When the World Comes Crashing Down

Mitch tumbled out of bed, almost bashing his head on the bedside table and sending his alarm clock flying. He tried to climb to his feet only to faceplant, wincing when he felt his nose squish. He blinked repeatedly, eyes watering, and finally woke up enough to realise that the world really was shaking up and down. Earthquake.

He half crawled, half slithered across his room to the desk and huddled under it, almost pausing to wonder where his chair had gone. He felt at his nose cautiously but it wasn’t broken and it had already stopped bleeding. It had probably dripped everywhere as he slithered across the floor. He’d have to ask Nikola how to wash blood out of carpet when he wrote today’s letter. They really did write everyday. They probably would have called as well but the time difference made that difficult, not to mention Nikola’s sleep schedule as he tried to recover from the exhaustion imposed by the last few weeks.

The shaking stopped and Mitch lurched towards the door, hitting his head on his desk and stumbling over the clothes scattered across the floor. He met Amelie in the hallway. Unlike him she’d thought to grab a torch and the light was almost blinding. He blinked, tears filling his eyes. Vampires might not be able to see in the dark, not without the use of magic, but they couldn’t see with torches in their eyes either.

“Come on,” Amelie said. She led the way outside, snagging her coat off the hook by the door as she went. Mitch hastily followed suit, wishing that he’d thought to put on slippers as she had. Some of their neighbours were already outside, shivering in the cold or huddling together for warmth. A few had bumps and bruises but it looked like he was the only one to get blood all down his front.

He shuddered and wrapped his coat around himself, fishing out the packet of tissues that still lived in his pocket for Nikola. A car alarm was screaming halfway down the block, drilling into his already pounding head and making him think longingly of Nikola’s painkillers. They were still inside somewhere but a vampire’s metabolism was so damnably slow.

The ground heaved again and everyone staggered, clinging to one another to stay upright or toppling to the ground in ungainly heaps. More car alarms went off and he heard windows shatter. He thumbed the ring on his finger, glad that he slept with it on (he never took it off if he didn’t have to), god only knew what everyone would think if they saw him covered in blood with a mouthful of vampire fangs. It was his blood but he didn’t fancy trying to explain that to a mob of people that were already scared. No doubt there was something around here that could double as a stake with a little improvisation. Mitch was ninety-nine percent sure that Amelie would protect him; he was less sure about who would protect the would-be lynch mob.

“Do you think it’s over?” Mitch asked.

Amelie shrugged, “I couldn’t even tell you if it was caused by the war or not.” Mitch sighed, his breath forming a plume of fog. Nikola could have told them, assuming he was still conscious of course. It was probably a good thing that he wasn’t here.

Mitch yawned, he supposed that he could try asking Hayley but he didn’t want to see her and he couldn’t decide if it would be better or worse to learn that the war was still being fought over Dunedin. Maybe Nikola would know what to do.

Amelie huddled a little closer and he wrapped his arms around her, sharing what little body heat he had. Vampires didn’t run as hot as humans, but his magic let him ignore the cold.

“Should we risk it?” Mitch asked. The car alarms had been silenced and some of their less cold resistant neighbours had already gone inside.

“I guess.”

The house appeared to have survived more or less intact. It had been properly earthquake proofed when it was renovated at the start of the year and it looked like all of the big furniture was where it was supposed to be. His books had slid off the coffee table and the dining chairs had fallen over, but nothing looked broken.

Amelie turned on the lights and Mitch blinked as they stung his eyes. He put the jug on and opened the pantry, jumping back to avoid a small avalanche of food.

“I’m going to check the news,” Amelie said. “Try not to break anything.”

“No promises,” Mitch said, picking everything up and putting it on the bench. Again it didn’t look as if anything was broken but the floor was a god-awful mess where lids had popped off containers. He vacuumed and put everything away carefully, restoring it all to its proper place. Amelie would have rolled her eyes, it wasn’t Nikola’s kitchen anymore, but he did it anyway.

He took Amelie a hot chocolate and then ventured into his own room. He located his desk chair lying on its back in the middle of the room and scanned the rest of it quickly. It looked more or less the same as it had when he went to bed the night before but now there was more stuff on the floor. Including his books.

He put his cup on the desk so hard that it would have spilled if he hadn’t drunk so much, and hurried across the room. He kicked aside clothing and tossed aside textbooks until he unearthed the books Nikola had given him. He picked them up carefully and checked them for damage, hugging them to his chest when he was sure that they were alright. Nikola had enchanted them to protect them from harm but…

He sighed in relief and set them down before straightening the rest of his books. He picked up an old teratology book and a golden feather fell out of it. He blinked, he’d almost forgotten about the archangel feather, Hayley’s feather, and picked it up slowly. It was warm.

