The church is a massive building.

  This is the first of many thoughts that I file through as I shove its massive double doors closed behind me, all of which are useless. Right now, I need to quilt together what little I remember of the layout of this place. Think! What do I remember… there’s a massive courtyard inside, in a sort of U-shape. At the far end, the chapel juts out like a cliff over the sea, peninsula of faith. The perimeter of the building on either side is a string of spare bedrooms that used to be classrooms, connected by a hallway each that meets up at the chapel in the middle. The only actual entrance or exit for the whole building is the front, but the walls are functionally two-thirds just glass.

  I’m confident the government has more pressing issues than vandalizing a church.

  On the other hand, the large glass windows are also a double-edged sword. Running through the courtyard would be stupid—it would give my pursuers a clean line of sight. Which, the shouting behind me notifies me, they already have because I’m still standing right in front of the glass doors like an idiot. They’re just reaching the statue now. They’ll see me no matter which way I go, but if I can turn a corner before they catch up, I might be able to hide in the storage room at the end of the hallway. I bolt left, turning right at the corner of the hallway just in time to hear, rather than see, my hunters curse, voices muffled through the glass.

  Then, I’m gone, sprinting down the jarringly light, sunlit passage, a metropolis to my left, Eden to my right. There it is, the rapidly growing shape of the door to storage that connects to the South transept.

  No sound of creaking hinges. I don’t have time to ponder what the two men are doing outside. Probably planning. If they are, they must not be worried that I’ll leave from some other exit, or I’m not their main priority. Either way, every second they spend outside is another three strides of space I put between them and me. My right arm stretches out before me as much as I dare reach without unbalancing the spear leaning on it for support, muscles tensed as I ready myself to open the door, locked or not. Unlike most of this city, the church is old. I can probably just break the handle if it’s locked, but I don’t have time to find out it’s locked first.

  Fifteen strides, ten, five. I practically slam into the door, hand yanking at the handle with all my might. I feel some resistance, then a click, and I tumble into the storage room. Behind me, the sound of footsteps has resumed. I shove the door closed, not bothering to lock it from within—assuming the lock isn’t broken anyways. Food and water. Just water for now, a human can survive three weeks without food, one week without water. Of course, you stop being able to function well before that, but being alive counts as victory here. The dead zone should only be another ten minutes, tops, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.

  I spot it quickly: a thankfully opened pack of water bottles (return empty bottles to store, it says on the package) in the far corner of the room. As I lunge forward for it, I scan the rest of the shelves. There are a couple of energy bars resting atop the larger box from whence they, supposedly, came. I snag them in the same motion as I rip a bottle free of its tight plastic embrace.

  Only now do I realize I did not take my backpack with me. Ripped wings, of course I didn’t. My plan was to run away ASAP, and a sack of ten-pound books would have done me no good.

  In a split-second decision, I rip off my jacket and use it as a makeshift sack, not bothering to tie the sleeves properly because by now, it sounds like my foe will burst through the door any moment now. In these tight confines, I have no space to maneouver; the closest thing I have to a weapon is the spear from Minerva, which I doubt can even be held horizontally along the short wall of this room. Thank god the storage room connects to both the hallway and the South transept.

  I have maybe thirty seconds at best before first contact with the enemy. Thirty seconds to take some sort of cover in the chapel. My impromptu pack secured as well as it’ll ever be, slung on my back and tied with the sleeves, I stand up, turning to the door into the chapel. I burst through the door, hesitating at the entryway only for a second as I try to recall good shelter places in the large room before me.

  The pulpit! A silent nudge rests my eyes on the ornately carved masterpiece that is the pulpit. I always wondered just what it was meant to shelter the speaker from. It will suffice.

  I only make it two bounds, before I stop in my tracks.

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  The footsteps are coming from behind me, and to my right—the latter already in view. Seeing me, he redoubles his pace.

  They’ve pincered me, the sly bastards. Nothing for it. My best shot is still the pulpit. I cross the remaining few strides and up the stairs by twos, left arm still gripping the spear as my right latches on to one of its wooden pillars, my momentum carrying me around as I swing into the shielded platform and crouch down, leaving only my head above its rails..

