“Violet, you see the new one, ay?” Sierra said, “He looking you up and down. Who is this old woman that big burly men look at in fear, he asks himself. Practically one foot in the grave, perhaps a young lad such as myself should seize control, no? Do you think he will challenge you? He seems to think much of himself and his strength.”

  “Shut it, Sierra,” Violet grumbled, “I’m only thirty four. Idiot probably thinks that you’re the one in charge if anything.”

  “Ah, no!” Sierra laughed, “Me? In control? I could not bear such a thing. Much funnier to stand behind you as intimidation. Big bodyguard standing there with his red eyes and pale skin. Much better image than you guarding me.”

  “Yeah,” Violet muttered, “Queen of a prison. Whoop de do. We’re never getting out of here at this rate…”

  The door to the large cafeteria opened up, and one of the guards came out. He walked forward and locked eyes with Violet as he moved. Above on the upper levels the other guards with their riot suppression weapons watched carefully as the prisoners in the cafeteria glowered at the guard as he moved by them.

  The man stopped just in front of Violet and Sierra.

  “Visitation of you two. One… Malketh here to talk to you. He’s here right now. Do you accept?” he said in a bored tone.

  Violet and Sierra shared a look. Was it someone from the GFC? Violet would give whoever it was a piece of her mind, disrespecting Malketh’s memory like that after he sacrificed himself for her…

  A sacrifice that only led her to rot here away in prison.

  But still.

  The visitation room had two sides. There was a long line of chairs and little booths lining the whole space. In the center were reinforced glass windows separating them from the identical setup on the opposite side for the visitor.

  Violet could see that their visitor would be seeing them at the end of the rows as the guard led the way.

  “Remember, everything you say is recorded,” the guard said in a bored tone, “You have fifteen minutes, don’t smudge the glass, don’t…”

  Violet stopped listening and felt Sierra stiffen next to her as she caught sight of who was sitting there like a ghost from her past. Her heart beat rapidly and her blood rushed to her head as pure shock radiated from her mind.

  The guard finished his speech and then turned away and left them alone.

  “It’s been a while,” Malketh said with a slight smile, “But I’m back.”

  “B-Back?” Sierra stammered from next to her, “But Malketh, we saw… we saw what happened to you. How are you here?”

  “I’ll tell you later,” Malketh said calmly, “Now we’re going to take a few minutes to calm down and collect ourselves. Then I need you to be ready for when I do something drastic. Okay?”

  Violet’s rapid heartbeat and shock died down a little as Sierra heavily sat down in the only seat available to them. Alright, deep breaths in and out…

  Seems like Malketh was not only alive but about to break them out of jail somehow.

  “Alright, are you both ready?” Malketh asked them after they had both silently calmed down, and they both nodded, “Okay, stand back and get ready to run. Look away when I throw my shirt.”

  He reached down to his button down shirt and with a few quick motions took it off revealing a sleeveless shirt underneath. He pulled a little white tab of cloth on the inside of the shirt he had just removed and it revealed that there was a long thin string underneath that Malketh tugged hard before it completely detached from the jacket. Malketh threw the jacket at the glass between them suddenly.

  With a loud blast, the jacket exploded and destroyed the glass. The large attached pieces of the bulletproof safety glass went flying and peppered Violet’s back, punching through her thin prison uniform but not far into her skin before bouncing off and falling to the ground.

  She turned around and saw that the explosion had bounced back and torn some singed holes across Malketh’s front and opened large rips in his shirt. But somehow he looked completely unhurt with only his clothing damaged.

  A loud alarm started sounding from above.

  “Alright, let’s go,” Malketh said, “Climb through, careful of the glass.”

  After a moment of shock from the both of them, they complied and scrambled over the desk and over to Malketh’s side.

  “What is the plan now?” Sierra asked as a blaring alarm suddenly started wailing above them and shouting from where Violet knew the guards would be.

  “Now you follow behind me,” Malketh said, “I’ll handle the guards.”

  “Did you bring any weapons with you?” Violet asked hopefully, “The guards' weapons will only work for them. They’re nothing but hunks of metal if we steal them.”

  “No,” Malketh said as they started jogging to the exit of the room, “Checks were too thorough. The jacket was the most that I could get away with. But this is the shift with the lowest number of guards right during lunch. Just follow my lead, I have a plan.”

  Malketh threw open the door to the room and started running through the prison hallways with Violet and Sierra not far behind. Several guards ran at them shouting and brandishing their stun batons or stun guns.

