Lluvio was already waiting for them at the other end of the vent shaft, fidgeting impatiently and snapping his eyes about to the depths of the surrounding halls. The bandit he had knocked out was thankfully still unconscious—gagged with his own shirt, hidden beneath a wall curtain the former had torn down in haste, and hogtied with the long tassel that had supported the curtain—but he wasn't certain for how long he would remain that way or how long before another bandit found him. It came as both a start and a blessing when he finally heard a resounding clang of metal as one of the kids pushed the grate aside after what felt like an eternity of waiting.
Joao was the first of the children to appear from the shaft, and as he began to climb out Lluvio lifted his arms up to catch the child by the waist before setting him aside and turning to repeat the action with the others. He gave his sister a small hug as she fell into his arms. Fuega was the last of the group to appear. A sigh of relief left him as he looked her over and found her unharmed, though his eyes widened in confusion at the large sword she bore in one hand and he wasn't prepared in the least for what followed as he helped her down.
Thwack! Her hand felt like a whip to his flesh as she smacked him hard across the face with a fiery, hard-set scowl. Immeadiately, he cupped his cheek, hissing with pain. "What was that for?!" he demanded when he got over his initial shock enough to speak.
"That's for making me face Chakal alone!" she barked in reply, waving the sword at her side. "Do you have any idea what I just went through? I had to flirt with that horrible, disgusting—Ugh!" She writhed uncontrollably at the memory.
He blinked in surprise, the words leaving his lips before he could stop them, "You flirted with him? He's a bandit and he's gotten farther with you than any of us back on campus have! How's that fair?" All too late he realized his mistake, nearly earning himself another smack on the other side of his face to match his already red cheek.
Watching the pair quarrel, some of the children snickered quietly to themselves, their smiles hidden behind their hands. Only Fuega's dangerous glare silenced them completely.
Lluvio was about to shoot another remark her way when a faint, golden glow suddenly appeared from the vent shaft out of the corner of his eye. First timid, the Book of Life slipped with careful grace from the opening and turned about as if searching for any signs of trouble. Following his gaze, Fuega smirked, dropped her weapon, and spread her arms out wide with her palms up in offering. The Book's fear seemed to evaporate at the sight of her and, with a swift blur of motion, it glided into her hands. The sheer size of it made her fall off balance and she grimaced before regaining her footing, a grin slowly making its way back to her features. Even with her arms extended at full length, however, it proved difficult for her to carry.
Whistling softly in amazement, his eyes still wide in shock, Lluvio stretched out a hand to touch it, but flinched back when the Book seemed to recoil at the notion. He then stepped away, watching curiously at the way Fuega fussed over it as if she would a child. "It really seems to like you," he snorted with a half-smile.
"Yeah?" she said, raising a brow in amusement, "Well, though I've never met a book I haven't liked, I think this one might be my favorite." The corners of her mouth twitched into a faint, honest grin and she blew a few loose strands of hair out of her face.
Redirecting her attention back to the Book, she addressed it fondly, "It's alright: You're safe now. He won't hurt you." Lluvio nearly fumbled back as she took a step closer to him, causing her to roll her eyes at the reaction. "It's damaged pretty badly and I can't carry it all by myself, you know."
"I can carry it!" Sasha nearly squealed, bounding up and down on the balls of her feet as she reached up with eager hands—her springy curls bouncing along with her. No, she couldn't. The Book was twice her size and could probably crush her flat, though both of Lluvio and Fuega were loath to break it to her and remained quiet in awkward silence.
Thankfully, the other children came to their aid. "We'll carry it," corrected Sanjay, shaking his head with good mirth as they stepped forward.
Careful not to drop the Book of Life, Fuega knelt down next to them as they lined up in pairs to accept the book in their shared grasp and carry it as one, with Sasha following in the back to offer a final helping hand and steer the group forward. Familiar with the children from earlier in the day, the Book acted comfortably—even cheerful—in their hands and its warm glow flared anew.
Lluvio watched the scene with laughter in his eyes until a dreadful realization suddenly hit him, erasing all of the relief he had first felt with the Book now in their possession. Damaged… "The Book of Life is damaged…" he murmured, running his fingers through his hair nervously. His breathing began to quicken in his panic, and he paced in front of the others as a startled mess of nerves. "If we bring the Book back to Xibalba like this, he'll—!" He forced himself to shut up, not wanting to reveal the deal he had made with the Lord of Death to his sister.
