Bab 6: Take Ten - Escape
Angel stepped down the stairs of the cellar for the ninth time now, and for the eighth time she would engage in a fight with Arthur.
As she neared the bottom, the two people in the small room stopped talking, signaling for her to sprint across the rest of the stairs and through the room. Arthur swiftly turned and sent a punch to Angel's head, but she dodged just in time, and his hand only hit her hair. In turn, she sent her own fist at Arthur's stomach, was dodged as well. But Angel was quick to react as she threw her body onto Arthur, causing him to tip over.
Before the large man fell, he caught himself by putting a foot back, and sent a straight punch in Angel's blind spot towards her jaw. Before the hit landed, Angel leaned back, and the fist brushed past her nose. Arthur had a backup plan, though. He sent his leg in a kick to Angel's feet, aiming to trip her. That plan backfired again as she dodged it as well, without even looking. In turn, Arthur sent his elbow down on the short girl's head. She twisted around and his arm missed her shoulder by a hair.
It seemed that all of Arthur's simple kicks and punches were seen through before they made any contact. Just who was this girl? In this new mystery Arthur decided on a change in tactics. He made a wide turn—something Angel wouldn't be able to dodge—and prepared to push her away from his body. However, the girl suddenly twisted around with him and crouched down, still hugging his torso firmly.
That was where Arthur made his mistake. Just a small move by the girl would be enough to tip him off balance, making it easy to throw him onto the ground. So hi relaxed his muscles and raised his hands up in defeat. Angel paused her movements. "Okay, okay! I lost. I really don't know why you just attacked me out of nowhere. So please, let me go."
Angel dropped her arms to her sides and stepped back. Arthur plopped onto the ground, breathing heavily. He had used a lot of energy there to speed his time up to keep up with Angel's movements.
"So, you're finally awake," Arthur managed to fit in between his short breaths.
"Yes. Though my muscles are a bit sore."
Arthur knelt up on his knee. "Well, either way, that's not how you should treat someone that saved your life!"
Immediately after he finished his sentence, he turned a 360 and stood up, sending a foot straight to Angel's head in a perfect roundhouse kick. Wrong move. Again.
Angel ducked and grabbed Arthur's foot, using his momentum to push him back to the ground. Arthur landed hard on his back, knocking the breath out of him. He wouldn't be standing up any time soon.
Walking up to the man, Angel bent down and took out a ring of keys from his pocket. She walked up to Damien, who was standing with his back to the wall, clearly in shock at what had just happened. She started testing each of the keys on the keychain again. On the eighth one, the handcuff's lock clicked, and Damien's wrists were released.
Behind Angel, Arthur had stood up, still out of breath. "Huh, so you two really are together."
Angel ignored him, and started walking to the stairwell, motioning for Damien to follow her.
Arthur followed her. "Wait. Seriously, who are you? Normally somebody would only be able to see about half a second away in the timeline. I'm already above average, at an entire second. But you… you predicted all my moves."
Angel stopped and turned around, smiling at Arthur. "Me? Well, my sight is just as bad as everyone else's. Normally… I guess I could see about an hour?" She didn't reveal anything more than that, as it might reveal some of the crimes she committed to get to this point.
Angel turned back to walk up the stairs, and Damien caught up and followed her. She had finally finished her first objective, freeing Damien from the cellar. As she came out into the open, the sunshine felt different now that Damien was with her. The grass was more green, the autumn leaves were more orange, and the sky was more blue. Angel raised her arms up in a yawn. All that time looping had taken its toll on her mental state, and she briefly forgot about her next objective when she snapped back and became serious.
Stopping in her tracks, Angel turned to call back to Arthur. "Our pursuers are coming. Could we borrow your wagon? We need to head out quickly."
Arthur had just come out of the trapdoor. He put his hands on his hips in suspicion. "Pursuers? What, are you some sort of criminal?"
Angel's heart skipped a beat at that. Yes, she was a criminal, but she didn't want to get on Arthur's bad side. She would need him to escape the shooters. "Aren't you getting this mixed up, old man? They are the criminals, okay? And what about you? You haven't even introduced yourself and you're assuming who we are?"
Arthur was taken aback by that, but thought for a moment and quickly introduced himself. "Well, my name is Arthur. I'm basically a supervisor of this region. Very nice to meet you." He said that last bit sarcastically. "And you are…?" His voice trailed off as he suddenly came to a realization. "Wait, don't tell me you're…nobility?"
He paused, thinking, and Angel stood there waiting for him, but also curious as to why he thought that. "That…explains your supernatural sight…and your combat skills…" Either this girl was a very important figure, or a skilled criminal. But if their pursuers actually were criminals then the former would be more likely. "Well, what can you say to make me believe that your pursuers are criminals?"
