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Fire swirled around his feet to welcome him. It was happy he was here.
Because it wanted him to help destroy.
The rage caught him by the throat and held on. This fire wanted destruction just like the fires he’d found in the community. The carpet flamed around him, sending plumes of smoke into the air. Every bookcase was fully consumed to the point that he couldn’t identify anything. He couldn’t hear a thing over the roaring flames.
It didn’t stop him from shouting. “Nick! Layne!”
Nothing. But he knew approximately where she would have waited, and he started forward.
Only to trip over another body.
This one was on fire, and he only knew it was a guy because of the shape. Not Nick too big. Gabriel swept his hands across the clothes, sending the fire off to find other things to burn. Then he hooked his hands under the boy’s arms and started to drag.
This guy was easily as heavy as Randy. Gabriel borrowed strength from his element, but it wasn’t going to be enough.
Suddenly, hands were there, beside his, helping to drag.
Gabriel looked up, expecting a fireman.
But finding Hunter.
“The firemen are waiting for hoses,” Hunter yelled. “It’s too hot. They can’t ”
“Is this guy alive?” he shouted.
A pause. “Yes.”
“Then shut the f**k up and pull.”
They got him to the entrance. Gabriel didn’t wait to see whether Hunter would follow him. He had more ground to cover.
Another girl was by the circulation desk, her skin red and blistered. Not breathing. He picked her up and carried her back to the entrance, pushing through when he didn’t see firemen there.
They were just outside in the hallway, however, in full gear, masks on, radios crackling .
Gabriel shoved the girl at one of them and turned to bolt, but another fireman grabbed him. Gabriel fought, but a second fireman caught his free arm.
They were wrestling him back, pulling him away from the library entrance, shouting something, but he couldn’t understand them through the masks and his fury.
Then Hunter was there, a gun in his hand.
And then he was pointing it at the fireman holding Gabriel.
They let him go real quick.
Gabriel didn’t even think about the implications of this. He just ducked under Hunter’s arm and ran back into the library.
Somehow, the smoke was thicker now. He crawled beneath it while flames snapped at his jeans and curled around his fingers.
He begged the fire to calm itself, to stop the rage.
It refused.
“Nick!” he yelled. “Layne!”
Nothing.
He crawled forward, around a row of bookcases, heading for the back of the library, where he knew Layne usually sat.
