Chapter 650 (1/2)

Quick as a flash, Naffur was back on his feet and jamming the close door button. As the metal slowly lurched to respond, Naffur also pressed in the button for the ground floor. Anything to get away from this place.

“Excuse me young man, but no matter who you are you cannot- is this blood?” Senator Firefly’s voice started out stern, but it abruptly switched to concerned as he noticed the state of Naffur. Only when the metal doors slid shut, blocking out the sound of Dank’s cursing as he struggled to clean the melted flesh off of his helmet, did Naffur relax.

Naffur tried to imagine what he looked like as he turned around to face the Senator. He likely didn’t look like he was a no good street rat whose heart was pounding in his ears. But then again… maybe Naffur did. He felt so small and dirty before this man. He was not large, but his eyes were incisive and bright.

Those eyes seemed capable of piercing right through Naffur’s mask and seeing him for who he truly was. A fraud. He was not the Ghosthound. He was nowhere near a hero. He was just a kid that was in way, way over his head. And maybe this was his chance.

Blood dripped down Naffur’s soaked suit and pooled on the ground of the elevator. He hadn’t soaked up much, as it was partially dried, but it was still enough to leave very noticeable stains. Aside from the crimson shirt, the rest of the clothes were probably a lost cause. His Ghosthound mask seemed to be melted in the corner where a bolt of plasma had whizzed too close to him.

As Naffur opened his mouth to confess everything to this imposing older gentleman, two things happened at once. First, the pain of having his thumb burned off by plasma finally stomped past the haze of adrenaline and began to rip apart his resolve to come clean.

The second thing is that there was an audible sound of impact above, and the elevator started to accelerate somewhat. It moved right passed safe speeds and into free falling in the next four seconds.

“Damnit, I knew we shouldn’t have traveled separately…” Senator Firefly muttered to himself. Then he shook his head and looked at Naffur with a more measured gaze. “...well, going the silent route, are you? I suppose it is safe to say you are not friendly with these volatile elements, then. Please, stand back.”

It felt like the small elevator was careening downwards at ever higher speeds as Naffur obligingly stood with his back against the wall as the Senator rolled up his sleeves. It surprised Naffur, but the vantage point was enough to show that the Senator was trembling.

Good. So Naffur wouldn’t be the only one who had peed himself before they died.

“Flaming Burst!” The Senator shouted as he pointed at the wall. A balloon of flame seemed to inflate from his hand, and even though he had rolled up the sleeves of his shirt, there was the distinct smell of burning cloth. The wall of the elevator began to tremble and ooze as the high heat destabilized the metal. For several long seconds, the walls distorted as the Senator continued to apply heat.

The Senator seemed pleased with this development, but Naffur just stared wide-eyed at the man. The heat in the elevator was rapidly rising to something that felt like 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Then, of all things, the Senator bashfully looked over his shoulder at Naffur and coughed lightly.

“I- ahem, excuse-” But the Senator couldn’t talk anymore, because he was hacking as he attempted to breathe, only to find nothing that could sustain him in the air. Naffur wasn’t completely sure, but he knew that oxygen burned away when fire was used in an enclosed space. People with higher Endurance and Vitality could ignore the lack of oxygen for a short time, but it was very hard to convince your body to ignore its biological imperatives.

Even Naffur felt a slowly rising, panicked, need to breathe. There was a story that Naffur always liked about how the Ghosthound walked to the bottom of Lake Apollo to slay a dragon and stayed there for three days, not moving until the dragon thought the Ghosthound had departed and walked right out of its cave into his waiting arms.

‘You ARE NOT the Ghosthound!’ A part of Naffur screamed at him. That was the part of him that wanted to curl up and hope that nothing bad would happen as this tiny, partially melted metal box crazed into the ground floor. The floor indicator was rushing past 10 now and was very quickly at 9.

Of all things, the throbbing pain of his missing thumb brought Naffur back from a panicked state to something resembling calmness. Time seemed to slow, although that was perhaps just his overdramatic mind thinking about how long it had been since he had breathed. Feeling the agony and strain in every corner of his body… all Naffur could think of was how he didn’t want to die.

Naffur clenched his fist as he watched the Senator with a red face and hacking up phlegm. This man… perhaps he was good at running a district and voting on taxes, but he was a fool. For whatever reason, Naffur felt no desire to help the man, but rather…

Rather, some selfish part of Naffur that had Skulked in alleys as richer individuals walked by wanted to prove to these people that they weren’t all they were cracked up to be. There was something more important than money. Naffur would prove he mattered.