If we bring the Book back like this, it's bye-bye blue skies and hello six—feet under! He looked back to see Fuega staring at him, and could tell by her eyes and the way she bit her lower lip that she was thinking the same thing.
"We need to get the Book to the university," she said, resolve in her tone with the confidence of having a solid plan. "There should be tools there that I can use to fix it."
"But can you?!" he urged, unable to stop his words from pouring out a second time, "It's not exactly a kiddie pop-up book that you can tape back together!"
"I can try!" she yelled, clenching her fists at her side. Making herself simmer down before she fell into the roaring flames of her own emotions as she had alone in the throne room, she repeated, "I can try: I can do that much. Now," she reclaimed her sword from the floor before continuing, "We can't walk there—not fast enough. And it's not like that horse outside can carry all of us. Any bright ideas this time?"
Fueled by the determined heat radiating from his companion, he found himself nodding slowly in answer. "I think I saw some weird sort of carriage…thing, outside. I think they usually use it to bring prisoners here—it literally looks like a cage with wheels—but it's something."
"Well, the desperate can't be choosy," Fuega replied, readjusting her glasses out of habit with her free hand. "Let's just get going before someone sees us. You load up the Book and the kids, I'll hitch up the horse."
The short walk it took to make it back out into the courtyard was blessedly uneventful and luck seemed to smile on them when they found the gate of the prison carriage unlocked and all of the equipment to tie the horse to it there at their disposal. While Fuega temporarily abandoned their side to harness the steed, Lluvio helped the children into the morbid coach and scooted the Book of Life inside after them.
Chakal's enraged shout reached them before the sound of alarms blaring throughout the palace did, announcing that their time was up.
"We need to get moving!" shouted Lluvio over the noise as he slammed the door of the carriage shut, "Now would be nice!"
"We can't go anywhere until I've got this harness adjusted!" Fuega snapped from the front.
Lluvio cursed under his breath before making a mad dash around the carriage. They didn't have time to fool around! Granted, he had no idea how to help, but maybe a second pair of hands could speed things up!
A blur of motion shot out of the corner of his eye, and he just had enough time to fall back to the ground with a frightened yelp as a broad blade swung where is head had been not a moment prior. He heard Fuega scream his name from the opposing side of the steed as he stared up with widened eyes at the bandit now looming over him. While the foe smirked evilly in triumph, Lluvio staggered back along the earth to find himself pinned by the side of the carriage. "Leaving so soon?" the former chuckled, raising the blade above his head, "Here's your parting gift!"
Trapped, he could only raise a hand to defend himself: It was only good timing that he didn't have to. Jumping up into the small floorboard of the coachman's seat, Fuega sliced her own weapon through the air and blocked the strike. The blades trembled in their attempts to force each other back. "Behind every man is a woman," she sneered through clenched teeth, "with a big sword!"
With Fuega holding his attacker off, Lluvio kicked at the bandit's kneecap—effectively shattering it and causing the man to fall. He dove back around and stepped into the seat, rounding the young woman and snatching the reins in his grasp. Leather cracked as he whipped them and signaled the horse to move. In an instant, it sped off around the palace and rocked the whole carriage with it. The children screeched in fear as they were brutishly thrust against the bars by the sudden movement.
The motion also nearly thrust Fuega off of the carriage, and just before she could go tumbling Lluvio grabbed her by the back of her shirt and pulled her into the seat beside him. Another bandit tried to give chase on foot, jumping up only to be kicked off by the chest not a moment later. "¿Estás loco?" she exclaimed, turning to him with a wicked glare, "You're going to get us killed!"
"Sticking around any longer than we had to was going to get us killed!" he returned, only briefly glancing her way as he fought to keep his eyes on the streets. He guided the horse away from the castle and into the labyrinth of the city. "Are they following us?"
She craned her neck around, gripping the sword in her lap tightly. "Not yet," she answered, "but they will be. And they won't be lugging a cage of steel with them." Raising her voice to a shout, she asked, "How are you kids holding up?"