“I guess it was the war then,” he said, setting it aside. Maybe he could keep it with him as some sort of early warming system. He reshelved his books and did his best to sort out his floordrobe, he had to get up in an hour, there didn’t seem to be much point in going back to bed.

“Learn anything?” he asked when Amelie appeared in his doorway.

“Not much,” she replied. “The epicentre was off the coast somewhere, doesn’t sound like it caused a lot of damage in town but they issued tsunami warnings.”

“Guess classes will be on then,” Mitch said, looking around his room. It was cleaner than it had been for a long time. He’d even left his shirt to soak the blood out and tried to clean the carpet. “I hope there aren’t any aftershocks.” He’d experienced just how much damage an aftershock could do and even if he hadn’t the Christchurch CBD was a stark reminder. They still hadn’t finished rebuilding.

“Fingers crossed,” Amelie replied. “What do you want for breakfast? We have time.”

Mitch’s first thought was pancakes but they wouldn’t be the same as Nikola’s. “French toast and bacon?”

Amelie grinned, “French toast and bacon it is,” she said, leading him into the kitchen and entrusting him with the eggs. The first one sort of imploded in his hands and Mitch sighed before he began picking out bits of egg shell.

“Now I remember why we never let you cook,” Amelie said.

“I have other talents,” Mitch retorted, fleeing the kitchen before he could ruin breakfast and straightening the living room instead.

“Clearly maid isn’t among them,” Amelie said as he haphazardly tossed cushions onto the couch.

“Why do you think I’m at university?”

“Your major is theoretical mathematics.”

“Well yours is biochemistry,” Mitch said, well aware that hers was a lot more practical. Amelie just smirked at him before turning her attention back to the frying pan.

“I’m going to go check on Nikola’s room,” Mitch said.

Nikola’s room was as neat and orderly as he’d left it. There wasn’t anything left to fall off the shelves and it only took a minute to close the drawers that had slid open and pick up the fallen pillows.

Mitch sighed, the bed was neatly made but it looked wrong without Nikola’s green blanket. Or Nikola for that matter. He sat down and lay back but nothing of Nikola remained. He’d taken his stuff home with him and changed all the bedding and all that remained was the fading scent of fabric softener.

He shuffled over to the other side of bed and looked at where Nikola was supposed to be lying, golden curls spread around his head like a halo.

“I miss you,” he whispered to the empty room.

He glanced at his watch and felt another pang of loss. It was one of the few presents from his parents that he’d actually liked but they’d made it quite clear that they wanted nothing more to do with him. He kept meaning to get a new one but somehow he’d never quite got around to it.

His arm flopped back to his side. On a normal day he’d just be dragging himself out of bed and Nikola would be out running or sick and trying to sleep. On a normal day… he probably needed to redefine normal a little. Nikola wasn’t coming back.

#

“You’re smiling,” Miriama said.

“What?” Mitch blinked up at her and she sat next to him.

“You’re smiling,” she repeated.

“It’s a perfectly normal facial expression,” Mitch replied.

Miriama rolled her eyes. “You haven’t smiled once since Nikola left and now you’re ten minutes early to an eight am lecture on a Monday and grinning like a loon.”

“Am not,” Mitch muttered. Am I?

“So what happened? Did they spike your coffee with something?”

Mitch shook his head. “I got up early this morning and called Nikola,” he replied. Nikola had looked good. The bags were gone from beneath his eyes and his usually fair skin was lightly tanned. Even his allergies were under control and he’d cuddled Fluffball the entire time that they talked.

“I should have known,” Miriama said.

“Yeah well…” Mitch began, unsure of where he was going. “Fuck.” He stared at the blue-eyed figure who had just stepped through the door and was heading straight for them.

“I’m sorry?”

“An angel just walked in.”

Miriama raised an eyebrow, “She doesn’t look like your type.”

“What?” Mitch gaped at her and then realised her misunderstanding. “I meant that literally,” he said. “She’s the archangel–” Hayley’s hand closed over his mouth,

“Best not to use that name,” she said. “The Host is still looking for me, especially after last time.” She dropped into Nikola’s seat.

“What did you do to them last time?” Mitch asked.

“By archangel you mean…? Miriama asked, leaning forward to stare around him.

Hayley raised an eyebrow.

“She’s Aroha’s sister.”

“I’m never going to live that down am I?”

