Retrospect

Twelve

   As soon as I saw Miles struggling to get the weapon off of him, I jammed my pocket knife once again into the back of the man's other knee. He roared like an animal and spun around to face me. This action made the spikes cut into Miles' leg even deeper, making him wince as he attempted to pull them out.

   I stood up and darted out of the way just as the man punched the place where I'd been a second ago. I saw Murl rush over to Miles and they yanked out the spikes, so I tried to keep the man distracted. He lifted his leg, pulled it back and kicked at me, but I was fast and ducked, narrowly escaping the blow.

   Murl ran up behind the man and kicked the back of his leg, where I had stabbed him. The man's legs buckled and fell over, all while Miles limped up next to him, yanked off his helmet, and used the rest of the Sleep Spray in his face, the stuff sputtering out into his nose. Then Miles hit him over the head with the metal can.

   The man was unconscious for now, so Murl turned to me and Miles. "We should probably go before anybody finds out we're still alive," he told us, looking at the hole in the elevator. Miles nodded and tested out his injured leg on the ground.

   I stared down at the red stream, trailing down to his foot, the deep cuts resembling the claw marks of a bear. "Do you need anything for that?" I asked. "I think I have something in my bag you could—"

   "I'm fine," Miles bit back, agitation revealed in his tone. He just wanted to leave this place and I couldn't argue with that.

   Murl kept his distance from the hole in the elevator, but he peered through it and motioned for me and Miles to follow him. "It looks like there's a wire connecting from the aircraft to this building. That's probably how that guy," Murl gestured to the man with the weapon, "got in. It's like a zip line."

   Miles bent down and picked up the man's weapon, studying it before fitting into his bag with surprisingly little trouble. "Well, are we going or not?" he asked, pushing past Murl and heading straight for the elevator. I looked to Murl who shrugged and followed his cousin.

   Once we all got into the elevator, the aircraft's horn rang out from nearby. Miles took out three pairs of silver gloves that he tossed to Murl and me. He sure was prepared for this. Miles slipped his on and immediately grabbed ahold of the wire. The aircraft hovered a little bit higher in the air than the floor we were on, so there was an incline and we would have to hang from the wire and pull ourselves across it. I just hoped we had good grip the whole time.

   The building we were on had no places for footholds. Climbing down it was impossible, but the building just below the aircraft had a fire escape that would be perfect. If only we could make it that far across the wire, we could drop down onto the other building and get to the ground.

   Murl and I had no idea how many people would be able to fit on the wire at one time, so we both watched from the elevator as Miles began crossing the wire. This was when I found out the gloves we were wearing weren't just any old pair of gloves. Once they came in contact with the steel wire, Miles was sent forward, traveling over it quickly as if the gloves were charged with an energy.

   The aircraft shot many times at Miles, but it was too late because he dropped from the wire and landed safely on the roof of the building. Now that the officers had their weapons warmed up, it'd be a little more difficult for Murl to make it across alive. They began firing at me from the craft while Murl and I hid next to the hole in the elevator.

   I could see Miles through it all, getting the weapon that had belonged to the unconscious man. He brought one of the spikes up to the wire above him and used it as a saw. The aircraft's shadow shielded Miles from view as the wire finally ripped apart, sliding over the edge of the roof he was on. I watched as it dropped to the ground far far below us, hitting the side of the worker building Murl and I were in.