"Could be better…" groaned one of the boys.
For a few seconds, they could enjoy the peace. Everyone was safe. They had the Book. They were going to get it repaired. Everything was going to turn out alright.
Then Fuega remembered something with horror. "The breeching!" she shouted, pointing to the large strap of leather running down the horse's left side and wrapping around one of the carriage shafts, "I didn't get it buckled properly!" She set her weapon on the seat and began to stand, gripping tightly to one of the bars behind her to steady herself.
"What are you thinking?!" exclaimed Lluvio with worry, releasing the reins with one hand in attempts to force her to sit back down with the other.
"I'm thinking that at this speed, if I don't fix that then we're going to flip over!" she bit back.
Lluvio swallowed hard. She knew too much about this sort of thing to be exaggerating, but it wasn't as though they could pull over and if she tried fixing it now then she could wind up falling off and getting trampled in the end. Not only would she lose her life, but all chances of fixing the Book would go up in smoke. If it was only adjusting a buckle…
"You steer," he ordered, fighting back the quiver in his tone. He unsteadily rose to his feet as well as they raced down a long strip of road. Gripping her by the shoulder, he made her sit and squeezed the reins into her hands, white knuckles matching the pallor of his frightened features. "I'll take care of it!"
"Lluvio—!" she was about to retort, but he already began to slowly creep along the shafts of the carriage, both hands and feet propped on opposite ends as he held his head up to avoid being slapped by the horse's tail or kicked with its back hooves. Leaving her with little other choice but to trust in him and watch the road, she bit her lower lip and scoffed, "Well, be careful!"
"Please don't remind me!" he returned, frozen along the edge. "Otherwise I'm not gonna make it through this!"
Inch by inch, he crept along the shafts—nipping back trembling nerves. He could see what she meant now: Already the strap was beginning to loosen, and the buckle rattled noisily each time it struck the shaft. The moment it slipped was the moment they would die.
He lunged, pushing all his weight forward and wrapping his arms around the steed's neck. The startled animal took off at an even greater pace, almost knocking him off and causing Fuega to scream in response. His feet dangled momentarily from its side before he caught himself and was able to swing one across its back. He paused, gulping down air as he tried to get over his shock and get his thoughts in order.
"Are you alright?!"
"Please stop talking!" He released the horse's neck with one hand, and then the other as he twisted himself around to fold over its back—fumbling the straps until his fingers found the loose leather. He didn't need instructions to know to tighten it, and he looped the excess around the shaft once more for good measure before fastening the buckle.
A gun fired, some of the children screamed, and a loud ting of metal striking metal overpowered the pounding of hooves along the pavement. "We've got company!" Fuega announced, though that much he already knew. "Kids, stay down!"
Things just keep getting better and better! Somehow repeating the tedious process of getting across through greater difficulty and urgency, he next found himself back in the carriage seat—clinging desperately to the bars and not quite remembering how he got there.
Looking into the enclosure, he spotted the kids all huddled to the Book and each other—hands covered over their heads—in its center. From what he could tell, none of them had been hurt, and thankfully the bars were so close together that it made it unlikely for them to get shot. But as he peered into the darkness behind him, he could tell that their pursuers were gaining—four bandits, all riders and all of them armed.
His hand roamed to his back, where he had stashed the gun beneath his clothes, and paused there. Acting almost subconsciously, he began to scale the bars until he reached the roof of the carriage. Flattening himself against its surface, he kept hold with one hand, stuck his feet between the bars for further support, and tugged free the pistol with the other. He fired once in warning, and although he didn't hit anything, the fact that they could fight back seemed to cause the bandits to hesitate for they briefly slowed down.
From within the carriage, Sasha picked up the fallen bullet casing. "Lluvio?" she voiced worriedly.
"Just keep your head down, Sasha," he commanded, "It's gonna be ok."
No sooner had he said this did a bullet whiz over his own head. He glanced up once more to see them picking up pace yet again. The gun shook slightly in his hands and he fought to steady it as he raised it a second time. He wasn't a killer—he doubted he had it in him to end a life even if he had a clear shot—but he didn't want a repeat of what happened at the museum and he knew he had no room for hesitation. He fired again, and while he heard one of the bandits shout a curse with venom none of their pursuers slowed down any further.
