3| Diamond [Pietro M.]

08. Sugar We're Going Down Swingin'

Nothing could've prepared me for what I see once pulling open the barn door. Nothing could've even prepared Pietro. The speedster flinches as the heat of the recent explosion bathes over us. Unlike him, I'm quickly able to adapt and walk right into the inferno of heat that wafts heavily in the air. Behind me, Pietro calls for me to come back. I don't even realize I'm tuning him out.

The pines are alight with flame in a smoky frenzy as the day's light begins to die. The grass is shriveled or ash. The chicken coop is gone. The blaze creeps towards Carter's home.

With my heart in my throat and my lungs burning with inhaled smoke, my legs move faster than my brain. I sprint towards the log cabin and the man that's taken me and my friends in. However, I can never hope to be as fast as my fleet-footed boyfriend. 

I make it maybe a hundred feet from the barn when the second shell makes contact with the earth in front of my eyes, leveling Carter's home. The shockwave is upon me in seconds. It throws me to the unforgiving soil -- back to the Earth that just refuses to give us a break. With ringing ears and a distorted sense of balance, I lay on my back watching as the world spin, twist, and burn. Truly, this was Hell on Earth.

I'm not sure how long I lie there. It could be seconds or it could be hours. All I can do is focus on analyzing any way, shape, or form Carter could still be alive. He can't be dead, can he? Just like that?

My hearing remains a high-pitched buzz that refuses to subside as a distorted shape appears within my line of sight. A face, perhaps. Who's? Their face refuses to come into focus, but I can tell their mouth is moving. Their features are drawn into worry. As the seconds slip away, the face comes into focus. It isn't just one person, but rather two. Pietro and Steve. Where Steve came from I can't say, but here he is. Face caked in ash and flushed due to the surrounding heat.

"Iris? Iris?" A hand waves in front of my face.

"Carter..." I softly croak while batting their hands away from my face half-heartedly. I roll onto my side.

"Iris, no, come on." I can't figure which of the two says it.

"Carter..." I stumble to my knees, then finally feet, all the while batting hands away. One thought drives me on. But once I'm on my feet with my vision somewhat clear, I know there's no way I'll find Carter. 

Everything is gone. Razed to the ground in a blaze kindled by the sharp winds. Two steps and I was back on my knees, sobs shaking my body as strong arms wrap around my shoulders. "No!" My voice is heavy with dismay and crippled by smoke and ash. How could I have lost one of the first people to show me kindness? To raise me as their own? The closest thing I'd ever gotten to having a father?

I cling to the one human that's just barely keeping me anchored to any semblance of sanity. Tears freely leak from my eyes as Pietro quietly murmurs 'there's nothing we can do.' Quiet pleas to leave this place follow. "No...no, no..." My tears disrupt the thick coating of ash on my face. Despite my agony and false hope that I can do something, that Carter's still there, I know there's nothing to do. There's nothing before me except ash and ruin.

I hadn't even noticed the rest of the group had come running from the directions of their chores until they're standing around me in a half circle. We watch as the fire licks at the sky. A somber mood is heavy in the air as everybody comes to realize there was only one person still inside the cabin. The home that no longer existed, in the place where only a crater remains.