He tried to keep his balance, grabbing unto the metal railing by the waterside, but that, too, fell from his grasp, like everything around him. He caught himself right before he plummeted over the side into the black water, and edged backwards. The pavement cracked around him as he moved, forcing him to stop.

The smoke was making his eyes water, and he coughed, and looked up through the haze of the fire to see the skysc.r.a.pers crumbling to pieces, falling one by one into the water. Sirens shrieked, fading in and out of his hearing, as if screaming for the end of the world.

Because it was.

Li Huai forced himself to stand, clenching his fists to keep balance. The iron taste of blood in his mouth. The screams of people in his ears.

His head throbbed, and he felt like his eardrums had ruptured. It was like he was hearing everything from underwater, slow and distorted. Had he hit his head on something?

The ground rumbled again, moving like a wave, and tossed him into the air, throwing him onto the breaking pavement. He skidded maybe ten, twenty meters, sc.r.a.ping himself all over. The sting was piercing, but he ignored that for now… Where were the others?

He pushed himself up, trying to scan the smoking rubble for his friends. He tried to call out for them, but he couldn't. Something seemed to have sealed his lips shut, tighter than glue. He forced himself to climb to his feet once again. Just one more time, just one more time, was what he told himself.

Over and over again. He swore to himself that this would be the last time that he would have to endure this, to make himself stand up out of sheer willpower, before he could let go and fade away…

Come on, open your mouth… He tried. Please…

"w.a.n.g Zhaoshu!" he screamed. A broken scream. Blood and spit flew from between his lips into the smoky air, catching onto pieces of dust, dyeing them the color of life, and the debris fell, like wilting flower petals in the night.

"Lin Yuxing! Hua Fu! Chen Shan!" Hoa.r.s.ely, again and again, until he screamed himself ragged. "w.a.n.g Zhaoshu! Lin Yuxing! Hua Fu! Chen Shan!"

Where are you? Are you okay? Please be alive. Please let me see it with my own eyes before I…

But he had no strength to communicate these final thoughts of his. He could only scream their names over and over again, dragging himself through the carnage, hoping that these simple words ripping out of his hoa.r.s.e voice could convey the complex feelings that he held.

I'm not going to rest until I see that they're alive, was what he told himself. His trudging had slowed to a crawl, until finally he was literally dragging himself with his bloodied hands. He had no strength left. He was doing this out of sheer willpower.

Please oh please oh please don't be dead…

He wouldn't allow himself to rest, but still he collapsed, face down in the rubble. Helicopters sounded above, and for a moment, he let himself wonder, what exactly had happened?

Bombs or war? An earthquake? A tsunami? Or had it been something more…otherworldly?

As he lay there, breathing in the dust and smoke and fire, tasting his blood, sweat and tears, a voice said in his head, Say it. Say it, and your suffering will be over. Just let yourself go.

No, no. He would never do that. Not until he saw that his friends were safe.

With one final bit of strength that he had, he pushed himself up once again, and opened his mouth, preparing once again to scream their names…

He saw them.

Lin Yuxing's gla.s.ses were gone, and he stared helplessly at Li Huai, trapped underneath a fallen piece of skysc.r.a.per. And there was Chen Shan's leg, sticking out, blood trickling down it. w.a.n.g Zhaoshu was clawing at a pile of rubble, screaming Hua Fu's name.

Li Huai stretched out a hand. I'm coming, he wanted call. I'm coming!

And then the bomb exploded.

Li Huai fell back, the world shattering around him…

Why did all this happen?