Dane turned back to the woman. With Wong gone, she lowered her arms, the flames disappearing. She took one look at Dane. He opened his mouth to say something, to try to fast talk his way out of this, but he had nothing. He turned back to the burning shop where Abby was, looking with dismay.
The woman in red did not consider Dane worth her attention. Her prey had escaped for now. With a swish of her red robes, she turned and walked down the street, disappearing into the smoke and flames which covered the side street.
Loyal and dutiful, the masked assassins pulled themselves off the street, some grabbing the unconscious bodies of fallen comrades. Then without a further word or look, they followed the woman in red into the smoke, leaving Dane alone on the burning street.
Turning back to the raging conflagration that once was Wong's shop, Dane wracked his brain trying to think of something he could do. Maybe he had a gadget that could put out the fire, maybe there was a plan or plot. Maybe there was a back door they didn't know about, or Wong had an emergency bunker he had not thought to use. Or maybe...
Something in the building exploded and the fire roared even stronger. This was the point at which Dane's hope disappeared. She had been inside... and now the whole place was burning.
He had failed her.
"Oh Abby, I am so sorry..."
A Rain of Ash
Dane was still in front of the burnt husk of Wong's shop when the city authorities finally showed up. They had to move all their gear from the other side of Chinatown to this new street, which took a surprising amount of time. This was also hampered by the wards Wong and others had put on the street to deter unwanted attention - until those enchantments burned too. While fires still burned when they arrived, many of the buildings had burned down completely, becoming more smoking frames than fiery wrecks. Three lucky buildings survived with light damage, but they were the only lucky ones. Wong's shop had burned down completely. That was where emergency services found Dane, still in shock. A blanket was put around him and he was taken away as firefighters shouted, moving in their trucks to put out the remaining fires. The night was lit by flickering fire and the flashing of emergency lights.
Not considered a risk and just in shock, Dane was let go from paramedic care. Still wearing the blanket, he was sitting on the curb when agents Jameson and Voss arrived. Dane was coherent, but he wasn't himself. His usual enthusiasm and descriptive ability was lost, so in hesitating words, he tried to explain what happened. Jameson unsurprisingly scoffed at the story of masked ninjas and the woman of fire. However, Voss paid more attention to the part where his girlfriend Abby had been in the burning building when it went up in flames. With a roar that was halfway between rage and heartbreaking sadness, Voss tried charging into the still smoking frame of Wong's store where firefighters still had to use breather masks. Jameson held him back, stopping Voss from sifting through the wreckage. He calmly explained to his partner that Dane was probably mistaken, as Dane often was. And even if not, the city crews would search the wreckage for casualties. Jameson said that then, and only then, would he even begin to take Dane's outlandish account seriously. Voss tried getting Abby on her phone, but there was no answer. He was on edge and worried, but he nodded and agreed that what his partner had said was sensible.
But sensible things do little for emotions. So Voss consoled his emotions by punching Dane. His fist still clenching and considering another strike, Voss finally nodded and turned away. He became the agent he needed to be and put his personal life aside. Jameson and Voss started questioning the firefighters about victims.
Down on the ground, Dane's lip was bleeding, but he felt he deserved that punch. He had screwed up. He had gotten someone else hurt again. A paramedic helped him off the ground, shooting a glare at the agents walking away. Dane shrugged off the care, feeling he deserved that. He knew he had failed Abby. Just like he had failed others long ago.
Someone put Dane in a cab, but he couldn't remember who. He had stuttered his home address and the cab had taken off. Dane couldn't stop thinking about the fire. He always laughed off the danger, but it was real. Jaya had been right - Dane was always lucky, but those around him were not. Dane had felt horrible after Jaya was injured. And it was even worse when he had lost... he tried not to think about that other memory, about one of the worst failures in his career. However, that same emotion returned tenfold when he thought about Abby and this new failure. He didn't want to think about her state, only the end result. Dead.
He numbly swiped his card to pay for the cab when it arrived at his street. He got out of the car and wondered what his next move would be. Sleep? Calling Jaya and apologizing for every time he had even gotten her hurt? Apologizing to Linda yet again? Trying to find some way to make this right? Giving up ever trying to do anything ever? The hour was getting late, the night very dark, so he thought maybe he should lay down before deciding what could possibly make up for this failure.
Dane may have intended to wallow in guilt, but there were other plans for him. The decision was made for him with a blunt object. Dane had just begun to walk toward the front door when someone hit him on the back of the neck, sending him spiraling into unconsciousness.
Abby was not dead. Reports of her death had been greatly exaggerated. While her survival would have obviously been a huge surprise to Dane, it was also a big surprise to her as well.
