I didn't know how it happened, but I managed to recollect my thoughts and assessed the situation with a clearer mind.
The first three harpoons only hit us once and didn't cause any massive problems for us. It was more like a minor inconvenience, if anything. But terror itself soared into the air thereafter. The second batch of harpoons flew into the air, and one of them pierced through the balloon. Immediately, I felt our aircraft descending, slow but torturous nonetheless. And the closer we are to the kapres, the better they would be at hitting us.
My jaws dropped, contorting my face into a nasty scowl while I frantically pulled my hair out with both hands, trying to ease the panic in my heart. But I couldn't suppress it. Fuck this hot air balloon and fuck this war. All of this shit! FUCK IT ALL! It would have been an easy mountain climbing trip if none of this bullshit had to happen. Why do we have to go to war anyway? And why do we have to fly in a hot air balloon into enemy territory? Why is the most important figurehead of an entire nation flying around a hostile area with just one boy beside him?
The entire thing is a recipe for disaster, and I have no fucking idea why nobody told me all about it beforehand. Couldn't we have just flown to a safer area? DO WE REALLY HAVE TO FLY LITERALLY ABOVE THE ENEMY'S ARMY!?
This is a fucking nightmare.
"We're going down." The soldier peered into the hole. I couldn't even look at the harpoon anymore; no way in hell would I check the immediate cause of my second death. I just looked at the Ziggurat ZOOM screen and saw the giant heretic god readying to fire his next batch of harpoons.
"Harpoons incoming!" I screamed the news at them.
The soldier immediately used the curved nail at the end of his wings to rotate the balloon until the hole on the balloon was placed behind us. I could hear air coming out of it, but I didn't have the stomach to look at it. I just checked the ZOOM screen again instead.
"The harpoons have been pulled!" I screamed again as I helped the soldier rotate the balloon.
Times then took a step back. "We're losing speed." He started gasping while looking at the harpoon flying towards us. His earlier composure is quickly dwindling. "That will hit. One of them will hit."
"...shit." I whispered. "How sure are you?"
"Absolutely certain."
I looked in front of us with bloodshot eyes and cold sweat.
Skystead Keep is so close. So, so close that I could practically grasp it with my hands. If I'll die anyway, I might as well hit the bucket once I've stepped foot on what's rightfully mine.
"Exile, keep the torn part of the balloon facing our backs." Times then moved to the soldier and whispered something to him.
The Vyurborne general and the soldier then flew out of the aircraft and started flapping their wings, sending a strong breeze into the hot air balloon, enough to push the aircraft away faster.
"I'll be troubling you again, Exile," Times screamed as the breeze coming from his wings intensified. "Protect my daughter at all cost."
"No, General Times, get back here right now!"
"Sorry, Exile." Times snickered. "But this old man likes living on the edge. "Maybe if we meet again, you'll explain how a human like you can see through the fog."
"What?"
Times then flapped his wings with such great intensity that his body recoiled backward. As his body shot away from the aircraft, the hot air balloon darted forward like a released arrow, heading straight into a narrow ravine. Gertrude almost fell out of the basket because of our current speed, but thankfully, I managed to catch her midair. The wind then began to slice through my skin, leaving small scabs all over my body as I grabbed Gertude's wings, pulling her closer till she's on the floor with me, feeling the intensity of the air slapping our faces. I looked back to check on the two Vyurbornes if they're catching up to us; by the time I turned my back to glance at them, my heart sank and shattered into a million pieces.
Blood, torn flesh, and unmoving wings.
Through some strange work of pure misfortune, a harpoon hit Times' wing.
"TIMES!"
I looked down at the falling general as the now crashing hot air balloon continued to plummet as swiftly as a meteor. What awaits our descent is the mouth of a narrow ravine. The soldier, shocked at what he had just witnessed, didn't react swift enough.
Times was there, nosediving into certain death like a hunted sparrow, plunging into a horde of kapre, stampeding on his landing site, waiting to rip his body to shreds. As an innumerable amount of kapres dashed towards the falling general, their interest in the crashing hot air balloon they might have presumed to be empty disappeared.
I looked around to gauge where and when the balloon would crash; I pulled the still unconscious Gertrude closer and used my body to protect her, embracing her tightly and using my back to brace for impact.
The Vyurborne general's descent hadn't stopped.
I remembered the last thing he told me.
'And god damn it, I vow in my honor, I will save this girl!'
As a loud blast thundered into the mountains when the metal basket crashed into the ravine, another explosion erupted from a distance.
And before I lost consciousness, I saw it.
"Z-ZOOM..."
A winged man shot up into the air like an arrow piercing the heavens, soaring with a large harpoon sticking out of his wings while his golden clothes glimmered with the sunset. Another winged man orbited around him as they penetrated the clouds. And just like that, two shooting stars sliced the atmosphere and fell nearby.