City On Fire

19

Everything was loud. Traffic, people having conversations all round her, boxes and crates were being unloaded somewhere while a man in charge barked orders. All of it was deafening but above the city’s roaring she heard the chime of a bell.

“The time has come my brothers and sisters!”

Ella kept her eyes shut. Some fanatic’s rambling was a little more than she had the energy for at the moment.

Despite her attempts to drown out the sound the man and his bell resonated across everything ells with hellish intensity.

“We must repent! God will give no second warning!”

He eyes flew open. The nightmare, the one where the priest told those people they should have repented, clouded into her mind and made her breathing quicken dramatically. She stood in the middle of the sidewalk as the city hustled around her. Across the street stood a man in with a bell in his one hand and a bible in the other. He didn’t sound like the man from her dream, he didn’t even look like a priest. His clothes were dirty and his hair turning grey but he was quite quick on his feet. There was not a single person that walked past in whose face he didn’t leap. He shoved flyers in their hands before crossing them and shouting hallelujah to the high heavens. The unsuspecting pedestrians seemed to take the strange man with a pinch of salt and none over reacted. They accepted the pamphlets and carried on with their business.

Ella stared at the strange man with interest. True there were plenty of fanatics preaching on street corners but something about him made her mind uneasy and it wasn’t until the first explosion that she was able to take her eyes from him. In a matter of seconds the building across the street was reduced to rubble and fire. People ran from the site and others screamed as a dense for of ash surrounded everything.

Ella found herself on the ground battered and bleeding but not seriously injured. She was however coughing violently and her ears were ringing. Looking around and trying to deduce what had happened she found herself face to face with an all too familiar scene. There was c*****e everywhere as limbs perturbed from beneath the blood splattered rubble. Somewhere amidst the chaos child cried and called for its mother. After gathering herself Ella got up on her feet but managed only a view stepped before collapsing to her knees. She was disorientated and as she looked down at the ground she noticed small drops of blood coming from a cut on her fore head. Looking up there was no sign of sunlight, only dust and debris and what remained of those caught in the middle of the horror. She had just made it to her feet when there was a second explosion this time right behind her. The force sent her plummeting into what remained of the building across the street and by the time he could open her eyes again she could hardly breathe. A large part of the wall had collapsed on top of her and one of it iron supports and imbedded into her abdomen. Blood rushed into her mouth and pretty soon she was coughing. Not long after she realised that despite the sirens quickly approaching hundreds would be wounded and several more dead and she would be counted amongst the latter. The pain was excruciating and a part of her prayed for it to end as she closed her eyes. The pressure on her chest grew heavier and a man’s laughter forced her to open her eyes and as she did she quickly forgot about the pain. On the concrete that hand collapsed on her stood size eleven with a hand gun pointed at her face. ”You should be grateful I’m showing mercy.”

The smile on his face as he pulled the trigger made it very apparent that all this had very little to do with mercy or even the end goal of his order but rather everything with his own pleasure.