Cheng, his breath forming quick clouds of condensation in the crisp night air, stood shoulder to shoulder with his brethren-in-arms on the rooftop of the Ho Man Ting Mall. Each moment prickled with a tension that somehow felt new, even for the habitual chaos of Kowloon’s south.
He knew he couldn’t draw from any past experiences to aid him now. This would not be another skirmish in the labyrinth of alleys, not just another instance of violence reverberating through the concrete veins of Kowloon. The Yau Bombings changed everything, and now he saw every encounter with the Yang as a loaded gun hanging over the city’s innocent populace. And he would do whatever he could to protect them all.
As Cheng stood there, staring at the thousands of heads awaiting in anticipation, his focus was broken by the brisk voice of Shing, finally arriving. Cheng turned back, hearing General Denzhen give orders in hushed whispers.
‘…Yes, General. Right away,’ Cheng heard. Shing turned and lightly jogged over to him. As he approached, Shing offered a bow.
‘Good work getting here swiftly, prefect,’ Cheng said. ‘I don’t see Yutai. Where is he?’
‘About that, sir. We were in Kam Shan doing something urgent for Tong Feng. We were unable to abandon the task for the night. He sends his apologies, he’ll wrap up and get here as soon as he can.’
Cheng shook his head, I gave Yutai an order. ‘Fine, we’ll discuss this later. Get into position, I have a feeling this is going to start soon.’
Shing walked to Cheng’s right and took his rifle off his back. He pulled out it’s pronged stand below the barrel and slowly laid himself prone against the gritty rooftop. With his PAW12 perched on the rooftops edge, he placed his eye in the scope and began scanning out the crowd, as General Denzhen would have ordered him to. Cheng stood up high above the anxious crowds, hoping Yutai would get here before something bad happened.
****
As the King Rail announced its arrival in Ho Man Ting, Yutai dashed out, his footsteps echoing through the dark, silent Yau embassy. Exiting the building, he locked the door behind him and was met with a massive crowd surging towards Ho Man Ting Square. Joining the human tide, he navigated the dense sea of people, overhearing whispers of ‘Is that a Kingmaker?’
Despite the collective body heat making him sweat under his leather trench coat, Yutai pressed on, eyes fixed on the glowing blue display of his holo-map. When the 18/5th corridor appeared, he broke free from the crowd, bolting through a metal gate into a dark alley shortcut to the square. Thunderous roars and an amplified voice from the square echoed through the corridor, increasing the tension with every step. I must get to the signal before the caller leaves!
He darted through small alleyways adjacent to the square until he found an archway that led towards Ho Man Ting University. A chilled wind hit Yutai as the alleys gave way to an open overhead space. The sounds of the crowd from the other side of the university building before him revealed the magnitude of the event. He approached the backside of the looming brutalist structure, away from the ongoing main spectacle, determined to reach the origin of the phone call’s signal.
Yutai charged up a short ramp towards the back doors of the university, only to find them locked. A twitch of anger surged through him, and he kicked the door in frustration. Yutai walked backwards away from the door, taking in the backside of the building in its entirety as he wondered how else he could gain entry inside.
Scanning the structure, his eyes fell upon a small scaffold on the fourth floor’s broad landing, half-painted and adorned with an enticing window at its top.
An entrance point, perhaps?
With renewed energy, he took several steps back, then sprinted up the ramp, leaping onto the small awning jutting above the locked door. Hoisting himself up, he scrambled up the windowsills and cracks in the greyed, damp plaster, reaching for anything he could leverage to climb higher. Even under the relentless rain, his grip remained steadfast, his boots finding refuge in small nooks and crannies against the wet surface. Yutai hoped that wherever Shing was in the square at the other side of the building, he was okay.
****
Shing’s finger was a tight coil of readiness. His hold was tight around the grip of his formidable PAW12, index finger twitching as if his mind wrestled his body to not pull the trigger. The mounted long red rifle was completely still as Shing’s eye was engulfed by the scope, trained on the silent silhouette of a man known only as Mogwei to his allies, and The Ibilis to his enemies.
