17: Smoke
Alex woke to the acrid smell of smoke and immediately knew that she’d run out of time. She wasn’t sure how far the fire had spread, but it wasn’t like she could stay in a burning building – for starters, the best case scenario involved her having to explain what she was doing squatting in an abandoned building in the first place, which she absolutely was not in the mood to do. No sooner had she grabbed her sword and darted out the room she’d been sleeping in, the first of her pursuers burst through one of the thin walls swinging a sword with the intent to take her head off.
Alex dove for the ground instinctively, which was both a good was to avoid having her head separated from the rest of her and a great way to avoid smoke inhalation. Her own blade hit the ground with a clatter, and Alex thought how stupid it would be for her to die here after making it this far. The thought gave her sufficient motivation to get her sword out of its sheath and cut her assailant’s legs off at the shin – or at least attempt to do so. Her assailant was a little more agile than that, and jumped backwards quickly enough that she only managed to give him a shallow cut across the shins.
That didn’t do much to incapacitate him, but it did give Alex enough time to get back to her feet and dive sideways through the doorway leading to the stairwell, thinking it best to get down to the ground floor and into the streets as quickly as possible. It was, as she should have expected, currently playing host to both an incredible amount of smoke and the rest of the team sent to kill her. Alex had been ready for the smoke part, but she was surprised by the sheer number of bodies standing between her and the exit.
“Stand down now, girl,” one of them shouted, “and perhaps you won’t have to die here tonight.”
For Alex, however, there was really no way out but through. She tightened her grip on her sword and charged.