Chapter 6

Clark

            The wave of heat was intense, even to me.  I was shocked, acting on adreline.  I charged after Chloe, who'd been thrown fifteen feet through the air behind me.  Caught her in my arms.  I saw the street explode in flames, a giant fireball moving with ease.  Tearing up concrete, buildings, …people.  The smoke in the air hung thickly around us.  I could hear Chloe gasping for air as she clung to me, shaking  and vibrating with silent screams.  What…what had happened?  Lana, where was she…I, was Pete alright.  I couldn't see either of them, couldn't hear over the cacophony of terror.  But something, a voice clear and loud through the shouts around us, penetrated the fog clouding my mind.

            Whoa!  Hold it right there buddy.  No sudden moves…like that last one.  At first I though Chloe had said something.  But it couldn't have come from her.  She had her head buried against my shoulder, struggling to breath.  'Must be imagining things,' I told myself.  Then I ran, streaking back towards the edge of town.  The air was better here, and Chloe took a few shuddering, deep breaths.  Gently, I laid her down, propping her up against the side of a car.  She coughed once, twice, then finally open her gray eyes.

            "Wha…what.   Happened?" she chocked out.  Her voice was raspy, but she was okay.  I took her head in my hands, peering intently at her face.

            "Chloe?  I'll be right back, I promise.  Stay here, I have to find the others, okay?  Just stay put," I told her.  She tried to respond, but doubled over into a fit of coughing again.  Weakly, she nodded.  I turn, running back the way I'd come at a normal speed until I was well concealed by the smoke.  Then I charged full out 'till I hit the heap of gravel that had minutes earlier been the street.  Lana…Pete…they were nowhere to be seen.  I turned over cars and slabs of concrete, searching frantically for my friends.  I covered every inch of the corner where Lana had been standing.  There was nothing there, no sign of her.   

Lana

            Every fiber of my body was racked with pain.  Dim shapes swum around me as I drifted in and out of conciousness.  Faintly, as if I was listening from miles away, I heard human voices.  Screams, shrieks of terror that varied in volumes and intensities.  Once, I was almost certain that I'd heard my name.  I open my mouth to call out, to add my voice to the chorus of those around me, but the black smoke filled my mouth, choking me.  It hung around me, hiding me from the massacre taking place just feet away.  I sputtered, my heading aching, trying to focus, take it all in.  I think I passed out again, because the next thing I remember is seeing people through the smoke.  Hearing voices that hadn't been there a minute ago.  Closing my eyes, I willed myself to listen, to make sense of the noises they were making.  I heard as their footsteps crunched on the rubble around me. 

            "This is the one?"  The voice was male.

            "Yes, looks like it?  She took a bad hit," a second, lighter voice replied.  This one belonged to a woman. 

            "Doesn't matter.  Just get her up."  The man's order was sharp.  I felt a tingle of fear run down my neck.  What did these people want?

            "Sir, if she struggles it might just damage the body further.  Might I suggest we…" the woman began, but I didn't hear her finish.  I felt myself being moved, hands picking me up, holding my shoulders.  There was a moan.  Me…did that sound come from me.  My legs were throbbing with pain, straining to hold my own weight.  "Here, take her," the woman's voice ordered someone.

"Be careful with her, you fool.  If you screw up, the Visser will have your head!"  Who was that man?  What did they want with me?  'Visser'…were they foreign?

  I tired to struggle, but there was little I could do.  Tried to yell.  Opened my mouth to call for help.  Then…something against my neck.  'Oh God!,' I thought, 'they're going to shoot me.'  A sudden burst of cold air on the back of my neck…  'This is dying?' was all I had time to think before my legs gave way and I fell into the spiral of blackness around me.