by Daniel Evora
The single white light revealed a fourth figure along with revealing the other three. But, I didn’t need the light to know that it was what I imagined. In the very middle of the shot was Ben tied to a brown, wooden chair. He never looked directly at the lens. In fact, Ben hardly moved an inch. Clothed in the same blue inmate jumpsuit, it was unzipped halfway down his torso with bits of blood on the white shirt under the suit. His hair, shaggy, and his lip swollen.
The two figures in the background were Sam and Adrana. The two of them stood still where they were while Adam slowly stepped around Ben’s chair until he was behind him. Adam stared straight into the camera lens and slid out his white katana. He rested it in his dominant hand.
Adam pointed the tip of his blade towards the camera. He looked right at me.
“Before you ask,” Adam thundered. “General Perez is alive. You didn’t think I’d be that stupid to leave him behind there with you. You’ve put on quite a show, and I respect your determination, but now it’s time to end this.”
He reached into his pockets and held out a small remote with a trigger.
“You have twenty minutes to turn yourself in. If you don’t then we’ll just have to end this early. If you come in with anyone other than yourself. I will pull the trigger as well. Twenty minutes, Nathaniel. You’ll know where to find me.”
All the screens switched back to their normal image when on the other side of the courtyard, another group of Rebels showed themselves as they busted through the doors. As I knelt in front of the bomb. I stared at the timer as it ticked and ticked itself closer to zero minutes and zero seconds.
Sara jogged towards me.
“Did you guys see that?”
I continued to stare at the timer. The sound of the beeping clock put me in a trance of thought. While I stared into deep space, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I took a step back and took my mind back to the live broadcast shown moments ago.
“Nate?” called Pete after he shrugged at Sara.
I couldn’t hear anything but only my memories. I took a picture of the broadcast within my mind to observe the surroundings when Adam turned the light on. The dark brown wood flooring. The chair that Ben was sitting in. The desk on the side of the room is illuminated from an angle creating a shadow that cast itself onto it. Then, I went back to the conversation we had in his office. When he had given me the katana. All these things I remembered. I couldn’t get the small details out of my mind. They took their place by force within the front of my mind as if...as if they had been there the whole time.
That’s when I opened my eyes and everything around started moving again like normal. The beeping sound made its way back, and I frowned with the realization of where I had to be. Where I had to go.
Pete came up from behind and tapped my shoulder.
“You okay, kid?” he wondered.
“I think I know where he is,” I declared.
“Well, come on let’s go,” rushed Sara. Many of the troops began to move out as well.
“Wait.”
“What?” questioned Pete.
“I’m going in there alone.”
“I’m sorry, but not a good plan,” he objected.
“You heard what he said. I’ll go in alone. Stay here, Pete and keep me posted with the time on that bomb. Sara, you’re coming with me. Take only three others with you. Follow me from a distance. Don’t come into the building.”
“It’s a trap you know,” Pete speculated.
“I know, but the only reason Ben is there is because of me. I need to finish what I started.”
Chapter 12
The Renegade
There was not a doubt in my mind that I hadn’t figured out Ben’s hiding spot. Second thoughts were virtually non-existent as well. I was so certain in fact I nearly felt as if I could walk in and take Adam down myself. Like I had superpowers of some kind. But, I knew I had to look at things in a much more realistic sense. It was just me and whatever, or whoever, was waiting on the other side.
Sweating bullets from jogging, I was near the destination and looked down the long street of where my mind had set Ben at. It had the image of a ghost town. At least Avil Ranch had more people roaming about it’s streets than this one road in Qeles City. The wind I could feel a bit on the side of my face had also faded like a ghost. The only few people left were the street market folk who would sell food. As soon as the wind ceded, those few quickly scurried and closed up their little shops and peeked through to watch me stroll along the empty street. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes.
The silence was so intense that I could even hear myself breathe through my nose, and the beating of my heart. The chaffing of my outfit. The clicking sound of my footsteps and crumbling while I stepped on some trash. Each one was more difficult to make than the last.
One of the people I attempted to look back at. But, as we met eyes they instantly hid.
“Twenty minutes,” informed Pete, as the walkie beeped to signal his voice.
It had all come to this.
I’d never thought I would be here.
But, it had to be done.
Once I was in close proximity to the building, a sudden rush of memories and nostalgia flowed throughout my body. I almost felt like shedding a tear. Slowly I placed my left hand on the top of the fence gate and pushed it open. The metal gate squeaked as there was rust that formed on the swiveling mechanism.
The concrete path up to the porch was filled with cracks and the grass had spread while growing in them. Everything in front of the porch was either overgrown, uncut, or dirty. All of the asters, orchids, and daffodils were all the same lifeless hue.
As I stepped up on the porch. The steps creaked and were fragile. The windows were missing their clear glass panes and had been boarded up with pieces of plywood. Some of them were spray painted with graffiti. I reached for the door handle, but as my hand bumped it the door had opened up a bit. The lock was broken, and the door left slightly open by a couple centimeters.
