Chapter edited by: Potentialslayer1
Myka felt her body was stretched out at an odd angle. She forced her heavy eyelids open in curiosity. As she opened her eyes she let out a cough, hindering her from adjusting to her surroundings straightaway. She gasped for breath before taking in her surprising surroundings. The floor of her room at the Head Quarter's hotel had collapsed. It was slanted from the story it was previously a part of, down to the floor beneath, not unlike a ramp. There the bed was at the bottom of the slope. There was so much rubble, along with part of the ceiling underneath the bed, making it at an awkward slant. Myka sat her, rather rejuvenated, body up to focus her sights on the bed, but was having some difficulties due to all the dust and ash in the air that was lit up in bright yellows and reds from the sunshine that seeped through the giant hole in the outer wall. The mattress had peculiar scorched markings around the corners, but there was a perfect circle that went around the bed, like the centre of it had been protected. The sheets in the middle were not burnt but were hardened and brown with a strong reek of blood to them. An I-beam was just over Myka's head which pierced through the wall and into the neighbouring room beside her.
The woman's eyes watered in reaction to all the particles and heat in the air, as she tried to fathom how she had found herself in the situation. After a brief moment she realized that she was not alone, a body was pressed into her lower side, and a head lay on top of her lap. Her hand had a sharp pain through it as well, which seemed to be in-between her and the other person. She abruptly took her free hand and whipped her eyes, clearing her vision up a bit, before looking to the mass laying on top of her.
"HG!" she gasped out, knowing those raven locks.
Myka took her one arm and turned the other woman over on her back, laying her right next to her. HG was still, too still. The brunette raised her hand to check her pulse, but then discovered that it was tacked together with HG's and, what looked like, a book. She winced in pain towards her hand while she had it extended. Her eye then caught on a light that emanated from the nail that held them together. It glistened for a brief moment when she moved, then went back to a rusted colour just as her pain had also dissipated.
Myka's eyes widened as she recognised the artefact from one of her inventory days at the Warehouse. "Shit, Crist's Crucifixion Nail," She burst out while taking her free hand, moving it as quick as lightning, to grab the end of the artefact, and with a thunderous grown, she pulled it free from both their hands.
Fresh blood came pouring out from both their palms. Myka smiled in relief at the sight of the blood from HG's hand. Her heart was still beating. The American grabbed part of the sheet and wrapped it around the other woman's hand. She then did the same to her own, but as she was horribly binding it, she noticed med supplies tossed at their feet. She shot for a roll of gauze, like it was a hundred dollar bill about to fly away in the wind. She wrapped it around her own hand first, and then moved to HG's.
Once both of them were bound to the best of her abilities, she leaned over to HG and checked her pulse. It was weak but consistent. With a sigh of relief she took a moment to just calm down. She really should have been trying to figure out how they were going to get out of their pocket of space, with only a small hole in the wall as the only exit. But instead she slunk her body down next to HG's and wrapped her arms around the woman, pulling her close. She just needed a moment to process. She just held the unconscious woman, that she knew had nearly sacrificed her life for her own. She gently took HG's head in her bloodied hand, and brought it to her chest, resting her chin on her cobalt head. She closed her eyes while inhaling the woman's Lavender scent mixed with the metallic smell of the blood that surrounded them. She had missed her dear friend over the years. She hadn't realized this until now. Her anger had masked all other emotions that she had for her. She had forgotten why her betrayal those four years ago, was so hurtful. She had cared so much for her that she couldn't take the thought of HG ever wishing to harm her. The fact that she tried to destroy the entire world didn't faze the American, it was the personal pain that the Victorian had caused her. But for the first time Myka acknowledged the reality that HG didn't destroy the world because she couldn't bring herself to destroy her, Myka Bering.
The Brunette's eyes started to tear as she kissed her beloved friend on the top of her head and whispered, "I'm so sorry Helena. I believed in you then hated myself for doing so. I made you do this. I made you prove yourself to me." She stroked her raven hair and sniffled with tears streaming down her face, "But the reality is. I never stopped believing in you." Myka stopped caressing the woman's hair as she finally realized where the source of all her hurt and anger were coming from. She muttered so quietly that she could barely hear it herself, "I never stopped loving you."
