Chapter Text
Kaz was falling.
He had been meeting with an upstart gang in the area. A parlay of sorts. Mostly to scare them off from their cocky blunderings into his territory. By agreement it was supposed to be just the leaders speaking together at a canal bridge on the edge of the harbor. Neither Barrel boss actually expected the other to show up with only their seconds. Jesper stood beside Kaz. Inej was undoubtedly hidden somewhere with a view of the entire area. The nearby streets and rooftops were prowling with gang members from both sides.
The proceedings were short, but not as sharp and loud as the gunshot that ended them. A young boy—not one of the Dregs, Kaz was far too smart to bring inexperienced members to a tense situation like this—had fumbled his pistol while sneaking along an adjacent alley. It went off; the retort kickstarted a chain-reaction of violence.
The two gangs rushed from their hiding places along either side of the canal. Kaz and the other boss were sandwiched into the fray from their meeting on the bridge.
The silver crow whistled through the air before burying itself into the shoulder of an approaching man wielding a club. He dropped. A snarling woman with a pistol came up in his place, but one of Inej’s knives pinned her gun-hand to the railing. Kaz gave a quick nod to the nearby rooftop where the trajectory had come from.
The bridge was a scene of violent chaos. The cobblestones slick with blood and gore in some spots. Kaz kept his back to the railing, swinging his cane at attackers and keeping an eye on his gang. The Dregs were doing well. Some of the other gang were already abandoning the scuffle, melting into the surrounding buildings and alleys.
He swung again, hooking the cane’s beak around the neck of a man, knocking him off balance and using the power to whip him at the railing. Kaz shifted his grip on the cane as the man toppled over, but it had caught on something. A jacket or necklace. Kaz stumbled as he jerked hard to free it from the falling man. He didn’t want to go through the hassle of retrieving it later.
Off-balanced and peeved at himself for the near-miss, Kaz didn’t have time to see the snarling woman from before rushing up behind him before a sharp pain met his back. A hip struck the railing and the momentum tipped Dirtyhands over the edge of the bridge.
Kaz was falling.
“KAZ!”
Inej? The voice was filled with shock and fear. Not emotions often attributed to the Wraith. Was she alright?
Those thoughts were all that had time to flip through Kaz’s mind as the bottom of the bridge grew smaller in his view. It wasn’t that long of a drop, but time seemed to have slowed as he made his descent.
Then it ended. Dark water rose to meet him in a frigid embrace.
The shock of the winter-chilled water seemed to lock Kaz’s muscles in place. Or maybe it was the water already rising up around him in his mind. His eyes were open. Kaz turned, and saw the man he had knocked off the bridge moments before. He had long hair. It waved in the current and curled around his broken neck. The body was sinking towards the murky canal bottom. Tendrils of blood darkened the water between the two–spreading from assorted wounds on both bodies.
Kaz felt ill. Precious air left his mouth in a burst of bubbles. NO. He struggled to gain control of his body and fight back. Fight back against the waters in his mind and the frigid waters currently leeching his body of strength. This boy was NOT JORDIE. Kaz WOULD SURVIVE.
His arms and leg—the combination of cold and the old injury kept the one too cramped to move—peddled stiffly towards the surface. Too slow. Too slow . His chest was burning. Despite the moonlight reflected on the canal growing slightly brighter and nearer, a darkness was creeping at the edges of his vision. Cold hands seemed to catch at his legs, holding him back. Kicking out, not even able to effectively swim in his panic, Kaz looked down, searching for the ghosts holding him back. There were none there. Just the cold darkness and a trail of dark red leading down into the murky bottom. Blood? His body felt numb. He didn’t know if or where he had been injured. Maybe the blood belonged to someone else.
Kaz realized he had stopped swimming. He found he didn’t really care. The darkness had grown. He couldn’t see the trail of blood anymore. The moonlight had almost disappeared. Kaz reached up, trying to grab at the disc of pale light before it left him.
A quick shadow—not as dark as the creeping black wrapping around him—crossed in front of the light, blocking it. A hand reached down for his. He couldn’t move, couldn’t flinch as fingers gripped his wrist and began pulling him up and up and up. The darkness stayed with him however, and before Kaz could near the surface it completely engulfed him. He knew darkness and cold and then, nothing.