As soon as I stepped into the building I pulled my gun out and my katana. Using up one hand each, I carefully took light steps. Many of the wood walls and floors were decaying. Some of the walls had gaping holes in them, exposing the support structure and electrical wires hidden behind the drywall.
I raised the walkie to my mouth, pressed the button, and spoke with silence.
“Alright,” I murmured. “I made it.”
By making as little noise as possible I tucked away the walkie-talkie and stepped towards the end of the hallway where the stairway was. Beside the back door.
I stopped and looked left, right into the study and found nothing of consequence. It was only a bunch of dusty furniture. The recliner seat had been torn to shreds. The coffee table was missing two legs, and the large sofa wasn’t there anymore. All the other furniture that was here was gone, beaten up, or dirty as well. Even the exposed wall right up against the staircase had a broken bar of steel lying on the floor in front of the first step.
Creeping up the staircase to the second floor I waved both my weapons towards the open area. It was dimly lit by the sunlight peeking through the crevices on the wooden boards covering the old windows. Every step had the creak in it at this point, not just the second to last one like before. Light on my feet, I walked down past the office and further down towards another hallway, and at the end were two doors across from each other.
“Seventeen minutes,” Pete updated.
For a quick moment my hand trembled from hearing his voice out of nowhere in such a quiet place.
With my closed fist I pushed open the door on the right with swift haste while checking each corner, and pointing my gun in every direction.
Suddenly, a single, bright light switched within the room. It beamed and reflected it’s light around the room. Revealing Ben in his chair and the camera in front of him. I approached him and put away my rifle.
I knelt down to his level and held his face upright from his sitting p
osition. His eyelids heavy, he slowly opened them and winced. His jaw bruised, and a bit of blood running down from above his left eyebrow that had dried up somewhat. Ben looked at me for a moment and closed his eyes once more.
“Ben?” I muttered, while gently shaking his shoulder.
He began to fold up in his chair as I tried to keep him upright with my hand. I could not even imagine the physical pain that he’d be feeling at the moment.
“Hey, stay with me. I’m gonna get you out of here,” I quietly explained to him.
I stood up on my feet and brought my walkie out once more, holding down on the talk button.
“Sara, I found him on the second floor. I’m gonna…”
Then, that’s when I stopped speaking to her. Since the floor was so silent and void of sound it made every noise that much louder. That’s when I heard another. I literally paused, let my thumb off the button, and froze. I told myself that my ankles were being tied to cinder blocks.
Sara tried to contact me, while the walkie loudened her voice.
“Nate? Nate, you alright. What’s going on? Hello?”
I raised my hand in the air, and just sat there. Every cell in my body was certain who was standing and watching me from across the hallway. Two steps they took, most likely towards me.
They spoke only two words at first.
“You’re not going anywhere,” the person commanded. “Drop it.”
I was assuming that they were talking about the walkie so I let go of it as it struck the floor with a bit of force.
“The rifle.”
I tossed the rifle towards Ben’s feet.
“Walk back towards me.”
I stepped back into the hallway as I could sense them right behind me. Then, I took a deep breath.
“I don’t want to fight you.”
“You don’t get to choose!” they retaliated.
“There’s always a choice,” I argued, as I turned to her. “Adrana.”
There she was, standing in the doorway of the old girls dormitory. I stared straight into her eyes, as she looked back at me, raging, with a gun in her dominant hand. Her sharp attitude had only gotten worse from the last time I ran into her.
Her goal was much more focused and attainable by that logic.
I attempted to step closer. But she wouldn’t give me an inch as she repointed her gun straight to my face. Right between my eyes.
“Are you gonna kill me?”
She stared at me with a focused rage building up inside her. Gripping the gun firmly, while I glanced at the barrel right in front of my chest. Adrana put her finger on the trigger, signaling that I were to take another slight or sudden move at all, that I would get shot.
“What are you waiting for?” I doubted.
The longer she and I stood and stared at one another the harder it was to keep still. Adrana averted her eyes to the trigger and her index finger that relaxed itself onto its surface.
Making use of my opening as her attention drew away for a second while glaring at her trigger finger, I jolted forward in quick succession and put both hands on her gun pulling it away from her right hand. I tilted my head past the center of the barrel to get out of the way in case the bullet fired on accident. Unfortunately while I went for the gun and took out the clip, Adrana saw that opportunity to go for my katana. Swiftly sliding it off my belt and pointing the tip to my neck. All happening in a matter of seconds, I dropped the empty pistol in my hand and raised them both in the air when she pointed my own blade at me.
Pete spoke through the walkie I dropped as well.
“Eleven minutes, Nate.” the walkie transmitted.
With her left hand, Adrana laid eyes on her InterFace watch and spoke into it.
“I’ve got him right here, Mr. West” she told him on the other side. “He won’t be going anywhere.”
“Good,” Adam replied. “You know what to do.”
Adam’s voice ended and she put down her hand and approached me with caution.