General Denzhen stood at the rear of all the men. A granite statue of a man with steel in his gaze, unyielding, unmoving. At the moment, he was the one giving the orders to the six other Kingmakers and the two units of Tien Tao Rioters, making for twenty-six individuals on the rooftop altogether.
Beyond the lip of the rooftop down below, the square was packed with thousands of people, gathered under the glow of lights spilling from the gargantuan groundscrapers flanking the square. Their collective murmurs and chatter vibrated through the concrete, a monotonous drone of rebellion, fuelled by generations of outrage and alienation.
‘I think most here are Yang sympathisers,’ Cheng said as he watched the crowd warily. The comment fell on deaf ears as Shing was consumed by the spectacle unfolding across the square at Ho Man Ting University.
‘How long?!’ Shing heard General Denzhen bark into his wrist through his holocommunicator.
‘No, Mr Enji, your men need to get there NOW! What do you mean there’s been a hold-up at the fort? Then tell them to hurry up!’
The general growled as he hung up the line. The name Mr Enji was known to Shing. He was the district coordinator for Ho Man Ting’s special operative force: The Tien Tao Rioters.
The air felt heavy, dense with anticipation and foreboding, flecks of rain sprinkling past Shing’s magnified scope as he stared at The Ibilis. Suddenly, the elusive figure raised his hands, a simple gesture that wielded the power to silence thousands. Shing watched as the figure began to speak, his voice amplified across the square, bouncing off the steel and concrete of their southern underground city.
‘Children of Kowloon, my warriors of the South,’ The Ibilis began, his voice echoing through the vast expanse. ‘No longer shall we remain bound to the chains of bondage. For too long, we have been marginalised, pushed to the fringes of our society, our voices unheard, our rights trampled. Today, I stand before you to reignite the hope that flickers within the South…
****
…They fear us because they know we hold the power. We are the backbone of this world. We toil in the mines, we run their machines, we leave our homes and families to build their towers of concrete and steel throughout Kowloon. And still, we are overlooked, disregarded, treated as though we are less than the dirt they tread upon. Operation Searchlight saw proof in their actions, when they targetted our innocent brothers and sisters in district Yau with no proof or due process.’
The voice thundered from the square, from the other side of the building, the escalating roars injecting an urgent pulse into Yutai. He stood on a scaffold cluttered with paint cans and rollers just outside a closed window on the 4th floor. He attempted to hoist the window, but it was locked.
Damn it!
Cursing under his breath, he withdrew his hand cannon from beneath his trench coat, shattering the window with a single, silenced shot drowned out by the uproarious crowd. After kicking out the remaining shards, he unlatched the lock and hoisted himself through the opening into a dim hallway, the crunch of shattered glass beneath his boots welcoming his intrusion into the dark hallways of the desolate university.
Once inside, the immediate relief of escaping the rain was replaced with a new predicament: left or right? Opting for the right, he sprinted down the winding hallway, his eyes scanning for an elevator amidst the closed doors and windows. The soft sounds of rain hitting the windows accompanied his dash down the hallways, shadows of the streaks of water slithering down the walls. Yutai saw a sign pointing towards the fire escape. He ran down that direction, and an open door revealed a staircase, an emergency exit devoid of any railings, its grey walls promising a quicker ascent. Yutai rushed up the stairs, keeping in mind that the signal was coming from the 13th floor. He mentally ticked off the levels he was passing.
7…8…9…
Dashing two steps at a time, The Ibilis’ voice reverberated through the university walls and echoed up and down the fire escape.
‘Our brothers and sisters in the north, the core, the west, they live a life we can only dream of. Well-lit homes, abundant food, warm clothes on their backs, while we fight for scraps. Is this justice? Is this equality? Is this how we treat the people of Dong’s birthplace? As we watch our eastern brethren starve on our doorstep, we see the same oppressor locking the door, leaving them to their slow deaths. We watch them scoff at our demands for fairer treatment, laugh at us when we demanded our imprisoned siblings back from their foreign prisons…
****
…and then have the audacity to act surprised when we resist! There is a flame that has been kindled in the heart of the south. A flame that the winds of their neglect and apathy cannot extinguish, but instead fan to intensities untold. That flame is the spirit of the Yang, the spirit of resistance, the manifestation of Dong’s final calling. We are the predecessor of his mission, the chosen of the Light!’
