Natural. She's panicking so I shouldn't take anything personal.

“You need to relax, Flora.” You walk over and unlock her handcuffs. “I was just kidding.”

Flora rubs her wrists and looks up at you. “I’m sorry.” Then, to your surprise, she wraps herself around you and hugs you tightly. You find her trembling and hold her in return. “I’m so scared that I’m started to lose control of myself.”

The warmth of her body invades your clothes. All the memories of Delilah come back in an instant and you squeeze her. “Don’t worry about it. You’re going to get out of here in one piece.”

Without wasting another second, you both leave the cell room and get back into the vents. “One of these paths need to lead to the outside world again. Perhaps then we should search for the others.”

“We only need Kenji. Scarlet might be...Gone. You didn’t see anyone else in there, did you?” Flora says in a low voice. “Did you hear anything about Kenji?”

“No,” you grimace. “But, I overheard some other things from the person I stole the keys from. It sounds like something else is going on out here, so we should be careful. There’s no telling what is happening.”

A few bad jokes about dying in the vents are told, but the longer you crawl around, the less funny they seem. Fortunately, you feel a cold breeze shoot through the vent; often enough, you can track down one of the vents near a door that was being opened. Once the coast is clear, you slip out of the vent and use the same door causing the draft.

As soon as you both escaped outside, you huddled close to each other, hopping alleyways to avoid patrols, getting closer to where you had embarked into the city.

Nothing changes until you dip into yet another alleyway to hide from yet another passing patrol. Flora groans beside you and leans against the wall. “These people must be messing around like crazy to have this many patrols.”

You poke your head out and scan the area before retracting back into the shadows. “Quantity over quality, right?”

Just then, an entire squad rolls by. Each of them bulky and armed to the teeth with rifles that sparkle with polished barrels. Flora adjusts. “More like quality with quantity…”

You don’t reply to that. You think you’d spiral out of control if you started to accept the entire situation as being hopeless for you. All that truly mattered was getting out of the Heights area; all you had to do was wait for a chance to present itself to you…

An opening started to show yourself to you. The streets were witnessing a dry spell. You stiffened your back and told Flora to get ready to run for it again - a little more push, and you’d both be seeing each other out of this place finally. Flora was so close to your back that you felt the heat from her body slowly coat over yours.

Your feet dug in, your vision narrowed, and you got ready to bolt. You were so confident between the distance between you and the wall that you thought if Flora could keep up, you’d be able to scale over it and keep running. Instead, however, seconds before you could start your run, the ground shook, and the air boomed. You exchanged looks with Flora, but before you could say anything, you see all the earlier patrols shift their attention to wherever that explosion happened. There’s a new round of yelling and running as the entire wall crawls with soldiers. By the time they’ve all moved, there’s nothing but a skeleton crew left tending to the wall. Just like the ones that left, however, they still look like a considerable threat, but if it happened, a firefight wouldn’t be the **** of you. Fortunately, you don’t have to test that theory when you scale over the wall.

You make it back to the horses. It’s just you and Flora there, but you aren’t exactly taken aback by this information. To mount your horse to leave, but Flora stops you.

“We should wait for the others,” she pleads. “Just in case they are still trying to escape.”

The town you had just left is burning. Silhouettes of tiny black dots of men bounce from corner to corner, stopping the spread of the fire. You could hear orders being shouted in the distance while they scrambled amongst each other, but you chose not to strain your ears for nothing.

“I bet Kenji or Amari started that fire with that explosion earlier,” Flora breaks the silence. “Those two think with fire when they’re in a pinch.”

“That’s a little wild,” you tell her. “There could be innocent people in there.”

Flora shrugs. “Their fault for holding us captive.”

Whether you agreed or not, you heard some movement in the brush that brought you back to the surrounding area. What follows after is a groan and an annoyed plea to hurry. Three figures break the tree line, and it’s the rest of your crew, even Kenji. Scarlet is with them, thankfully, but she’s looking bruised too. The last person you notice is one you can’t admire or spot any characteristics because it’s too dark, but you can piece together that it’s Amari.

There’s a round of questions exchanged between all accompanying members of this unexpected reunion, but Kenji reminds everyone that he’s been shot and needs proper medical attention. Amari hits his side, and he grunts. She makes a sarcastic remark with a stifled laugh but agrees they need to return to somewhere private. She makes eye contact with you, her smile flattened in an instant. She B-lines to Scarlet and has a very brief conversation with her that is heard by no one else besides them. Scarlet looks up at you too, but all she does afterward is just shake her head at Amari.

The ride back is nice, you suppose. Even as it begins to snow again, you don’t let it distract you from the fact you just broke out of the worst situation you have been in since your career as a contractor. Even through the scare of Kenji getting shot, you didn’t lose anyone; not even Flora had been moody after you got out of your own cell. You glance up at the column of horses with their organic payload of humans. You, Kenji. Scarlet, and now Amari. You wonder with the main hunching back what this will mean. Pay raise? A lecture? More running around? Alexandra might be dead for all you know. You hide your face when you remember pissing all over you during your last sexual session. Where did that come from?

From the rear, you notice that the column is shifting. Someone has stopped and is waiting for you to catch up to them. You suspected Flora, but it’s Amari. She rides beside you, not saying anything, but you can still feel her eyes occasionally shooting you a glance and clearing her throat, making it painfully clear that she wants you to start a conversation.