The building rumbled and bits of glass fell here and there. “Got any ideas, Arthur?” Lydia asked, coughing. Please say yes. Tears blurred her vision, and she rubbed her eyes furiously. Her hearing was slowly returning, albeit she had to really listen. The sprinklers still worked on their side of the hall and doused them and the small fires in cooling water. Lydia lifted her head, greedily gulping every drop and washing the cinder out of her eyes.
“Working on it,” Arthur said.
“Let me help,” a voice offered from the smoke ahead. Two orbs joined the orange embers floating on the dark clouds and part of the smoke formed a face, like a hellspawn from the fire. Arthur pushed Lydia behind him and Lionel smiled. “Please. Like you can do anything.” He leapt into Lydia’s mouth.
Lionel wormed his way into her throat and down to her lungs. Her whole chest erupted like fire, and her lungs clogged like she had swallowed a bucket of dirt. Air went in, but bounced back before reaching her lungs. She gulped, spasmed, and flailed on the ground, unable to make a choking noise. Arthur held her down and performed chest compressions while threatening Lionel. That only amused the BEP, and he laughed somewhere within and outside of her.
“Lionel.” Whyte crawled out of the smoke next. He had calmed down, and put his hands behind his back. “Don’t kill her.” Smoke wafted out of Lydia’s mouth until it formed Lionel’s head and torso. The rest was still inside, but it allowed her to breathe. She swatted at him in vain.
Whyte turned to Arthur and straightened his tie. “We need to finish our fight. Don’t worry about Lydia. She’s in good hands.” Out of the smoke, mercenaries and the rest of Whyte’s BEPs steadily joined him. Gary and a few others were missing. It was then that Lydia heard the faint, staccato gunfire outside, followed by another boom from the tank. The fighting had died down. A car screeched on asphalt and sped away. Who had won? How many had escaped?
“Come, Arthur. I don’t have all day,” he said. Arthur stood his ground, his fists at his sides. “If you’re going to be that way, I’ll be sure to kill Lydia after I kill you.”
Arthur spread his feet and readied himself. Whyte lashed out first this time, catching him in the chest. He drove Arthur farther into a hall, where offices lay open and empty. The spectators followed, Lionel keeping a tight leash on Lydia. “Don’t stray too far,” he said.
The group followed, Oliver lighting up small fires here and there for everyone to see the fight. At one point, he nearly caught Whyte. “Watch it!” Whyte snarled at Oliver, and sidestepped a blow from Arthur.
“Sorry!”
Whyte slammed Arthur up against one wall and punched his gut repeatedly. Arthur chopped his arms, breaking the hold, and tackled Whyte into an office. He grabbed a desk lamp, swinging it left and right. The lamp base sliced through the air as Whyte jumped side to side. He snatched hold of the lamp, struggling with Arthur for control.
They held a few seconds, growling at one another, the fire highlighting their features like brutal, savage warriors, before Arthur kicked at Whyte’s side. The other man took the opportunity to bend out of the way and take the lamp. He swatted Arthur’s forehead with the lamp base, and brought it down hard on the point of his skull. Arthur staggered into the door, and Whyte sprang forward and planted his heel deep into Arthur’s chest.
The smoke continued to build and soon started to fill the hall. Neither man cared. Arthur only just managed to avoid toppling over as Whyte predicted every move, slapping aside his attacks with ease. The few blows he allowed were simply for a sporting chance and didn’t slow him.
As it was, there was no hope of Arthur winning if something didn’t change. Lydia reached out several times, but her throat tightened whenever she did. “Stay out of it,” Lionel said, gagging her as a reminder.
The culmination was when Arthur led Whyte back into the thick smoke cloud near the hole caused by the tank, with small fires raging all around until they were nearly encircled. “Trying to choke me to death?” Whyte asked. However, there was a slight hesitancy in his stride. The air was heavy with smoke, and Arthur coughed nonstop. “Or are you looking to be cremated?” Whyte entered, unwilling to let Arthur escape.
“If you want, I’ll spread your ashes over the Cave,” Whyte said. He coughed deeply and Arthur lunged for his midsection, bringing him low enough so that Arthur caught some fresh air and knocked the wind out of Whyte. Whyte shoved him off, stumbling into some flames, and jumped aside, patting out his burning shoes. Arthur came at him again, catching him harder. Whyte elbowed the other man’s back, but Arthur kept his grip and lifted Whyte high and slammed him into the ground, dangerously close to the fire.
