Shadow Walker

Bomb

They found the boxes in the last storage vault they searched. Typical. And Teegan wasted no time setting the fuse that would blow them up. Dec had had to bite his tongue when he saw that Teegan's fancy 'bomb' was nothing more than a waxed rope, which she stuffed under a loose end of packing tape before laying it along the wall of the vault and out into the main factory.

"How long do we have?" Dec asked as she flicked the spark wheel of her lighter and brought the flame close to the frayed fibres.

Teegan bit her lip. "I tested the combustion rate back at the shelter and counted the handspans I would need. But I didn't factor in such a dry, hot, room."

Handspans? Dec broke out into an immediate sweat thinking of all the possible angles of trajectory his body parts could take should the packages spontaneously combust. "Don't you think we should ...."

The flame caught, crackled and began making it's way down the length of rope. Teegan was up and running in an instant, passing a cluster of wires attached to a control panel on the wall.

Dec struggled in tow, shoulder jerking painfully with each step, sling making his gait lopsided. If someone had told him their city's fate would dangle at the end of a rope and the stretch of Teegan's fingers, he would've punched them. And yet here they were.