Alice woke from her unconscious state and grit her teeth against the excruciating pain on her head. In pitch-black, she stumbled her way through the rubble-strewn darkness, her heart pounding as the loud sound of ambulances grating by outside in all directions. She frantically searched for Mother Turtle in the suffocating haze of fallen concrete and dust. The pace of her breathing hastened as she failed to find anyone.
She had dug for the past half hour by bare hands, and her hands were now covered by scratches of wounds by rough fragments of cement. Her struggle to find Mother Turtle failed, only to find the remained of the old six-story apartment building had split in two. Her eyes stung from the dirt and debris, then she heard a piercing cry woke her from abyss: "Help! Help! Someone please help us!" The shout in Japanese came from the fifth floor below of a lady.
Alice scrambled towards the source of the voice, then crawled and climbed through the rubbles while her feet sinking into piles of wasted furniture. When she finally got out of Mother Turtle's demolished apartment, she found a Japanese woman was on her knees in front of the hallway that one side of its wall had been demolished.
"Ma'am, ma'am, you must try to stay calm," Alice said in English, though she knew it would not be understood. The woman simply pointed to a staircase beside an elevator shaft.
Alice ran as fast as she could and soon heard a baby crying above scattered concretes of fallen wall. There she found Mother Turtle and a man who held a newborn, both unconscious with severe injuries. Then Alice realized the elevator shaft was right below Mother Turtle's apartment, and that was how Mother Turtle got here. Luckily, they were all still breathing, but the scent of blood and sweat filled the air.
Alice reached for the infant but was blocked by a long steel bar. She collapsed to the ground. Her head was throbbing, and she could feel her body beginning to shut down from exhaustion.
Alice's blood on her face dried as she could hear clearly of a man's deep voice echoed loudly through her head as she semi asleep, despite the rasping cries of the baby. "Why are you still here? She means nothing to a privileged girl like you," it hissed. Alice whirled, searching for the source of the voice.
"Who are you? Please help us! They need to get to the hospital," she pleaded.
"She is just an insignificant woman with no kin and nothing. A poor, mad wretch." The man's callous words rang to suggest Alice to leave when she still could, yet Alice refused walk away.
"It does not matter who she is! Please help us!" Alice shouted back while smoke painted her face with ash, and she could feel the heat rising from the beneath her feet. The building was slowly catching on fire.
Suddenly, an impossibly bright white light burst forth from Alice, so hot it pushed her several feet away from its powerful force. The steel bars between Alice and the survivors began to melt away like candle wax in extreme temperature.
"The darkness cannot prevail before the power of light, for I am its witness," intoned the mysterious voice faded away. Alice was stunned, and she glanced around frantically to see if anyone else had witnessed this strange miracle – and she only found the astonished Japanese lady standing behind her, eyes wide with shock.
"What-how—how did you....? You are a witch!" stammered the woman.
"No! It wasn't me!" shrieked Alice, her panic rising once again. The scent of burning metal filled the isolated space, and Alice could feel the heat was only growing more intense by the second.
The woman rushed forward to snatch up the baby and kneel beside the motionless man.
"I'm sorry, it wasn't me!" Alice repeated her conviction.
Alice sat beside Mother Turtle and felt the weight of Mother Turtle's frail hand on hers, then touch grounding her in the rubble-strewn chaos. Alice observed the old Mother Turtle as she attempted to sit upright, her movements weak and unsteady, as if every inch of her body was screaming in pain.
"I'm ok, but I think my legs are broken." Mother Turtle croaked, her shaken voice amidst the din of the sirens outside.
Alice let out a scream of relief, the sound echoing through the ruins of the collapsed building. "But thank God! You are awake!" her voice hoarse with emotion.
She scrambled to remove Mother Turtle's coat, propping the old woman into a sitting position, and cushioning her head with the jacket. As she did, she saw that both old woman's legs were relaxed in an unnatural angle. Alice's heart sank at the sight, knowing that her injuries were severe.
Beside Mother Turtle lay a man, unconscious and bleeding profusely from a compound fracture on his left shoulder. As the metallic tang of blood made her head dizzy with nausea, Alice reached for her phone, hoping to call for help, but the screen showed a busy signal.
Panic gripped Alice's heart as she looked around at the 6 floor apartment building in wreckage and it was beginning to burn gradually. feeling time slipping away like grains of sand through a funnel. "What should we do?" she pleaded with Mother Turtle while she began to panic.
"It's impossible to get any assistance for now," Mother Turtle wheezed, her voice thick with pain. "If you can, find something to wrap up that man's wound and rest until someone finds us. With heavy rain from the night before, the building is still moist enough to block the fire for now."
Alice nodded, the weight of their situation settling heavily upon her. She knew that time was of the essence, and that every tardy moment could mean more casualties.
☆☆☆
As the night deepened, Alice and Mother Turtle sat across from each other, savoring the silence that had come upon them. Alice's eyelids growing heavy with fatigue. The two women sat in companionable momentary peace, the occasional sound of distant sirens was the only disturbance.
"You look just like me when I was a young girl," Mother Turtle said.
"You should rest, I believe help is coming soon." Alice replied.
"I apologize to have kept myself from you," Mother Turtle confronted. "I am the girl in the picture, my name is Claus Kharat. Daughter of Gill Kharat of Suman."
"You are Claus?" Alice finally knew the reason Mother Turtle showed great concern for the Gatekeeper, compassion in a very specific and personal way when every time she spoke of him. "You must have loved him deeply."
Suddenly, the wind shifted, bringing with it a thick fog of dust and a noxious stench. The ground began to shake and tremble, growing more violent by the second. Alice's heart pounded with fear as she saw dark shapes emerging from the mist, and their bodies covered in fish-like scales. The herd of at least several thousand buffalo like creatures stretched for at least several miles, sprinted towards the east of the city. Their eyes glinting and terrified.
Alice realized the nearby Japanese couple who held their baby tightly in their arms, were completely unaware of the menace that approached. They felt the strong shake and thought it was the aftershock of the quake. Alice's eyes darted toward Mother Turtle, seeking an explanation.
"Not many people with untrained eyes can see them," Mother Turtle replied cryptically before continuing. "They are no house pets to deal with, my dear. They are vicious Hell Beasts."
Mother Turtle's exhaustion made it hard for her to speak more in detail, "They are one of the infamous gangs of chimera who erupted from hell long ago. Nothing but malevolence courses their intentions; they are the most horrible embodiment of what terror is capable of. But why they seemed to be in exile, only heaven knows why..."
As the ocean of beasts finally passed by the ruined apartment, a profound revelation of relief and joy filled the air as the Japanese lady's husband awoke from his coma.
Alice broke the silence with an urgent inquiry: "What are we going to do? We must get help for this man! And it's getting very hot here, we can be burned into ashes if we don't act fast."
Mother Turtle contemplated for few minutes, then suggested, "We need to reach some kind of facility before these beasts find us as game. The only way to survive is to turn west to head to the opposite direction of these creatures!"
After Alice scavenged a wheelchair in a nearby building, they began their journey toward west, in desperate attempt to outpace their monstrous pursuers. Alice could hear the beasts' claws scrabbling against the pavement behind the rubbles, stench of death and decay followed them like a malevolent shadow. Luckily, other survivors of the earthquake slowly emerged from every corner of the streets, then gathered in synchronized formation.