Hiss of the Steam

Chapter 11 - Calm before the storm

I woke up and the first thing I looked for was Amber. Not finding her next to me, I remembered that after spending just a bit more time with her, she finally left and fell asleep. I had told her about Gerick joining the cause and I thought this news would be good for her to hear, but instead she only smiled slightly before I left. I wondered if she was unsure of why Gerick would turn her down but not me. It made a little more sense to me. She had always been a bit fast to act, and it got her into heaps of trouble when we were young. I was always quiet and much more reserved. As Amber started to become more and more rebellious and snide toward Gerick, he started naturally trusting her less and less. In fact, it was the reason she left for the lower city instead of staying with Gerick in the middle. I received a bitterly short note from her while still in training saying:
"I'm leaving Gerick's care and starting anew on the lower branch. Had a fight and was dared to prove him wrong by making do all on my own. Good luck in whatever you are doing. Amber" I could tell she had put spite into that last sentence by how much thicker the ink was, suggesting that she had been shoving the pen to the paper. And now I understood why.

I forced myself to get up and walk to the door. Today was the day, and we were stuck in the middle city. Thankfully, Gerick's home was close enough to the elevator down to the lower city. Granted, Gerick's house was close enough to the SkyWire that we would even make good time if we got moving. The SkyWire was the main transport for pedestrians in Icarus. It's basically a huge elevator that connects the lower and middle cities; however, they are seldom used for obvious reasons.
The upper city is only accessible by private transport, since only the richest of the rich can live up there. I've only been up there once to celebrate the launch day of the Skywire with all of the other soldiers. It was pretty formal; we greeted a few important politicians, ran a few drills as to how to protect the capitol should it come under siege (which should be useful information if we get that far), and even met the president himself. He was seemingly malnourished despite his position, not to mention pale, but not stressed. He was very cheerful, in fact; too cheerful. You'd think that the weight of running a country would bring you down, and physically it looked like it had, but mentally, not a trace. I figured it could be one of those acts that politicians put on to seem cheerful, but no act could be that good. The lower politicians themselves didn't seem to notice his ghastly appearance, due to how enamored they were by his outgoing personality, but something about him made me uneasy. I didn't know how to describe it but... I suppose there is a better time for that.

I stepped out into the workroom and found Gerick, Amber, and Yames all sitting around discussing plans like yesterday had never happened.

"Ah, Mark, good of you to join us finally. I see your old sleeping habits haven't died," Gerick said, checking the time with a pocketwatch.

"Tell me about it. This guy couldn't be bothered to go stop pirates if he's asleep," Amber piped in, giving me a roguish smile. I smiled back, knowing what she was thinking about.

"Well, you should have seen yourself when you woke up late for once. Hair in a mess, drool, it was all there," I said teasingly, sitting down next to her.

"Ge- get out of here, I did not!"

"Did too, saw it with my own eyes." She stuck out her tongue at me, giving a mock-angry look.

"Alright you kids. To business."
Me and Amber said together. "To business."
Gerick leans forward and unrolls a blueprint of the tower.

"Now, Walter tower is built with four main supports on each corner," He points to the four supports labeled 'cobbled stone'. "each of these pillars are connected through cross beams under the floor on each level, so if we take out the bottom of those pillars then the center pieces should collapse, taking the whole tower with them."

"And I, can supply the explosives for you! I got four bombs for ya, all made the same... more or less." He pulls out a glass tube with a sickly looking blue liquid inside. "It has a special acidic solution that can melt through stone. You'll have to stick it to the side of the tower, light the fuse and run. The glass will then explode and get the solution on the walls melting them to paste and killing everyone and everything it touches!" He has his hands in front of his face in fists and he was grinning like it was Christmas morning.

I inch closer to Amber and farther away from Yames.
"So I'm guessing we'll need to keep the fight away from the corner so that some people can sneak in and set the fuse?" I ask Gerick.

"Yes, we should have a very small group maybe even just two people in each party. One carries the bomb and the other needs to keep them safe from attack. But here's the thing, we aren't fighting with the most well trained people and we don't have much time to get them together."

Amber suddenly remembers, "Oh damn, we need to meet up with Chatwin."

Gerick raises his eyebrow, "Chatwin?"

"Chatwin." Amber repeats.

"Who exactly is Chatwin?"

Amber struggles to find the words to describe 'Chatwin'. "He's kinda a prick... but he's also kinda popular... but mostly just a prick."

"I see.... So he's helping you organize the people?"

"We can only hope he is."

I pitch in, "He seems reliable enough, not exactly mentally stable but I think he'll keep his word."

"Right, well all of that being said, we need to get going. Let's get out of here." Amber says, as she slaps her legs softly and stands up and runs to the door, and places her hand on the knob. We follow suite and she throws the door open with a loud whoop. I shout out a loud "Yeah!" Gerick yells "Glory for Icarus!" and Yames yells something in what sounds like poorly translated Swahili. "Kutomba ndiyo, hebu pigo shit up!"