The impact was violent, the air smashing from her lungs and whipping her head forwards, a concussion wave that ripped at her body, driving her into the pavement, crushing her frame into the bricks. She struggled to retain consciousness as long as she could, gripping the last precious second of life with her fingernails.
A fine rain was falling, barely more than a mist, haloing the streetlights above her, which leaned over, like skeletal passers-by stopping to stare.
This was it. The moment of her death. The sights around her, the last thing she would ever see. The infinitesimal beat bridging life and death, beyond bodily pain but before surrender.
Her search for meaning had brought an answer, and it was the wrong one. Like a monk, after a lifetime of devotion, dying only to find an angry god screaming at him in a language he cannot understand.
Her only choice now was acceptance of the tragedy of her life.
Her breath came out slowly. She pursed her lips to slow it down, savour it.
And then she inhaled abruptly, a sudden involuntary gasp, and the agony returned, driving a bed of nails into every part of her back and legs, pulling her back down into the ground with heavy weights. The pain was excruciating, but it brought with it hope, that life was returning.
A groan escaped, and she rolled over to the side, looking down in confusion at the glossy black shell that cradled her. She was lying in a metal crater she’d created by the impact of her fall.
‘We need to go. Now!’
She looked up at the speaker, her eyes woozy, light and shadow tracing in her vision. Someone was standing over her, only the top half of his body visible. She put her hand down and pushed herself upwards, wincing as needle-stabs punched at her ribs.
She was lying on the destroyed bonnet of a car, the four corners twisted upwards like the petals of a flower from the force of her landing.
Hands were reaching over for her.
‘They’re coming!’
Sara twisted away from the hands and rolled off the bonnet, collapsing on to the cobblestones on all fours.
Shouts rang out, near and far, rolling around her head like a carousel. With all her effort, she put a hand out and pulled herself up.
She was standing by a black Range Rover, the front of which looked like it had been struck by a single blow from an industrial hammer. A man was opening the driver’s side door and stepping behind the wheel. Tall, thirties, tailored jacket and t-shirt, handsome were it not for the sadness that seemed to have taken up residence in his eyes.
At the end of the street, black blobs ran around the corner, coalescing into a group, rifle barrels sticking out like antennae.
‘Got her!’
Sara pushed herself off from the car and took an exploratory step. Blinding pain radiated through her entire body.
She began to move in the opposite direction, pushing past the open passenger door of the Range Rover, pulling her body with awkward steps towards the other end of the alleyway.
‘Get in!’ said the driver.
Sara hesitated, looking inside the car. Her vision was clearing, the blurred shapes coming into crisp focus. A few of the armed police stopped and knelt in the road to take aim.
‘I know where your mother is!’ shouted the man, his voice increasingly desperate.
Sara stared at him for a second, her mind still sluggish, groping its way back to life. And then she was climbing inside the car, the wheels of which were spinning even before she closed her door, slipping on the wet stones as the man pressed the pedal to the floor and the car zig-zagged in reverse before he regained control and spun them into a turn. The rear window exploded as a hail of rubber bullets pelted the car. The man shifted gears and threw the car into drive, pressing Sara into her seat with such force that she felt like she was landing on concrete for the second time.
The car tore down the road, the driver sitting up in his seat to see over the damaged bonnet, which rattled precariously as they tore around corners.
Sara kept her eyes on the rear-view mirror, waiting for company.
‘Bailing out at this moment would be risky,’ said the man, smiling and looking across her. Sara followed his eyes and saw her fingers were gripping the door handle, ready to tear it open at any moment.
‘I’m Caleb Goodspeed,’ he said, holding out his hand.