“I told you…that it would come to this. Time, and time again, I tried to warn you, but look where we are now,” scowled Adrana. “Enemies.”
“I’m not your enemy,” I retaliated.
“You don’t understand...I have to do this...I have to kill you,” she explained. Suddenly, her face warped from that of rage, to that of fear as she whispered. “Or he’s gonna kill me.”
“We can find another way,” I implored. “Adrana, please. I’m running out of options here.”
“So am I,” shot Adrana.
Moments after she spoke, she swung her katana at full speed near the level of my neck as I ducked under and evaded down the hallway. At the end of her swing, missing me by a hair, the blade followed through and lodged itself into the left wall. Violently pulling away from it, Adrana charged as I attempted to avoid every single attack. The more she missed my body the more she put her weight into each swing. Each one more intense and frustrated than the last. All I could hear was her yelling, and the whooshing noise of my katana cutting through the air like an arrow.
Adrana backed me against the stairwell as she pushed me onto the weak guard rail. The top of the wooden rail and the pillars holding up upright, collapsed upon bearing my own weight. Since I was leaning onto it, all of my weight went down with the broken parts down the stairwell as my face hit the wall and I rolled over on my back, sliding down each step. Adrana stepped down as I hit the bottom, grunting in pain.
I got up and looked at her while she approached me slowly from the stairs.
“I’m not gonna fight you,” I declared, wiping the blood off of my bottom lip. Then, I picked up the stray metal bar I found earlier, next to the wall up against the stairs. Preparing for an attack, going into a proper stance.
“I thought you said you wouldn’t fight,” ridiculed Adrana.
Three different attacks she went for in three different directions consecutively, while defending my spot. Since I had the advantage of experience, I was able to block all of them with her final blow hitting the hardest as we stuck in a cross, putting her weight and force on the katana.
I looked directly at her and replied, “I’m not.”
As I ducked under my blade and allowed Adrana to plummet to the floor with all her weight, I jogged my way towards the back door and bumped the face of it with my shoulder. The structure was weak enough to the point where the lock broke straight through the wall as I rushed towards the garden. Right behind me, Adrana charged with full force as I blocked all of her intensive attacks and swung towards my own body. I could see her own mind collapsing in her eyes. It wasn’t just anger, but something else mixed in with it.
Then, her final attack was so strong that the impact could not be fully absorbed by the metal bar. She screamed so loud it made me flinch. I lost grip of the bar while I fell on my bottom and backed up to the entrance of the greenhouse.
She squinted her eyes arrogantly upon realizing that I was no longer armed. She swung for my head as I backed up into the greenhouse. She missed my head and hit the broken glass door. The remaining shards fell and shattered on the floor.
I backed up even more between the two rows of wilted plants and dry, coarse dirt. Every attack I was able to dodge. Some of them only by a hair length. The blade collided and sliced through the potted plants while the ceramic debris made a mess on the floor. Once I started to run out of room, I eventually went for my katana by striking her hand with my palm and swiped my katana from her grasp.
That’s when she used her final attack.
As soon as Adrana felt the katana leave her grip she reached to her waist and brought out an object that made me freeze.
“Move, and they all die,” dared Adrana, holding up the trigger for me to see clearly.
I glanced over to the trigger and saw the timer counting down on it. I had less than two minutes.
“Look,” I explained, letting my guard down. “Whatever I did to make you this way...I’m sorry.”
“I’m sure yo
u are!” she shouted back.
“Why the anger? The hate?” I questioned her.
Adrana paused for a second. She thought to herself for a couple moments; didn’t speak a word for about three seconds, but then the words came through like a freight train.
“You don’t have to do this. Please.”
Adrana took in my words, shaking her head, and broke down in tears.
“I don’t want to, but I have to,” she cried under her breath.
“We’ll find another way.”
She continued to shake her head. “You can’t. He’s watching.”
I put my free hand to my waist only to grab nothing but air. That’s when I remembered that the walkie talkie I was trying to grab with my hand was still inside the building on the second floor. In desperation, I quickly looked around to see if there was anyone I could spot in the distance.
“It’s no use.”
The timer reached thirty seconds, and Adrana lifted one of her fingers holding onto the trigger; hovering over the disarm button.
Then, I noticed what she was about to do.
“What are you doing?” I asked with my eyes widened.
“You said earlier that I always have a choice, so I’ve decided,” Adrana replied.
Her hand trembling, she slowly put pressure onto the disarm button. The trigger beeped, and the timer paused at seven seconds before zero. My stomach dropped as I reached out to her and tried to run as fast as I could towards her.
Even my heart stopped.
Peaceful. It felt peaceful standing there behind the--clear as day--glass. We both had a sense of familiarity. I looked over out the window, and watched the tall skyscrapers reflecting the sunlight in that mellow yellow-orangish hue. Flowing like waves across the sky. I could see the clouds moving as its droplets of water bounced off the sunlight with a mixture of both colors. Then, she stepped right up next to me and watched the same sight as well. It was like we were watching a moving painting. With the hints of the ambient city noises.
