The wire hit full recoil, crucifying Wilco where the anchor had dug in. There was a squelch like someone beating a wet cloth, followed by a crunch as his remaining bones shattered. Some poked visibly from his body. Even more blood spilled onto the evacuees who jostled below. This, at last, silenced them.
Around them, the bombardment continued to pound. Also faintly audible was the sound of the blazing fires, and the Titans’ footfall and chomping.
Wilco was dead.
He’d died in vain.
No…I won’t let it be in vain.
Rita clasped hold of the reins.
“Everybody, get back inside. We’re closing the gate!”
Strange. The words flowed easily.
Strange. Her body was moving of its own accord.
She focused on a point straight ahead─Wilco’s crucified form. Aiming a fraction to the left, she fired her anchor. The tip drove into the stone ceiling of the passageway. She felt the impact through the wire.
“Close your eyes.”
Taking firm hold of the bawling girl, Rita rose up in her saddle. Depressing the trigger, she kicked into action the recoil of the wire. The equipment on her back growled and started to spin. An incredible force wrapped itself around her, and she and the girl were propelled into the air. Her arms felt ready to come off.
They sailed through the air. Wilco’s crucified form rushed closer.
For a brief moment, Rita lost her composure. She came close to shrieking. But the girl’s weight and heat─not warmth, it was heat she felt─allowed her to hold on to her senses.
Together, Rita and the young girl soared over the evacuees, who craned to watch when they caught sight of the pair.
Rita twisted the hilt of her blade again; setting the angle she pulled, freeing the hook from the ceiling. In an instant it wound fully in. Carried now by inertia, Rita and the girl continued to soar diagonally upwards. They would trace a trajectory then gently descend─or so she’d pictured it.
Instead Rita rammed shoulder-first into the curved ceiling, and pain shot from her head to her toes. The girl stiffened in her arms.
Rita came close to losing her grip. She gritted her teeth, endured it, and somehow channeled renewed strength into her arms to hold the girl tighter─tighter still.
“What the…?”
“Up there!”
They began to tumble towards the evacuees’ heads. Rita considered firing an anchor before impact but didn’t have the time. Instead, she noted the directions of the ceiling and the exit. Twisting around, she used her back and arms to protect the girl.
They scythed into a few of the evacuees. In a stroke of luck, they seemed not to have hit any children or seniors. The people around them cleared space amidst shrieks and jeers.
“Sorry…but I’m in a hurry!”
Rita adjusted her hold on the young girl and, without attempting to stand, fired an anchor at a section of the ceiling nearer the exit. She felt her belt constrict. She struggled for air. The next moment, she surfaced from the surrounding evacuees. One tried to grab her─probably a man she’d knocked over─but unable to match the pull of the Vertical Maneuvering Equipment, he cried out and pulled back.
Rita and the girl climbed diagonally up towards the ceiling once again. This time Rita was quicker to free the anchor but careened into the ceiling regardless. The impact was at least gentler. She rebounded and began to tumble diagonally, and again lacking the time to fire an anchor, she was flung towards the ground and another group of evacuees. Even as she was beginning to lose feeling in her arms, the pain ricocheting through her body refused to dissipate.
Repeating the process, Rita finally cleared the passageway. Her vision darkened, then light flooded back.
A vast crowd thronged inside the gate area, the majority carrying valuables or children on their backs. They were making frighteningly slow progress. Avoiding the densest clusters of people, Rita touched down. She let her limbs absorb the impact, then placed the girl gently down.
Rita raised her head and appealed to everyone around her.
“The Titans are close by! Leaving is too dangerous, go back to town for now.”
She pressed the girl’s diminutive frame into the arms of a middle-aged woman. The girl was utterly passive. No doubt she was finding it hard to process the events that had unfolded before her eyes. The middle-aged woman looked hesitant but accepted the girl.
Rita meant it when she told the girl, “Be strong, okay?”
Her parents were in all likelihood dead. If they had survived, they were continuing their evacuation on the other side of the wall. It was impossible to know when she’d see them again. The same applied to Rita and Mathias as far as that was concerned.
For now…the gate!
Forcing herself to change gears, Rita set off for a structure close to the gate and appended to the wall. She peered through the open doorway.
There.
As she’d expected, the post was manned by greenhorns from the Training Corps. They gazed at Rita with eyes on the verge of tears, their hands clasped around the crankshaft that opened and closed the iron gate. They knew they had to do something, but not what or how, and looked it.
Rita hollered, “Close it! Right now we have to shut the gate. Commander’s orders. Hurry, before the Titans get through!”
“Hey, wait. What about us?”
“We won’t be able to get away!”
“How is that fair?”
Voices of discontent rose from the civilians who had overheard. Rita turned and barked at them, “What’s the point if we’re all wiped out?!”
The trainees finally began to heave the enormous crankshaft around, releasing the chains. The gates began to come down in unison at either side of the passageway.
“Ouch. Reel them back!”
“Out of my… Stop it!”
Here and there shouts began to erupt after having once abated. No one cared to get sandwiched between the gates and the ground. There was a wild scramble to get out first, either beyond the wall or back into town.
But the gates didn’t halt.
Little by little, the outside world was suppressed from view.
Wilco was first to go.
Flames lapped over the shanties. Rita’s colleagues were embroiled in battle. Titans of varying sizes eyed the passageway with confusion. A few began to approach.
Mathias was out there, beyond it all.