Ok, sorry for being late, I was up extremely late at a dance so I had to skip writing. Second, there will be a poll. And depending on the results I will adjust my writing from now on. Until then, Scarlett woke up in a dark cell, with a sickening smell of mildew and rotting flesh. She began to look around in a daze, noticing silhouettes highlighted by dim orange lights on small boxes. To her right was a rotting corpse of a human, killed recently within what must have been a week. To her left was an old chain that went from a rusty bold on the wall to her ankle on her good leg. Scarlett could tell that something was about to happen, the silhouettes were beginning to move faster and with more purpose. Whispering began to become louder and more rushed. In the distance she could hear footsteps. As Scarlett's eyes adjusted she could see the outline of a staircase leading in both directions, with heavy footsteps coming from the upper area. Her heart began to race as she began as an extremely massive outline began to stomp down the stairs. It wielded a massive spear glowing blue with electricity. It's eyes glowed bright orange, the clang of its boots unbearable loud as it began to exit the stairs and approach her cell. With a growl it ordered some of the insignificant silhouettes to open the cell. They scurried fearfully forward and unbolted the cell before receding into the darkness. The creature stepped through the doorway menacingly, and with one rapid movement grabbed Scarlett by the ankle and dragged her out of the cell. As he pulled her out the doorway the chain on her ankle grew taught, and with an impatient yank on her broken leg he pulled her leg towards him, snapping the bolt and her ankle with a sickening crunch. Scarlett screamed out in pain at the fact that the figure had yanked on her broken leg and snapped her good ankle. Oblivious to the screaming the figure continued to drag her towards the stairs, heading downwards and letting her smack her head on the slick steps each time she moved. By the time they had reached the bottom Scarlett's head throbbed and her leg was numb with pain. The figure hoisted her up and put cuffs on her wrists, holding her suspended two feet above the ground. With a hum generators turned on and lights flickered on. Scarlett looked around her in pain to see a fallen Archon with bloodied hands standing in front of her. The floor around her was littered with bones and covered in dried blood. There were tubes and vents all over the room, and a small table with saws and needles. Scarlett was inside the torture room of a demented fallen Archon. She hurt all over, bruised, broken and battered, with multiple cuts on her face and body. Her wrists hurt from the tight cuffs suspending her, Scarlett felt like she would die soon. The Archon paced around infront of her, assessing her condition and searching for weaknesses. He noted her broken ankle and leg, as well as her bruised face. Deciding on a course of action he let his spear rest against a wall as he pulled out a set of chains. The Archon moved towards her and attached the chains to her ankles before hooking the remainder of the chain to a machine directly below Scarlett. The Archon then moved over to a leaver and pulled it down, causing the machine to turn, slowly pulling the chains tight until Scarlett began to scream in agony. The Archon then released the lever and walked back to the table where he picked up a small device and attached it to his helmet. As soon as he attached the machine to his helmet he grabbed his spear and approached her. "Are you comfortable?" The mechanical voice rasped with a scarcastic laugh. Scarlett remained silent and glared at the Archon. "Not much of a talker then. Maybe I have to loosen your lips with force." Inverting his spear and clicking a button on the handle the pommel buzzed with crackling electricity. The Archon reared his arm back and roughly smacked Scarlett in the gut with the pommel, taking her breath away and zapping her for a short period of time. "Now will you cooperate?" "What do you want?" Scarlett croaked in pain "Tell me where the rest of humanity has fled to, [i]guardian[/i]." "Never" a resounding crack filled the room as the Archon smashed the pommel against her chest in a wide ark. "Tell me now." The Archon said. "I don't know." The Archon smashed the pommel into her cheek, leaving a large bruise and a cut on her cheek. "I don't know where they are." Silently the Archon turned his spear around, and flicked the edge to test its sharpness. "Last chance" the Archon said monotonously. "I don't know where they are." The Archon stepped back and in a sweeping arc slashed the sizzling blade against Scarlett's thigh, leaving a large gash bleeding profusely. Scarlett's heart pounded in hear ears, her sight growing dim from pain. The sweet release of unconsciousness was slowly taking her, until she saw nothing but black. Suddenly out of nowhere Scarlett was yanked from her unconsciousness by a bucket of water splashing against her face, soaking her long red hair and dripping down her body, chilling her to the bone. Her eyes fluttered open and her heart sank. It was no bad dream, it was reality. The Archon stood before her, spear in one hand, a wicked curved knife in the other. The Archon seeing that she was awake stepped forward and whispered, "tell me what I want or endure more pain." "I've already told you, I don't know, and if I did I wouldn't tel, the like of you." Scarlett snarled at her captor. She then spit on his face with a defiant expression. The Archon laughed and put his spear down, grabbing the knife with both hands. "So be it." The Archon spun and slashed the knife against her chest, leaving a shallow but painful cut. Scarlett but her tongue, resolved to not give in to this monster. "Is that all?" Scarlett mocked the Archon even more defiantly, the knowledge that the creature would extract no information from her satisfied her (regardless of the fact that she actually didn't know anything about the human safezone) The Archon growled and made two large slashing movements with his knife, the first cut horizontally across the top of her chest, an inch below the collar bone. The second made a shallow but long cut diagonally across the front of her chest, from hip to shoulder. Both made her flinch in pain, but she was not going to let this Archon know how much pain he inflicted. Frustrated by Scarlett's lack of emotion to his attacks, the Archon cut from two inches above her left hip to an inch below her right hip, followed by him walking behind her and cutting from her right shoulder blade to the top of her left hip along her back, leaving a wicked cut that stung badly. Slightly woozy from from pain and blood loss Scarlett fought to remain conscious. The Archon, frustrated at her lack of compliance or obvious suffering stormed out of the room, dropping his spear on the floor and stopping up the stairs. As soon as the Archon had left the room Scarlett began testing the strength of the chains holding her by pulling on them. This resulted in more blood flowing from her cuts and her legs to throb. However, she had accomplished her goal, she has discovered the fact that the chains holding her in this room of horrors were badly kept, and relatively weak. Scarlett scanned the room for nearby tools, and sadly could find none. What she could see however was the lever, position directly to her left, and almost brushing her leg. Scarlett began to lean to her left, her leg up against the lever. With one desperate motion Scarlett threw her hip forward against the lever, activating the machine and pulling the chain tighter and tighter. Tensing all of her muscles, she added more strain to the weak chains, until they snapped under the pressure. The a single chain link on her on of her hands broke, leaving about a foot of chain and the cuff still attached. Scarlett reached over with her hand and pushed the lever into the neutral position. Reaching as far to her left as possible she grasped the electrified spear and pulled it close to her body. A wave of nausea swept over her, and she waited for it to pas before lifting the spear over her head and swinging it to cut the chain. As the link snapped she crumpled to the floor, unable to support herself with her own legs. She slowly pushed herself into a sitting position and used the spear to cut the chains on her ankles. Finally freed from her bonds Scarlett crawled towards the wall with a large duct on it. As she reached it she tried to pull it aside only to find it locked. Crawling back to the sharp spear she dragged it back with her, using it to hammer down the grate with the pommel. As she crawled into the grate she discovered that it sloped steeply upwards. Steeling herself against the ongoing pain, Scarlett began to pull herself upwards, using her hands on opposite sides of the duct to slowly crawl upwards, leaving a trail of blood behind. After a good hour of climbing Scarlett could see light further up the shaft. She had so much further to go before she reached her freedom.