"Two words. Timeline cherrypicking."
"Time—those techniques?!" That had certainly taken Arthur by surprised, but he quickly composed himself and his expression became dead serious.
"Now then, shall I introduce myself?"
After Arthur said nothing, she bowed slightly, and spoke. "My name is Angel. I am daughter of the queen of Centrar. Nice to meet you."
Lie. In truth, of the 44 years she had been jumping through worlds and timelines, she had never once been to Centrar. There were way too many law enforcers there, and she would be caught for sure.
Nevertheless, Arthur stood straight in realization. "I…I'm so sorry…I didn't know you were…" He bowed, and continued, "Sorry, I'll introduce myself properly now. I am Arthur, currently serving as an observer, overseer, and supervisor of chronal sector 78434 world A002. Please forgive my rudeness, Milady. I did not realize you were a figure of such high importance."
Angel crossed her arms. "Now that we have cleared things up, how about you go get that wagon of your's?"
Arthur quickly stood back up and ran to the side of the cabin where the horse stables were, and retrieved two horses. Angel walked up to the wagon in front of the cabin, with Damien following her, and climbed in while Arthur hooked the horses up.
"Quickly. We have around a thirty minute head start, but they will catch up to us."
Arthur sped up his work at Angel's orders, and the three set to leave the town. The wagon rocked heavily as the wooden wheels hit pebbles and imperfections on the unpaved road.
"Wh-where are we going?" Damien managed to say as they left the town and took a left on an intersection. With only a pair of shorts on, he was hugging himself and shivering in the cool autumn air. Angel dug through the wagon and found a pair of pants and a shirt, and handed them to Damien for him to put on.
Arthur called from the front of the wagon. "I have a time machine in the forest, so I'll be taking us there so we can escape this place."
Angel interrupted him. "No, we should not go there. Go to your backup time machine instead."
Arthur turned his head. "Why not? That one's closer." Then he turned back and said suspiciously, "and how do you know I have a backup time machine?"
That was the wrong thing to say by Angel. Arthur still didn't trust Angel fully yet, and she almost revealed she had already gone through the timeline. She would have to be careful of what comes out of her mouth. "Don't underestimate what a princess knows," she replied instead.
Arthur hesitated, but eventually turned the wagon back around, and headed back to the intersection. "Your orders, milady," he said as the wagon turned left, this time heading directly away from the town.
***
An entire hour passed before the wagon slowed to a stop at the edge of a nondescript place of the forest. For the entire journey was silent, with everybody sitting in place lost in thought. The shooters were still nowhere in sight, but they could appear any time now.
Arthur stepped off the wagon, followed by Angel and Damien. But before they headed into the forest, Angel stopped them as she remembered how long it took to get to the time machine last time. "We should go on the horses. It will be faster that way."
Arthur unhooked the two horses from the wagon, and the three jumped on, with Damien riding behind Angel. Angel had experience riding horses in the past, but it has been a long time since she had been on one, let alone one without a saddle. So with a kick and a neigh, the group set off into the forest.
It didn't take long for them to reach the backup time machine, but they did go through enough turns in the forest to make Damien feel lost. Angel, on the other hand, kept track of the entire route, noting some possible shortcuts along the way.
This machine was just as well hidden as the other one. The location it resided in was just like the rest of the forest, and you could walk over the hiding spot without noticing anything.
Arthur hopped off his horse at the destination and looked around, raking away fallen leaves. When he found what he was looking for, he bent down and lifted off a large covering, revealing a large capsule that looked more like the ground than an actual time machine. Angel sighed in relief. They would be escaping smoothly on her first attempt.
Feeling around the capsule, Arthur found a hatch and opened it, revealing an entrance. "This is only the backup one," he said as he bent into the machine, "so it isn't as capable, but it should work well—"
He cut himself off, and after a moment of fiddling around in the capsule, he pulled himself out. "Well, ain't that interesting… It isn't turning on."
That was when a figure dropped down from the trees above and landed on Arthur's back. He turned just in time for the knife to miss his head, but that didn't prevent it from tearing into his elbow. Ignoring the fact that he just got stabbed, he swiftly swung his arm around to hit the short man behind him, but the attacker jumped off onto the ground.
Angel took a quick look at the new person. He was definitely one of the shooters from before—the one that had given Damien the shoulder wounds she had healed. But before she could think of what to do next, the man lunged at her, slicing through the flesh of the horse's leg. Angel and Damien fell off the horse, and before Angel hit the ground, she was back at square one.
Sunlight filtered through the window into the cabin room, where Angel woke yet again on the straw-padded bed.
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone