PROLOGUE
He hadn’t been looking at her when it happened.
He remembered taking his brother’s hand, and they had turned away from the door just as the first blast resonated through the building and made the earth underneath them bubble. The sound that came next--so loud that it burst like electricity across his senses--tore reality in two; he wasn’t sure how far it sent him flying through space, but knew that he went alone.
The surface he hit ground the flesh on his face and his arms to shreds, and his mouth filled with dry salt and ash, the taste burning down his throat and into his lungs. He tumbled, not coming to a stop for a long time, and his ears were violently ringing, something deeply inside of them broken beyond repair and had deafened him.
He hit something--hard--his back cracking against it and knocking the dusty breath out of him. Tears were forcing their way out of his clenched eyelids, but he didn’t need to look to understand the absence of George’s hand in his when he had finally come to a stop.
He rolled onto his stomach, and the heat that came next was incredible--sporadic and hungry flames on a dead and dried forest--the most barren heat that he had ever known hit him as if it had come alive, consuming him in a sort of air that was difficult to fathom ever drawing breath from. He lifted his head from the ground and pried open his streaming eyes, the world around him awash with smoke and vengeful orange firelight. The world was in ruin around him, the hotel crumbling to ash and swirling with the bright, lively flames.
In the seconds it took to scan the area around him, the smoke became so thick that he could hardly see a hand held up before his face. Adrenaline surged through him.
Forcing his legs to yield, he made his way onto his knees, his head spinning.
“George?” He was underwater, his voice garbled and muted. Then, he was on his feet, and the pain in his back caused him to cry out when he took a step forward, suddenly acutely aware of the indescribable wetness on his head. He drew his hand through his hair, and it came out stained and sticky, like dark honey that streamed down his fingers and onto his palm. His blood looked murky; foreign.
He staggered forward on shaking legs, his back screaming with every move. He was coughing, choking on the gray haze that was billowing off of every charred bit of wood and wall that was still standing around him, flaming ghostly figures in the confusion of the destruction. He seemed to be wandering through cement--his legs heavy and clumsy--he held his arms out before him, trying to feel his way through the chaos, trying to discern whether or not the piles of rubble and ruin he saw in the corners of his vision were bodies or bricks. He swiped at his eyes, but the blood on his fingers merely replaced his tears, and he blinked in earnest, trying desperately to regain his senses.
He could feel the fire getting stronger--hotter--eating away at every futile remnant of the hotel’s walls and furniture. Above him, pieces of ceiling were beginning to fall, raining down in clouds of drywall and shards of broken beam. He threw his arms over his head as a large piece crashed down inches from his ankles, and the ash it spit upward at him burned his nostrils and caused him to double over with coughs. The flames took on new life and rose into the spaces of empty blackness above, reaching their talons ever skyward into the upper levels. He could hear the creaking of the hotel frame--could feel the walls beginning to contort--but he still couldn’t see the door.
Then, suddenly, out of the mire--how far away from him, he couldn’t tell--a green flicker of light broke through the black smoke. It flashed wildly, then disappeared, and then it came back stronger, glowing eerily in the spiraling ash and haze. He could hear a distant disturbance tear through the chaos and confusion--someone was screaming.
He locked his gaze onto the distant light and told his legs to run. They lurched him forward, and he immediately tripped, catching himself and faltering into swaying steps that took him off to the left, but forward. As he went, he felt words forming on his lips, but he couldn’t hear himself--he could hardly hear anything at all; the world around him was caked with thick tar, and his throbbing ears rang loudly over his muffled, strangled voice. As he was getting closer to the light, the air grew hotter, and he felt the flesh on his face begin to blister.
Another explosion shook the floor, shook the flames, shook the ceiling, shook his skeleton beneath his very skin. The noise could’ve been incredible, but his ears were long-numb, humming with pain so consuming that he hardly was able to comprehend the sound of the second shock. He hit the ground again face-first, and the ceiling came down upon him, beams cracking and sighing as they fell and drywall bursting into flames. Heavy wood and shrapnel landed on his shoulders, and he pressed his hands to the back of his head to protect himself. The weight atop him increased as more of the hotel’s rafters came down into the decimated lobby, funneling downward in unstoppable destruction.
He saw green light glowing fiercely behind his eyelids, but he couldn’t get his eyes to open--they were burning with tears, and he felt fresh blood trickling down his face and into the corners of his mouth. His breathing felt ragged in his chest, and he tried to move his arms, but they were pinned down beneath his torso at an odd angle, unable to squirm free under the ever-falling, crushing weight.
The light got brighter. The crackling of the flames roared dully in his ears.
“I’ve got to get you out of here!”
Someone spoke. The voice was far-off, clumsy, and broken in places, but it hadn’t been misunderstood. Pain exploded across his right leg--a piece of beam finally snapping under the weight and lodging itself into his thigh--and he let out a scream that tore his throat, but that fell flat in his own ears. A blaze of green light exploded through the flames somewhere off to the left—another scream distorted itself through reality.
“Where are you?” Again, the voice cut through all else. He felt like he was going to be sick.
He had said her name, then. He remembered the casual feel of it in his mouth--as he had said it so many times before--and he knew vaguely it had come out as a shout, taking the last of his breath with it.
The light was overwhelming now. He forced his eyelids to open a mere slit, and he was absolutely blinded by it.
Hands were on the sides of his face, then--familiar ones. Ones that knew him.
He yelled something, angry, but he couldn’t hear it. Blood filled his mouth when he spoke, and she was crying, her trembling fingers tightening on his skin.
There was a burst of white light, and then, nothingness.
