𝐄𝐀𝐓 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐑𝐈𝐂𝐇 | 𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐬¹

Ashes and Promises

T'Chaka's voice filled the chamber with measured authority, his words about unity and responsibility weaving through the hushed atmosphere. The morning sun streamed through the vast windows, casting long shadows across the polished floor. I sat perfectly still, my enhanced senses taking in every detail—the subtle shifts of fabric as diplomats leaned forward in their seats, the soft scratch of pens on paper, the steady rhythm of dozens of heartbeats.

Then something changed.

My eyes caught T'Challa's profile, the sudden tension in his jaw, the microscopic shift in his posture. His heartbeat spiked—just slightly, but enough for my enhanced hearing to catch. Something was wrong.

That's when I heard it: a faint, mechanical ticking, barely audible beneath the sound of T'Chaka's speech. The sound triggered something primal in my brain, memories of training scenarios and threat assessments flooding back. My body moved before my mind could fully process why, muscles coiling as I rose from my seat with predatory silence.

Three steps toward the window. The ticking grew louder, more insistent. Sweat beaded on my neck as adrenaline flooded my system, sharpening every sense to a knife's edge. I could smell fear beginning to ripple through the crowd as others noticed my movement.

My eyes met T'Challa's across the room—his expression a mirror of my own dawning horror. Time seemed to stretch like taffy, each fraction of a second distinct and eternal.

"Everyone, get down!" The words tore from my throat, raw and desperate. The sound waves of my shout hadn't even finished reverberating off the walls when I saw it—a millisecond flash of red light, a subtle shift in the air pressure that my enhanced senses registered like an oncoming storm.

Then, the world exploded.

The blast hit like a physical wall, a concussive force that turned the air itself into a weapon. The window shattered into a million crystalline daggers, each catching the sun in a terrible, beautiful display. The roar was deafening, a primal sound that shook my bones and set my enhanced hearing screaming in agony.

Heat washed over me in a scorching wave as orange flames bloomed like deadly flowers. My last conscious thought was of T'Challa's face, twisted in a cry I couldn't hear over the chaos. Then darkness rushed in from the edges of my vision, swallowing everything in its void.

The world disappeared into a black symphony of breaking glass, screaming metal, and the hollow echo of my own heartbeat as consciousness slipped away.

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Consciousness returned in fragments—first sound, then smell, finally sight. Dust motes danced in shafts of sunlight that cut through the smoke-filled air. My ears rang with a high-pitched whine, making every other sound seem distant and hollow.

"I'm... I'm sorry," I managed to stammer, the words tasting like ash in my mouth. My enhanced healing was already working to repair whatever damage the blast had done, but the emotional impact hit harder than any physical pain. I glanced down at T'Challa beside me, watching him shake his head in wordless reassurance, though his own movements were stiff with tension.

Then we both turned to survey the room, and the full scope of devastation knocked the breath from my lungs.

The explosion had transformed the elegant chamber into a war zone. Shattered glass carpeted the floor like cruel confetti, smoke curled in lazy spirals toward the ceiling, and the acrid smell of burning synthetics filled the air. Papers floated down like wounded butterflies, their edges singed and smoking. Through my enhanced hearing, I could pick out a cacophony of sounds—groans of pain, frightened whispers, the crackle of small fires, and the ominous creaking of compromised structure.