When I read that, I don't ask myself how Emmie made the discovery she wants to show me. Instead, I feel a chill rise up from my feet to my head, and my womb suddenly cramps up.
The small probability event I have convinced myself can not happen has happened. Tyne has done something to Emmie. He is the only one who could have sent the message.
The tone might resemble what Emmie would have said had she sent the message herself, but I know for certain Tyne has nothing hidden in the lab we used for tutoring class yesterday. I also know for certain that even if something must happen there that I failed to pick up on, it would not be now, or worse, half an hour ago, when there have been even more people who have yet to leave.
The message has the fierce stench of a trap, of a net waiting for me to jump in, and I know I can't avoid it. Even Tyne must know. I don't know why he is doing that, whether because he got impatient or he noticed something, but I have no other choice.
I force myself to breathe, in and out, neither too deep nor too shallow.
I have no choice, indeed, but I can't leave myself without a safety net. I need one not only for myself, but also for Emmie too. I swallow my saliva while hoping that she is safe. I look around, at the mostly empty corridor and school ground. I take another breath, and swallow my saliva, before I shift my bag into a more comfortable position.
I set my neurons on fire and make my brain work as fast as I can. Tyne is a monster, but a rational monster. He has a superiority complex, maybe a little bit of a god complex, but from his perspective, that is understandable. I don't know if he thinks he is the only mind reader around, or maybe even in existence, nor do I know if he knows others. Whatever the case, something he is not is stupid.
If he was stupid, he would not have created a harem of slaves right in the middle of the school. As I think, panic starts to set in. My hands feel cold, and my fingers stop being steady. My mind starts getting foggy.
I look at the corridor and it seems to me like a dark maw waiting, for my flesh, my body. The fate deep inside, I don't know if it is worse than death, but I know that filth tainting my mind is enough already. I don't know if I will be able to endure it tainting my body. I feel nauseous just thinking about that, and that repulsion pierces a hole through the fog bogging my brain down.
I got the idea for a net that can bring a little bit of safety before I'm forced to jump in the trap. With a beginning, it is like I have found a thread, and I follow it down the line for something that might very well save me, after I save Emmie.
I open the server account where everything I have stolen has been uploaded. I don't have the mind to focus on feeling anger or disgust. I just check to be sure the size and number of files is the same. I take another breath, then my fingers move to put the plan I have come up with in practice.
I count the seconds, not even the minutes, as the connection feels slow to me. And the worst is that I will have to wait just as long as I have to now, a few more times.
I start pacing back and forth. Sweat makes its way down my forehead, down my chest, and down my back. My top clings more tightly onto me but I don't care. I can't care.
Time passes, slowly, too slowly. At last, I can't hold back anymore. I take off running. I go back inside the teaching building, but not toward the lab where the message is trying to get me to.
I basically fly over the stairs and climb over the floors. I don't feel the dull pain that has bothered me for the better part of the day anymore. At the back of my mind, I know I will feel it later, for sure.
I'm happy I have taken to taking better care of my body lately. The evening runs have done their jobs as I only feel a little winded when I stop climbing higher, I don't crumble.
After a second, I take off running again, until a door that is locked. I can't let that obstacle stop me, so after a look around, I press myself against it, and using minimal distance to gather momentum, I slam my weight against it, using my hip to focus the force on the level of the handle I'm holding.
*Crack*
The sound is muffled, and blocked by my body. I repeat the same thing twice after a hurried glance around, and the door gives way.
The devices inside, in my eyes, at this moment, look like hope instead of mere machineries. They make my heart calm down for a moment, and make me get just that little bit of respite I really need. I check the progress bar of what I'm doing on my phone, then hurry to do what I have climbed many floors and broken a door to come here to do.
Five minutes later, I'm set. My phone vibrates, and I open the new message 'Emmie' sent.
"Max, where are you? Hurry up!"
I take a deep breath outside the room with the broken door, and type my own reply.
"Sorry for the wait. Meet me on the rooftop."
My heart is pounding as I send that. I'm betting, gambling that Emmie is safe, and that she will remain safe.
When there is a risk, before it has been eliminated, the leverage that can keep it in check can only be secure, not destroyed or thrown away.
After one last check, I run to the stairs again, this time, for the rendezvous point I have decided on, for 'my' battlefield.