R.E.birth Page 12

“What is that thing?”

  “It’s a mechanical device that uses electricity to control pulleys that lift the elevator up or bring it down inside of a shaft.”

  “Wait, so we are at the top of the building? By the train?”

  “Yep,” her eyes glimmer with delight.

  She lets her arm fall, sliding her hand into mine and our fingers intertwine. My heart beats faster as she leads me, pulling us up another set of stairs to our right. I feel the cool night air hit my face as we exit onto a flat surface and looking around I realize that we are on top of one of the buildings that looked so menacing before. But now we stand on it like conquerors and when I look out over the city I see that it reaches far beyond what I could have ever imagined. It overwhelms me and my legs suddenly feel unsteady. The height alone makes my limbs go stiff and the wind that passes gently by does not help any. Yet somehow Ami coerces me toward where people are gathering near the edge of the building waiting for the train.

  “Excuse me sir, what is the fare for the train?” Ami asks tapping a short elderly man on the shoulder.

  “One hundred credits a piece missy. You can purchase tickets over there,” he points behind us and we both look.

  There is a booth with a person inside and people in line out front of it. For purchasing tickets to get on the train, the line is rather small, in comparison to the number of people on top of the building.

  “Thank you!” She lets go of my hand and runs off to stand in the line, leaving me feeling insecure in such a place.

  I see it coming around a turn several buildings down. With two large lights on the front of it, it blinds me because I am watching intently. The speed it is traveling is just as unreal now as it was the last time I watched it. As it gets closer I look behind me to find Ami is still in the line waiting to purchase tickets. Only a couple buildings away it speeds toward us. The train lets out such a large blast of noise that I am forced to cover my ears. Squealing as it approaches, it comes to a halt in front of me and the doors slide open to let waiting passengers out. There is a hustle as the people around me come and go and I end up shoved in several different directions. Lost in the crowd I look behind me to where Ami was I find she is gone. I panic and begin to look around frantically for her, but with the sea of people still beating me around like an ocean would I cannot see her.

  “Ami? Ami where are you?” My voice is nearly drowned out by the surrounding people.

  Another large blast of noise sounds from the train.

  “Ami?!” I continue to yell.

  Grabbed by my arm, I am pulled in the direction of the train. Sliding in just before the doors to close, we make it inside and Ami smiles triumphantly at me.

  I smile back nervously, trying to calm myself of the panic that was caused by mere moments of being separated from Ami in this absurdly-sized city, despite knowing she would not have left me.

  The train begins to move, slowly at first, but then picks up. The platform where we were standing quickly disappears and I watch in amazement as the scenery begins to change rapidly. She tugs on my arm and I am almost too entranced to move, but I realize that she’s trying to get me to follow her to some open seats. Though many people entered the train, the interior is larger than I thought and I find we have plenty of room to move about. We sit down on one long seat that is facing the window opposite the door we came in. There is enough room for Ami and me to sit, but it leaves little room between us and other passengers on either side, making me feel cramped.

  Ami pulls herself in close to me and I feel her hips and upper torso press against me. My hands start to sweat and my body tenses up, but looking down at her it seems she either does not notice or care as her attention is taken by the view outside the window. Turning my gaze to look, we fly along at a high speed and the buildings race through my vision. Then as we turn I can see darkness followed by more buildings off in the distance and it seems like it might be the field that the house is in. We sit in silence watching the scenery go by together, her warm body pressed against my side makes my eyes heavy.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  My eyes snap open and I am awake as the sun hits my face. I squint and see that it has begun to peek over some of the buildings’ tops and around one very large building that seems to tower over the others. I shiver and groan, hating both waking up and the cold. Looking down, I see Ami curled up on the seat, her head in my lap and my hand is across her collarbone. Realizing my hand is in a position that might be misconstrued I quickly remove it and notice that we are completely alone.

  Where could everyone have gone? And why is the train not moving?

  Ami grumbles and begins reaching for something, perhaps my hand that is no longer keeping her warm, and when she cannot find it she rubs her eyes instead and she rolls over onto her back. She looks up at me and smiles sweetly. I smile back.

  “Not to alarm you when, but I think there is a problem,” I tell her.

  “What is it?” She groans while stretching her arms across me.

  “It is morning, and the train is stopped,” I point out the window.

  “Oh no!”

  Ami springs up, nearly smashing her face into mine in the process, and presses her face to the window. She looks around and begins mumbling to herself and I can understand her say that her mother is going to kill her.

  “So what do we do?” I ask while getting up and heading around to where the door is.

  “I have no idea where we are. All I’m seeing is city, buildings all around!” She follows me.

  The door is propped open partially and we are able to slip out of it onto a rooftop. There is another train there in front of us on the next building over, blocking us from seeing anything beyond it. As I survey the area, I see a few ticket booths and a stairway down.

  “Over there,” I point for Ami to see. “There are the stairs. I wonder if we could find someone to help us.”

