Miho the Killer
Chapter 95: Thank you

Chapter 95: Thank you

My eyes opened to flickering light and the sound of my own breathing. Too fast. Too loud. Every breath stabbed through my side like hot needles. The pain pulsed in waves, sharp then dull, sharp again. There was a hand around my wrist.

Miho.

She was dragging me. Fast. Her fingers were slick with blood - mine, probably - and she kept looking back toward the hallway.

Then the sound hit.

Gunfire.

Too loud. Too close.

I couldn’t move my legs. I wasn’t even sure if they were still attached.

Another shot cracked in the distance, followed by something heavier - a boom that shook the air. The hallway behind us lit up for a split-second like lightning. Then smoke. Then shouting. Someone screamed. Someone else barked a command. The world spun again.

I tried to speak, but my mouth didn’t work. My throat was dry. It felt like I’d sucked on rust.

Miho kicked open a metal door and pulled me into a side corridor. We hit the ground hard. She crouched over me, one hand on my cheek, the other gripping the hilt of a blade.

"Stay awake," she whispered. Her voice was shaking.

I blinked.

Behind her, the corridor flashed again. Another bang. Then shouting. Then-

Silence.

A terrible silence.

The kind that came after something ended.

Miho froze. She didn’t look back, but I knew. I knew by the way her lips parted slightly, and the breath caught in her throat. The light in her eyes changed. Something inside her cracked.

And then - she let out a sound I’d never heard from her before.

Not a roar. Not a battle cry.

A scream.

Raw and hollow. Full of something so sharp and deep it didn’t belong in this world.

My Miho, the devil that everyone feared, was breaking.

———

I lost time again. A few seconds. A minute. I don’t know.

When I opened my eyes again, I was being lifted.

Miho had hoisted me up over her back, one arm hooked under my knees, the other gripping my back. Her movements were jerky now. Not graceful. Desperate. She kicked open a hatch on the floor - metal and rusted. A utility shaft, maybe. I couldn’t see. I could barely breathe.

A ladder. She was climbing.

With me on her back.

My head lolled forward and I saw her fingers - white-knuckled and trembling - but still moving. Still rising.

There was shouting again somewhere above us. Another door slammed. Then boots on concrete. Fast ones. Someone was running.

No - multiple someones.

Miho hissed between her teeth and shoved the hatch above us open with her shoulder. We were in another floor. Industrial. Pipes, dust, grease. Somewhere in B3, maybe. I had no idea how she navigated it. This was a passage that only the Old Man and Miho knew.

She dropped to her knees beside a red-painted access grate in the floor. She’d been here before. Shin must’ve shown her.

"Hold on," she whispered to me, though I couldn’t even nod.

She pulled a small multitool out of her boot - one of Shin’s, probably - and pried the grate open.

Then we were falling again.

Not far. Just enough to land in stale air and wet concrete. A tunnel. A crawlspace.

The exit Shin had promised.

She didn’t stop to rest. She just dragged me. Her shoulders were heaving now. Every breath was a sob she didn’t have time to cry.

The tunnel was cold. I felt the chill finally reach my skin.

Miho limped. She was bleeding from somewhere too, I could tell. But she didn’t say a word. Her jaw was clenched like if she spoke, something might shatter.

I tried to open my mouth.

"T... tunnel," I managed.

She didn’t answer.

We just kept moving.

I don’t know how long we crawled. Ten minutes. An hour. It felt like days. Her hands were raw by the end of it, covered in grime and blood. Mine just lay useless at my sides. I tried to help. I really did.

But the pain was eating me alive.

And through it all, I kept thinking -

He’s gone.

The Old Man is gone.

He didn’t scream. He didn’t beg. He didn’t say goodbye.

He just stayed.

So we could go.

———

When we finally emerged, it was an underground garage. Quite some distance away from the safe house. It didn’t seem like we were being pursued anymore. Miho switched the light on and there was an ambulance parked in the garage.

Huffing and puffing, grunting - Miho used her last remaining strength to drag me into the ambulance and put me on a stretcher at the back. She then quickly got changed into a paramedic uniform that was prepared inside.

All the while, she didn’t look me in the eyes. She had been quietly crying this whole time. Dried tears and snot on her face.

"Miho," I called out to her, struggling.

She sat next to me with her head buried in her hands. With her shoulders quietly heaving, I could tell she was sobbing again.

We stayed like that for a few more minutes.

The pain on my side was killing me, but I knew I couldn’t rush her.

She lost everything to Shin.

Then Shin became her everything.

And now she just lost him too.

One less person in her lonely, cursed life.

I thought - perhaps, I could bring happiness into her life.

How arrogant.

All I caused was trouble.

We couldn’t forgive what Shin did all those years ago.

And now we’d never fully understand why it all happened the way it did.

But for better or worse, the Old Man was the only one Miho could lean on in this harsh world that allowed her no joy.

Now he was gone.

And I took his place.

"Miho, I’m so sorry..."

She did not answer.

Another minute passed.

When she finally lifted her head again, I saw that she was bleeding on her lips from biting them too hard.

She looked like hell.

"Let’s go," she finally spoke.

Miho moved to the driver’s seat. From the light coming in, I could sense that the garage door was open.

She started to drive out slowly.

I could hear the sirens - police cars, firetrucks, ambulances.

Although it felt like we struggled through the tunnel for hours, I realized our exit wasn’t actually that far away from the safe house.

So this was the getaway that Shin had prepared all this time.

I closed my eyes and thought about Shin.

He never made it out.

But he made sure we did.

I’m sorry, Old Man.

Thank you.