“Miriama, Hayley; Hayley, Miriama,” Mitch said, choosing to ignore the interruption in the hopes that this would be over sooner rather than later. “Do you really not know about angels?”

“I didn’t know that I could change my speciality either,” Miriama said. “Your education was a lot more comprehensive than mine.”

“Focus, Mitchell,” Hayley said, drumming her fingers on the table.

“That’s what I’m trying to do.” Mitch looked meaningfully at the front of the room, their lecture was about to begin. “Can’t you wait an hour?”

“No.”

“Is she really an angel?”

Mitch opened his mouth to reply, though he wasn’t sure which of them he was going to answer, when he realised that he couldn’t hear the outside world. He could see the lecturer’s lips moving but he couldn’t hear a word she was saying.

He turned to glare at Hayley. “I’m supposed to be studying,” he said.

“This is important,” she replied.

“So are my grades,” he hissed. She’d already got him expelled from one school.

“The war is here.”

“I noticed,” he said. Her damned feather sat on his desk now and it glowed every time there was an earthquake.

“What war?” Miriama asked.

“I’ll explain later,” Mitch said, grinding his fangs together. He’d have to take her into the Netherworld to do it, there were some things that he didn’t want to discuss where they could be overheard by impressionable humans.

“It’s looking for Nikola, Mitchell. He saw inside Tevial and Raphael’s minds. He knows how the curse was made, where it was hidden and how to break it.”

“And it almost broke him,” Mitch yelled.

“I just want to talk to him, Mitchell,” Hayley pressed, “the Host wants to kill him.”

“No,” Mitch said.

“Mitchell please,” Hayley said. “It was Raphael who cast the Twisted Curse.”

“Ask him then,” Mitch snapped.

“Please Mitchell, try to understand, you have a brother too.”

“Cullum has nothing to do with any of this,” Mitch said stiffly. He was going to have to ask Nikola how to angel-proof the building.

Hayley shook her head. “That’s not what I meant. You remember The Four Brothers?” Mitch nodded, Miriama looked blank. “Didn’t you ever wonder what happened to the fourth?”

“No,” Mitch said. He hadn’t. The Four Brothers was a fairytale, not history.

“He disappeared Mitchell, we fear that Raphael sacrificed him to cast the Twisted Curse.”

“Well there’s nothing we can do about that.”

“Nikola could tell us if he’s still alive or not,” Hayley said. “Wouldn’t you want to know if it was your brother?”

“You absolute bitch.” He shoved his book back into his bag. Apparently he wasn’t going to be allowed to study today so he might as well leave. Hayley put a hand on his shoulder and Mitch tried to twist free to no avail.

“Nikola knows everything,” Hayley pressed. “He is the key to ending the war and the Host will kill him to keep him from being used.”

“And you’ll just use him,” Mitch said. “Go back to Hell.”

“It wouldn’t hurt him,” Hayley said, blue eyes paling.

“No,” Mitch spat, “it would just drive him insane.”

“He would recover.”

Mitch recoiled.

“Be reasonable Mitchell, millions of people will die if we don’t do this.”

Miriama cleared her throat. “I could really use that explanation.”

“If the Eternity War isn’t stopped then it will end the world,” Hayley said, “Nikola knows what we need to stop it.”

“I’d quite like for the world to not end,” Miriama said. “Can’t you just ask him? You did say that you spoke to him this morning.”

“He’s my best friend.”

“What does that have to do with anything? The world is ending.”

“You want me to throw my best friend under the bus on the word of a complete stranger?”

“I don’t recall you disagreeing with anything she said.”

Mitch shifted uncomfortably, the Eternity War would end the world eventually, just as it had ended the dinosaurs. He wasn’t denying that, he was just denying the necessity of breaking his best friend to stop that happening. Someone else could save the damned world.

“What would Nikola say if we asked him to help avert the apocalypse?” Miriama asked.

“He’s a good person,” Hayley added, “all you have to do is ask.”

“One,” Mitch began. “We’ve not going to ask Nikola anything. I already know that you can’t get to Faerie,” he said, glaring at Hayley, “and I doubt you can either,” he turned to Miriama. He wished that they were both on the same side. It would have been easier to glare at them then, and easier for him to escape.

“You can call him, can’t you?” Miriama said. “Or write him a letter.”

“The ice caps will melt first.”

“I can arrange that,” Hayley said.

“I thought you were against collateral damage,” Mitch said, seriously considering climbing over the desk to get out.

“Melted ice caps is better than ending the world,” Hayley shrugged.

“So what’s two?” Miriama asked.