Lydia’s spirits rose and she sat up. Arthur was winning! He straddled Whyte and punched his cheek, snapping his head to the side. Whyte caught his fist on the second swing and pushed back, but Arthur came at him with the other hand, breaking his nose and pushing him toward the flames. Whyte waved his arm, yelping when he brushed the flames and slapping Arthur, reaching for his neck and trying to drag him down.
Amid the crackling smoke and fire and grunts of the fighters, a shot rang out and the battle stopped. Everyone went into shock, most of all the two combatants. Slowly, they dropped their arms and gazed to the point in Arthur’s chest where a trickle of blood poured out and stained his shirt. Looking to Whyte, then Lydia, he fell off, breathing heavily.
“No, no,” Whyte murmured, wiping his bloody nose and crawling underneath the smoke. He dragged Arthur out into the open, away from the cloud and examined the wound. “No, no, no.” He ordered a mercenary over and asked for something to seal the bleeding hole. “Do we have any medkits left? Check the offices. Are there any?”
While the others searched, Gary slunk out of the smoke, hacking and coughing into the crook of his arm. A pistol clattered in his hand with every move. Whyte connected the dots immediately and snatched the man. Through clenched, furious teeth, he asked one word at a time, “What? Did? You? Do?”
“I-I-I thought he was going to kill you!” he squeaked. “It looked like he had the upper hand!”
“Idiot! Do you really think I wouldn’t have won?” He rattled Gary and lifted him up into the wall, then threw him to the ground.
One of the mercenaries reported back that there were no medkits to be found on the floor. Whyte cursed and yelled at the top of his lungs. He cast a glance at Arthur and then at Gary, and ran a hand through his hair, smoothing it down. “This was not how I wanted it to end.”
“Sir, maybe we could take him with us and he can be saved,” Gary began, but Whyte cut him off.
“No, he can’t. You made sure of that.”
Already, Arthur’s breathing was worsening and his face was losing its color. He turned to Lydia but she didn’t know what to do. What could she do? He was going to die. But he couldn’t. He just couldn’t.
“I’m sorry,” Gary said.
Whyte extended a hand and helped Gary to his feet. “Answer me something. When I let you join, what did I tell you? Do you remember?” Gary mumbled a reply. “Speak up. I can’t hear you.”
“That Arthur was yours.”
“Right. Do you have any idea how long I’ve waited for this? How many nights I’ve dreamed of killing Arthur right here, in this very cave?” Gary opened his mouth to answer, thought better of it, and snapped it shut. “Do you not think I could’ve ended him as soon as he climbed up the rope? Do you not think I could’ve called on my men to rip him to ribbons? I wanted to relish this, enjoy it, and savor it.”
He took the pistol from Gary’s hands, frowned at it, and aimed it in Arthur’s direction. “All I could do now is put him down. You’ve taken that great pleasure from me. Do you know what that feels like?” Gary looked at his boss with sincere remorse. “It’s like,” Whyte waved the gun around, “being woken from a wonderful dream. Like watching your prized possession get stomped to pieces. It’s like…,” a gunshot echoed and Gary looked down at the hot barrel pressed against his stomach, “a lot like that.”
Clut
ching his stomach, Gary stumbled and slumped against the wall. He raised his eyes to Whyte, his lips quivering. “No, please. I didn’t mean to.” A quick bullet to the shoulder shut him up, and he dissolved into agonized cries.
“Yes, exactly like that,” Whyte said. He crouched beside Arthur, who was wheezing hard and swallowing air. “I guess we can’t always get what we want, huh?” Arthur glared at him, only heaving in reply. “I won’t apologize. I will say I really hate for it to end like this. You weren’t bad. Not good enough, but not bad.” He leaned in close, and Lydia barely caught his next words. “Fitting that you and this place die together. So long, Arthur.”
He snapped his fingers at his people. “Let’s move. Oliver,” he said, motioning with his thumb at Gary, “take care of him.”
Oliver squinted his eyes and smiled. “With pleasure.” While two mercenaries dragged Lydia to the stairs, Arthur reached out to her. His trembling fingertips brushed her foot before he succumbed to the pain and dropped his arm, clinging to the last bit of life. In the background, Gary whimpered as Oliver chuckled. “Hey, Gary. How about a game of ‘Hot Foot’? Think you can beat Harper’s score?”