Dog Blood

wall and half hop, half drag myself along, knowing that the building I’m holding on to is about to be obliterated. I can almost see the grassy hill Paul and I ran down now, but it’s still too far. I’ll never get there. The piercing whine of the fast-falling munitions keeps increasing in volume until it’s all I can hear. Then it stops.
    Nothing.
    A split second later and the air is filled with more noise than I can believe, the power of the blast forcing the air from my lungs. I drop down and cover my head, ready for the world around me to explode. The ground shakes violently, and I curl myself up into the smallest shape possible, waiting for the remains of the hospital building to start to crumble and fall. My guts churn with fear, and I brace myself for what’s coming next, knowing that the worst is yet to come…
    The noise starts to fade.
    Everything sounds muffled. Debris starts falling. In the distance people are yelling for help and screaming with pain.
    Was that it?
    I tell myself I’ll count to thirty, and if nothing’s happened I’ll try to move. I only get to seven when I feel people starting to get up around me. Did all the bombs explode? Did the Unchanged pilot fuck up?
    I cautiously stand up and turn around, not knowing what I’m going to see behind me. The air is filled with spewing clouds of dust, like a thick, dirty, grainy fog that quickly settles and coats everything with gray. As it fades I realize I can still see the far end of the hospital building intact. The outbuildings that were the focus of the fighting have gone, but the main campus is in much the same condition as it was before the attack. The only other thing that’s missing is the crowd of fighters, and I realize that they were the target today, nothing else. Those Unchanged bastards have managed to wipe hundreds of us out and still leave their infrastructure relatively undamaged. I don’t know whether it’s the sight of the unscathed hospital building or the empty space where the crowds of fighters were standing that makes me hate them most.
    As the haze settles, everything takes on a bizarrely calm, almost dreamlike state. Those who’ve escaped the full force of the blast begin to stagger past me, some soaked with blood, others looking like white-faced ghosts, covered in powder-fine debris. Behind those who can walk I see others who’ve suffered much worse injures. A woman, I think she may have been a Brute, tries to drag herself along the ground. Both of her legs have been blown off below the knee, and she leaves an uneven snail trail of glistening blood behind her. She manages to travel a couple of yards farther before she dies. I shake my head clear and try to force myself into action as a man stumbles closer, walking like a drunk, carrying the lower part of his left arm in his right hand. He’s asking me for help, I think, but I can’t hear him. Is there something wrong with his voice? I try to answer, but I can’t hear my own voice properly either. Everything sounds muffled and low, and I realize the problem’s with my ears. I nervously look from side to side, suddenly aware that if I can’t hear properly, I’m wide open to attack. I need to get away from here and find somewhere safe so I can get my head together, then get on with what I came back out here for. For half a second I wonder whether I should stop and look for Paul. It’s a stupid, pointless idea. He’s probably nothing more than a pile of blackened bone and ash at the bottom of the bomb crater now. He was no help anyway. Stupid fucker didn’t listen to a word I said.
    Pull yourself together, I tell myself again as the shock and disorientation slowly start to fade and some clarity returns. I need to forget this place and get back on track and keep moving toward Lizzie’s sister’s house-and, I decide as I start to hobble away, my ankle still weak, I need to do it on my own. I have to keep away from everybody else because when we’re together we become an easy target for the Unchanged to pick out from the sky. Cowardly bastards. Face-to-face they know they don’t stand a chance. Long-distance battles are the only ones they can win.
    I start to run, slowly at first until the pain in my ankle becomes slightly more bearable. I head back toward the entrance to the hospital I first came through, desperate to put some distance between me and everyone else. I reach the bottom of the grassy slope below the college playing fields, and this time I