“Nikola doesn’t like the Other World,” Mitch said. “Or humans, he’d say no.” Nikola was safe in Faerie, and happy, and Mitch didn’t actually want him to say yes. What was the point of saving a world that demanded that he sacrifice his best friend?

Miriama recoiled and even Hayley looked surprised, her eyes paling.

“He helped you save Belle last year,” Hayley said, reaching out to put a hand on his shoulder. Mitch jerked away and Miriama shot him a glare. He’d almost elbowed her.

“And he refused to help free the Academy from the Twisted Curse the year before.” Nikola had wanted the Academy shut down, not saved, and after seeing what it had cost to save the Academy, Mitch didn’t blame him.

“You live here don’t you?” Miriama said. “Wouldn’t he want to help save your home?”

“And the Twisted Curse will probably kill you before the end of the world,” Hayley added. Mitch shook his head.

“He would do it,” Miriama said, leaning forward, “he loves you.”

“And you think I’d let him?” Mitch said, jumping to his feet before Hayley pressed him back into his seat.

“What about Amelie?” Miriama said. “What would she have to say about this?”

Mitch swallowed, he knew exactly what Amelie would say. She’d tell him that Nikola would recover eventually, that it was worth sacrificing his best friend like that, using him, betraying him. She was wrong, they all were.

“You can both go to hell,” Mitch said, making another bid for freedom, this time using magic to strengthen his body as he tried to escape Hayley and climb over the desk. Hayley tried to restrain him and then stopped and for a fraction of a second his spirits rose.

And then the ground shuddered and he fell, the world heaving around him. His leg bashed into the desk and he barely managed to get his hands up in time to keep from hitting his head on the next row of desks.

“Ow,” he groaned, slithering to the floor between them. The sound came back, not the slightly monotonous tone of their lecturer talking about matrix algebra but a chorus of screams and breaking wood. Mitch looked around wildly but there was no sign of Hayley, just books and stationery bouncing across the desks and hitting him on the head.

“Ow,” he said again, Miriama’s book had almost taken out his eye. Dust rained from the ceiling and the ominous creaks and groans suggested that a lot more than dust would be falling on him really soon. The ground heaved and Mitch barely maintained the presence of mind to roll under the desk and huddle there, his bag awkwardly tangled around him.

A few people tried to run for it, probably the international students who had never had an earthquake drill, but most of the class was huddled under the desks like him. He could hear someone crying.

More dust fell from the ceiling and he coughed. Next to him he could hear Miriama doing the same. Stationery tumbled past them and then a piece of plaster-board and what looked like a chunk of the ceiling panels.

“Are you ok?” he choked out.

Miriama nodded. “You?”

“Yeah, fucking angels.”

“They’re causing this?” The ground lurched violently and Mitch heard something crash. “Think we can huddle a bit closer? My ass is a little exposed.”

“Sure,” Mitch backed up as much as he could while staying under the desk. He could heal himself if he was injured, Miriama couldn’t. He inhaled more dust and coughed, it had to be almost over didn’t it? If it kept going much longer then the ceiling would come down on them. Mitch tried to remember what was on the next level and prayed it wasn’t something heavy.

There was another crash, louder this time, and his classmates screamed. Mitch winced, the sound grating across his nerves. No wonder his brother was claustrophobic.

“No,” he yelled, seeing a couple of his classmates break and try to run. One managed to stagger through the door, the other got clobbered by a hunk of ceiling and fell. He didn’t get up again and even through the dust Mitch could see the blood pooling around his head. He swallowed. Hopefully he was just unconscious, but that wouldn’t help much if something else landed on him.

Mitch bit his lip, not even noticing the sting of pain as his fangs tore through his skin. He could use magic to enhance his speed and strength, pass it off as adrenaline. Once he made it into the aisle he’d have a relatively clear path…

A pipe burst, slicking the floor with a layer of water. He could still do it, enhanced reflexes, better balance. He tried to ignore the fact that he’d always been terrible at sports because he overthought them. He wasn’t over thinking this. It had been a couple of seconds at most.

Before he could think any further he was off, slipping and sliding across the floor, using desks and fractured walls to keep his balance, and keeping a wary eye on the ceiling. He skidded to a halt by the guy who had tried to escape and dragged him under a desk just as there was another crash.

He hauled the unconscious guy under the desk and looked around wildly, panicked screams echoing in his ears. One of the desks had been partially crushed. Blood was streaming from a gash in one girl’s head while another was desperately trying to free her leg.

There was an alarming creak and Mitch poked his head out from under the desk to peer up at the ceiling. Somehow he didn’t think the floor above was feather storage, he didn’t recall seeing pillow stuffing on the course list. He flinched back under cover when there was another crash and then he heard Miriama scream.

