Dismantling The Box of Grief and Venge

Chapter 20: The River Swapped Away The Enemy and The Pain

The flow of the river buried their feet in coldness, fueled up the terror of Eric's men. The river's current was quite dangerous that night, giving them the idea to trick Eric's men into it, hoping to eliminate most of them. They piled up some woods on the higher part of the river and stretched out two sets of rope for them to pass through the river. Ezra and Sam tied their waist on another rope to a big tree to prevent them being dragged away by the strong current.

"Irlan & Iriana are your parents?" Soni asked her and she nodded. "Oh my, Amy. I'm sorry," he embraced her in his arms, trying to comfort her in the short time they had, but it only made her sob again. "Look, Amy. They're gone from stopping him doing whatever his obsessive ambitions were back then. Compose yourself and focus. We'll stop him. This time, no more victims, but you have to focus, okay?"

"Okay," she said while still sobbing. She took a deep breath and steadied herself before walking passed through the river. Sam helped her crawl on the rope, while Ezra busied himself with whatever he did on the river side. He didn't bother helping her. He somehow changed, but she didn't understand why. She shook the thought away and went to the pile of woods Ezra & Sam had collected before.

Moments later, Eric's men arrived and found Ezra & Sam in the river. They immediately ran towards them. In just a few minutes, half of the men had already surrounded them. Ahmya was worried, but she had to wait for Soni's signal to push the wood piles. After they're gathered enough in the middle of the river, Sam and Ezra cut each rope that they set to pass through the river. Eric's men instantly lose their grip on the rope. Some of them slipped and were taken away by the river currents, some tried to reach out to Ezra and Sam for support. Half of them still could hold up on their feet, and that's when Soni gave the signal. They pushed the wood pile, but Ahmya just realized that her pile was too heavy for her. She used her body momentum to push and she did, but unfortunately for her that she slipped then fell to the river.

"Ahmya!" Soni screamed her name and was ready to jump, but then Eric caught him and attacked him. Ahmya tried her best to reach anything to hold on and she did. It was a branch that was stuck between the rock in the river, but it couldn't hold her long enough and her fear of the water worsened her situation. Sam and Ezra were still busy fighting the man who was lingering on them.

Her worst fear then happened. The branch was pulled off the rock. "Help!" Ezra quickly jumped towards her ignoring the man that lingered on him. Once he caught her, his heart dropped as he felt his waist loosened up. He gazed behind to see the man had cut his rope, and so they both were taken by the current. He had to think quickly, then an idea popped in his mind. He took two of her arrows as he shouted, "Hold on to my waist!". Ahmya couldn't really think and just did as he said, then he pulled them down the river bank. The current was so strong that he had hard time to control his movement, but eventually, he got a grip on the river bank by stabbing the arrows to the soft sand in it. Ahmya held tight to his waist as he slowly crawled to the river side.

After some time, they reached the surface, but also at that moment Ahmya's hand loosened up. Ezra quickly grabbed her, who was unconscious and dragged her to the ground. "Ahmya?" He immediately did CPR on her. He had sworn not to touch her again, but what other choice he had, right? He had to save her.

She wasn't breathing and her lip was cold as ice when he did mouth to mouth on her. "Come on, Ahmya. Wake up, wake up!" He kept repeating the words. Water was dripping off his cheeks, either it was the water or his tears, he couldn't really tell. Desperation creeped on him, whispering to him to just let her go, but he never could.

"Ahmya... please..." at his most desperate moment, she coughed.

"Ezra..." She opened her eyes.

"Thank god," Ezra instinctively kissed her forehead. "You stopped breathing. I thought I was going to lose you," tears fell off his cheeks.