  As we begin walking, I notice Ami has stopped briefly to fuss with her hair, putting it up into a ponytail, and I do not recall her taking it down. She steps quickly to catch up with a smile and we make our way down the eerily empty walkway to the elevator. Ami reaches out and presses an arrow shaped button that is pointing down but when the doors don’t open immediately I listen intently. It starts out quiet, but eventually a humming noise resonates through the building, getting louder. The humming noise appears to peak and the familiar ding noise causes me to jump. Ami laughs.

  “You okay?” she asks.

  “Yeah, just a little unnerved right now for some reason.”

  “I guess hearing those noises in this quiet would do that to me too if it were my first time.” She grins in a playfully mocking way.

  “You are not going to pick on me now are you?” I poke at her side.

  “‘You’re’,” she corrects me while wrapping her arm in mine and poking me back. “And no, of course not! Why ever would I tell my mother how you jumped at the sound of a bell?!”

  The doors begin to close and she thrusts her arm in between the two sliding pieces of metal. Alarmed I attempt to stop her.

  “Wait! Your arm!” I yell.

  Ding. The doors open again and she giggles while jumping inside. My face turns red with embarrassment and I walk inside with her. Turning around to face the doors I cross my arms and look away from her.

  “That is not funny! I thought you were going to be hurt,” I protest her joke.

  She presses a button labeled ‘Ground’ and then latches onto my arm once more.

  “Of course it’s funny. Because I knew I wouldn’t get hurt and you’re cute when you’re trying to be heroic.”

  The doors close and we begin to descend. I blush even harder, regardless of trying to ignore her comment, something she promptly notices and points it out.

  “Look at how red your face is!”

  I release her arm and turn away to face the wall of the elevator but she jumps onto my back, wrapping her legs around my waist and pokes at my c
heeks, squishing them together. In order not to fall over I am forced to hunch over and grab the railing that lines the interior.

  “Look at Rain, everyone! Isn’t he so cute when he blushes?!” She toys with me.

  In the middle of trying to balance her while she pokes fun at my inability to control my blushing, the elevator stops and the doors slide open to reveal two men in blue and white striped uniforms along with strange hats that have only a partial brim on them. They are toting around mops and an orange plastic tub with wheels.

  “What’re you doing here?” The taller of the two asks as he adjusts his wire frame glasses.

  Before I can speak Ami buries her face in my hair and uses her hands to manipulate my mouth.

  “We fell asleep on the train and when we woke up it was stopped! We were just leaving! Don’t hurt us!” She deepens her voice and jokes around pretending to be me.

  “Well hurry on your way,” the shorter and chubbier of the two asks.

  “Yes sir!” Ami continues the charade, manipulating my mouth.

  I haul her out of the elevator on my back and I find that we are in a building very similar to the one we entered to get up to the train. Heading down the stairs we exit the building and as we do the thought occurs to me that we should have asked one of the men where we were and which way to go. But when I look back it is too late, they are gone. Stepping onto the road, I let go of her legs and force her to stand on her own. As I look around I become concerned about picking the right direction and how far we are from the house. Without a soul in sight on this street I make a decision.

  “I say we head to our left for now and see if we can locate someone,” I suggest.

  “That’s fine to me. As long as we’re together,” she says.

  “Hmm?”

  “I mean, you know, as long as we don’t get separated. That would be bad.” She smiles innocently.

  “Indeed it would,” I smile at her and hold my arm out for her to take.

  I am almost positive that she is not just hinting at liking me, but going out of her way to make sure I know.

  As we walk down the street in our designated direction, I notice that there is something different about this area, that it is not a commercial area. There are no shops or welcome signs, but instead the buildings begin to space out, while becoming fancier and nicer the farther we go. Their architecture appears to be different, as their outsides are formed to look like large columns and they have wide arches and carvings along their sides. When I turn my head to the right while passing an intersecting street I can see the one building that reaches taller than the others, finding that though it is quite a ways down I can see it clearly because it is separated from the other buildings. But I can tell that it follows the style of this section of the city. I stop and stare at its majesty for a moment.

  “I don’t think we are going the right way,” I tell Ami.

  “I don’t think so either.”

  Stopped at an intersection with four paths available for us to take, I look around down each direction and when I turn my head to look back the way we came from I see two familiar figures off in the distance and they are not friendly figures at all. Recognizing them as the two fighters that we saw coming out of Emma’s shop the first day we met her I pull Ami around the corner of the building as they head this way. I put my finger to my lips.

  Did they recognize us as I did them?

  Ami had not seen them and is now giving me a questioning look, but it does not take her long to realize that we are hiding from people as their voices can be heard. I strain my ear to hear what they are saying but I am unsuccessful.

  “Why are we hiding from people? Maybe they can help us,” she asks.

  “They are the men from Emma’s shop, the ones that were harassing her.”

  Her eyes go wide and she covers her mouth with one hand. I switch sides with her so that I am near the corner and peek around to see that they are about a block away walking at a steady pace, not appearing to have seen us.

  “Ami, go around the opposite corner of the building and keep out of their sight,” I whisper.

  “What are you going to do?” She looks at me with confusion.

  “Never mind. Just do it please!” I whisper.

  Ami lets go of my arm and runs at full speed to the end of the building and ducks behind its corner. Seeing her peek her head out I hug the wall near the building’s corner pillar and I can hear their voices clearly now.

