Valour

Chapter 11- The Plan

Crash.

I cringe at the blow of glass breaking.

Cal lunges into the opening and I get a view of his-

I look away biting the inside of my cheek.

The opening is just wide enough for the broken shards not to cut his skin. I feel like this is one of Cal's signature entrances. Jumping uninvitedly through windows, remembering the first time I laid eyes on him, thinking he was the bringer of death. Despite our new found trust, I still don't know a single thing about him and he doesn't seem like an open up and share what you're feeling type of person.

Cal fully shimmies inside and then turns around, his arm stretches back out through the opening, the palms of his semi gloved hand outstretched facing me. I stare at it.

Cal shakes his arm impatiently.

"What's wrong ?'' I ask. Looking around to see if he dropped anything. We're situated at the side of the train station, where a large platform overgrown with weeds and trees is laid out for trains to stop at and let ghosts get into. We broke what looked like a small ticket booth to enter the actual building itself. Graffiti decorates the walls. I read them distractedly,
"RUN." one them says scrawled on the wall beside the window booth. A cold sweat begins to form.

Cal shakes his outstretched palm again, the inside is too dark to discern anything.

"What do you want?" I ask, putting my arms on my waist.

"Give me your hand." he hisses.

Irritated, I swat his hand away. "Do I look like a fucking damsel in distress? I don't want your help getting in a building that's on the ground floor. I've climbed worse things."

He immediately pulls his hand back, saying nothing and I hear him step deeper into the room.

I scramble through after him.

I'm surprised to find that it's significantly warmer inside. Realizing just how much the temperature has dropped, and I'm tempted to put my windbreaker back on. I walk into the semidarkness, my eyes slowly adjusting to the tiny slivers of light cascading from the unknown. The room is empty save for the narrow door opening leading into an abyss of more darkness. I hold my rifle steadily out in front of me, my knees bent ready for a fight. I hear rustling on the other side, then the familiar sounds of combat boots thudding on the floor

"Sky?" Cal whispers.

I walk inside the room. This place is bigger than it appears from the outside. We're standing in a large rectangular room, which I'm assuming served as a waiting area. Old holstered seats line the area in aisles, reeking of mildew, their cushions ripped and torn out in some places. The roof high overhead is finely decorated with arches dipping downwards carved from plaster. For some reason I expected the inside to be completely overrun with nature, but it seems we've left all of that outside. Weird. I walk past them towards Cal, who's waiting for me at an entrance to a staircase. He held his hand out in a fist, motioning for me to stop. He looks over his shoulder,

"I'll take you to the roof. Stay up there, I'll take care of the players in the building."

Panic rises in me, Cal quickly adds, "I won't leave you don't worry."

My heart rate instantly slows down, good.

Immediately I kick myself, stop acting like this. I don't need Cal to feel safe.

We make our way up the stairs. They're narrow and short, and we reach the darkness of the second floor, the solid ground doesn't groan under our combined weight and I'm grateful for the stealth. Cal stops and checks the scanner once more, the blinking dots read ten meters away. Apprehension holds onto me in a vise-like grip. The enemy could be just standing around the corner or on the very utmost floor, either or. The scanner doesn't tell us. Darkness breaks through the window, as the last dredges of daylight flicker out, it feels almost like we'll encounter a ghost rather than an actual player. Almost.