“Anyone!”
All around me people screamed, they screamed and cried out to God. But in the darkness of the night, it seemed he’d closed his eyes on us. My whole body was sore as I rose from the cobblestone paved street.
“Thomas!” I screamed at the top of my lungs. I was missing my shoe and hat and as I limped around I could feel that my hair was clumped together and coated in blood, ash, and sweat. The smoke rose from the ground like hellfire as the buildings crumbled around me and the flames swallowed them whole. Above, what looked like a giant whale glided through the skies as fire dropped from its belly.
“Help—” A man reached out his bloody hand from beneath the rubble beside me and I saw that two of his fingers were bent at an unnatural angle. “Please help…”
I reached for him but before our hands could touch he went still.
“Sir?” I touched his hand and saw that it’d gone limp. “Oh…” I gasped as I backed away from him.
“Nellie!”
I felt his hands before I saw his face as he pulled me back into his arms. Looking up to him, I saw that his hat was gone too and there was blood in his light brown hair that had rolled down his white face over his scar. His green eyes were glazed over with fear.
“Nellie!” He grabbed my hand and dragged me with him, ignoring the limp in his bad leg as he forced me to run behind him. “We need to get the shelters!”
I couldn’t help looking up at the sky and at the beast that slithered through the darkness.
“There are no soldiers here,” I whispered as if—as if they cared—as if they could hear me. Maybe they could because no more bombs came down.
“I have you,” Thomas whispered. He wrapped his arms around me as we ran for the shelters.
“I have you too.” It was all I could think to say. I didn’t even know where to go.
Buildings gave into fire and pressure and crumbled beside us, causing me to nearly trip, but he caught me.
Without a word, I took off my one remaining shoe and left it behind as I ran with him once more. The city erupted around us. Smoke and glass and fragmented rocks struck us from all over. There seemed to be no one else around us, and then, no more than a foot away from me, stood a small boy covered in ash from head to toe and staring wide-eyed at the sky.
“Come!” I yelled at him as I stretched out my hand. But he did not move! “COME!” I yelled again and this time he ran towards me and grabbed my hand.
“Nellie…” Thomas’ voice was hoarse as he looked down at the boy who now clung onto me. The boy would slow us down but I couldn’t leave him there. His voice trailed off when he looked at me again. Without a word, he bent down and picked the boy up before he reached out to take my hand once again. Unaccustomed to this much pressure on his bad leg he ran at a much slower pace. However, there was no other way.
He held my hand as we ran towards the station, and soon we spotted others in the distance waving us over. I could tell that they were yelling though I could not hear them over the beast overhead. And even as pain consumed every inch of my body, I ran towards our salvation, crying out once we were within the safety of the tunnels.
Inside we could see all the people—mothers cradled their crying children while men cried over their losses. One nurse was trying to attend to the wounded but there was barely any space to walk or move around without stumbling and tripping over someone.
Just as Thomas bent over to set the boy on his feet, his ash-covered hair snapped up at the sound of a voice. “Robbie?”
Further down the tunnel a woman stared directly at him as the man beside her looked up from the children he was looking over.
“Ma!” The boy ran towards the woman and leaped into her arms and the father wrapped his arms around them both. She smiled at us and whispered her thanks, but it was me who wanted to thank her. She’d renewed my hope.
“We’re going to make it this time, Thomas,” I whispered but he didn’t say anything. “Thomas?”
I looked around to find him resting against the walls and gripping his leg. I placed my hands on his face forcing him to open his eyes. He leaned in to kiss me and I could taste the blood in his mouth.
“I’m alright,” he whispered, but he neither seemed it nor looked it. He drew in a sharp breath and forced himself to say, “When it stops, run home.”
“You are my home.”
“Stubborn, even to the end.” He smiled but I did not.
“Are we at the end?”
He did not reply.
“THOMAS!” His leg gave out and I reached out to catch him and as I did I felt a dampness on his chest that was more profuse