“Just keep paddling, Marcus, don’t stop!” Sitting behind him the broken chair, Marcus’ father enced him, pointing ahead with his left hand: “There! You see? We’re almost there! Just keep going! You do it my son!”

  “Dad… my arms are sore!” Marcus replied, while still paddling the water using a ft piece of pstic along with his father: “I wish Mom is here… so addle together… Where is she, Dad?”

  “She will meet up with us soon, son. Don’t worry!” Marcus’ father wiped his forehead and tried his best to sound hopeful and upbeat: “Just keep going son, we don’t want to keep your mother waiting, do you?”

  “No… but… my arms are so sore!” Marcus whined and cried: “I - I just ’t go anymore!”

  “You do it! Just believe in yourself!” Marcus’ father said, slightly raising his rate of paddling the water with a piece of broken wood.

  “I - I really ’t!” Marcus cried, her young arms finally stopped, almost dropping the piece of pstito the water: “I ’t! I ’t!”

  “You really ’t?” Just this moment, Marcus’ father’s voice turned calm and even a little suggestive: “That’s okay, son. Just rest.”

  “I - I ?” Marcus turned back, feeling a sense of unease. His father’s faehow became dry and no longer weary, even though they had been oer for hours and had not had evee of food. The day was already getting brighter, and Marcus could see that his father seemed unnaturally calm and collected. Even his shirt seemed dry and well-ironed.

  “Yes, in fact, we just meet your mht now, if you want.” His father responded with a smile and a calm voiot heaving, not grunting, no sign of weakness or exhaustion, just like casually giving angestion that they should go to the park: “Do you want to go meet Mom now, Marcus?”

  “What?” Memories of Marcus being grown and a possibly under-valued detective fshed through his head, and he became both fused and somewhat alerted by this oddity: “Why do you say that, Dad? Do you know something?”

  “No! What are you worried about, Marcus?” His father scooted closer to him, smiling aending his hand forward trying to stroke Marcus’ wet hair: “Don’t you wanna go meet Mom?”

  “No!” Some of Marcus’ adult memot ba, and he immediately spped away the hand of his father: “You’re not my father! Who are you? ”

  “What are you talking about? I am your father, I am your Dad…”

  “No, nonono - you’re not!” Marcus immediately moved back, and his Qi was slowly trated on his arms: “Who are you!? Why are you here?”

  “I am your father. Why don’t you just e with me, let me bring you to Mom…” Marcus’ “father” squirmed and tried to touch Marcus’ head one more time.

  “No!” Marcus dodged the hand of his “father”, and unleashed a swift palm strike against his dry and smiling face. The ter of his palm made close tact with the cold nose of his “father”, then his face, then the inner parts of his head. The entire frame of his “father” cracked, crumbled and shattered like it was made of thin a or stained gss. Along with the fad body of his “father”, the se around Marcus also broke and colpsed into darkness.

  “What? Why are you doing this?” Ier darkness, Marcus heard the desperate pleas and cries of a woman, which sounded quite simir to the void tone of the rotten woman, but only more lively and more human. “e on, please. You ot do this! You ot do this! Why are you doing this to me!? No! No!”

  After a brief moment of silehe woman’s voice became much more desperate and even somewhat unhinged: “No! What - what the hell are you doing!? These people - they’ll kill me! No! You ot do this to me! You ’t do this to me! They’ll fug kill me! You… you lying, cheating bastards! You sick traitor! You sold me out? You sold me out! Damn you! Damn you! Curse you! Curse you! I’ll tell everyone ! I tell everyone about our deal! I’ll tell…”

  The woman’s voice was muffled by something, and then the darkness broke, as Marcus woke up on the floor in the house.

  “Marcus, gd you’re awake now.” While he was adjusting to the light in the room, Marcus felt someone pulling his arms and helping him sit up straight.

  “How long was I out?” Marcus scratched his head while sensing the meridians in his body - his Qi was quite spent, there was only a very small portion of it left in him. Lucky for him, all the collisions and battles between his Qi and the cold energy did not cause too much damage to his meridians - he sensed some bruises and small shes, but those would gradually heal as long as he kept calm and did not overexert his Qi.

  “From what we could tell, we were trapped in here for only about five minutes. But we just woke up not long before you, so it’s a bit difficult to say.” Kevin shook his head.

  “How are you? ” Marcus took a look at Kevin’s hands - there were indeed bite wounds on his fiips, now red but beginning to scar. He then looked at Keryn, who was also sitting on the ground, trying to recover in a meditative pose and with her eyes closed. Her meditative pose retty standard abook, quite simir to the pose Marcus used when he meditated.

  “I - I feel okay, what about you? Are you okay?” Kevin shrugged, but instantly gasped and had to y back, as his left shoulder seemed to have caused him immense pain.

  “’t pin. Here, let me take a look.” Marodded and raised his hand above Kevin’s left shoulder. Keviated for but one moment, then pulled down colr and exposed his heavily bruised skin.

  “That bit - I mean that woman’s scratch was quite nasty, huh?” Kevin grunted and ihrough his teeth as Marcus id his palm on him and slowly pushed a warm stream of Qi into his muscles and meridians. There were still some very light traces of the dark, cold energy remaining in his tissues, and the warmth of Marcus’ Qi burning it away caused him even more pain as well as the light but visible recovery of the bruises.

  “When we’re outta here, have someoake a look at this.” After a short while, Marcus moved his hand away and coughed, because Kevin’s skin showed signs of redness and light burn from prolonged tact with his Qi: “I am pretty sure this should help, but it might not have pletely removed her touch.”

  “Thank you, Marcus.” Kevin sighed and pulled his colr up, then took a quick look at Keryn: “And, uh, what should we tell everybody when we’re out of here? I assume her you nor Keryn have registered with the city?”

  “No. And I don’t know about Keryn there. But I am assuming no.” Marcus chuckled and shook his head: “Her style is not - well, let’s ask her this when she’s done. Hope she’ll finish soon.”

  “I’m done.” Keryn opened her eyes and stood up: “And no, I’m nistered either. So we’d better have a cover story.”

  “I checked the door and the wall, there was no damage there. ” Kevin shrugged: “Whatever pce we were in, it was only loosely ected to this space we’re in.”

  “So, let’s go with something simple then.” Marcus scratched his jaw.