“No, no, no that way,” she squawked in my ears in a way that it sounded like Aaron’s favorite song, leaning so close to me that my arm could feel the touch of her chest.
But at that time I had already been blinded by the deadly smoke that had mutated into tear gas, which was even more irritating than the poor air outside, and was desperately uncertain about what she meant when she said ‘that way’.
“I can’t see. And I had absolutely no idea about what you’re trying to tell me.” I patted her arm to grab her attention, then lightly two-fingered at both of my closed eyes for three times, praying she would understand what I was conveying.
Thus she, holding my hand so tightly that I could feel the tiniest perspiration creeping its way through the pores of her hand, started leading the way, and I felt weird to be pulled here and there without actually knowing where the destination was by a complete stranger, especially in such a jeopardy. So, imbued with this immense sense of insecurity, I tried to lift up my stiff and dry eyelids with my thumb as the feeling of weirdness then inevitably evolved into a sense of doubt because I felt like we were just stumbling around on the same floor, instead of going down a flight of stairs or something like that to somewhere safe, but I couldn’t.
“Where are you taking me!? Aren’t we supposed to go down and leave this building!?” I asked, eagerly massaging my eyes with my thumb to help speeding up the recovery of my sight like I had just worn myself out by straining my eyes too much.
“No. No. This way to heaven. To heaven. Safe, safe,” she said.
With my adrenaline pumping, “What? I’m not going to heaven! I don’t want to die here!” I barked loudly and instantly hauled back my arm with every ounce of strength I’d ever possessed, sending her to the ground, with my fist clenched.
And I stormed away, with my eyes fully open in spite of the increasing discomfort stemmed from the thick walls of impenetrable smoke, and sprinted back to where the others had gone. The evacuation guidance light was much more difficult to find than before at that time since the entire floor was already engulfed. I could only grope my way around until I magically laid my hand on one of those melting canvases, which seemed very sarcastic at that moment, hanging on the walls, and espied a tiny margin of dying heavenly light emitted by the half-broken system.
Following its guidance, passing by the elevators, turning left, then right along the corridor, I reached a fire exit door and pushed it open without a second thought, then regretted for the massive wisps of dark smoke that swirled out from the sweltering emergency exit at the next second. The entire escape route was working like a chimney without an opening, which trapped all smoke, and was probably heating up at an unimaginable rate, and it forced me to recede a step before I could enter, nevertheless, that was not the most horrific thing I’d seen there. The most horrendous thing of all was seeing the piles of bodies of people stacked up at the bottom of the stairs that made me shudder.
It was only a quick glance, but still, I was able to see one of them floundering, trying to crawl out of the piles like a zombie rising from its tomb. He seemed to be sober, half alive and suffering greatly, but was moving like a turtle. I bet he wouldn’t last another minute without my help. My instinctive selfishness that made me tiptoe away from the door wanted me to find another route and get myself out of this blazing hell as soon as possible, but the contemptible shamefulness of not helping the headband man accumulated in my mind told me the exact opposite and prompted me to edge closer to the door. The internal conflict was tearing me apart and wasn’t settled until a voice within cross-examined me. How could I in all conscience justify the thought of turning a blind eye to someone in dire need of help again?
Looking back now, I know that’s the exact same question – a rather easy one when compared to others’ – that changed my life because that’s what I was asked when facing Gradius before the pearly gate for the first time. And I would say it’s kind of the most unexpected question I’d imagined. But my answer was quick and simple. There is no justifying anything for my hands have already been tainted with sin but confession.
That being said, at that time, I wouldn’t dare to rush in there brainlessly like mounting a final banzai charge and got myself a free ride to the heaven. Then I thought of one thing in my suitcase that could help me accomplish this, so I darted back to where I dropped it off, found it, unzipped it, rummaged around for the mask, and clamped it over my face. It wasn’t one of those polished fire resistant masks that could repel lethal smoke particles, but it was fairly useful in terms of alleviating the impact of breathing in hot fumes of smoke. And I rushed back, pushed open the door and stomped down the stairs, crouching, to the crawling man, who had a crimson face that seemed to augur ill.
“Hey,” I said, jiggled his shoulder, checked his vital signs and found a throbbing pulse, his skin red hot like a branding iron.
“He… lp……” He, a man who appeared to be in his early fifties, emitted the word so weakly that I had to guess what he was trying to say.
“Don’t worry. You’ll be all right. I’ll get you out of here.” I injected confidence into my tone even though I was utterly clueless about how I was going to get out of this place with a fainted man on my shoulder and thought for a moment. I wasn’t sure about anything but that the thick layers of smoke would definitely kill us in less than ten minutes if I kept on being indecisive.
So, assuming it was a suicide mission to carry him further down the stairs, where the densest clouds of smoke could be found, I arduously dragged him back up to the third floor and grinded my teeth as my brain raced to think of a possible way out. Why did the staff want to get us to the other side? I pondered and decided to go back the old way, realizing maybe I had been wrong, maybe she knew it would be a fatal mistake to have gone to the fire escape but was just unable to conquer the language barrier. And I felt terribly ashamed as well as embarrassed for the gratuitous pain inflicted on her.
With the man on my right shoulder and my arm securing him in position, his legs dangling wildly over my spine, I, inch by inch, began hobbling along the way I’d walked once and let nothing stop me until a windowless dead end, where a despairing, solid-looking brick wall shattered my fragile hope, faced me. Initially I thought there was simply no way out and was then learning to accept my faith, but if it was true, where was she? Either she had vanished without a trace, or there must be a hidden way out of here.
A new hope was ignited, and I poked around vigorously and relentlessly, the floor, the walls, the ceiling, and keep on ferreting around despite the growing-grim situation. And when I bent over to check the corners, an unusually high-pitched air streaking sound that indicated there was a small crack somewhere on the walls around captured my full attention and reminded me of what she had said about a ladder.
“Find the crack, find the ladder,” I stood back up, removed the mask, put it into my trousers pocket, and mumbled. “Find the crack, find the ladder, find the exit!”
But then I tripped over something soft and clumsily stumbled forward. The momentum carried me to the brick wall, and I had to slam my arms against it to avoid smacking my skull into it.
And when I looked down to see what I’d tripped over, I discovered it’s his hand. The man had meekly held up his hand. He was awake.
So I went to him and tried to help him up with my arm round him, “Hey, how are you feeling?” I asked and was slightly surprised by a deep scar that went from the top of his forehead down to his right eye, which was unobservable back in the fire escape due to the stifling smoke. It wasn’t a fresh wound, but if he told me he had fought in a war, I’d believe him without a doubt.