.

“Where...” Ak tries but his throat is so dry the word crumbles into a cough.

“Here,” says the standing figure in a woman's voice, stepping into the light to offer a small tin cup.

The water within is tepid and tangy but Ak chugs the lot anyway, smacking his lips, then handing the cup back with a nod.

“Who...” he tries again.

“We're the United People's Front,” says a man's voice, as the seated figure stands.

Through pain-narrowed eyes, Ak looks up at the pair. They are both skeletally thin with dirty faces and raggedy clothes of a style he doesn't recognise.

“We rescued you,” says the woman. “”We blew out the wall of your cell but you were... well... knocked out by the explosion, which wasn't the plan, so we had to carry you. But at least you're out! You're free!”

“Lucky I'm not dead by the sound of it,” Ak grumbles, rubbing his face.

“Please!” says the woman urgently. “Tell us about The Higher Place! What's it like? How do we get there? Are the long range elevators real?”

“The...” says Ak, trying and failing to keep up. “The what?”

“The Higher Place!” insists the woman, pointing up. “Where you're from? Where everything's as it was back in The Golden Age? Before the dead zone? Before we were cut off?”

“Wait,” says Ak, pressing his fingers against his temples. “You mean all of this used to be part of The Levels? But what... No, hang on... Did you say long range elevators?”

“We don't have time for this!” the man snaps. “You can discuss your myths and legends later. What we really need to know about is the technology they caught you with.”

“Oh,” says Ak, taking a deep breath and trying not to be sick. “The metal spider thing?”

“Exactly,” says the man. “What is it? How can we use it against them?”

“Against who?” says Ak, utterly confused.

“The Government Corporation!” snaps the man. “The people who had you in a cell?!”

“I don't know what that spider thing was,” says Ak, waving the question away. “Or where it came from. Quite frankly, I don't understand anything that's...”

Shouting nearby silences them all.

“Quickly!” barks the man.

The shouting grows louder and now tangles with screaming and heavy thuds of bloody violence. The pair take Ak by the arms and drag him to his feet. The woman holds him upright while the man huffs and heaves at some nearby boxes, revealing a trapdoor in the floor.

“You two go!” says the man, moving to the door. “I'll buy you some time.”

The woman helps Ak to the trapdoor and between them they lift it. The escalating soundtrack rouses Ak fully and he drops through the small hole into a cramped, narrow tunnel.

“Move up,” says the woman above him desperately.

The storeroom door is shuddering under a sustained rain of heavy blows.

“There's no room!” cries Ak, shoving the woman away and pulling at the trap door.

“Please!” she cries, lunging back at the opening. “They'll kill me!”

Ak manages to slam the trapdoor above him down onto the woman's brittle fingers so that she screams and withdraws her hand. He finds a bolt on the underside and slides it home before scrambling off down the tunnel into the dark.

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