The System Can’t See Me

"Break the box," Nia said.

Kai turned his face enough to see her. She had stopped watching her trapped fingers. Her eyes were on the case wedged across his left shoulder, at the bend beyond his head.

"You can't get to me while that's there. Break it."

His first instinct was to keep the lid shut. The core inside had interfered with shelter prompts. Moving it had hurt his meridian. Whatever had leaked through the lid was now under their bare feet.

Nia's crushed hand lay beneath the red pipe, beside his hip. Her other arm was folded under her chest, and she was stretched across his lower back. The case trapped him at one end of the crawlspace; the fallen pipe held her at the other.

"It could spill," he said.

"Then tell me when to close my eyes."

She sounded angry. He was relieved to hear it.

The case pressed into the hollow above his collarbone. Its lower corner had split along a seam. He could feel the two edges separately when he breathed, one digging into him while the other moved against the wall.

He had been trying to shift the whole thing. That meant lifting its weight against the narrowing concrete with an arm he could barely use. The damaged corner was smaller than his palm.

Kai put his forehead against the wall and looked along the seam. The far side remained wedged higher in the bend. If he forced the split corner inward, there might be room to slide his shoulder out beneath it. Or the entire case might drop onto his neck.

He told Nia both possibilities.

"I can't catch it," she said. "Don't count on me doing that."

"Keep your weight where it is. I'll move underneath you."

Her eyes shut. After a moment, she nodded against his back.

His right wrist was still folded under his ribs. He left it there. He could not push with the torn palm, and reaching for it with his left hand would put that hand beneath the case again. Instead, he dragged his scraped knee forward until the toes of his less injured foot curled against the floor.

The movement pulled across all three wounds at his waist. Nia lifted her elbow clear of the exposed skin, but her pinned hand stopped her from lifting any farther. Kai waited for the blur in his vision to pass. It took long enough that he began to worry it would not.

"Your neck," she said. "Move your head first."

He tucked his chin and pressed his cheek to the wall. That brought the corner against the broadest part of his shoulder instead of his throat.

Then he pushed with his foot.

The split widened against his skin. His shoulder gave a deep, sickening jolt, and he stopped before his leg had straightened. Nothing came loose. He had only driven himself harder into the case.

Nia started to speak. He shook his head once, asking for a moment.

His mouth had filled with saliva. He swallowed carefully. When he could look again, the lower edge had bent away from its neighbor. There was a strip of black space between them now.

He shifted his shoulder against that edge.

This time he kept pushing after it hurt.

The corner folded with a sharp crack. A jagged piece fell beside his face. His left shoulder slid into the space it left, and the case dropped against his upper arm before its far edge caught on the narrowing wall.

Kai lay there with his teeth clenched, waiting for the rest of it to fall.

Blue light spread across his cheek. A wet line ran down from the new opening and stopped in the grit beside his head.

The case held.

He could no longer raise his left elbow. Trying sent pain straight through the joint. But the broken edge was no longer hooked above his collarbone. He eased backward beneath it, using his toes, until the case scraped over his shoulder and left him shaking on the floor.

Nia's breath broke into something close to a laugh. She stopped when it pulled at her hand.

Kai had moved the width of his shoulder. He could turn it now.

"I'm going onto my side," he told her. "Keep that arm straight."

She watched him instead of answering. He made the turn slowly, lifting his chest just enough to take its weight off his right forearm. Nia's body settled into the shallow space he left. Her arm stayed extended toward the pipe.

His right wrist came out from beneath him.

For a moment he could not recognize the hand. Grit had packed the torn palm. The fingers lay loosely curled, and the blue band showed beneath a smear of blood. When he tried to close them, only his thumb moved.

Then the band pulled toward the sump.

His forearm slid along the floor. He caught it against his own thigh before it could carry the torn palm into Nia's wrist.

She saw the blue light.

"Is it taking you again?"

"It's pulling. I can still bend my arm."

He bent the arm, using the movement he could manage rather than asking his fingers to grip. The cold traveled upward under his skin.

Nia had worked her other elbow out from under her chest while he turned. The numb hand followed, hanging uselessly from it. She held it against her stomach and stared at the trapped one.

Kai could reach the pipe now. His head was still toward the blocked bend, but his freed right arm extended back along his side to her wrist. He turned his face toward the entrance and looked over his exposed hip.

The pipe lay across the knuckles. Lifting it with his fingers was out of the question. Even if he could close them, he would be putting another injured hand beneath its weight.

Beside his head lay the corner that had broken from the case. Its triangular side still joined a narrow strip of the box's base. Resting on that strip, it stood low at the torn point and rose toward the thick folded rim.

He hooked that rim with his thumb and dragged it toward his hip. He had to stop twice to press his forearm against his thigh when the blue band tugged. Each time Nia watched the piece scrape closer without telling him to hurry.

Beyond the pipe, a black plate slid through the runoff. Kai lost sight of the hook behind it.

