Saxifrage Fire

0013

Theo touched her bleeding temple, worrying briefly about the implications of her headache. Ironically, in a sera-state, she never would have ripped her anti-suppressor out so violently. She knew better. But, she'd been driven to such madness by that awful power called grief. Now, in its place, she just felt empty. 

She ran over the fallen tree that bridged the river and through the meadow, driven by the decision that she was not going to let people die at the hands of the weapon she'd created. Even in a sera-state, the thought of Kaleo holding his dead child in his arms made her nauseous. 

She reached the treeline and stopped to analyze what was happening. The Garda had the townspeople lined up in the street at gunpoint and were drive metal stakes into the ground. She keened her eyes at one of the devices, identifying that it was the source of that beeping sound. Each one had a couple of buttons and a digital timer- these would dispense the toxin. 

"One minute!" a Gard called.

She closed her eyes and drew a deep breath. If she didn't act, all those people would die by the weapon she'd made possible. If she died trying to save them, it would be what she deserved.

She slid down the slope and carried the momentum into a fill sprint towards the first depenser. No one spotted her at first- the Seras were too busy shaking guns at sobbing children and pleading parents. 

Her boots truck cobblestone and she glimpsed her mother's blood in the gutter before whipping out her knife and slashing the first Sera Gard across the throat and face. She yanked the stake from the ground. The seconds blinked on its digital timer: 50... 49....

Her presence was announced through a series of shouts then bullets cracked past her. She darted inside a doorway and bolted through the house, jumping over an overturned table, kicking the backdoor free, and rounding back to the street through a farther alleyway.

She caught the next Gard by surprise, knocking her out with the butt of her knife, and stealing the second stake. 42...41... A Gard spotted her and fired; the force of the bullet against her vest threw her backward. She rolled over, clutching the stakes. 36... 35... She caught her breath and swore she heard her name being shouted among the Koro people. 

She clambered to her feet and made break for the last dispenser- its timer blinked red. Bullets cracked past- one grazed her arm. She forced her burning legs to run faster, weaving erratically, until she stopped to snatch the last stake. A bullet struck her vest and she was on the ground. She couldn't breathe. She felt like a crater had been blasted in her torso.

The stakes started to hiss, billowing amber gas.

She tried to reach for the dispenser but bullets beat the ground around her and she curled into a fetal position waiting for one to hit her again.

A boy broke free from the line and stood over her.

"Go!"

She grabbed the last stake and kept to her feet. She could hear his body being riddled with bullets but she didn't look back.

She broke free past the last building and turned sharply towards the fields and the approaching flames. The toxin reached her throat and eyes, stinging like tiny cuts and lemon juice. She reached the waist-high flames and kept running, the heat biting like a rabid beast into her legs. She broke past the tree-line where the fire was high and ran towards the wall of fire, chucking the hissing dispensers into it with all her might. 

She halted, realizing she couldn't breathe. She grasped at her throat, gasping at the smoke. The burning world seemed to be spinning. She collapsed to her knees and started to crawl through the embers and brush towards the tree line. She reached the grass, and her vision went black- she awoke seconds collapsed in a patch of dirt. She forced herself to stand and staggered forward, half falling, half running towards air, or an army of Seras who would shoot her through the head as Father had done to Mother.