Lance crouched atop the ruins of the Empire State Building, preparing himself to take a human’s life. In one hand he held a small pistol, in the other he held a hand grenade. He preferred the pistol--a lot less blood that way. And today there would be bloodshed.
Pulling Binocular Goggles over his eyes, Lance surveyed the rubble below. He spotted the area that was clearest and locked the grenade’s coordinates to that spot. If he threw the grenade now, it would land precisely where he wanted.
That is, if he really wanted to murder the Emperor.
Zeppelins rumbled overhead. That meant the Emperor was not far behind--his watchdogs, the wizards, preferred zeppelins. The Emperor preferred wizards.
Lance took a deep breath and adjusted his position. He might as well be comfortable while he shot the Emperor.
Emperor Cornid, in his younger days, had killed millions of innocents. “We must weed out opposition,” was his mantra. And that he had done for the past half-century. He was a murderer, a greedy man, and--worst of all--a heretic.
Lance tightened his grip on the trigger. Squeeze, don’t pull, he reminded himself. This was only the second operation he had been through that didn’t involve magic. Magic was messed up, backfiring even when Wands worked perfectly.
A car rumbled somewhere behind Lance.
Lance focused on the clear spot, squinting his eyes, forcing himself not to think about the killing part.
Just squeeze the trigger, he thought. Let the bullet do the work.
Sweat glistened on Lance’s forehead. It dripped down and stung the cuts along his forehead, cheeks, and nose. The stinging reminded him of the spell that had backfired, flinging him out a window, fatally wounding his partner…This would be different.
The limousine came into view, crunching through the rubble until it came to the clear spot. Lance pulled the trigger and missed the tire he had been aiming for. The bullet ricocheted off a building and clattered into the rubble.
The driver of the limousine punched the gas and roared across the rubble. Lance fired again, hitting the hood of the car. A dull thud rang out, but no damage was visible. Lance gritted his teeth and leapt off the building.
He had no parachute, wings, or jet pack. He counted on magic. If it backfired--well, the General would kill him anyway if he failed on this mission. Might as well risk it.
Lance quickly solved an equation in his head and put it into play with magic. Magic was math--in a way. If you were good at math, you were good at magic.
The air around Lance shimmered and made his skin itch. Not that he cared while he fell several thousand feet. He felt himself slowing, getting under control. His feet touched the ground where there were skid marks from the car. By now, the car could be almost anywhere in the city.
Lance ran forward--just in time. Behind him, the air that had cushioned his fall, exploded and made the Empire State Building creak. One of its rusted supports buckled, and glass and metal sprayed hundreds of yards. Lance ducked behind a large boulder and waited for the shaking to end.
The building groaned and leaned towards Lance.
Now might be a good time to run, he thought. Then he leaped up and ran. Parts of the building crashed down all around him. A metal support nearly crushed his foot, and another smashed into an alley he was about to run into.
The bulk of the building groaned one last time and careened down. It ground into several other buildings, crashing, bending, screeching. Debris--large and small--banged around Lance as he ran and dodged. An old, battered desk fell out a window and smashed into his right arm. Sharp pain informed him it was broken.
Lance finally cleared the blasting zone of the Empire State Building. Without taking time to breath, he ran on, following the skid marks of the limo.
“Halt!” a wizard said behind him.
Lance veered into an alley, but a wizard blocked the way out. He turned and sped in the opposite direction, but he was surrounded.
“You didn’t think you could get away, did you?” Captain Limsky laughed. “Hello! We were right up there, following your every move.”
“Limsky,” Lance said. He stepped forward with malicious intent, but a wizard grabbed him. Lance knew better than to resist.
“Let’s see,” Limsky said, ignoring the tablet an orderly offered him. “You’re under arrest, Lance Raeburn, for treason, murder, theft, unlawful magic, disrupting the peace, and walking towards an officer with malicious intent. Did I miss anything?”
“Traitor,” Lance spat.
“Right,” Limsky said. “I thought I covered that one in ‘treason.’”
“Not me, Limsky, you! Why?”
Limsky gave Lance a long, smug look. He pulled a knife from his belt and raked it across Lance’s face. Crying out, Lance tried to reach up, but the wizards gripped him tightly.
