The river sizzled, casting a cloud of heavy acid steam over its moonlit banks.
Deca felt her shell slowly rusting- or was that just the condensation drizzling down and eroding her slowly? Either way, it was no longer enough to avoid touching the water itself. The noxious stuff permeated the air and forced Deca to maneuver away from the river, where the heat was drier and the steam less concentrated.
The crackling, sizzling cacophony got louder and louder, and it was joined by the sound of rushing water- or acid. Oddly enough, the last sound was getting louder as Deca drove downstream, and she decided to be optimistic and take it as a sign that the river was going to change trajectory. Hell seemed closer than ever, and the unfriendly environment, with its acidic air and discordant noises, only reinforced the feeling.
Deca's low beams abruptly cut through the fog and illuminated something far ahead. It appeared at first to be the edge of a massive hole, but as she approached, its true nature was revealed: it was a cliff, a sharp drop with jagged edges. Unusual red flora creeped aimlessly through rocky crags and down into rough crevasses, all the way down to a churning black sea far below that flowed through an abyss beneath the cliff.
The rushing water was even louder now. Deca turned to illuminate the source of the noise and realized she'd strayed further from the course of the river than she'd thought. It now cascaded down the cliff a short ways from her in a raging waterfall, spitting off flecks of acid left and right into the air- the rocks near the waterfall were mostly eroded, their inner layers laid bare like the rings of a tree stump. If Hell River flows into this crater, Deca thought, then this crater must be...
Free of the mist that had previously made her switch to her low beams, Deca activated her high beams and set her sights past the black sea, where she noticed for the first time a sandy beach, stained darker the closer it got to the water. Then there was a boardwalk at the edge of the sand- too far away to get a good look at- and then a city, which looked almost like a model city from Deca's vantage point. Little red buildings with pointy steeples and dark windows, clustered together amidst thin streets and miniature plazas, windows mostly dark. The few lights she could see might have been illusions, reflections of the moonlight.
She let out a quiet honk to wake Reca up. Moments later, Reca scampered down the ladder and peered over the whole crater, squinting to try and see the places where Deca's beams didn't reach.
"Pandemonia," Reca whispered over the spray. It was almost too quiet to hear. "But how do we get down?"
Deca realized she'd been asking herself the same question. She felt less useful lately- she had been unable, after all, to convey Reca across the bridge into Ammonia, and she carelessly hit an electric fence before that at NukeCorp. She feared- but readied herself to accept- another journey she'd be unable to follow Reca into.
"Hmm," said Reca, peering into the darkness. Deca illuminated her view and noticed something she'd dismissed before- a smooth (albeit steep) path that wound through the rocks on the opposite side of the crater to the waterfall. It clung tenuously to the crater's side and seemed about as wide as Deca was, but it was riddled with cracks and insecurities that, if aggravated, could probably plunge Reca and Deca into the sea, or worse- plunge them directly onto one of the patches of sharp rocks that riddled the sheer coastline below.
Long ago, it had probably been a seaside entry path to Hell. Of course, it had now been out of use for a long, long time.
Deca's headlights weren't strong enough to reach past the segment of the city near the boardwalk- the crater faded into darkness beyond, and if there was a path on the other side, it was currently hidden. Night had only just fallen, and Deca doubted Reca would want to wait until daylight to be absolutely sure the cliff path was the only way. Deca decided to trust in her synergy with her travel partner. The entire journey had been fraught with danger. What difference did this make? This was, after all, perhaps the duo's final destination. If Reca could go on, then it didn't matter...
It was useless to think about things like that.
As Reca caught up- Deca hadn't noticed that she wasn't up on top in her usual place- a third sound joined the waves, the rushing, the sizzling, and the wind. A voice. Reca's voice...? No, someone else's! But who could possibly be yelling? Nobody was there, unless she had overlooked someone-
"Reca!"
Reca?
"Reca! Is that you? Over here! Over heeeere! Ack!" The mysterious voice launched into a coughing fit and its location was suddenly made clear- a dark, dingy outcropping on the rock face halfway between the path and the water.
"Who are youuuu?" called Reca, cupping her hands around her mouth in the hopes that her voice would somehow carry further. There was movement on the outcropping- a person, for sure, but they were wearing something red and boxy on their head, and the perspective also meant that said red boxy thing obscured most of their body.
"It's me!"
The person must have been a woman, but her voice was so hoarse it was a little hard to tell. Reca glanced momentarily over at Deca as if to ask, 'is it weird that I don't know who that is?'
