The Last Flautist - [Ch.1]

She could smell the fire even before he sent her the signal, and closing her eyes, she decided to breathe in the scent. This would be the last time she'd breathe in such thick and polluted air, so she was ready to compare it to her first ever breath of freedom.

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Freedom.

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God, did that word taste sweet on the tip of her mind's tongue. To be broken out of those stonewall cocoon cells, to run freely in the fields beyond the bars of her empty room. Freedom. Yes, freedom, and the world beneath her being ahead of her also - it was a dream, and here she was with her nose tilted up to the thickness of the air, taking in her last breaths of shackled heels and bloody ankles.

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She heard the hum of a quiet flute through the wall on the opposite side of her cell, and she held her breath.

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She was ready.

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Within a few moments, the alarms sounded, and guards began rushing into the room to escort the prisoners to the outside of the building. Through the aching scuttle, she slipped the candle-wax mold of a key into the cell door before her, and twisted it open in a swift, quiet sweep. She hunkered her scrawny body between the dent she made in the wall, and she held her breath tightly in her chest, feeling her heartbeat ricochet against her ribcage.

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She waited until the only sound was the fire alarm blaring against the cold hallway, and then she let the fire in her throat go in a quick exhale. The last breath of shackled forever.

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Then, with ease, she pressed through the stones in the dent in the wall, pulling and ripping with brute force, the skin beneath her broken nails breaking just as easily as her nails did weeks and weeks ago, and in one fell swoop, she fell through to the other side of the wall.

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Upon picking herself up from the floor, she frowned. She knew that he wouldn't be in the cell waiting for her - it'd be too dangerous, and even if only one of them got out alive, it was a risk that needed to be taken. Still, she couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed, seeing Gum's cell so empty and deserted. She shivered at the thought that he was there just a few seconds before her - she could still feel his warmth in the room, and she could so easily imagine his panicked breathing and toothless smile as he thought, "Yes, yes, freedom!" and crawled through the hole he dug in the ground, the hole he once used to transport his extra rations to her on the nights the guards left her to starve.

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But it wasn't safe to stay here, despite her wanting to sit still and take in the atmosphere of the room. It wasn't safe here, and she'd see him again soon, and this time, she wouldn't ever have to leave his side again. They'd be free.

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She wiped the tears from her eyes and the blood from her hands, and she pushed on, picking up the flute he left behind before crawling through the tunnel. It wasn't until after she'd gone through that she realized the tunnel was a direct drop, and with one final gasp, she felt her head make direct impact with a hard surface. It was hot like fire, stinging with immediate pain and dizziness, then came the ringing in her ears, and then, finally, nothing.

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Yes, she drew it in. The last breath of shackled forever.

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At last, she was free.