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Ahead, the pathway opened up wide to the darkness. Without a word, they both started heading left; the flame began to dance towards them. They found the rubble wall again, but this time, it included a large, gaping hole, and as they drew closer, the flame's movement grew more vigorous. There was nothing but darkness on the other side of the opening, so Camilla, with noticeably strained effort, launched the flame through it and gave it an extra burst of power. The fire tripled in size before it stopped a few yards in front of them, and the two women stuck their heads through.

At first, Elsie didn't see a thing. And then she realized it was just because everything there was to see was so far away that the sparse amount of light couldn't reach it all. Directly on the other side of the hole and level with their feet was a slab of the stadium ceiling, jutting out like a giant diving board into an abyss of darkness with the rubble wall acting as a precarious fulcrum. Past that, Elsie couldn't see a thing but the black void, and she wasn't really sure she wanted to know what lay in it.

Regardless of how Elsie felt, Camilla sent the flame further out. Initially, Elsie could see the faint outlines of what looked to be partially crushed pillars, except each pillar had the width of a semi truck. She didn't realize what they actually were until the fire drifted closer.

"Are those... the tanks?" Elsie almost whispered in awe. "The tanks that hold everything they use to build the terrains?"

"Looks like it," Camilla answered, not sounding nearly as amazed as Elsie felt. She moved the fire closer to the nearest tank, illuminated some of the Japanese characters painted on the side. "This one says 'dirt.' But I guess that was obvious."

Elsie didn't know what she meant until she saw where a narrow and long sheet of metal had struck the tank like a spear, tearing a hole in the side and draining it of its contents. Dirt was still falling out in a slow trickle, but it wasn't a surprise; the opening wasn't huge relative to the size of the tank, considering that Elsie couldn't even see where the top or bottom of the tank was. Based on what she could see, the tank was at least taller than a ten-story building.

Each tank had a staircase winding up and around it, connecting to the web of maintenance pathways at every level. On their current level, most of the pathways seemed relatively intact, giving them access to most of the tanks. Unfortunately, Elsie had trouble focusing on possible ways of escape when her attention kept getting drawn to the void of darkness below them and the long fall that it promised.

"If we can get to the main walkways," Camilla's voice snapped Elsie out of her thoughts, "we can use a tank's stairs to get almost to the field level. From there, I should have enough energy to send some kind of signal through one of the access points in the platform that the tanks connect to. We'll head to the west side and see what we find; the tanks here probably took too much damage to be structurally sound."

Elsie, for once, couldn't find any words for a response and managed to only reply with a stiff nod. Thankfully, Camilla didn't seem to notice or care as she hoisted herself up and out of the hole. When her shoes hit the metal slab diving board on the other side, it rang like a giant tuning fork, and Elsie shuddered.

Camilla suddenly began to sidestep to her right and out of sight, and Elsie's curiosity beat her nerves, at least enough for her to stick her head further out the hole to look. There was a path that she hadn't noticed earlier, probably because it wasn't much of a path at all. It was a one-foot wide portion of the walkway they were currently on, separated from the rest by the rubble wall. It extended about ten feet too many before joining up with the maintenance paths that connected to all of the tanks.

What made it worse was that most of the handrails had been knocked off or were hanging by a sliver of metal, rendering them completely useless. It looked like one of those trails that only mountain goats could navigate and Elsie was definitely not a mountain goat.

"Can... can't we continue down this hallway first?" Elsie proposed. "There... what if there's another way to access the maintenance paths?"

"You can try," Camilla said, her attention focused on kicking some stray rubble from her path and into the void below. "There's a dead end a few yards ahead."

If she wasn't so desperate, Elsie would have taken Camilla's word for it out of stubbornness. But she was extremely desperate, and a quick look and minimal lighting confirmed Camilla's observation.

After returning back to the gaping hole in the wall, Elsie looked down at the narrow pathway, trying to muster up the courage to do exactly what she didn't want to do. But all she could think about was falling helplessly from the narrow ledge of that building, watching the city street rapidly getting closer and closer.

So she thought about what she would've done had she gotten free of her captor's grasp back then. Instead of falling, she would've carefully sidestepped to the open window they had come out from and returned to safety. That's what she needed to do now: return to safety.

Without giving her fear a chance to return, Elsie hoisted herself through the hole in the wall and dropped her feet firmly on the metal slab below, doing her best to tune out the reverberations that rang out in response. And after a pause, she was pleasantly surprised. That hadn't been so bad. With her renewed confidence, Elsie took a step off the metal and onto the narrow concrete walkway, then another, and another...

