He'd been arrested a couple times before for stealing batteries or stealing into power stations to get his sister a good night's charge but never had he thought he'd be sent to the Patch for it.
The Yellowlines was a place meant for murderers and terrorists and so on, not boys who stole batteries because he couldn't afford to buy any for his sister. His father had raised him well enough to understand that the city and the world they lived in wasn't fair but he still didn't get it. He never even stole the batteries in the first place.
He sat at the back of a prison transporter well beyond the gates of Acropolis, far way from home, far away from her. His sister Lou had never been great at surviving in the Gutters, but she'd always had him to look after her. She was all alone now, probably lost in one of the zones looking for him.
He blinked back the tears of fear ,swallowed and got to looking at the lot he'd been sorted with in the car to their very own version of the crossworld. They sat in two rows across from each other, exactly four on each row facing each other with only one person sat facing the door. From what he could tell, there were only two girls on the other row which was as far as his neck could move in its strap. He was only aware of the individual facing the door from the periphery of his eye.
A horn sounded which he guessed meant they had arrived or they were closest to arriving to the Patch. Not that he knew how far the prisons were anyway.
The car stopped. Yep, they had finally arrived at their destination. Exile. He took a deep breath listening as the doors opened waiting to see the masked Soldiers with their guns ready to hand them over to whoever served the Acropolis in the Patch.
Instead he heard gunshots, the doors opening fully just in time to reveal two Acropolis soldiers falling to the ground one of them missing half his head. There was green dust blurring the view but someone approached from a few paces away.
A black hat preceded his dark-skinned face and plasma pistol. The man was taller than most people he'd ever seen his frame almost blocking out the light where he stood. He scanned the bed starting with him and ending with him.
"As far as you know, all of you are cursed folk and outcasts condemned to exile by Royal Decree. I am Jaim the Elephant Man and I have saved you from this fate in exchange for another, a much more human one. I am under contract to deliver all of you to your new masters and I must tell you that I regard my work religiously. You will listen to me without fail till we get to where we're going. I will begin with freeing you," the man said.
Jaim the Elephant Man seemed to access the transporter's system.
He felt the cuffs around him loosen flexing his wrists when he felt cold metal in his hands. Jaim looked at him smiling.
"Anyone tries anything foolish you shoot them. You disobey my word, I shoot you. Understood boy?" Jaim asked.
He shook his head words having become foreign to him. Jaim nodded back and heaved himself into the transporter shaking it with his steps. He went straight away for the person at the front who he now saw was a young boy who was restrained from neck to his waist by a whole metallic cover. From what little he could see, the boy seemed to have a face half-metallic half-skin with very blue eyes. Almost as if they were glowing.
Jaim freed him strangely patting his head when he was done, then moved to the rest of them. He saw that four of them were girls instead of the original two he had seen. One of them was fully a biome with green hair and the brightest smile he'd ever seen. He almost smiled back only remembering that he nee knew her at all.
Next to her was a man with dreadlocks who was almost as large as Jaim while seated. He had his head down the locks covering his face fully. He appeared to be sobbing.
Jaim freed who he assumed was the oldest girl of them all who sat opposite of him. She had a scar running from cheek to cheek that seemed to widen when she flexed her jaw.
"Areet, we're going to travel in this transporter for a while to make sure we don't get attacked by nymiras. Then we'll have to switch to a stealthier vehicle," Jaim said.
"What's a nymira?" He asked against his better judgement.
"Sand demon, the most dangerous thing in the Minefields after the hunters," the woman with the scars said.
Jaim looked at her for a good minute then nodded. He took out another pistol and handed it to her.
"You, boy keep your gun on her. You, lady make sure there's order in here."
With that Jaim got off the transporter the doors locking instantly behind him. He aimed the pistol at the woman feeling the car start moving again.