He set the broken corner beside Nia's hand, with its base flat on the floor. The low point would fit beneath the curve of the pipe. Pushing the piece farther in might raise the pipe along its sloping edge long enough for her knuckles to pass.

"I can try to wedge it up," he said. "When it lifts, pull your hand straight back. Toward me."

Nia looked at the scrap. "How much will it lift?"

"I don't know."

She swallowed. "Get it in place. Tell me before you start."

The scrap skidded when he first pushed it. Its edge struck her little finger, and she jerked against him. Kai stopped immediately.

"Sorry."

"Other side of my hand. There's more room."

She was right. He had chosen the side he could see most easily. On the other side, the curve of the pipe left a slightly wider space above the uneven floor.

Kai drew the scrap back and moved it around her wrist. The blue band wanted to drag his hand farther toward the mouth. He kept his elbow against his side and used his forearm to guide the piece, leaving his damaged fingers open.

He could not drive it in with his arm. His shoulder had begun shaking before the ragged point disappeared beneath the pipe.

He would have to turn far enough to put his knee behind it.

Nia lay in his way. He explained what he needed, and she edged her chest toward the wall, using her unpinned elbow. Her damaged calf dragged through the grit. She stopped twice, once to catch her breath and once because the movement had begun to twist the hand beneath the pipe.

Kai waited. The creature scraped somewhere outside the opening. He wanted to pull her faster and had to press his forehead against the wall until the urge passed.

The space Nia had cleared let him bring his less injured knee level with her wrist. He turned his back against the wall, keeping his head toward the bend, and worked the knee behind the scrap's thick rim. His bad ankle followed on its side. He could not keep it from rolling, and the pain made him gag.

Nia kept her eyes on the scrap. "You're behind it. Stop there."

His knee met the folded rim. The base of the scrap rested on the concrete, its low point under the pipe. His right forearm kept it from tipping sideways; his damaged left arm stayed against his chest. With his back braced against the wall, he could drive the rim with his knee without asking either hand to lift the pipe.

He looked at Nia.

She had tucked her chin close to her trapped wrist. Her numb hand rested against her stomach. Sweat had cut two clean tracks through the dirt on her face.

"Go," she said.

Kai pushed.

The scrap drove beneath the pipe. Its thick rim bit through the torn fabric over his knee. The pipe rolled a little toward the mouth and rose on the sloping corner.

Nia pulled. Her fingers moved, then caught at the knuckles.

She made a sound he had never heard from her before.

Kai pressed harder. The broken rim began to bend under the load. He could feel it collapsing against his knee, and he put his whole weight forward before it could flatten.

Nia's hand came out.

She dragged it against her chest. The pipe crushed the scrap flat and struck the floor where her fingers had been.

Kai sagged against the wall. For several breaths he heard nothing but his own pulse.

Nia had both hands against her stomach. The freed one was swelling across the knuckles. Two fingers sat at an angle that made him look away before he could stop himself.

She noticed.

"Don't try to straighten them," she said.

He nodded. He could not have done it anyway.

She touched the injured wrist with her other forearm, trying to hold it still without closing either hand. Kai wanted Mara there with her practical questions and her impatience. He could remember the pressure of her fingers on his arm more clearly than he could remember the route back to the shelter.

Water splashed at the mouth.

The hook struck the red pipe and slid over it. Kai pulled his knee back. The point scraped the patch where the broken corner lay, close enough that he felt grit hit his shin.

He wriggled headfirst toward the case. Nia followed on her elbows, the crushed hand held off the floor. Their legs tangled once. She kicked clear with her bare heel, swore at him, and kept moving.

They stopped against the damaged case.

The hook remained between them and the sump. Kai could not see a path around the black plates behind it. Ahead, the lunch box still obstructed the bend, but the folded corner had left an opening along the floor. He could fit his forearm through it. He had no idea yet whether he could fit the rest of himself.

Nia rested her injured wrist against her stomach. "Which way?"

He looked through the gap.

Blue light fell on the concrete beyond. The wet trail from the case led toward the closed reset valve somewhere out of sight. Going deeper would put them beside whatever remained inside the box, with no room to get clear if it spilled.

His left meridian hurt.

He had mistaken it for pain from his shoulder until he felt it follow the old meridian down to his palm. It had the same inward pull he remembered from the carrier core on the shelter floor. He took a shallow breath, and it eased. When he leaned closer to the broken corner, it sharpened again.

The core was near that opening.

He did not reach for it. His fingers could not close around it, and he remembered what touching the first one had cost before his body was damaged this badly.

But the familiar sensation made him look back at the case with more than fear. He knew something about what it held. He had learned it himself, before the tickets and the custody records and the route had reduced every choice to another demand.

"Forward," he said. "Along the wall. Keep your hands away from the gap."

Nia looked toward the hook, then began to bring her knees under her.

Kai put his right forearm against the cracked side of the case. The blue band tugged toward the sump. He held his elbow against the floor and waited until the pull eased enough for him to position his knee.

He had room to choose where to push now.

This time, he set himself against the damaged side.

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