She opened her eyes, finding herself lying on her back. It was morning, the gray sky still marred by smoke, her view framed by buildings. She sat up, her body aching, wincing at the pain and finding herself coughing from a rasp in her lungs. She was in a wide alley between buildings where the dumpsters were kept. A layer of gray ash covered most of it, as if a spring snowstorm had come through instead of the raging fire that destroyed people's homes. She found that she had been laying on newspapers spread out into a makeshift bed. When her breathing was more steady, she smelled the lingering scent of smoke and something else. In a moment she realized the other scent was, of all things, breakfast sausages. She looked over to see a man she didn't know crouched over a piece of smoldering debris. He wasn't paying her any attention.
Abby seemed safe for the moment, so she tried to remember what had happened. Her head hurt from that much concentration, but she pushed through the pain.
She remembered that the shop had been set on fire, the flames spreading quickly, glass jars of herbs exploding in the massive heat. She had looked for a back exit but couldn't find one. Smoke was filling the air, choking her lungs. She had remembered hearing that many arson victims died from smoke inhalation before they caught fire. Was that true? Was she going to find out? Covering her mouth and coughing, she had been cornered against the back wall by the flames. Whether by fire or smoke, she had thought this was going to be the end. She was surprised that after all she made of danger in Dane's job, she wasn't dying due to robot, monster, or mad scientist experiment. That was almost kind of depressing.
When all seemed lost, when she was ready to see her life flash in front of her eyes and resigned to the fact it would be a very short movie, something odd happened. Though she was against the wall, she felt someone grab her hand. Then the hand yanked her, and she was pulled back through the wall, as if it were water. As soon as she started to move through the wall, everything went strange and she passed out. And then she woke up here.
She looked over to the man. He wore a floppy hat and a long coat. There was a rucksack on the ground near him. Looking at him longer, she realized he wasn't just crouching in front of the fire. He was cooking sausages over a still-smoldering piece of debris. That solved the mystery of the sausage smell. She marveled on how he was using the sharpened end of a walking stick to hold the sausages over the heat. It was something out of an old movie.
"I hope you like sausages for breakfast," he said, not turning to look at her. "Best I could get, because I didn't want to go too far and nearly everything's closed on account of the chaos. Of course, these are vegetarian sausages. Amazing what they c
an do these days. Used to be that you could only get meat sausages. Of course, it also used to be that there were no sausages. Time changes much."
"Who are you?" asked Abby.
"Just a poor wayfaring stranger," said the man.
Abby stood up and walked a little closer, looking at the man in profile. She took in the man's face, searching for some recognition. He looked Asian, she thought he was probably Chinese from everything going on lately. He had stubble, but no facial hair. His features were thin, almost delicate. She couldn't tell how old he was - he didn't look young and he didn't look old. He looked simply Right Now. Despite his sudden appearance and her being alone in an unknown alley with him, she didn't feel unsafe in his presence. There was something about him that was calming and bright. That could have been of course her grogginess and the headache confusing her. She didn't recognize him at all.
"What's your name?" she said.
He turned and looked at her, catching her stare and locking eyes with her. She noted there was something odd about his eyes but she couldn't figure out what. He then said in a deflecting tone, "What's in a name? If you must need a name for me -"
"I must," interjected Abby.
He smiled. "Then you can call me Daoren."
"Daoren? I've never heard that name before."
He shrugged, an odd movement as he was still crouched on his heels. "It's a name now, isn't it?" He turned back to his sausages.
"I feel like I'm not getting good answers," said Abby.
"Maybe it's the questions you're asking," said the man.
Abby rolled her eyes. "Mysterious and coy is rarely attractive."
"I have no beauty contests to win," said the man with a smile.
"Clearly. Okay, better questions then. Let's start with the basics. Why am I here? Why are you here?"
"I wanted to make sure you were safe," he said. "These are dangerous times."
Abby nodded. "Chinatown has seen better days. But why the White Knight act? Why me? I can't imagine I'm the only one who has been in danger."
He pulled the sausages off his walking stick and put them on a half folded paper plate. He handed her the plate and a plastic fork. "Here you go," he said as he gave it to her. "Why you? I was just passing by. You're the one I saw."
"You saw me here in the alley?" she suggested. Smelling the food up close she realized how long it had been since she ate. Abby tentatively took a small bite of the sausage. The taste was acceptable, not rancid or sketchy, as she might expect of a sausage cooked by a strange man in a back alley under a curtain of falling ash. Her stomach took that moment to let her know just how hungry she was.
"Here as well," he said.
"So you're suggesting you're just a Good Samaritan who just happened to be in the right place at the right time," she said, not quite believing him. "But you're being very mysterious about just where the right place was and when the right time was."
He smiled. "Some details are unimportant. But perhaps I was in the right place when I found myself there. I just follow the way and find myself where I am needed."
"I know someone else like that," she said with a mouthful of food.
"That could be all of us if we just listened," he said. "Though some voices are louder here than elsewhere."
"I don't understand," said Abby.
The man just shrugged.
"So what's your deal?" she asked. "I thank you guarding me while I was asleep and I think also for saving my life, but you're clearly around here for some reason besides me. Why are you here really?"
"Dangerous times," he said.
"You know, you're sort of frustrating to talk to," she said.