  “I don’t like the schedule. I wanna go back ta sleepin’ durin’ the day and bein’ up at night,” I recognize the larger one’s voice.

  “Quit whining about it. It won’t do any good, and frankly I’m tired of hearing it,” his partner snaps at him.

  “Didja hear what happened at lil’ miss Emma’s shop?” The big one asks.

  “That Denis took things into his own hands or that guy actually had the gall to chase him off?”

  “Both I s’pose. Wonder who woulda had the brass ta run boss off.”

  They turn the corner and I slink into the shadows of the pillar, hoping not to be noticed. I sit down and bring my knees to my chest to make myself appear smaller, concealing the mass of my body as much as possible. They pass the shadows while continuing their conversation and I have the urge to follow them. When they are half a block up from me I slink to a nearby doorway and continue to listen to their casual conversation.

  “I wish they’d put in a day shift of the train to run us back and forth from the U.F.A. building and the market. I hate making the walk all the way to the commercial district,” the skinnier one says while adjusting his strange, dome shaped hat.

  For now I find that I have gained a vital piece of information, discerning that the tallest building down the way is the location of the United Fighting Arts that Emma spoke about. When there is sufficient space between us I move up to the next doorway of this building and I hold my breath when they reach the corner that I sent Ami toward. Hoping that she too took refuge within a door way or something similar, I wait quietly to find out if they see her, crouching to spring into a sprint if needed. But there is no reaction from them. They continue on past the next intersection toward the building with the arches more grand than the ones on these, and I hug the wall until I get to the corner. Turning around it I find Ami is not there.

  Ducking into another doorway on the new side of the building I keep myself hidden to avoid detection on the chance that the two men look back. But in the shadows I am attacked as arms wrap around my neck and I now have a person on my back. I turn my head and see Ami smiling away, as if nothing is wrong.

  “Did you find anything out?” She asks.

  “Yeah, first is that we are indeed going the wrong way. They just came from the commercial district so we should head back the way we came,” I tell her and then point to the tall building. “Second is that I believe that is the U.F.A. building.”

  We wait until they are mere dots in our sight and then return to walking arm-in-arm, following the building back to our original street and heading toward where we had exited from the stairwell. Walking for a significant amount of time I watch the building styles gradually change from the nicer style with a significant amount of thought put behind the architecture to the simpler style. But that too changes and we find ourselves in a section of the city that is in disrepair. The street turns at an angle and I find that we are heading in between two of the shortest buildings I have seen within the city yet. Their brickwork appears old and their chimneys have all but crumbled.

  A discomfort falls over me as we near, despite feeling like we are headed in the right direction. Walking through the alleyway between these two buildings I survey and see that the rectangular windows that line the building have been broken out from the inside, as glass is littered all over the ground. That unease creeps up in my spine and I feel my muscles tense up in anticipation. I can tell Ami feels it too as she clings tightly to my arm when we reach the corner of the buildings.

  Our bodie
s have warned us with good cause, as a scruffy man appears hastily from our left wearing a long dark coat, its hood shadowing most of his face. He grits and bares his teeth while wielding a large knife in his hand. Whatever has caused his desperation, he now exacts it on us as he menacingly waves the knife in our direction.

  “Give me any credits you have!” He growls.

  Ami slinks behind me, her arms grabbing onto my sweater.

  “Should you not be sleeping?” I ask him, trying to contain the fear in my voice.

  “No, I’m a day walker. Now give me your credits!” He thrusts the knife in a threatening manner.

  “We have none to give,” I respond, refusing his demand.

  “Give me any valuables you have or you’ll be in the obituaries tomorrow!” He barks.

  “Ami, back up,” I whisper to her.

  “But,” she protests.

  “Do it, now,” I demand.

  Her hands release from my sweater and I hear her run a few feet back. The man moves to run after her, but I intercept him and block his path to her. My heart begins to pump harder and I get a boost of energy from the adrenaline that has started coursing its way through my body.

  “Look, friend, we have nothing for you.” I hold my arm out in front of my body to stop him. “We just want to go home.”

  “Well I’m so sorry, let me just give you a free pass through my territory this once.” Sarcasm rings through his voice.

  “No heart? Cannot let us pass this once?”

  “No and no.”

  He comes at me with the knife held in both hands at his stomach level. As his arms extend outward to stab me, I dodge to the right with ease, keeping me from being stabbed. Kicking his left shin as he passes I cause him to falter. He grunts, turns around and tries again, this time holding the knife like one would a sword. With his right arm out too far and his feet wide I notice several weaknesses within his stance.

  Hurriedly he tries to assault me again but switches methods. When he gets close he draws the knife up and swings downward, trying to catch me in a shoulder or the chest.

  Resolving to show no fear I wait for him to get just close enough that the metal nearly tastes my flesh and then dodge down and lean my left side back so that his swipe misses me completely. Coming back up from the dodge, I plant my palm into his chin and I hear his teeth clatter together. He lands on his back. The knife is thrown from his hand and spins across the ground. Ami hurries to step on it while he groans and spits out blood to the road.