The Embers Book II: Rise Of A King

Chapter Two: Consequences

Chapter Two: Consequences

Taylor arrived back in the alley where he jumped the man just moments before, it was blessedly empty. The people on either side were completely unaware that just only a few short minutes before that two men disappeared in a whirl of blue fire. He looked at the pistol in his hand it was black with a thin barrel and was quite heavy, he didn't know much of guns but he recognized it as a Berretta 9mm. He only knew because of films that he'd watched and the information had just stuck in his head. He looked around and found a bin behind him; he used his t-shirt to wipe it clean of finger prints before lifting the top of the bin open and dropping it in.

With the gun disposed of he made his way out of the alley and made his ascent up through the favela toward his new destination. It was going to take some time to find as all he had to go on was a description and hadn't wanted to waste time asking for exact directions, and I wanted to push the thought of the man falling from his head. 

The sun blazed ever stronger as he walked up through the busy streets of Rocinha passing people as they went about their lives, he knew he was getting close due to the fact that more and more Os Ceiferos roamed the streets. They were all well-armed with some even wearing military body armour, it wasn't a problem for Taylor but it showed that they were well funded for a drug gang. Most gave him suspicious glares through the throngs of people, and all of them noticed his eyes. They were hard to miss, Taylor had considered getting contact lenses but decided that he would deal with the stares and that it wasn't necessary to hide their colour. After rounding a corner and having navigated his way through the waves of people flooding the streets the building he was looking for, loomed in the distance.

It was an impressive sight and anyone could tell that Araujo had spent a lot of money tidying it up. The bright white paint of the building was well applied at first glance with the black railings of its balconies helping to make it even more distinctive. The railings were formed in the shape of flowers and trees giving off the distinctive feel all the more. Taylor was surprised, he hadn’t expected it to be so neat and extravagant in appearance, the man clearly had refined tastes for a drug lord. 

The sight of men with AK47’s and other varieties of weapons he didn’t recognize dotted the balconies which ran all the way up the front of the building, and up the right and left sides. The problem was getting inside without causing too much ruckus; he held no illusion in his mind that he wouldn’t have to kill anyone. “I’ll have to wait until nightfall; there are still too many people around” Thought Taylor as he made his way down the hill and back to his shanty house.

He awoke several hours later; the sleep had been uncomfortable and rough to say the least. The dream never gave him a moment’s peace when he slept, he’d tried to keep his mind focused on other things before sleeping but the dream always broke through to the forefront of his mind. But something changed in the dream this time, Farn and Michal were there. They were blaming him for letting them go off to die by Caius’ hand, and they asked why he didn’t save them until yet again he was forced back to the edge of the ash mountain and fell into the flames below. He pushed it to the back of his mind knowing that he had to be one-hundred percent focused on the task ahead, because tonight he was going to assault the second most powerful drug lord in all of Rio.

He swiftly got to his feet, dressed and then left heading up the steep climb through Rocinha until he came upon Araujo’s headquarters, the streets were empty so he stuck to the shadows and used alleyways where possible.

The building was in sight, and that was when he realised how screwed he was. On both sides of the building were flood lights mounted on tall metal poles as high as the building itself, they illuminated the entire structure not leaving a single shadow to be seen. It was now going to be near to impossible to get onto one of the balconies without being seen. He would have transported himself further into the building, but the problem with his ability that he discovered recently was that you had to know what a place looked like so that meant knowing what the interior of the structure looked like.