Nile watches as the only person who ever treated him kindly is consumed by the flames.
The heat hits his face; the smell of burning flesh turns his stomach, and yet he cannot look away.
His small, fragile world collapses before his eyes.
Why did it have to be her?
Why is it that whenever someone shows him kindness, he ends up being destroyed?
Can't he have even a moment of happiness?
The air crackles, and amid the sound of the fire, echoes of the past return.
The white walls of the laboratory. The cold lights. The metallic smell of blood and disinfectants.
His mother, dressed in a stained robe, looked at him with disgust, as if his every breath were an offense. "You're a damn mistake. A plague. Because of you, I'm going to die, you damn monster!"
And his father... He didn't yell. He just looked at him with tired eyes, full of sadness.
