Before Rix's Death…
In the aftermath of the catastrophe...
Seraphine's eyes opened slowly. Her head spun, and a suffocating weight pressed down over her whole body.
She was buried under layers of dust and pulverized plaster, her limbs trembling too hard to still. Her mind moved sluggish and thick, but the memories started piecing themselves back together anyway.
She'd been standing behind a load-bearing wall when it hit. She never actually saw the meteorites fall, just a reddish-orange glare tearing through the windows, so bright it burned into her retinas before everything went black.
She coughed hard as ash-thick air hit her lungs, shoved a heavy wooden beam off her chest, and pushed herself up onto one elbow.
Then she looked down.
A shard of glass, dagger-sized, sat buried deep in her left shoulder.
She bit down on her lip until it split, swallowing the scream trying to claw its way out of her throat. Dark blood ran over her collarbone, soaking into her clothes and staining the dust-caked mess of her bluish-white hair.
Hand shaking, she reached up and gripped the base of the glass. Her knuckles went white. She sucked in a breath, set her jaw, and ripped it free.
"AAAHHHH!"
The sound tore out of her, echoing off cracked concrete. Pain spiked white-hot through her chest as she let the bloody shard drop onto the rubble.
Blood surged from the open wound. She forced her breathing to slow, forced herself not to panic. She tore a strip from the hem of her shirt, wrapped it tight around the wound, and pulled the knot shut with her teeth. Blood soaked through almost immediately, but it would hold, for now.
She looked around.
The structure had been gutted. Half the building burned, flames licking through collapsed support beams. Bodies lay scattered everywhere, crushed under slabs of concrete.
Fear. Helplessness. Underneath both, something colder, anger, starting to rise.
She tipped her head back. Through the shattered roof, the sky burned a deep, unnatural orange, only a stray streak or two of fire still falling somewhere far off. The worst had passed.
If her college looked like this, she couldn't even guess what the rest of the world looked like right now.
Legs shaking with every movement, she forced herself upright, one hand clamped over her shoulder to keep pressure on the wound, fingers digging into her blue sweater.
"R... Ri... Rina..."
A dry cough cut her off, smoke scraping at her throat.
Rina was the only name left worth calling into this.
"R... Rina... are you there?" Her voice cracked. Rina had been standing right beside her when it hit — she had to be close.
Seraphine stumbled through the debris, hands shaking as she pulled away chunks of wall and broken cement, ignoring the sharp sting of her shoulder. She tossed slab after slab aside until a glint of gold caught her eye.
"Rina!"
She scrambled over, tearing at the concrete with bare, bloodied hands.
Rina Velmont lay buried beneath the wreckage. Seraphine's stomach dropped as she cleared the last of the rubble-Rina's skin caked in grime, clothes torn and blood-soaked. The girl once known across campus as the college belle now lay broken in the dirt.
Seraphine dropped to her knees. For one terrifying second, Rina didn't move at all.
"No... no, no..." she whispered, panic rising fast.
Then Rina's face twitched. A thin, rattling breath escaped her chest.
Seraphine reached out and tapped her cheek, gentle but urgent. "R-Rina... hey... wake up... please..."
Rina's eyelids fluttered.
Opened...
"Mm... hmmm... huh... AHHHHHH!"
The pain hit the second full consciousness did. Rina's hands flew to her head, fingers digging into her scalp, a groan tearing out of her. Blood trickled down her forehead, matting into golden hair.
Her vision cleared just enough to make out the figure crouched over her.
"Huh... S... Sera..."
Seraphine managed a strained smile, tears cutting clean lines through the dust on her face. "I'm glad you're alive."
Rina gave a faint smile back and tried to push herself up, only to double over, coughing hard as dark blood hit the broken tiles.
"Wha... what actually happened?" she rasped.
Like Seraphine, she hadn't seen the sky fall either. Just the orange glare, then this.
"We'll talk about that later," Seraphine said, cutting in before the panic could take root. "Can you walk?"
Rina glanced down at her leg, her face falling. "I... don't think so. My ankle's broken."
"That's okay. Try to stand." Seraphine held out her good hand. "I'll support you. Let's just get somewhere safe."
Rina took it, hauling herself up, putting all her weight onto Seraphine as she balanced on one foot and looked around at the burning hallway.
"Safe?" she whispered, voice trembling. "Where?"
Seraphine dropped her gaze, tightening her arm around Rina's waist. "I don't know. But let's get away from here first."
"Okay." Rina nodded, leaning hard into her as they took their first step through the ruins.