Just then Myka's ears tweaked to a familiar sound, she let go of HG; gently resting her back on the mattress as she, once again, sat up on her one elbow. She could see the outdoors through the large hole in the wall mere metres away. The building was smoking making the scenery out there look like a smoggy haze. But after a short moment she made out an image that brought on a laugh of pure relief. There was Williams hanging from the familiar rope ladder of HG's airship, about eighty metres away. He was slowly being guided down and towards the gaping hole in the wall. Myka had to really give props to the pilot, he was quite amazing. She assumed he must have had a military career as a helicopter pilot or something of that manner.
Myka climbed over top of HG and off the bed. She had to be careful of all the debris on the ground and the rebar protruding out at her from every which direction. She carefully climbed over objects making the short distance to the hole. Looking down she could see that half of the building was no longer standing, and then the worry of structural integrity entered her mind. Gazing back up, she saw Williams, still slowly, being guided right to her. When he made it to about three metres away, Myka smiled, "You know, we really must stop meeting like this."
The man grunted a smirked for a brief second as he grabbed a hold of some rebar that protruded from the wall, and pulled himself into the opening, with great strength, positioning himself right next to Myka. "We don't have much time," He shoved the ladder into Myka's hand, where she had to abruptly reach for the wall to anchor herself down, as the rope tried to hank itself free from her. "Whatever you do, don't let go of that," he said while quickly making his way over to his captain on the bed. He grabbed her up with one quick motion while Myka strained to not let go of their exit strategy, as the rope almost made her cry out in pain as it pulled at her bandaged hand. Williams, awkwardly steeping over debris, with HG in his arms making his was back to Myka.
The airship was drifting ever so slowly over top of the building, where Myka was using all her strength to not let go of the tension building ladder. Williams repositioned HG to lie over his big broad shoulder as he grabbed the rope back from Myka. "Get up there quick," he ordered her where she was fast to get on it and climb up a few rungs with him holding the bottom. Before she knew what was happening, she found her grasp quickly tighten as she hugged the ladder close while her body swung out. She felt like she was back at the Warehouse on the zip-line. After prying her eyes open, which she had not realized were squeezed shut, she looked down to see Williams holding HG, still over his shoulder, at the bottom of the ladder. All three of them were suspended in midair, being flown over their smoking, destroyed headquarters to land back in the initial clearing where they had an emergency landing the day before.
Just as Williams's feet touched the ground, they saw a Turkish fighter jet coming up from the horizon taking fire at the zeppelin. Bullets came hurtling towards the goldbeater's skin balloon. The envelope punctured several times at the starboard side and exited straight through and out. Myka then touched ground as they watched part of the envelope loose its shape as the fighter plane flew over to loop back around. It looked like the zeppelin had at least two gas compartments breached. It continued to drift to the ground.
"Come on," Williams grabbed Myka's forearm and pulled her away from the landing area.
"But they can't land here! They'll be sitting ducks!" Myka spat.
"Not really a choice now," he grunted.
Then a Czech plane flew towards the Turkish one, as it was looping back over the ocean to make another pass at the zeppelin, and before Myka had time to process the second aircraft's appearance, the ally plane fired a missile at it, which hit directly, blowing up the enemy hostile.
"Sir, you there?" Came a man's voice in another British accent, through the radio on Williams's belt.
Williams tugged Myka to the tree line and then gently placed HG against a large trunk, before taking a hold of his communicator. "Yes, I read you."
"All enemy hostiles have been eliminated for the time being. We're not picking up anything more on radar."
"But we are going down," shouted another man from the radio sounding as if he were further away. He had a North American accent unlike all the rest of the British crew members.
"Roger," Williams simply said into his radio before dropping his arm to his side.
Myka knelt next to HG as she checked her pulse again. It hadn't changed from the last time which made her sigh in relief. Still remaining next to her dear friend, Myka looked up to the man and asked in almost exasperation, "Wha— what about the building? It's gone! Did everyone make it out alive?"
"No," Mrs. Fredric stated, where the two agents whipped their heads behind them, to see the mysterious woman in her same crisp pink tweed outfit. "We lost six agents in the explosion and one allied plane. You and Agent Wells were fortunate enough to be protected by your Atlantean Shield, but others weren't so lucky."
"….Artie?" the woman muttered out.
Jinks jogged up to them from the bush, "Nah," he smiled at her, "Artie's coming along behind me. But in Claudia's words, 'he was faster riding his pet dinosaurs back in the day.'."