  Malketh barely slowed down as he diverted and took each of them down with a few precision strikes of his open hand. They shot him with their stun guns and stabbed at him with the sparking tips of their batons as he chopped at their necks and skulls in quick bursts of motion.

  But Malketh barely even flinched as he finished his attacks and kept taking them out with maximum efficiency. Violet looked at Malketh in a sort of quiet awe as they kept running and he handled every guard they came across effortlessly with his bare hands even as they ran. She was no slouch and had trained for a long time to improve her hand to hand skills. But she could just see in his easy and smooth movements that he was an absolute master of the craft. Every motion planned for and wasted not one scrap of energy as he moved with perfect economy of movement.

  They reached a locked door. One made of a metal mesh with a heavy lock holding it closed. Violet knew it was one of three between them and the visitor section. Past that was the final heavier door at the opening of the prison walls.

  Did Malketh have some device or… Malketh punched the door full force with his arm. Violet stared at his hand in concern, but frowned as she saw that he was completely uninjured. But his punch had dented the metal…

  Malketh punched again in a flurry of over a dozen hard punches into the metal mesh of the door near the lock and Violet’s eyes opened wide. What in Gaia was he doing? He was going to break his hands if he kept it up!

  But with one final punch, there was a click as Malketh’s punches warped the door enough as it bent inwards that the little bolt holding the door clicked against its housing as it strained to come free.

  Malketh planted his feet and stuck his fingers into the newly formed gap between the edge of the door and the wall and lock in the wall. His punches had dented the door inwards enough that it looked like some giant had given it a giant kick and caused the edge of the door to angle inwards.

  Malketh used his fingers in the crack and heaved so hard that Violet could see his arms tensing at maximum power as he sat there. But he kept going for a few more seconds, had he gotten stronger? What was he hoping to accomplish?

  But then with a loud creak and snap, the deadbolt holding the door into the wall tore free, and Malketh managed to fully open the door.

  Violet glanced at Sierra, who was just as shocked as she was at Malketh’s display of strength. But when Malketh ran through the now open and deformed door, she and Sierra hurried to follow after him.

  Malketh did the same thing to the second door, not even looking strained in the slightest by what must be the massive strain on his body and pain in his fists from punching and bending metal.

  At the last door two more guards found them again and tried to stun Violet and Sierra when they saw them.

  But each of them were well trained combatants. And although they apparently weren’t as skilled as Malketh, they were easily able to take out each of the guards within a few seconds of starting to fight them. Malketh worked on opening the door as they did so.

  He somehow managed to use his overwhelming strength to tear open the locked door again and the three of them ran until they burst through an unlocked door outside. Guards in the two towers on either side of the main gate shouted and pointed down at them as they ran. Violet and Sierra kept running to follow Malketh as he ran straight towards the closed main door. Even with his strength, Violet was sure that he wouldn’t be able to open it. The three metal bolts keeping it in place and into the heavy wall were each thicker than her hand. The door was meant to be big enough that a vehicle could come in through the walls. What was Malketh planning to do to get through that? Was their escape doomed?

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine,” Malketh promised them, “Get close to the door. The towers don’t have a good angle of fire on us down here.”

  Sierra and Violet crushed in as the first electric stun blast hit the ground behind them from the guard tower above. Malketh was right, the angle was too sharp for the guards to be able to fire their weapons on the three of them directly.

  Violet’s head snapped around as she heard a sickly crack behind her. She turned around and saw Malketh pressing one of his hands against one of the thick metal bolts holding the big door to the wall. He waited for a few seconds with his hand pressed in place before with another sharp jerk of his hand upwards, there was another signature crack of snapping bone.

  Violet looked down as she saw the three longest fingers of his right hand falling to the ground. Her eyes widened and she looked back up and saw Malketh’s hand jerk sharply again. Her instinctive gasp was abruptly cut off in confusion as she finally noticed that somehow his severed fingers were regenerating and returning to him.

  She looked between the severed fingers on the ground and the regenerating ones buried in the massive metal bold holding the door closed. Huh?

  Violet and Sierra stayed there waiting as a rain of stun bolts landed on the ground just outside the shadow of the door slightly inset into the wall.

  “Why do they not come down and shoot us themselves, huh?” Sierra whispered to Violet.

  Another sickly crack. Malketh’s hand was now pressed about halfway up the second heavy metal bolt. She could see from between his fingers that Malketh had somehow carved through the first bolt and left a trail of gore coating either severed end of it.

