City of Fog

18 The Height of the Night

The impact twisted my hip bad, so bad that even the slightest shift felt like a fire burning on my side, other than that I was fine, just a couple thousand tiny scratches here and there, no big deal. But when I tried to stand up my whole body groaned in mass protest, threatening to overthrow my conscience.

I come so far, I am not just going to walk away, after all he done to us. So just move my god dammed legs!

That moment my will triumphed over, my foot was set in place, back arched, head facing forward, then upwards as I scanned the surroundings. The place was a wreck, not a single crate left un-shattered. Too make matters worse, the wooden debris from the shattered crates jutted out from all sides like sharp stakes. From what I saw, the previous entrance has been buried underneath the debris, the only I could go was ahead. The entrance of what is possibility Francisco hideout.

He was going to pay, every last bit of it. Holding onto that thought, I took a bold stride towards the door, with the debris cracking beneath my feet. And it was that moment a question hit me hard:

What am I going to beat him with?

The original plan involved a split team scenario where, I and Yoshino will find Francisco and deal with him in our own ways; I will deal with uncovering his illusions, and Yoshino will go for the take out the actual Francisco with me pin pointing it for her. But that was before Yoshino was driven mad by the vision. At the time my plan was truly in ruins, and my head grew light at the thought of it. And the moment I straightened my back, I felt something cracking beneath my shirt. Nauseating, I lifted up my shirt to check, sure enough there was some plastic case cracked beneath my shirt...

The memory came back to me like a punch, I can't believe how much of a moron I am! As I recall at the time, I had this phony plastic time bomb on me that I stitched together last night, in a last ditch effort. Basically I converted my black electric alarm clock, into a timer that actually starts counting down when I press a specific button....and more than that, when I scan my eyes across the space one last time, a genius plan came across me, one that was so good a little laugh escaped from me just from the thought of it. Truly I have gone mad as I scooped up a handful of fallen gunpowder around me, and began to rub myself all over with it. I smeared myself with so much of that stuff, I was literally a standing shadow. And with that hint of madness and rage still boiling inside me, I began climbing my way through the wreckage, all the way to the last door.

***

On the other side of the door was dark long corridor, so dark no lights penetrated deeper then 3ft, and I felt I still have a mile to walk. But really the actual walk wasn't that long, not even close to a hundred meters, but it was the darkness that made it felt like eternity. Feeling less confident after step, I traced my hand across the wall, until suddenly I hit a wall, until I realize it wasn't a wall, it was a door. I gave it pull but it wouldn't budge, and tried several more times. Before finally giving it a push instead, a like that the door opened smoothly.

What an idiot I am. I thought to myself. But as soon as I walk through the door, I was stunned by the scenario. About 30ft away from me was Aurora wrapped in changes, dangling head down over a pit of lava and Aine nowhere to be seen. And as soon as I arrive, Aurora eyes flew open and began to scream for me:

"Help Ying! Get me out of here! Please!" Tears swell in her eyes, as the run down her cheeks like living sapphires. Her expression, the heat, her voice, it was all too, but it was her sentence that made me think twice.

I take a step back calmly and said:

"Nah, you hang in there."

Despite the tears, she blinks back at me in confusion.