Okay, now it was bad. Her confidence suddenly vanished without a trace, and the darkness below her seemed to be engulfing her vision and she couldn't tear her eyes away from it. Elsie wanted to crouch down, to at least take some strain off her wobbly legs, but she had enough sense left in her to realize that there wasn't enough room for that. Instead, her fingers dug into the wall at her back, grasping for anything that she could grab for support. There wasn't much that was small enough to get a good grip on, but Elsie kept trying anyway, needing some sense of security.

"Elsie," Camilla's voice said with emphasis, as if she had been repeating herself and Elsie hadn't noticed. "Breathe, okay? Deep breaths."

Elsie hadn't noticed she stopped breathing until Camilla pointed it out. Her next inhale was a gasp for air that burned her lungs and made her unsteady. She stumbled before her mind could process what was happening, and panic suddenly surged through her and every single muscle in her body seemed to seize up if it wasn't already tense.

A firm grip grasped her right shoulder and held her in place. "I got you," Camilla said from beside her. "Don't worry, I got you. Just breathe."

Elsie automatically did as she was told, her free will long gone, overthrown by panic. She struggled at first, her lungs too tense to let in any air. But eventually they began to cooperate, and her breathing began to sound more like she had just taken a brisk walk down the block rather than a sprint.

"I'm good," Elsie managed to say, but her voice sounded strained.

"Of course," Camilla replied. "I'm not letting go though."

Elsie's relief easily won over her embarrassment. She wasn't sure how much Camilla could do in her weakened state, but her hold on Elsie's shoulder was still reassuring. Her head felt like lead, but she managed to turn it just enough to look at Camilla.

"Thanks," Elsie said. "Again."

Camilla stared at her in silence for a moment, not acknowledging her appreciation, before looking at the path beneath their feet. "Are you able to move?"

Surprisingly, she was. Elsie nodded. "Slowly, though."

For what felt like hours but was probably only a few minutes, Elsie and Camilla carefully edged their way along the ledge. Camilla matched Elsie's pace, not rushing her even when Elsie needed to slow down, for which Elsie was grateful.

It got easier once they were a couple of feet from the wider maintenance path, and once Camilla reached it, Elsie had to restrain herself from immediately and recklessly jumping over to join her. And when Elsie did finally reach the relative safety of the much wider and stable walkway, she very nearly collapsed. Instead, she only sank to her hands and knees in a somewhat controlled descent.

"Never... again..." she panted.

Elsie half-expected Camilla to mimic her own words and say, "That wasn't so tough, was it?" To her surprise, it was the complete opposite.

"Are you okay?" Camilla asked instead. While she sounded more indifferent than concerned, at least she didn't sound sarcastic or condescending.

"I will be," Elsie said. "In a bit."

Once Elsie didn't feel like the ground was wobbling beneath her, she carefully got to her feet and took a deep breath. While the panic still left her with a residual numbness in her mind, she felt a hint of pride too. She had faced her fears. And it was quite the ordeal and struggle, but she won eventually. She grasped onto that self-confidence like a lifeline and let it inspire her to continue.

"Okay," Elsie said, feeling a proud smile growing on her face. She was glad for the masks just then, because Camilla would probably have thought she was crazy. "Let's go."

They only got a few steps before a slight tremor began to shake everything around them. At first, Elsie thought it was residual panic, but then she noticed Camilla had frozen, not even moving her head to look around them. Just as Elsie was about to ask what was going on, a rumbling sound resonated from above them, and there was a distant sound of rocks crashing together. Then, a crack of light began to shine through an opening about twenty stories above them.

Camilla swore angrily—Elsie had never heard her curse before.

"Stay close," Camilla said, her eyes focused above them as she stepped in front of Elsie, facing her.

It took Elsie another moment to realize what was actually happening: the platform above them was rising.

Before Elsie even felt the first pebbles of rubble raining down on her, Camilla was already working on building them a shield, pulling the dirt from the broken tank behind her and condensing it into a solid barrier above them. As much as Elsie's initial instinct was to run and hide somewhere, the only places to run to was along the web of maintenance paths, all of them exposed to the rubble that was being loosened by the movement of the platform. Even if they managed to find one that led to the outer walkway, those were probably just as dangerous, and there was no guarantee they could even make it in time. So all Elsie could do was watch Camilla struggle to protect the both of them.

