"NO- " I'M STILL YELLING EVEN THOUGH IT'S USELESS. Ortiz is gone.
I'm powerless to move. I can't drag my eyes off the spot where a moment ago, Ortiz stood looking at me. All that 's left is a wisp of vapor and a quick, bright discharge of light. Like a dying sparkler.
No.
Anna, are you in there?
A voice from outside. A voice that keeps calling my name. Urgently. Unrelentingly.
Anna, where are you?
It breaks through the miasma of my despair and brings me back.
The heat on my skin, the roar of the flames, the acrid smell of-what? My shoes. I look down and realize what I'm smelling is the soles of my shoes. If I don't get out, I'll be joining Ortiz in whatever afterlife awaits the vampire.
I'm not ready to find out what that is.
The flames have traveled on a straight path from the stairs to the gaping hole I tore in the bay.
Have I waited too long?
Panic raises bile in my throat.
A sound.
To the left.
Someone is pounding against the metal of the adjoining bay. Doing what I did just a little while ago to get inside this one.
I race over. Use my fists to pound, too, until the metal gives way. There 's no seam here, I gouge into the metal with my fingers, using nails and finally teeth to tear a hole. With my hands, I yank at the hole, enlarge it, make it big enough to gain purchase with my hands. At last, I can rip back the steel fabric. It's not easy. Blood from lacerated palms makes my grip slip. I ignore it and the pain. Keep working until strong hands grab mine and pull me outside.
The hands drag me away from the building, across the parking lot.
I don't realize my eyes are squeezed shut until they open and I'm staring up at sky.
A face peers down.
Are you all right?
My savior is a woman with a kindly middle-aged face.
I attempt to sit up. When my palms press against the asphalt, pain in lightning sharp daggers races up my arms. I look down to see great jagged cuts like macabre lifelines scoring the flesh. My nails are torn to the quick.
My back hurts from being dragged, my left arm throbs, my eyes still stream from the smoke.
I glance back at the building, fully engulfed, smoke blocks the sun, staining the sky like angry storm clouds.
I see Ortiz-standing in front of me one moment, gone the next. His face, calm, accepting, will haunt me for a long time.
The cool night air on my skin, the smell of asphalt and burned rubber, the roar of the flames.
I'm alive.
Suddenly, I've never felt better.