‘Sir?’ Shing shouted back to General Denzhen. ‘I can put an end to this right now!’ His glass scope was fixed on The Ibilis’ left knee. If he fired, it would rip his leg into two pieces.‘No, not yet. This is their first time stating their demands publicly. Even they deserve to say their piece.’
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
Shing could barely hear the mutter of Cheng’s frustration under his breath. ‘Why the fuck are we letting them do this?’
Shing could only agree at the back of his mind, I wish I knew. ‘That is why I appear before you with a heavy heart. All of you know how hard we have tried…with our lives no less. But the painful reality is that today, from Shenzhen to Tsim Tsui, the streets are filled with desperation and grief. In the Huang Wildlands, the blood of our starved brethren stains the floors of every building red, from the ground to the peaks of the 100th levels…
****
…Today, the people of Kowloon want freedom, the people of Kowloon want to survive, and the people of Zhongguo want to have their right to a dignified life! What wrong did we ever do?’
Upon reaching the 13th floor, the sprawling labyrinth of hallways stretched before Yutai, blanketed in a foreboding stillness. From this floor, only the echoes of The Ibilis’ voice reached him, the crowds a lot more distant. He quickly snatched at every knob, hoping one would be unlocked. He crossed windows fighting against the patter of rain, hoping his target hadn’t escaped.
Yutai turned a corner and noticed a door ajar in the distance. He approached the door slowly, with The Ibilis’ voice as the foreboding backdrop to his advance.
With practised caution, Yutai slid out his RS6 handcannon from its holster. Slowly, he reached out with his free hand, aiming the handcannon with the other and nudging the door open with deliberate care. The gun panned left and right in tandem with his racing heartbeat, scanning the vast darkness that swallowed the room. A spectral red glow bled in from a wide window in the back, casting an ominous red hue that seemed to drip off the furniture and walls. Yutai noticed the red hue came from some sort of red cloth outside, flapping against the wind. He was in a chemical laboratory. The Ibilis’ voice continued.
‘Our THIRD demand, AND OUR FINAL AND MOST IMPORTANT ORDER…
****
…The Kingmaker’s and Emperor Puyin’s unconditional surrender of the Ditu over to the people of Kowloon, for true freedom will only come once we depart from the chains of the underground!’
‘That’s enough,’ General Denzhen hissed softly, arms crossed, hearing the positive cheers and roars of the crowd. ‘Take your shot, Shing.’
‘Kill or —’ Shing began, only to be cut off.‘Kill.’ The General’s voice was cold, and his eyes hardened. The time for listening had ended.
In an instant, Shing’s flicked his scope from the knee to the forehead in a fraction of a second, his finger firing the PAW12. Barking a single deadly shot, the echo reverberated off the buildings. The deafening bullet tore through the open space above the square, the air spiralling around the metal round, the dull glow of the tracer striking the centre of the mask’s forehead.
****
As Yutai stepped into the dark lab, the sudden rip of a single rifle shot from the square outside stilled the air around him. A sound he recognised all too well — the biting fire of Shing’s PAW12. The echo hung heavy in the room, pinning Yutai in a moment of confusion, his foot poised in mid-air.
Yutai shook himself from the distraction and took another step into the room. Suddenly, a barrage of gunshots unleashed from the outside, with what felt like a hundred guns letting loose a deafening symphony of energy and lead. The relentless firing battered against the building, each round a drumbeat causing the room to shudder.
‘Brothers and sisters, they mean to silence me! This isn’t over; do not let our dreams perish!’ Came the voice from outside.
The crowd’s roar outside intensified, morphing into a tumultuous sea of noise that threatened to drown the senses. Amid the pandemonium of gunfire and frenzied shouts, Yutai felt deafened by the chaos. Soft light from the square below glowed through the window into the dark lab room. His gut forced his gaze onto the obscured window, his brows knitted in expectation. An intuitive hunch gnawed at him, the hairs on his arms rising as if he were standing on the precipice of something momentous…
CRASH!!
A sudden fury of movement and shattering glass erupted around Yutai, the deafening crack of a splintering window slicing through the air past him. He raised his arms to protect his face from the sharp shards, the lab now howling with wind and pulsating lights from the square.