"Hey, I heard that!" Artie grumbled as he fell alongside Steve with both Vanessa and John on his heels.
"Artie!" Myka beamed at the sight of him along with the others, where he grunted a legitimate smile in return in seeing his agents out of the building and alright. Vanessa was quick to go to HG and check her over. Where Myka pushed for more answers, "But, how….?"
"The personal shield generators, that's how. We got out just before you two did," Jinks smiled, "Oh, and by the way, I am really, really sorry about shooting you in the leg." He said with meaning in his shinning blue eyes.
She smirked, "It's okay, really. I know you weren't yourself. Wait!" Myka snapped her head towards Artie, "But how did you get the shield generators to work? You weren't radioactive."
"Radio –wha— Does nobody listen to me around here?" The old man snapped, "We altered them to go off in case of radiation. But they activate and deactivate whenever you want normally."
"Oh," Myka bore wide eyes and strained her neck in embarrassment for forgetting what he had said earlier. She then caught a hold of Jink's warm eyes, where she took the opportunity to quickly change the subject "So, Agent Jinks, since we didn't really do proper introductions last time; Hi, I'm Myka, nice to meet you."
Just as Jinks was about to do the same and introduce himself, Artie cut in, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, and he's Jinks and he's glad to meet you too, enough with the pleasantries." He pointed to Myka's hand, "You! You need to get stitched before you pass out on me… I mean us, again."
"We have med supplies on the ship," Williams grunted, "You can use it as a temporary HQ, since, you know." He shrugged his shoulders and gestured at the smoking hotel and then the fallen airship.
"Thank you," Mrs. Fredric bowed her head to him.
Myka stood up from where both HG and Vanessa were on the ground. "Artie, as soon as this," she put up her injured hand, "is dealt with, I'm going back in to find Pete."
"Me too," added Jinks.
"Wha- what?" Artie snapped his head towards him. "But we only have one pair of goggles."
"Yeah, but I'm not leaving Pete in there. And besides, Myka is going to have difficulties bringing him back when she finds him. She'll need help."
Myka threw her good hand on her hip, "You know Artie; he has a point. The amount of cookies Pete eats…"
"It'd practically take a truck to move him. Fingers crossed we can manage together," Jinks finished where they both flashed a smile at one another.
"But what about the effects of the Labyrinth?" Vanessa asked, looking up from HG.
"Wait, wait, wait," Artie scratched his goatee as he paced a bit while he started to mumble to himself, "The maze effect sensory input, like hearing and vision mostly, so if we…." He then turned to Jinks, "Blind you and deafen you!"
"Yeah," Myka said enthusiastically, "I can guide you along. We can deafen you with those noise canceller headsets that you guys have," she pointed to Williams where he nodded, "and…. What?" she looked to Artie, "just a simple blindfold?"
"Yeah, that should work," he nodded.
"I can assist you in locating your companion," John spoke up.
"No, no, John, thank you, but no thank you," Myka said warmly to him as she approached, "You have done more than enough when you saved me from that shadow creature in there. You should stay here where it's safer." Then she got a mischievous look in her eyes where she continued, "Besides, you have to tell Artie all about the University that he's going to send you to."
"What? What University?" Artie barked.
"Yeah, the Russians promised him a full scholarship to a university in Zürich."
"Eldgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich," The boy clarified.
"Yeah," Myka smiled, "So I was hoping that, well, you know, that we could send him instead," she shrugged while giving her boss one of her adorable smirks.
"Well a…" Artie began, "Can we?" He looked to Mrs. Fredrick.
She gave another slight head bow before saying, "I'll make sure that it happens."
Myka beamed where she gave the boy a thumbs up, but he didn't seem to understand her signal. "You are paying for my finances then?" John asked for clarification.
Myka burst out in a giggle and a nod, "Yeah."
The boy then smiled at Myka, "thank you." He then slid his large sword off his back and walked it over to her, "You may require this when you re-enter the Labyrinth."
Myka took it and said gently, "Thank you."
Just then the zeppelin landed where they could see some of the crew members already opening the hull for the gangway to be placed down.
Without a word, Williams walked over to his fallen captain and picked her up in his arms, forcing Vanessa to move out of the way. He then started making his way over to their ship, like he had a great need to bring their captain home. Everyone simply fell in line behind him, and silently went aboard.