“There’s a scar to match the one you gave me,” Limsky said. He smiled at the wizards. “Take him out of my sight.”
The wizards dragged Lance down the road and forced him into a building. They went into an elevator and waited while it scraped up to the top floor where a huge hole gaped in the ceiling. A ladder perched on the edge of the hole, leading up to a zeppelin that was docked just off the building.
“Into the zeppelin,” a wizard barked.
Lance struggled to get free, willing to take the risk now that his future seemed certain. If they took him onto that zeppelin, he would never come off again. Not alive.
A burly wizard--Tom--rammed his knee into Lance’s stomach.
“Into the Zeppelin!”
Lance allowed himself to be dragged across the landing, into the zeppelin. He made an act of looking worn out and sick. A plan was beginning to form in his head.
“We got ‘im,” Tom said to another wizard. “Limsky wants us to go on the preplanned course now. And this thing--”
Tom kicked Lance.
“This thing needs to go to the brig.”
Lance eyed the walls. Red arrows were painted on the sides, pointing, he assumed, to the main bridge. If he could just get there for a even a few moments…
Lance wrenched free and slammed his head into Tom’s face. He smacked a gruard out of the way and darted into a corridor. He followed the red arrows, trying to calculate how long it would take the wizards to catch up.
Alarms blared.
“A prisoner just escaped and is going towards the evacuation chamber!” a wizard shouted over the intercom. “First one to catch him gets extra rations tonight!”
Evacuation chamber?
Lance veered left, just barely dodging a group of wizards. They shouted and ran after him. One shot a fireball out of his wand. Lance dropped low and dived behind several crates. Exploding, the fireball filled the corridor with smoke. The walls were undamaged; magic proof.
Lance used the cover of smoke to sneak down the hallway. He knew that the wizards would be scrying for him, and that if he didn’t hurry, they would catch him. And since he had escaped, the law would allow them to kill him without a trial. It would just mean paperwork for Limsky.
“There he is!” the fireball wizard shouted.
Lance coughed and ran onwards. He dodged a cloud of stinging ice, a blast of pure electricity, and--
The walls around Lance shattered and sprayed wood all across the corridor. The walls were magic proof--there was only one wizard powerful enough to undo that.
Limsky laughed and fired a sphere of powerful gravity out of his palm again. As the sphere traveled, it gained more gravity. The walls bent in and imploded around Lance. Several shards pounded into his skin, penetrating beyond muscle.
Lance turned around and faced Limsky.
“What are you going to do?” Limsky chuckled as he undid gravity around himself. “Explode yourself again?”
Lance gritted his teeth and let loose a flurry of tiny, black shards. The shards whistled forward, but Lance didn’t stay to listen. He ran as quickly as he could, hoping there was no thread attaching him to the explosion about to follow.
A thunderous shockwave threw Lance off his feet. The walls around him caught fire; the explosion had gone beyond the threshold of the walls’ anti-magic barrier. Lance knew the zeppelin would explode if the fire wasn’t put out.
Oh well.
Lance stumbled to his feet again. The zeppelin shook, on fire outside as well as in. It slowly leaned to the left, and gravity seemed to dissapear as it fell. Grabbing hold of a rail, Lance ran forward. The rail shook and vibrated, jarring his hands as he pulled himself along.
The alarm became increasingly loud in Lance’s ears. Wizards rushed around him, but none tried to stop him. They had a bigger emergency on their hands.
A sign came into view. It said, “Brig,” in big, bold lettering. It wasn’t part of his plan but…anyone who was Emperor Cornid’s enemy was Lance’s friend. They didn’t deserve to die in the coming crash.
Lance blasted the door open. Heat clawed up his arm and red skin peeled back. The magic had almost backfired.
Lance ran through the doorway and fell down long, metal stairs. Inside the brig rattled and shook more than up above.
“Who are you?” said a fearful voice behind bars.
“Lance. I’m here to rescue all of you.”
“All of us?” the young boy’s voice asked. “I’m the only one still alive.”
Something in the zeppelin snapped. The stairway bent and creaked, nearing the point when it would be ripped apart.
Lance put his wounded hand on the lock. Something inside exploded, and the door swung open.
“Can you walk?” Lance asked.
Instead of answering, the boy stood up and ran. Lance followed after him.
Two minutes later the zeppelin exploded.
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