TO CUT A TURNING TAIL

50) THE THREE

 Zenith is running around with his beautiful weapon, a dagger with two sides, each holding a scythe's blade. He passes a burnt car, a woman groaning inside. But he moves on rather than helping, as he walks deeper to the end of the road, he realizes what just happened here.

[Actually, a hundred years back, the population was under a million so there were many colonies that consisted of a mere lane or two. The lane where Highwater was situated was a one-lane colony, thus making the lane quite lengthy as well.]

He gravely looks at the banks of the road and realizes the places have been burnt down. He steps back in crumbling fear, a grave wide-eyed look covering his face and his hair falling on the left eye. He moves the hair away, brings out a ball from his pockets, walks nearer to the residential building because he kind of got the idea the other place is a school and won't have many causalities (in case there were any). 

He sneaks into the resident palace through one of the windows and checks around the room. He unhinges its rigid door to get out of the room. The place hasn't been burnt by a normal fire, but a special case of blue fire which is more used than the normal fire in this world as it doesn't ask for the burning of wood ever, neither does it acquire much oxygen. It's a mixture of a few things and can be burnt down using stone compressed in water with a drop of a specified liquid. Other than that, there are small lighter which can bring about the fire, but they are comparatively expensive. This place's burning is the cause of the same effect. 

The entire place has turned stale black but no harmful sort of gas has been expended, neither have the articles been affected nor has a single kid. Though he can't figure out where all the kids are. He walks around, he might have passed a drawing room and a kitchen but yet no sign of a single human. It looks as if he has walked into a mirror, out of the kitchen, a compact hall appears to his sight, very similar to the vestibule he passed by. Just that the vestibule has been mirrored.

 There is a wooden staircase on each end of the hall, he looks at the one near him. No sign yet. He runs to look at the other one. There they are.... the two kids. Phoenix and Moanna. Numb and silent, as if in a trauma. Anyhow, the sister feels the note of someone's presence. So, she gets up and furtively walks all the way up the stairs, her brother follows.

It has been a while that the siblings left from below the staircase. Zenith doesn't seem to care, he just wanted to see what's happening. Now that he knows two people still live, he is sure someone would be able to display what happened here, from their point of view. So, he starts to walk away. But something stops him, he realizes the presence of humans beneath him. He finds it really sketchy. So, he subtly walks to the staircase and sits under its darkness. 

In a few minutes, he starts hearing footsteps approaching the hall. His eyes widen as he looks up, his best space, he rolls down the railing and fits himself behind the stairs. An old woman and a young man are running to the staircase. They stop right beside it and rub a knife at the wooden floor. They pull out a gate and bustle down the trapdoor. Voices of young kids fill the room.

 Sitting at the staircase, Zenith can clearly hear them. He smiles at the fortunate event and gets up after granting assurance that everyone is safe. However, as he starts to get up, he hears a deep, stricken, angry voice. A masculine, stern, angry man is standing at the stairs. An exchange of glares between both of them.

 Suddenly, another pair of feet come in rushing. A cross-dresser joins them both in a rush. "What's happening Zachary?" he asks the masculine man in a slim, modulated, commanding, and frustrated, high-pitched voice. "I can explain", Zenith says as he looks at their boiling expression, however, before he can do anything, the cross-dresser brings a cane lying at the edge of the quarter space landing and punts Zenith with its assistance.