  “Against procedure,” Malketh said as he broke his fingers again in a sound that made Violet wince as he continued using his… finger gore lasers to carve through the metal bolt.

  “Anyone who comes down here is at risk of being killed during a prison break,” Malketh continued as he finished off the second bolt and reached for the third bolt. He had to reach just above his head to get his hand pressed against it and start the process for the last bolt.

  “Sierra, boost me up, would you?” Malketh said. Sierra didn’t do anything for a moment before coming forward and after grabbing Malketh around the waist heaving him upwards to get a better angle.

  “Thanks. *snap*, they have to stay up there. They assume this door will keep us contained until reinforcements arrive from inside. Unfortunately for them, their radios seem to have been jammed so that they can’t call for direct help or tell the others exactly what we’re doing. If they even know what I’m doing.”

  “What in Gaia are you doing?” Violet asked pointedly.

  “Explain later,” Malketh said as he snapped his fingers again and pressed his bloody hand against the last resisting bit of metal bolt holding the door closed. Violet could see Sierra wobbling a bit and puffing as he attempted to keep Malketh stable as he held him up. But after more than a minute of effort Sierra was beginning to flag and struggle to keep Malketh up.

  Malketh’s hand finished carving through the bolt, but despite that the door remained in place.

  “Stand back,” Malketh said, “But not too far that you’ll get hit,” he added as Violet started backpedaling quickly, stopping her in place.

  Just like he had for the other doors, Malketh stuck his hands in the gap of the massive door and gripped it firmly and planted his feet and then started heaving backwards with all of his strength.

  And slowly, with loud creaks and groans, the door slowly opened inch by inch even as Violet heard the whines of motors and gears trying to close it again. There seemed to be a breaking point after about thirty seconds and a loud crunch and high pitched whine as something finally gave in the motors trying to keep the door shut and they broke or mostly shut down.

  Malketh immediately started making more progress and opened the massive door to create a foot wide gap between it and where it had stood closed. That gave him enough room to wedge his body inside and press outwards and raise his legs to push off with them too to make the door open even faster. Violet could see practically every muscle in his body bulging to its ultimate limit like a body builder even as his face remained calm and his breathing stayed steady and even.

  Finally after a few awe inspiring seconds, the door was open far enough that Violet and Sierra could slip past Malketh to the other side. Malketh quickly let go of the door and followed after them as soon as they were through. The large door slowly began closing itself again as soon as he let go despite the motors moving it groaning and straining as it did so.

  Malketh pointed to a nondescript car and Violet and Sierra rushed towards it and opened the unlocked back doors and jumped inside. Malketh went into the front and started it with a soft rumble.

  The car tore out of the exterior prison parking lot at high speed, leaving the prison with alarms blaring behind them.

  There was the sound of cheap helicopters and more advanced ships with thrusters that were circling the prison behind them after a few minutes and after a brief pause split off to chase after their car that was speeding away.

  “Change into the clothes back there,” Malketh said distractedly as he pressed the pedal to the floor as he raced at maximum speed through the rural streets.

  “About five minutes from the city,” Malketh said, “We’ll blend in after.”

  Violet and Sierra quickly found the two packets of clothes on the floor for them and changed out of their prison uniforms, not worrying about modesty with the current situation and the lurches of the moving and speeding car.

  Malketh roared into what could only generously be called a city, and Malketh drove quickly before slowing down and turning into a parking garage just as all the flying vehicles arrived above them and circled while shouting at them over their loudspeakers for them to turn themselves in.

  They went to the parking garage and Malketh went to the lowest level down under the ground.

  They got out of the car and Malketh took something out from the center console box. A fist sized device with a pin and handle running down its side. Some kind of grenade?

  They all left the car and Malketh waited for Violet and Sierra to get some distance before quickly throwing the grenade into the still running car and running for it himself.

  The grenade let out a massive gout of flame and after a second the electric car’s batteries exploded next, with such heat the Violet could feel it even from here.

  “Got rid of the evidence. Alright, this way,” Malketh said as he turned and went towards the corner of the area where a tarp was sitting on the ground. Malketh threw the tarp back and opened the wooden trapdoor sitting underneath it, revealing a hole beneath with a metal ladder going into the darkness.

  “Go in, go in,” Malketh insisted, “Quickly, before they send someone in after us.”

  Violet stared down the hole suspiciously as Sierra immediately turned around and started climbing down the metal ladder.

