Am I alive? A whirling dizziness overcame me as I awoke abruptly and shot upwards from the cot. I stumbled onto the floor and began to vomit. The sensation was shocking considering I have never felt sick before in my life. I focused on the floor to remove my mind from the tight shuddering in my chest. It was solid gray. The floor had no tiles or decoration of any kind just the cold metal found in the bot areas. Yet the struggle to fight off the aggressive gagging was a failure. I began to vomit again until I was empty. I continued to dry heave as the door to the room opened and a man came in. He helped me back onto the cot.
      "Try to rest you have lost a lot of blood and your poisoned. It will take some time to regenerate." He then stood and left the room. With my energy consumed everything quickly faded into blackness again.
      Awaking again nauseous I realized I was alive and in pain. How did I survive? Shouldn't I have died? Sharp pain struck my back and I realized that the wound was real and somehow I managed to get away from the monster. I rotated in the cot and reached around to my back. The wound bandaged up and it was soaked in my blood. I was still bleeding? I gathered up some energy and sat up and looked around.
      There was a small cot in the corner and a toilet across from there. Adjacent from the cot sat the toilet and a flickering florescent light. It appeared to have been smashed with some force but yet managed to produce enough light to cast a gloom on the small restroom. The toilet was leaking from the base. The mirror was cracked as well with only a few shards missing yet managed to fit perfectly in this beaten room. Why am I in a strange restroom, and not the clinic area of the vault?
      I staggered to a stand and went to the mirror. Dodging the cracks I looked into my eyes. They were bloodshot and my face was pale. My skin was covered in a cold sweat. I looked dead. I pulled a bandage from my chest and looked at one of the puncture wounds. It was just barely beginning to heal. The dizziness overpowered me again pulling me to the floor. My vision began to fade out.
       Waking up once more in the uncomfortable foreign room I realized that some time had passed. Someone had moved me again onto the cot. Without getting up I checked the bandages on my chest. They appeared to be almost finished healing. Kami would be so worried. I needed to contact her and let her know I was safe. I sat up the pain in my back was trivial in comparison to before. I could feel that it was beginning to heal now at least. Standing was much easier. All my stuff was on the floor at the end of the cot. I grabbed it, moved strait to the door and opened it. It was time to get home.
      Beyond the door I found myself in another bot constructed room. Stale metal surroundings with a few monitors on the far wall. In the center of the room was a circular display of monitors that descended from the ceiling. A control chair with controls under them. A bot was plugged into the chair. Although the bot wasnt moving I knew it was controling all three stations at once. Under the monitors at the far wall was another cot with a man sleeping. This must be the one who saved me.
      The man was a light sleeper and awoke as I approched him. He got up and smiled.
      "I'm glad you made it. I wasn't sure you'd make it."
      I staggered a little and he quickly moved to the center of the room to support me. "Come, lets set down."
      "I'll be fine just a little weak still. I need to get home."
      "You will die if you chance another trip in your state. We need to wait until the vault sends a rescue team."
      He was right I wouldn't make the trip back. The wind alone would blow me over. Then the tick beasts would swarm the wounded prey and I would be gone for sure. I had to find another way. I put my hands in my pockets and discovered the information disc the forman wanted me to deliver. I pulled it out.
      "What you got there?" He asked as he looked at the information disc.
      "The foreman asked me to deliver this to some central bot. Its some sort of upgrade."
      "Well here it is." He pointed to the bot working on the three monitors."Lets see if this will help us communicate to the vault."
      His words disturbed me. If that was true then I had no way of talking to Kami and letting her know I'm ok. "You mean we are cut off from the vault, they have no idea whats going on out here!"
      "As far as I know, yeah."
      I hobbled over to the bot. "Bot I have an information data upgrade." A section at the top of the bot spun around towards me and revealed a slot to insert the information. I put the disc into the bot and waited. The monitors went black and appeared to be rebooting. There was a buzzing coming from the disc as the monitors flashed some program code across the monitors. Then the bot went back to whatever it was doing before I bothered it.
      "Hello! Hello?" We both jumped as the intercom came alive. "Dear Jesus, I'm glad someone made it. This is Mike the foreman in charge of getting that station up and running. Who am I talking to?"
      "This is Gaven. I'm the volunteer you sent out without informing him he might die out there."

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