The dread of not having Jo at her side diluted Celia's courage against the band of armoured vehicles. Having jeeps and trucks that shot big, round capsules of sticky green stuff instead of rubber bullets meant damaged objects and people became the final test of this experimental technology. Them doing this was the near-culmination of more than seven years of research and development by Hellenic Ballistics.

Besides this, the mushy halves of the capsules with their exposed contents on the ground appeared a bit runny. They resisted by throwing whatever they found towards their direction. Even with its ineffectiveness, this didn't stop them from doing it to deceive themselves into thinking they were making a difference.

For Celia, whatever pain that came from her head bump became easy to ignore when the boy who was always by her side wasn't there. Jakob did what he could to get her to keep moving with everyone else, but it looked like she was near her limit. How could she have believed they would be truly free? Even if they had escaped into the forest, to do well there would be improbable.

To not even have the security Ironside provided meant there was no deterrent to protect them from a worker or other threats while in the preserve. Also, many of the same guards that would work as said deterrents would be searching for escapees.

She learned how they used technology that was small, had many spinning blades and had no one inside to find those who tried to flee from their control. Such devices were quite effective and for her to think they had a chance against such an advantage was idiotic.

Jakob reached out to carry her on her back. Convincing Celia to keep going was a challenge and he was not willing to let her get captured as long as he believed in them. "Celia, just trust me. We can escape this thing if we try hard enough because of all the debris in the street."

"I... I... I can't. I just can't, Jakob. It's too hard to force myself to run." Celia was becoming consumed by fatigue. Even if she got herself to continue, her legs and lungs couldn't do it.

"No one is forcing you, Celia. Whether you want to be free or not is up to you."
Celia was ready to surrender for the tightness in her chest, calves and thighs to end. Then, in that very somber moment, she remembered the face of the boy that was somewhere likely dealing with the same problem. She knew he wouldn't want to give up in the face of such hardship, but unlike him, she didn't have a gun.

A teenage girl had no chance to retaliate against vehicles that launched capsules of sticky green stuff from weapons resembling rocket launchers. She wondered if his bravery would remain in the face of such strange technology. Celia was swift to tell herself no. And this, at least in part, was how thinking about Jo couldn't get her to continue running.

This was when Jaholven's divine grace came to her, compelling Celia to have him guide her on what to do from here. Sadly, the screams of Jakob holding his shin would put a temporary pause on God. The large back section of a vintage television had got him.

"Jakob, come with me. I want to repay the favour to show I'm grateful for what you did." She was willing to pick Jakob up and carry him, but someone shorter than her said that he would take him. They preferred for her to use her remaining energy to look for Jo. Celia was touched by their compassion. Even so, she couldn't make herself run anymore. Therefore, they opted to get a big-boned woman with impressive speed to lift her.

As a group, they had to change their plans to cease their advances. Seeing the effectiveness of the capsules in halting some of them, they hurled these back at their vehicles to decrease their speed. Despite doing this, the remnants of each capsule did not slow them down. Because of this, some chose to hide wherever they could. To them, a counter to their aggression felt impossible.

Throughout their distress, they came upon a portion of a big multi-storey trailer about to fall over. From its aesthetic, it resembled a suburban home for a nuclear family. This was when they realised they were in a much richer area of Bale. Celia admired yet refused to live in such expansive spaces for her and Jo. They would achieve their own path to prosperity without giving up the last of their soul to a greedy corporation.

For them, this was an opportunity to strike. They worked fast to get their muscle behind it and waited for them to come near to push it into the street. Its collapse created much debris and a sprinkling of dust that forced the closest vehicles to be buried beneath it. For those further away, they smashed into each other or drove off the unpaved roads while stopping to evade it.

Celia, Jakob and the others noticed that the vehicles were blocked by a wall of the fallen materials from the trailer. Looking around, they saw several other trailers they could do the same to in order to keep their distance from them. She was relieved about this. Celia had to give thanks for being able to use their own homes to defend against the enemy.

"I should have never doubted him at all. God always delivers no matter what." She noted how dumb she had to be to allow her faith to waver. Once she had God with her, there was no need to feel the way she did.

At the exact second she reaffirmed her religion, a helicopter made a U-turn to pepper them with sticky capsules. Soldiers from both sides were hitting their group with considerable accuracy, bringing doubt if they could take it down. Then from her left came a shove that got her out of the landing spot of a sticky capsule. Both her and the big-boned lady were on the ground trying to recover from whoever pushed them.

The person who did it was Mel, while Jakob, with the pain in his leg still significant, abandoned the person who was toting him to pull her out. But, in doing so, he got his arm stuck by accident. A person like Mel was too valued for him to not do what he could for her. Her, like Willy and Bonn, had cared and listened whenever he struggled. In his mind, to not do similar was being inconsiderate.

"Get away from me, Celia!" The passion in his words nearly had Celia second-guess herself in offering aid.

"But I can't leave you like this!"

"You heard what I said, Celia? It's pointless to try. Please, I beg you."

She couldn't stand to have him talk like this. This wasn't what she needed when she was desperate to do anything for them. For her, at least in this moment, the past was irrelevant.

"I don't want you to end up like me or Jakob. Just listen to us and leave us alone to suffer. We'll be okay."

Everything Mel said was a lie. How could them or anyone else be fine when they were trapped in weird stuff from military guards in uniforms of green, brown and black?

They were screwed. They had to be.

With stains all over him from the sticky stuff, Jakob barked at Celia to run to safety. She wanted to do what she could to help, but he ordered someone who wore a long-sleeved shirt to take her away.

Celia couldn't accept this. She soon began to weep and fought to return to him.

There's no need to fight me. You know there's nothing you or anyone else can do.

She detested the truth the long-sleeved man spoke. Her struggling shoulders, elbows, head and everything else became tame as she came to terms she couldn't be his saviour. Despite her supposed strength in God, she felt to be out of his grace.

Was this the mysterious way God worked? By leaving his precious children to the slaughter? Even with this swelling doubt and anger, she allowed God the opportunity to intervene.

If he didn't... Then God had truly forsaken his children.