Deca honked, hoping that it would be interpreted as a 'no'.
"Boy, you're stupid! Rivergal! Little Demon! It's ME! Reca! Reca!"
"Oh! You! ...What happened?"
"No time to talk! I'm losin' my voice from screaming so much! You oughta come down this instant and save me if you don't want a big red stain on your conscience, alright?!"
"...Yeah!"
"Finally! Reca, Reca! I'm so glad to see you! I thought you weren't planning on coming down here to Hell!"
"Save your voice," called Reca, wondering where Rivergal's 'no time to talk' rule went. For someone who was stuck on a cliff, Rivergal seemed kind of nonchalant, but she nodded- at least, it looked like she was nodding from where Reca stood. Seconds passed, and Reca looked between Rivergal and Deca, Rivergal and Deca.
"We're going on that path! C'mon! No time to lose," Reca commanded, voice faltering.
Deca found herself between a rock and a hard place. She wanted to be useful- of course she wanted to be useful! But at the same time, the path was so thin and so precarious that she'd be lucky to make it down unscathed. It would be selfish to disobey Reca, right? But what if they both died? What if she accidentally expedited Reca's death by plunging off the cliff face?
"C'mon... c'mon! Deca, I know you're there!"
She blinked her cabin lights. She was there- but would she be there at the other end of the path? Would either of them?
"I need to save her, or else what kind of adventurer am I?"
Go save her yourself, Deca thought. I'll just get in the way. She couldn't say anything. She could never say anything. Would every conflict be like this?
"Deca," Reca said, sniffling, corners of her eyes suddenly wet. "I need you..."
Everything came into focus for Deca. Reca wasn't some grand adventurer- she was a child- an inquisitive, smart, intuitive child, but still a child- and she was almost entirely alone. The adults back in Andistronica weren't there when the pair left town. Right now, the buildings were probably rotting away, dissolving further with every new acid snowstorm.
Reca and Deca were the only Andistronicans left. For the first time, Deca described herself as one of them- as an Andistronican- and found that it felt right.
They couldn't turn back. They carried the memories of that little tin town with them. If they lived to see another day, so would their memories; if they died here, they'd be the last remnants of home, but they'd be so far from home...
Maybe she was wrong. Maybe the adults returned after the storm and looked for Reca and found that she was gone. But something about that idea didn't feel right.
"Please," sobbed Reca. "Please."
Deca decided that, whatever happened, the two last Andistronicans would die- or live- together... and she turned on the cabin lights.
"Thabk y-you," she sniffled, losing coherency. Moments later, she sat on the roof in her usual spot, and Deca- has much as her mind told her she should turn around and guarantee the safety of both herself and her friend- sallied forth onto the cliff path, leaving stable ground.
Slow and steady was the rule Deca set for herself. With every new bump in the road, every new tiny crack, every new pothole, Deca braced herself for the sensation of hitting the water or being punctured by a rocky spike. It never came, even when Deca's wheels jutted out halfway over the edge of the path and she was forced to pull in as far as possible. Reca, meanwhile, clung flat to Deca's shell to avoid hitting her head on hanging rocks where the 'roof' was lowest.
The worst parts of the path were those with unstable ground. Every time Deca unintentionally dislodged a rock and watched it plummet into the sea, she imagined herself following, sinking and sputtering in the acid, shell dissolving, engine waterlogged. It was easy enough to put the idea out of her mind the first time, but then another rock came loose... and then another, and then another.
"Stop," whispered Reca, and Deca obliged. Rivergal's outcropping was just ahead. Her situation was visible, now: she held the red wagon over her head like a helmet, and her clothes were twice as tattered as they had been when the duo encountered her near Bastion. If they got any more ragged they would up and fall off.
Without another word, Reca slid down the windshield- there wasn't enough space between deca and the wall to use the ladder- and crept along the cliff wall until she was able to reach her hand out to Rivergal. Unfortunately, the distance between them was still too great, even when both of them stretched their arms as far as possible. There were no sturdy hanging vines nearby, only resilient red grass and gently glowing moss.
"Hm," mumbled Reca, pacing back and forth, trying her best to focus on Rivergal and not look down at the water. "Um... give me the handle of the wagon, maybe."
"Why?"
"I was thinking I could... like, use it as a rope to pull you up, I guess."