As his mind surged into overdrive, a shadowy masked and robed figure materialised through the window. A punch, swift as a silent spear, surged towards Yutai’s jaw. With a sharp snap of his arms, Yutai blocked the punch and countered with a powerful kick aimed at the attacker’s face. The figure blocked, and they descended into a whirling storm of punches and parries, a lethal dance of violence. Yutai’s strikes followed with an intention to cause serious bodily harm…but the masked man’s punches whispered with the intention to murder.
Yutai managed to shove the man back and vaulted off a table on his right with a single leg tornado kick that rocked the masked man. Yutai’s officer’s cap flew off in the flurry, but the assault didn’t halt. His adversary, reeling but relentless, fired back a barrage of rapid strikes. Yutai, graceful as a shadow, danced around them, his assailant’s fists just missing Yutai’s body.
Capitalising on an opening, Yutai grabbed both the man’s arms, yanked him closer, and smashed the masked face with a powerful headbutt.
Yutai staggered back, the shock reverberating through his skull as he realized the ‘mask’ was more helmet than a piece of vanity. Both of them were disoriented from the headbutt, but Yutai forced the pain and nausea aside as he lunged forward, aiming to topple his adversary with a swift leg sweep, only to be met by an iron-hard uppercut to his chin.
A whirlwind of blows ignited between them once more, each second pulsating with lethal intensity. Beakers shattered, circuits flew, and lab materials transformed into weapons swung around the lab, discarded as quickly they were used. The masked man managed to grapple Yutai and fling him onto the surface of a lab bench strewn with computers.
Yutai sprang to his feet with a swift kip-up, but his opponent was already atop the bench, fists and legs a blur of martial prowess. They exchanged rapid blows, their movements precise and controlled. The snap of kicks and punches meeting muscle and bone vibrated the very air it travelled through, too quick for the average person in Kowloon to follow with the naked eye.
****
‘He’s gone!’ voices murmured from around the rooftop, incredulous.
‘Rioters, storm the building! Leave no corner unseen! I want that Ibilis in Xhiku links before the hour!’ The general barked into his holocommunicator.‘Shing, do you have a visual?’ Cheng asked desperately. Shing’s scope scanned the rip in the banner, where through it he could see a shattered window. As he fixed his sight through the darkness of the window…
‘What in the name of the Light…’‘What do you see, Shing?!’ Cheng demanded.
‘I have a visual of The Ibilis inside the room…but there’s another person inside, and I cannot tell what it is they’re doing.’‘General!’ Cheng shouted to the back.
‘What is it, Cheng?’
‘We have confirmation that The Ibilis is inside that room!’ Cheng pointed to the shattered window. ‘But there’s another inside who we are unable to identify. What are your orders?’
The general nodded and contacted the Rioters currently storming the university building.
‘Hello, Mr Enji? Have your rioters made contact with The Ibilis? Alright, understood.’
The general raised his arm in the air. ‘Men! Take aim at that window!’
****
Despite his adept defence, Yutai found himself on the back foot as the masked man did not relent in his assault. The martial style was something he’d never encountered, the masked man seemed to be predicted every one of Yutai’s moves.
They both leapt from bench to bench as the savage brutality ricocheted them across the room. Yutai, realising he couldn’t reach for his gun, understood that even the slightest move to retrieve it could provide the masked man with an opening to incapacitate him. In the midst of this realisation, the masked assailant deftly manoeuvred around Yutai, leaping onto his shoulder. With Yutai’s right arm stretched out, the masked man yanked him and sent them both crashing off the bench and onto the ground. The impact resonated with the sound of shattering glass, and Yutai’s arm became ensnared between the masked man’s crisscrossed legs in a tight arm-bar. The masked man pulled it back, subjecting Yutai’s elbow and shoulder to immense strain.
Locked in his assailant’s vice-like grip, Yutai could feel his elbow and shoulder joints creak under the strain. He frantically scrambled for an object on the floor with his free hand, stretching it as far out as he could trying to make contact with a fallen broomstick a meter away. The masked man noticed Yutai reaching for the broom and twisted his arm further.
