The Portside

The Catch and The Catcher

To say that Anya was scared would be a harsh understatement. She was terrified.

The smoke had encased and surely stunned the enforcers, yet two still managed to fire warning shots in the direction of the girl. One shot had been so close she felt the heat of it fly past her ear.

The shock made her legs buckle, and she began to tumble down the roof top when she felt two hands grab her arm and swing her round. "What're yuh waiting for Anya?" Skratt yanked her along and the two ran across the rooftops as if they were on fire.

Two of the enforcers had joined them on the mismatched terraces, giving chase alongside the swearing lieutenant clambering behind them below on the busy street.

Skratt attempted to jump across the street to the opposite rooftops, but quickly disbanded the idea when an enforcer lunged at him from behind, making him produce a pitiful squeal. As she caught him Anya realised boy was now wearing the Lieutenant's hat, and she considered shoving him off the building.

By now the children had long abandoned the cursing enforcers on the street, but the soldiers behind them stumbled on in hot, albeit tired pursuit. It reminded Anya of the army games the pair would often play , but this one was real. The two were quickly loosing stamina, and a stitch scorned Anya's rib cage, making her judgement scarily clouded.

There was another issue. The rooftops were running out, quickly making way for a waterway up ahead. Both knew the narrow river there was freezing this time of year, not to mention shallow. Jumping in it would be a large, possibly fatal gamble.

The two enforcers were close enough now so Anya could feel their energy, and it wasn't difficult to tell that both soldiers were furious. The only option now seemed to be a leap of faith onto the only object that still remained on the river, an ancient metal signpost which gave it its name 'Loner's straight'.

The signpost was crooked, leaning to its right with age and wear, while the metal could barely be seen due to the rust. Worse, it looked like a painfully far jump. But it would have to suffice.

Skratt, a small and nimble child, had reached the end of the extensive row of houses and now whipped around in search of guidance.

"Jump it, Skratt!"
She yelled as loud as she could without searing her lungs with pain. "Hell no! It's to big-a jump!" Anya lost all patience, she had mere metres of street left. "Do it or I'll push you!"

He turned pale. "Anya..!"

She could have murdered him herself. "Just jump!"

He took a running leap and Anya dared to look. He seemed as if he was flying over the wine-dark waters for a moment, before he slammed heartily onto the sign's face, gripping it for dear life.

Now it was her turn. The enforcers were sickeningly close by now, and we're closing in on her. She had no time to stop now, Skratt made sure if that. As her feet left the roof she closed her eyes and threw her arms forward as if to soar. For a moment all she could feel was air rushing past her, the wind whipped past her ears and she was utterly weightless. She barely managed to grasp the sign when her upper body banged into it. Her fingers grated down the gritty metal and just as she was going to fall Skratt darted to grab her arm.

In the grand scheme of ideas the sign was relatively close to the ground. However Anya's stark fear of heights complicated matters, and she shrieked for not the first time that day. The enforcers, content with the children's impending demise, had already dissolved into thin air.

"Shut up Anya!"
The boy was now crouching over the side, scrambling to keep a grasp on his screaming friend, and with all the action the sought after hat fell off of his head.

Anya was about to command him to leave it, but it was too late. He leant forward to retrieve it, and in doing so sent them both plummeting to the ground in a screaming jumble into the narrow waterway.

As they were both falling, something strange began to happen. Everything around them began to shift and alter, while letters spun around in a arcanic dance. The air seemed full of an odd, hazel-brown aura. They were falling still, yet Anya knew they were somehow safe.

Suddenly she felt ground below her. A crow ruffled it's feathers overhead and produced a familiar sound. She cautiously got on her two feet to see they were on a street, somewhere, she guessed, to the south of Zaun. Neon-coloured signs filled her view and the air reeked of the usual chemicals. Everything was normal once again.

"Ain't we....dead?!"

Anya walked over to the boy and kicked his leg. "Ouchhh!"

"Nope. We're still alive."

"Then how in hell did we get 'round here?" He rubbed his eyes as if they were deceiving him.

Anya hardly moved. She tried to think of something to say. "Must've been the wind." She said, finally. It was a ridiculous suggestion, however, not wanting to seem foolish, Skratt accepted it as truth.

"Musta. Hey! My hat! It's here!"

The girl whipped around to see the boy brushing mud off of the Enforcer's hat. "Who said it's yours?"

He scoffed. "Why would you want' it?"

"Because it was my plan, dumbo, now give it to me!"

Anya tried to take it from him, only for the scuffle to result in her face down on the floor. By the time she had gotten up, the boy and the hat had both vanished.

"I'll get you for this!"

She yelled in the direction she suspected he had slinked off. The threat was said in such a fierce way, it was both a shame and a fortune nobody heard it.