Fire. That’s what she remembered the most. She remembered being bathed in it, enrapt in it, every nerve blossoming with agony on a level unheard to her then…or since. It seared like a blade on every edge, every piece.
Her body was thrown like a ragdoll, tossed aside like a piece of discarded paper in the wind. Her lungs ached, filled with soot and smoke, her eyes watering from it in the air. She coughed. Her body was a mess, covered in grime, dirt, and mud.
She reached out with a hand. Her stained fingers grip at the soft earth, as Gracie painfully started crawling.
Images swam through her head…and the dim sensation of pain jolting through her left side. She reached with her left arm–but her hand was gone. A bloody, burnt stump was all that remained.
She pulled again with her right hand, trying not to scream in horror, not to cry, not do anything but get towards the figure slumped over against the tree, his police badge gleaming in the moonlight.
It hurt it hurt it hurt!
Rocks scratched at her stomach, leaving angry, jagged red marks across her belly. Her ears rang as the dim sound of emergency vehicles closed in on the two of them. She made a mistake. She always made mistakes. If she wasn’t bleeding out and half-broken, she would have screamed at herself for it all. Closer. Closer. She was nearly there to the man.
What was his name? She couldn’t remember…
The searing blade sank deep, and she cried out helplessly, as her body turned numb.
Gracie tried harder, but it was like being disconnected from her controller- she was stuck, unresponsive, her limbs flopping like useless instruments.
Gracie reached again weakly, her fingers twitching, as she attempted to will some semblance of function into her fingers again as she reached for the officer.
Presley. That was his name, some dim part in the back of her mind thought, untouched by the aches and cuts.
Her breathing became panting, heavy gulps of air in lungs that barely were holding on. Tears started dripping from her eyes, her arm trembled. PLEASE.
Gracie reached desperately again, a final agonizing burst of energy- and then her vision swam- lights dazzling, sirens hearing- her mother yelling at her- spraypaint- O.B.C.D.- lectures…
And then it all went black.