  The man across the room reaches me first. At least, I assume it’s a man. Now that I am looking directly at him, the figure is clad from head to toe in a dark color—It’s hard to tell what exactly in the relatively dimmed light wafting through stained glass windows. The gear is bulky in some parts and otherwise baggy and loose, as if the stuff was designed for comfort but had war forced upon it. Two belts circle his waist, and his left arm is covered in what I can only guess is armor or weaponry, all hard angles and much thicker than his right.

  Then he’s in my face, and I have bigger things to worry about.

  I duck as a fist punches through the air above my head, the man not bothering to go around my makeshift shield. The hand retracts, but something in my head screams danger. I keep my head down, spear held level to the ground to stick out from the entryway, and a second later the roof of the pulpit is gone and my feet are swept from beneath me in the impact. The next moment, there’s a crash below to my left. A cursory glance to one side informs me that the back pillars weren’t spared, beams of wood hanging by splinters around me. Just how the fuck did this guy do that?

  The scream blares again. Back! I heed it, legs kicking off the wall of the pulpit to shove me back a stride. I’m vaguely aware of my jacket catching on a jagged beam, its knot coming undone, its cargo spilling across the platform and down the stairs. The gap between me and the wood is occupied a breath later by my aggressor.

  I react on instinct. My spear hand swings upwards, left hand snapping up to support it. I realize my mistake too late, the momentum leaving me unbalanced and my swing weak. It is too slow. The man doesn’t even flinch.

  Then, I’m gasping in agony as a stinging sensation cuts through my nerves. I have no time to look down to see it. I can still move, I’m not dead yet. That will have to be enough. I need to get my feet back under me.

  My opponent’s arm is still carrying on the momentum of his cut. I have an opening. I don’t take it, opting instead to put my left hand back on the wooden platform as I pull my legs back into a crouch in one motion, right arm held in my best attempt at a guard over my abdomen. My hand grips the ledge of the platform, where the thing cliffs off into the stairs. Careful of your footing. Right. I slide one foot back and spring back up, feeling the edge with my heel. The pulpit isn’t big enough for two people—It’s barely large enough to spread your arms at its diameter, let alone allow two people and a large weapon to fight inside. I need to get out; in this thing, I’m the one at the disadvantage. I need space to maneuver.

  I lean my weight forward, right arm still putting a bar of stone between us as I take a step back, onto the stairway. How long has it been? Fifteen seconds at most. It feels like more. His partner will be here any second now. If the first guy still has the upper hand by then, I’m as good as dead. More dead than I already am. Bad as dead, I suppose.

  My musings are cut short by another glint of metal, and the wound in my stomach redoubles its screeches. Shit! I need to create some distance. My off hand snapping up again for support, I steady my grip on the spear, pulling it back to get a better aim. The foe is still on the platform, but my step has freed most of my flexibility. His dodging space is limited. I aim for the abdomen, trying to leverage my spear so that if it misses, I can follow up with its bladed tip.

  I still overshoot, my accuracy found wanting, but it creates the opening I need. As predicted, my opponent dodges to the right. Still, he made a mistake. He threw his weight backward in the same dodge, right on level with the spear point. I swing the spear towards him again, hoping to trap him between stone and wood.

  Somehow, miraculously, it works. For about two seconds.

  Still, those two seconds are all I need. I snatch a wooden beam in my off hand, ripping it free from the last fibers that held it together and hurling it at the man’s face. I don’t wait for it to hit, my hand already reaching for the next loose beam. The entire structure was rattled by our fight, letting my adrenaline-boosted arm rip free plank after plank of the railing, hurtling them all at the now bloody figure before me.

  The sound of footsteps triples in clarity as his partner finally enters the room. My only saving grace is that he freezes in shock for a second as he takes in the destruction we’ve wrought. I’m out of time.

  I withdraw my spear, counting on seven large chunks of wood to the face to be enough to leave my current engagement dazed. Still, I’m not taking any chances. I thrust the point again, this time directly at his chest. The tip halts suddenly, accompanied by the sickening crack of ribs. Not hard enough. I pull back and thrust again, this time throwing my weight into it, aiming slightly below my previous hit and angling upwards. Still, the spear faces resistance, but it at least hits something important. My opponent’s eyes go wide, his mouth opening in a silent scream as his next wracking breath coughs out blood.