He grinned. "You wouldn't be the first to say that. And not the last."
"Can't you be more clear?" she said. "You do seem like you're trying to help, but its maddeningly vague."
"Do you like stories? I love stories. If you can spare the time and patience for an old man, let me tell you a story."
"Sure," said Abby.
"Great!" he said, clapping his hands together. "This is a story from long ago in a China that no longer exists. In this long long ago, there was a forest. It was a beautiful place, tucked up in the mountains. Untouched and wild, the sort of place where men did not walk often, and when they did, they did so with respect of the forces that lived there. The trees were full of spirits, the mountains full of gods, the air crisp, and the water that spilled down from the mountains clean. In this place lived a man - a hermit, you might say, having given it all up for this little existence in a big forest. He was known to others as wise but he thought himself a fool. He yearned desperately to find the way, but despite that he couldn't quite find the peace he wanted, even when surrounded by a forest that hummed with peace and serenity. Over a century he dwelled there, learning much, but still not quite finding what he sought."
"Over a century? Was he some old man?" asked Abby.
"Not old as you might think of it, but his youth was definitely gone," he said.
"I'm not sure I understand it," she said.
"It's a story, sometimes you just need to accept things," said the man. "Stories have their own logic and their own lessons."
"But I'm trying to figure out if it's true," said Abby.
"It's a story - true and false don't matter," said the man. "A story matters in what it brings to you and what you take from it. But you'll get neither if you don't indulge it - from logic to falsehoods, strangeness to clarity, balls to bones."
"I doubt some of what you're saying, but I'll shut up and let you continue, since I think that's what you're telling me," said Abby.
He just grinned and continued his story. "One thing this man truly loved was nature. He enjoyed the sky, the trees, the earth, and the animals. Alone and many miles from civilization, animals were his only friends. He particularly enjoyed the company of two red foxes that darted here and there in the woods. Once coy, he gained their affection by feeding them and playing with them. The foxes knew he was harmless, but being foxes, they played tricks on him just the same. They brought laughter to his days. And then one day the man had an idea. Just a single idea that became so much. Was it a good idea? Was it a bad idea? No one can say for sure though there are many opinions of it. But the point in this story is that it was his idea and it changed so many things.
"It was a gift. That's important. A gift freely given, not an obligation, not borrowed power, no strings. It was given to two he loved. See, in all his years seeking the way, the old man had accumulated a fair amount of power. Magic, if you like. More than he ever needed, so he thought he could surely spare a little bit. And that's what he did - to each fox he gifted some of his power. It wasn't a large amount, not enough to be dangerous. He gave them enough that they would become more than mere foxes. Not yet enough to stand on their own, but enough that with the right cultivation, they could become very special. And he could help them become that. So he gave them this gift and over the years they changed from just foxes to what we would call people. Still foxes, but also people. Fox people."
"I think I might know one of those foxes," said Abby.
The man continued without comment. "After many years, the man had taught them all that he could on his own. There were things he could tell them, but they would not be able to learn them yet. They needed experience, to go out on their own. And the man had his own way to follow, that tugging of wanderlust in his chest. So they parted ways, the foxes leaving the forest and the man going his own way. But he never forgot them and he watched from afar, checking in on their own travel. He saw their loves and their joys, their successes and their failures, but he has also seen the trail of death and flames that followed."
The man paused to frown, his eyes far away. But then he continued. "And through so many years, one question always persisted in the old man's mind: if a gift is freely given, is the giver responsible for how the other uses it? Where does responsibility lay for how one uses what they are given? Is the way itself indifferent o
r is it involved?" His frown deepened but his words came to a halt.
Abby felt she should say something. "I... I'm not sure I understand." She wrinkled her brow.
The man's frown disappeared and he looked at her with an affectionate smile. "After all this time, I don't think I do either." He stood up and brushed the ash off himself. He grabbed his rucksack and threw it over his shoulder. "I think this old man has wasted enough of your time. I'm sure you have places other than here to be."
"I appreciate you saving my life," said Abby. She was sure he had somehow pulled her from the burning building, even if he still hadn't said anything about.
"You owe me no thanks or debt," he said. "I gave you breakfast, you returned the favor with your time and your ears. Nothing is owed, no debt has been acquired."
"You're a strange man," she said.
"But not the only one you know," he said with a smile. He tipped his floppy hat, a gesture that was almost comical. "Maybe I'll see you around. If that's where the way takes me."
Abby was surprised to not find a message from Dane on her phone. Surely he had been worried about her when she disappeared, so why hadn't he tried calling her? She decided to chalk that up to Dane's wavering attention span. He was probably embroiled in some new fantastic thing and would remember to call her when he remembered to breathe. She decided to preempt that process and call him. The phone kept ringing and eventually hit his voice mail. It still had the generic voice message that Dane had never bothered to change. She left a message saying she was okay and to call her, then hung up.
Burning Monday: (Dane Monday 2) Page 16