us in the eye as they kill us. They don’t have to strength
to face us as the light leaves our eyes.
Pushing myself off the ground and as try to regain
my pace, I hold my shirt to my nose and mouth, struggling to pull in each breath. Clutching my side as I pick up
the pace, I realize that my ribs are either badly bruised or
maybe even cracked. With every breath, a new shot of
pain races along my side, the pain feels like fire inside my
lungs. Running causes the smoke to make my eyes burn
more and as they start to water, the water spills over and
tears rolls down my cheeks. The wind makes the tears
feel cool on my cheeks, offering relief from the heat that I
have gotten used to over the months.
I run down a side street after hearing gunshots
off to my left. The city surrounding me is full of destruction, the walls that surround the street were probably
once tall and majestic skyscrapers that used to soar hundreds of feet above the ground but have been reduced to
little more than crumbling buildings that don’t reach
more than twenty feet into the air. Glass and crumbled
bricks scatter the ground, where bombs have broken
down the buildings, making me have to watch where I
step. The shoes that I wear cover my feet but the soles
are worn from running on rugged ground for a long time
and do not offer much protection from the broken glass
that litters the ground.
The gunshots sound again and this time sound
closer than they were before, my immediate reaction is
to turn away from them so I allow my feet to carry me
down what probably used to be alley but is only destruction. I slow to walk and quietly carry myself among the
rubble. The smoke makes it hard to see more than ten
feet in front of me so I keep my eyes focused solely on
the ground in front of me. I spot a crack in one of the
walls that seems to have been spared of the worst of the
damage; I jog up to it and poke my head through, allowing my e