Playing With Fire

The Escape

The hallway was in chaos. doors were flung open, people stumbling out, coughing and panicking. Riley pulled her scarf to cover her nose down to her mouth. Marcus yanked off his tie and did the same.

“Stay calm!” he shouted. “Head to the stairs! Don’t take the elevators!”

Of course, the CEO’s presence was enough to bring some calm and decorum. Taking charge was also enough to assure everyone the outbreak was under control. They reached the emergency exit. Marcus slammed the door open, and they spilled into a stairwell that was already crowded with panicking employees.

Riley started heading down, but Marcus grabbed her arm.

“Up.” He said with nice aggression, suggesting that should retreat further up the skyscraper.

That didn’t sit well with Riley. How could they possibly be moving further up when the main goal was to escape the outbreak?

She stared at him. “Are you insane? The fire’s below us.”

“The fire’s between us and the exit.” He pointed downward.

Thick and dark smoke was rising from few floors below. People were retreating upward, coughing violently and panicking.

“The stairs are not safe,” Marcus said. “The roof has a helipad. We head straight up to safety”

He was right. Riley silently couldn’t agree more. Everything she’s learned about fire escape told her so. He might be a devil, but on this, he was dead right.

“Lead the way.” Riley said, succumbing

They kept climbing. Floor Fifty-five, fifty-six. But the smoke stubbornly followed them like some sort of hot chase. It rose faster than it should.

“This doesn’t make sense,” Riley muttered in a rough voice. “Fire systems don’t fail like this.”

Marcus’s face hardened. “I know.”

Riley thought, and so if he knew? Was that supposed to mean some sort of credit to him and his team for putting everyone’s life in danger?

At the fifty-eighth floor, a man rushed out of a door, his suit was torn, as blood ran down his forehead.

“Mr. Ashford!” he gasped for breath. “The executive floor…it’s on fire. We can’t go…”

A sudden blast cut him off before he could complete his statement. The stairs shook violently. Riley found herself flinging against the wall. Lights went off and Emergency red lighting flashed on. People screamed and rushed downwards.

The bleeding man shouting a note of warning in panic vanished before their eyes. He was most likely gone with the inferno. It became scarier. Even terrifying at the point.

Marcus quickly pulled Riley up, rejuvenating her courage. “Move!”

It was just the two of them now. They kept climbing. Floor fifty-nine, sixty…. Riley’s legs hurt so badly now. Her lungs screamed from smoke. Her bag constantly slapped against her hip with every step she took, but she wouldn’t ditch the bag. Six months of evidence was inside. Six months of thorough research to destroy Ashford. No, she wouldn’t drop it.

Then another blast came off again. This time, the blast was more threatening.

The staircase door on the fifty-ninth floor flung open outward in a brutal blast of glass, sand and fire. The Heat from the blast pushed Riley backward, but Marcus reflexively pulled his arms around her, protecting her as debris rained down.

Riley could feel the warmth and comfort of his protection. Looked as if the devil was her superhero here regardless of her own intent.

“Don’t look,” he said.

She looked anyway. The fifty-ninth floor wasn’t just on fire. It was blowing up. Literally.

“Oh my God.” Riley said, her voice was almost a whisper. “This isn’t an accident.”

Riley was sure of it now, that this was a pre-meditated attack. Her years of training told her so. Ashford industry was under attack from a different enemy. But from whom?

Marcus held on tighter to Riley. “I know. Keep climbing.”

Marcus’s response warranted so many questions. If he knew about the attack, so what? But this wasn’t the time for interrogation for Riley.

They made it to the roof access door. Marcus pushed it open, and rush of fresh air hit them like a lifeline.

The roof was their place of salvation right now. Or, at least, for the moment. It provided a sort of respite from the fire storm. It was an open air, free from the fire ravaging the floors beneath them.

Riley dropped to her knees, inhaling a gush of fresh air. Smoke poured from the stairwell behind them. The building moaned with a deep, heavy sound like it was falling apart.