"No way that'll work," said Rivergal, holding the wagon handle up nonetheless. Even on her tiptoes, arm fully outstretched, Rivergal wasn't able to get the wagon high enough for Reca to do anything but graze it with her fingertips.
"Uh, well, we should try something else..."
"What about that ladder on the van?"
Reca's stomach churned at the thought of disassembling her friend, but as she looked back, she realized to her horror that the ladder, if expanded fully, would be tall enough to rescue Rivergal. Surely there would be a mechanic in Hell capable of reattaching it, right? And Reca was strong enough to yank it off, right? And a van losing a ladder would be like a person losing a finger, right?
Deca backed up, unsure about the situation, but found herself flying blind. The ground behind her had crumbled a little when she'd passed it; it no longer seemed long enough to back up over! Maybe it wouldn't hurt so bad to lose a ladder... but would Reca really dare?
In what seemed like one swift motion, probably due to the adrenaline pulsing through Deca's flesh, Reca slid back up the windshield, scooted herself backwards three times, and gripped the ladder- which now seemed more fragile than ever.
One pull.
Please be gentle, Deca thought, wincing and writhing inside her shell.
Two pulls.
Ouch, Deca thought. No, no, please. There must be another way.
Three pulls...
A searing pain ripped through Deca's shell, starting near her bumpers where the ladder had once been and reaching the hood in no time. She nearly crumpled in on herself- it was quickly morphing into a dull pain, which was better than the sharp pain for sure, but still far from desirable. Moments later, there was an audible scraping of metal as Reca wrenched the detached ladder out of the gap between the van shell and the wall.
"Thank you," she whispered. Deca flinched. The pain would go away in time- maybe the lack of a ladder would make it possible for her to hang closer to the cliff wall, but the old tether spots would be raw wherever they rubbed against the rock, so maybe not.
It wasn't lethal. Was she just rationalizing it? Was she forgiving Reca because she had come all this way? Was it her fault for not communicating better?
She made it her resolution- a vague, vague resolution, but a resolution nonetheless- to find a way to communicate more effectively upon arrival in Pandemonia, if the duo even made it there at all. That was all she could do at this point- the ladder was already gone, and the pain was already beginning to fade.
Reca popped the ladder open, expanding it to twice its compressed height, and jerkily pounded it onto the ground next to Rivergal.
"You have no clue how long I've waited," Rivergal gasped, sounding like an old woman. "Water- do you have water?"
"No... no, I'm sorry... how long have you waited?"
"I dunno," she croaked.
"Oh, so when you asked... you were asking because you actually didn't know the answer."
"Duh..."
"We'll get some water in the city."
Rivergal nodded. Reca climbed onto the roof again and gave Deca a consoling pat, but it was all too ineffective at numbing the pain. Just as she was about to beckon Rivergal onto the roof with her, she noticed that she was already riding shotgun, eyes closed, snoring away gently. Fine, then.
When Deca pulled forward onto a wider section of the path, Reca slipped into the driver's seat, wondering why she didn't think to do so before. The van's movements were choppy and jerky, no doubt because of the pain that Reca now regretted causing- she vowed never to hurt Deca again. Unless she really needed to. No! No, there was no 'unless'.
"I won't do anything like that ever again," said Reca, hugging the steering wheel in front of her. Deca flashed the cabin lights, but there was somehow a tinge of melancholy in them- was Reca imagining it?
Maybe it didn't matter. What was done was done. Forgiveness would have to come after survival, if it came at all- the prospect of never receiving forgiveness twisted Reca's internal organs into knots, as did the lurching of the van back and forth. She curled into herself, but found that it was tough to treat the treacherous rocking of the van over the cracks like the gentle rocking of a crib.
With one final burst of speed, Deca careened over the largest crack in the path, dislodging a massive chunk of unstable cliffside and landing with a hefty thud on the black part of the beach. Rivergal and Reca let out synchronized sighs, and there was finally peace... or what passed for peace in Hell. The waves lapped in and out. The waterfall roared in the distance. The occasional loose rock fell into the sea. In Reca's mind, the loudest sound of all, though, was her pounding heart.
"Let's..." coughed Reca, stumbling onto the sand and tottering towards the boardwalk, "Let's get... I... we need... me-me-mechanic..."
The pounding in her chest got louder and louder, and the red in her eyes got brighter and brighter with each beat. One more step. One foot in front of the other. Good- another foot in front of that foot, and... and... just another...
The pounding red swallowed up the city, and Reca fell face-first onto the sand, just out of reach of the tide.