One by one, he fired every bullet from his limited supply—each and every one a miss. With morality came relief, but holding dominance over all else that whirled in his mind was the pressing weight of the danger they were in. "Can't we go any faster?!" he shouted to Fuega.
"If only!" she returned, gritting her teeth as she tugged the reins hard to one side and forced the horse to make a swift turn to the right and onto another street. Lluvio clung tightly from his precarious perch and saw the kids and the Book rear back to one side of the carriage as their entire party was swung about. He heard more gunfire—saw chunks of brick blast off a building as they rounded it.
More treacherous than the main roads, the buildings grew more and more desolate and ravaged. One structure had completely caved in on one side, coating the street with rubble and leaving the inside bare for all to pear within. Mounds of debris stacked around them, and metal bars and wooden boards from higher levels of the damaged buildings hazardously supported whatever remained from the floors above them.
Lluvio's eyes widened with sudden thought. He turned his head first to what lay ahead of them, spotting a single beam remaining of a pair that had steadied the surviving balcony—naked of whatever cover had once protected it. He then looked back to find that their pursuers had entered their streets and were even closer than before.
"Stay close to the right!" he yelled to Fuega. "Just trust me on this!" he added, not even giving her the chance to ask why or make a retort. He heard her groan, but felt the carriage shift sideways beneath him. Good: Almost…
He lashed out at the beam with one foot the moment it was within reach. As it toppled over, it brought the balcony and part of the connecting wall down with it. He watched as the stone crumbled away in a heap in the middle of the road—a massive cloud of dust erupting in the destruction. He saw two of the bandits go down and the other pair pull away in order to save themselves from racing into range of the collapsing wreckage.
The victory, however, was short lived. The remaining pair of bandits and their steeds lunged through the cloud to come storming after them still, and gained ground with greater ferocity. Soon, one of them had pulled up to the side of the carriage, and Fuega had barely enough time to slip her arm through the reins in order to keep hold of them and raise her sword in defense as he rode alongside her. She cringed with effort as the bandit drove his own blade down upon her with one hand.
Lluvio cried out in warning as the second rode up along the other side. The latter unsheathed a bayonet from his side and got in close. Grinning, he got closer—preparing to thrust the weapon through Fuega's unguarded back.
Impulsively, Lluvio lunged from the carriage rooftop and sprung upon the bandit. He screamed upon landing—startling Fuega and nearly knocking her off balance once more by nearly landing on top of her—but successfully took the bandit by the arm and forced him off of his steed. Unsteadily, he slumped into the seat beside her.
Fuega recovered faster than her own opponent from the initial shock at this incident, and planted her foot against his side to kick him off in a similar manner to his ally. Safe once more, Fuega turned hotly to Lluvio and snarled, "Idiot! You could've sent us both flying off of this thing! Why can't you be more careful?" She continued to rant and rave, taking out her frustrations on Lluvio's dangerous maneuvers to defeat the bandits.
Then, a chill running down her spine, she silenced herself. For a moment, all that could be heard were the trotting of hooves along pavement—too quiet, too foreboding. "Well?" she demanded expectantly. Where was the usual, snarky reply? Lluvio always had a comeback, and she found that this silent treatment was eating away at her nerves greater than his antics typically did. "Lluvio!" she scoffed, gripping his shoulder tightly to force him to face her, "Answer me when I'm talking to you!"
He contorted around himself in agony at the movement. She gasped and her arm slipped slowly to her lap.
The bandit's bayonet had gone right through the left of Lluvio's abdomen—near his stomach—and the already a soaking red pool had blossomed from the wounds.
Once some of the pain had subsided, Lluvio allowed himself a soft chuckle as he observed her brows contorting in confusion and distress. He looked down at the twin, newly-made openings in his side, as if noticing them for the first time, then looked back up into her eyes with a tired smirk. "Why is it that every time I try to help you," he chortled weakly, rubbing blood-painted fingers together with intrigue, "I wind up bleeding?" His eyes languidly fluttered shut. His body began to slump sideways.
Fuega screamed as she caught him before he could fall from the carriage seat.