Marcus sprinted toward the helipad. “We need….”

Then, he stopped dead in his track. Riley looked towards the direction of his eyes and froze to spot.

The helicopter had been destroyed. No, it was not damaged or faulty. It was sabotaged. The blades were twisted and Cockpit was crushed. Their only means of salvation had failed. Climbing all those stairs just for nothing? They were sure doomed to die.

“Someone planned this,” Marcus said, his voice was low with disbelief. “Every part of it.”

Riley’s thoughts were spinning. Her mind raced so fast. She was terrified to a fault. The smoke. The explosions. The timing. Those were not a coincidence. There was an enemy somewhere.

“Who wants to take you out?” she asked.

Marcus turned towards her, all sweaty with messed-up suit and real fear flashing in his eyes. “I don’t know. But they clearly want you dead too.”

“Me?” Riley shook her head in disagreement. “I’m nobody. I’m just a journalist…”

Riley trying hard to draw attention away from her. It would be in her best interest to hide her intent….and her real name. She had come her under false circumstances with one mission she’d best keep from his prey…. Marcus. But Marcus wasn’t buying all that façade.

“Doing what here, exactly?” Marcus pressed, stepping closer to Riley. “You’re not from Forbes. You pushed too hard, asked too many direct questions. You came for a reason.” His eyes narrowed. “What do you know?”

Riley stepped back without a second thought. Her hand moved toward her bag, obviously protecting it. The flash drive was still inside there. It was the evidence of everything.

But someone had just tried to kill them both. For a moment, she found logic in what Marcus had just said. But that’s not something she’d like to deliberate upon. Riley would rather draw attention away from herself.

“We need to get off this roof,” she said instead.

“You think I don’t know that?” Marcus snapped. “We’re sixty floors up. The stairs are blocked. The helicopter’s destroyed. What do you suggest?”

Riley was in a position where she had no answers to these questions. The tension was raging both within her and the building.

Fortunately, the building answered for her with another blast that was so strong it shook her to the bone.

The concrete split across, and the roof shook harder under their feet. It was terrifying

Marcus grabbed her hand. “Move!”

They sprinted to the edge. Riley looked down from the height where they stood, and she instantly regretted it. She regretted ever coming to this chaos. Though she had wished to create chaos, but not this type. Certainly not the type that put her life at stake. From where she stood, the fire trucks looked like toys and the crowds down, down below looked like dots.

“Over there,” Marcus said.

The building next to them was shorter. It was about forty floors, and pretty close, maybe only about thirty feet away. There was a maintenance bridge that connected them. It was a narrow metal walkway just broad enough for equipment.

Riley was definitely not going to buy that. Using that narrow bridge to cross over to another skyscraper was suicidal.

“No,” Riley said. “Absolutely not.”

“The bridge can hold,” Marcus insisted. “It has to.”

Another explosion hit the building from below. This time, it seemed to swing and she lost her balance for a moment.

“It’s going to collapse,” Marcus shouted, waiting for Riley to join him. “We don’t have time.”

He climbed onto the bridge and offered a hand. “Come on!”

Riley had no choice, or did she? Obviously, survival was the priority regardless of how, but she was limited on options.

The breeze hit at her as she balanced on her feet. Riley stepped onto the metal grate, her heart was pounding. While doing so, she could see straight down below. The height and the depth.

“Don’t look down,” Marcus cautioned. “Look at me.”

She managed to force herself forward, one step at a time. She had her throat in her mouth, but she must keep moving. Survival first, she braced herself.

Halfway across, the crumbling building behind them let out a deep, shaking groan. She couldn’t help but glance back at the state of things. The roof was now starting to crumble and fire shooting upward. The outbreak had definitely reached the roof. But if she hadn’t agreed with Marcus to use the grate to cross over?

“Riley!” Marcus shouted, urging her to focus. “Come on!”