The first large piece of debris that hit Camilla's shield made an audible crashing sound that made Camilla wince from the impact and Elsie flinch in shock. Moments later, three more pieces fell, one after the other, and dirt sprinkled down from the shield. Camilla waved a hand, and more dirt flew from the tank behind her to reinforce her defenses. 

Two more thuds. Dirt was falling and flying. Camilla's arms began to shake.

Four more thuds. Dirt was raining everywhere. The light from above was now bright enough to shine a spotlight on them. A stream of blood flowed from Camilla's wound on her side.

Another thud, louder this time. The shield cracked slightly, but Camilla couldn't spare the time or energy to fix it. The cloth that was tied around her nose and mouth was long gone, revealing her paling face twisted in pained determination. Elsie wanted to help. She needed to. But she didn't know how.

Just as Elsie was about to offer her assistance, she noticed something move behind Camilla. The piece of metal that had pierced the tank of dirt was shifting, most likely because the soil it was balancing on was being pulled away by Camilla. It was moving ever so slightly as it protruded from the side of the tank, drifting slowly downwards.

Then without warning, it dropped. While one end was still embedded in the tank, the other end was rapidly getting pulled down by gravity, like a giant seesaw with nothing to balance out the weight on the other side. And it was heading straight for them.

Sure, there was a chance that Camilla's shield could have stopped its fall. It was unlikely, since light was already starting to shine through the cracks in her defense, but it was possible.

That possibility was on Elsie's mind as she stepped right in front of Camilla. She didn't want to ruin her concentration, but she still wanted to help her somehow. And in the event that the shield couldn't hold, Elsie wanted to be there to offer one last line of defense.

Elsie wanted to protect Camilla just like Camilla was protecting her, and just like Camilla had protected her all those times before. It wasn't like Elsie wanted to return the favor, it was because she wanted to do the right thing, and that seemed to be it.

So Elsie was grateful for her height advantage as she wrapped her arms around Camilla, holding her tight, and shielding her from whatever she couldn't hold back on her own.

Elsie heard the shield burst apart and felt the dirt crumble on her head. She heard the sound of a knife cutting into meat, and felt a reverberation shudder throughout her body. She heard Camilla's voice asking her something, sounding exhausted, then asking her something again but with more urgency.

Elsie was tempted to ask if the stadium had stopped threatening to bury them alive, but the words seemed to get stuck in her throat. Her vision was wobbly, and she wanted to sit down, but she realized belatedly that most of her weight was already being carried by Camilla. She tried to apologize and back off, but the latter ended up being a mistake.

As soon as Elsie moved, she finally felt it: the metal slab was lodged into her right shoulder. At least, that's where it was before Elsie collapsed from the sudden pain that engulfed all of her senses, and Camilla couldn't hold her upright anymore. With the metal gone and her body splayed across the ground, Elsie could feel her clothes getting soaked in blood. It was like she was wading in a pool of warm, thick water, but with an overwhelming sensation of agony.

Elsie found herself lying on her back, and her vision was illuminated by the sunlight above her. It was a little too bright, but it was a nice change after being stuck in the dark for... how long had it been? Minutes? Hours? She wasn't sure anymore.

Camilla's face then blocked out some of the light, but Elsie didn't mind. She knew she was mad at Camilla but... why was she mad again? Elsie couldn't seem to remember. She opened her mouth to ask, and to point out how she had never seen Camilla's face look so worried, nor had she ever seen Camilla with tears streaming down her cheeks, but Elsie struggled to put her thoughts into words.

She was tired. So, so tired. She wanted to go to sleep, but Camilla kept shaking her awake. Rude. Elsie tried to lift her hands to push Camilla's away, but her arms wouldn't move. She couldn't even tell if she still had arms.

The light was disappearing from above, and everything was growing dark. Elsie wanted to protest, to tell whoever was responsible to keep the lights on, she still needed to see, but she couldn't. Thankfully, Camilla seemed to hear her, and a faint light began to shine from her hands off to Elsie's right. It was soothing, like a night light, and Elsie felt a warmth spread throughout her body as she closed her eyes to sleep.

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NOTES

Two enemies stuck in an elevator? 😐

Two enemies stuck under an over-engineered, over-priced monstrosity of a stadium that's definitely not a critique of the single-use infrastructure used for the Olympics? 😊

Up next: another flashback.

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