“Miriama?” he yelled, straining to see through the dust. “Miriama?” She didn’t reply.

The shaking stopped though the creaks and groans didn’t. Dust still fell from the ceiling, turning to mud in the spreading pool by the burst pipe. He heard a whimper of pain as the girl whose leg had been trapped freed herself and began to hobble out, moving far faster than Mitch thought possible with that kind of injury, even though she had help. Others were simply running for the doors but a couple were heading towards him.

“Get him out,” Mitch rasped. He coughed and staggered back to Miriama, his feet slipping on the floor and his ankle threatening to twist on the rubble.

“Miriama?” Mitch said. He thought that he could move the rubble pinning her to the ground, he was less sure that doing so was a good idea. Of course, leaving her trapped was probably a worse option than whatever risk moving that rubble and getting her out posed.

He grabbed her wrist and tried to feel her pulse but his own hand was shaking too much for him to feel anything. He sharpened his hearing instead and leaned down, holding his own breath until he heard hers. He gasped in relief and smelled blood though none had seeped out where he could see it yet. He gulped; vampire or not blood had never been his forte and he had no idea how badly she was hurt.

Except he could. He wasn’t a huge fan of x-ray vision, it was hell on his eyes, but he could do it. He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, trying to calm himself, trying to see outside the visible spectrum. The world shifted, becoming dark and shadowy, his gaze drifted along Miriama and under the rubble and his concentration shattered. He wasn’t sure how bad the damage was but he was sure that her spine wasn’t supposed to look like that. He really wasn’t supposed to move her either but as if to highlight how dangerous leaving her might be another panel fell from the ceiling. He’d just have to keep her as still as possible. At least she was unconscious.

He scrabbled at the rubble, pushing and pulling at the larger pieces and tossing the smaller ones aside, the whole time hoping that they weren’t the only thing keeping her from bleeding out. He thought morbidly of the empty blood bags he still carried, grit his fangs and continued working. The building creaked and Mitch worked a little faster. He might be able to do something about the bleeding, he couldn’t do anything about a building squashing them like bugs.

Soon his hands began to slip. He grimaced and dried them on his pants, leaving them smeared with dust and blood. It was a lot of blood. He heaved another piece of ceiling aside and paused. The next piece was thrust into her back. He gulped, no way was he moving that. She probably would bleed out then and god only knew what it would do to her back.

“Fuck,” Mitch breathed, “fuck, fuck, fuck.” He knew what all the first aid courses said about not moving people with injuries like that, hell he knew what they said about making sure that you were safe first, but this was different. Cryomancy didn’t lend itself to treating life threatening injuries either. Somehow he didn’t think that giving Miriama frostbite would help.

There had to be some way of immobilising it. He dragged off his coat and then hesitated, certain that he’d move the shard of wood no matter how careful he was to hold it in place. Magic then? Nikola could fix an item’s relative location in space. If he could hold the spar of wood in that exact position relative to her body…

He wasn’t even sure it would work for him but he had to try. He focused on holding everything in place and then awkwardly wrapped his jacket around her, gingerly working around the piece of wood. It didn’t move, either because of his caution or because the magic really was working. At the very least it might slow the bleeding.

He tossed aside the final pieces of rubble pinning her to the floor and eased her into his arms. It was awkward carrying her face down but he wasn’t about to risk turning her over. He’d just have to manage. He watched the floor carefully, not quite daring to split his attention enough to give himself supernatural reflexes and balance. More supernatural anyway, vampires did a lot of self-manipulation sub-consciously and he was no exception.

“This would be a lot easier if vampire blood really did heal injuries,” Mitch muttered as he navigated the debris. “I’d just bite my wrist and we’d both walk out of here. Too bad we’d need a unicorn for that and the bloody things are poisonous. There’s a reason why they say that those who slay a unicorn are cursed you know.” She probably didn’t but she was unconscious anyway so he figured it didn’t matter. Unicorn blood wasn’t much of a magical cure-all anyway, it only worked when it was given willingly and unicorns weren’t known for sharing. He kept up his monologue as he picked his way to the door and stepped over it. It had been half torn off its hinges by the quake and the fleeing students had done the rest.

Something collapsed behind him and he risked walking a little faster. The floor was dry out here and while the lights were gone, daylight streamed in through the windows. The ground shivered and Mitch’s walk began to approximate a jog. He hadn’t gone through all this effort just to be stuck inside during an aftershock, he just hoped that it was enough.