Consternation (DNF 9/11 A/U)

~4~

Us three had reached what we assumed was the tenth-floor stairs and Clay and I were very out of breath. Our lips were dry and so were our throats. It was hard and painful to breathe, and both of us were wheezing cause not we weren't getting enough air in our body's. But we had to push through.

As we continued our journey down another part of the South tower had collapsed and a big metal pull that was a part of the endoskeleton of the building came crashing down at the perfect angle and snagged on my upper left arm causing there to be a big gaping slash, that made me let out a cry as Clay looked back at me instead of focusing on our path.

"Moxie?! What happened?!" He answered his own question as he looked to my arm and saw me clutching my bicep as the pale skin color that was once on my hand was soon covered with bright red.

"I'm fine." I shrilled trying to catch breath trying my best to not fall unconscious at the pain that engulfed my sore body, and we kept moving. Normally, Clay would have stopped to make sure I was actually fine, but due to the circumstances there really was no time.

The next time another part of the building collapsed the rest of it would go down as well.

As we got to the end of a set of stairs, we followed the rest of the crowd and could begin to see firefighters.

"This way!" a man yelled, everyone listening to him, seeing as it was all for them to do. When we did listen to him, we went through a pair of doors and at first there was no difference because smoke and dust still filled our eyesight, but not too long after we could begin to see the blue sky the more and more, we ran out eventually we were far enough away and we all three looked back to see what was in front of us. It was the two twin towers that were on fire with large amounts of smoke coming off of them.

We then turned back quickly and began running more to get as far away from the towers as possible.

After about another 10 minutes of running Clay, George and I stopped at a random bench and Clay sat George down.

"George, are you ok?" Clay asked with panic piercing his voice, and not too long after saying that getting a weak nod in response he said. "Moxie, what about you, are you ok?" I nodded my head still trying to catch my Breath and also wiped some of the dust off my face.

Clay could be seen doing the same for himself then doing that for George seeing as he was physically incapable to do it by himself.

We didn't know where to go or what to do. The closest A house was Clays, but that was still 11 miles away from our current location, so it was useless seeing our current state.

We would have gone to get Clay's car, but it was near impossible because it was way too close to the twin towers and was two dangerous.

We were out and alive, but it still seemed hopeless.

"What do we do?" I asked as I could feel tears start to form in my eyes for the second time today. "I-I don't know what to do, we can't go to your house o-or get anyone's car, we don't have any options!" I yelled a little louder than anticipated out of fear.

"It's going to be ok," Clay reassured in a calming voice and looked between George and I." W-we'll figure it out." He gulped looking at George and George embracing himself in Clay's arms and letting out needed tears. After a while of them sitting like that as Clay rubbed small circles on George's back trying his best to calm him down, Clay looked around him, me following his gaze as we saw the South tower, what we stood on 30 minutes ago turned into nothingness in a matter of seconds. Dust filled the air and screams could be heard from all around us even from people who were out and far away from the towers.

George saw this as well and heard people's reaction which caused him to hide his face and began shaking and crying more than he already was. Clay then embraced his smaller body once again and he also then turned to me opening his arms to let me join them, and I did.

Even though we had no way of knowing if our friends Zak and Nick made it out alive, and even though we had no way of ensuring a safe way home, we all stayed like that for what seemed like ages, not wanting to leave each other's embrace, and thankful we survived the terrorist attack of 9/11.

We are lucky to have made it out alive...