  But with a groan, she followed suit after Sierra’s head sank below the surface. Gaia, she hated enclosed spaces, reminded her of her time in that horrific isolation chamber when she was captured by the Jade Congress…

  Everything went dark as Malketh replaced the tarp covering the opening above them and shut the trapdoor. Violet kept climbing down the ladder until she reached the bottom that only had a single dim light strip on the ceiling shrouding everything in a dull gray haze.

  Violet squinted and stumbled out of the way of Malketh as he came down from above her.

  “Okay, be careful here,” Malketh whispered, “There’s a little maintenance path about three feet wide through the open door. In the main subway tunnel. We’ll be going about two miles until surfacing again. From there the GFC will fully extract us and smuggle us out of the city to safety. Just make sure that you don’t tumble out, but we’ll have to jog if we want to escape before they find the tunnel and start searching the tunnels for us.”

  Malketh picked up something from besides the ladder and with a soft click the room was lit up with a slow powered flashlight.

  “Each of you get one, we’re almost there,” Malketh said encouragingly. Sierra and Violet did so and all three of them went out into the circular subway tunnel and started jogging down the flat maintenance path to the side of the rails. After a few minutes of following after Malketh at a jog, they heard the rumble and rush of air of a train coming down the tunnel.

  “Lights off!” Malketh hissed and pressed himself against the wall of the tunnel as well. Violet fumbled a bit at the sudden command, but managed to turn off her light and press herself against the wall as the subway suddenly roared by them at high speed for a few moments before receding into the distance.

  They turned their dim lights on again and kept running. Almost there… Violet was panting from all the sudden running, maybe she’d let herself go a little after being in prison for so long…

  Almost… there.

  At a seemingly random moment, Malketh suddenly stopped and turned his flashlight to a nearby door set into the wall. All three of them went inside and saw another metal ladder going up into the ceiling like from before. Violet could clearly see the cracks and jagged cuts in the hole in the concrete, and the places where the metal ladder had been bolted into the existing structure. The ladder and exits had been added after this room was already finished being built…

  All three of them climbed the ladder after Malketh made sure to firmly lock the door behind them. At the top of the ladder, Sierra reached up and threw open another trapdoor and climbed out into what appeared to be someone’s garage.

  A man was standing there watching them as they climbed out of the hole, a pair of physical car keys held in his hand. Malketh climbed out of the hole and covered it with another tarp.

  “Everything ready? The house is scrubbed clean?” Malketh asked the man, who nodded back in reply and silently opened his front door and put his keys into the access slot.

  The rest of them piled inside the vehicle as the unfamiliar man opened the door to the garage and started driving away through the city as if nothing was the matter at all.

  Not that they saw much of that. All three of them were crammed in the backseat and the driver had thrown a large tarp over them so their faces wouldn’t be caught by any passing cameras hooked up to the government network.

  It took a few hours, but they were eventually brought to a plane and took off, clear from the manhunt looking for them in the city that they had just escaped.

  It was Violet who broke the silence.

  “Malketh, I… How are you here? Alive?”

  Malketh held up his hand that was still completely coated with dried blood from when he was breaking his fingers over and over again.

  “I’m Immortal now. I did die back there. But the Shadow stopped it and turned me into an Immortal.”

  “I-Immortal? The Shadow? You saw it? Then where were you? We all thought that you were dead. We had a funeral for you…”

  “I’m sorry,” Malketh said with a sigh, “I came back as quickly as I could. About a year ago. The GFC really struggled with you two gone for these last years. But it’s back to a good enough place that we could do this. I’m sure that your wife will be happy to see you, Sierra. She’s been busy preparing quite the party for our return even now.”

  Sierra smiled, “Such a beautiful woman,” he muttered, “I will make sure to take the biggest bite of the cake. Biggest bite for the largest man.”

  Malketh snorted, “Sure, man. Biggest bite for you. We’re free to talk now, and we’ve got a few hours before our flight lands. Did you know that our old commander is in charge of the entire GFC now? He’s really moved up in the world from local base commander to in charge of the whole thing…”

  They all talked, even if the conversation was surreal to Violet. Malketh was back, alive, and Immortal. He had broken them out of prison and was bringing them back to the GFC. It felt like a strange dream of sorts as she spoke with him. But somehow… The conversation was easy. Even after ten years, it felt like only yesterday when Malketh and Violet were relaxing and playing videogames together after she’d just gone on a hard mission to the Jade Congress’ territory and filled with all sorts of horribleness.