Sadie watched him as he ran to the window. Although she loved him for his inquisitive nature, at times like this it drove her mad. Completely unintentionally, and unconsciously, he could be the most selfish person she knew.
He looked back at her over his shoulder, flashing a quick, unconvincing smile. What had he seen, what was he hiding from her.
She looked away for a moment and when her eyes returned to the window were he had been she couldn’t see him. The commotion outside, whatever it was, was beginning to affect the people in the hall and soon the mood had changed from light hearted and pretentious to panicked and aggressive. People where rushing for the exits as the sound of explosions and screams grew louder from outside the windows.
Before she could make up her mind if she should stay put or head for the door, an explosion to the back of the hall made the choice for her. She looked back and saw that the roof was engulfed in flames. Large, burning chunks of the ceiling were crashing down to the floor setting everything around them ablaze. Through the commotion she saw a startled colleague encircled by flames trying to find a way out. Sadie called to him but no sooner had the words left her lips than he was crushed by a flaming roof beam. She had to get out, now.
She fought through the crowd, pushing hard to reach the door. The people around her, people she knew had become animals. Everyone was screaming, pushing and kicking, trying to carve their own path to the exit. Next to her a brute of man was forcing his way through the crowd. Just as he passed her she grabbed onto his belt and clung on for dear life. Even with a baby in her belly she wasn’t a big woman, and he didn’t seem to mind, or notice, her. When they reached the door she let go of her grip and peeled off to the left, against the grain of the rushing horde in the street.
Tears were welling up behind her eyes but she wouldn’t let them spill. If she could find Josh he would get them to safety. She tried to make her way to an opening but the surge of the crowd carried her down the street. She managed to get both her feet on the ground and dodged through the pedestrians until she reached the lip of the sidewalk. Once there, she scrambled onto the bonnet of a parked car and desperately began scanning the crowd. A wave of relief washed over her as she picked him out amongst the chaos and a smile spread across her face. Her voice trembled as she called to him, watching him fight through the flood of people. But he couldn’t hear her over the madness. Her gaze remained on him as she tried to make her way to him.
He was temporarily obscured from her view as people rushed passed her, but when her window on him opened again she froze. He was on his bike, and although she couldn’t hear it she could see the engine vibrating beneath him. She tried to call out to him, but when she opened her mouth nothing came out. He was going to leave her.
Sadie stood in road, unable to more. She wished her eyes would scorn him, that her voice would curse him, but she was in utter shock and her face showed only sadness. As strangers forced themselves past her, bashing and bruising her, tears rolled downed her cheeks. A plume of smoke rose from the rear tire as he let go of the clutch. Her eyes were stuck to him as he sped off.
She would’ve stayed like that, there in the street, with her unborn child in her belly and been incinerated by the heavenly inferno, if it were not for the stampeding horde. A burly man, who smelt of sweat and fear, knocked her clean off her feet onto her back and trampled her left arm as he continued on his course.
The pain of her wrist being crushed under his weight brought her violently back to reality. She quickly pushed herself up to stand up but a knee came crashing down the bridge of her nose, instantly breaking it and sending tears streaming down her face. She rolled over onto her stomach, careful not to let her belly be crushed, and tried to seek out an escape route. Between the chaos of the fleeing crowd she saw a hole which had been blown open under a gutter. The concrete lip of the gutter hung over the opening, protecting from the onslaught from above. It was not far and she began to move.
The soft skin of her knees and elbows was ripped off by the tar almost instantly but she crawled along, doing her best not to be crushed. She was within reach of the scraggily mouth of the gutter when she heard the grumbling, cracking groan of the clouds. On all fours as she was, she jumped for the gap but her ribs met with a swift boot as someone tripped over her. At that moment a boil began to split open, its molten substance dripping down from above. It was milliseconds from exploding.
Her body was numb to the pain of her crushed wrist and her broken nose and ribs, and she threw herself at the gap again, miraculously slipping through without getting caught on its jagged edges. She landed on her crushed wrist with an audible thump and let out a wild howl. But no one heard her, for the boil had burst with beastly force and a feral, unnatural scream.
As the thick, lava-like liquid spilled from the sky it set everything it touched up in flames, and what would not burn, melted. The flaming, molten mess flowed arrogantly down the street; nothing could stop it. As it flowed over the scraggily lip of the gutter, too thick to drip between the narrow openings, it cut off the daylight and entombed Sadie in the sewers.
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