Chapter 6: Runway Walk

Corvo’s chest heaved as he broke through the water, dragging in ragged gulps of night air. His lungs felt scorched, each breath like fire clawing its way inside him. Muscles that had already been driven past their limit in the frantic rush through Coldridge now screamed with renewed fury, every stroke of his arms and legs like dragging chains through the icy depths. The prison had been an endless gauntlet—blood, blades, shadows—and the water was the last cruel test, its chill sinking into his bones as if the sea itself wanted to claim him.

But he did not stop. He could not.

The vast iron wreckage of the gate floated behind him in twisted shards, the echoes of the explosion still chasing themselves through the canyons of the city. If the blast hadn’t alerted every guard within half a mile, the massive splash of his escape certainly had. Corvo forced his body forward, every kick of his legs stabbing pain through his thighs, every pull of his arms dragging him closer to the jagged, broken edge of stone and metal that jutted up from the waterline.

At last his fingers found purchase. Rough stone bit into his palms as he hauled himself from the water, dripping, shivering, his breath tearing raggedly from his throat. His boots squelched against ruined ground—old stone and broken iron, a forgotten piece of the prison’s underbelly that led away from the main fortress.

The world beyond the walls was not freedom yet, only another labyrinth. Ahead, half-collapsed foundations twisted downward into what looked like an abandoned network of tunnels—old service routes, pipelines no longer tended to, eaten by rust and damp. It was a perfect place to vanish, to hide in the underbelly of the city while the chaos behind raged.

Corvo did not allow himself to linger. His body cried out for rest—legs trembling, arms heavy as lead, every nerve screaming for warmth—but he pushed on. He forced his wet frame into motion, his boots splashing through shallow puddles and crunching broken glass beneath their soles. His mind stayed sharp: if even one guard had caught the glint of his dive, if even one pair of eyes followed the ripples to shore, he would have bullets in his back before he could blink.