Threads Of Fate

CHAPTER 4: Remembrance

I start packing up my things as the supervisor calls it quits for the day. I pick up my hammer, my helmet, my gloves, my lunchbox, and my canteen. I put it all in my bag, and start heading down the stairs of the half-completed high-rise to go home. On my way down, I bump into someone I've never seen before. For some reason, he turns around and gives me this glare. The type you give someone when you wish they just died. I can't see his face because it's covered with a black ski mask, but i can see his eyes, and they clearly tell me what he's feeling. Those eyes, filled with emotion, convey everything perfectly. Hatred, anger, bloodlust. Pure rage. In that moment, they are the personification of destruction. He turns around after a few seconds and leaves. I follow suit.

It feels like hours later when I arrive at my neighborhood, and turn into my street. Something's different, though. A warm gush of air hits me from behind, and as I turn to look behind me, my surroundings shift and morph, until suddenly I'm surrounded by skyscrapers and billboards. Weird. It looks just like Times Square. The light buzz of neon, the hundreds of footsteps per second, and a fiery gush of wind from an unknown direction, so dry I feel my lips cracking just from being in contact with it. Everything feels so oddly familiar. I feel an itch on my chest, but can't seem to scratch it. The itch just won't go away. I keep scratching. Eventually it starts to bleed, but I keep on scratching. Gradually the bleeding increases, but my scratching doesn't stop. Until I jolt upwards when I hear a loud bang, and my heart sinks down to the pit of my soul for some inexplicable reason.

I look around. Smoke is rising from a nearby building, and with it comes the smell of blood. Screams erupt and echo throughout, followed by a horde of frightened people running away from something. Looks like an explosion in one of the high-rises. Unfazed, I start walking towards the source, weaving through the hordes of people running the opposite way. I'm walking towards it but it feels like an eternity before I get anywhere. I start crossing the main road to get to the other side, but I stop dead in the middle as I'm overcome by a heavy feeling of Déjà vu. Everything falls silent. I look around, and not a single person in sight, the loud thumping of their footsteps gone with them. No screams, not a single sound, except for the whistling of that blazing air, hot enough to warm the dead in Helheim. The world seems to have come to a stop.

Then something grabs my attention. A polaroid picture, under my shoe. Weird. Polaroids used to exist decades before I was even born. Why would there be a polaroid here? No, wait. How do I even know what a polaroid photo looks like? As I'm about to pick the picture up, the world starts to move again, and another explosion occurs in a building no more than a few dozen or so metres away from me. Debris starts flying. My instincts tell me to run, but my body won't move. Is it because I'm afraid? No. For as long as I can remember my biggest wish has always been to die. I'm not afraid of death. I look back down at the picture, and something starts screaming at me to go against my baser instinct. It lures me in, and I don't fight the urge. I reach my hand towards the picture and pick it up.

The explosions don't stop, no. They actually gradually increase in numbers. First it was one, then two, now there's multiple buildings blowing up. The air is thick with smoke and ash. The hellish breeze grows thicker and hotter. It's enough to choke you, make you yield. Debris and smoke mix with specks of embers, forming a swirl of a horrific, yet oddly beautiful sight. For some reason, my eyes start tearing up. Strange. I don't even remember the last time I even felt sad, let alone cried. The photo is close enough for me to be able to see now. I start to flip it over. The explosions grow nearer. The horizon is leveled, the distant structures falling down, one by one, like a tower of cards. Then there's only the buildings left near me.

Time seems to be eluding me, because an eternity passes, and I'm no closer to seeing what this photo is about. As the explosions come nearer, every blast deafening, ringing sharply in my ears, the air grows thicker. Smoke piles on top of smoke, ash piles on top of ash. The air grows thicker, and my heart grows heavier with every passing millisecond. A strange feeling wells up, and the tears flow more free than before. After what felt like years, I feel the blaze all around me, the sense of impending doom rising with every building that tumbles down, along with my nervousness. What am I about to see? And why do I feel like this is what I've waited my whole life for? When the photo is turned enough, I look closely. My eyes widen as my chest tightens. I feel like the air is sucked out of me and my soul with it. As the last buildings engulf in flames and the sound of sweet death reaches my ears, I muster the courage and strength to open my mouth. It's a name. "Astrid."