Everyone else is asleep now. I don’t think I can, not until I get this down. I feel like I did a week ago, when the bomb went off. If I don’t get this down, it’s going to always be there, harrying me, haunting me. I’ll burst and I’ll break, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to get up again.
I think the first thing that happened was that it went quiet. The storm birds had been screaming at the sky for an hour, and all of a sudden they disappeared. We didn’t think anything of it – why would we?
Those who weren’t resting were outside, looking for supplies. I was checking out a truck with a couple of the guys – we were hoping to get it working. Our group wasn’t the only one out and about; there were others, doing the same as we were.
It was just a fall of rain, the most natural thing in the world. A scudding-together of orange-stained clouds that let loose. But it swept up the street with the most awful sound. At first I wondered what the water was hitting to set up such a screeching.
Then I realised that it was people screaming.
We didn’t stop to see why; we ran for the café. Just dropped everything and ran. I shouted for people to take cover, shoved others when I reached them; anything to get out of the street. We only just made it before the rain reached us. It hissed when it hit the ground, and it dissolved alive within its reach.
Carter and Trevor were making their way back to us from their equipment-gathering mission. They were too far away. They ran – we could see them, we called to them – but they didn’t make it. I can still hear their voices, screaming in pain as they went down.
I never knew that a human body could melt like that. In this nightmare week, it’s the worst thing I’ve seen. Faces warp, there’s blood and then bone showing, and then it’s all mashed together on the ground. A whole person, reduced to nothing but a steaming puddle in a matter of seconds. I want to throw up again.
We’ve stepped out of a disaster movie and into horror now. There’s no other word for it.
We had to hold Thorpe back. He was wild, wanting to get to his crewmates, shouting and screaming. I think we were all shouting; my throat is raw with it. He struck at me and Ben tackled him to the floor. It took Ben and Sax to hold him down.
Liz was out in it, too. We heard more screams up the street: a woman and the higher, shriller sound of a little one. She’d taken one of the kids for a walk. Aaron; the kid’s name was Aaron. Oh god, he was so tiny.
I tried to herd everyone back from the front of the café. Especially Dillon – I didn’t want him to see what was happening. It was probably too late, but… it seemed like the thing I was supposed to do. And I was so scared – a breath of wind might have driven the rain further inside. Back, get back, get away from it, get away.
No-one saw the lawyerlady until it was too late. She was so quiet that we often missed her, and she never did anything without one of us telling her to. Eat, drink, walk, keep going. But she did this on her own. Between Thorpe and everything else, no-one saw her walk up to the doorway.
She paused there, long enough for us to spot her. Then we were shouting again, and I ran after her. She turned around and looked right at me, and I’ve never seen eyes like that before. So empty, so awful and dark.
And then she stepped outside. I–
I didn’t make it. I didn’t pay enough attention. I didn’t try hard enough to get her to talk, to reach her before it was too late. I didn’t take the time to convince her not to die.
I never even knew her name. Maybe if I had known her name, I could have called her back.
After that, after she was gone, it went quiet. All we could do was stare at the hissing of the rain. If we listened hard, we could hear the leading edge of it claiming more victims, the screeching growing quieter as it spread its grip. Dillon was crying and I held him so tightly I must’ve hurt him.
It wasn’t until we all settled down together at the back of the café that we realised that Delaine was missing. Perhaps it was the quiet; the lack of his complaining. Someone said they thought he’d gone to look for something. He didn’t come back even after the rain passed.
So there’s just eight of us left now. Ben and Thorpe, Sally and Sax, Nugget and Simon, and Dillon and me. The café feels empty without the others.
Our world has turned into fire and acid and broken rocks. We’re in the belly of the beast, and I can’t see a way out.
Tags:
Carter,
Delaine,
Liz,
rain,
sky,
Thorpe,
Trevor,
water