The Dead Scout's Handbook of Afterlife Survival

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Extinguished

The walls were on fire, the floors were on fire, and things she couldn't imagine being on fire, sizzled and snapped. Rebecca toppled out of her seat, down the stairs, and crashed into an armchair, knocking it forward into the flames.

"Charlie! Where are you?"

"Here!" A voice rasped from behind the front desk.

Rebecca dragged herself over the charred floor and wrapped him in her arms. The soot from his shirt rubbed against her skin. She pulled away and scanned him over. No stitches, glue, or bandages seemed to be required but he would need soap, and a lot of it at that.

"You're okay, right?"

"Huh? Yeah. I think so. I was hiding before the explosion hit."

Rebecca turned to the giant trapdoor. "We're going to need Sarah in there with us."

"What about Cayden... and Martha?"

"They can fare better than anyone here... I... I'm going to get Sarah!"

Rebecca rotated to the staircase and stopped. In the burning chasm opening the opposite wall, stood the crimson armor of War. With a deep growl grinding into a man's scream he lifted himself up by the kinked steel beam in the gaping hole behind him. The giant grasped the handle of his sword ripped it out from the debris.

"I'll hold him off. Find Sarah!" Charlie shouted with a trembling voice.

Rebecca stared at the massive burning broadsword, the flame stricken first floor, and the behemoth blocking the exit. "Nope," she replied as she held a hand out and bent the supporting beam in War's grip.

The hotel shook as the wall collapsed with an avalanche of brick, wood, and concrete. In seconds, the debris buried War, leaving the ceiling sloping toward the far corner, as shifting furniture crashed above them.

"Alright, let's get Sarah! We don't have much time!" she grasped Charlie's wrist and pulled herself into her seat.

He wouldn't budge. She tugged again and he refused to move. A gurgling voice spoke above her. "Not conceivably".

Rebecca whirled around in time to feel Charlie's fist connect with her cheek. She crashed into a wall and felt the rush of adrenaline and the spurting blood in her throat. Cupping her jaw, she winced as it shifted with a crack. Charlie raised a block of rebar over his head. Rolling to her side, Rebecca dodged as it fell with an earth shaking rumble. Scrambling to her chair, her neck swiveled to yell at Charlie, but her mouth wouldn't open. Leaking blood from her nose, she dodged Charlie's fists crashing down and tried to force the word 'stop', though only a muffled whine emerged.

Charlie grabbed a supporting beam, brought it to his shoulder and then staggered to the left as a brick, guided by Rebecca, flew into his temple. Scrambling against the front desk, Rebecca met Charlie's blank, then confused and horrified eyes. He struggled to speak, unable to create a syllable, and finally collapsed.

Everything went quiet with exception to the crackle of the flames beyond the debris. Rebecca whined as her jaw moved on itself. She struggled to her seat and, using several large fragments of wood, levitated Charlie carefully to the underground panic room. She dropped him and from above, Rebecca heard the echo of a crash and then something soft and heavy tumbling on a concrete floor. Clutching her chin to prevent any further motion, she rose up the stairs to find Sarah.

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Sarah crossed her arms, kicked her feet up, and leaned into her frozen pyramid. "So it won't be awhile, then?"