Yutai shrieked as he felt his elbow about to pop out but desperately tried again and reached even further for the broomstick, going as far as even pulling the masked man as he dragged his whole body towards it, grabbed it by the smallest edge, spun it around and holding it like a spear, swiftly thrust it into the eye hole of the mask, a piercing shriek following the next second from the masked man. The grapple hold was broken, and adrenaline shot Yutai back to his feet as he ignored his near-broken arm, the masked man up too, covering the eye hole with his hand.
Yutai’s focus locked on his adversary. He had no idea if he managed to take out the masked man’s eye. He hoped so. Yutai felt something pour out of his nose, and wiped it with his sleeve, noticing a red streak. His assailant looked at the hand that was covering the eyehole of his mask and rubbed his palm against his thigh.
The two stood there, a tense stand-off punctuating the whirling chaos that had unfurled in less than a minute since the window had shattered in Yutai’s face. Now was the moment to end it. Yutai’s hand hovered over his pistol. The masked figure tensed. Each braced for the deathly dance to rekindle.
Suddenly, the room erupted in a furious storm of bullets.
BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG —
Without a second thought, Yutai dove for cover, his body sliding across the floor behind a nearby bench. The masked assailant mirrored his actions, ducking behind a second bench just a meter beside Yutai, divided by a curtain of gunfire. Yutai noticed the man’s eerie calmness cutting through the deafening gunfire.
The bullets flew into the back wall of the room and the floor, computers were blowing up, glass closets shattered, and everything in the room was slowly being destroyed. Yutai knew if he peeked out for even a second, he would be shot in the head. He looked at the cover where the masked man had been…but he was gone. The door then slammed open as he heard running footsteps in the hallway. The man had escaped, but the firing had not stopped. Yutai, knowing Cheng was with the other gangsters firing into the room, called him from his holocommunicator.
As Cheng answered, Yutai could hear the echo of gunfire on his end too.
‘STOP FIRING! I’M IN THE ROOM!’ Yutai yelled over the chaos. ‘I’M IN THE ROOM!’
The confusion in Cheng’s voice was palpable. ‘YUTAI? YOU’RE WHERE?!’ There was a brief pause, and then Cheng’s distant voice ordered, ‘CEASE FIRE! WE HAVE A KINGMAKER INSIDE!
****
YUTAI IS INSIDE!’ Cheng roared across the rooftop, waving his arms to signal the cease-fire, but his voice couldn’t overpower the deafening sounds of the firing squad. General Denzhen was the only one who barely registered Cheng’s panicked pleas, his eyes widening with horror, boomed his voice even louder, flailing his arms to catch the attention of everyone as he echoed Cheng’s command.
‘CEASE FIRE! I REPEAT, CEASE FIRE!’
The gunfire dwindled and then stopped, replaced by distant cries from the panicked crowd below. Shing felt his heart rise up through his throat, about to be vomited out his mouth.
What did he just say? Yutai was inside!?
Shing turned to Cheng and shot him a horrified, wide-eyed expression. Cheng returned the same, stunned expression. Shing quickly turned back to his scope, scanning what he could through the hole in the wall where the window was, looking for any signs of Yutai. As the room looked completely still, Shing began prayed out loud.O Light, I humbly plead, O Light, I humbly plead,O Light, I humbly plead,O Light, I humbly plead, spare my brother!
When Yutai’s head popped out of cover from behind a lab bench, a rush of relief washed over Shing, so potent that he nearly dropped his rifle.
As the dust began to settle, Yutai slowly walked towards the decimated wall and looked out at the Kingmakers and Rioters across the square. Shing scanned Yutai’s body for signs of injuries and was glad to find none. But instead, he found a face badly beaten, deep with the expression of concern.
Shing glanced up at Cheng to his right. The young tribune stood tall on the ledge of the mall, a silhouette of unwavering resolve against the dead sky. Despite the chaos shaking Shing to his core, Cheng looked like a proud warrior, exuding a steadfast courage, ready to lay down his life for his home. This sight of the tribune, standing with his chest out and eyes blazing with determination, filled Shing with newfound resolve. One thing was clear to him: The south was ready for a fight. And the Kingmakers, if need be, were ready to give them one.